History of Strider's Strikers

Originally a lance of medium and light Mechs, the Strikers met hardship from the very start. The Strikers completed their first contract in the year 3058. The first four pilots included Mike Strider, Norbert Owens, Mark Pike, and Andrew Allen. The loss of Norbert "Set your hair on fire!" Owens greatly reduced morale during the unit's early days. However, founder Mike Strider worked to rebuild the lance and began looking for both a replacement and additional warriors to expand the unit. Gradually the team took on various small contracts with success, meeting old friends along the way and making countless new acquaintances.

Working under an exclusive contract with Comstar, the Strikers were lucky enough to aid in an assault against the Jade Falcons. Here they met Strider's old friend Xandar Harlow. Harlow was already living on the planet and working with Comstar against the Falcons. Other Comstar support consisted of two unlucky Comstar pilots, Adept Mace Volt and Acolyte Marc Lucas. Along with a samurai monk from the Draconis Combine named Duo Maxwell, the combined forces were able to defeat the Falcon forces in their area. All four warriors opted to join the mercenary unit after the battle had ended.

Meanwhile Clan Nova Cat officials had decided that a single exceptional Nova Cat warrior by the name of Devon Carns would be selected for an "experiment" with the Nova Cat's Inner Sphere allies. Relationships were strained already with the Inner Sphere peoples of the Irece Prefecture, which prompted the Clan leaders to initiate a plan of mutually beneficial integration. Deciding to form a bond with a small mercenary team to broaden their social relationship within their new realm and teach their Mechwarriors in tactics altogether new to the Clans, the Nova Cats selected the outrageously small Strikers as their starting point.

Feeling punished, Star Captain Devon reluctantly followed orders and aided the Strikers in a series of contracts. After a report from Carns many months later, Nova Cat officials decided that their warrior's acceptance into the Striker team was a positive solution to closing the wide gap between Inner Sphere and Clan warfare techniques.

While aiding locals during a fight, Strider and Carns found themselves in trouble with the local government officials. Two civilians, Ryan Allen and Rocky Potts, had gotten into gambling debts with members of the local law enforcement. The two Strikers' pilots assisted them out of pity and were targeted by the government leader afterwards. Besting the government's best Mechwarriors and making a powerful enemy, the unit left Trolloc Prime and began building a base on the Marik world of Wasat.

The mercenary team was eventually invited to Nova Cat space in 3060, whereupon they were issued a challenge by a hardline Crusader Nova Cat warrior. Devon Carns accepted the challenge, then defended his position in 3 on 3 BattleMech combat. Soundly defeating technologically superior challengers, the Strikers remained in Nova Cat space while receiving limited Clan and Inner Sphere technological aide. Shortly thereafter they accepted a contract on Wasat.

The unit made a local name for themselves after building a base on Wasat by running small contracts for civilians. Running afoul of the Trolloc Prime government's hired guns in 3059, which included a copycat posing as the legendary Bounty Hunter, the Strikers were nearly destroyed after a powerful attack against their stronghold. On Wasat the unit took two long-term contracts. One was a bounty hunt for an individual known as the White Thief. The other was a full-time Marik contract. The second contract called for monitoring of new Word of Blake units who had arrived on planet. The Strikers soon engaged members of one of those units in a Mech duel. Afterwards the team momentarily lost its commanders to the Vampire's Fangs mercenary unit. The Fangs were a new team formed solely by the Word of Blake forces, who were gaining considerable power on Wasat. Recruiting an artillery veteran and a former Knight of the Inner Sphere, remaining Striker members were able to face the captors. After defeating the Fangs under Mace Volt's instruction, the commanders were rescued and the Fang's rein was ended. Unfortunately the Strikers soon fell victim to the Toyama faction of the Word of Blake, who had carefully planned for the complete takeover of Wasat. The planet finally fell when the Strikers were forced to retreat, overwhelmed by two to one odds and facing further Blakist reinforcements. The units specifically aimed at the Strikers declared themselves The Denouncement, a scientist subcaste of the Toyama group. Without any of the other members' consent or knowledge, Mike Strider hired an assassin to eliminate those responsible in the group for the deaths of several Strikers killed during the invasion.

To strengthen their forces, the team underwent a massive expansion, nearly doubling their numbers. Using scouts on Solaris VII and Outreach, many new pilots were hired. They joined up with the Strikers unit en route to the Nova Cats' Irece Prefecture realm within Kuritan space. However, their Word of Blake enemies seemed to know no borders. They constantly hounded the unit, trailing them across light years and even braving the fury of the Nova Cats by venturing into the Irece Prefecture. The Blakist Denouncement group boasted their technological might on several occasions, though they failed to decisively win in any encounters against the Strikers' forces they faced.

Arriving in the Irece Prefecture of Clan Nova Cat in the Draconis Combine, the Strikers were joined by stars of warriors from both Clan Nova Cat and Clan Steel Viper. They garrisoned the planet Miranda in Clan Nova Cat space, where they fought Clan Wolf with the help of a newly arrived Clan Steel Viper star. That star then officially joined the Strikers unit. Shortly thereafter the team was mysteriously reunited with Norbert Owens, who had been MIA for the past 3 years.

After their regrouping, the Strikers split their forces to take on multiple contracts. Devon Carns led the Clan half of the unit against Steiner forces in the Federated Commonwealth Civil War. The Strikers showed their support for Victor Davion again when Duo Maxwell accepted a private contract by one of Steiner's enemies. Duo lead the majority of the remaining units in a campaign along the edges of Clan Jade Falcon/House Steiner space. Unfortunately Maxwell got more that he bargained for when his units were attacked multiple times by the Jade Falcons.

