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The Human Sphere is a BattleTech universe set in 3100. The Jihad has come and gone, leaving in its wake dozens of small realms in a perpetual cycle of raids and small wars. Will you seek money or defend your nation? Or both? You decide.
"Artillery adds dignity to what would otherwise be a vulgar brawl." - Murphy's Laws of Combat
Allied Mercenary Command
History
The FedCom Civil War proved to be a devastating time for the Inner Sphere, and most rejoiced as it came to an end in 3067. They celebrated the end of the war, toasting to the peace that would come. But few in what remained of the Chaos March, embroiled in a series of wars between the dregs of humanity and what remained of the defenders, echoed those cheerful thoughts. Many worlds flew the reborn flag of Tikonov, one of the three most powerful organizations in the Chaos March. Some flew the flag of the Word of Blake, welcoming them cheerfully or under duress.
But many others flew neither flag, and it was on those remaining worlds of the Chaos March that the Wolf’s Dragoons and the Allied Mercenary Command continued to fight a war that few outside the Chaos March even knew about. Most who knew anything of the region only knew of terrorist attacks; buses, trains, and planes sent to kill and terrorize. They did not know who sent them. Only that they were glad that they lived in a place that either did not know war or would soon know peace. Most held little regard for those who lived in the Chaos March, and those few who did felt lucky that whatever chaos transpired there would not touch them. How wrong they were.
In August, four Clan Elders of Northwind, one of the few centers of calm in the Chaos March, died in tragic “accidents”. The Highlander regiments returned home to elect new Elders, exercising seldom-used loopholes in their contracts that covered such matters. Their actions angered many who did not like mercenaries, particularly in the Draconis Combine. But those limited deaths of such perfectly chosen targets were pale simulacra of what would come to pass in a mere two months, or later.
On 15 October of 3067 another, and perhaps the most well known, bastion of calm in the Chaos March suffered a grievous assault. Outreach, the home of the mercenary lifestyle, came under the guns of mercenaries bought and paid for by the Word of Blake. It started with a bombing run by Smithson’s Chinese Bandits that hit Harlech Interplanetary DropPort, followed by the Dragoon Housing Center. That cowardly attack murdered thousands of civilians and Dragoons in their sleep, starting fires that would burn tens of thousands out of their homes. Into the streets as the Bandits’ allies came marching into Harlech with weapons on full auto.
Waco’s Rangers, the Tiger Sharks, and the Fifty-First Dark Panzer Jaegers, all names that will forever live beside Amaris in mercenary minds, burned down anyone who stepped in their way, civilian or Dragoon, as they marched on the battered DropPort and downtown districts. At the DropPort they met Battle Magic, the Wolf Spiders, and the Dragoons’ Zeta in a firefight that shattered entire city blocks. The hastily assembled Home Guard, Beta, and Epsilon Regiments held the Hiring Hall and the rest of downtown, stopping the traitors’ assault cold with a wall of metal and gun fire that ripped the heart out of the attackers. And several more city blocks. It took over two days for the Dragoons and their allies to hunt down the traitors as they tried to break back out of the city. They were willing to destroy anything in their way if they could open a path to escape, and the city suffered more grievous wounds. But on the 15th, the last of the traitors fell to the wrath of the Dragoons and their allies. Few were granted the chance to surrender.
And then the Dragoons fell back to lick their wounds. Over two hundred thousand civilians dead and three times that many injured. More than three million living left homeless. Thirty thousand mercenaries or law enforcement officials dead, and another fifty thousand injured. The Dragoons and their law enforcement capabilities had been savaged, and law and order collapsed as the survivors looted and pillaged for the necessities of life. Or for a nice music player. It took the Dragoons over two weeks, and the arrival of Gamma Regiment, to return order to the shattered city. Entire tent cities were erected outside Harlech to house the refugees of the destruction, but as November began to pass by heavy construction equipment began to arrive from Remus to clear out and rebuild the debris into a recognizable city.
And through all that the Dragoons tried to find out who had hired the traitors to perform the attack. Their operatives scanned what records survived, tracking down one dummy corporation after another, until they found their culprit. The enemy they had been fighting for years in the Chaos March. They brought their evidence to the Star League conference, only to find that they were simply the most visible victim of Word treachery. Others brought forth their stories and their intelligence, and on 30 November, 3067, the Word of Blake was censured and named persona non-gratis in the Inner Sphere.
The Word’s response proved swift, and on 5 December they bombed Tharkad, sending nuclear hellfire over the capital. Ten days later, with the Inner Sphere still reeling from the first wave, a Word force arrived over Northwind to keep the Highlanders from ever being a threat again. They wiped out the Northwind navy in a pitched battle and advanced on Northwind itself, but the Dragoons dispatched the Congress-class Beowulf, Lola III-class Darius, Vincent-class Mars, and Beta Regiment to end the assault. A risky double-jump deposited the fleet in a pirate point in high Northwind orbit, and they followed that with a ground and space assault in conjunction with the Highlanders that shattered the Word presence in system. But what they did not realize was that the force that hit Northwind was a shadow of the force that was arrayed to strike Outreach.
