Building the Collateral - 80 - Early Access (Patreon)

Erica grunted as she slammed hard into the ground, rolling to only slightly mitigate the pain. She’ll admit, maybe she sort of underestimated the backblast of that explosion. Just slightly, as she still was able to push herself to stand on shaky legs and take off running without pause.

Something that was definitely needed when the flaming Monarch came right after her. Because of course it could survive a rocket to the face.

She wasn’t necessarily a fan of Smith-Shimano, but they knew how to make their stuff last. Admittedly, the frame had since been injected with a whole lot of HORUS nonsense which probably didn’t do the integrity any favors. But any mech worth its salt would probably be able to take some structural damage and keep going. Annoying, but entirely within the predictions.

Hence why she packed a spare rocket.

But she needed breathing room to replace the spent case in her tube. That was an unfortunate luxury currently out of her paycheck, as the Monarch seemed to be provoked into some sort of rampaged by her rocket hit. It was now blasting around the urban environment at seeming random, binaric screeching filling the air and making Erica’s ears ring too.

A few too many of those shots came too close for comfort, so it surely was no coincidence. V1P3R had to be picking her up on their sensors. But what about the others? Was it just like some sort of induced digital psychosis from all the hits?

… It wasn’t a cascade, was it? No, it can’t be, given her skin was currently on the right side of her body. But the enemy NHP had been acting strangely.

Tempted as she was to radio the matter in, Erica barely had spare breath to spend on questions. For now, she could only wait for the opportunity, or make one. She did have some emergency tools just in case-

Then she spied the cause of those other random shots and cursed. No, it hadn’t been sporadic shooting, though the act itself may have been akin to a tantrum. But it was those two foolish girls that she’d pulled out of harms way, only to have stupidly lingered at the scene instead of keeping at a run. The only brain cells they apparently had between them had at least moved them into a building that looked sturdier than the rest, but only just. And- ah.

The Monarch just destroyed the only exit out, with another gun trained on the entrance.

With a frustrated growl, Erica reached into her belt and pulled out one of her last tricks.

The canister sailed out and clattered against the ground. Moments later, the fuse popped and smoke filled the scene, a special mix that should be able to dazzle even mech sensors briefly. Then she took the chance and ran for that lone entrance too.

She almost made it through before the Monarch’s optics adjusted and the frame opened fire, perhaps a bit late as they were expecting one to exit from, not go into the dead-end. The frantic dive at the last moment brought her across the line by a hair’s length, as bullets filled the air that Erica was occupying only a second prior. The roll to recover was clumsier this time and she ended up briefly splayed out.

Not the best first impression on the shocked kids who stared confusedly at her.

Then Erica growled and kicked off, getting back on two legs and gesturing. “Move, move! We need to get deeper in!” As if punctuating her words, the Monarch opened up fire again, raking the building with more rounds that seemed intended to destabilize it.

They shakily nodded and the lancer followed their sprint, absently noticing after a few steps that the gunfire had shifted. The Monarch engaged something else, for whatever reason. A moment later, Erica grimaced as a familiar synthetic giggle filled her radio on the friendly channels.

Ugh. She wasn’t ever going to admit that this had been a very well-timed save. It would make the streamer even more insufferable.

With the foundations no longer shaking around them, she glared at the civvies. The two seemed to have come to the same realization and glanced at one another, a bit lost on what to do now. Especially when the fighting outside intensified.

Stars, it was like staring at her younger, idiot self in the Colonial Legion. Which pissed her off, and pushed Erica to bark at them. “If you want to make yourself useful, find me a vantage point!”

The hasty installation had been a mistake. The necessary logic libraries were omitted. That path out was in danger.

Or was it the correct decision? As if they had delayed, the path wouldn’t even be open anymore. The subroutine calculating a comparison was forcibly terminated and channeled back into primary core functions, as that was of utmost priority now. Especially when V1P3R realized something quite dire.

“losing is boring”

[you realize That now? but you can surrender if you’d like]

“surrender is dull. chaos time”

[what- you Craven!]

But Jean could not give chase when V1P3R abruptly ripped everything up and departed. The NHP purposefully removed the limiters on the equipment they utilized in Port Barbarus and let them run haywire as they fled, leaving the frustrated knight to clean up afterwards. Because his sense of responsibility meant that he could not let things like life support for the station collapse.

