Tales of the Mimetic Badarses - Hole in the World

Title: Tales of the Mimetic Badarses - Hole in the World
Series: Battletech/Mechwarrior
Originally Published: April 2013, Classic Battletech Forums

By this point, everything in the Mimetic Badarses series was in place; we had our alleged heroes, we had the villains, we had their mercenary minions, we had the wildcard element and we had the vauge hint of greater mysteries waiting to unfold. Now was the time to use it.

Hole in the World picks up after the events of Deviants and moves the story into it's next stage. Re-established with their new recruits and new allies, the titular team would be looking for targets. Bringing them into contact with the main antagonists and giving them a chance to hit back as such seemed like the next logical step. In addition, it served as a great way to continue some of the overall plot threads of the series.

Tales of the Mimetic Badarses - Deviants

Title: Tales of the Mimetic Badarses - Deviants
Series: Battletech/Mechwarrior
Originally Published: January 2013, Classic Battletech Forums

While the Mimetic Badarses series had its protagonists and its antagonists, the idea of having a 'wildcard' third party was also in the overall storyline plan. Of course, the biggest problem with such was allways going to be introducing it and making sure it could fit into the overall story line. After considering several different options, the idea of a chapter dedicated to the subject seemed to be the best solution.

At the same time, there were other storyline problems that needed to be dealt with; after so long beating down the titular Badarses and stripping their resources away, it was time to start rebuilding them and giving back. The two objectives very nicely intersected to the one fic.

Red Asphalt

Title: Red Asphalt
Series: Battletech/MechWarrior
Original Publication: August 2012, Classic Battletech Forums

The last (for now) part of the Grand Theft Agro series, Red Asphalt serves as a wrap-up of sorts, closing off some storylines while opening new ones up. It also was intended to show the change and evolution in the timeline from the earlier fics; conflicts grew and forces became larger, but there would still be those people who, by their actions, can make a world of difference. It also serves to show the changes in the characters, their motivations and their goals, especially when a changing world shifts the proverbial goalposts.

As normal for me, there's a lot of character introduction. This is a necessity; very few carry-over characters appear in this one, which meant that a large cast of newcomers were required. However, a few of them should be sticking around for the future.

A Fistful of Trade Creds

Title: A Fistful of Trade Creds
Series: Battletech/MechWarrior
Original Publication: September 2011, Classic Battletech Forums

Sometimes random ideas just bite. And sometimes they join up with other random ideas and manage to form a coherent story as a result.

A Fistful of Trade Creds was one of those moments. The original concept for the fic come together over a (fantastic) dinner in my favourite Chinese Restaurant as a result of making fun of some in-jokes. It ballooned from there, attaching itself to other stray ideas before reaching its finished form. Surprisingly enough, unlike many of my fics, there were no major re-writes or redevelopments along the way.

While this fic runs parallel to the Grand Theft Agro series, it’s not really a part of it. There are no major GTA characters in it, and it doesn’t really affect the overall plot. On the other hand, it does continue the story of some of the minor characters.

The Best Laid Plans

Title: Best Laid Plans
Series: Battletech/MechWarrior
Original Publication: May 2012, Classic Battletech Forums

When I decided to upgrade Grand Theft Agro from a one-shot to a series, my mind began plotting out a long-term story arc; more to the point, it decided where to end that arc first and then worked backwards from there. Of course, that finale was a long way off and just about everything changed along the way, but a few elements of what was originally planned survived.

The end result was Best Laid Plans, a continuation from Salting the Earth featuring some of the (surviving) characters and incoperating the ending that I had planned all along. It also served as a handy end to one particular character set, bringing them up to the end of the published Dark Age material. For the moment,  this marks the end of their storyline, but not the end for them as a whole.

After all, with Era Report 3145 due soon there's no telling what may be within...

Tales of the Mimetic Badarses - Nothing but a Hound Dog

Title: Tales of the Mimetic Badarses - Nothing but a Hound Dog
Series: Battletech/Mechwarrior
Originally Published: November 2012, Classic Battletech Forums

One of my objectives in my fic writing series was to tie everything together to a degree. The concept was to have two series running in parallel with a third that would follow on to them, but all being interconnected. However, that fell apart very quickly as I got distracted, ran out of ideas and moved on to other things.

Nothing but a Hound Dog was based around some of those earlier concepts. Characters featured in this fic made their actual debuts in You are saying Impudence to me (Yet to be republished) with a backstory that was alluded to but not actually described. A part of this fic is dedicated to expanding upon that, filling out details and also better explaining characters and their motivations.

The other main goal of this fic is to expand upon the Bad Guys in two ways. The first being to bring more life to the Word of Blake force that had become the adversaries to our heroes. The second is to introduce the titular Hounds, a collection of Mercenary units working for the Word.

Tales of the Mimetic Badarses - Haven

Title: Tales of the Mimetic Badarses - Haven

Series: Battletech/Mechwarrior
Originally Published: March 2012, Classic Battletech Forums

Originally I had planned to alternate between Mimetic Badarses and Grand Theft Agro fics. However, that plan fell apart as I became more and more focused on the latter, resulting in a year-long gap between fics. It was particualrily galling as Haven here was conceived in 2010, but would go nearly two years before actually seeing the light of day.

A direct follow-on to Hotel California, the two fics began life as merely parts of the same story. However, as they both ballooned, they were split off, resulting in the substantial gap. The main point of Haven then became to end the story arc that starts with Stormfront, and begin the next one.