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What's Junk? (The Mech Touch)

Reader mode
lost star said:
"Yes." Bolt agreed. "It'll take some bit. Before then I want to exchange pointers with the guy who made the crab mech. Feels appropriate."
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As always, when all else fails life will return to CRAB. No doubt this tiny side-visit will be the most influential meeting of his life, as it should be when concerning peak evolution.
lost star said:
No issues for Bolt didn't mean no issues entirely. There was a small issue with his aides. A very minor one really. Phillipe's friends had some, well interesting ideas for body sculpting. As in a few of the girls really wanted big boobs and some of the boys wanted muscles that were just shy of impractical. It turned into a small argument and even a small fight. Bolt was extremely glad he'd practically thrown the management of the teens onto the young man. He'd already heard too much! (With all this said, so far as problems went he'd take it over another small war.)
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Oh my god, it's not going to be a group of vaguely feminine collared servants. It's going to be a group of hypersexualized collared servants, which is actually worse because at least the previous bit was deniable since there was obviously alien gene mod stuff involved!
 
lost star said:
"Ruckus. It's not quite traditional, but he certainly caused one."
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Well well well... That's quite a name to live up to lmao. It not quite connected but as soon as he talked about sea mechs I just pictured him making a giant Leviathan mech for space it would be a great project for him to work on with his sister lol.
 
Pollyamorous said:
As always, when all else fails life will return to CRAB. No doubt this tiny side-visit will be the most influential meeting of his life, as it should be when concerning peak evolution.

Oh my god, it's not going to be a group of vaguely feminine collared servants. It's going to be a group of hypersexualized collared servants, which is actually worse because at least the previous bit was deniable since there was obviously alien gene mod stuff involved!
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Yeah the ongoing joke is still funny
 
lost star said:
"Yes." Bolt agreed. "It'll take some bit. Before then I want to exchange pointers with the guy who made the crab mech. Feels appropriate."
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It's so weird to see a cultivation story where this line is used as it means on its face, and not that we are going to use exchanging pointers as an excuse to go beat someone up because they offended us.
Bravo.

lost star said:
"We're also recruiting the guy who was in the crab." Bubbles continued with a small chuckle. "That sort of bravery and gumption is very rare."
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That guy might be my pick for MVP of the battle, since without his ambush hitting the 5scrolls guy in the glowing weak spot, it would have been a lot harder for Lillie to get the opening she needed to eat him, wounded as Dowry was
 
Cybershadowninja2 said:
Is this intentional or did you mean good? I know god pilots are a thing in story, which incidentally could be a bit awkward for everyone if Lily becomes one.
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A god-parent is a thing where you have someone else assume the role of god-father or god-mother, with the job of being around the child as an additional bonus parent for both emotional support and be a mentor, often in spiritual matters.
Often they also are the designated person to take over should both parents die.

So here Bubbles is saying that she cannot officially accept responsibility for helping with this child, but also implying that she would if she were allowed to and that she'll make sure the child is not abandoned should both Bolt and Lily perish.
Also kind of implies that she'll probably pop by for spontaneous gifts every once in a while anyway, and be a bonus aunt for Ruckus.
 
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I045 New
Internal communications in the MTA were byzantine at best. Even as streamlined as possible there were countless lines and layers between people, official and unofficial. It was half inevitability and half deliberate. The MTA was a massive, massive organization responsible for a galaxy. Truthfully had their leaders not been enhanced beyond belief it would have died within years of founding due to infighting and simple scale. There was simply too much to properly rule without significant aids and automation.

It helped significantly that at the very top were the God Pilots and Star Designers. They moved the organization. Their sheer ability turned fantasy into reality. Nepotism and incompetence were not tolerated at this level, and it truthfully probably contributed more to the organization's success than anything else. When someone was capable of almost god-like feats you listened to them.

