Kur's Dissension [An Armored Core Fan Fic]

[Hell Masker]

Chapter 1

Well there I was, a 22 year old grease monkey working on some rich guys AC. It really amazes me how he got so rich, he fails half the sorties he accepts and his AC comes back so torn up that I don’t think there is one panel of original armor on the whole thing. “Damn it!” it’s so frustrating when you drop a wrench. Now I have to climb 30 feet down to the ground and 30 feet back up. Today just sucks.

After I finished reattaching the head I decided to take off early. That’s about the only advantage to being a Global Cortex employee, if there is no work to be done you don’t have to stay. I was almost out the door when my boss found me, “Hey Kur! Where do you think you’re going?” Damn, that just means more work. “I’m guessing nowhere right boss?” “Hehe you know it. I just got a call from Flameberge, he says during his last mission he got his one of his legs blown off my a plasma cannon. Real mess, everything’s
welded to everything else.” I really didn’t need this today, a job like that could take all night and I was tired.

Turns out all of the shops transport trucks were either out of service or in use, so I had to take a construction MT to the job site. It’s an ok MT, almost as tall as an AC, they are designed for heavy lifting and flight, not much in the way of armor, just enough to keep the pilot alive if an I beam fell on it. It doesn’t drive like an AC either, there is just a cockpit with four foot pedals, a couple of joysticks and a multitude of buttons and levers.

After two and a half hours of flying and walking, I finally made it to the dessert where Flamberge’s AC was standing on it’s 3 remaining legs. It wasn’t the best AC I had ever seen but it was one of the prettiest. it’s paint job was fire engine red with orange and yellow flames going up the arms and legs. I noticed the weapons he had also, a standard laser rifle, a small rapid fire back mounted plasma cannon, and a decent sized plasma sword. Not a very efficient design for a quadruped. I bet he ran out of energy and
that’s why he couldn’t fend off whatever shot his leg off.

I got out of the MT and climbed down to meet Flamberge. “So what seems to be the problem?” I knew I was being a smart ass but I didn’t care. Flamberge hasn’t liked me for as long as I can remember. “The leg got cut off, ass wipe. Now get yer worthless ass over there and put it back on!” Normally when I am treated this way I take my good sweet time to do the repair but I was dead tired and just wanted to go home.

Well my boss was right, the leg was a complete mess. there was no way I could reattach it and have it work. I broke the news to Flamberge and watched in glee as he stomped around bitching and moaning about how much a replacement leg will cost him. I told him he should just pick up his leg and
boost home. That left me in the middle of the dessert at midnight with no sleep in the past 38 hours. I decided to sleep in the cockpit of the MT and make my way back to the city in the morning.

“Holy Shit!” I almost jumped out of the cockpit when I heard the noise. I looked at my watch, 2:34 a.m. Well at least I got a couple hours of sleep. I was about to lay back down when I heard it again. it was a
thunderous bang that echoed in my head. this time though the sound was louder, witch means that whatever made it was closer. I started my MT and turned it around just in time to see two ACs rushing at me at full over boost. One of them looked black as midnight until it got closer and I could see it in my MTs lights, it was then I realized that the AC wasn’t black but a deep deep red, almost like molten steel that has cooled enough to barely glow. It looked to have a heavy well armored core and a fast hover leg part.
I could make out the weapons as well. A thousand round machine gun, some sort of missile launcher, and what appears to be a moonlight plasma sword. I was pretty impressed, it’s not every day you see a moonlight, only the best and richest Ravens can afford one of those.

The other AC I could tell was the source of the ear rupturing explosions. It was a bright blue AC with white outlines and it was a midweight no doubt about that. The only thing that set it apart from another midweight though was the huge cannon hanging off of it’s back. It was gigantic, the cannon came down on one side of the ACs head and some sort of satellite dish was on the other side. I have been an AC mechanic for 4 years and I’ve never seen anything like it. The ACs other weapon was a left arm mounted shield. I though it was strange that there was now weapon in the right hand but then I
thought that a right arm weapon might make the AC overweight.

I was in such awe over the battle that I almost forgot I was about to be run over. I quickly stomped on the outer most foot pedals and boosted strait up into the air. The head of the blue AC just nicked my MTs foot causing it to rock violently in the air. I looked down and saw the blue AC stop suddenly and boost backwards as the red AC kept sliding away due to it’s hover legs. that is when the blue AS took a knee and it’s cannon lowered over it’s shoulder. the red AC finally stopped sliding and began firing it’s machine gun at it’s opponent. the small high speed bullets were just bouncing off the blue midweight but soon started to penetrate the armor. I thought the blue AC was just committing suicide until I heard it. BANG!!!
It was the loudest sound I had ever heard, I was sure the earth had exploded. I looked down and saw that the red AC was nowhere to be found, “what did it vaporize?” I said under my breath. just then I looked back at the blue AC and saw it laying on it’s front face down in the dirt.

I lowered my MT near the fallen AC and looked into the horizon. I wasn’t sure but I thought I saw the red AC over boost behind a tall sand dune. I used my MT to roll the AC over and I found that there was a small
(comparatively speaking, it was actually 6 inches in diameter) hole going right into the cockpit. I figured it must have been where a machine gun bullet finally got through the armor.

I climbed down out of my MT and made my way up to the cockpit hatch of the AC. when I opened the hatch all I saw was blood and little bits of bone splattered against the back wall of the cockpit. I looked around and noticed that really not much of the equipment was damaged and a little rewiring of what was damaged and I could pilot this thing home myself.

