The Mech Touch novel Chapter 163

Miss Miranda plotted a brisk course that brought them to Mancroft within seventeen days. She wanted to alternate between short and long hops in order to test and calibrate the brand new FTL drive.

"The core of the galaxy is familiar with this generation of FTL, but it’s new technology to us. We need to establish a baseline so that we’ll know how far we can push it. Corvette-class ships are especially known to have a generous threshold."

"And a threshold is?"

"How near we can transition into a star system. The threshold is mainly dependent on the relative mass between the ship and the destination’s star."

"That sounds kind of dangerous." Ves apprehensively noted.

"Good thing we have a First Class Engineer, sir. Ushra has plenty of experience with pushing FTL drives to their very limits. Our former clients liked the thrill of jumping in deep."

Ves took her word for it. He hired them on exactly because he wanted more options in case they ran into any trouble.

While all of the crew engrossed themselves with their tasks, Ves and Melkor had a lot of time in their hands. Melkor sighed as he followed Ves out of the bridge.

"Raella probably would have loved to befriend your crew."

As the only two men on the ship, they both felt a bit out of place. Ves sighed. "I guess we’re relegated to passengers. Let’s prepare for the upcoming expedition. I don’t know what kind of role you’ll be able to play, but make sure you’re ready to roll out if needed."

They passed the time in peace. Melkor spent most of his time down in the cargo bay. He used the cockpit of his rifleman mech as a simulator pod and feverishly trained his ability to shoot in zero-G conditions.

Unlike Dietrich’s Harrier, Melkor’s Stanislaw model lacked a flight system. Unlike the Old Soul, Melkor’s rifleman was meant to fight a running battle. It featured a robust and powerful engine, allowing the Stanislaw to weave around various obstacles while spoiling the aim of its opponents. Its rapid-fire laser rifle excelled at wearing down mechs at medium range.

"Whoever was in charge of its maintenance did a great job." Ves declared once he finished going over the mech. It hardly required any tweaks.

"The Larkinsons know their mechs. We employ some of the best mech technicians in Rittersberg, you know."

Since Ves didn’t have anything else to do at the moment, he returned to his stateroom and lazily browsed the galactic net. A bored Lucky jumped on his lap and made himself comfortable.

The ship’s quantum entanglement node allowed Ves to keep in touch with the rest of the galaxy. He closely followed current events on Cloudy Curtain. The recent happenings along with his first press conference left people scrambling for answers.

The complacency on the part of the White Doves and the Greens left them ill-prepared to the sudden shift in public opinion. A large swathe of neutral citizens who never paid attention to politics became passionately involved once one of their own got hurt.

Ves found it rather funny that he ranked higher than the leaders who ruled the planet for many generations. The pacifists along with the consortiums standing behind them founded Cloudy Curtain and built it up into a quiet and idyllic farming planet over more than two centuries. Even now they directly or indirectly employed over half the population.

Despite all of their efforts, the founding elites garnered very little appreciation of the common folk. Their greed and their attempts to stall the development of what they thought was their own private playground worked against them this time.

All because of mechs. The current zeitgeist of this era revolved completely around the majesty of mechs. Even the lowliest of farmers and menial laborers were swayed by their primal urge to worship these gods of the modern age.

"Why does Bentheim attract all of the attention? We don’t even have our own mech arena!"

"I told you that the man keeps pushing us down! The fat cats up in their towers drink their million credit wines every day while average folk like you and me can’t afford a house!"

"Mechs! Mechs! Mechs! I want to see more mechs! I want to see them with my own eyes!"

"All of these mech heads have gone crazy! I can hardly walk my dog these days without hearing constant discussions on mechs."

Even the Pioneers started to join the bandwagon. They self-servingly took up his cause as if they never attempted to take advantage of him. Ves didn’t know what to make of their support, but he welcomed their efforts anyway.

In any case, the White Doves and the Greens started to push back against the rising tide. Perhaps aware for the first time that ignoring the masses was a bad idea, they started talking about their upcoming plans to increase the planet’s infrastructure spending.

In their words, the tax reform bill is needed to pay for better schools and hospitals. Every wealthy business has to make some sacrifices in order to increase the planet’s quality of life.

Mysteriously, a lot of exemptions disappeared. In exchange, the bill subjected many industries to a less outrageous maximum tax rate. The clever maneuvering made it more difficult to say that the White Doves and the Greens favored their own little circle of friends over an outsider like Ves.

That didn’t change the fact the Living Mech Corporation had to pay forty percent of its profits to the planet’s coffers. While this sounded a little more reasonable compared to the previous rate, it still exceeded Bentheim’s rate.

"These guys just don’t know when to give up."

Hardly anything could compete against free goodies. Even the allure of mechs might lose out to personal benefits.