[Abe Sargent]

November 22,3065 – Duke Essex has contacted Theodore Kurita, and they agree to meet on Dieron.

December 14, 3065 – Essex arrives at Dieron and meets with Coordinator Theodore

“Hello again Coordinator. Thank you for meeting with me. I wanted to discuss the ongoing situation between our nations.”

Theodore and Duke Essex talk for a while. Essex explains his actions in Quentin are an honorable response by the Coalition to the attack on Caph. We understand you did not authorize the attack, but we cannot have that if we are to be neighbors. So, instead of going after a ton of your worlds, or attacking your people, we have landed on Quentin, and just paid the factories there to make mechs for us, instead of you, for a few months so far. We have not taken anything that is yours – this is not even a raid. We did not take units you had already paid for, and were sitting in your warehouses, we did not take your ammo, armor, mechs tanks, infantry, or anything else. We didn’t attack civilian targets, we didn’t swap ComStar out for Word of Blake, we have not exacted martial law, and we have not forced Independence to make units for us for free, which we could have done, at gunpoint, using the stuff already on planet. We have paid them, so we have actually helped the economy of Quentin. We have even fixed battle damage we caused in our skirmishes.


So far, we have done an honorable response to your actions.

“I know we can’t hold Quentin forever. Even if they asked to join us, you would land 10 regiments of mechs and bring every single WarShip you own in order to knock us off the world. I get that. And that would not be a friendly, neighborly thing for us to do either.

But it would cost you. Your troops are already battle beaten in the Thumb, the Fed Com flank, and the Ghost Bears. You would lose hundreds of mechs, tanks, and thousands of soldiers. You would lose so many fighters. And you would damage the economy and infrastructure of a highly valuable world, one of the ten most valuable ones you have.

Then you would have to bring a full navy and forces against us. And you will do this, Quentin is too important not too. I get that.

So, I’m willing to give you Quentin back, peacefully, without a single shot fired. And, I’ll trade you the WarShip we captured from you too. And there’s just one thing that you have that we want.”

“What would that be?”

“Remember when our units fought together in Operation Bulldog? As you know, the Star League forces there took out a few Smoke Jaguar WarShips. Afterwards, they gave the hulks to you. Some you sat on, some you scuttled, and some your restored to make up your navy.”

“You want the ones we still have.”

“Precisely.”

“I don’t remember them exactly, hold on, let me look it up. They left nine WarShips.

There were two Essexes. One, the Sabre Cat, we have restored. The other, the Dark Claw, we moved and have ready, in case we need to fix it later.

We had two Congresses. One, the Fire Crest, was salvageable, and we were going to do the same with the Dark Claw that we did to it, but it went missing. We suspect Word of Blake took it.

We had two Yorks. One was past its sell by date. The other , the Lioness, is now waiting if we ever want to do anything with it. It’s in the same state as the Dark Claw.

We got a Texas class which was unsalvageable and scuttled.

Finally, we had two Fredesa class WarShips. Both were badly damaged. One was deemed unsalvageable without paying more than the ship is worth. The other could be done, but would require some cash. We did not want to build the infrastructure to refit the clan vessels, so we didn’t bother, and they are towed and in storage as well.”

“And they are right here, above Dieron, right?”

“Yes. So let me get this straight, you want the Dark Claw, the Lioness, and the two Fredasas, one of which you can’t do anything with?”

“Correct. You aren’t using them, they have no value to you right now, and you didn’t spend a lot of money making them or taking them down. As you know, your WarShip is fully captured, repaired, and ready to go. You can get it back, free of any money lost, and a planet back for free as well. And we get four hulks of WarShips.”

“How could a nation your size even begin to get the money together to pay for their restoration, let alone their upkeep?”

“Upkeeping Warships is a lot cheaper than people think. Making them is the expensive deal. The Dragoons have 6 WarShips with one planet, Outreach, supporting them. We have 20ish. Plus, remember the Periphery in the Star League era had dozens of WarShips per state. We can have a few too.

This is a fair offer. You give something not worth that much to you, and we give something not worth that much to us.”

“Oh, and I promise not to have my people put any bombs or spying devices or anything on the WarShip we give you back, but check anyway. Because you never know what Blake will do.”

A smile escapes the coordinator. “I was surprised that you moved your realm to their grip, that won’t end well. You know that the stuff they are doing for you is just to build up their prestige.”

“Of course they are. You remember when ComStar had to admit that they had a he army they never told anyone. The ComGuards, stationed on every planet in the Inner Sphere. It was scary, so for years, they helped out with humanitarian causes and fixing up stuff and helping those in need on every planet. To build up goodwill. But after around 7 or 8 years, they stopped. Blake is doing the exact same thing. But you know what? It helps my people out, so I’m in.”


He wants us to toss in the Okinawa DropShip and pocket WarShip that we captured, and to move up our departure date from Quentin. While we are keeping our ships, I agree to move us out in just a couple of weeks.