Yet you sit there munching your bacon sandwich, happy to hear tales of the secret Order of the Potato and their exploits...
You realise not that yours is a racial memory, either of pilots who have gone long since or from the very mechs with which you interface.
There was a time when we fought for our very existence, our mechs too light to deal with that with which we fought. Their systems were to advanced and they lurked and ambushed us with abandon.
Yet as humans, we thought outside the square, employing cunning and guile where we lacked metal. We turned the tide.
It was not a warrior who saved us but member of the camp entourage. A cook, some say a chef.
Hearing that the enemy hid in ambush, he suggested the potato to flush them out. It needed to be fired at low velocity else it disintegrate, but it will be faster than wildlife yet slower than gunfire. The odd speed should confusion motion sensors and elicit an automated response from a hidden mech.It was suggested that rocks could be used, as they were more plentiful. But the chef tapped his nose and told them to stick with the potato for when jammed in a barrel there would be no windage.
And it worked as he had said. A well placed potato would activate an enemy mech that was hull down, and it would be mobbed by lighter human mechs.
But the victory was short lived, and in short order the enemy began to ignore potatoes.
When he heard of this, the chef nodded and said he had expected this. Most likely they had adjusted their threat recognition systems, and tied infra red with motion detection. Potatoes must be stored at a cool temperature. If both motion and heat did not register at the same time, the threat was not valid.
A potato could not be heated thus, for while baked or boiled would give the heat signature needed, once fired it would simply be mashed...And thus he gave us bacon, and the enemy could not help but respond and so they died in droves.
Forced them back we did, however they were not finished. Their gates ended in inhospitable places. On desert worlds they regrouped, places so hot that the heat of bacon was a norm.
So it was cold that was needed now. The chef passed forth sour cream, both cold to touch and yet fluid, so it would adhere and outline the hard lines of a mech so that it stood out against the smooth and ever changing dunes.They made their final stand on lifeless rocks and cold dead moons. We know them now as the Yomi Reefs, but as a battle ground it froze potatoes to their barrels, leached the heat from bacon. Even sour cream was useless, for without an atmosphere the rocks were already cold and the light was stark and shadowed, while rocks were jagged and linear without the wearing of water and wind to smooth it.
The chef only nodded, for he knew the enemy had made its final mistake. Food was life, and in a lifeless place, no food could grow. And so he chopped chives and told them to fire these upon the enemy to mark them.They did not understand, for what use where green stalks? He smiled, for there was no green in the Yomi Reefs, where light does not reach and air does not exist. If it has green and moves it is the enemy, and you will hit it.
We use these tactics still against newer enemies; Bismarck, Drocha, Drake, Xerxes.
We match our heavies to their heavies and flush out their lights so ours may face them.
We send forth those that most would think mad, those who run in Ant and Anzu, armed with only Potato and Bacon, with Sour Cream and Chive. Those who test the waters and flush out the vast enemy forces so our battle lines may respond as appropriate.
Those who on some level can remember the way and the weapons that chef gave us.
Is that all that was on the menu you ask?
Never underestimate the power of the food... there are always new recipes for success.
Submited by David McCallum #701548