Zoids: Chaotic Age Zero |
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Name: Blackdust Mercenary Group (abbreviated "BDMG") General Background: The Blackdust Mercenary Group is a the largest private security contractor (or mercenary) group on Zi, and undisputely the best organized and trained and the most powerful. It is less than a decade old, and started as a ghost of a dream. Its origins are at best shrouded in mystery, as the BDMG finds its beginnings in an extremely mysterious man. Commander Halen, the Commander of the Mercenary Group (CMG), is rumored to have worked towards the formation of such a Group for the majority of his life, though no man alive other than himself can give a full account of the founding of the BDMG. Almost everything regarding the early years of the planning of the Mercenary Group and Halen's individual efforts are pure conjecture. However, speculation ends and facts begin prior to the public announcement of the BDMG. Our factual story starts one stormy night five years ago, when the man known only as Halen walked into a small, grubby bar alongside the ocean in west Europa with a metal briefcase handcuffed to his wrist. There, he met another figure of legend and notoriety - Matthew "Fade" Korimeer. Words were exchanged, no one knows exactly what was said or what was in the case. By the end of the meeting, though, the men were partners. The dream and the common goal of the two men was to build up from the ground a legendary mercenary group, relying not on quantity (as the factions did), but on the finest quality of soldiers and leadership to win their battles. Halen's own skill as a Zoid pilot is largely unknown, but can be inferred that Halen did not have confidence in his own. The original plan between Halen and Fade was that Halen would focus on becoming a master tactician and administrator while Fade Korimeer would concentrate his efforts on building one of the finest fighting forces that the world had ever seen. Halen and Fade Korimeer spent the next two years preparing for their ultimate push to found the Blackdust Mercenary Group. Halen spent most of his time forging contacts, gathering funds, and finding ways to establish a military base or bases in spots he had picked out in the Northeastern Territory of Nyx. Fade dedicated his time to tracking down the best pilots in the world, designing teams and assembling groups that might one day serve as units within the BDMG. Both began to scout for personnel that might be helpful to the BDMG in one way or another, and eventually developed a roster of thousands. Even with their considerable wills bent towards one cause, establishing the BDMG, Halen and Fade Korimeer might have failed. Raising the appropriate funding discretely, establishing a base of power in Nyx, and luring the appropriate pilots and soldiers to the frozen north would have been difficult at best. However, fate, it seems, was on their side. Two years into the two leaders' programs, three years ago, a third legendary figure entered their world. Jack Sisco, the world-renowned mercenary and Lightning Saix pilot, approached Halen. He offered to back their organization in exchange for a place among the Commanders of the Mercenary Group. Halen and jumped at the chance, and two partners became three. Construction on Blackdust Bay immediately, and Sisco's large personal fortune was suddenly at Halen's disposal. In one year's time (between three and two years ago), the BDMG (though it was not yet recognized as an independent nation), received the right to build in the Northeastern Territory, gained corporate status, and even military permits to ressurrect and retrofit an old, oversized Hammer Kaiser. This all happened extremely quietly and smoothly as Halen's contacts and Sisco's contacts arranged it all. However, the BDMG had yet to recruit any pilots. This all changed two years ago, when war broke out. The BDMG saw its chance, and had to act quickly. The Zi International Coalition ressurected an old tradition dating back to the days of the Guardian Force: recruit elite Zoid pilots to form an international peacekeeping unit. This wasn't exactly the good kind of competition, given that the ZIC had its eyes on many of the same pilots that the BDMG did. Further, the BDMG was largely unknown when compared to Zi International Coalition, meaning that the ZIC recruitment offered pilots more prestige than some small, obscure mercenary group. That's not to say the BDMG met with no success. They had been ready to move the moment a war broke out, whereas the start of the conflict had caught the ZIC off guard. Before hostilities even officially began, Fade Korimeer rallied to himself the elite team that he had been piecing together for the last two years. He had recruited every person he had intended too. The "special forces" contingent of the BDMG, the Omega Forces, had already definitively taken shape. The rest would be, Halen knew, a problem. The three Commanders of the BDMG had forseen competition for the top pilots and soldiers in the world once a war broke out, and had admitted that they would not get everyone they wanted. But the Commanders wanted a group of exactly 5,000, so they compiled a list of 10,000 candidates to choose from, each ranked a priority. What went on next was one of the single, most furious bid for pilots that Zi had ever seen, the ZIC and the BDMG each recruiting the elite as fast as they possibly could. One the ZIC's side, there was a long established tradition: international peacekeepers were well-established for their skill, courage, and their sense of justice. On the other hand, the BDMG offered a large salary and a budget to any pilot willing to join up with them. Oddly, many observers would say that neither of these