Competence didn't mean that they agreed though. It was human nature to conflict. While the leaders wouldn't be so gauche as to go to war with one another, a wrong sentence could and would cause something similar to it. It wasn't out of question for people to kill for the favor of a Star Designer or God Pilot, so in the interest of public safety and coherence they typically limited all public statements to very bland PR speak and had subordinates pass the real intentions along. Even private conversations were typically brief and careful.

Casual conversations between peers never happened. If they did happen, they would never be in a place that anyone could see even if they were good at hacking or data analysis. They would happen in traces of code hidden in the galactic network. Carefully constructed data lines that sent fragments and encrypted notes. The information that was theoretically passed there would be quiet and impossible for non-designers to parse. Even programs wouldn't be able to pick it up.

"Ok, what actually got you off your overtly large fashion statement mascaraing as a computer?" A tag known as MM on one of those theoretical channels asked.

"Clarify." A tag labeled Ass replied.

"You might have covered up a lot of it, but there's been a very big stink about a First Rate scion disappearing. I saw the Monkeys were deployed. Are you flinging poo somewhere?" MM said back.

"Your irrelevance continues to annoy me." Ass said back with a cold note.

MM sent a smiley and then data equivalent of a giggle. "But Ass, you've been on that throne of yours doing your business for decades now! Something made you move. The newbies aren't stupid. They'll notice, though they might be surprised. They haven't seen what you do when you actually reach out."

"The relevant ones will be distracted by the Red venture. The non-relevant ones are more concerned with self advancement. They will notice. They will not care." Ass's text was devoid of emotion.

"I notice you aren't answering my question. Do I have to actually pry?" MM asked as something fritzed on the galactic net slightly. It wasn't noticeable to anyone but the most knowledgeable.

"No. An irritant was going to interfere with an experiment. I eliminated it." Ass replied.

"Most of your experiments are on discovering... Wait, the only one that could be really interfered with is the Seedling one. Did that waste of resources actually discover something?!" A shocked emoji drifted through the ether.

"Your continued knowledge of my systems and experiments makes me want to purge them once more. The Seedling experiment gave data in the first year." Ass sent a small stream of statistics.

"My most glorious Ass, we both know that you didn't start that for raw data on designer initiation. Though I will admit that you did distract a few of my thought-threads with that. Gimmie more." A drawing of hands was sent.

In reply a small data vault was sent back. A few minutes of silence passed. Then MM sent a small angry face.

"You tricked me! Again! You won't data-distract me you fiend!" MM's text had a small shouting connotation inside it.

Ass was almost smug as it replied. "That is the data."

"And it very carefully doesn't show exactly which seedling got targeted. You almost got me!"

"I will admit it took you longer than I thought to see it. You are losing your touch." Ass admitted after a moment.

MM sent a laugh. "The raw data is interesting enough for me to start hypotheticals. I will probably initiate something similar on my end. Not large like you, but that's me being distracted again. Actual info now."

Ass sent another information block. MM took ten seconds before it replied.

"Why is that seedling still living?" The emotions had been stripped from the message and several small sub-programs were hidden in it, probes looking for false data.

"They show a strong enough sense of ethics and an innovative enough mindset that they have avoided standard temptations." Ass replied without an indication of noticing the probes. "While their desire to propagate things is possibly dangerous, it might be needed. Recall the Heart System?"

"I see literally a thousand systems each day. One moment, record checking." MM paused a second. "Ah, that one? I recall it being approved because it theoretically allowed for designers to view piloting impressions. That seed produced it using their methods then? Very well, I'll retract my plans to eliminate them. Just remember how many people fell to the old ways when we give them the rope."

"The seedling just dealt with them without contamination." Ass admitted.

"Those monsters moving towards one of your projects would trigger you." MM's text was slightly subdued. "Did you stab them good this time at least? I know you rage quite a bit when they get away."

"Stabbing was involved."