It arrived on 20 December and destroyed every fortification in Outreach orbit, including the Sovetskii Soyuz-class Athena and Lola III-class Nelson. Then they dropped troops on Harlech, and the tent cities around it, and began a campaign to exterminate the Dragoons that made Waco’s attack look like the work of an amateur. Still, like with those traitors, the Dragoons held their lines despite atrocious casualties and stopped the Word short of downtown. They had sent any mercenary who did not swear to defend Outreach out of the system within days of the assault on Tharkad, and those that remained fought like demons against the Word, bleeding them white. Until the Broadsword Legion joined the ranks of the traitors on the 24th and all but destroyed the Wolf Spiders in a pitched battle that badly weakened the Dragoon flank.
The Word commanders awoke on the morning of the 25th, thinking that victory was theirs. That it would only take a few more hours to burn the Dragoons down, but their dreams of victory turned to ash when rest of the Dragoons arrived. The Aegis-class Alexander, Beowulf, Darius, Alpha Regiment, Beta Regiment, and the Northwind Hussars performed a rapid double-jump from Northwind to Outreach, arriving near the Word fleet, and opened up with all weapons. The troops landed to reinforce the flagging defenders as the Dragoon fleet rained vengeance for their dead brethren on the Word fleet.
The running battle in orbit raged for two days as the ground forces slowly began to push back the Word, and it looked as if Outreach would triumph again. Then the Word commander ordered the remains of his fleet to perform a high-speed pass over Harlech and launched a full-scale orbital bombardment on the city. More strikes targeted Remus, and fanatical Dragoon defenders rose up into the sky to intercept the attacks. Nuclear explosions filled the air over the targets, and Harlech itself felt the sting of more than one explosion. When the bombardment ended, the enraged Dragoons on the ground charged the surviving Word lines and shot anything that moved. No surrenders accepted. In orbit, the Dragoon fleet cut the Word off from escape and ripped them to pieces with a concentrated barrage of fire, leaving behind only Dragoons and debris.
With the second battle for Outreach in three months over, the Dragoons once again fell back to lick their wounds and survey the damage. This time nearly two million civilians dead under the Word guns, along with over twenty thousand mercenaries. Another five million people were wounded, and Harlech itself had become a ghost town with less than one hundred thousand people living in the old city limits. Destroyed and damaged BattleMechs, vehicles, and fighters littered the city, and the debris of larger ships dotted the landscape around it. The wreckage of ships and stations rained down across the planet, and it took the Dragoons months to clear the orbitals of the deadly pieces of ships.
It took them significantly less time to strike back at those responsible for the deaths of so many under their protection. On 30 December the Tikonov Free Republic officially allied with the Dragoons. They had hired and been friendly with the Allied Mercenary Command since it formed, but in the wake of the Word assault they chose to make their allegiance official. In January, they landed troops on Liberty and Epsilon Indi, with the Darius and Beowulf clearing the road for them, in support of the Allied Mercenary Command. The Dragoons Beta Regiment, the Northwind Hussars, and others in the AMC supported the drive to clear the outer systems for a drive into the Blakist Hegemony itself.
Then ComStar’s Cameron-class Invisible Truth arrived to lead a small naval squadron and a division of troops in the assault on Bryant. The WarShips cleared a road through the Word fleet in a heavy fight that cost the Word two WarShips and forced three more to flee the system. The ground forces landed through the opening the WarShips opened, and in March of 3068 the first major battle for a Blakist Hegemony world began. The massive storms of the world limited their ability to perform aerial surveillance, allowing the Word forces to fight a long battle of attrition. They fell back from losing battles, drove hard in battles they could win, and cost Tikonov and the AMC dearly for every square kilometer they claimed. But Bryant finally fell to what the participants soon began to call the Star League offensive in December of 3068.
In January, in retribution for the loss the Word of Blake assaulted Hall, Outreach, and Northwind with simultaneous thrusts to keep them from supporting each other. They were meant to be punishment raids, with full nuclear armaments designed to wipe out their enemies. Instead they ran into an orbital shell of small battlesats that, with the help of the Alexander at Outreach, the Mars at Northwind, and heavy DropShip and fighter fleets at all three worlds, ripped the approaching fleets into ribbons before they could achieve bombardment range. Those were the last major Word assaults on any of those worlds.
March of 3069 saw the Star League force assaulting New Home, a world of resource-rich highlands and numerous old Star League fortifications that the Word protected heavily and refused to give up. The Darius found itself surrounded and badly damaged in the opening rounds of the naval engagement, though the Beowulf was able to rescue it with a well-placed broadside that shattered her attackers. The Darius returned to Outreach for repairs after that and was unavailable for the rest of the campaign for New Home. The Word used that lack to their advantage, transporting supplies and reinforcements via high-speed supply runs that usually made it through the weakened blockade. Still, the Star League force broke the back of the Word resistance in October, and from them on it was a cleanup operation. The cleanup operation lasted more than a year though, as the Word fought for time they desperately needed to reinforce the rest of their space.
