So, I've been working on this off and on for nearly nine months now and am finally happy to post it for others to read. I did put the old version (36k words, roughly 10 chapters) in the Battletech Ideas thread here on SV for people to have a look at a few months after I decided that I was unhappy with it, that somehow I'd screwed up somewhere along the line. This version drew some of those ideas, some ideas from both the SB and SV Battletech Ideas threads, smashed them together with some new stuff I'd been thinking of and voila!
This isn't drawn straight from the CYOA, since I feel some of those rolls just don't work for a long term story idea. I'll go into further detail later as people ask.
Now, onto the story!
<^-^>
Student Dorms
University of Alpheratz
Alpheratz, Outworlds Alliance
January 1st, 3011
What the hell was that ringing noise?
I mean obviously it was a telephone, but I didn't own a phone that sounded like that. Especially what sounded like an old rotary-dial land-line – I don't think I'd heard something like that since I was a child. My mobile ran through a list of different tracks depending on what I was feeling the last time I messed around with my phone and while that did include a recorded version of something like this it didn't actually sound like a real one.
So why did it sound like it was ringing right next to my head?
Groaning I lifted my head off the pillows, those gloriously soft and comfortable pillows. The room was dim and I could only assume it was sometime in the morning since it didn't feel like I'd been asleep that long after crawling back home from an extended evening out celebrating New Years. The ringing phone was indeed a rotary-dial handset resting on my bedside table, so I carefully moved myself closer and picked up the cheap, cool plastic, taking a couple of seconds to enjoy the blessed silence before I put the receiver to my ear and managed a somewhat clear and coherent greeting. Ugh, why hadn't I hydrated properly before collapsing into bed? Rookie mistake there on my part.
A quiet, precise voice responded, an accent both familiar and not. Male, professional, calm – and calling me at some early hour on New Year's Day. Alarm bells started ringing as he began talking. "Good morning, my name is Logan Persimmons from the law firm of Kirigaya, Persimmon, Chao and Urquhart and I am looking to speak with Mister Damon Karter. Would you happen to be him sir?"
No, I am not and I do not know anybody by that name – put phone down, go back to sleep.
"Yeah, this is he. What's the problem?"
What. I did not just say that. Why the hell did I just say that? And why the hell did it now seem really familiar to me?
"My apologies for calling you so early, especially on a public holiday Mister Karter, but I have urgent news for you. My firm represents your father Roger Hustain and we are saddened to inform you of his passing seventy-six hours ago." The lawyer continued to talk for a time after this, my empty grunting obviously giving him the impression I was actually listening to him as he talked but I was steadily drawn into my own thoughts and throbbing head.
That couldn't be right. That wasn't my father's name. For one, we shared the same surname. And even if both my parents died at the same time it wouldn't be a law firm contacting me, it would be the police or hospital or something like that. But even as part of me kept insisting that none of this was accurate, another part kept pushing forward and insisting it was. That my father was now dead and that that my mother, hells take her greedy soul, wouldn't give two shits about the fact he'd died unless she got something worth her while from it.
I took some time to swing my eyes around the room I was in. Yes, definitely not the room I (largely) remembered going to sleep in. For one, it wasn't a queen sized bed with my girlfriend in it, familiar furniture against the walls half-open with our clothes spilling out. A single bed I was alone in, a wardrobe with both doors shut and a desk with a decidedly chunky looking computer on it. A door to an ensuite was the only real similarity. The other voice in my head insisted that this was my room, my dorm room, at the university my father had paid for me to attend so I could later come and join his business empire and work my way up the ladder before eventually taking over.
A steadily sinking sensation in my stomach unrelated to my apparent hangover began to make itself known to me. No. No, this couldn't be happening to me. A fucking self-insert? And the phone-call intro on New Year's Day was also vaguely familiar, so where was I exactly?
Gods damn it. I needed to know what that other part of me was. I swung myself up from lying down on the bed to sitting on the edge finally and tried to focus on to that life rather than what most of me was insisting was the real one.
