Chapter Sixty-Two - Quick Thinking

Chapter Sixty-Two - Quick Thinking

Chapter Sixty-Two - Quick Thinking

During the early 2010s, several companies ran this advertising campaign that encouraged people to name their children after a brand or corporation.

These children would, in theory, benefit from discounts and rebates while shopping at those locations.

Of course, that backfired spectacularly when most corporations forgot all about that by the time those children were old enough to purchase things themselves.

--Interview with Walmart 'Walt' McDonalds, 2034

***

I have a plan, I said.

That was quick, Gomorrah said.

The plan is that Ill jump out of this car and summon a giant warmech so that I can fight and hold off the aliens while you keep bombing the ground around me, I said.

Gomorrah paused for a long few seconds. I see now why the plan was quick.

Hey, its got decent odds of success, I think. We need to slow down the advance of those bastards, and thisll let the vans continue to drop bombs along the shoreline. The vans were coming around for another bombing run already, continuing the line that wed started already. Gomorrah and I had left them to it and were racing to where the antithesis were actually coming from, about a kilometre and a half further down.

Fine, Gomorrah said. Dont die.

I grinned. I wont, I promised. Myalis, how far can that mech you were talking about drop from, and can you summon it with me inside?

I see where youre going with that line of questioning, and while the attempt does sound spectacular, it also sounds foolhardy. The warmech I proposed earlier can drop from a height of seven metres without any issue. Above that it will suffer increasing amounts of damage from the fall. As for the summoning, yes, I could summon the vehicle around you in mid-air. Or you could politely ask Gomorrah to swing down and drop you off at ground level.

I groaned, but she was probably right.

It wasnt nearly as badass though, to be dropped off than to jump out of a moving car, summon a warmech around me, then land with that. Gom, can you drop me off... about over there? I pointed to a spot some fifty-ish metres from the shore. There were some wooden piers over the lakeside where the water ended at a cet of cement walls. The piers stretched out over the water, and there were some restaurants nearby using them as sitting space.

A few smaller models were already pulling themselves over the edge of the pier. Dog-like model threes, some tentacle-covered assholes too, and of course, a bunch of model ones were flying right out of the water and into the air for a short distance. A flock of these were hanging onto the rails, like seagulls on a wire, only worse in every way.

Gomorrah brought the Fury down low and quick, the hood popping open to release a flamethrower which did flamethrower things to the nearest aliens.

I waited for the fire to die down before stepping out. Stay safe, I said.

Youre the one going out there, she said.

Yeah, but Ill be fine, I said as I clicked the door shut. The Fury rose up past me in a wash of broiling air and I was left standing in the circle of burning pier over increasingly agitated waters. Gonna wanna back up a bit, I said to myself.

Are you ready?

How much is this going to cost? I asked.

The more you put into it, the more youll get out of it.

How long do I have before that model twenty-eight shows up? I asked.

Approximately two minutes.

I nodded. How longs the tutorial?

Significantly longer than two minutes, Catherine. This is a full-on stealth capable warmech. Piloting it without assistance makes piloting a modern main battle tank look like riding a tricycle. The upside is that the wide control range means that a pilot can do some spectacular things with a vehicle like this one.

I ground my teeth. Sure, letting the autopilot take care of things would be fine... but I really wanted to do the piloting myself. It was too cool not to be something I wanted. And I could just imagine the ladyboner Lucy would get once she found out.

Do you have one of those implantable knowledge things? I asked.

For a few points, certainly.

I rolled my eyes. Really, Myalis?

Actually, the Mark IV Mechcatular Nyanzerfaust comes equipped with its own learning architecture. All youre missing are the neural uplinks to truly make use of it all.

Fine, I said. But nothing too intrusive. Call it two hundred or so points? Im feeling cheap right about now.

New Purchase: Internal Neural Uplink System

Points Reduced from 17,634 to 17,434

What Myalis got me came in the form of a small, boxy syringe with the words PRESS TO FOREHEAD written on one side.

I did just that, and immediately felt a wave of cold washing over my head, like a sudden brain freeze. Little tendrils raced across and out of the box, and I almost ripped it away only to realise it was stuck there. Then my head vibrated for just a moment and I was hit with a sudden sense of deja-vu.

System installed. There should be a new jack along the back of your ears. Youll find a connector on the ceiling, jack it in.

I felt at the side of my head and found what she was talking about, a tiny pinprick hole that hadnt been there before. Wait, did that drill through my skull?

Just a little bit. Dont worry, its stronger than it was before.

I frowned as I tugged the jack out of the ceiling and shoved it into place. There was a noise, like connecting one of those old aug cables, then... then I felt myself.

My vision doubled. I was at once in the cockpit, and also seeing out of the eyes of the mech.

I moved my arm back into place, then raised a paw.

Whoa, I said.

This... was fucky.

And unfortunately, as the pier exploded out around me, I was out of time to explore that fuckiness.

***