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As I was working on the damaged control circuitry I began to think about my life and where it was going. I was most likely to be stuck as an AC mechanic for the rest of my life, and that didn’t sound very fun at all. I only got paid 58,000 credits a year and that is barely enough to survive on. I began to daydream (well it’s actually 4:00 a.m. but I’m still awake) about being an AC pilot. I could pull in the big bucks weather I was any good or not. I mean just look at that fat bastard Raven that got his ACs head blown off, he absolutely sucks and he is still filthy rich, well compared to me anyway. most Ravens pull in over 20,000 for a sortie and they can do more than 5 of them a week. All in all they average twice in one week what I make
in a year.

There was no reason why I couldn’t be a Raven was there? I mean sure you are required to have a minimum of 5 years battle MT experience and you have to already be rich enough to afford an AC. Well, I mean ok I haven’t had 5 years of battle experience but I have had 4 years of construction MT experience right? and I know I don’t have an AC now but if I don’t spend any money at all I could afford one in 8 years. oh well I guess I am stuck in this dead end job forever.

All through my daydreaming I hadn’t even noticed I finished the repairs to the control mechanisms. I turned the key and hit the start button, the ACs nuclear generator began pumping energy to all the other parts and the AC roared to life. now I mentioned before that ACs and construction MTs are piloted in completely different ways. I had never piloted an AC before except a few steps to make sure a reattached legs works correctly. since the AC was now laying on it’s back the first thing I had to do was lay down as
well. next I slipped my feet into the stirrups and they automatically strapped my feet in tightly. next I placed the belts around my waist and chest and again they automatically tightened around me. next was the helmet that I had to pull down from the ceiling and found the former pilots head
still inside. after disposing of the head I placed the helmet on my own head and slipped my hands into the control gloves. immediately I saw a virtual reality display of the surrounding area, witch was the star filled sky being as how I was on my back. now all of these devices are attached to the walls
of the cockpit witch is shaped like a sphere. As the pilot moves a body part i.e. his foot, hand, or head, the control arms attached to that part are moved and the corresponding part on the AC moves to match. All MTs used to be controlled in this manner, hence the name Muscle Tracer, but around 60
years ago it was found that it was too expensive and MTs really didn’t need that degree of control unless it was a battle MT.

Now that I had control of the AC I noticed all of the 18 buttons inside of the control gloves, 9 in each glove. I had no idea what button did what so I tried pressing them one at a time. the first button I pressed caused the shield on the left hand to activate. I pressed the button again and the shield deactivated. After pressing all of the buttons I found that there are 2 for each finger to control but only one for the index finger to be used as a trigger. I also found that the lowest button locks and unlocks the ACs hand so that it can either hold onto a weapon while I use the fingers to control various parts of the AC without the fingers moving around and losing their grip on the gun, provided I had one, this AC didn’t.

Now that I knew how it all works I need to get it on it’s feet. I tried sitting up and found that the control arms attached to my body provided no resistance and I was able to move freely. I sat up quickly and felt the G-force as the ACs body raised with the same speed I did. After a good 3 minutes of wobbling around I finally got the AC to it’s feet and in a steady walk. I walked around for a little while getting used to the feel of it and soon I was running and trying out the boosters. after a half hour of this I had to stop because I was almost out of breath. I walked the AC over to the construction MT and tried to lift it but I could find now way to carry it with out damaging it in the process. So my only option was to get in the MT
and carry the AC.

On the way home I began to think to myself again, I was thinking about how much money I would get for turning in this AC. the average rate was 20,000 credits and extra for any special parts such as a high performance generator or a huge back mounted cannon of some sort. I figured I would get 25,000 or so and that wasn’t a bad chunk of change for a broke guy like me but it wasn’t going to make my life any easier or anything. then I began to wonder, “why should I turn it in? I found it damn it. I fixed it, I should be able to keep it.” the though kept running through my head like a song you just can’t stop. I kept telling myself that it was against the law and I would most likely be put to death if I was ever caught.

I was within 5 miles of the city when I stopped my MT from walking. I sat there in the cockpit debating whether or not I could get away with keeping the AC. I could disguise myself as a Raven and sell some of the parts to fix it up. then I could take some missions and..., no that won’t work everybody hires Ravens through Global Cortex. I do however have access to the mission request terminal so I could accept a mission and delete it from the memory banks before anybody even knew it was there! well it might
work any way. but then again if I am caught it is almost certainly my life is over. Ahh what the hell my life sucks anyway. I’ll do it!

My first order of business is to get this thing repaired. I have a huge hole through the hatch to the cock pit and several other holes in the armor as well. I found out that the cannon on the back was the newest version of the extremely powerful linear cannons made by Crest. I also found out that it was out of ammo charges. I figured that if I was going to survive a mission in this thing I better get some different weapons, preferably ones with more than 10 shots.

My second priority was to become a Raven without actually becoming a Raven. To do this I hacked into the governments main computer system and entered my name in as a certified Raven, I even opened an official account so I could actually get paid for my missions. All I had to do know was go down to the government offices and pick up my identification and paperwork.