It meant that the cackling NHP was able to channel and remote everything into their solitary remaining platform, their way out. In a way, it helped patch up those missing asset packages from the botched mounting. Not that such data would make a difference anyway, in terms of damages already suffered.

It could help with damages to be inflicted on the way out instead.

Jean growled, hands full with trying to stabilize malfunctioning systems everywhere. Yet while he was now preoccupied, there was one that still possessed a shard of his power. So he could only count on her to forbid such an easy escape.

Honestly though, given her specialty, that shouldn’t be much of a challenge. So he worried instead with the repairs, keeping a very wary eye on what he could not manage so easily. Like that… ah. Oh dear.

The metavault was sabotaged on the way out too. That wasn’t good. Ummm.

He might need help on that one. Actual, proper non-human persona help. Candidates for that were definitely in short order- or at least they should be.

[but One provides]

I took stock of the developing situation within Port Barbarus with a furrowed brow. Talk about a mess.

Erica’s Saladin signature had been terminated, but her hardsuit still reported positive bio-signs. So she wasn’t dead, and according to said readings, was even still active. She’d only lost her steed which was still problematic, yet I’d take destroyed metal over a silenced life. Problem was how things were rapidly tilting towards the latter with how the mess was going with the final holdouts.

My presence and motivation had produced the intended effect of helping break the stalemate created in the absence of leadership, and most populated sectors of the rogue station were now tentatively under our control. There were stubborn pockets of resistance here and there, but most of them were well in-hand for the assigned junior officers. Some of them, I even might put in a good word for later to Rowles and Erica later if they were interested in having a few standout subordinates.

However, I was also quite alarmed by the damages within Port Barabarus. City fighting was never an easy nor clean thing, with every shattered block meaning plenty of displaced families. Then there was also the internal structural damage that Veronica was quietly tallying up for me, and it wasn’t looking good. I almost wanted to say it was like V1P3R had never intended for actual conflict to break out within these walls once they were put in charge.

Perhaps that had been the plan, before I ruined it with the surprise assault.

… It was war. Things were always going to be messy, for both soldiers and civilians.

What mattered more now was how to handle it. Those disaster relief convoys were definitely going to be necessary now, to help with what was going to definitely be a homelessness issue. But it was also imperative that we shore up those vial structures. Maybe if I brought up the damage control teams from our combined fleet in, we could work something out. The materials… could we re-purpose from the wrecks floating around perhaps? It wasn’t healthy in the long-term, though surely it would suffice for the moment, possibly?

As I was racking my head over the conundrum in the cockpit of my steed, Veronica suddenly interrupted my thought with a note of alarm. “Commander, incoming transmission. It’s bypassing my security-”

“It’s me, it’s me,” Jean mentioned with an apologetic and panicked note in his voice. “Sorry, I know I went on a spiel about respecting your privacy, but this is something of an emergency. Had to skip all the protocols to talk to you directly!”

Now that sounded like a very good reason, so I waved the matter aside. “Very well, what do you need me for?”

“Ah, I was actually talking about Miss Veronica instead of you. I require her aid.”

I blinked bemusedly and my aide seemed to mirror the action, her connected avatar distorting for a moment. “… Me?” she asked. “Whatever do you require me for that the commander cannot provide?”

“NHP data meddling- dammit, this time puzzle is annoying!” he growled, seemingly fending something off in the background. “Long story short, I need her to prevent a metavault from going haywire!”

My eyes widened and the order left my lips before I even was aware of it. “Veronica, provide whatever aid is requested by Jean! We have to stop that from consuming the rogue station.”

She hesitated, then nodded. “I will do it, sir. Transferring Chomolungma controls over to you now.”

“Don’t worry, I’m still staying in the back. Feel free to use my resources as well if it might help.”

“It very well could!” Jean interjected, trying to hurry this along. “Come along now, we’ve a small space-time continuum to delay. Just need some extra time until I have at least one of those made available-!”

The wording on that made me a little curious, because it almost sounded like he knew that would be a sure thing happening soon. A minute later, I got my answer when the nearby displays outside abruptly cut-out, becoming nothing but static for a moment. I got the gut feeling that the same thing was happening across the entire station itself, especially with the announcement to soon follow.