I was Damon Karter and I was twenty years old today, born on Coraines in the Outworlds Alliance. My father was Roger Hustain, a major land-holder on that planet though he spent most of his time off world looking after his business interests. We'd never been particularly close, either physically or emotionally. My mother was Sheila Karter, a gold-digging "noble-hunter" who somehow managed to get pregnant with me despite my father's precautions against such little mistakes, then approached him once she was significantly pregnant with the plan of forcing a marriage - the local social conventions being of a type to force that situation - so she could live in luxury for the rest of her life, especially considering if we were anywhere else other than the Outworlds he would have held a noble title, at least that of a Count. My father had more or less laughed her off, not caring about such trifles, sent her off for a paternity test – he had had other women try something similar on him in the past and the then-future, including at least two where he wasn't the father to begin with - and then begun to make plans for me. He hadn't taken her off me, but had set up funds to pay for my (and only mine) upkeep, including tutors and nannies to teach and raise me. Sure enough by the time I turned ten she was gone – off to find someone else to raise her up from genteel poverty, having sponged what she could from my father's generosity – and I'd continued to be raised by a succession of carers, only occasionally getting meandering letters from my mother and the rare visit from my father, when his business brought him into the system.
I'd gone to the best school on the planet, got good marks and behaved myself, then made preparations to head to Alpheratz to attend university there for a time just after my seventeenth birthday. During some of those visits from my father he'd discussed how he'd like to pass down his private businesses to me - since I wasn't eligible to inherit the land-hold due to being a bastard, even if he'd decided to marry my mother later – and the path I'd need to follow to qualify to take over from him. I went to the best primary and secondary schools on the planet, then was to spend a year on Alpheratz before then going to the Taurian Concordat to attend a university there for a couple of years before finishing my degree somewhere in the Federated Suns only to hit a major snag – my first ever jump basically left me completely incapacitated for a week. Severe TDS – Transit Disorientation Syndrome – was the diagnosis, though I didn't find out until I'd arrived on Alpheratz, being drugged into unconsciousness during the follow up jump. No way in hell was I going to put myself through that just to go to university - especially on potentially multi-month journeys - considering the strongest anti-TDS medication available, dralaxine, had done next to nothing for me, the little they'd manage to get into me while unconscious.
Messages had gone back and forth until my father next came by Alpheratz to discuss it in person and by the time he left we'd sorted out a full plan. I'd do my full degrees here, at the university outside Farmindas, then join his company as a junior factor here on planet and in the worlds within a two jump radius, freeing him up to undertake longer voyages without having to be personally present for certain local deals. I'd buckled down and finished a double-degree (business management/finance) in just under three years. This New Year celebration was actually the first opportunity in my whole time here to cut back and relax, having not even taken time off during term breaks so I could get this main one under my belt. A party, then spending the summer interning for the company I'd be inheriting, before returning to the university to do some technical degrees over the next few years.
So, a distant and now dead father, an absent mother, no siblings and no real close friends, though plenty of people I was friendly with. And even with the lack of close parental support, I'd turn out a fairly decent human being, largely due to my carers as far as I was concerned.
Okay. Well. That was a bit different. And I recognized more than few of those terms. Shit. I was in Battletech, wasn't I?
I knew Battletech. I'd been a fan since I'd played Mechwarrior 2 (and all the expansions) religiously as a young teen, finished the other games, even gone back and played the Crescent Hawk games. I'd even managed to play some tabletop, though the people who had the miniatures and rules had moved away and I'd had no one to play with for nearly a decade, gradually gathering material for my own use in the interim. When Online had come out I'd joined a Merc Corp and played from halfway through Closed Beta to the introduction of Solaris, spending the time in between rounds debating points of lore amongst general trash talking, before I'd finally burnt out on the game. I'd eagerly kick-started the HBS game when it was announced and was waiting on 5 to be released next. So I knew a fair bit about the "glorious future of the eighties" universe I'd found myself in.
The old life was definitely different in terms of family and friends. A loving mother and father, both still kicking along, a sister who – despite wanting to occasionally stab each other – I got along quite well with. I even had a nephew, provided by said sister for my personal amusement – toddlers are funny little things. I still had a good bunch of friends from school as well, definitely much closer than my friends in the here and now.