I continued to go to work for the next few months while I worked on my new AC. I kept it in an abandoned factory in a closed section of the city. there were lots of people in other buildings around me, mostly homeless or running from the law. I sold my home and moved into the factory, I only bought enough food to keep me going and I used the rest of the money to fix or replace the armor and any broken parts. once I had it at 100% I would, every now and then, pretending to be a Raven, sell one of the parts and buy a part more my style. I wasn’t much on midweight ACs so I bought and replaced all the parts with heavyweight ones. I guess I just want my AC to be more personal, more like me I guess. I’m 6’4 and 258 pounds and, before I acquired the AC, I spend all my time at the employee gym at Global Cortex.
so I guess I am partial to the big, powerful ACs. the heavyweight parts were more expensive but I had the money from selling my house to make up for it.

Eventually it was time to buy weapons. by now I had saved up 18,000 credits and I also had nearly 140,000 from selling the shield and the linear cannon. with that money I bought a powerful energy weapon called the Karasawa, mostly because I don’t feel like paying to much for ammo. I also bought a moderately powerful plasma sword. I wanted the moonlight of course but I couldn’t afford it and the shop didn’t have any in stock anyway. I decided to save the rest of my money for food expenses until I get paid for
my first mission.

My first mission came all too fast. no sooner did I get to work on the day after I completed repairs that I checked the mission terminal in the rec. room. as soon as I turned on the terminal a brand new mission appeared, I checked it out, it was a sortie from kisaragi that paid 18,000 credits and involved destroying a convoy belonging to crest who, supposedly, stole a prototype MT from a kisaragi warehouse. The mission didn’t seem too difficult and it paid pretty well, for me anyway, so I decided to accept. After entering my account number I got a printout of the location and time limit of the mission.

I ran out the door and right into my boss. “Damn it Kur I know you got work to do in there so you better not be going home.” Shit what do I do now? “Hey uh boss, I am really sick here. I think I must have had a leak in my mask when I was working with the silicone powder for the optional parts performance chips.” He was looking at me trying to decide if I was lying or not so I faked a cough. That seemed to do it. “Ahh get the hell outta here.”

I got to the old factory and started up the AC. I hit the boosters and flew out the door. by the time I got to the mission area the transport was almost to the Crest factory, if they made it inside I wouldn’t get paid. I raised my arm and saw, in my virtual display, the Karasawa rising to aim at the first vehicle in the convoy. I fired the first shot and to my surprise I missed by almost 20 feet. “You dumb ass you forgot to turn on your FCS!” I was so mad at myself that I stomped my foot and realized that wasn’t such a good idea. My ACs incredible weight drove the massive foot right down to the knee joint through the road I was standing on. “great now my foot is stuck.” after turning on my FCS with the toggle switch on my waist belt I aimed my weapon again and fired. the vehicle in the lead of the convoy exploded in a bright blue flash of light. of course by the time all of this had happened the 8 MT escorts were well on there way to where my AC was still stuck.

The MTs weren’t as dangerous as they looked. each was only equipped with a small missile launcher and a small shotgun. I knew they had no chance of killing me but I still didn’t want to pay for repairs. I only had one chance to get out of this with out to much damage. I shot the closest MTs leg off and used my plasma blade to cut the concrete and earth away from my ACs leg. with my leg free I was able to step out of the hole and kick the other MT over that was boosting in towards me. once it landed on it’s back I thrust my arm out stabbing my blade into the generator of the MT. I looked on my radar and saw that the convoy was almost to the factory. I immediately over boosted and rushed past and through the remaining MTs and almost flew past the convoy. I shot at and destroyed 3 more or the vehicles and used my blade
to slice another in half.

And that is when it happened. a huge blip on my radar right behind me. “where the hell did that come from?” I turned my head and saw the AC coming out of the Crest factory. “shit this isn’t good!” I was trying to turn around but my AC has very slow turning speed. the four legged AC lifted it’s right arm and began firing blast after blast of laser fire into my ACs back. when I finally got turned around I noticed who I was fighting. “oh look at who we have here. it’s good ol’e Flamberge.” I new that if I could get him
to run out of energy I could do some major damage to him when he can’t fire his weapons.

once I got turned around I fired my Karasawa at his ACs head. he must have known what I was doing because he ducked down. but then I noticed what he was doing. he got lucky, he was just squatting down to use the pulse cannon on his back. that was my que. I hit my boosters and strafed to the left and the right while he fired away as fast as he could. My AC being so heavy couldn’t maneuver very well so I only dodged 6 shots and I got hit with 5. by the time I got to him Flamberge was out of energy and had no weapons until his generator recharged. I slashed at his AC with my plasma sword cutting his right arm off. he tried to defend himself by grabbing my Karasawa with his left arm but my ACs arm was stronger so I continued to lift my ACs arm and I reached out with my left hand and grabbed his head. I closed my fingers and squeezed as hard as I could. In my virtual display I saw Flamberge’s head slowly crumpling and sending sparks in every direction. I pulled my arm back tearing his head off. now that he had no means of knowing where I was I turned my attention back to the convoy.

“shit” the convoy was just a few yards from the factory! I had an idea. I shot 4 shots from my Karasawa into the factory wall causing it to fall into the entrance and blocking the path of the convoy. I ran as fast as my AC could to the convoy and destroyed all of the transports. the prototype MT was laying on a trailer behind one of the now destroyed transports trucks.