factors decided the outcome of this recruiting struggle. The ZIC's military, over the many years of worldwide supremacy by the ZBC, had been all but disbanded. However, even then, the BDMG already had some famous names associated with it. Matthew "Fade" Korimeer and Jack Sisco were both renowned in their own rights, and the Omega Force that they had assembled was nothing short of a super-elite outfit. Many pilots saw the invitation into the BDMG as an invitation to join the ranks of the few and the elite, and salaries had little with many of their decisions. As the ZIC had yet to gain the aid of Bit Cloud and the Blitz Team, they had less drawing power, and ultimately gained fewer of the top pilots. More than a year ago, following the ZBC's recognition of the New Helic Republic as an independent nation, the BDMG gained nation-status as recognized by the ZBC. This raised more than a few eyebrows among the political analyists, as the Commission Council had debated the recognition of the NHR for almost a month with raging and heated argument on both sides. Acknowledging that they were no longer the world's sole power seemed a harsh blow to them. However, just a month after that, the BDMG's application for nationhood passed through the Commission Council with not a word of debate spoken. It is rumored that Jack Sisco was involved, calling in old favors from the highest level of government, and that a great deal of money also changed hands. Whatever the reason, the BDMG now lays claim to nearly a third of Nyx, the Northeastern Territory (the largest of the four Nyxian territories), and is recognized as an independent government by all other factions of the world. (This may be, in part, because it will not sell its services to a nation that does not recognize it as the same.) Though the BDMG has not yet picked sides in the war, simply claiming its rights as a neutral and continuing to import goods, Halen has hinted that he will soon be calling for the factions of the world to bid on the BDMG's services. As a note, though there are more than 10,000 people in the Northeastern Territory (the majority of whom are civilians working on Port Sisco), only the 5,000 soldiers of the BDMG are Blackdust citizens and carry Blackdust passports. The others are considered to be aliens associated with another faction, and actually carry visas. Military Information The Blackdust Mercenary Group, however, is not respected for the sheer size of its military. They are reknowned for the quality of their soldiery and the brillance of the their officers; the skill of their Zoid pilots and the ingenuity of their technicians. Though their numbers are far from an army, merely ranking among the Brigades, the 5000 Blackdust Mercaneries can probably outmatch any other 5000 soldiers in the world, including the elite units among the Zi International Coalition. Commander Halen has said from the start that the BDMG emphasizes quality over quantity, and that the small size of the group allows them to operate will unparalleled flexibility. The BDMG, therefore, may not boast any quantitative titles, but it boasts plenty of qualitative ones. For example, the BDMG armed forces as a whole have a higher Zoids to People ratio than any other armed force of unit of its size, having 200 Zoids to spread amongst its 5000 soldiers, (an astounded 4 per hundred soldiers, as compared to the standard 1 per hundred soldiers). General excellence is the name of the game with the BDMG, though. The footsoldiers and Zoid pilots alike are only the top, highly trained veterans from around the world, making the entirety of the nation act like one large Special Forces unit. Most of the Zoid Pilots are either former military or peacekeeper pilots, intermingled with the few Class S Zoid Pilots who went onto the open market following the outbreak of war. That is not to say that the BDMG emphasizes nothing. The Special Forces of the BDMG - the 1st Airborne and 1st Parachute Infantry (codenamed the "Omega Forces", nicknamed the "Dark Omegas) were handpicked by Matthew Korimeer himself, and are a notch or more above the rest. The feared 1st Parachute Armor, the Zoid Pilots of the Blackdust Omega Forces, consists of 12 pilots (13 counting Korimeer himself), all of whom are speculated to be among the top 25 in the world. The Blackdust Airforce is similarly structured, CMG Halen picking the best aerial combat pilots he could find from around the world. The First Fighter Squadron, the much-talked-about Black Eagles, is rumored to truly be an aerial force to be contended with. Unfortunately, with all the emphasized upsides of the BDMG, we tend to gloss over the downsides. The BDMG Navy is undersized at best, not even having a separate department within the armed forces and mostly relying on Sleeper Zoids to do what little work is assigned to it. Leadership is a point of excellence within the BDMG as well. The general army is managed by Senior Commander Jack Sisco, whose superb ability as a tactician, strategist, and Zoid Pilot cannot be questioned. The same can be said of Commander Matthew "Fade" Korimeer, who commands the special forces and the airborne. Halen is the mystery man among the trio, as his abilities as a pilot and leader have yet to be proven. War, they say, is quite a cruel proving ground, too... Thus far, however, every field test and war game has shown the BDMG to be a well-oiled machine and a force to be reckoned with. The Blackdust Flag, the Gold Eagle, is a powerful symbol, but many say that their Coat of Arms is far more accurate. The Blackdust Coat of Arms, which displays a dragon wrapping itself many times around a sword, is said to symbolize the Group itself. It is believed among military observers that this symbol may be accurate, the