It is said that fate moves in mysterious ways and rare is the place this was more true then in the Eyes in the Myst stable. The stable began when a young soldier left home for the excitement of battle, to protect his family from harm, only to have them die in an earthquake, leaving him the sole heir of considerable funds. Likewise it was a cruel twist of fate that brought each warrior to the stable, whether it was a political twist or simply luck. And it was a twist of fate that restricted the mercenary units size to twelve, thus leaving half their numbers still to fight on Solaris, bouts which the soldier half bet on regularly in considerable amounts, enough to fund the growing expansion of the unit beyond anything regular mercenary service could do.
The Sons of the Dragon R&D is a fine example of a humanitarian business venture. Originally started as the Eyes in the Myst Stable on Solaris 7 in 3003, the EiM earned repute as one of the most stably well performing stables created, due in part to the tradition of hiring veterans of the 3rd Succession War as both fighters and trainers.
The stable performed so well that when owner, Harold Janson, retired in 3026 he signed the entire business over to his employees, signed each mech over to its pilot, and provided them with a small fortune to use as they saw fit to maintain the business. Jez Rictheron, an elite warrior, previously employed by the Kell Hounds was elected to lead the business.
His first decision was to split the EiM into two seperate divisions, the Solaris stable and a new company sized mercenary unit dubbed The Dragon's Teeth. Half the money left them was used to purchase a somewhat decrepit Union class dropship and a Scout class Jumpship. With so many employees having previously served with the military it was not necessary to hire an outside crew as the aged veterans taught the younger employees how to operate things.
The founding of the mercenary branch came just in time for the 4th Succession War, even though they were untried, their fighting record was good enough to earn them a mediocre 3 month assignment securing a underarmed Capellan world. The Dragon's Teeth proved far better then expected when they subdued any resistance in 8 weeks without losing a single unit and capturing no less then 8 operable (if damaged) Capellan mechs. They were quickly hired for more dangerous duties with a much higher pay rate, proving time and again an aptitude for unorthodox strategy and tactics.
With the conclusion of the war the Dragon's Teeth came out more then twice as strong as before. Their original contract had given the unit complete salvage rights providing them with the 8 captured mechs and a Leopard class dropship that had been in the midst of repairs at the space port. The money earned was enough to purchase 4 more mechs bringing the unit force to 2 companies, though a fair amount went into transporting the new units back to Solaris.
3030 brought another big decision which proved infinitely beneficial to the unit. With Wolf's Dragoons whittled down to only a fraction of their force it was believed by all but a few that the unit was dead. Jez Rictheron threw his total support behind the unit, transfering the extent of their mercenary forces to Outreach to provide additional defense and to serve temporarily as a branch service of the Dragoons to acquire income for the belegered unit.
When Wolf's Dragoons reappeared in all of its glory, Jaime Wolf offered the Dragon's Teeth several concessions for their aid. These included free use of the hiring hall, and free use of the Dragoons repair facilities until further notice. The better paying contracts with free services allowed both the mercenary and stable branches of the business to develop exponentially. By 3035 the mercenary unit was up to a full regiment, with transport resources for 75% of their units.
A 5 year hiatus on apparent funds finally became apparent in 3040 when a large number of jumpships appeared over Solaris, depositing massive structures purchased from across the Inner Sphere into a secluded part of the main city. Another year went into repairing and connecting the buildings before the new structure was officially christianed 'Sons of the Dragon R&D', a new battlemech construction facility made from parts of long destroyed star league era structures.
Over the next several years the three branches of business supported eachother leading to growth on all fronts. The Sons of the Dragon R&D in particular showed tremendous growth, developing from an original run of three mech designs to four times that number by 3050. In particular the Hyperion was proving a very popular alternative to the rare Atlas and the Gawain was highly prized by militia units.
When Dragon's Teeth forces were caught in the first wave of the Clan assault only a single battalion of the second regiment managed to escape but brought with them a boone of four Wolf omni mechs, heavily damaged but salvagable. With the help of the Dragoons, retooling of their factories to produce the new technology was a quick matter and whole new lines of mechs began to roll off the SotD productions runs just to battle the new clan threat. The upgraded Hyperion was amazingly popular at this point as all previous purchasers had been given special contracts allowing for 2 complete upgrades for 15 years after date of purchase. The newly designed upgrade easily surpassed even the new model Atlas for firepower.
With the conclusion of the first Clan Invasion the Sons of the Dragon R&D continues to produce some of the most advanced machines in the Inner Sphere, promising a bright future for the company.
Iron Wings Naval Assets was a subdivision of the Sons of the Dragon R&D team which was originally started in early 3055 with funding provided by Colonel Jaime Wolf of Wolf's Dragoons. Wolf requested plans for a new warship to help fill out the ranks for his forces as many of the ones brought from Clan space were in poor shape due to half a century of neglect.
Jez Rictheron used the initial funding to hire an entire design team from across the Inner Sphere to begin the process of designing a warship. When the plans crossed his desk 16 months later he set about paying for the construction of a shipyard dock at Kathil to begin producing the new Warship. When Jaime Wolf asked to see the plans in early 3058 he was given so but also presented with footage of the keel being layed. He was so surprised and pleased he immediately offered an additional 5% for the ship.
This single dock served as the Naval arm of Sons of the Dragon R&D until 3064 when enough funds had been produced, from the sale of the warships and the companies various other ventures, Rictheron funded the creation of two more docks and redesignated the facility Iron Wing Naval Assets.
The Creation of Iron Wings Naval played directly into the evolving combat style of the unit. Even before the Clan invasion, the Dragon's Teeth had begun to adopt a larger number of aerospace fighters then most any unit in the Inner Sphere. Where as the average unit consisted of 2 fighers per company for a total of 18 for a regiment. In 3050 the Dragon's Teeth fielded nearly 3 times that number for the 1st Regiment and no less then 22 for the 2nd Regiment.
The Clan war showed the advantages of aerospace units, while more fragile they could quickly decimate a battlemech formation while presenting a much more even combat field to their Clan counterparts. The Dragon's Teeth quickly put out a call for more aerospace fighters and pilots, units which were initially bought from other companies.
Never liking to be relient upon others, as soon as the new aerospace branch of the SotD R&D was christianed a design team began work on the first Dragon's Teeth fighter. These fighters have proven so successful that aerospace fighers have quickly come to outnumber battlemechs in the unit forces, serving aboard both Naval ships, in battlemech regiments, and even serving in the 3rd Regiment, composed entirely of aerospace fighters and LAM battlemechs.
Possibly the most famous accomplishments of the Iron Wings Naval Assets were the creation of Space mechs, an experiment in creating a unit that, while slower then an aerospace fighter, could match one in firepower, armoring, and surpass them in manueverability. Also it was theorized that a spacemech system could perform a number of special operations currently designated for space infantry. Much maligned for the first decade of their production, the Spacemech finally showed its abilities in the chaos of the late 3070s and throughout the 3080s.
In 3066 Iron Wings Naval Assets came directly to the Commanding General of the SLDF with a proposal. At the time the largest ship in the Comstar fleet, slated to officially transfer to the SLDF in 3071, was only in the Cruiser class. There was no strictly designed ship to serve in a command function for entire campaigns. Alvert Halbercot offered a new design to the SLDF to fix that, the Istari battlecruiser. After thorough examination the design was accepted and the keel for the first Istari was layed, though it did not leave port until 3088. In its time, the Istari became as famous as the Mckenna class.
Based on Battletech, Mechwarrior, and Aerotech.