Well my orders were to make sure the prototype doesn’t fall into Crest’s hands. so I used my left hand to pick up the surprisingly light MT and I turned around to see Flamberge still wandering around blindly. I walked over to his AC and got behind him. he started to fire blindly into the city destroying several small buildings in the process. I couldn’t let him murder innocent people so I plunged my plasma blade into the generator of his AC and boosted back and watched it explode. I really didn’t want to kill him and I had never killed anybody before. I told myself that it’s not like I had a choice. he was killing dozens of people and I had no other way to stop him. it wasn’t until I got home that I realized in my haste to stop him I didn’t
think to simply disarm him.

Well aside from killing for the first time it wasn’t a bad sortie. I was paid the 18,000 credits and only had to spend 1,900 for repairs. I normally would have spent 4,800 if I was a “real” Raven, but since I am an AC mechanic and did the work myself, I don’t have to pay labor costs, only materials. I left half the money in the account and used the other half for down payment on a new house in the “nice” part of the city. I went to work the next day and decided to check the mission terminal at the end of the day, I couldn’t
afford to get fired for leaving work early every day.

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It took almost a week for me to find a mission that was easy enough for me to pull off and hadn’t been seen by any of the other Ravens yet. The mission request was from an anonymous corporation, I was guessing Mirage but there was no way to be sure. I followed the directions to the mission area
and arrived an hour ahead of time. The mission area was inside a large building near the middle of town. the inside of the building was pitch black so I had to turn on my night vision display. I could see pillars every
hundred yards or so supporting the ceiling witch seemed to be almost a quarter mile up. I wondered what kind of mission I could possibly have in an empty building when suddenly the lights came on blinding me, and almost ruining my night vision display. I was about to use my communicator to ask what was going on when my radar started to go crazy. I counted 30 bogies on my radar within 500 yards of me but I couldn’t see any of them. when I looked at my radar again I noticed that the blips were blue and slowly turning red. I had never seen that happen before so I was very surprised when 16 panels on the floor burst open and out of each hole a strange looking MT flew up and then landed side by side, forming a circle around me and my
AC.

I did a weapons check and braced myself for whatever might happen. “Thank you for showing up Raven. We are pleased that you were early.” who the hell was that talking? it seemed to be some woman with a deep voice over a loud speaker in the building. “We have invited you here to test out our
newest MT model G-21.1. It is a model designed to work as a team in large numbers. Now we hope you were not expecting an easy mission because this will most definitely not be. “Great, I’ll probably die here and if I don’t my AC will be so f’d up it’ll cost me more than I make to fix it.” I thought about just leaving and living to fight another day but as I turned my head to look back, the huge steel doors of the building slammed shut, locking me in. “Provided you survive the test you will be paid the amount we agreed on in
the request form, 10,000 cr. for every unit you destroy or incapacitate.” Oh my God! I thought I was getting 10,000 for the whole mission! this is great. “the test will be timed, you will have 10 minutes to destroy as many of the MTs as you can. Begin.”

I didn’t even have time to blink, the MTs moved with phenomenal speed and I had a lot of trouble keeping up with my heavyweight AC design. Made me wish I would have gone with a lighter design rather than my own personal preference. in a matter of seconds I was taking fire from every direction. Missiles coming in from there, machine gun fire from over there, oh and can’t for get the flame-thrower from right behind me. I was screwed I was so totally screwed. it was only 30 seconds into the mission and I had 16 MTs
buzzing around like flies on shit, I was already about to overheat and my AC was starting to look like a piece of swiss cheese. “Ok Kur you accepted this sortie and you are going to finish it!” in actuality I was scared to death that I might well... die. but I was not about to let that happen. I extended my plasma sword and over boosted to the other end of the building. along the way I managed to slash two MTs clear in half. and I used my right arm to grab a third and hold it near me as a shield. I thought I was doing ok until I heard the alarm.

“Damn it what the hell is that?” it took me a few seconds to realize I was in output down status. Over boosting when I was already hot was a bad move. my generator was off-line until it could cool down enough to start back up. that left me with whatever power I had left in the capacitors to fight with. just moving was draining my power and I knew that in this state a few shots from the Karasawa or a couple slashed from my blade would leave me defenseless. I switched my makeshift shield/MT to my left hand, grabbed the Karasawa and released the clips that held it on the side of my ACs leg. I threw the weapon at the approaching hoards of MTs hoping it wouldn’t get to damaged in the process. then I threw the MT in my hand at another that was trying to sneak around behind me. I took a moment to survey the scenario. Two MTs destroyed, one seems pinned under my rifle, and the one I threw seems to be malfunctioning. That left me with 12 MTs to go and I only had 9 minutes and 12 seconds left in the battle! “Crap I am going to die!!!”

my generator was still 2 minutes from coming back on-line and my power gauge was at 75% of maximum. a few of the MTs managed to get behind me and once again I cursed my heavyweight design for it’s obvious weaknesses. then it hit me. I didn’t waste a second, I jumped strait backwards and spread my self out as much as I could. The huge AC landed flat on it’s back crushing 2 more Mts. the force of the impact drove the air out of my lungs but I still managed to get back up on my feet. I ran backwards towards the back wall of the arena getting the MTs to follow me. In one smooth motion I planted my
left foot on the wall of the arena and pushed forward causing my AC to fall forward crushing 3 of the little MTs in the process. when I got up I noticed one of the MTs arms was sticking out of my ACs core. I use my right hand to pull it out hoping that no wiring would come with it. I was lucky, and now I had a weapon, kind of. A strange looking MT came at me and grabbed onto my ACs core with it’s hands. I had no idea what it was trying to do until I saw the huge drill bits extending from it’s forearms. I tried to shake it off but the MT held on tight. the drills were almost through my armor before I remembered my weapon. I brought my arm down as fast as I could whacking the little MT in the head with the arm of one of it’s friends. with the head
crushed the MT let go and fell to the ground at my feet. I threw the arm at a nearby MT but missed as it boosted by to my left. And this is about to get real ugly.

