The Mech Touch novel Chapter 496

Their brief stay aboard the Antecedent yielded little excitement. Ves got to relax for the first time in almost a week, while Pierce still brimmed with excitement of all the fighting he witnessed on the surface.

"Man, calm down Pierce. You’re jumping around like a rookie whose cherry got popped. It’s starting to become embarrassing!"

"I’m sorry Ves." Pierce apologized and quickly calmed down. "It’s just that I’ve never witnessed the majesty of mechs at such a massive scales. Numerous companies of mechs moved around and clashed against each other in the suburbs of Neron City. Sometimes, over three-hundred mechs battled at once!"

That was nothing to Ves. He once witnessed the dreadful scale of two entire mech divisions trying to murder each other without reserve. The collision of a handful of mech companies paled in comparison.

"If you’ve learned anything from what you’ve seen, make sure to write them down before you forget them. There’s no guarantee we’ll witness another battle of this scale any time soon."

No matter how impressive such battles appeared, they drained a lot of money to both sides. Without any gains, a money-conscious mech regiment such as the Flagrant Vandals would never willingly throw themselves at formidable enemies.

The next couple of days, Ves and Pierce drew up their sleeves and helped with the aftermath of the largely successful operation. The spacers aboard the Antecedent took stock of the casualties and the haphazard piles of loot they stuffed inside the cargo hold.

The two mech designers spent most of their time assessing the battle damage of the Antecedent’s complement of mechs, which wasn’t much. As a spaceborn-oriented combat carrier, she took part of the initial battle and chase of the Vesian garrison fleet the Vandals smashed at the start of the operation.

Because that battle mainly unfolded into an ambush on the Vesians, the Antecedent’s mechs sustained relatively little battle damage.

Of course, chasing down a cornered rat often led to retaliation. Mech pilots with nothing to lose sometimes lashed out with all their hearts, which led to a handful of heavily damaged spaceborn mechs.

Surprisingly enough, the Inheritor light mechs took the brunt of the damage.

"These mechs aren’t very difficult to repair." Ves judged. He studied the spaceborn skirmishers extensively, and possessed a moderate grasp on their design. "The only challenge is to perform them as cost-efficient as possible. The easily solution would be to scrap the damaged portions and replace them with pristine equivalents."

At their current state, such a ham-fisted repair procedure would waste a lot of the fleet’s stock of rare exotics. These types of exotics needed to be bought from dedicated suppliers. The Vandals wouldn’t be able to plunder them from a random trade convoy or manufacturing complex.

"No, the best option is to restore the damaged components as best as we can."

With the help of the chief technician, Ves devised individual repair plans for each damaged Inheritor mech. He took into account the skill level of the mech technicians and low-ranking mech designers aboard the Antecedent. He quickly found out that the crew wouldn’t be able to accomplish the most complicated repairs with the facilities at hand.

This wasn’t an issue as the fleet enjoyed the services of several capable logistics ships. While the massive Wolf Mother accompanied Colonel Lowenfield’s detachment that escaped in another direction, the smaller logistic vessels at Major Verle’s disposal possessed sufficient capabilities by themselves. Ves merely needed to queue some orders for the most difficult parts to help the repairs along.

Ves also spent some time getting debriefed by a Vandal intelligence officer. This was mainly a dry affair where he mechanically recounted what he did aboard the Stubby Growler and when he crash-landed onto the surface of Detemen IV.

When he mentioned that his assistance was pivotal in tracking down Lord Javier, the officer raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Are you certain that you haven’t overstated your importance? Be aware that we have access to your logs on your comm."

"Go ahead, sir." Ves waved his hand. "The logs should clearly show how much I contributed to Lord Javier’s capture."

He knew that his military comm wouldn’t be such a simple device. It figured that it had some way of keeping tabs on his activities.

"Very well, Mr. Larkinson. You will hear from us later if we need some clarification. You can go back to work now."

Recounting recent events put Ves in an introspective mood. The relative period of tranquility aboard the Antecedent allowed him to unwind his nerves. While this relieved some of burdens, thinking about the chaotic circumstances of his accidental deployment on the surface of Detemen IV ruined his mood.

He couldn’t help but contemplate on whether he made a number of big mistakes. He could justify small mistakes and certain oversights on account of working under difficult circumstances. No one would be able to think clearly in the midst of several crises.

The only mistake that Ves really got hung up on was his extended use of his self-fabricated comm. Even though he always knew that the Mech Corps and by extension the Flagrant Vandals treated foreign electronic devices with paranoia, he still dared to make use of a civilian-grade comm.

In ordinary circumstances, such a sloppy oversight would have earned him a court-martial!

"Am I in trouble for this?"

Ves weighed the possibilities and tentatively judged that it wasn’t likely the Vandals would bring it up. He was alone for quite a while and tried to survive on the streets by himself. Such a lapse in security was excusable.

It was less excusable for him to continue to hang on to the comm when he came under Captain Orfan’s wing. In that, he made a genuine blunder.