The Darius came out of the makeshift yards in time to spearhead the invasion of Keid, a world the Word only weakly defended, in May of 3070. Forced to spread their attention between supporting Keid and the crumbling resistance on New Home, the Word sent what they could to slow the Star League down. Most of those they sent proved to be unstable, badly brain washed or simply inexperienced in war. But some of the soldiers were incredibly deadly, the product of experimental techniques that the Word had been using on prisoners. Utterly loyal to the Word, these “super soldiers” made the Star League pay in blood for the conquests of Keid and New Home. But by September of 3071 the two worlds had been generally pacified. Remnants of Word resistance remained, as they would for years after, but they were broken and no longer required heavy military formations to wipe out.
With that taken care of, the heaviest units of the Star League force returned to Outreach to commence refitting and repairs. The fleets continued to spar along the border of the Hegemony, but major combat stalled as the Highlanders, Dragoons, Tikonov, and ComStar made ready for the next phase of the war. The Word had spent their time building up the defenses of Caph and the invaders knew they would need everything they had to take it. They built up supply depots, shipped in more troops, and Harlech again became a bustling city as military men filled it to the remaining rafters. And when the preparations were finished, they jumped.
On 10 August of 3072 the Third Sirian Lancers, the Second and Third Republican Guards, ComStar’s Third and Fifth Armies, Wolf’s Dragoons’ Beta and Epsilon Regiments, all three Dismal Disinherited regiments, and the two Northwind Highlanders regiments hit Caph. The Alexander, Beowulf, Darius, and the Invisible Truth’s squadron, along with a massive nuclear barrage of the orbitals, smashed the Word fleet and orbital defenses into gibbering hysterics, opening the way for the ground forces to land. There the remains of the Word of Blake’s First, Fourth, and Fifth Divisions fought to stop the invasion with a fanaticism that surprised the attackers. Their defense was a scorched earth campaign that wiped out the majority of the population and left the world a shattered husk. It also inflicted catastrophic losses on the Star League ground forces, but in the end the Word forces fought and died there, unable to retreat because of heavy WarShip space superiority. Caph was declared pacified in January, a lightning-fast campaign compared to the early stages of the war. The attackers credited the speed to the large amounts of planning and preparation that went into the assault, and returned to Outreach again to plan the next stage of the war.
Terra.
The WarShips of the fleet returned to Outreach and the rapidly expanding repair docks in orbit one at a time to undergo much needed maintenance and repairs. The ground forces in the meantime rested and recruited new members to replace their losses. In May of 3073, the Federated Suns fleet, led by the Avalon-class Melissa Davion and sent after they and ComStar pushed out the Word presence in the Federation, finished their repairs as well. With that reinforcement, the combined fleet prepared to assault Terra. They jumped into the Terran system on 23 July and smashed the Word defenders easily. But as they began to accelerate in towards the inner system small Word ships began to harass the Star League fleet. The Star League, thanks to the Dragoons’ WolfNet, knew how many WarShips the Word had left though, and knew that the Word could not hope to break their fleet.
They were preparing to order the troop ships into the system when the Word hit them with a fleet of small craft outside the Titan Yards. One thousand ships strong, the Star League quickly realized they did not have the forces to defeat it and began burning for a jump point. They made it, but the running battle cost them heavily in men and ships. The Alexander, covering the retreat of the smaller ships, took down scores of small craft before jumping. Heavily damaged by weapons fire though, the drive failed in mid jump and the Alexander never arrived in the Caph system.
The fleet fell back to Outreach again to perform repairs and regroup from the loss. The remains of the Free Worlds League fleet reinforced them there. Once the largest fleet in the Inner Sphere, the combined force, sent from four nations of the former League, numbered less than two-dozen ships, many of them newer small ships built during the Jihad. Still, even after the losses of the Jihad, they were the single largest force in the Star League fleet, led by the Thera-class Santorini and Sardis, as well as the Black Lion-class Xanthos. They also brought several regiments of troops to support the ground invasion, led by Photon Brett-Marik.
The combined fleet jumped out again and hit Terra in 3074, after taking time to devise a way of killing the Word’s small craft and to take their primary object. They knew the Word would never give up the powerful Titan Yards intact, and the Dragoons came up with the idea of using neutron bombs on them. Unsurprisingly, the Regulans agreed with them completely, and despite the reservations of the rest of the Star League, the plan went forward. They prepared the warheads and then left in August of 3074 to hit Terra. They arrived off the Titan Yards on 23 October and began their assault instantly.
A massed fighter assault from the Theras stripped the small craft defenders back, as assault DropShips and WarShips advanced on the yards. They smashed the defenders, but Word counter assaults, including the arrival of their last dedicated WarShips, took their toll on the Star League fleet. Until the elite Dragoon Kommandos launched from the Beowulf and Darius to deliver their loads of destruction. Aboard stealth-coated small craft, they coasted into the Titan Yards without being detected. They left the neutron bombs behind and coasted out the other side of the Titan Yards before triggering the explosives. The radiation killed every living being in the Yards and left the Word incapable of destroying them.
