I looked up at the ceiling.
I, well, had time to kill right now.
A few hours before I would be out to explore the Ersatz Kohima production lines in Utility Mountain.
I had time
Time to think.
I didn't sit down to think before this, what was the point after all. But, I suppose I had to do that now.
I couldn't get myself to sleep.
Things had been moving fast, I had been moving fast, setting up the factories, making calls, letting the System move my body into exhaustion.
Now, now I'm trying to figure out what exactly my feelings are on what I've been doing.
Things were slowing down enough for me to think about just what I had been doing.
Laying it out, I've been building both war material and civilian materiel. But, really, most of it save for my original designs the Ute and the 20 Ton Trucks were unambiguously civilian. Sure, they could be modified to be military, but they came off the production line as civilian vehicles that could be sold onto the open market
The question then was 'did this bother me?'
'What did I want to do in the future?'
The answer to that was a… maybe?
I had to actually sit and think about it.
My eyes went upwards.
Mmmmm.
No, I need to sit upright for this.
So.
I moved my body upright and crossed my legs.
"War Materiel." I say out loud.
I listen to my body.
A strange pooling in the gut, a heating in the chest, coolness through my arms, a… sort of lightness.
I was apprehensive, yet excited about it.
Right.
Strange, why not a singular emotion, but I supposed that this was good too.
The entire problem here being that my brain was the headquarters of the body.
But the headquarters, due to a problem with the maintenance and construction of the base in it's initial phases couldn't get the information back from its subordinate units now that everything was set and the concrete laid.
So headquarters sent orders down, then heard nothing back except for the sound of gunfire and screaming, with no indication as to how things actually were.
If headquarters wanted to actually find out, there had to be complete silence, peace, and careful probes sent out to elicit a response and the screaming and shouting and gunfire analysed by those in headquarters.
Or, just sit here and think about things and identify my reaction to them, put them against a pre-tabulated range of responses, then correctly identify the emotions I'm feeling as a result.
Thankfully, whoever built my body hadn't fucked that up as well. Just imagining the shitshow it would be if I had a body with non-standard responses and a non-functioning line of communication between headquarters and the body at the same time… well, it didn't bear thinking about.
In any case, positive feelings generally to war materiel.
'Civilian Manufacture.'
Oh?
Warmth, lightness, lifting. The upper arms were warm, the chest was warm.
I guess I feel really really positive about these things huh.
Helping people was, well, a good thing.
My body thought about it, my mind thought about it, huh, I liked it.
Pride. I was prideful.
The feeling transitioned as the warmth spread to the rest of the body, to the tips of the fingers and the toes.
Happiness at the idea of helping others.
Well.
I suppose I was that kind of person.
One who liked to help others.
A failing, I think some might say, but, well, it felt good.
Right?
My body certainly agreed.
'Helping Alexander.'
Positive.
'Helping the LCAF.'
Positive.
I guess the adoration I had for the military as a child still hadn't gone away huh. Reading the Commando books, having my first proper book be the Rats at Stalingrad (was that the name? The one based on the Vasily dude), then the Collated Falkland's War magazines. Still had my smell-o stickers on that thing as it sat on my bookshelf when I died the first time around, I wonder what happened to it.
Wanting to be a soldier.
Until extreme lactose intolerance and a shattered ankle put paid to that dream.
A coolness in the extremities, the hands, forearms, feet, calves.
'Disgust, sadness, depression.'
Well, yeah a few other things I didn't want to think about.
'People dying because of my products.'
Ah. The feeling of burning, a low heat burning in the chest and gut, in the throat.
Disgust
Revulsion
Well, that was clear enough.
Was I being a little bitch about things?
I think so.
Producing war material and loving and then whining about them being used to hurt people?
I guess the words of my teacher when I was 13 years old were still relevant huh.
Man up.
Don't be a little bitch, take what you get and make the best of it.
Yeah. I suppose that was true.
Nothing ever came to you because you whinged and whined, a man needed to take action if he wanted to see the change that he wanted.
That was just how the world worked.
