If Auld Acquaintance Be Forgot...
Sarna News
| If Auld Acquaintance Be Forgot... | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Serialized novella by Michael A. Stackpole | |||
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| First Publication | |||
| Published | 15 June 2020 — 15 June 2021 | ||
| Published in | |||
| Publisher | Catalyst Game Labs | ||
| Illustrator(s) |
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| Pages |
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| MSRP | $3.99 (EPUB) | ||
| Chronology | |||
| Era | Succession Wars era | ||
| Timeline | 24 December 3010 — 24 July 3011 | ||
| Series | |||
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If Auld Acquaintance Be Forgot..., subtitled A Kell Hounds Story, is a serialized novella by Michael A. Stackpole that was published in four parts in the first to fifth issue of Shrapnel.
The story seamlessly continues the Kell Hounds Ascendant series. The first part was published in the inaugural issue of Shrapnel in June 2020. Parts 2 and 3 were released in the following two issues, but Part 4 being delayed until Issue 5. On 27 November 2023, the story was republished as a stand-alone novella in EPUB format and again, on 1 December 2023, as part of the extended omnibus edition of Kell Hounds Ascendant.
From the Back Cover[edit]
A RACE AGAINST TIME…
Fresh off saving Prince Ian Davion of the Federated Suns, Morgan Kell returns home to find his paramour, Veronica Matova, has vanished without a trace. Desperate to find her, Morgan tasks the Hounds to track her down—and uncovers a conspiracy to destroy the Kell Hounds’ reputation using Veronica as a hostage.
While Morgan races against time to locate her, Patrick engages in a dangerous game cat-and-mouse with their unknown adversaries, pulling every trick in the book to stay one step ahead of whoever wants to take the Kell Hounds down. But these shadowy enemies don’t realize who they’re dealing with…and no force in the Inner Sphere will help them once Morgan Kell finds them…
Plot Summary[edit]
On Zavijava, Morgan Kell finds on 24 December 3010 that his love interest Veronica Matova has been abducted by what seems a very professional and powerful agency. Ian Davion, thankful for the Kells having just saved him from a random raid by the Ion Knights - a unit of holovid MechWarriors moonlighting as real pirates - during his secret stay on Zavijava, pledges his support and provides help through Quintus Allard, who begins to work on the case together with Morgan Kell. The hunt for the kidnappers finds the nascent Kell Hounds facing the various enemies again that they've made since their inception three months ago:
Before long, they have zeroed in on the kidnappers' safe house. But when they storm the hideout on 28 December to rescue the captive, whom they believe to be Veronica, they find out that it is in fact Ion Knights leader Constantine Fisk - they have stumbled across an unrelated kidnapping. After the failed Ion Knights raid the actor had gone to ground masquerading as a woman, but the local Einhoven gang, being fans of the Ion Knights show, recognized and abducted the washed-up actor, hoping to ransom him to a studio (and unawares that Fisk had turned to real piracy because his career was on the decline).
On 30 December, Thomas Ryan, the real kidnapper contacts Morgan on behalf of his unknown principal (whom he refers to as his client) and sets three conditions for her safe return, the second and third to be revealed only after the completion of the previous one. The first demand is that the Kell Hounds raid the Mecklenberg Economic Opportunity Compound in the South Coast district on Zavijava, a freeport storage area taken over by the Barovsky crime syndicate, to retrieve certain items. In the process they are to neutralize the syndicate forces, with the implication that seeing the Barovskys punished is even more important than the items themselves to the unknown principal. Kell ostensibly carries out the mission but manages to convince crimelord Ivan Barovsky that they have a common enemy and makes a deal with him.
Meanwhile, they decide that fugitive Ion Knights pirates are the most likely to have kidnapped Veronica. Hoping to make these ex-Ion Knights reveal themselves, they hire a hack writer and use Constantine Fisk's knowledge of the unit and its failed raid to produce a book version deliberately seeded with errors that would be corrected through regular updates. Commercial data returns show where the book and its updates are purchased. Combining this data with a variety of special items that Morgan knows to be associated with Veronica marks Dubhe, a Silver Hawks Coalition planet in the Free Worlds League, as a place of extreme interest. The Kell Hounds stage a raid, easily overpower the militia and indeed identify three former Ion Knights among their ranks. Duping them into contacting Count Markham Somokis, the mastermind behind the Ion Knights' attempt at real piracy, allows the Kell Hounds to find Somokis' residence on the planet, the Villa Vino Verde, and stage a rescue raid on 15 May. Somokis is indeed behind the kidnapping of Veronica Matova, and is killed by the rescuers when he tries to kill her on the way to his safe room. But something is amiss; the brothers Kell deduce that Somokis worked for someone else yet. Worse, Veronica Matova feels that she has been broken, and refuses to continue a relationship with Morgan. She does, however, agree to help finding the true mastermind - on the condition that it would her hand to wield the knife when his heart would be carved from his chest.
While Patrick Kell tries to determine how Count Somokis received his orders from his master, three messages reach the Kell Hounds: One from the court on Tharkad, ordering the Kell Hounds to Alioth II to deal with trouble stirred up by "the Chosen", members of the Church of Jesus Majificent, an organisation the Kell Hounds had clashed with and pacified back on Galatea; one from Thomas Ryan, ordering Morgan Kell to arrange a public and highly publicized reunion with Ian Davion by September that would suggest the Kell Hounds were going to work for the Federated Suns soon; and one coded message that Patrick identifies as orders to Count Somokis to deliver Veronica Matova to Galatea as soon as possible. Morgan decides that Patrick should lead the Kell Hounds mission to Alioth II while he himself will go to Galatea with Veronica.
On Alioth II, Patrick Kell clashes with Sachi Treyford who speaks for the governor and wants him to clear out the Chosen from their New Eden enclave. She is unhappy with Patrick's reluctance to use brute force, but he finds out that her family actually owns Wellway Systems, a biotech enterprise, and obviously seeks to purchase the New Eden area because of a potent narcotic that the Chosen harvest there. Confronting her with this knowledge Patrick forces a seething Treyford to accept a peaceful solution.
Meanwhile on Galatea, Veronica Matowa has concluded that the only man with a grudge against both the Kell Hounds and herself who also knew Count Somokis was crimelord Haskell Blizzard, whom the Kells had dethroned and effectively destroyed when they ran afoul of him upon arriving on Galatea. She surrenders herself to a meeting with Blizzard. However, Morgan Kell is also present on Galatea; his highly publicized meeting with Ian Davion on Northwind that was demanded to ensure he could not interfere on Galatea was a ruse (he has sent Constantine Fisk to impersonate him, as the actor had always wanted to play Morgan Kell). He has also brought Barovsky and his henchmen, who are in fact staffing the bar where the meeting is taking place. Having cornered the vengeful Haskell, Morgan reveals to Veronica that he kept her in the dark about knowing Haskell to be behind it all. Since Veronica is having a personal crisis and feels Somokis, and by extension Blizzard, broke her, and expressed a need to kill them in order to find out who she is, Morgan hands her a knife, tells her that he doesn't think she is broken, and gives her the choice on what she will do...
Featured Characters[edit]
Featured Units[edit]
- Kell Hounds
- Ion Knights (mentioned)
Featured Places[edit]
Featured BattleTech[edit]
BattleMechs[edit]
DropShips[edit]
- Overlord-class 'Mech carrier DropShip, Argent Saber
- Union-class 'Mech carrier DropShip, Argent Spear
- Unclear DropShip-class, Queen's Gambit