Aaand here's an omake. Because I feel like writing some (
probably) non-canon stuff.
Make of it what you will.
[---]
Brawl
The jaeger fought angrily. Each time they faced a kaiju, they could feel it's cold aggression in each punch it landed, each bone it broke. It was as if the ancient machine took the monsters' very existence as a personal insult.
And one day, they decided to try and find out why.
The answer was in the few chunks if data they'd saved from the beginning; a record of the jaeger's last fight.
It had been the fourth time the machine had been deployed. Just a month earlier, the Mark III, Gypsy Danger, had been destroyed by Knifehead-- an event that the jaeger wasn't going to let happen again.
They were up against a Category IV, codenamed "Perpetrator"-- just them and Diablo Intercept. Not the most promising team, but a good one.
The fight had started alright, both jaegers opening up with their missiles, cracking several armour plates and punching shallow wounds into the beast's body. As usual, they'd charged ahead, while Diablo circled around to strike from the sides.
And it all went downhill from there.
They'd hit the kaiju with a shoulder tackle, smashing the larger creature to the ground. With it off balance, the jaeger had been able to get its foot up in time, and slam it down into the monster's chest. Most of the time, the pain would have taken the kaiju off-guard, and let Diablo drive a Devil Fang into its skull. Most of the time.
What actually happened was that the kaiju had retaliated, its tail knocking the jaeger's legs out from under it... just as Diablo had made its attack. Its arm had been sliced off at the elbow, and the machine had just enough time to crash to the ground to see the Cat IV leap up and knock its partner away.
The dark red jaeger hadn't taken the blow well. Diablo was built for speed and striking power, not structural toughness. The Mark II lost its-- now empty-- missile bays, and a good chunk of the rest of its chest armour, leaving its innards dangerously exposed.
Three minutes in, and Perpetrator had taken the lead from them.
The shatterdome had radioed in, said that they were sending in another jaeger. The mission had changed; now, they only needed to keep the monster occupied-- something easier said than done, as the kaiju's next blow had cost Diablo its left arm in a cruel mirror of what the red machine had dealt to them.
They were bulky, oddly proportioned. All that had been thought of when they were put together was
fight the kaiju. Getting up hadn't been accounted-- but even so, they managed to rise to their feet. So occupied was the Cat IV in playing with the battered Diablo Intercept, that they'd been able to surprise it, driving a wedge-shaped hand into the monster's neck, crushing its esophagus and ripping through musculature. The monster had squealed and thrashed, head bent at an improper angle.
But that hadn't killed it.
One of the nastier features Perpetrator had was a jagged spike on the end of its very flexible tail. The same tail that was promptly driven through their reactor, cutting off the power feed, leaving them on what little was in the system.
Coincidentally, that was just enough power for the assist AI ad pilots to see Perpetrator turn around and rip Diablo's head off.
When the AI had restarted, years had passed. The world was ruined, its old pilots were gone, and all the other jaegers were dead.
Brawler Yukon had been the first jaeger built. It was the oldest, the one with the longest running programming.
And after its death, Brawler
hated the kaiju more than any other jaeger had.