The Word WarShips tried to shatter the Yards with naval fire, but the League fleet engaged them in close-ranged combat, forcing them to decide between survival or destruction. The surviving WarShips and small craft retreated from the Yards, leaving them mostly intact, and set course for the inner system. The Star League fleet followed them, but proved unable to destroy them during inter-planetary burn. The small craft with their large fuel stores could easily fight during the burn, while the more short-legged League fighters could not do so well. The Star League hammered the Word hard with continued raids but were incapable of destroying it short of Martian orbit and the heavy defenses there that the Word had built over the years of their control.
Unable to defeat those defenses, the fleet returned to the Titan Yards and began repairs once again. As the repairs went on, the Beowulf and Darius, with the support of the Tamarind and Oriente fleets, began to support troop landings on every major rock outside the asteroid belt. Sometimes the Word fleet came out to fight, but as the months went by they slowly gave up and hunkered down at Mars and Terra. By November of 3075, the entire outer system was under Star League control and the Regulans had nearly finished preparing the next stage of the assault. The ancient Kimagure-class Katherine Steiner, under a Lyran flag, arrived as well, as well as the dregs of new construction in the Inner Sphere. The combined fleet was as large as it would ever be, numbering scores of ships from ComStar, the Federated Suns, the balkanized Free Worlds League, the Lyran Commonwealth, and the Allied Mercenary Command. With the exception of the shattered Draconis Combine, it was truly a united Star League fleet.
And in March of 3076, the fleet began burning for Mars. They accelerated to a significant fraction of the speed of light and launched missiles before turning around and beginning to slow back down. The missiles arrived hours before the fleet, igniting their drives as their onboard chronometers marked the target time, and shot down on the Martian defenses. The Word soldiers in forts, fighters, and small craft shot many of the missiles down, even caught flatfooted as they were. But enough arrived at their targets and the dirty nuclear explosions they generated lashed any nearby body with enough hard radiation to fry even hardened electronics. The majority of the minefields effectively ceased to exist, the forts either died in nuclear fires or were rendered impotent, and over a hundred fighters and small craft were simply no longer a threat. One way or the other.
But there were still some defenses left, and the Word moved to draw a line in space with their remaining forces, five WarShips, over a hundred DropShips, over a thousand fighters, and nearly five hundred of their remaining small craft. The Star League fleet tore into the Word without mercy, and what remained of the Martian defenses joined in. ComStar’s Invisible Truth and scores of other WarShips died in the Battle of the Line, but they wiped out the Word fleet nearly to a man. Then, with the Word fleet and the Martian defenses wiped out, the Star League brought in the troops and pacified Mars. Outnumbered and outgunned by the invaders, the Word fell rapidly.
With Mars pacified, the fleet burned on Terra itself, where the only remaining defense was the Reagan Space Defense System on Luna and Terra. The Regulans nuked any position that fired on the fleet, and though many protested, the Dragoons and their allies remained silent. They had seen Outreach nuked. They felt no sympathy for the Word now. With the way opened, Tikonov and the Allied Mercenary Command landed in South America to pacify that hemisphere. The joined up with the remains of the ComStar resistance and rolled the Word up with a wave of firepower that ripped them apart. The battle of Buenos Aires in January destroyed what remained of organized Word resistance in South America, leaving the path open to North America.
Leaving the smaller AMC units to deal with the remaining guerilla fighters, the Wolf’s Dragoons, Dismal Disinherited, Northwind Highlanders, and the Republican Guards hit Panama. They marched up through Central America until Belize fell in May. Then they marched on Mexico City and Monterrey with little resistance. The Word was failing and everybody knew. They also knew that if the Word had ever planned on surrendering they would have done so long ago.
In July they met up with ComStar’s Third Army and penetrated the North American subcontinent. They captured Wichita in August before continuing on to Hilton Head where they met the remnants of the Word of Blake defenders. Everything the Word had left fought them tooth and nail, and attack after attack failed to break them. Until the Regulans hit Hilton Head with a naval bombardment powerful enough to erase it from existence. The Dragoons congratulated the Regulans on their effective use of materials to end the battle.
The war continued for a few more months after that, but the loss of Hilton Head and its leadership hampered the Word resistance badly. The Allied Mercenary Command helped to dig out the remaining Word soldiers, and by April of 3078 their resistance had been effectively wiped out. The Terran system had been cleansed of the Word of Blake Problem.
With the war over, the Allied Mercenary Command returned to Outreach to rebuild their shattered forces once again. Most of them had been granted landholds on various worlds they’d helped liberate, and they returned to those worlds after repairs were finished. And then life on Outreach began to return to normal. The massed numbers of foreign troops returned to their homes, and the Dragoons began to rebuild Harlech. The Dragoons and the rest of the AMC hired out battalion-sized forces to bring in money, the profits of which were sent to the rebuilding effort, and Harlech began to take shape again.