Then there was the difference in personality between the two parts. Or rather, the very minor difference in personality at its base which obviously had a huge impact. For someone nearly fifteen years younger and born a thousand years further in the future, the only difference I picked up straight away was that he was more a lot more motivated for that age. In fact, comparing the two lives younger me hadn't fallen into a slump post-primary school and coasting on my brain rather than learning how to learn – which hadn't really affected me until half-way through secondary school when my grades plummeted and I just couldn't be motivated enough to fix the issues. It had taken me almost a decade to get my brain back into gear, even though I'd never bothered to go back and fix the educational gaps. The younger me had had tutors who had dragged him kicking and screaming through the problem time and come out much the better for it. So I was much more motivated and driven, rather than being a bit of a drifter falling from opportunity to opportunity.
There were some social-based differences. Being raised in the Outworlds had lent itself to Omniss beliefs being subtly layered in. I suppose that worked in a way – both parts of me had wanted to be a fighter pilot as a child, even if it would never have worked out (for differing reasons – poor vision for older me, neuro-compatibility issues for younger) – but I was generally a lot more physically pacifistic overall, I noted, while being a lot more inclined to actually argue and debate. Nothing out of the ordinary for an Alliance citizen.
Comparing myself physically as well, there wasn't too much of a difference. I'd actively participated in sport throughout my childhood and teens, though in my older life I'd had an injury during my late teens which had meant six months of being unable to go faster than a walk, a slow walk at that. I'd lost a lot of my fitness level during that time and never really recovered, starting to pack on a bit of weight but nothing too bad – though it had ballooned out due to my work/life balance later on. This me had stopped the organised sports due to the study routine, but had kept exercising in the gym leaving me worse off than I had been but nowhere near where I was in my mid-thirties. Same hair and eye colour and going from memory I seemed to favour the same hairstyles too – that is to say either close-cut or working down to shoulder-length, depending on time and other commitments. Also, no glasses in the here and now – I'd worn them there since my mid-teens, but here I'd been treated young and never had to. A good thing, since I was never able to put in contact lenses myself and was thus resigned to always having glasses on.
"Mister Karter? Excuse me, Mister Karter, are you still there?" the lawyers slightly pointed tone drew me back into the room and the present. I had either stopped grunting to indicate I was supposedly paying attention, or he'd reached a point in whatever he was saying that he'd required a response. I winced as a sharp throbbing pain made itself known to my head again.
"I'm sorry, sir. I drifted a bit there, combination of lack of sleep and shock I think, you understand? Late night last night and to be perfectly honest with you, I don't think I understood a word you've told me. Could you go over the basics again please?" I managed to get the words out with a somewhat apologetic tone. Between the hangover, competing histories and lack of sleep, I felt quite lucky to have managed even that as a response when all I wanted to do was hang up, bury my head in the pillows and hope it all made sense sometime in the future.
"Of course Mister Karter, of course. Perfectly understandable, what with the time of the year and all. I myself had to cancel plans to deal with the issues of your father's demise at the last second, so I'll probably have to make it up to the wife and children at another time."
I got the impression he was shaking his head, even over the phone. Hopefully he didn't get into too much trouble. He cleared his throat and began again.
"Our firm represented your father in several of his interests, both here on Alpheratz and within both the Outworlds Alliance as a whole and in other polities. Just two weeks ago, he updated his will to reflect several large changes to his businesses, primarily focused on creating a new endeavour that you stand to inherit in total. I'm given to understand that while prospecting in a system not too far from the border between ourselves, the Federated Suns and the Draconis Combine he found a derelict jumpship with several dropships filled with military equipment. He had stated he intended to use the equipment to form a mercenary force, to take beyond the borders of the Alliance and out into the Sphere and Periphery."
What?
Okay. I understood part of that. The largest part of my father's business empire was the interstellar transport company he ran, outright owning a jumpship as well as having shares in several others, primarily here in the Outworlds. The rest of the business rotated around that, at least those not directly associated with the land-hold back on Coraines, to help keep it solvent and running. He'd also owned a pair of dropships as part of a private security force – nope, no mercenaries here, rent-a-cops all the way, even if they had fighters and military-grade weapons – which acted escorts for his jumpship or others, as well as having shares in various cargo dropship companies rather than outright owning them. I didn't have much in the way of exact details on the dropships he owned, one being an aerospace fighter carrier and the other carrying marines, both being well used against pirates and raiders.