After Striker tank crews discovered the Acer's Hueys mercenaries' abandoned military base in the Labrea system, recovery teams investigated the area. A coded computer memory core that once belonged to the team was discovered. After computer specialists cracked the memory core, it was revealed that the Hueys were likely still around, still keeping the secret that nearly killed their unit some 25 years earlier. That secret was rumored to include the coordinates of a classified Star League era prototype Warship. Mike Strider and the command lance left the Labrea system shortly thereafter in search of the Hueys. When finally found in the Taurian Concordat, the Hueys agreed to help the Strikers in exchange for aid in obtaining a valid mercenary license.

Holden Trumphay was granted commanding duty of the remaining forces in the Labrea system of Clan Nova Cat. His role proved extremely important, as Word of Blake forces bent on the complete destruction of the Strikers amassed an incredible task force against the base while the rest of the team were away on contracts. Unknown to any of the Strikers, the Blakists had intercepted a Marik SAFE agent's transmissions. The Free World League's spy had gone undetected for years, and that agent's coded messages provided the Blakists with the perfect information. They could hit the mercenary unit at its weakest time while only garrison forces remained to guard the main base on Miranda.

Trumphay was able to hold off the Blakist Denouncement group for weeks, bluffing that he held the Warship coordinates that the Blakists were seeking and would destroy the data if attacked. Trumphay's desperate gamble worked long enough, buying him time to recruit another mercenary unit to defend the Strikers' assets. Though the new unit, called The Crusaders, proved more than a match for the Blakists they encountered, the combined units were grossly outnumbered. The base was abandoned, with The Crusaders and the Strikers escaping into the nearby Gustus mountains.

Thanks to communications aid by the Baron of Wasat, the other subdivisions of the Strikers unit were alerted to the situation. As these other groups returned with Acer's Hueys allies and from their various contracts, the team was slowly able to counter the Blakists. Knowledge of the surrounding terrain, as well as a lucky strike against a Blakist repair facility, helped the three mercenary groups to best the Blakist forces after a bloody year of fighting. The tide turned after Clan members led by Devon Carns challenged the Blakists to a direct confrontation in the Stricken Desert. The Nova Cats' and Steel Vipers' combined forces made short work of all foes foolish enough to accept the proposition.

With Blakists on the run planet wide and a naval blockade preventing any Dropships from retreating from the planet, the Strikers had all remaining enemies cornered. Unfortunately the surviving Blakists, backed by the Vampire's Fangs mercenaries again, were able to turn the public against the Strikers. Hundreds of civilians were killed in bloody crossfires by the Fangs Mechwarriors, which successfully framed the Strikers and set all local governments against the team. With the final defeat and capture of the remaining Blakist supporters, Strider's Strikers retreated from the public eye and fell silent for several months. They faced weeks of riots outside their base and small arms militia blockades that cut them off from supplies for nearly one month. Only after playing recorded confessions of the atrocities by pilots of the Vampire's Fangs could they finally begin calming local peoples and start earning the public trust once more.

Shortly after the defeat of the Blakists, the Strikers and Hueys developed a recovery team specifically for the lostech Warship. After two botched recovery operations, the teams were able to capture the Warship from a group of pirates who had taken control of it. They immediately began hiring crew members for the vessel through a series of 'cover up' contracts, hoping to protecting themselves. They had still yet to realize that a Marik spy had infiltrated their unit years earlier. The cover ups worked to a limited extent, but Clan members of the unit released the information without restraint to their superiors, starting with Sasha Breen of the Steel Viper members. Political infighting between Clan and Inner Sphere members reached a high point, with both sides claiming freedom to keep or hide such information from outsiders.

In 3067, the Strikers internal security group released two secrets they had uncovered. One was the fact that a Marik spy had been transmitting messages from the base's computer systems. The second, possibly more damaging secret was that Mike Strider had hired an assassin covertly. Because the Clans' honor and integrity was on the line, Strider was immediately challenged for his dishonorable behavior by Clan members. After losing a fight to Devon Carns, Strider was humbled when he was relieved of his command. However his position was returned shortly thereafter by Carns. This decision was criticized by other Clan members almost immediately, but Carns successfully guarded his choice by warning of a second Trial of Refusal to any who doubted his command and intellect.

Before they could prepare the proper defenses, the Strikers faced the Ghost Bears in a Trial of Possession for the Arbiter Warship. Through careful bargaining done by Devon Carns and Mechwarrior Savalas, the Strikers bid perfectly. The Bears failed to capture the ship, but also dealt a great blow to the Striker defenders.

Surviving all that had been thrown at them in the last 3 years, the Strikers stepped up their training programs. Though their goal was to be better prepared for events like the Blakist attack of 3065, units led by Duo Maxwell instead met with tragedy while training on the moon of Trilobite in the Labrea system. A nuclear weapon was detonated, seemingly by Blakist survivors, which killed several members of the team. Many of those that survived the devastation died later of radiation sickness.

Adding to the destruction wrought by the nuclear bomb of Trilobite, Blakist death squads attacked the Strikers main Headquarters and barracks area. When the command company's building was hit, both Devon Carns and Mike Strider were killed during the attack. The loss of several other key members figuratively brought the team to its knees. Most of the surviving Strikers theorized that the Word of Blake possessed some kind of secret support system that had actively produced nuclear weapons and other military arms in vast quantities. The unit benefited from Acer's Hueys support but lost that crutch when the Hueys went to Outreach to defend their own case for a new mercenary license issuing.