THR-01A THALESTRIS
Built by Rigor-Platt Dynamics in 2764, the THR-01A Thalestris was rushed through prototyping and into production right in the final days of the Star League, fueled by one of many gargantuan defense contracts put out by the SLDF to increase its military might.
Weighing in at 80 tons, the Thalestris was described by at least one SLDF commander as “two Shadowhawks in one pair of pants” and its detractors decried it as being too generalized, a complaint often leveled at the Shadowhawk as well. Another nickname given to the Thalestris during its short service was The Squabblemaster, due to its superficial resemblance to the larger, 85 ton Battlemaster.Only a handful of THR-01As were produced before the fall of the Star League, as the board of Rigor-Platt Dynamics had big dreams and was in the process of moving the entirety of their industrial operations to Terra to better and more directly serve the SLDF when the Amaris Coup hit. The R-PD factory was commandeered and retooled to produce parts for experimental super-heavy LAM designs instead, catering to one of many crazy dreams of Stefan Amaris which, for better or worse, never came to fruition. The few Thalestris ‘Mechs which survived the coup were hidden away by ComStar, and kept as backup units for the defense of Terra. These few were eventually either destroyed or were captured by the Word of Blake at the beginning of the Jihad. Only a single surviving 'Mech can attest to any Thalestris ‘Mechs existing after the Jihad.
BATTLE HISTORY
When the THR-01A was first field tested against four ancient drone Merkava Mk VI tanks in an intentional echo of the first combat test of the Mackie, most of the guests who had come for the champagne and fireworks only paid a minimal amount of attention to the Thalestris as it solidly stomped the opposition into the ground. More serious investors would later comment on the test by saying that it was a lackluster way to introduce a ‘Mech that Rigor-Platt Dynamics was trying to push as the next, most desirable piece of military hardware. The board of Rigor-Platt had no response to this on record at the time, though notes have been found of at least one board member, Daniel K. Frodlund, saying that he’d worked very hard to dig up four operational Merkava Mk VI tanks, and that anyone who didn’t appreciate the test could go eat a bag of [REDACTED].
Scant extant records seem to indicate that those few THR-01A ‘Mechs which survived on Terra into the Jihad were destroyed in their hangars as victims of nuclear bombardment. Only a single Thalestris is known to have been transported off of Terra during the course of the Jihad, and then only at the behest of a Blakist collector who arranged the transfer out of a desire to preserve for himself a piece of history that might otherwise have been completely lost.
Comments
Post a Comment