Now once again a crowning jewel of the Human Sphere, Harlech City houses one of the largest space ports in existence. Any mercenary with a ranking of C or above in the Mercenary Review and Bonding Commission is allowed on Outreach, as of course are all members of the Allied Mercenary Command, but less reputable soldiers are banned. The Dragoons will no longer allow vipers and traitors to lie in their midst, preparing to strike.
Now mercenaries come and go from Outreach and the other MRBC hiring halls, having fought in every major conflict, and most minor ones, since the Jihad. Life, for the mercenaries at least, is back to normal. The Human Sphere has many conflicts and many people with money willing to pay for good soldiers, and the mercenaries of today fill the needs as they have for centuries. Many worried that the betrayal of the traitor mercs would cause others to distrust mercenaries in general, but the AMC’s prosecution of the war against Blake put aside most doubts. There are still nations that dislike and distrust mercenaries, but in general they are nations that always have. But mercenaries proved their honor in the Jihad, and they have continued to do so since. And an employer can be certain that any mercenary unit allowed entry to Harlech City will hold to their contract.
The mercenary trade is a booming business, and with the continued small wars and raids, few believe that boom will make a downturn any time soon.
Major Mercenary Units
A large number of mercenary units maintain membership in the Allied Mercenary Command, with those below only being examples. The AMC has full members or contacts throughout the Human Sphere. The units that proclaim their loyalty to the AMC often fly their flags off Athena or Doune-class frigates built at Outreach or Northwind, and use many designs built on worlds affiliated with the AMC. In addition, Nelson-class frigates, and sometimes a rare Alexander-class cruiser, defend many worlds with AMC landholds. The AMC looks out for its people, and those who betray them should beware.
Wolf’s Dragoons (7 Regiments) – The Wolf’s Dragoons have spent the quarter century since the fall of the Word of Blake rebuilding their shattered regiments and fleet. Not wishing to risk a repeat of the Jihad assaults on their world, the vast majority of their fleets and regiments remain at Outreach at all times to protect it. They do contract out some of their forces in battalion elements with fleet support but no more than that. Their primary wish and mission now is to protect Outreach, and they do little else. Their flagship is the Congress-class Beowulf, escorted at all times by the Lola III-class Darius and a number of Nelson-class frigates. Alexander-class cruisers command other formations, also with Nelsons supporting them.
Northwind Highlanders (7 Regiments) – Like the Dragoons, and the majority of the Human Sphere, the Highlanders suffered greatly during the Jihad and have taken most of the time since then to rebuild. Also like the Dragoons they hire their forces out in battalion-sized elements to maintain fighting trim in all of their regiments, but no less than two-thirds of their military remains at home at all times. Their most frequent employer is the Federation of Skye, a nation they feel very comfortable working with because of their similar heritage. Their flagship is the Vincent-class Mars, heavily modified over the years to become a powerful WarShip in its own right.
Grey Death Legion (1 Regiment) – All but destroyed on Hesperus fighting against the rebellious Federation of Skye during the FedCom Civil War, what remained of the Grey Death Legion remained for a time on Hesperus. Soon though they returned to Glengarry, where many thought they would die. They did actually, ceasing to assemble as a fighting force at all. But when the Jihad began and the Federation of Skye once again claimed its independence, Alexander Death Carlyle and many of his friends left Lyran service and returned home to Glengarry. There he found what remained of his father’s command, and requested their aid in reforming the Grey Death Legion. The new Grey Death Legion sells its services a battalion at a time, rotating that duty through the battalions to keep them fresh and experienced, but has been through few major conflicts. Many wonder if it can fight and win as the original Grey Death Legion did, but so far they have not been required to prove themselves to that degree.
Battle Corps Legion (1 Regiment) - The beginning of the Jihad found the Battle Corps on Alula Australis. Near Terra, the Word dominated the world's news services and the Battle Corps only knew that the Free Worlds League had fallen into a civil war, and that the other nations had their own "difficulties" that made communications difficult. The Battle Corps enjoyed good relations with the Word until they were ordered to perform a "targeted assault" that would guarantee heavy civilian casualties. Colonel Nichole refused and the Word declared them rogue,targeting them for extermination. They ran, breaking out for what remained of the Free Worlds League. They ended up working for the new Captain-General, Alys Rousset-Marik, defending her home of Augustine while she led the war against the Word. They took heavy losses, but held the line until the Free Worlds League eradicated the Word menace in their space. In 3073, their Alpha Battalion flew with the League forces to rendezvous with the remaining Star League forces at Outreach. They fought the long campaign to liberate the Terran system, and then Terra herself, from the Word, deployed with the other mercenary forces in South America before marching up into North America. Reduced to little more than a company of combat effective BattleMechs by the end of the liberation, they returned to Augustine where they have maintained a presence ever since. They've rebuilt their two reinforced battalions in the last quarter century, giving them the combat power of a regiment. Beta Battalion defends their land hold on Augustine, while Alpha pays the bills. Having suffered numerous head hunter attacks, the Battle Corps is now commanded by an entire lance of pink Banshees . Nobody outside the Battle Corps knows which Banshee Colonel Nichole pilots, and her MechWarriors take great care to make certain that doesn't change.