Well, now that I think about it, he said that to an Italian boy in my class. Italian specifically because he had to shave twice a day even at the age of 13. Him and the other Italian boys who called each other 'wogs'. Having to shave multiple times a day in a school that enforced strict personal dress codes. The head of the year would go around with his disposable shavers and force each boy to shave.
I felt bad for them, until I got my chin hairs and then I just felt jealous.
I sighed.
Well, time to man up then I supposed.
No time to waste on the pointless.
I stand upright.
I felt exhausted, my body and mind not used to the amount of introspection that I had just done.
Normal people could do that without thinking or even trying.
Seriously, how tired must everyone be all day with that introspection running on automatic all the while?
Still, I wish I could do that, the introspective capability.
To at will, check in on what you were feeling about a topic or issue without needing perfect silence and calm.
Oh well, if wishes were horses, I would have broken my neck.
Time to get started, I had my factory workers to meet, to encourage, to cheer on, to remind that they were doing important work.
Well, that was good. I needed that.
I also needed to figure out what I wanted to do next. I had a month and the world wasn't going to be sitting around and waiting that was for sure.
+Break+
Alexander watched the jumpships as they slowly came to life under the hands of the hundreds of torches of the production facilities.
Ha.
The Clan thought that it could weather this secretly.
He wished them luck.
He had argued for a controlled reveal but the old guard had overruled him.
It was certainly going to be difficult, what with the sheer scale of immigration that was coming to Tetersen.
Mount Utility could be staffed by the Clan, true, but the jumpship slipways required so many hands, hands specialised in zero-g manufacturing that it simply wasn't possible.
One or two perhaps, not 51.
51 Jumpship slipways. A staff of over 500 for each, meant that there were 25,000 workers at a minimum working in the Consortium Slipways.
Zero-G workers that experienced were not young, they brought their spouses and dependents with them.
Not even mentioning the apprentices and trainees that were flocking to this new, emergent industry in the Commonwealth. Already thousands had arrived and were waiting for the construction of new slipways to be first in line for the new job.
Possibly 150,000 people had been brought in through what could only be space magic by Huu as he made the calls and arranged the trips. All of them housed in small gravity rings attached to each of the stations.
He wasn't sure what Huu was doing, but the gravity decks were becoming more armoured, long term housing being built in them, defensive emplacements going up, aerospace launch bays studded into defensive works.
Like spikey balls of death slowly coming together, defence from all angles.
It was the Capital Fortification that the now Duke Huu had spoken of.
The entire region of space was essentially so fortified that it would take multiple nuclear warheads to do even the most basic levels of damage to the infrastructure inside.
A giant target floating above his world.
A giant demand to target them.
He grinned viciously.
If they attacked, where his line of communication was short and theirs was long, they would be annihilated.
He would make sure of it.
Granted, his capability to do so right now was limited, but he wasn't going to stop trying.
A glittering city in space, far beyond anything that even the Star League had tried to do.
Haha, only on Tetersen.
The best part of it was that there were so many young men and women up there, bored out of their minds in the zero-g rings that he was sure that his recruiters could live well from their harvest of young bodies. Aerospace, infantry, tankers, Battlemechs, he was going to find as many as he could.
+Break+
Aurelius von Randt cracked his neck.
An echo to the right had him turn his head.
Ah, Alexander had done the same.
Great minds truly did think alike.
"Everyone here?" He asked, looking around the room.
Alexander turned to regard his own people.
There were senior officers only and yet the room was still so crowded that it was standing room only.
"Everyone is here." His adjutant answered in his ear, Alexander's doing the same.
"Excellent. Time for us to begin." Aurelius said, waving to Alexander to step forward.
The young man deserved his time in the limelight for his excellent work in developing this doctrine.
"Thank you Hauptmann-General. I have met most of you, but for those that I haven't, I am Alexander Slim, author of 'Planetary Raids of Annihilation' that you may have read on your way here." The young man started off, his officers nodding.
Good.
He had made it mandatory reading.
