Angus Labov

Angus Labov is an oddity amongst the Clan, a Warrior who willingly went down to being a Merchant before being forced back into service. A skilled commander, politician and logistician, Labov would likely have been a better fit for the Diamond Shark leadership during the Clan Invasion than Ian Hawker. He helped with the reconstruction of the Shark’s touman and supported the McKenna Edicts after being put back into he spotlight.

Early Life

Angus was born in 2998 in a mixed sibko of Clan Diamond Shark with no real expectations. Even early on, the sibko was pushed towards mercantile and technical prospect rather than military ones, which informed Angus’s early life with the necessities of logistics and strong technical support for the Warrior caste. Rather than allow himself to take the easy path to one of the “lower caste”, Angus stuck with the Warrior training and became one of the rare cadets to reach the full MechWarrior part of the training without washing out. Even there, his military skill were not top-notch but were sufficient to allow him to join the touman as a MechWarrior.

First Military Career

Growing Pains

Angus Diamond Shark was stuck in a difficult position at the start of his career as there was not much room for advancement in the merchant Clan. He settled in a position in Alpha Galaxy, where he reached Star Commander after 2 years. While there was some rumbling regarding an invasion of the Inner Sphere and the Dragoon Compromise, Angus Diamond Shark was happy to simply do his duty while also managing the unit’s supply stashes.

Through his work, Angus slowly got in the good graces of the 21^st Assault Cluster’s Star Colonel, who put him up as an Executive Officer to the elite Cluster. After a few more years, Angus had climbed to Star Captain and oversaw the supply lines for the Cluster and managing the various dropship inventories and equipment loadouts. When Star Colonel Curtis Nagasawa retired in 3041, Angus took the position of Star Colonel. This promotion put him on the board for an opening in a Labov Trial of Bloodright, the second one Angus would participate in after failing to achieve a Bloodname in 3035. This time, he triumphed over multiple much younger opponents.

Placement Trials

Angus Labov having mainly Crusader ideals (even though he was liberal in many other aspects) was allowed to keep his command by Khan Ian Hawker. As the commander of an elite unit, Star Colonel Labov fully expected his unit to be called up once a plan for the invasion of the Inner Sphere would be drafted up despite his age.

He was honored to be selected with his unit to take part in the Placement Trials for the Invasion, even though he objected to the concept itself of the Trials as he believed all of the Clans should be mobilized for the invasion. He had submitted (in triplicate) an invasion plan, timeframe, objectives and logistics chain to his own Khan (who ignored it), the ilKhan (who never even saw it) and Ulric Kerensky (who was quite interested by it and applied some of it to Clan Wolf during the invasion).

During the Placement Trials, Labov initially lost to Clan Star Adder, who had bid less aggressively than many had anticipated. During the second and third round against the Hell’s Horses and Goliath Scorpion, Angus Labov was more careful in his bidding and made sure his units were well-supplied for long term engagements, drawing out the fight until they had the advantage. He finally fought against the Steel Vipers, where things ended in more or less a standstill until a lucky air support mission destroyed one of Labov’s hidden supply train.

Merchant Factor

Early Retirement

Through a combination of factors, mainly regarding his counsel being ignored by everyone and his final loss against the Vipers, Angus Labov decided to retire from active duty right before Operation REVIVAL to focus on merchant work. He was immediately put in as a saFactor after his retirement due to his military career and bloodname, and became Merchant Factor right before the Battle of Tukayyid. This is when his politics also shifted from Crusader to Warden as he saw the result of the Invasion from a third party perspective.

After the Battle of Tukayyid, Labov was contacted by SaKhan Barbara Sennet to begin a complete revamp of the Shark’s now depleted touman. While he originally only started trade and production of new equipment, he was told that the sheer number of losses would require rapid reactivation of reserves and “early retirement” commanders. As the Diamond Sharks were flying back to Strana Mechty for the election of the next ilKhan, Angus Labov began putting out lists of officers which needed reinstated which had been sidelined by Ian Hawker’s purge of Warden leaders along with proposing a Minus-One Testing setup to bring back warriors into the fray.