Battle Magic (1 Battalion) – Primarily a support unit filled with technicians and instructors that can fight, much like the old unit commanded by Doctor Bonzai, Battle Magic has proven in the past that it can fight well. They held the attacking Tiger Sharks at the Harlech Interplanetary DropPort until reinforcements could arrive in the first battle of the Jihad for instance, and fought beside the Dragoons through the end of the Jihad wherever the Dragoons traveled. Since the Jihad ended, Battle Magic has returned to Outreach where they upgrade other mercenaries’ units with new technologies and, more importantly, teach the techs how to maintain them. They have not left Outreach since the Jihad, only helping those mercenaries that travel there. They have a landhold on Remus where their families live and where they perform research into new and better weapons of war.
The Dioscuri (1 Cluster) – Having lost Kikuyu to the Jade Falcons during the FedCom Civil War, the Dioscuri fell back to Morges where they began to rebuild with the help of the Kell Hounds and the Wolves In Exile. The battered command trained hard with the Wolves until the Jihad and the renewed Jade Falcon invasion began. That war was the crucible that made them what they are today. Fighting beside the Kell Hounds and the Wolves, they helped hold the Falcon advance on a half dozen worlds, including Arc-Royal itself where they helped break the attackers. They continued to fight next to the Kell Hounds and the Wolves through the end of the war in 3075, learning much of how the Clans fight. They still help hold the line against the Jade Falcon menace, performing raids and defending against Falcon raids, using their knowledge of Clan tactics to the utmost. Their landhold on Arc-Royal gives their dependents a secure place to grow up in, and they maintain a portion of their force there at all times on a rotating basis, relaxing from the border skirmishes.
Dismal Disinherited (4 Regiments) – A powerful force with a long history since their creation following the First Succession War, the Dismal Disinherited are one of the best mercenary forces in existence. Not as flashy as others like the Dragoons or the Highlanders through they have rarely been the subject of heroic stories. Still, many owe their lives to this strong unit. After the Tikonov Free Republic defeated the Saiph Triumvirate, it hired the three Disinherited regiments to garrison Saiph, Tall Trees, and New Canton against Capellan terrorists and raiders. That contract kept them out of the opening phases of the Jihad, guarding against possible assault by what many considered to be an ally of the Word. The Capellan Confederation. They remained there until after 3070 when the Word finally assaulted the Confederation, shattering the once proud nation. With that threat neutralized, the Dismal Disinherited prepared to aid their allies closer to Terra. They helped spearhead the invasion of Caph in 3072, and fought with the best of the AMC and Tikonov when they assaulted South America on Terra. They marched into North America as well, and saw the final destruction of the Word of Blake before returning to Outreach for repairs. They have since returned to Saiph, Tall Trees, and New Canton where they defend those worlds and their landholds against raiders. Using salvage gained on Terra and Caph they have raised a fourth regiment, each battalion made up of members of the other three regiments who serve on a rotating basis. This regiment serves on the battalion level throughout the Human Sphere, gaining experience for the Disinherited that they take back to their home regiments.
DropShip Irregulars (1 Regiment) – Starting the Jihad on Bethel in New Syrtis space, at first it appeared as if the DropShip Irregulars would be uninvolved in the war. Until Colonel Medron Pryde, a veteran of Solaris VII, found out that the world had been assaulted and put out a call to all former warriors of Solaris to move to defend their home. A full company of Irregulars who had fought on Solaris went with him and they smuggled their way onto Solaris in a cargo transport. They arrived in time to rendezvous with Grand Champion Kelly Metz under Solaris City and escorted her out to the resistance in Nowhere. Other Solaris warriors began to arrive, smuggled in by the Yakuza, followed by the main body of the DropShip Irregulars on their Excalibur-class DropShip that was modified to look like it had a naval particle cannon in the nose. They slipped through the Word blockade with their typical amount of insanity and bravado, but they arrived intact and ready for battle. They spent the rest of the Jihad on Solaris, fighting the Word in a bloody series of battles that nearly destroyed the force more than once. The Fourteenth Skye Guard RCT finally arrived in 3073 to relieve them, but Word space forces destroyed the bulk of the force in orbit. But with the help of their survivors the DropShip and Solaris Irregulars finally triumphed in 3074, crushing the last of the Word on world. The DropShip Irregulars spent the rest of the Jihad rebuilding on Solaris, and remained in the new Cooperative until 3080 when it began to recover. They have since begun taking battalion-level contracts, but a third of the force normally stays at their landhold on Solaris at all times. First Battalion, the Warriors, have a pair of crossed swords on their right torso, opposite the Overlord and stars that make up the standard Irregular insignia. Second Battalion, known for being filled with excellent warrior technicians, is symbolized by a Bonsai tree growing out of a famous HeavyMetal-brand coffee can. Third Battalion’s touch is a monkey wearing a cowboy hat and firing revolvers while riding a barrel, an image that accurately depicts their insanity in battle. Each battalion flies aboard a single Excalibur-class DropShip, the Arthur, Merlin, and Kai respectively, which mounts a heavy naval particle cannon in the nose. The Irregulars have studied hard over the years to find new ways to have fun while fighting and embarrassing their enemies, and few escape with their dignity, or anything else, intact.