To be continued...

[Hell Masker]

Chapter 2

I was taking major fire through the whole battle, unable to boost I was getting hit by 8 out of ten shots. it was lucky for me the shells were relatively weak so my armor would still hold up, for now anyway. I checked
my power gauge, “damn I’m down to 18%. and my generator was still 1 minute 20 seconds from coming back on-line. I had to do something fast if I was going to survive this mission. “More like a gang rape” I didn’t have the energy to make it until my generator came back on-line I had to think. “think damn it think!” I need to take cover until my generator is back up but where? there is nothing here but pillars and the MTs are fast enough to get behind me anyway. that’s when I got the idea. I ran for one of the hatches on the floor that the MTs flew out of. it was closed of course so I punched it and to my surprise my ACs fist went right through the steel door. I pried the doors apart and hopped inside pulling the door shut behind me. the MTs were shooting through the doors but the bullets lost considerable power and were just bouncing off my AC like a light hail storm. “by God I think I’ve done it.” I was content to stay in that hole until the ten minutes ran dry but I had only earned 80,000 cr. and I was sure my ACs damage was more than that. I needed the last 8 kills to make it out of here with a profit.

That last minute seemed to take forever. As I was counting down the seconds until my generator kicked back on I looked up to see the MTs drilling through the thin steel doors. “10” their drills are coming through “9” damn it they are putting there gun barrels in the holes “8...7...6” they almost have the hinges off! “5......3...” the door is being lifted off! “2..” crap I am wide open and stuck in a hole! “...1...” that one’s got a bazooka aimed at my head! “zero!” my generator kicked on and my capacitor gauge filled in a flash.


I immediately hit my boosters and jumped out of the hole. on the way out I grabbed the bazooka out of the MTs hands and tried to fire it but my ACs hands were to big to fit on the handle. instead I flew into the air almost to the ceiling. I pulled the magazine off the bazooka and let the shells drop. they exploded on impact and I took out 2 more MTs this way. I stayed in the air as long as I could dodging fire from below and searching for where I dropped my laser rifle. I found it on the other side of the room but the MT trapped under it was now free and the malfunctioning one seemed to be fully operational.

I made it to my Karasawa and picked it up, be the time I turned around the MTs were all around me with there machine guns and flame-thrower going. my ACs radiator just couldn’t keep up. I was dangerously close to going into output down status again. I fired three shots from the Karasawa and watched as 4 MTs were melted into puddles of steel. “wow 2 for 1 deal” the remaining 4 MTs took off like rockets and headed to the far end of the room. this game my AC time to cool off a little and gave me time to do a damage
check.

My AC was in a little better shape than I thought. I only had 4 holes in my armor and the only internal damage was a bullet went right through the conduits that supply my over boost boosters with energy. well no over boost is probably a good thing right now. there were plenty of dents in my armor due to the light machine gun fire but I could have a construction MT pound those out in a few hours. I checked my watch and saw that I still had over six minutes remaining in the mission with only 4 enemy units to go. I was
thinking, “hell yeah, I am going home with 160,000 credits tonight!” well I was until I saw what those last four MTs had done.

they came back from the far side of the room but they were different. there were only 2 of them now but they seemed larger?... no they didn’t get bigger, they connected themselves together!!! now instead of 4 lightning quick MTs to deal with I have 2 larger quadruped MTs that are much faster! as they were running, much like a cat I thought, they threw their small machine guns and flame throwers down and latched the four arms each now had, into two arms. the hands then shot off and out of the arms a large barrel emerged.

“They have GRENADE LAUNCHERS?!?!” I was in trouble now. those machine gun bullets just dented me a little, a grenade launcher of that size will blow me in half! the closest MT fired 2 shots at the same time. if I wasn’t so scared that I couldn’t move I would have been dead. the two shots went to either side of me, presumably so that I would jump to the side right into the path of one of them. the next two shots however were not to the side, they were right on target. I boosted strait up into the air and lifted the Sawa to fire. “you may have bigger guns and more legs but you have the SAME ARMOR!” with that I fired and watched in unbearable disbelief when the large blue mass of light simply dispersed into a shield that surrounded the MT.

I didn’t get it. the MTs didn’t have the shield when they weren’t connected, why would they have them now? then I understood. when the MTs were separate machines the one generator had to supply power to movement, weapons control, and all of the other things that drain power. no that they are connected, one of the generators can supply movement and other stuff leaving the other generator, or most of it anyway to power a continuous shield. well that was my theory and I was stickin to it. I tried 8 more shots just to be sure I wasn’t weakening the shield any, I wasn’t. I dropped the Karasawa again to lighten my load and give myself a little more maneuverability. I checked my energy gauge and saw that it was almost depleted. I had to land soon or run out.

