A Fine Mess
Chapter 1
Her vision overlaps, for the lack of a better description. She sees the screen and the cockpit, but she also sees through the cameras as if they were her own eyes. Oddly enough it does not hamper her as a pilot. Only in the beginning does she hesitate, but the moment passes and she begins the test.
MX 00 moves smoothly, as if it were a human being. Its run is not as jerky and jarring as that of her father's earlier robots. Balance had always been a problem for two-legged machines, but this does not seem to affect MX.
Not a splash of paint lands on its armour: she evades the shots with ease. Unfortunately, her aim could be better as well. She feels almost as if MX were rejecting the gun. Her lips curling in annoyance, she opens the channel to the control center and speaks:
"The aim is off."
Her father responds after a moment, no doubt having taken the time to take at least one sip of his favourite soda: "Switch to melee phase."
"Roger that."
She lets MX jump forward and it covers the distance between them and the spider tank surprisingly quickly, almost as if it were eager to meet the opponent face to face. The drone is completely crushed by the landing and she certainly hadn't wanted to do that. She intended to land in front of it and then attack. Instead, not only did she miscalculate, she also let MX stumble and fall down. The result is predictable.
"Akari, we're ending the test," her father announces. "Power the machine down."
***
Jin Akari is dissatisfied with her own performance. MX 00 is a brilliantly constructed robot. She should have been able to pilot it without making stupid mistakes. If it wasn't such a ridiculous assumption, she would have said the machine does not agree with her on how it is to be piloted.
She explains what she observed to her father and is quite proud of how calm and collected she is. Even if she failed, she won't make a spectacle out of herself. She is a professional pilot, after all.
"So, what exactly was wrong with the aim?" her father asks, his brow knotted in a frown so similar to her own.
"It was shaky," she explains, "and jerky. As if MX didn't like what I was doing--I know it sounds silly."
Her father smiles at her encouragingly and she continues.
"The boost was much stronger than I expected too."
What other observations she had remained unsaid. The sound of breaking glass interrupts her. She reacts instinctively, grabbing her father and pushing him down to the floor. She falls on him, a shot almost grazing her arm.
She rolls to the side and kicks the nearest object—a chair—at the attacking group. Their armour is fairly thick and protects them from impact, but the one hit does stumble nevertheless. It is his downfall. Literally. He loses his balance and falls through the smashed window.
The resultant moment of confusion gives her the opportunity to pull out her side arm. It is a mere laser pistol, but its enough to deal with armoured bug troopers. Their armour protects from impact, not heat.
She aims for the visors covering their faces. Their anatomy is different from that of a human and while a hit to the chest might kill them, she's not about to risk that she will merely slow them down instead of killing or incapacitating.
Another falls, but she is fairly certain that she won't be getting out alive. She can only hope, she will buy her father enough time to escape.
There is a thump as a soda can collides with the head of the right-most commando. He takes a step back and makes a chittering sound. This seems to distract the others as they try to get away from the can. Do they think it's a weapon? Whatever the case may be, Akari uses their distraction and gets further two. Her third shot misses, but this proves inconsequential.
A giant hand reaches inside and grabs the enemy. It withdraws nearly instantly and Akari sees what had rescued them. It's MX 00: a smooth wraith-like silhouette, watching them with glowing blue eyes.
***
"Uh… Sorry?"
Her father goggles at the young man, who had piloted MX during the attack. He is not the second test pilot. In fact, he is not a pilot at all and not even military. According to his own explanation, he is Watanabe Arashi, a delivery boy, working for the local Italian restaurant.
By pure chance, he had been around when the attack started. His delivery lost, he had been pushed by one of the soldiers into the nearest building and that was the hangar that housed MX 00. Arashi got himself into the machine partially out of curiosity and partially because it seemed like a good idea at the time.
Then came the part which made her father goggle: MX powered itself up. Arashi wanted to get out of the hangar and get out he did. By teleporting. How he did it was a mystery. While it was true that FTL travel was described as teleporting by some, the drive that allowed space ships to move instantly between planets was far too large to install in a machine like MX 00.
Even if her father would have managed to scale down the drive, the energy produced by the robot moving, not to mention the machine itself would have ripped the hangar to shreds. That had not happened. The building was slightly dented, but only because a spider tank stumbled against its door.
"Was it a secret or somethin'?" Arashi inquires, sounding genuinely worried.
"Teleportation is physically impossible," Akari explains in lieu of her father, who is still busy staring at the delivery boy, "and subspace travel is still highly theoretical."
"So… I did the impossible?" Arashi asks, awe creeping into his voice. "Sweet."
"That is certainly a part of it," Akari's father finally joins the conversation. "Tell me young man, have you ever considered the career of a pilot?"
"Only of a tour guide, sir," Arashi replies.
Akari can do nothing else, but sigh. She has a feeling this will turn into a fine mess and that she will be involved.
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