The Furies (1 Armored Regiment) – An armor unit since their mutiny from the DCMS, the Furies are known for their “divide and conquer” strategies. Excellent at spreading forces out and then hammering them hard, the Ridziks hired them to defend Capolla against small raiders operating from Federation space. The Word of Blake ignored them in the Jihad and they maintained their position, protecting the border of the Republic from raiders of both the crumbling Federation and Capellan nations. As the Jihad continued to rage though they were finally called on to help near Terra and participated in the conquest of Keid before supporting the invasion of Caph. They continued on to the invasion of Terra and remained in South America for the duration of the war before returning to Capolla. There they remain to this day, protecting their landhold, when they are not on assignment to the nearby border worlds to aid against raiders.
Lindon's Regiment (1 Regiment) – The Jihad found Lindon’s Regiment, then barely more than a battalion strong, on Liberty performing peacekeeping duties. The targets of Capellan and Word of Blake terrorist attacks, many Lindon warriors died even before the Jihad began. The upswing in Word activity in the early months of the Jihad nearly destroyed the battalion, but the arrival of the Republican Guards and the Allied Mercenary Command in 3068 saved it. Major Lindon ordered her unit back to Outreach to rebuild where they stayed for more than a year. Their first major action after rebuilding to battalion strength involved the conquest of Keid where they worked with the Furies. They garrisoned that world until the final battle for Terra began and they joined the rest of the AMC in assaulting South America. Once again, they remained in South America until the end of the battle for Terra, then returned to Outreach to rebuild and reorganize with their salvage. They have since been granted a landhold on Liberty where they stay to this day, contracting out a battalion at a time to maintain experience in the unit.
Known Factory Complexes That Supply the Allied Mercenary Command
Northwind - Cosara Weaponries - Black Watch, Crab, and Highlander BattleMechs; Schiltron OmniTank
- Defiance Industries - Locust, Uziel, and Wasp BattleMechs; BattleArmor
- Shipil Company - Seydlitz AeroSpace Fighter, Claymore and Overlord DropShips, Doune frigate
- Cyclops Incorporated - Drillson, Glaive, Maxim and Hover APC vehicles.
Outreach - Blackwell Heavy Industries - Adder (Puma), Gargoyle (Man O'War), Ice Ferret (Fenris), Timber Wolf (Mad Cat) OmniMechs; Gallowglas IIC, Griffin IIC, Imp IIC, Locust IIC, Marauder IIC, and War Dog IIC BattleMechs; Badger IIC, Bandit IIC, Kestrel IIC, and Peregrine IIC omni vehicles; Jagatai and Jengiz OmniFighters; Athena and Nelson frigates, Alexander cruiser; Overlord-C DropShip
Glengarry (Federation of Skye) - Grey Death Technologies - BattleArmor and advanced electronics
Solaris (Solaris Cooperative) - There are other factories, but these are the only ones that build enough units to sell to the Allied Mercenary Command.
- Blue Shot Weapons - Cestus and Lynx BattleMechs
- Norse-Storm Technologies Inc. - Maelstrom and Nightstar BattleMechs
- OmniTech Industries - Colossus, Koto, Morpheus and Tsunami BattleMechs
- Solaris Naval Yards - Hirsch DropShip; Noton frigate
- Trisagion Aerospace - Archangel and Serraphim Land-AirMechs; Nephilim AeroSpace Fighter
Charter Allied Mercenary Command Establishments
The Charter Allied Mercenary Command worlds have expansive Mercenary Review and Bonding Commission hiring halls, except on Glengarry, and are generally considered the best places to obtain contracts in the Human Sphere. Sporting impressively-advanced hiring halls, practice fields, and training centers, these worlds are the heart and soul of the modern Allied Mercenary Command. Members of the AMC can rest and relax in the AMC reservations setup on each of these worlds, and consider them secondary homes even if they have a landhold elsewhere.
Outreach – The heart and soul of the mercenary trade in the Human Sphere, Outreach felt the wrath of the Word of Blake during the Jihad. An estimated two million people died under the two major assaults of that war, but the Dragoons have done everything in their power to rebuild the shattered city. Scars remain, but Harlech is once again a lively city as it was before 3068. The modern Harlech is separated into two primary sectors, civilian and mercenary. Only the locals and trusted members of the Allied Mercenary Command and Mercenary Review and Bonding Commission are allowed in the civilian sector. It is kept physically separate from the rest of Harlech with formidable walls, automated weapons turrets, and guards from infantry to BattleMech that allow the local civilians to live without fear of a second Waco. The rebuilt Harlech Interplanetary DropPort is in the middle of the mercenary sector, and houses powerful defenses of its own, including ground-to-orbit weapons grids that work with the orbital defense grid. In order to limit the chances of a second Waco further, only members in good standing of the Mercenary Review and Bonding Commission are allowed on Outreach now. The mercenary sector is kept clean and safe, with police on every corner to watch for threats. Mercenaries can still find places to let their hair down and party though, the Dragoons realizing that they need to relax. But any establishment that threatens the security of Harlech does not last long.
