47

After sending a quick message to Kamea something along "sorry Dear, I'll be late again, work duties", I left for New Vandenberg.

Granting Davion's and Steiner's technicians access to the various departments of VMI created a number of problems, not only security but also for many old school Taurians who did not see the situation with good eyes and only the fact that it was a direct order from Thomas led them to collaborate even if with a lot of grumbling.

This, in turn, facilitated the second and most delicate part of the instructions Thomas had given me.

One of Pascal Allais' team members, posing as an official disgusted with the situation, got in touch with a member of the local Combine embassy which by "mere" luck turned out to be part of the spy cell operating there. In return for an exorbitant sum, he handed to the Combine the plans for the ER Large Lasers and Freezers as well as the production line blueprints for both.

To convince Pascal and his team member to do it, I needed to show them Thomas Calderon's orders and only then did they agree to participate in this operation.

Some time later VMI security "found out" about the leak and "investigated" it. If MIIO and LIC believed it, I never knew, but the Davions did not make a scene about the case.

With Thomas' permission and the release of some of his personal funds, however small, the migration of the older / low tech lines from VMI with 'Mechs such as the Stinger 3R and Griffin 1N production to Mechdur began as well as the collaboration with Kamea to participate in the reconstruction of the Detroit factories as well. The amount obtained from Combine was fully applied in Detroit. The initial idea had been to send the 'Mech production lines to Detroit, but the fact was that while Mechdur had the auxiliary factories to support said production lines, for several years Detroit did not have this capacity and we decided to change the initial plans.

From the material captured in the two battles in Ward, V4RU with the support of components supplied by VMI, had been able to rebuild 13 'Mechs, one being a Cataphract 2X that last one had been done using parts of a 2X and of the 0X. A new 'Mech company was created by the Revenants, a mixture of Concordat and Reach 'MechWarriors and it was sent to Ward to participate in their defense and to get some experience in real operations. After all apart from their lack of experience, these Mechs, unlike the others used by the Revenants, had no advanced components and this company had no other support elements.

Meanwhile, TTI on Taurus had expanded its DropShips building capacity (while New Vandenberg had focused on JumpShips) and launched a new and much improved version of Jumbo, called Jumbo II, demonstrating a total and expected lack of imagination for new names. In the area of military DropShips thanks to the help provided by Federated-Boeing under the cooperation agreements the production of Overlords had started.

In June 3034, the DropShip carrying Edward Calderon suffered a take-off failure, and only the high quality and quick response of the crew prevented this accident to turn into a total catastrophe. Even so, they suffered several deaths and Edward was seriously injured, being hospitalized for several months. An exhaustive analysis of the wreckage indicated that the probability of sabotage was quite high but produced no indication of who could have done it.

By September 3034, the Andurien last forces had been expelled from the Capellan territory with severe casualties and Romano began planning a counter-invasion, but was informed that the FWL would side in the conflict with the Duchy of Andurien, leading Romano to turn her attention against the Magistracy.