Chapter 19

“Congratulations on your win. You really meant it when you said matches are decided before they begin.”

It was a flawless victory, a better result than he could have hoped for. It was a little disappointing that they had to crush a rising star from their country, but it was a great way to show the world what their partnership could do. With no damage being done to the rig, Jeff was able to just give it a check-up while preparing for the next match. From the looks of things, they even had a day off between matches, due to scheduling. There were few ways that his day could get any better.

The second day of the junior league matches was between Sachiko and a pilot from the same country, as well as a match to determine who would fight the winner of the first match two days after that. That meant that Savannah’s next opponents would be Satou and Mia. Of all the school league pilots in the series, they were the ones that Jeff considered the biggest threat. That wasn’t because of Satou, but rather because of Mia.

Mia ‘The Hungry Wolf’ Rossi was the heiress to Rossi International Inc., and as playful and innocent as she seemed, she was still a direct descendant of the Rossi family, and Jeff had no doubt that she was every bit like the rest of her family.

Before the invention of the rig, and war changed throughout the world, the Rossi family was an arms manufacturer that stopped at nothing to try and put one of their guns in the hands of anyone with cash. With their networks, logistics and prices, if there was a war crime happening somewhere in the world, probability said that it was done with one of their weapons. Yet despite that, they still managed to walk openly in the streets, free and without any worries about authorities. They were well practised in the art of keeping a clean public face.

When rigs changed everything, they seized on the opportunity, and invested heavily in the development of new ways to arm them. It paid off for them too, both in terms of finance and reputation. While before people saw them as a lump they couldn’t prove was cancerous, now they were upstanding businessmen that ensured the land’s protectors were equipped with what they needed to win. In a single generation they had gone from reluctantly tolerated to upheld and revered.

Despite that, some people still thought that the family continued its shady past, and simply got better at hiding it. As cynical as Jeff was, there was no way that he would believe that Mia was just some innocent genius, unaware of her family’s past and duties. As much as Jeff thought that Satou was an idiot that felt too much more than he thought, the tiger hiding behind him was real.

In particular was the threat that came from her wealth. While victory couldn’t be bought, only a fool would think that it played no part. With her as the mechanist and footing the bill, Satou could use as many disposable items and bullets as he liked, within the limit of the rules, and never even notice they weren’t earning anything. Furthermore, they were able to use better parts licences, filled their workshops with better parts or could afford to do none of that and just hire someone to have Jeff killed. Money gave them a lot of options to work with.

While being vigilant of unaccompanied bags and staying clear of windows, Jeff set out developing a plan that would maximise their chance of winning. The obvious way was well known, hit them hard in the first round and damage them beyond recovery, but just following the obvious answer didn’t feel right. He and Savannah showed the world that they could win with preparation and strategy, just following a formulaic counter wasn’t something that matched well with that image.

Their image was another reason not to simply overwhelm in the first round. They built support from crushing their opponent completely since their image was of an angelic warrior slaying a monster, but that wouldn’t work against Satou. Satou had crowd appeal; both due to his record high DC as well as his knightly rig designs. Putting two knights in the field and having one of them thrash the other would just paint them as the bad guys. Once that label was attached, it wouldn’t come off quickly, so it was best to save it till it was absolutely needed.

Instead, Jeff thought of the perfect way to work the crowd in their favour, while still ensuring that the other side couldn’t win. The basic idea was to be the underdogs. While their age divisions were different, most people still had a lot of hopes for Satou’s potential. That was something they could work with, so long as Satou appeared to win the first round the basic purpose of the pit method, gathering information to adapt with, they could make a turnaround in the following rounds to with both the match and the people. The trick would be inflicting damage carefully, hitting areas that would be difficult to fix, but weren’t worth many points. If they deployed without the connection ports covered, then they would be ideal targets, though even with the covers they were still fairly good.

Another problem was making themselves seem vulnerable enough to seem like the underdog, while not actually being weak enough to lose, all without making the opponent suspicious about what they had planned.

It took nearly half a day for Jeff to come up with the ideal solution. In the end, Jeff stumbled across some very old weapon designs while looking into Rossi International Inc. and the idea came to him. Some energy weapons in the earliest days of rig combat had a backpack unit which held power in a large capacitor-like device, in order to fire a single burst that was far stronger than what could normally be managed. It was a design that very quickly fell into disuse when wing thrusters became normal. Rigs with wings were simply too much better at avoiding, making the extra power pointless. But that was just the kind of thing that Jeff was looking for, not for the weapon, but for a reason to remove the wings.

A rig without wings was at such an obvious disadvantage, that no one would ever expect them to stand even a chance at winning. But Sav had already proven that she could dodge and move effectively with just the body thrusters. Using overconfidence as an excuse, they could equip a backpack weapon and people would just assume that they were trying to follow the standard plan and deal critical damage as quickly as possible.

Another benefit was that the backpacks were discarded technology, and licenses for their use were either as cheap as possible or free.