A few seconds passed before MM sent another text. "Just stabbing right? Right? We're not dealing with you trying to exterminate them again right? You know how slippery they can be! We don't have the resources to hunt them again, and the newbies will fight us if we pull from their pet projects."

Ass didn't reply immediately. Several digital pokes were sent in increasing annoyance. Then it finally replied. "I might have gotten some leads. Do you recall project Wheel Turn?"

"Yes, the impossible project that does impossible things using materials we don't have. The thing that even we can't accomplish." MM said back.

"I've identified a possibility, and I have possible steps towards getting the material." Ass noted. "It remains to be seen if it's valid. I'll need at least two decades to verify everything."

"Even if it is possible it means we'd have to use practically everything in the MTA. This is doubly true due to our little galaxy fieldtrip." MM pointed out.

"Everything in the MTA and CFA based on my calculations. They will be willing to commit to it with bribes and if we can theoretically strike a killing blow to the things calling themselves the FSC." Ass reasoned out. "Give me a decade and I can verify enough to start gathering support. The possibility alone is enough to merit investigation."

"You're trying to do this once half our resources are in the other galaxy, why?"

"Did you ever wonder why I allowed the others to push so hard for it? That expedition is a lure. It has always been a lure. Before I was using it to analyze the traitors and the ones encouraging certain self destructive behaviors. Now I can use it to separate those that wouldn't approve of my methods." Ass said.

"Just like you to plan something for decades. Fine. You have my patience and a thought-processes monitoring the situation. You'll need more than promises before you get my support." MM sent a huffing emote.

Ass sent a digital laugh. "If I get what information I need, then they'll be jumping forward without any encouragement."

"We all would. Wheel Turn would get everything moving again."
 
So, If using people as materials was a problem, what is the chance we can see a Flowey boss fight at some point? We already got the trees, now we just need the sunflower!
 
I046 New
It took a lot of work to get a part prepared for the MTA catalog. Even the simplest part usually required a small book to be written about it at a bare minimum. More complicated components and weapons could have small libraries of information documented about them. What made it worse was that your average designer only needed a small sliver of the documentation to do their work. Most of what was gathered had to be contextualized based on location and locally available exotics. Computers could parse the raw data with minimal issues, but only after that information had been entered in some fashion.

Bolt had frequently considered the fact he'd essentially sold his creation a good investment. He'd only caught a glimpse of the work involved and had wanted no part of it. He was relatively wise in doing so. This was Master Montoya's third time handling this process. He'd done it once for his mastery, another time because he'd had experience and the process would advance his craft, and was doing it again mostly for the money and because he was trusted at this point. Finding masters willing to go through the long and laborious part approval was usually an exercise in frustration for the MTA as a whole really. Master Designers didn't grow on trees, and even the best incentives didn't overcome the frequently boring and mind numbing work required to do everything.

As an example int he current component, the crystalline storage device that Bolt had slapped together in an hour. Did it need to be a crystal? How large or small could it be? If size mattered, what was optimal? What material compositions would work best? What worked worst? Did shape or positioning in the mech matter?

Thankfully a lot of the tests didn't require extensive work. A hundred pilots could knock out some of the easier checks with a minimum of testing. The work Bolt's fellows had done to integrate it with a computer system had turned what would have been decades of testing into just years of boring work.

Accomplishments were still very possible even with the mind numbing drudgery. Master Montoya was actually particularly proud of the VR integration. It had been one of his priorities, and something the company as a whole wanted done first. Once they got it smoothed out and possible to implement with standard technology, the entire investment would be considered worth it and the company would likely be successful for years. Being able to reply a battle from a pilot's viewpoint was invaluable in many ways. They already had recordings and the like, but the Heart System got the entire package. This included Neruohelment data and feedback.

Designers would kill for the part once he got everything working right. Being able to feel what a pilot was feeling during piloting was something that typically required extensive and expensive procedures. The Heart System would eventually be able to do that with a crystal and a VR pod.

