Barley deployed on the field with his Jinez along with Captain Osprey and ten other pilots. If anyone looked at their chs, they’d shake their heads and say what a sad sight they represented. Every ch featured scratches, scuff marks and even pockets of rust. The lee chs had it worse than the rifleman chs..
Captain Osprey commanded only two dium knights, one of them being Barley’s ch. The success of the upcoming engagent rested largely on Barley’s ability to endure under pressure.
For a seasoned ch pilot who already went through this slog for two years, Barley shouldn’t feel worried. For a young ch designer who mainly ran away when faced with threats to his life, Ves felt as if he entered the won’s bathroom.
"I don’t really belong here."
He kept those words to himself. No need to worry his comrades and his superior officer that their reliable knight pilot suddenly shared his mindspace with a ch designer from the future.
"Is this even the past? I don’t believe that’s even possible! This must be an elaborate simulation or an alternate universe at most!"
The implications of actual ti travel frightened him beyond belief. Who knew how many entities ssed about the tilines if it actually beca convenient for them to travel back and forth in ti.
"Barley." The captain uttered over the secure channel. The Jinez’s tranceiver was in a shoddy state, leading to a fair amount of static even if another ch stood right next to it. "I know your machine’s sword arm is bad, so I won’t let you take point this ti. Johnson’s Jinez is in a decent shape compared to yours, so I’m putting him up as the vanguard. You’ll be taking the rear to keep an eye out for ambushes."
"Got it, sir."
"Be sure to stay on your feet. If Johnson has to back out early, we’re going to need your shield arm at the front!"
Barley’s pride as a knight pilot swelled at being given the role as a protector. With his stodgy attitude and unsophisticated mind, he excelled in enduring the rigors of piloting a knight.
To Ves, Barley’s personality provided him with a valuable window into his clientele. He realized that soone who specialized in piloting defensive knights would not enjoy switching over to an offensive knight. They preferred slow, deliberate and reactive combat over faster maneuvers and taking the initiative.
"I don’t want to be in charge." He reaffird his thoughts.
Before Ves could mull over the implications, Osprey alerted them that they neared the projected zone where the scouts had been nosing about. "It’s showti, lads. Everyone, slip into battle formation. Johnson, stick close to Eloise, she’s our sharpest shot after Fitzgerald kicked the bucket."
Barley took up the rear as ordered. His ch continued forward while its sensors scanned the rear. At their current state, the enemy would likely detect them first, but Osprey’s personal ch possessed so pretty good sensors as well, so they’d be able to force a fight regardless.
"Contact!" Osprey barked. Their screens updated with the positions of the enemy chs. "They’re spreading out, pursue!"
Their chs huffed towards the closest enemy bogey as fast as possible while still keeping together. The presence of the two lumbering knights slowed them down, making it impossible to catch the enemy scouts if they persisted in their flight.
"These cowardly dirtbags aren’t even turning around to take a peek at us!" Osprey cursed as he decided whether to ditch his protection in order to catch up to the slower enemy scouts. Caution prevailed, however. "There’s sothing funny about this. The dirtbags aren’t splitting up. They aren’t running closer to our base and into our trap either. It’s as if... they’re leading us into a trap of their own!"
Too late! The enemy scouts slowed their flight and turned around to close the net. From the sides, several more signatures erged as chs appeared from underneath their sensor-blocking camouflage.
"Two from the west, three from the east and three from the south!"
Along with the seven scouts that had been leading them on, that ant their unit faced a total of seventeen chs! Several of his fellow pilots started to curse in the open channel. Soone even suggested that a traitor leaked the details of their deploynt.
"Can it, folks! Traitor or not, there’s enough enemies to go around, no need to look behind our backs!"
Captain Osprey eventually ordered them to make a stand while he hollared back to base to send so backup. Help would be on the way, but the chase had led them far away. The first wave of reinforcents was already on its way.
"Nine minutes! We have to hold our ground for nine minutes! That’s all I’m asking for!"
Everyone beca determined to last this long. Barley felt proud for being given the responsibility to help their unit endure the coming ambush. Ves did not share his enthusiasm for turning to a sitting duck, but he had to make do with what he got.
With contact imminent, Ves relinquished much of the control of their body back to the original personality. He had no delusions that he could outperform Barley’s expertise in handling the Jinez.
His decision proved wise, as Barley’s instincts prompted him to jump his ch to the left and catch an errant sniper round aid for Eloise’s ch.
"Thanks Barley!"
"No problem, sweetie!"
As Barley positioned his Jinez to catch another volley of incoming fire, Ves grew fascinated with the way he fought. His perspective inside Barley’s mind allowed him to witness up close how a knight pilot thought and acted.
"It’s a lot more instinctive than I thought."
Many tis, lasers and projectiles appeared too sudden to respond, yet Barley managed to anticipate at least a third of their fire. Much of it had to do with pooling his experience, instincts and his intimate knowledge on the armant of his enemies into his instictive reactions. It was akin to a form of enhanced gut feeling that allowed him to block so many shots.