I turned off my boosters and began to drop. on the way down my gauge filled almost half way and as soon as I hit the ground I jumped to avoid 4 grenades that were about to hit me. as soon as I was back in the air I boosted forward and slashed at the nearest MT with my blade. no surprise there, the blade was also dispersed by the shield. I had to go in the old fashioned way. I turned off the blade and tried to reach in with my hand. my hand passed right through the shield and I was inches from grabbing one of the heads on this deranged MT when it boosted back away from me and fired two more grenades. this time I dodged to the side but still took damage from the force of the blast that went off right next to my ACs foot. I looked down to see the front (toes) of the right foot was blown off and there were sparks flying everywhere. this made it surprisingly difficult to keep my balance and hindered my mobility.

I had no idea how I was going to beat these MTs with that shield up. I had one of them staying back in a corner launching continuous volleys at me while the other stayed in close but just out of my reach. I kept dodging as much as I could and was lucky not to take any direct hits. I had plenty of large dents from the concussive blast the grenades made when exploding near me. I was at my wits end when I noticed something. the MT hiding in the corner wasn’t shooting anymore. it was just standing there, “It’s out of
ammo!!!” and by my calculations the MT closer to me only had 4 shots left and I had 1 minute 30 seconds exactly to finish them off.

I waited for the last four shots from the MT and hoping my calculations were right I boosted right at him but he easily out ran me and ran strait backwards. I saw an advantage to this so I veered slightly to the left and he veered to the right, well my right. doing this I managed to get him heading right for his partner in the corner. my plan was to trap them both in the corner and rip them to shreds with my ACs bare hands. but things never go as planned.

as soon as the shields of the two MTs touched a small explosion went off inside of the MTs bodies. then another, and another, until finally they both exploded in a huge fireball. my ACs alarm was going off from the heat but I managed to back away in time to avoid output down. “Congratulations Mr. Kur. you performed much better than expected. you have just earned yourself 160,000 credits. and you had one minute to spare as well. for your efforts we are prepared to offer you a bonus reward. but you must accomplish one more task to earn said bonus.” I was about to tell this woman to go to hell, my AC was falling apart and it was going to cost me half the money I earned to fix it. but apparently she wasn’t asking me if I wanted the bonus. “The bonus portion of this mission begins now.”

With that a large door on the wall to my left opened and all I could see was a bright light. I boosted back towards my Karasawa while looking at the light in the doorway. I was halfway to my rifle when a silhouette appeared in the light. it was huge. it had to be twice the size of my AC and it had weapons poking out all over the place. As the... whatever it was, got closer I could see two grenade launchers, two missile launchers, two energy machine guns, and two weapons I couldn’t recognize. all of them were pointed at me
and all of them looked very large and powerful.

“Ok Kur this thing is big and heavy and has the same weaknesses as you do, take advantage of them.” I kept telling myself that but I still didn’t believe it. I got to my Sawa and hit the button to lock the right hand
fingers in place around it’s stock. I lifted the rifle and took aim, my FCS confirmed the lock and I pulled the trigger. I was happy to see that my shot didn’t diffuse into some shield but I was devastated to see that by the time my shot got to where the monstrosity was, the monstrosity was no longer there. as a matter of fact it was half way to me and the bright white flame that seemed to be pouring out of it’s back told me that his over boost still worked.

“oh crap oh crap oh crap OHCRAPOHCRAPOHCRAP!!!” I didn’t know what to do, I kept firing over and over and each time the enemy would dodge to the left or right and be well out of the way of my shots. I was in a panic, it was my second mission and I am facing this thing this monster MT thing that is twice my size and 50 times my speed and who knows how much more powerful it’s offense. I didn’t know why but I extended my plasma sword and held it up across my field of view. just as the blade was at it’s full height the monster MT boosted over my head and it’s blade ran connected with mine. I heard the MT land behind me but I was to slow to turn around. I boosted strait to the left and watched as more than 8 large missiles rocketed by to my right just missing my right arm. if they would have hit I would be dead right now.

I was using my radar to dodge missiles and grenades because I couldn’t keep the MT from running behind me. I knew I couldn’t keep it up forever. I had to come up with something fast. I looked around in a panic and as I looked down I saw a hose hanging out of the side of my core. at first I didn’t know what it was but then it hit me. it was the over boost conduit that was damaged while I was fighting the small Mts. that gave me an idea but I had no idea if it would even work or not, and I had no idea if I had the right end of the conduit hanging out.

Well I didn’t have much of a choice. I pulled as much of the conduit out and held it in my ACs right hand. I aimed it behind me over my shoulder and waited for the right moment. I watch my radar very closely “NOW!” As the MT over boosted towards me I waited until my radar said it was within 30 feet of
me. I released the limiter on my generator and fired the over booster. I closed my eyes from the pain of it. the noise was so loud you could barely hear it, it was such an awful deafening noise, I could feel the blood dripping out of my ears and the vibration was jarring me to the bone. every alarm on my AC was set off but I couldn’t hear them. it was just the noise.

It only lasted for a few seconds but it felt like an eternity. I was deaf, a few of my teeth were loose from the vibration. My AC was not operational. I had to use the manual override switch to open the hatch. I
stepped out onto the open hatch door and looked around. Nothing, all I saw was the burning MTs from the first match and the building. I figured I must have destroyed or at least incapacitated the monster MT because it has been over 5 minutes since my AC shut down. I climbed up onto the shoulder of my AC and looked over.