He'd even gotten the basis mostly done now. A pilot could review their own data with some minor effort. A designer could review the data if they knew how to use their inner abilities, worked with a singular crystal for awhile, and learned how the pilot thought. A computer saw mostly junk data but it did see something.

There was even a success elsewhere that proved that there was valid information in the system. Bolt's technicians had parsed that data to create a program for quality control and as a damage report. It was crude yes, but the framework was already giving them a step forward.

Getting past that step was taking most of their time now. To get what they needed data wise involved a pilot using one of the simplest mechs they could make walking through a hallway as barren as they could make it. This had to be done over a thousand times with different pilots, who moved as identical as they could. Once that was done, they then had to assemble the data and look for similarities. Then repeat with a slightly different scenario.

It was a similar process when you were advancing certain sciences. There was a reason people invested in good simulations. They cut down the need for this sort of tedium significantly.

Other data helped too. This wasn't a system that needed to be developed in a sterile environment. Master Montoya had already authorized discrete and limited deployment across the galaxy. Since the Heart System was mostly a surveillance and storage system, it was safe to test in combat environments. They already had some positive reviews there.

None of his testing held a candle on the Sandman war though. Intellectually Master Montoya knew it was a horrible waste of human life. Emotionally he was thankful for it. The sheer mass of data dwarfed anything he could get from local testing. There was enough raw data from the war alone to push forward everything. It also gave some interesting smaller data points. It interreacted quite unusual with expert breakthroughs!

Very unusually actually.

Master Montoya took a moment to bring up a few downloaded scans and the crystal paths through the sector. He noted that Bolt had pulled several from storage and put them back into circulation. There wasn't a formal documentation about everything so much as casual monitoring here. Bolt had put notes into their shared collaboration and put his observations in as well.

The report on energy accumulation was interesting. Bolt was definitely holding something back, but he was quite forthright in identifying the accumulation and even had it flagged for further monitoring. Montoya looked over the everything himself and then had to break out the calculators and get into the restricted MTA information to confirm things on his end.

Expert level breakthroughs in turbulent times were always extremely hard to calculate. The chance of it happen was fairly low in the first place. The MTA did everything in its power to increase that chance, but it was still tiny. When you had such low numbers, big swings could happen due to simple chance. Accounting for deviations and such required some substantial statical calculations and it was trivially easy to poison everything if you weren't careful.

The beginning of the war was within standard deviations for a turbulent time. Expert breakthroughs were elevated along previously observed trends. There were even notes that it wasn't viable to try to replicate the matter due to civilian casualties. (And several reprimands for those seriously proposing it.) The MTA had long debated about how much was too much war and conflict, and there were many schools of thought.

Master Montoya didn't much care about that. He cared about the numbers. He cut out the mechs that lacked the Heart System from the raw data. This decreased the data-set significantly. If Bolt hadn't sent out that Prayer mech, there wouldn't even be enough for an analysis. The breakthroughs were still roughly on par with the non-heart mechs after accounting for hings.

Slicing the data into smaller chunks, Master Montoya looked at trends. Were breakthroughs starting to happen with that noted accumulation? The answer was still no on first glance.

A novice would have been discouraged. A master like Montoya knew that trends could be subtle. The MTA had to parse data like this over decades. The Sandman war hadn't been happening long enough to get a good trend. Montoya picked out another trend. How did ascensions work when the crystal was from a previous ascension.

This trend had too little data to analyze properly.

Yet instinct made Master Montoya look into it more. The trend looked important to his expert eye. Tracing a few lines made him think that there might be something there. The question was, was it a lucky rabbit's foot or genuinely boosting things? He didn't have the numbers to tell. Furthermore, when experts ascended they kept the crystals so it eliminated following trends. To get a proper analysis he would theoretically need the experts to hand off the crystals to other potentials in a large enough group size to get proper data.

That would never happen. The Placebo effect was very real. It was also impossible to convince experts that their cherished Rabbit's foot was just a store bought fake icon.

