STEIN KALFOX + ELIZABETH JACKSPAR
“Greed is so destructive. It destroys everything.”
E A R T H A K I T T
SIMULATION ROOM - NEW ANCHORAGE
The door to the simulated facility was thick and sturdy, yet with the two red points the Blur’s demolition charges were probably just enough to make an entrance. Just as Dr. James Lofgren implied there were alternate routes available and just like a real base the main door isn’t going to be utterly undefended. As such was with this facility, simulation or not, as there was already
something or
someone on the other side. Whichever was the case, reinforcements moving in from deeper portions of the structure wasn’t totally obtuse of an idea.
Dr. Lofgren was watching intently to both the neural readings and what they were doing in the virtual world. Knowing just who her “patients” were was always helpful and then there was her curiosity considering the ID’s of both of the pilots in the simulation were similar yet came from extremely different backgrounds— corporate and colonial.
“I recommend we split up. I’ll blow the door, distract whatever comes out, maybe you can find a way behind them.” Eli’s voice was soft, scratchy beyond the radio’s standard static. She cleared her throat, but it didn’t help much, and then somewhat awkwardly added:
”Suggestions?”There was about a half-minute of silence as Stein took to her ally’s question as she began looking at the simulated facility in front of her. There were many ways to go about attacking the base in question; remaining with Blur as a support unit, a twin pincer-style assault, an aerial breach, and a few others. The simulation was set to be very generic, that much was obvious and Stein being a former corporate military pilot led Dr. Lofgren to believe that she had been in situations like this so many times before.
“There are several flanking points I could utilize for your proposed plan. I could wait and cover you or alternatively breach the facility at a different point of entry. Both are sound options.” Stein’s response shot over from her simulated communications line, the tone was as was expected from the pilot: direct, analytical, and almost a near emotionless level of calm.
”Find the other entry point, then.” and with that, Blur approached the door. In short work she had charges set on both weak points, as well as three applied to the ground outside of the entrance. Once she was a safe distance away, she spoke up again.
”Blowing primary charges in five...four…” The thunder of the explosion crashed as the thermal heat blew open the metal that held the facility’s main doors together. As the facility’s alarm blared loudly another explosion on the opposite side of the facility became heard. It seemed as soon as Eli had suggested Stein find another entry point that Stein had already approached one with a plan to breach already in motion. Stein’s military background was definitely an asset— one she would need to record for her report to Commander Graham. That report being the whole point this simulation was even started in the first place.
“Other entry point found and breached.” Stein responded as the sound of the Little Dragon’s machine gun system echoed on the other side of the facility.
Blur’s thrusters hummed to life, and once the smoke settled she was already in the air, observing the blown-open entrance from above. With no real ranged weapons in her arsenal, it might have seemed like something of a precarious position. Perhaps the pilot had excess faith in her abilities, given the nature of the simulation, or perhaps she was counting on Stein’s breach.
Whilst Stein had most certainly the element of surprise on her side, the simulation admittedly was not as generic as it looked. Considering the fact that this was supposed to gauge the pilots and not be exceptionally challenging, Dr. Lofgren chose something that fit that bill yet was also a bit
different. What the pilots didn’t know was there were a few…
tweaks to the scenario that she decided not to mention. It would be simply too
boring if run of the mill NC’s and soldiers were the only thing she tested with two pilots like Stein and Eli. Something the two were about to find out with the simulation as they would see that these generic mech’s that laid inside the base were armed with anti-armor loadouts— volatile target-seeking
rockets for example.
“Simulation has customized loadouts. Taking evasive movement.” Stein commented over the simulator’s communications line.
“That’s correct.” Dr. Lofgren smirked as she observed the reactions from her desk.
Whilst Stein dealt with rockets, Eli would find her entry point intercepted by an enemy from the inside armed similarly to one of New Anchorage’s former employs. She recognized it as Goldenspur’s make and build. Blur remained airborne, focus clearly on the simulated enemy. Whether or not the pilot fully recalled Goldenspur’s loadout would quickly become evident, and past that, her ability to react to what she perhaps did not know.
Goldenspur stood at the ready in the hallway, his signature plasma lance already charged and ready to fire. “Surprise” was all the simulated pilot had to say as a beam of superheated death was fired right at Blur’s center mass. As was expected of the spry NC, Blur quickly dashed to the side, thrusters aiding her evasives. Range was a crux of her model, and it seemed as though Goldenspur had the means of keeping her at leash. That said, Blur still made a bee-line for her target, beam-sword at the ready.
If there was anything the simulation had remembered about Jan’s piloting style though, it would have been his willingness to take risks. The Goldenspur responded to Blur’s attempts to get into range by firing forward thrusters at full blast and dealing a shoulder-bash to his opponent, shielding his lance’s sensitive emitter from the sword in the process.
Blur smacked dead into the Goldenspur, rattled by the impact but not enough to put her down. In fact, with the sword unable to cause much damage, she brought up the other hand, claw-like digits extending and aiming to dig into her enemy’s armor, not so much to deal damage, but as leverage to vault herself over and get behind him.
Goldenspur seemed to hesitate for a moment, just long enough to allow Blur to vault over. It was a ruse though, as he simply boosted forward to get back out of range. turning around presumably just as Blur was doing the same thing, and letting loose with auto-cannon fire.
