Clan War XVII was run by the Craftsmen, with rumors that an unknown benefactor was bankrolling the whole event on the grounds that certain special conditions were met. This was a specialist event, where each competitor could pick a specialty that they would defend as, and every attacker must meet them on those grounds, or lose.
In theory, this allowed good preparation and strategy to even the odds against superior mass and firepower (somewhat). It had drawbacks. You didn’t have to prepare just your defending lineup; you had to prepare every tonnage limitation, and weapons specialty, and be ready to switch between configurations at a moment’s notice. It was a nightmare of work, the techs had been putting in more hours than the pilots, and the pilots were living on stim packs already.
From the shop floor rang the sound of crystal on ceramet armor, the defiance roar of a Gigus and the scream of a woman gone utterly around the bend. Charging to the mech bay doors, John beheld the strangest sight his Clanhold had ever seen. His chief tech (Knockers McGuinty) had been working on a Gigus outside the usual repair gantries, because all of them were already in use, and mecha were half assembled all over the place, including what looked like a pair of Luison dangling from the rafter chain hoists, being worked on hung upside down like shot pheasants.
Gigus have to be chained down when you swap out the weapons, because they do not like to give up their guns, and putting in new ones makes them itch terribly until the software syncs properly. John’s lances 80 ton Gigus (Muffin) was trying to defend the Kojin stove that Knockers was taking out. He had thrown her off and was scampering for his sleeping cradle. Knockers grabbed the crane override and slapped the emergency release, dropping a Luison on the Gigus head. As the stunned mecha rolled on the ground, a raging Knockers lept on its head, and with her crystal wrench began banging it on the forehead screaming
“Lie still!” (clang) “Or I’ll” (clang) “Give you Viper Lasers!” (clang) “You toaster!” (clang)
The Gigus lay still, whimpering, terrified of the chief tech, and her threat to leave him with only Viper Lasers. She ripped out the Rupture Shot savagely, and the Gigus made soft crooning noises and attempted to groom her (somewhat disarrayed) hair to calm her down. Hoisting the Luison back into the air, and slapping a shackle on the Rupture Shot for the next crane to remove, Knockers opened a can of Hatoraide, and a Stim Pack, and shot them both, before tossing the empties into the recycling bin 20 feet away. The can rang like a target drone on cannon test day.
John looked as his tech crew, noticing they all moved like zombies on PCP, and decided this war may have made casualties out of his techs before the first shot was even fired. He turned to Christine (Personnel and Public Affairs officer of the Defenders of Bunny) “How long have they been using Hatoraide on the shop floor?”
Christine muttered quietly “About the same time they switched to 16hrs on/8 off; so about a week now. I think most of them are bug-nuts crazy at this point, but their efficiency is damn near textbook perfect. Right up until they start eating brains, I think we are OK. Oh crap, she’s coming this way. Gotta go!”
Knockers was charging the office, wrench in hand. Panicked pilots raced to get out of the way, and even the great mecha seemed to shift to keep machinery between them and the raging mechanics. The DOB AI opened the door at emergency speed, unwilling to see if Knockers planned on slowing or opening it before coming through leaving John trapped behind his desk facing the pilot, whose eyes were dark pits you could park a Dreadnought in, and the bruises underneath would shame a raccoon or strung out Juba addict on a million ferrite bender.
“ I have had it! I have made a line up for each of your pilots for the whole Clan for your stupid war, and then I did it again, and then again, and then A HUNDRED AND SEVENTEEN MORE TIMES!” She brought the wrench down on the crystal armorplast desk that was rated to take a Rail Cannon strike and continue function, according to the manufacturers specs. Again and again the crystal wrench the pilots had bought her as a token of their esteem rang on the “unbreakable” computer desk until his holoscreens started to fritz, and Mighty Beatrice the AI painted a cartoon hologram above Knockers head showing what John would look like with that three foot crystal wrench shoved someplace wrenches shouldn’t go; indicating that perhaps he should calm her down before Beatrice needs a new mainframe, and John needs a proctologist.
Knockers finally ran out of steam and broke into sobs
“And you all keep leveling up, and things need tuning, and you keep reassigning the weapons, and I just can’t do this anymore, I want to shoot somebody so badly, can’t I shoot somebody, I really think it would help?” She sounded so much like his daughters at this point that he smiled and began stroking her hair.
“There, there Knockers, it will be OK. Would you feel better if you got to light someone on fire, maybe cut them down in the fury of a rotary powered Ferrite Storm? Or cut them down in the scream of a Galaxy Eye?”
She looked up, tears standing in her eyes, but a hopeful, almost smile touching her quivering lips “Maybe watch them come apart under the hammer of a hundred armour piercing missiles, or flash freeze in the scream of an Arctic Gale?”
John laughed. Granted, civilians would be calling for psychiatrists and sedation, but Clan Chiefs knew the correct response to such insane fury was to couple it with an advanced sentient Artificial Intelligence in a niode and crystal powered war machine, and turn her loose upon the world. Really, would’t the Galaxy benefit from letting such fury find fullest expression behind the controls of a mecha? Besides, she had earned the chance to join with her children, the mecha she cared for every day, and share with them the gift of battle.
“Clan War XVII is upon us. Go see Stephanie for your implant, and we will have you in the cockpit for the war. Keep my machines running, and you too can dance howling in the fire.”
Easter (the bunny, not the pilot clone) had hopped over, and jumped up into Knockers arms to head butt her until she began stroking the Bunnies soft fur. The Bunnies knew when their Defenders needed them. Through her own implants the Bunny sent a message image to the holoscreen in the chief office. It showed Jessica Rabbit; the Red Ant that was once Jessica Bradley-Rabbits ride, before she became a lance leader. Yes, that would do well. The Bunnies always knew best.
Clan War will rage, worlds will burn, and mechanics will lose their minds. Is your Clan ready?
Submitted by John T Mainer#28840