Just behind the AC were the MTs feet, one actually leaning against my ACs leg. behind that was,... the outside? the entire building was gone behind me. there was no dust, no debris, no nothing. Just a big grove in the ground that had to be a half mile long and probably 100 feet deep. I had no idea the blast would be so strong. I might have left the limiter on if I had known it would cause so much destruction.

As my hearing came back I heard somebody clapping and I looked down to see a woman dressed in a very expensive looking business suit walking with 4 men who were also sharply dressed. I climbed back to my cockpit and kicked out the emergency rope ladder. once I reached the floor I was greeted by the
woman. “Hello, my name is Stephanie Mactaggart.” I looked her over and was happy to see she was a young woman, maybe 25 years old and very well proportioned. she had strait, dark black hair down to her shoulders and blue eyes. she was wearing very little makeup and had earrings with large diamonds on them. “I was the one who designed the MTs you fought here today and I must say I was very surprised to see you alive. I designed these MTs specifically to combat ACs. I see that I have a lot of work to do.” I felt like punching her in the face but I was raised better than that. She hired me to come here and fight these things expecting me to die.

I was furious, I had to do something to piss her off. “Yeah well you sure did a piss poor job then. this is only my second mission as a Raven, just imagine what an experienced veteran could do to your little toys.” that seemed to put sand in her vagina big time. “Now you listen here mister!” oh great here it comes. I could hear the “I’m better than you are” in her voice for sure.

As I stood there listening to her bitching I realized she was checking me out to. “and why not?” I thought to myself. I have a little sex appeal, I think. I bet she isn’t used to seeing somebody standing so far over her head, I know that these corporate types always have there employees sitting in low chairs so that the leader always seems taller. even these guys she is with are slouching some to seem shorter. she couldn’t have been more than 5’5 with heels on and I was 6’4. I caught her looking at my body a lot, at first I was thinking all those hours at the gym are paying off. but then I realized I was filthy, I had smoke and blood stains all over me. I was glad that I keep my brown hair short, actually almost shaved off most of the time.
I couldn’t imagine being a Raven with hair in your eyes all the time and sticking to your face when you sweat. “...and another thing, just because you got lucky and...” God was she still talking? she is looking right in my eyes now. I wonder if I stare back will she look away? yep she sure did. she isn’t as dominant as she thought she was. but then again my eyes can be kinda scary. they are sky blue with a dark green ring around the pupils. and for some reason the part of my eyes that are supposed to be white are a
light gray. “...so take your money and your bonus and get the hell out of what is left of my building!” Ah just the part I was waiting for.

“So what is this bonus you forced me to accept?” I was curious now, what could possibly be worth going up against that monster MT? “Hmm, well I did promise you a bonus and so you shall have one.” “well spit it out, what ‘shall’ it be?” Ha! that got a scowl out of her. “come with me.”

-----------------------------

Stephanie led me to a small door on the back wall of what was left of the building. We walked through a long series of man sized hallways with out saying a word. I didn’t care much that we weren’t talking, frankly she annoyed me and I was just fine walking behind her watching her butt swing back and forth as she walked. after a while I noticed that the halls were at a slight decline, so I figured we were headed underground. we soon came to the polished aluminum doors of an elevator. One of Stephanie’s goons pressed the down button. The doors separated and we all entered the 10 by 10 box.

After inserting a card key Stephanie said “I suggest you hold the hand rail.” with that the elevator seemed to just drop. We had to be just free falling, I could feel my feet coming off of the floor. after a few seconds I could tell we weren’t falling, we were being pushed down at incredible speed. everybody was floating up in the elevator using their hands to stop from hitting their heads on the ceiling. we had been dropping like this for almost 5 minutes when everybody began to slowly float back down to the floor of the elevator. as soon as our feet touched the elevator began to slow down very quickly. I could feel the weight of my goatee pulling on my chin. Eventually we stopped and the doors opened.

We stepped out and into a massive area. I couldn’t see any walls or the ceiling. the only structure I could see was a giant support pillar that looked to be nearly a mile away. to the sides I could see giant racks holding various AC and MT parts. in front of me were rows and rows of people sitting at desks and other standing at work stations welding and assembling various things. “Follow me Raven.” Stephanie began walking forward through the middle row of desks. As I followed I glanced around at the blueprints
and computer screens of the workers. I couldn’t make out much but I did see a computer screen with the blueprints to a chip of some kind labeled OP-INTENSIFY. as soon as the worker noticed me looking he covered the screen with his hands.

“So just where are you taking me Ms. McDonalds?” “That’s Mactaggart, and I am taking you to your bonus.” I just wish she would hurry, I was anxious to get home and begin repairs on my beaten AC. eventually we reached the support pillar I saw earlier. there was a door on it witch we walked
through. inside was,... my AC? there it was standing on a platform with about 20 tiny construction MTs buzzing around it like worker bees around a flower. “What the hell are they doing to my AC?” I didn’t know if I should be mad or glad. if they charge me with the repairs I thought I might kill these people with my bare hands. Stephanie must have read my mind. “Relax Mr. Kur these repairs are part of your bonus. the rest is right over here.”