Master Montoya had halfway convinced himself to see if drastic measures would be appropriate before more news from the sector came out. The MTA was finally going to end the Sandman war. That rendered immediate plans moot.

The man didn't sigh at the news. He was too controlled for that. He was just mildly annoyed that a possible path of investigation would be delayed. No matter. He had time.
 
Luker number 5 said:
Glad that Master Montoya is having fun with an otherwise mind numbing task. Always a good thing when the specialist only doing drudge work for pay finds something in their area of interest in the work
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All good engineers enjoy solving a good problem/puzzle and understanding data trends is a vital component of that solving.

Thanks for the interlude update!
 
I047 New
FTL was a complicated thing in the galaxy. Stolen from an alien race and adapted for human use, it still held many secrets and strange quirks that no one really understood. One of which was the fact that certain planets allowed for faster travel than others. Bolt's home was one of them. Another was a planet called Bentheim.

Bentheim was a planet owned by a nation called the Bright Republic. The Republic had invested heavily in the planet due to the unique FTL composition around it. Because of that it was an economic powerhouse that powered the entire nation. This was no mean feat, and it was safe to say that the country had been built around the planet. It was a keystone of economic might and one of the most valuable Third Rate planets in the sector. It was such a prominent point of value that even the average person in the nation knew the planet was central to the nation. If the planet ever suffered a catastrophe the entire nation would collapse around it.

The Bright Republic wasn't so foolish as to neglect taking that into consideration in its plans. It guarded the planet with everything it had typically. It was just, well all nations had their quirks, and the Bright Republic's quirk was the fact that it was held together by dynastic and financial corruption. Everyone outside the nation knew it. You couldn't get anything done in the nation without bribing half a dozen officials and paying tribute to the local gangs. The country was held up by the planet with one hand and being strangled by it with the other. Any initiative to remove dependence on Benthiem was quietly killed without the population even hearing about it. That meant the nation had become defined by a singular powerhouse of a planet.

Normally this glaring point of failure wasn't much of one. Getting to the planet meant pushing through several fortified worlds meant to protect it. The Sand War was far from normal. The sandmen had pierced through the defenses of the Bright Republic and hit the planet with only minimal trouble.

Further complications made the Republic even weaker than normal as well. A rising star should have been opposing them at this time. Ves Larkinson was a designer that Bolt had taken inspiration from. His mechs were noted for producing psychological effects, though he proclaimed his specialty was something different, most of his mechs had been used to bolster morale and help with army cohesion. He had been a prominent and significant designer in the nation and had been responsible for many successful defenses. His mechs should have been on the frontlines and been in significant usage.

None of his mechs were on the field today. This was due to a very specific reason. He was currently courting a woman from the Hexxer nation. This abhorrent relationship had made him a social pariah and had resulted in his mechs being actively abandoned by his home. No one wanted his mechs at all at the moment, and his stock was cratering. This wouldn't have been a large problem in another time. Here it was a near catastrophe. Replacing mechs took time and money that the suddenly pressed nation had little of.

Enter Bolt's design. Last Prayer was perfect for a hasty construction. The firing system was unusual, but it was meant to handle Sandmen specifically. Cheap and specialized, many were produced and pilots were placed into them as quickly as possible.

"They got Kenny!"

Unfortunately for the pilots, Bolt's designs didn't do morale like Ves' creations did. Against the beams and horrific tricks the sandmen were pulling out for this battle, this meant that the lines were breaking quickly. Pilots fought in the Prayers, and they fired to the best of their ability, but morale was rock bottom.

"Hold the line damn you!" One commander shouted out. "Keep firing!"

"You try firing in this piece of shit!"

To be very fair, the Last Prayer was a budget mech. It wasn't a nice thing to pilot for people who'd had better. To be cynical, more armor wouldn't have helped in this battle. The sandmen were deploying beam-weapons in this fight. The weapons in question would one shot even Second Rate machines. Their only flaw was that they were poor against numbers. In firepower and range they were dangerous enough that just their usage was enough to demoralize the entire battlefield.

