The Cracked Canopy

The Cracked Canopy is a popular MechWarrior Bar in Solaris City's International Zone.

Overview

Located on the corner of Memorial Avenue and Defiance Street, the venue took up the entire bottom floor of a three-story building five blocks from the spaceport, and featured a cracked Catapult BattleMech canopy rumored to be from a Word of Blake 'Mech mounted over the main doors. It was an open, bright place, with light wood dominating the décor. Monitors are mounted at strategic locations allowing patrons to watch anything from Mech fights to soap operas.

The Memory Wall

One of The Cracked Canopy's most notable features is the "Memory Wall" that displays mementos of glorious victories and defeats during the Jihad or the Clan Invasion, both on Solaris VII and elsewhere, of honorable loyalties and venomous betrayals, of lifelong friendships and lost loves, to serve as a remembrance of those lost, ensuring that the past will not be forgotten. Either hanging or sitting on small shelves attached to the wall, each enshrined object has a story to tell and anybody is allowed to place an item on the wall as long as it is inorganic and non-Blakist.

• Numerous framed photos of either MechWarriors, other soldiers or groups of civilians.
• Plaques with engraved names.
• Many unit patches, including one from Draconis Combine First Sword of Light.
• Various religious symbols.
• Various Armor pieces displaying insigina of various military units and Solaris Stables current and past, including a tattered banner of the original Blackstar Stables.
• A broken katana hung next to a still intact claymore.
• A framed three paned picture featuring a Waco Rangers unit patch, a photo featuring Manny Totske, Ariadne Sherbow, Parker LaBelle and Hector Shirotan and an armor piece engraved with "Waco Rangers. 3007-3058 - Blind Arrogance Killed Us."
• A Kallon Industries autocannon shell in full casing, the name Justin Xiang stenciled on it with red crosshairs, supposedly from Philip Capet's Rifleman.
• A drinking horn fashioned from the tusk of some impossibly large animal.
• A limite-edition resin figure of Natasha Kerensky.
• A metal toy Buccaneer from Ham, a MechWarrior survivor from Outreach.
• A rippen in half card of jack in spades representing a Raven 'Mech.
• The wedding ring from the Red Wraith.
• A small piece of the Lumberman's Axe's bar of the razed town of Scranton's Mill.
• The knife used by Abel Mauser to kill the Blakist preceptor Aaron Kutuzov, the destroyer of Scranton's Mill.
• Leo's cut leather's boncord.
• A fragment of Salutaris Rex-like Dyno egg shell from Caph, leaved by the Silent Reapers' general Anoris McFaris.

Employees

• Leo - general manager who frequently speaks with patrons with items that end up on the "Memory Wall".
• Sedge - Day bartender circa 3090.
• Ms. Silver - The Cracked Canopy's unseen owner.

Notes

The Cracked Canopy was first introduced as a framing device for the Tales from the Cracked Canopy series in the Shrapnel magazine, a spiritual successor to the Tales of the Cobalt Coil from the BattleTechnology magazine. The individual stories usually revolve around an item on the "Memory Wall" and its background story as narrated by the patron who donates the item to the wall, usually within a framework story narrated in the first person by bar manager Leo.

Bibliography

• Tales from the Cracked Canopy: Blind Arrogance
• Tales from the Cracked Canopy: Shadows of the Past
• Tales from the Cracked Canopy: The Devil's Luck
• Tales from the Cracked Canopy: The Razor's Edge of Opportunity
• Tales from the Cracked Canopy: The Red Wraith
• Tales from the Cracked Canopy: Silent Roar