BDMG striking with all the speed and fierceness of one entity. The dragon symbology has also taken hold within the ranks of the BDMG itself, with many allusions and references to the Blackdust War Machine as the beast of legend. The BDMG was built to make money, mission statement and all. However, despite this, a strong nationalism runs through the ranks of the mercenaries, and many believe that the elite nature of their outfit makes them superior to their foes. This means that more than money ties the men to the group - indeed, not a single man has yet deserted or even expressed the desire to work elsewhere. The Blackdust Mercenary Group has not yet become available for hire on the open market, and cannot yet be employed by any of the other five factions. Despite this, Halen has announced that as soon as preparations for war are complete, his fighting force will be ready to enter the world scene. Bases of Note Blackdust Bay was originally noticed by a research team meaning to map out northern parts of Nyx when they realized that, on satellite photos of the region, they couldn’t tell the clouds overhead from the snow and ice beneath. At the time, however, the team hadn’t named the bay, they had merely assigned it a set of coordinates. When the first actual people stepped out of a specially modified Dragoon Nest and onto the “shore” of the frozen valley, it seemed to be snowing a black dust. Not knowing quite what to think or make of the phenomena, the researchers named the place Blackdust Bay, later discovering that the dust was ash, fried and then frozen, spewed forth by the nearest volcano: two hundred and fifty kilometers away. Blackdust Bay is now the home to the BDMs, though no one would ever think of calling it “sweet home”. Even the CMG has openly admitted that the only reason that the mercenaries took it without resistance was because nobody else wanted it. Built on a solid ice sheet and holding the dubious distinction of being the northernmost navigable bay on Zi, the frozen surface can reach temperatures of one hundred degrees below during the daytime: cold enough that prolonged exposure, even in standard winter gear, can prove harmful. At night, the thermostat can drop down to negative one-twenty, or even lower; lethal if someone leaves a door open. Strategically speaking, Blackdust Bay is impervious to ground assault. Wedged between two outwards-moving, kilometers-high glaciers, the bay has only one land entrance: the heavily guarded Chillwind Pass. On the sea front, the bay, being a bay, is exposed, but water temperature can be lethal in minutes for both people and Zoids not specially modified for Nyx aquatic activity. The ice patterns change daily, making for treacherous navigation, and most of the ice nearest the sea can’t even support a human, much less a zoid. Blackdust Bay isn’t much to look at, but most soldiers would agree that it’s highly mobile and safe, if nothing else. It consists of a small number of semipermanent structures, adapted Gustav trailers, and several shabby concrete buildings. Overall, the base is capable of supporting over almost two hundred Zoids and two thousand personnel. In the non-zoid part of the base, Blackdust Bay sports two barracks, repair bays, a field hospital, a recreational facility, several storage silos, two hydropondics domes, a number of portable generator complxes, a prison/jail complex, and a command center, essentially all made from renovated Gustav trailers. Thanks to the innovative design, most of the structures are even mobile, and can be moved via Gustav. It might not seem like much, but you can get a hot shower, and, in Blackdust Bay, sometimes that’s all that seems to matter. The tactical considerations of the Bay are worth a mention. Roughly ten kilometers to the north of Blackdust Bay is its only land entrance: Chillwind Pass. Though the Pass could easily have its own base description, suffice it to say that it is heavily monitored, guarded, patrolled, and fortified. Chillwind Pass itself is ideal for defense, being roughly a kilometer long but only 200 meters wide at its bulkiest point. Halen obviously keeps his own council on the subject, but is fairly obvious that Chillwind Pass is a chokepoint and is of great strategic importance in defense of Blackdust Bay. While this Pass might seem like a real gauntlet for an attacker to run, it is absolutely nothing compared to the sea approach. The five kilometer-long strip of ice and permafrost bordering on the sea between the glaciers is treacherous enough as is, as its exact border changes as thick layers of ice form and retract around it. However, Halen is not one to leave a location to its natural defenses. The entire stretch of ice, one it becomes permanent ice rather than randomly forming, is riddled with AZ and AP mines and coated with several thick layers of dragon's teeth. (Dragon's teeth are huge, tall, heavy steel and concrete spikes that prevent Zoids from moving through them, but have large enough gaps to allow infantry and infantry-launched AZ rockets through.) The security is so tight that even cargo shipments into the bay have to be loaded onto aircraft and ferried over. This appearance has leant this part of the Bay the name "the mouth of the Dragon", refering both to the dragon's teeth and the fact that it is on the doorstep of the Blackdust war machine. The Bay itself has its own defenses, including some 54 Zoids, both terrestrial and aerial. The waters off the Bay are believed to be mined, and the structures of the base are riddled with SAM sites and semi-permanent AZ missile turrets, along with other hidden defenses. Despite being incredibly small, the base is fortified to survive anything short of an all-out offensive. Name: Korimeer Army Proving