His private company, the one which he pretty much ran for his own entertainment, was a system survey and prospecting one. He'd told me about it once when I was younger, but it had mostly gone over my head then and I couldn't remember it now.
"What do you mean, a mercenary force? What did he find?" This hangover was kicking my ass, my head jerk on hearing that news brought new waves of pain throbbing through it. Obviously, younger me hadn't learnt to hydrate prior to sleep after a night of heavy drinking, a lesson I still sometimes forgot in later years.
"The exact accounting will have to wait until we can sit down and go through it with you at a later date, sir, but for now it is a jumpship, five dropships and roughly a battalions' each worth of Battlemechs, tanks, fighters and infantry gear, according to our experts on the matter."
That was a hell of a lot of hardware. A hell of a lot more than either of my memories thought I would get. A company of each at most, maybe – a battalion of each, pretty much a regiment sized force, seemed pretty excessive.
"Your father took steps to finish repairs to all the ships and was successful in getting the jump drive on the new ship working again. Using his contacts he has it fully crewed and was working on getting full crews for all the dropships, as well as recruiting some new marines and aerospace pilots including technicians and support personnel. As yet he had made no moves towards recruiting Mechwarriors or tank crews, apparently feeling he'd have more success elsewhere."
I suppose that made sense. The Omniss philosophy decried warfare, especially ground warfare, as violent wastefulness. Not for us here in the Alliance to worship at the altar of the Battlemech – very few of us were card-carrying members of the cult of the Mechwarrior. It made the fact that the first outright new Mech design in years came from the factories here a bit weird though. Aerospace was where it was at here – the Alliance military's philosophy was to stop them before they reached the atmosphere rather than have to fight them on the ground. The Alliance Aerospace Arm was considered to have the greatest pilot cadre in the galaxy and was considered the one military force that was "appropriate" to join here. We'd probably be able to pick up pilots and dropship crews easier than anything else, recruiting the rest of our soldiers from elsewhere once we moved into the Sphere.
"He'd brought the new jumpship here to Alpheratz where it remains at the nadir jump point nearly two weeks ago and was on board inspecting repairs to one of the dropships when they had a decompression accident, killing him and several other people in the compartment instantly."
Ouch. Not a pretty way to die.
"From the time he knew he could successfully jump the derelict jumpship until he died, your father worked tirelessly to consolidate resources, either merging or selling off assets to support the mercenary force in the future to the point where he withdrew his personal vessels from the transport company and attached them all to the unit as well. And it's already all been registered with the Mercenary Review Board and Comstar, with yourself legally recognised as the new owner already."
Comstar. Everyone's favourite toaster worshippers, with their vision of being the One True Overlord of a regressed humanity. Fucking Blake/Toyama/Karpov and their demented vision. What was I talking about? There was some debate on the fan sites and forums as to which of them was actually responsible for the doctrine which would eventually lead to the Word of Blake. I personally believe it was all three, but that Toyama and Karpov were the ones who drove the nails into the coffin of the phone company not being a bunch of religious nut bags.
"All that remains is to have you come meet at our offices to sign off the paperwork and take possession and you will be the new owner of a significant amount of military might as well as the ships necessary to take it from system to system. When would you be available to meet?" The lawyer finished up again, obviously at the point where he'd been when I zoned back in. I massaged the bridge of my nose (hey, benefit of no glasses, not dislodging them from my nose doing that) and thought on it a bit.
I really had nothing stopping me from going in at any time. Not today, even if they had called me early in the morning I was in no shape mentally, physically or emotionally for dealing with anything as monumental as this. I obviously wouldn't be going to intern for my father anymore and whatever the old me had been up to...
Well, that was nearly a full millennia in the past. Likely in a whole different universe.
"I can meet any time tomorrow, if that is suitable for you and your firm." I told him.
"Excellent, we are fully at your disposal and this is the main concern for our office here for the time being. Would you be requiring transport in or would you be able to make your way here?" He was being far too helpful and it was making me suspicious. Even for such a huge (and it was absolutely huge, the amount of cash those resources represented) account, this kind of service seemed way out of proportion even to current self who had a bit more of an idea of real world terms what this all meant.
I declined the offer of a ride into the office from the university dorms and got their address, assuring him I'd make my own way in. He relayed that I was welcome at any time and that someone would be waiting for me no matter what time I showed up, then we said our goodbyes.