Now grounded, Blur had fewer options for evasion, not to mention her shot at damaging the Goldenspur was lost as soon as it had been presented. Was she slower than usual, or was the simulated pilot a good reader? Whatever the case, as the close-range fire opened up, she rocketed side-wards, though not fast enough to avoid a spray to her trailing hand, and as consequence, lost the beam-sword. She quickly created a distance between them, which made sense, but now Blur was back to square one.
Once she was away, she pulled the back-sheathed plasma blade free, it’d have to do.
Goldenspur continued to put more rounds downrange, strafing about as he did, he seemed wary of Blur’s ability at close combat and reluctant to give her the advantage of a good reaction.
Blur took off again, getting airborne as soon as the immediate danger of being shredded apart at close range had subsided. She went high, circling the Goldenspur and gradually getting closer, perhaps she was trying to outstep it? The Goldenspur fired some reactionary shots from its own gatling guns, and when the Blur began to get just too close for comfort, it charged directly at it at maximum speed.
The air cracked, angry and loud, as the Blur shot suddenly up, high enough to avoid the charge, but then immediately the engines died. She fell fast to the ground, and in another moment her thrusters kicked up again, launching after the Goldenspur with a wide-swing cocked back.
The simulated Goldenspur managed to look up in time for the Blur to slash a beam-saber right across the face, cutting the upper half clean off and ruining the Goldenspur’s positioning, forcing it to thrust backwards and take some time to regain footing, charging the thermal cannon for another blast all the while.
As the fight carried on, outside of the simulation pods and at her desk, Dr. Lofgren began to tap her fingers on the base of her keyboard as she observed the fight. Her tweaks had caught both of the pilots a bit off guard and while she was pleased that it did add a bit of dynamic she did think they would go through slightly modified AI faster than this. Maybe she set the AI too high? No. There was no such thing.
”Time is running out, ladies.”Clearly this was what Blur had wanted, for as soon as the damage had been dealt she took off once again, only this time going past the Goldenspur, perhaps to try and get around it again. Momentum was certainly a key to her fighting style, as was evident. It wouldn’t take long for Blur to swing back around, waiting for her enemy’s next move.
Goldenspur, deciding the current battlefield did not suit its needs, boosted forward again, this time however, he landed on the ground and kept sliding forward… Its legs folded together and the main frame bended backwards. What was a humanoid robot just a second ago was now a superheavy tank, the lance its main turret and the autoguns repositioned to forward-pointing positions. The Goldenspur then retreated back into the facility, presumably to set up an ambush inside.
Blur followed suit, speeding past the entrance to give chase. Cramped quarters were bittersweet for her, there was far less space to move around, but that also meant less distance to cross to get to her target. She killed the airborne thrusters once she was inside, letting the forward momentum carry her in.
Sliding inside on her feet, Blur could see that the facility entrance branched out into three; one to the left, one to the right, and what seemed to be an elevator straight forwards.
Goldenspur wasn’t standing right in the hallway, but Blur could just see it slipping away into the rightside passage. His lance emitted the distinct hum of a full charge ready to fire.
Blur kept up the chase, rounding the corner after Goldenspur without hesitation. In fact, she picked up speed, every thruster blaring but her body didn’t lean full forward.
Blur rounded the corner, and found herself in a situation much like how this fight began… facing down the barrel of a plasma lance about to fire. “You fell for that twice?” a mocking voice rang through comms as the deadly payload was let loose.
Perhaps too late, but too decisive of a move to have been reaction, Blur shot diagonal, cramming against the wall and corner in an attempt to avoid the shot. There were plenty of sparks, plenty of metal lost to metal, and when she came down her leading shoulder was a fair bit shorter than the other, but nonetheless she continued straight for the Goldenspur.
While the Blur moved as fast as it could, the Goldenspur’s pilot, simulated or not, knew how to deal with fast targets at close range due to raw experience over the years. Not to mention, a particle beam of plasma would be simply too fast to even register at that range anyway. Blur’s left-most fuel tanks exploded, both in the arm and in the leg, leaving them just barely holding on to the main body and making them glorified dead weight. The remaining thrusters could do little except shove her in the opposite direction. Without that, Blur collapsed in a heap, more or less thoroughly defeated.
Dr. Lofgren had to look again. Blur was
inoperational? Followed by information about her synchronization spikes, lowest and highest she went on the ‘radio’ and sighed in a fit of disappointment.
“Well.. you’re free to start desynchronization procedures now. I got what I wanted, thank you for participating.” She paused for a moment before she shot a glance at the pod Eli had set up in.
“Not used to fighting NC’s similar to your own, huh? Maybe the tweaks I made were too hard for you. Let’s hope the other girl is doing be—”There was a quick pause as Dr. Lofgren looked back to the statistics. She had been focusing way too much on Blur’s progress that she hadn’t even looked at Little Dragon’s own.
“—well. Perhaps you drawing the attention of Goldenspur was a good play. Not for you, though. Heh.” The doctor muttered under her breath as she moved her glasses up closer to her face.
She would be certain the scenario would be completed in only a matter of a few minutes. But then again, Stein only had a few minutes to drop the Goldenspur AI.
“Should be interesting.” Dr. Lofgren thought aloud.