Grounds Description: When the Blackdust Mercenaries finally became a nation, they found themselves having claimed and having been recognized as controlling all of the Northeastern Territory of Nyx. The Northeastern Territory is a pretty sorry location, is I do say so myself. There are few or no natural resources - just snow, mountains, volcanos, and old battle sites. Other than collect scrap and warn off the leftover ghosts of the last war fought here, the Commanders of the Blackdust Mercenary Group had little use for most of the Northeastern Territory. The Trans-Nyxian Mountain Range might have a few good sites for bases, and the accumulation of meteors from centuries of impacts might be interesting from the astrogeological perspective, but otherwise, few things of interest existed in Nyx. So, what did the BDMG do with a million square kilometers of land that they didn't have a use? Well, they created a use. It wasn't long before the founders of the Group picked up their pens and quartered off a million square kilometers of that land, one thousand kilometers on each side, to become the Korimeer Army Proving Grounds. This massive proving grounds includes few compounds, but more land and landscapes than you can possibly imagine. If you ignore the ubiquitous snow, there are beaches (with snow instead of sand), tundras, snow deserts, mountains, volcanos, hills, valleys, even old battle sites that can simulate current battle sites. There is also a good deal of aquatic territory, including lakes and parts of the ocean, for the undersea warriors to practice in. The Korimeer Proving Ground is the largest Proving Ground in the world, and one of the more diverse. Proving Grounds traditionally mean the proving of new weapons and techniques, but for the BDMG, it means something different: proving the man. Each and every Blackdust Mercenary had to run through a series of trials on Korimeer Proving Ground, proving his worth, and most continue to drill and practice there incessantly. In terms of military viability, the Korimeer Proving Ground is indefensible. If someone decided to invade half of it, the BDMG probably couldn't protect it. The unit assigned to it, the Bay Strikers, is technically charged with defending it, but this is unrealistic. There are 1000 Bay Strikers on the ground, and 1,000,000 square kilometers to protect. There are no bases in the region but a few interspersed monitoring stations, bolt holes, and supply stashes. The Bay Strikers themselves, (and the complement of bombers that joins them) have mobile bases in the form of transports. However, there is little more than barbed wire and a few intermittent signs to stop intruders from entering outside of a training times. When a drill is in progress, however, security is at its strictest. The entire drill area is quartered off and the Bay Strikers patrol to make sure no spys penetrate the perimeter. The trials performed here are probably among the most difficult known to humankind and all the militaries of the world: it is said that Matthew Korimeer demanded that he be allowed to personally evaluate every pilot (some say every soldier). Name: The Dragon's Den Description: The Dragon's Den is the Army Command of the Blackdust Mercenary Group, located somewhere within the Northeastern Territory of Nyx. Little is known about The Dragon's Den, because Senior Commander Jack Sisco insisted that it be built and operated in absolute secret. It is rumored to be nestled somewhere along or in the Trans-Nyxian Mountain Range, though only certain members of the Blackdust Mercenary Group know for sure. The veil of secrecy around The Dragon's Den is not without reason, because it is the hive center for the majority of the BDMG's military operations. If and when the BDMG becomes involved in armed conflict, a stationary base with known position would be all too vulnerable to cruise missile or ballistic missile attack. Blackdust Bay, being itself mostly semipermanent and highly could be evacuated or even moved quickly, whereas the good ship Dragon's Ante is highly motile. The Dragon's Den is the only large, permanent base that the BDMG possesses - even if no one knows where it is. A few things are known about The Dragon's Den. First and foremost, it has exactly 1,175 mercenaries permanently assigned to it and 46 listed by the BDMG tasked solely with its protection. Import records of insta-concrete mix, electronics, munitions, and other materials and components into Nyx suggest that the base is both large and state of the art, and that no expense was spared in its construction. Furthermore, the terrestrial Zoid force that defends The Dragon's Den is known as the "Ice Raptors", a battalion under the command of Omega 7 - an organoid. No one knows quite how or why this pairing works, but many agree that if an organoid can lead a force, that force would be a tough opponent to contend. Lastly, the history of the base's name is also known. Originally, the BDMG commanders wanted to name it "Fort Sisco" or "Sisco Base" or similar. However, the increasingly frequent "dragon" metaphors for the BDMG war machine appealed to the commanders. Eventually, they decided on the name "The Dragon's Den". Here is where the dragon roosts. You may not know where it is, but it is there, where the Dragon operates and strikes from. And here is where the Dragon lives. You have been warned.
Currency: Zian Dollar Suffrage: None Executive branch: Legislative branch: Political parties and leaders: None. Flag description: Golden eagle ringed by silver stars on black background with red sun in the middle behind the eagle. Coat of Arms description: Green dragon wrapping itself around a silver sword on black background. |
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