Petals of Titanium -- My Life as a Mecha Setting Bridge Bunny Quest
- Thread starter Gazetteer
- Start date
- Original Sci-Fi Users' Choice!
Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
- Location
- Earth
[X] Resolve the problem with a weird workaround, you're good enough
- Location
- Nova Scotia
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Leaving aside the very real problem of sexual orientation in that trio, I think Gloriana would literally murder him fairly early on if she had to date poor Milo.
[X] Resolve the problem with a weird workaround, you're good enough
For Titan. For the Empress. For Lori. Protagonist Powers Activate!
(Hopefully)
For Titan. For the Empress. For Lori. Protagonist Powers Activate!
(Hopefully)
Night_stalker
Slava Ukraini!
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[X] Resolve the problem with a weird workaround, you're good enough
- Location
- Internet
[X] Resolve the problem with a weird workaround, you're good enough
[X] Resolve the problem with a weird workaround, you're good enough
- Location
- Nova Scotia
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Inserted tally. Not exactly close this time!
- Location
- In front of my computer
As one of those shippers, that is indeed how I was feeling! Also, I never realized how much I wanted an official PoT anime before, but now it's all I can think of.
- Location
- Nova Scotia
- Pronouns
- She/Her
I'm calling the vote here, complete landslide.
I might do a little omake story after we get to the end looking at some alternate choices. Six romance is right up there on the list.
Thors_Alumni
Proud member of Thors Class VII from Liberl
- Location
- Liberl Zemuria.
Votes Closed.
- Location
- Nova Scotia
- Pronouns
- She/Her
On the positive side, it was the winning result anyway.
Update 041: Titan 1
- Location
- Nova Scotia
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Workaround; 42 people voted
Work with the problem; 3 people voted
Work with the problem; 3 people voted
Your hands glide over your workstation display, even as everyone else confirms the status of their own systems. By the time Captain Andre looks directly to you, you're already both metaphorical elbows deep in what settings you have access to. You don't want to shut the error detection off completely — going into a real battle, that was the sort of thing people get court martialed for. What you need is to just make it stop flagging you when there's nothing wrong.
"North?" Andre asks, frowning at you.
"Just a moment, ma'am," you tell her, quickly.
"I don't like the sound of that, Ensign."
"I really do just need a moment, Captain!" you assure her. The seconds between this proclamation and your intended goal are agonising beyond belief. But... there. You've fiddled with things to the point that the error should only push itself at a much higher threshold than normal. Which is considerably better than it doing so at a threshold of effectively no damage whatsoever.
"North?"
"Finished, ma'am," you say, relief obvious in your voice. "Scans system operational."
Andre gives you a slightly uncertain look, but in the end, you've always come through before. "Very good," she says, at last. "Carry on."
As your scans populate — from the Rose, the Violet and the other scouting ships — you see the battlefield begin to unfold. Here at last is Titan. Tiny compared to Saturn, but utterly massive on your scans, dwarfing Iapetus, to say nothing of puny, misshapen Phoebe. Surrounding it in orderly rings are habitats, mirror arrays, and defence satellites. Advanced in their own way, here at the the de facto capital of the Empire in exile, but the larger a planet is, the less practical it becomes to shroud it as completely as Iapetus was meant to be.
The enemy force is already huge, growing larger on your scans every time another signature is recognised. The Inner Fleet is rallying to the defence, supported by Titan's automated systems, but nothing is easy here. Already, with a sick feeling in the pit of your stomach, you can't help but notice a particular tableau unfolding: An enemy ship, under potentially lethal fire, putting itself between its attacks and a civilian habitat. Evacuations will have been attempted, but to where? The human shield tactic is paying off, again and again, and the automated defences are just as reluctant to endanger innocent lives.
The battle is almost larger than you can comprehend all at once, and it's about to grow yet again, once the Outer Fleet joins the fray.
You can't immediately worry about that, though. "Enemy mecha approaching at highlighted vector, ma'am!" You tell her.
Andre nods. "Perback, you're cleared to launch," she says into her comm, by way of response. There's an infinitesimal hesitation before she adds: "Sol keep you safe."
Gloriana's face is very briefly visible. "And you, Captain," she says, grave and coolly respectful. As if this weren't an exchange between two women who knew this may be the last time they ever speak. Your hands tighten on the edge of your workstation, hard enough that the pain is the first warning you have that you're doing it. You can't think about this — do your job, let Lori do hers. She's brave and skilled, and piloting one of the most advanced mecha available — you'll see her again after this is all over. You force yourself to relax.
"Mecha squad have launched, and are intercepting attackers," the control officer reports, having taken over communication with Lori and her team. You watch the nearest dots on your scan — the friendly blue glow of the three leaving the Rose moving in wide formation toward more numerous red dots. This view of the combat is frustratingly abstract, and you recall those surreal, heart-stopping moments when you were watching your only two surviving family members fight in this way.
As it is, when Lori destroys the first enemy machine, you can at least be entirely certain it's no one you care for.