Minus-One Testing Era

saKhan Barbara Sennet was happy with the early proposal given to her by the Merchant Factor while Khan Ian Hawker had to work to get in the good graces of the new ilKhan. The early McKenna edicts which led to the Clan Reformation were very much in line with Angus Labov’s own ideals and reconstruction efforts. The reopening of Brian Caches allowed the Merchant Factor to aggressively trade for new war materiel for the Clan, while all other merchants were given strict instructions to acquire as much “new equipment” as possible to reinvigorate front line forces.

The Minus-One Testing was the other large initiative by the Diamond Shark, which was later copied by other Clans as the expansion of their touman began under the new McKenna Edict. Active reserve Warriors were allowed to return to full time service with a one-rank demotion, potentially down to the new “Second-Line Warrior” rank. Inactive reserve (like Labov himself) would need to do a new Trial of Position at one rank lower than initially. Many of those trials were done through simulator or with blank ammo to limit losses of materiel and personnel.

Due to his involvement in the whole rebuilding of the Shark’s touman, Angus Labov was approached by the ilKhan Council to become a part of it. Angus declined, however, saying that his responsibilities was toward his Clan first in its time of need. Some expected this would damage his reputation, but it actually improved it within the Sharks.

Full Reactivation

Challenge to Leadership

Problems began in 3056 when Angus Labov’s work was in full force. A few more aggressive warriors within the Diamond Sharks started claiming that the Merchant Caste had taken over the Clan, and blamed Labov for it. Even with the protection of the saKhan and the indifference from the Khan, accusations against the Merchant Factor accumulated, leading him to have to face a Trial of Grievance from an angry Star Colonel which was denied supplies due to having requested too many too quickly.

Angus was given a derelict Glass Spider to fight, which he managed to recondition in time for the trial. With a pair of gauss rifles, Labov easily dispatched his opponent’s “short ranged focused” Grendel OmniMech. While he would have been content with remaining a Merchant Factor, this automatically placed him back as a Star Captain within the touman due to the Minus-One Testing policy. Within 6 months, he had already reached the rank of Star Colonel, acting as executive officer under saKhan Barbara Sennet and as a contact officer to the ilKhan Council.

SaKhan At Last

Ian Hawker multiple failures and lack of leadership during Operation ISLANDHOPPERS forced him to take radical measures to show prove his leadership, leading to his death on Chupadero in 3060. Barbara Sennet took her position as Khan of the Diamond Sharks, with the majority of the bloodnamed warriors supporting Angus Labov as saKhan.

Remaining close to the ilKhan Council, saKhan Labov was able to secure multiple advantageous trade deals for his Clan to keep the units on the Inner Sphere front well equipped. As Clan Ghost Bear relocated their entire operation to Alshain from the Homeworlds, saKhan Labov provided ships to carry the lower caste members to the Inner Sphere while also negotiating the appropriation of Ghost Bear holdings through trade rather than trials. Labov presided over the acquisition and production of more than a hundred JumpShips for the Clans in general through agreements with the Free Guilds. He also supported the ilKhan Council’s plan to expand recharge and resupply stations through the Exodus Road to better accommodate travel between the two regions of space.

Personal Life

While more open-minded than many Clan warriors, especially future Khan Ian Hawker, Angus Labov was originally a Crusader, allowing him to remain in command of front-line units during Hawker’s purges, but he was critical of the way the Invasion was prosecuted in general. Most of his predictions came to light after the disastrous results of the Battle of Tukayyid, which he did not dare attribute to Ian Hawker until after he was restored to his position in the touman. His political ideology changed to fully support the McKenna Edicts, which would be closer to a Warden position.

Angus Labov maintained a relationship with a Merchant caste member named Jane since his early days as a Warrior. While this would normally have hurt his political aspiration, he remained popular with the troop as he always strangely managed to have “just in time” resupply. He later had two freeborn children, the first one completing the full, grueling freeborn sibko before the Clan invasion. He later won his Bloodname during Operation ISLANDHOPPERS. Labov’s second child, Remy, has recently completed training in a freeborn sibko and has joined a second-line galaxy.

Angus Labov’s BattleMech

In his first outing as a MechWarrior, Angus Labov piloted a Mad Dog. After his reactivation, he maintained a Glass Spider.