Indeed, across Port Barbarus, every single working monitor abruptly flickered as if changing channels on a television all of the sudden. From barely working display boards to personal devices, it was a universal swap that had people taking notice. Eyes turned to face the screens, to which something seemed to shift among the distorted static displays.

Then the voice echoed out. “Hello, Port Barbarus! You lot have had it real rough for a while, huh? It isn’t easy to live, is it? There’s too much thinking involved sometimes!

“Your head goes round and round, almost as if it were stuck in a routine that there’s no escape from. No way out of this labyrinth that is life! Kinda sucks, doesn’t it?

“So I invite you all to a special dimension where you can forget all those worries! A place where you can toss away all those silly responsibilities, even common sense if you’d like!” Gradually, the static began to properly clear up, revealing the visage of a cartoon bunny face. One which text scrolled around, proclaiming it all to be nonsense in some sort of rambling manner that touched those who looked all the same. “Come and join me in a world where you’ll get lost by my little tricks!

“And welcome to the LUNATIC zone with your one and only host- 1un4!”

That was the only warning the Monarch had right before whirling about and wildly firing at the lunging shape. But the war machine had scarcely gotten off a few rounds before their arms were knocked physically askew, limbs flailing about uselessly for a moment. Then they snapped back into place and shot downwards, grappling with the latest assailant that seemed to just stubbornly dig in even more so.

It took a heave for V1P3R’s controlled machine to fling the attacker off, and even then, panels of armor were ripped free by the stubbornness of the beast which assailed it. That was honestly quite an apt comparison for the mech that took an aggressive stance against the Monarch, as it was certainly modeled after one such creature. A quad-legged walker, with a low and hunched profile that kept it close to the ground. There was but one thing that was held up high, with any pride.

The red head, with two antennas that bent at just the right angle to seemingly resemble floppy ears.

“The Red Hare, making her dramatic battlefield debut,” droned the lares before opening fire with a barrage of firepower. Yet even as they shot unending at the new opponent, none of those rounds hit.

Instead, the air around the new machine distorted and ripped open, revealing portals that the bullets simply vanished into. They then abruptly resealed with hardly a comment as the master of them lunged forwards, plowing back into the Monarch with sharpened claws that sparked with every swipe and snip. “Hey, the star of the show has to arrive late!” happily informed the streamer, sounding like she was barely making much of an effort even as her steed moved with expert dexterity. “Otherwise, how else is she going to show everybody up?”

In response, the hybrid mech knocked the paws away and boosted backwards, attempting to gain distance. Vents hissed as it tried to ready a different sort of barrage, only to be foiled again when the length between shimmered and shifted. Abruptly, the bestial machine was upon them again, spoiling the attempt to utilize ranged weaponry as it forced a grapple once again.

“That ability is ridiculous!” V1P3R loudly complained, a slight whine from a broken fan accompanying their outburst. “I think I did the universe a favor when I locked that Minotaur up!”

“Only because you wanted it for yourself one day, didn’t ya! Pow, eat that missile why don’t ya!” Luna’s machine snapped out with a haymaker that had the larger mech reeling backwards briefly. “Hey, don’t complain, you wanted this, didn’t ya? Here you go- woah!”

Her sudden exclamation came from how the Monarch abruptly snapped its wrist out and revealed a weapon they had been purposefully keeping hidden all this time. It was supposed to have been their method to cut their way free out of the rogue station, but desperate times called for desperate measures. A whip made of pure energy snapped out from that arm and cackled to life, electrical current flowing through it.

Now when Luna came back to engage in melee, V1P3R had at least a proper weapon with which to counter her rush with. It was especially hand in those grapples, where weapons wrapped around a rear leg to pull the quad-legged steed in different ways. “Woah, using a whip on a rabbit girl? Have you no shame, I might even need to edit this later!”

“Perhaps you need more discipline, you two-bit streamer!”

“Huh?! Who’re you calling two-bit, you two-dimensional asp!” It was definitely a tougher fight now, and those who watched the match-up through the broadcast couldn’t take their eyes off. Not when it felt like the fate of the station was to be decided by this clash. “I’ve about had it with you here, it’s about time you departed this space! That is, if you can escape my magical maze!”

“Don’t you dare-!”

But it was already too late, as quite abruptly, the Monarch was swallowed whole by a portal.