The wider battle is taking shape, the attackers unavoidably aware of the Outer Fleet bearing down on them. It seems that they're not entirely flat footed — Enemy ships were held back in reserve. These are now able to respond to this two pronged attack as your allies move silently toward them, each side poised to begin the lethal dance of war in space. The Rose is out of the heart of the fighting for now, but you can expect that as the fleets close into firing range, she and the rest of the scouting vessels will be pulled together to be put to good use. A cloud of mecha begin launching from both forces, accelerating toward each other ahead of the ship fire.
Beyond all this, the Inner Fleet still struggles to defend Titan. People die with the help your fleet brings cruelly in sight. As you look at the scan map of this unfolding battle, there's something more than this that troubles you. Something that you'd hoped you were mistaken about initially, but which you now know you can no longer deny.
Well, no one thought this was going to be easy.
--
Onboard the HIMS Hawthorne
Flagship of the Outer Fleet
"Owusu Squad cleared to launch. Owusu Squad 01, proceed toward bay—"
J6 is listening, but not quite retaining this information that doesn't pertain to her. Simultaneously, she is prepping her Morrigan for launch. Sealed in the cockpit, her hands fly over the complicated series of interfaces necessary to establish the mecha's direct neural link.
"Jaycee?"
That voice gets J6's attention properly. "Hello, your Highness," she said, eyes flicking down to Daystar's face in the bottom corner of her helmet display. "Is there anything you require?"
"Anything I— oh, don't be like that," Daystar says, sighing. "Stay safe."
"I'll do my job, your Highness," J6 replies. It's certainly not the same thing, and Daystar knows this. But she also knows that this is the best she'll get. The truest proof, in a funny way, of J6's independent thought.
"Don't you want to live?" Daystar whispers. It's hard to see where she is, precisely, with how small the display is.
"Yes," J6 says.
Daystar gives her a pained expression. "Jaycee..."
It's difficult to tell when a yes or no question is just a yes or no question, and when people want more. J6 has no talent for it, and the capacity of everyone around her to see so many shades of nuance in the most ambiguous of gestures is always a little disheartening. "I want to live. I'd like to see you become Empress."
"We don't know that I will," Daystar cautions, a small, desperate smile tugging at the corner of her mouth.
"You'll be good at it."
"I'd do my best. Better, if you were by my side."
J6 almost tells Daystar that she knows she'll do her best, even if J6 is gone. It's not that she discounts how much she means to her princess, so much as she knows the kind of woman she serves. She knows that Daystar is a woman worth serving, for this very reason, even more than her kindness to J6 personally. The harness closes around J6 with a loud clack. The neural bridge induction clamps seal into place on her suit, and she feels their internal counterparts do the same, not yet active, but it sends a cold, sickly thrill through her nervous system. "I have to neural link now, Highness," she says, instead.
Daystar closes her eyes, taking in a deep breath. As if she can prolong J6's existence in the universe, in her life, by drawing this moment out. "I wish you all luck, Guardswoman," she says, unusually formal.
"I'll need it."
That at least cracks a smile, and it's enough to buoy J6, right before the end of the call. When the sudden shock of the neural link sets her body briefly on fire, makes her world go black, and expands her fragile, human mind outward to touch the machinery around her, simplistic in comparison. She hears a voice — in her head, not through her ears — telling her she's cleared, and with a thought, she guides the Morrigan out of its mecha bay, moving slowly through the busy mecha deck. Toward the designated airlock, and the fury of war beyond.
She does want to live, but it's like she told Ensign North, in that brief, happy meeting onboard the Titanium Rose, a good little ship that she feels more attached to than she ever expected: Some desires are mutually incompatible.
--
With the arrival of the Outer Fleet, win or lose, it is assured that the Battle of Titan will be remembered as one of the great space battles of a century already rife with violence. Whatever polities exist in later decades will study this conflict as part of history lessons. Stories told, repeated and distorted. Films will be made, with various levels of accuracy and propaganda. You are a small part of that.
The enemy divides its focus away from attacking the moon and its defenders in order to combat the new arrivals, fresh from the long journey from Iapetus, weakened critically on their way here — doubtless, the losses to the fleet's mecha forces will begin to tell as the battle goes on.
Still, this has been accounted for in planning. The weakness mitigated as best as it could be. It's a known quantity well ahead of time. As you see the enemy laid out before you, though, hammering Titan's defences hard, it's not your most pressing worry. In this first initial clash, already something is wrong. Not a deathblow to your fleet's efforts, but a serious complication that must be worked against, a fundamental difference in the scenario than what you expected.
What's wrong?
[ ] The enemy fleet is larger than expected
[ ] The defenders have taken heavier losses than you'd hoped
[ ] Civilian casualties are already worse than you'd feared
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[X] Civilian casualties are already worse than you'd feared
I don't like it. I don't. But it's the option with the least severe military impact. And frankly?
It just makes sense. Of course using civilians as human shields is going to cause civilian casualties to skyrocket. It fits perfectly with the narrative we're being given.
I don't like it. I don't. But it's the option with the least severe military impact. And frankly?
It just makes sense. Of course using civilians as human shields is going to cause civilian casualties to skyrocket. It fits perfectly with the narrative we're being given.