"Is this what an advanced pilot is capable of?" His impression of defensive knights had already gone up a notch so far.
Skirmishers are closing in! Don’t let them take out our rifleman chs!"
Osprey’s n shifted gears. They stopped trading potshots at distant chs and started firing their weapons in longer bursts at the incoming light chs. Barley quickly noted that the enemy chs wielded daggers, which ant that they felt confident they could get past Barley and knife the vulnerable ranged chs.
"Not on my watch!" Barley uttered as he changed the footing of his knight. The Jinez waited for the closest skirmisher to co within a hundred ters before springing his ch to the side. "Caught you!"
The weak sword arm held up for now as the Jinez managed to rake one of the skirmisher’s arm with his heavy knight sword. The weight of the blade did most of the work, successfully chunking the thin and fragile limb.
The Skirmisher lost its balance from the blow. A friendly spearman ch quickly capitalized on the vulnerability and punctured the unbalanced enemy with a stab through the chest.
The first blow was made in haste and without montum, allowing the Skirmisher to sacrifice much of its armor to bounce away from the blow. Unfortunately for the enemy pilot, Captain Osprey slashed it from the other side with a single stroke from his swordsman ch. The enemy didn’t stand a chance.
"Help out Blazer and Eloise!"
Barley had already dismissed the first skirmisher as soon as it skidded out of his range. The limited mobility of his knight didn’t allow him to chase after his opponents. Instead, his responsibility was to defend a zone and make it diffiult for enemies to approach his position from a certain angle.
The presence of the two knights at the front and the rear constrained the enemy by their presence alone. The light chs possessed no wish to confront them directly, which forced them to approach the cornered Domain pilots from the sides.
In turn, the limited approach vectors allowed the defenders to concentrate their fire in only two directions instead of four. They already took out three foolhardy skirmishers who thought their speed and agility would make them impossible to hit.
The dirtbags learned their lesson and waited for the noose to tighten before they reengaged.
"The dium boys are here now!"
A handful of dium chs that weighed on the lighter end of their weight class arrived to take point. Barley mainly had to deal with three swordsman chs of different make. While he possessed a vague familiarity of their designs, he didn’t know enough about their capabilities to prevail against three at once.
Sweat poured down from his head where the neural interface connected to his head. Barley had ended up in a number of tight spots over the course of the war, but never did he face such dire circumstances.
Ves found it admirable that Barley still maintained his duty towards the Domain and kinship towards his comrades. He never thought of flinching away. It betrayed the very core of the principles he held as a knight.
As the three enemy swordsman chs closed in, Barley figured out their plans. They’d leave the middle ch to tie up his Jinez while letting the other two chs run roughshod over his unit’s vulnerable ranged chs.
The awful thing about their plan was that Barley could do nothing to stop them. Any decent pilot of a swordsman ch learned how to leverage its mobility to constrain a knight ch.
Even though Ves was shaking in his taphorical boots, his considerable mind constantly studied the designs of the enemy chs. He realized quickly that they didn’t appear to be in tip-top shape either. The Alliance forces on this remote planet suffered from a lack of supplies as well.
The faded scars of battle damage told its own story. Ves possessed a decent amount of experience with repairing damaged chs, so he was able to read the markings as clear as day.
"Target the middle ch’s legs! It’s been blown apart before, and whoever replaced them employed weaker alloys underneath the standard system!"
The ch technicians did a good job disguising the inferior patch job underneath a top layer of standard armor. Any regular ch pilot wouldn’t know the difference, but Ves was different.
Upon his advice, Barley slamd the bottom edge of his ch’s shield against the nearest leg of his imdiate opponent.
CRUNCH!
The swordsman ch lost its footing as its right leg gave out. Barley spent an errant mont stepping his ch’s foot against the other leg, which crippled the stricken ch.
Barley had no ti to finish off his victim as he also had the other two chs to contend. His comrades already had their hands full in fending off the remaining dirtbag chs. If these other two chs attacked them from the flank, then their unit would quickly be wiped out!
"Focus!" They both said to themselves as the turned their attention to the left.
Ves already analyzed its major weak point and relayed them to Barley with the speed of thought. Barley slamd the shield close and blocked the next sword strike before hitting back with his own thrust that slipped through the sloppily sealed gap between the lower left side of his opponent’s torso.
The swordsman ch lost all power and dropped to the ground like a lumbering ox that got hit by a tranquilizer.
Having taking care of his second opponent, Barley strained his ch to turn around as fast as possible to hurl his shield high against the final swordsman ch’s head.
The errant throw dislodged the head from the fra entirely, montarily disorienting the pilot as he had to get used to a sudden shift in perspective as his ch’s backup sensors took over his primary view. A sword thrust from the rear downed the bewildered ch before it could recover.
"I don’t know who you are, but you’re goddamn smart! Keep ’em coming!" Barley yelled as he shifted his ch towards Eloise to help her fend off a skirmisher ch.
The enemies closest to his Jinez noticed his abnormal performance. They lessened the pressure on his comrades in order to deal with the greater threat.
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