Considering the bloating that Jeff placed in the parts list of the previous fight, if Mia looked into what they had planned, it would just look like Jeff was doing the same thing and buying up free and cheap licences as a diversion. No mechanist in their right mind would think that they were actually going deploy without wings, so they would be expecting the paperwork to be changed at the last minute. Jeff kind of wished he could see her face when she realised that that wasn’t happening.

For the sake of brand recognition, Jeff kept the rig in the same colours and general shape, only changing the armour composition and losing the wings. Instead he put a couple small wings on the rig’s helmet, partially to for aesthetic reasons and partially as a joke. In the rig’s right hand, it had a massive weapon that was shaped like a lance with a barrel running below the shaft, covered in rings and coils. It struck a balance between medieval and futuristic while walking a much thinner tightrope to the rest of the rig. Simply put, the four meter long weapon didn’t match the rest of the rig. That was especially apparent when a rig scale pistol and knife were added to the rig’s belt equivalent.

With the remaining time before the start of Sam’s next match, Jeff modified the weapons to match his plans, and set the program aside to compile. While that was happening, he and Sav went to watch the match.

Sachiko’s opponent was a Junior League pilot from the same country, and while they were in no way a bad pilot, they weren’t a good one either. They didn’t take any risks, which some people would see as a positive, and preferred to wear an opponent down before taking any actions. They embodied the mentality of a defence type pilot and it was reflected in their rig.

The rig was a dull iron colour and was fitted with enough armour plates that it seemed to be round or egg shaped. Even the wings were thick and heavy, with thrusters that would only barely be able to move that solid mass. Its uninspired form was actually one of the worst match ups for Sachiko. It would be possible for her to win, but it would be a win by points and cost them heavily in ammunition. Bullets would only cause thin scratches and it would take a constant barrage of a high density energy weapon to melt the armour. The only really way to deal damage would be with missiles or other weapons that could deal damage with impact.

When Sachiko entered the ring, it was clear that Sam had thought about that issue and reached a reasonable answer. That bright orange rig ditched the cannon in favour of a sledge hammer. The lump of heavy metal on a stick had a thruster attached to one side, making it faster to swing and able to be used to make more complicated movements. It was very possible for a weapon like that to deal visible damage against the grey armoured egg. Not enough to stop it, but enough to score points.

So long as Sachiko could put some dents in it without getting hit, she could win the match. It would even go well for her with the crowd.

Defence types were boring to watch. They were slow, rarely had flashy moves, and didn’t take much damage. That made it frustrating to watch someone shoot at them and nothing happen. But a hammer was different. There was a catharsis to watching something you hate get pummelled repeatedly with a hammer. The longer the match went on, the more the crowd would hate that lump of metal and the more they would love Sachiko for wailing on it.

The first round went as expected, with the defender getting beaten around by the rocket propelled hammer. Small dents started to appear in the outer layers of the armour, and that was enough to award the first round to Sachiko. The defender made some attempts at attacking but none of them were fast enough to hit. Sachiko realised the importance of deceptive movements from watching Sav fight, and started using the hammer to make her movements less predictable.

The second round went even better, as Sachiko opened by hitting a wing with a well-placed missile and hammering the falling opponent into the ground and not letting them stand back up. By the end of that round, Sachiko had almost mined her way through all of the armour, and was completely exhausted. Despite her fatigue, she lifted her hammer triumphantly into the sky, showing off both it and her new arm.

After her victory was officially announced one of the event organisers, a tired old man in an expensive suit, addressed the crowd.

“Firstly I thank everyone for gathering to watch these games, as our countries enter into a new era of cooperation. There has been an unexpected change to the order of the competition, one that I’m sure everyone in this arena, and steaming this broadcast, can look forward to.

Many years ago, a heroic pilot inspired a generation of new pilots with her revolutionary method, and in this competition, we have seen it renewed; Sara Campbell, the pit method pilot, and her son, Satou Campbell, the second generation pit method pilot.”

With the revelation of Satou’s heritage, the crowd was shocked but let out a scream of excitement.

“The second round of this competition will now be suspended in order to make way for an exhibition match. The new and the old; the mother and the son; who will win in this once in a lifetime match up. I can even confirm that the original mystery mechanist will be working on this match. Will the dream team be able to maintain their historic pride, or has the times left them behind? In tomorrow’s match, we get to find out. And to the competitors, whose matches are displaced by this event, know that if the legend wins, she will enter the competition in Satou’s place, giving the pilots a chance to go up against the hero Sara Campbell.”

With that announcement, a cold kind of anticipation filled Jeff. He had long thought that he was numb to Sara’s fame, but having the opportunity to fight them brought back the bitterness of when he found out about her cheating. Being given a chance to crush both her and Alicia Kaya was the best way to work through those feelings.

As he thought about that, a message came from Sam.

“Did you hear that? Can you believe that? How cool is that!? You’ll get to work in a match against the legend herself!”