Arc-Royal – In the Tamar Pact, Arc-Royal is a pleasant, pastoral world of mild weather and remarkable beauty. Its architecture proclaims its Germanic heritage, and despite everything it has been through it continues to have a small-town atmosphere where everyone is welcomed with open arms. Newcomers are expected to be nice and treated nicely until they prove they are not. Not as busy as some mercenary hiring locations, Arc-Royal is frequented mostly by units that believe themselves good enough to survive (or emerge victorious) in battle against the Jade Falcons. Not surprisingly, there is a steady influx of mercenaries returning to Arc-Royal from disastrous fights, and others returning with Clan-tech goodies that need to be repaired or fitted onto their units.
Northwind – Colonized by Clan Stuart from Scotland in the early days of expansion into the galaxy, the Northwind Highlanders have protected the planet for most of the centuries since. The world’s temperate zones are covered in postcard-worthy landscapes of rolling hills, vibrant green grass, and fog-enshrouded moors, all of which survived the Jihad intact. The only hiring hall on Northwind is located in Tara, the capitol city, beneath the watch of “the Fort” and sees many mercenaries coming through in search of jobs or education. Tara and its people look as if they were lifted from ancient Scotland, with cobblestone streets, small pubs, taverns, and inns, and kilts being no less uncommon than the wail of bagpipes or the thick Scottish brogues. Northwind has made numerous trades of services for companies in the Federation of Skye since the Jihad, and has opened its world to factories constructed by them, giving it an impressive output dedicated to the Allied Mercenary Command.
Glengarry – Home of the famed Grey Death Legion, Glengarry is a charter member of the Allied Mercenary Command though few would know by looking at it. Its bustling capital city of Dunkeld is as large as any capital city in the Human Sphere and is a major focus of trade, but has no mercenary hiring halls. Mercenaries who wish to look for contracts in the Federation of Skye are encouraged to travel to Galatea.
Major Mercenary Review and Bonding Commission Establishments
Independent of the Allied Mercenary Command, the Mercenary Review and Bonding Commission is generally considered to be the most trustworthy holder of contracts and bonds in the mercenary trade. Only the Federated Suns Mercenary Commission has been successful at directly competing with the MRBC, though their rivalry is kept to a professional level.
Solaris VII – The capital of the Solaris Cooperative, this terrestrial world is home to one of the densest concentrations of wealth in the Human Sphere. Dominated by the massively successful Solaris Circuit of duels, it has also become the most successful of the non-charter MRBC hiring establishments. Dozens of mercenary companies travel to Solaris VII for access to its impressive hiring halls, and the Solaris Circuit. Many mercenaries take advantage of the Circuit to attempt to make extra money while waiting for contracts, though such dreams often end in smoke, along with their vehicle. It is the favored port of call for the DropShip Irregulars and sports an Allied Mercenary Command reservation like those offered on the Charter AMC worlds.
Galatia III – In the Ozawa-Addicks Mercantile Alliance, the hiring halls of Galatia III benefit from the high technology of the Alliance with a full range of holoboards for displaying available contracts, and full immersion holographic battlefield simulators. When not in use by mercenary units, these large holographic practice fields are used by the locals to air anything from sports games to recorded battles.
Galatea – In the Federation of Skye, Galatea was once the center of the mercenary trade though its fortunes fell in the 3030s after Outreach rose to prominence. Its entry into the Commission in 3062 brought a return of the heady days that once had been its due, and now this world is the center of the mercenary trade in the Federation. It is also the home of Solaris-like duels that are broadcasted throughout the Federation and more than one Solaris champion has traveled to Galatea to test the local waters to see if the fish are dangerous.
Clinton – Situated between the modern Lyran Commonwealth and the Federation of Skye, Clinton is the homeworld of the Snord’s Irregulars. Long allied with the Dragoons, they were happy to allow the MRBC to build a hiring hall on this world. The Snord Antiquities Museum is well known to MechWarriors and historians for its vast array of Star League antiquities, and many mercenaries come to this world more to see it than to obtain a contract. A strictly neutral world, mercenaries from all realms are welcomed here. The Lyran Commonwealth claims this world, and sometimes sends forces to ensure its loyalty, something that is done with all diligence by the Snord representatives on world. Until the Lyran forces leave of course and neutrality returns.
New Avalon – Dominated by the powerful Federated Suns Mercenary Commission, the MRBC branch establishments on New Avalon are limited. They do monitor contracts offered in the Federated Suns hiring halls and rank them as they do all other contracts, but traffic through their small hall is sparse. They make a large amount of money selling their information to mercenaries on world though, so maintain the offices and hiring hall in hopes that expansion is possible.