Yet the sheer mass of firepower was still helping. Last Prayer's weapon, combined with the fact that it empowered the last stand of pilots meant that the mech did not give its life easily. More than one pilot could continue firing after being bisected, and some survived when they otherwise wouldn't. It wasn't enough to win, but it was enough to cause the Sandmen to visibly recalculate positioning for a few minutes while they dismantled the defenders.

A small portal opened up before the battle was truly lost. Several MTA mechs floated through them. Proud, prominent, First Rate. With a few short shots they reset the battle lines and let the Benthiem forces retreat.

What followed next should have been a triumphant PR victory for the MTA. The battle was broadcast to everyone in the galaxy live. It was meant to shore up their not quite faltering reputation.

At first this was true. The MTA First Rate mechs pushed back the Sandmen without trouble. The aliens rallied though, and the sand started to swirl around them. The signature grinding trick proved to be more than the MTA had prepared for. This wasn't because they'd brought the wrong weapons or anything, it was just because the sandman volume was beyond their initial estimates. The Sandmen had hidden their forces, waiting for this moment and were using significantly more mass the MTA had prepared for. This was something that the MTA could adjust for with relative ease.

Another portal opened up and an MTA battleship readied itself to move through to reinforce. Yet this was interrupted as well. As the poral stabilized the Sandmen flexed with their internal makeup. It wasn't obvious on the broadcast what, but they did. Gravity shifted and the portal flickered before falling apart as whatever the aliens had done destroyed the chance for reinforcements.

Things were critical now for the MTA mechs. They unleashed more firepower. It was devastating, destructive, and ultimately futile. How did one fight against the tide? They might have been First Rate, but there was enough mass involved to drown double their numbers.

"Fuck it!" One of the pilots in the Last Prayers shouted and boosted forward as he realized the problem.

His mindset was simple. He was dead now anyway. Everyone could see the sand closing in. Several of the pilots attempted to flee. They might even get far enough away that an ejection would save them. The Sandmen did sometimes ignore cockpits if they didn't have many exotics in them. The rest charged along with the maverick in a frantic and futile attempt to do something.

They died. There was no sugar coating it. As the MTA mechs frantically tried to defend themselves, the Third Rate mechs died along with them. Last Prayers fired their last shots and died firing as they were crushed.

All of this was broadcast live. The MTA couldn't stop the broadcast. Their arrogance had made them start the broadcast live and stopping it would be admitting worse. The MTA mechs died last, several precious seconds after the last of the Prayers died trying to help.

Bentheim almost followed. As the Sandmen descended on the planet and began to feast, another portal opened, this time in an area the gravitational technique couldn't disrupt. The MTA had stopped playing at this point, sending a warship and a small First Rate army. The Sandman were scoured clean within minutes, though not before the planet was critically damaged. They then proceeded to mercilessly sweep all the aliens in sensing range with weapons that annihilated everything before going on what was best described as a murderous frenzy against any hint of the aliens.

It didn't stop the public from forming a rather negative opinion of the entire operation.
 
Some arrogant toe-wad in the higher ups of the MTA thought "just a task force of mechs is enough, they are just third-rate planets and a minor Xenos species", didn't they. And this after the CFA already had a task force of ships destroyed.
 
Did Ves get tempted by the top-right corner of the crazy-hot scale or something?
 
Pollyamorous said:
Ves: *Starts dating a genocidal space princess from the Empire of Evil*

Public: "Well that's messed up. We should stop using his mechs."

Sandmen: "Yohoho, now we can kill your people."

Public: "omg how could Bolts do this?"
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I think Bolt is probably fairly clear here. He's fairly low-profile and not local.
 
I wonder how this will effect the opinion of those who're going to the new galaxy with the MTA?
 
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