I followed her over to a corner of the room and was invited to sit at a large meeting table and she sat at the other end. “Mr. Kur. do you have a last name because I really feel stupid saying Mr. Kur?” Great now she thinks my name is stupid. “Nope no last name, why don’t you just call me Kur and drop the Mr.” I was going to tell her to call me her daddy but I figured that wouldn’t be wise when I as so close to finding out what my bonus is and her security goons all around me. “Fine, Kur. if you will look in front of you there is a monitor. On that monitor you will see some blueprints for a new type of motor control for ACs. As you know, AC movement has always been accomplished by the manipulation of hydraulic pistons and levers. Each limb was required to house it’s own hydraulic pump and god forbid a bullet should breach the armor and cut a hose so you couldn’t use that limb anymore.”

I was very intrigued by what this young woman was telling me. I am after all an AC mechanic. “We have developed a type of high strength polymer. it is hundreds of times stronger than steel and extremely flexible. Mr. Gerban please bring in the display.” soon a man entered the room pushing a cart that had something under a white sheet on it. Stephanie then pulled the sheet off revealing what was underneath. It was some sort of stand with an arm hanging strait out to the right. from the arm something that seemed to be made of strands or coils was hanging limply. it was solid black and swayed with the motion of the cart.

“Now this is what I have talking about.” She held the material in her hand, pulling it, stretching it, and running her fingers over it. “As you can see it is very flexible and quite light. A single strand of it no more
than a millimeter wide could support almost 600 kilograms hanging from it. Now for the exciting part.” Her assistant, this Mr. Gerban, attached some wires to each end of the polymer and stepped back to some kind of control box that was at the other end of the wires. “Now Mr. Gerban.” He pressed a button on the control box and the polymer immediately contracted and became more than a fourth the length it was originally. Mr. Gerban then pressed a different button and the polymer returned to normal.”

I was amazed. if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes I never would have believed it. I guess Stephanie could see the disbelief in her eyes. “That’s right Kur. We have created the worlds first artificial muscle. How do you think we got the Titan MT to move so quickly? And the best part is that if a bullet is shot through the muscle, the muscle won’t be damaged. the next time the muscle is contracted the damaged cords will reattach themselves. it would take the entire mass to be cut in half for the muscle to fail. And as
we speak your AC is being rebuilt from the ground up. it will look the same as before but it will have our new artificial muscle system installed in it. You will now be able to equip larger weapons because your ACs total weight will be reduced by 30% and it’s strength will be increased by 150%. your AC will be much faster, stronger, and able to take much more punishment than ever before.” I could see a large smile across her face, she was very proud of her creation, as she should be. I didn’t hate her so much anymore, not because she was giving me this wonderful technology, but because she earned and deserved whatever she has. she actually seemed proud to be using my AC to graft her artificial muscle to.

“Well I must say Ms. Stephanie, I am... well I am ecstatic! I thought I was just getting some optional part called OP-INTENSIFY, but this is amazing!” The happy look on her face suddenly changed. “Where did you hear about that part? Who told you?” This didn’t sound good, if she thinks I know what this optional part does she could have me dead before I left the room. “Whoa whoa whoa, calm down I just saw the name on a computer screen as we were walking in. I didn’t see anything else.” Even I could hear the fear in my voice. I had to calm myself down before I could calm her down. She looked very very pissed, “How do I know you aren’t lying to save your ass?” crap “because, well... how could I know about it? I mean, uh...” I was lost I didn’t know what to say. “um, what about I lie detector test?” Her face seemed to lighten up after I said that.

“Gerban! Get me the lie detector!” the assistant left the room and came back in a few moments later. “You just happen to have a lie detector?” ,“Well Kur I have to make sure my employees are keeping all my secrets don’t I?” She walked over to where I was sitting and told me to lift my arm. she then placed a small plastic clamp over the end of my finger and then placed a collar around my neck. Mr. Gerban nodded his head and pulled a small yellow computer pad out of his pocket. “Mr. Kur, did you hear about the
OP-INTENSIFY part from somebody outside of this building?” “No” I hoped I wasn’t the .01% that fails these things no matter how they answer. “Mr. Kur, did you read the words OP-INTENSIFY on a computer screen in this building?” “Yes” I had the fingers in my other hand crossed for luck, even though I’m
not superstitious. “Mr. Kur, have you had any prior knowledge of the OP-INTENSIFY part before you read the words on the computer screen?” “No” I was sweating big time. how is it that you only get nervous about being exposed in a lie when you are telling the truth? “congratulations Mr. Kur you passed.” well now I was confused, “But how do you know? you didn’t even read the results.” I realized as soon as I finished saying it that I should have kept my mouth shut. “Hahaha, you are very observant but not very bright
aren’t you Mr. Kur? I know you are telling the truth because people always tell the truth when hooked up to a lie detector. they know that the person giving the test will find out the truth one way or another so they just tell the truth right off the bat. Mr. Kur, this isn’t even a real lie detector, it’s just a yellow box with a couple of wires on it.”

After the meeting I was given a room in the employees quarters behind the warehouse I destroyed. I was told that my AC would be completed in a weeks time. I couldn’t wait to try it out, to see if all of Stephanie’s claims about the speed and strength were correct. I was more excited about the increased speed. My AC was already stronger than most others just by virtue of it’s heavyweight parts. My mission against all of these faster MTs was proof enough that slow and powerful is not very effective against quick and weak. although I did survive the battle I was counting myself lucky. if that energy conduit hadn’t fallen out of my AC I would be dead right now. That Titan MT would have carved me to pieces in a split second.



To be continued....

[KurtZisa]

Wow 2 long chapters and I'm the only one who noticed it? Aw come one guys at least give him a chance.