Any time? The hells?
Placing the handset down on the bedside table, I ever so gracefully slumped back down onto the bed. My head continued to ache but I was too distracted to go and do anything about it. Now that the phone call was over and considering I was completely alone and had nothing else to distract myself with, I was starting to quietly freak out loud rather than keeping it internal.
I'd appeared in Battletech and was sharing headspace with a 31st century version of myself! What the hells was that about? What kind of shit self-insert crap was this right now?
And why the hell did I have to appear all the way in the freaking Outworlds. All the interesting stuff (bar those pirate ridden shitholes the Tortuga Dominions and Antallos, which, hey, were their own issues) was on planets the other side of the Sphere! If I'd appeared in the League or the Commonwealth I could probably try and arrange a Helm grab right away, but from here? Nuh uh, no way no how was that going to happen. I'd end up spending nearly a year just getting there only to be jumped by everyone who I'd attracted along the way.
What about everyone back home? I'm guessing I'm still alive back there doing my thing, but what if it's because something happened to me that I'm out here like this?
I'd never find out.
Groaning and moaning from the physical, mental and emotional discomfort I was putting myself through, I got up off the bed and walked into the small bathroom attached to my room. If I was going to torture myself like that, I'd better take care of the headache. Some water and painkillers later and I was sitting at the desk, slumped down and cradling my head in my hands waiting for the painkiller to kick in.
Okay. It could be worse - I could be in Warhammer or something. Mass Effect would be kind of shitty too, along with several other of my favourite fantasy worlds. I'd go full Appsro if I was stuck in Subnautica all by myself, especially since I wasn't a huge fan of the whole swimming thing. And if I was in Battletech, I'd be able to pilot a huge stompy robot! The ultimate fulfilment of a childish fantasy within reach!
Except it wasn't. Damn it, unless this new knowledge changed something dramatically in my brain, then I was just under the borderline for compatibility with the neuro-helms that would allow me to pilot one of previously mentioned huge stompy robots without falling over every time I tried to move. Again, damn it.
That also more or less ruled out piloting an aerospace fighter because any fighter worth piloting used similar technology to assist in flight and especially combat. It was one of the main reasons the me from here hadn't even tried to enter the militia or reserves to go flying, because if I couldn't fly something that could go from ground to space and back again on my own then it wasn't worth flying anything at all.
I suppose I could find out what tanks I got handed down to me by my dear departed father and look into driving one of them around. Or infantry, be a foot soldier, even though my life expectancy would likely sharply drop due to the nature of warfare in this time. If I was going to be involved in the fighting though I'd probably for those two options, if I stayed on the dropship or had some artillery I could attach myself to it'd probably be worse than me just being the civilian owner from my soldiers perspectives. Too many opportunities for REMF jokes there.
Too little information to make detailed plans. I had the theoretical knowledge of managing this business (thanks young me) and a fair amount of knowledge of arm-chair generaling (thanks old me) so I should - providing I got the appropriate military training - be able to at least run this unit somewhere other than into the ground. And as I found out what I had access to and built up my forces I could use my metaknowledge of the setting to grab advantages where I could. Though that metaknowledge could also be a great downside. I think I could avoid taunting the Dragoons, but I'm pretty sure I'd slip around the Irregulars at some point if I ever interacted with them a whole bunch and gods help me if I ever blabbed something and it got to any one of the Great Powers intelligence agencies curious about what else I knew.
Except SAFE. As long as I wasn't in the Free Worlds when it happened I'd probably be okay. Not saying memetic SAFE incompetency was a full on thing, but I'd be much more worried about the others. Especially the ROM branches.
Fuck Comstar.
I brought my head up and looked around the room again. I hadn't been coming back to this particular room again next year anyway so most of my things had been packed away and shipped off to be held until I knew where I'd be for next term, especially since I wasn't (for once) doing any summer courses. Today had basically been set aside as a recovery day, both for myself and my friends here on campus – none of them were expecting to see me at all, or even before I went and started my internship. So I had solitude to think for the rest of the day and wouldn't need to speak to another person unless I was getting food.
Actually, I was getting hungry. I should probably get some food into this swirling stomach of mine, just so it wasn't a distraction.
Food, then information. I had plans to make, so many plans