"Thanks to Duke Vu, we have managed to increase the production of the war materiel for the Commonwealth by several factors at least compared to where it was prior. Therefore, we can embark on what Hauptmann-General von Randt has termed raids of Annihilation. Doctrine must change then to ensure that we can prosecute our war aims to the fullest."
The room looked interested now, at least the ones that hadn't heard this part of the briefing before.
Aurelius hid a smile.
The second part was something only he and Alexander had spoken about, a welcome surprise to all of in a moment for sure.
"To start with, the aim for this doctrine is very simple. It is the annihilation of the Combine's military forces on the frontline and later their reserves. This goal of this is to allow greater strategic maneuverability so that LCAF forces can dismantle the Draconis Combine in their own time without pressure of counter-raids."
The room nodded at this, Aurelius nodded as well.
"What we will be doing then, the following steps, they will be expanded, but this is the specifics that we will use as the basis for our training."
Alexander's hand turned to the projector and activated it.
The list, the one that had been agreed upon with his own staff emerged.
A few words had to be changed of course, Dropshutte became Dropship. The DC3 had lost its Dropshuttles and now had 4 collars for dropships.
1: Invasion Fleet consisting of a full Combat Command loaded onto Jumpships and Dropships move to attack a planet.
2: The Jumpships will move to take overwatch over the planet below. Their enormous ASF compliments will achieve total air dominance of the local area, preventing the DCMS from sortieing in strength.
3: The Dropships with their load capacity will bring down the invasion force while the Small Craft transfer supplies on a smaller scale to individual battalions in the field. This will allow the individual Battalions to move without being tied down by a long line of communcation.
4: The Jumpship fleet will move with the ground forces to ensure the shortest possible supply route to prevent interdiction. This will also deny the DCMS aerospace forces any chance of extracting their trapped ground forces. The overwhelming superiority in fires will be able to also provide localised support to target key enemy formations to reduce friendly casualties.
5: The enemy forces are destroyed, friendlies picked up, then everyone returns to the jump point.
6: Another target is located and the process continues until a specific section of the frontline has been denuded of all DCMS forces.
7: To ensure the degradation of the Combine, a minimum of 1.2 Regiments of Battlemechs and/or Armour a month destroyed is necessary to put the Combine into a production deficit.
The assembled crowd nodded their heads appreciatively.
The last time that Alexander had presented this, the DC3 slipways hadn't been constructed yet, nor were the Kohima Dropships known about.
Now that they were…
"How many of these Dropships are there actually going to be?" One of the Battalion Commanders asked.
"Duke Vu has made it clear to me that he will have enough to transport an entire Combat Command in 3-4 years if he maintains his current rate of production. Thankfully he plans to multiply that rate until it is at least equal with the Jumpship slipways." His voice reached them and the others in the room grinned appreciatively.
"50 slipways huh? We can work with that."
"Question. It says here that the jumpships will move to the planet. What exactly does that mean?" One of his staff officers asked. One that Aurelius would need to take to task over the asking of stupid questions.
The groans from the rest of the room had him nodding his head appreciatively.
There was always someone that did not do the required reading wasn't there?
"The DC3 and escort Jumpships are Primitive Jumpships. This means that they can't do full jumps of 30 light years, but it does mean that they can move under their own power. They have enough armour and guns to make anyone attack against them very painful." Alexander replied, Aurelius appreciating that he didn't snap at the simpleton.
"I notice that there is a lack of aerospace pilots in the room. Where are they going to come from and how soon? We can't train together if they aren't here for the 'to' part you know?" Another hand was raised, this time with an intelligent question.
Aurelius nodded, he liked this man.
"We're currently recruiting them from the population of shipbuilders we currently have above our heads. The experience of living in Zero-G and the rapid transitions will be very useful." Alexander said.
The words that he pointedly did not say was that they just didn't have enough of the Eagles to practice with, let alone try and get some inter-service training.
Battlemechs were difficult to build, yes, aerospace was infinitely harder.
Something that was flinging itself into the sky in defiance of gravity and spending every moment of its life trying to avoid overthrusting or underthrusting to prevent its smashing into the ground face first was, well, more difficult to build than something you clapped at if it walked properly on its first go.
