the shape of things to come

the forming clouds. The recruits on the square dispersed, at
fi rst slowly, then faster as the master sergeant’s voice rose
higher. Palmer’s squad was up for weapon manipulations
fi rst. That meant an endless series of tightly timed fi nger
work, designed to drill behavior in weapon failure situations—or
so they were told. For Palmer, it usually ended in
frustration, knotted fi ngers and hands scratched bloody from
those damned copper fake-rounds.
“Load!”
“Unload!”
“Load!”
“Reload!”
“Jaaaaammed!”
“Change magazine!”
“Failure One!”
“Failure Three!”
“Aaaand again!”
Corporal Büttikofer sure enjoyed himself, Stefan thought.
Oh, how he longed for the fi rst-aid training this afternoon.
Taking turns lying comfortably on the ground, breaking out
the medpack, bandaging feet, arms or legs. Sticking needles
or pinching the guys where it hurt—all in the name of rescue.
Great fun. Especially the pics taken in real combat with all the
gore, splintered bones and mangled feet. Fun!
He could do without the patient transport, though. When
in the same group as Isler, none of the twenty-one ways to
haul a wounded comrade really worked. Not with a 130kg
lump of fl esh and fat.
“Are we dreaming sweet, Recruit Palmer?” The corporal’s
voice thundered from the other end of the group.
“Absolutely, Corporal. Always in your presence!”
Snapping remarks at dumb superiors was just plain fun.
And running laps after it was, too. Nothing better than a bit
of physical eff ort to keep in shape, after all.
8 December 3068
We had some fun today. Saw several instruments of destruction
a simple recruit usually wouldn’t catch sight of. One can
say about Instructor Grovler what one wants, but that man’s
capable. And all in all, not that bad. Deep down. Somewhere
near the molten core of Acubens.
He showed off a shoulder-fi red missile launcher used by antiarmor
platoons. Two linked tubes—short range, judging from
the caliber—with a quick reload mechanism and infrared sights
allowing an experienced tag-team to snap off a shot every fi ve
seconds. Devastating little thing. Just as much as the plethora of
grenades and mines arrayed around a spit-polished Imperator
22. Smoke, frag, fl ashbangs, all were there. Same could be said
about the mines. I even got to touch satchel charges and vibrabombs,
specifi cally designed to work against BattleMechs!
For me, even a trooper’s wet dream like the Starfi re laser rifl
e or a Liao Mandrake simply can’t stand up against anything
going boom.
But in truth…nah. Even such prospects aren’t worth living
through fi ve months of real groundpounder hell. Yep, Signal
Corps is just fi ne.
14 December 3068
It’s searing hot now. Everybody’s sweating liters just standing
still. When we went to the fi ring range today, I fi rst had to
slow down my heart to an acceptable rhythm. Essential, since
we were going to shoot at targets as far as 300 meters. That’s
diffi cult enough with a projectile weapon and nearly impossible
when panting from exhaustion. The whole thing is HPGaligner’s
work: Without a keen eye and carefully timed breath,
shots go wide in all directions, shattering a perfect score in a
moment of carelessness. Today however, Fortuna smiled on
me and the rest of B Squad. Every last one of us achieved the
goal in the commanded program with a safe margin to spare.
Once more I stood true to my reputation, hitting top scores
on all targets that looked vaguely human (and doing mediocre
on those boring round standard marks).
But that wasn’t the cool thing today.
The cool thing happened when we stepped out of the
range, pulled the muff s off our ears and suddenly felt like we
were in the real military.
Roaring diesel engines tore through the air, accompanied
by the characteristic clanging, rasping and squeaking of hardened
steel-alloy on concrete. With expressions from curious to
startled, the whole platoon turned heads, fervently trying to
make out the direction the noise was coming from. Bouncing
back and forth from the valley’s walls at fi rst, the sound quickly
became omnipresent, echoing from all directions.
A minute later, the fi rst of three APCs turned onto the square,
coming to an abrupt halt a close hand-span from Tom. Painted
a mix of dark green and pitch-black, the treaded vehicles sported
none of the usual militia insignias. Instead, a black cat on the
front panel smiled fi endishly from her white circle at us. She
did the same from the upper left arms and chest armor of the
mixed bunch of infantry stomping down the lowered ramps.
I admit, even my mouth stood agape until the fi rst of the
soldiers stepped up to Grovler and saluted sloppily before announcing
himself:
“Sergeant Chao, fi rst platoon, third company, Black Cats.
Command told us we could train here at your facilities?”
Black Cat mercenaries! Hell, I knew they’d been hired by
Acubens’ government, but I NEVER would have thought to
actually see them! Those guys are pure elite. Battle-hardened,
experienced and deadly. Even the militia’s pride—the
Acubens Grenadiers—didn’t stand a chance against them.
They were war personifi ed.
Or so Tom told me.
On second glance, up close, the mercs lost quite a bit of
their myth. In the tales, they were more disciplined and better
equipped than the ragtag band emerging from the APCs. Any
of my superiors would redline immediately if their recruits
looked that way. Privileges of success, probably.
Speaking of success: After that, Instructor Grovler assembled
the platoon in front of the fi ring range. And he wasn’t
happy. Marksman results were way above what he had expected,
leaving him no choice but to let everyone pass. No
repetitions the next weekend, no verbal reprimands right
then. It really looks like all of us will make it out of soldiery
into technical training next week.
This didn’t stop the master sergeant from announcing
a quick-march back to base instead of the promised ride in
trucks, though. Exhausting recruits on Friday, hours before
their free weekend began, was another of his favorite methods
of education.
At least we got dessert today.
INTRODUCTION
CONSTRUCTION
BASICS
BATTLEMECH
CONSTRUCTION
INDUSTRIALMECH
CONSTRUCTION
PROTOMECH
CONSTRUCTION
COMBAT VEHICLE
CONSTRUCTION
SUPPORT VEHICLE
CONSTRUCTION
CONV. INFANTRY
CONSTRUCTION
BATTLE ARMOR
CONSTRUCTION
AEROSPACE UNIT
CONSTRUCTION
WEAPONS AND
HEAVY EQUIPMENT
INFANTRY WEAPONS
AND EQUIPMENT
COSTS AND
AVAILABILITY
BATTLE VALUE
INDEX
RECORD SHEETS
143