Duke Huu would alleviate that problem in the future. He had promised them after all, they just needed to deal with the fighting, just think of the fighting. The Duke would make sure that they got what they needed for it.
The mere thought that he could trust Duke Vu to do what the entirety of the Commonwealth's industry couldn't felt absurd so he didn't bother thinking about it any longer.
Aurelius had his own problems after all.
Like training pilots. They didn't grow on trees, the machines were dangerous, their pilots had to be even better to manage them.
He also needed to stand up multiple regiments of Battlemechs, Armour, Aerospace, and Infantry. Train them in a new doctrine, then finagle an excuse to take the fight to the front. The Margraves over in that direction would be very unhappy with him trampling forward all over their pride. Which naturally meant he was going to need to be delicate.
After all, even if he smashed apart 50 billion Combine divisions, if their pride was hurt, the other generals would refuse to learn the doctrine properly due to sheer pigheadedness.
There were other options of course, he could see if the Duke would be willing to raise these units and then second them to the Commonwealth.
Of course, that woul risk the man diverting his attention from industrialisation to army building which, given what he had already done, was not in his best interest.
He sighed, some people truly were too stupid to be left alive.
"What does it mean here that we're going to be supplied from the air?" One of Alexander's this time asked, was this a new recruit? If so, a quick promotion. If not, he needed a quick demotion.
"It means that with the Dropships and Small Craft operating from the Jumpships above our heads on the battlefield, we will be able to effect resupply in the field directly onto the units doing the fighting. No more need to protect an extended line of communication. If we need to fight, we will get the bullets and armour directly from the sky." Alexander replied.
There were appreciative nods at that.
The standard Combine doctrine of hooking attacks was well known after all. A lack of a need to consider protecting their vulnerable line of communication would be a tremendous boon in concentrating the fighting forces onto the front.
The questions continued. Aurelius tuned them out.
The first of the Combined unit trainings would start soon and he wanted to make sure that things actually worked.
They needed to work together.
If they couldn't do that then why were they even here?
For a first step into welding them all into a unified doctrine, this was good as anthing else.
+Break+
Memories of a Mass Production Pilot by Wakako Zake, Tetersen University Press
Introduction
I came to Tetersen with my father when I was a teenager, 16 years old.
He was a welder, a zero-g welder. He learnt from his father who learnt from his father and both were fully paid up members of the guild.
I didn't want that life for myself, I wanted to be the one flying the machines.
So when the call went out for pilot trainees on the community noticeboards, I signed up. I'm actually a little embarrassed to say that I ripped the poster off the noticeboard to bring with me to show the recruiter that I was serious.
I would feel more guilty if I was the only one from my hab ring in the training, but thankfully there were multiple posters up and the recruiters were still wandering around.
I was joined by Johnny and Fred who were brothers. We called ourselves the triple 23rd, after our Slipway, the 23rd DC3 Slipway.
Our training modules were provided by the Utility Company.
Our ships were provided by the Utility Company.
We were destined to pilot ships built by the Utility Company.
The other pilots that we would later meet called us Mass Production Pilots. We weren't the Squadron based pilots from the LCAF proper. We didn't go around in groups of 6 or even in wings.
We operated in groups of 8 from the Escort Jumpships, or from packs of 54 from the Margarets.
We swarmed the enemy aerospace with our superior numbers, crushing them, tearing them apart like little minnows, then crushing them again into mince.
Once that was done, we went down to the ground and did the same with their ground forces, strafing their columns, hunting their strong points and headquarters, pruning them until none were willing to move into the open.
They called us Mass Production Pilots. We thought it was an insult, it probably was.
In the end we wore that moniker with pride.
Mass Production Pilots for the Mass Production Aerospace for the Mass Production Jumpships.
We were the Mass Production era, here to sweep away the old and usher in a new age.
That was what we swore on our graduation.
Our future as MPPs was bright and unknown.
We would bring change to the Commonwealth and beyond.
This is my story.