The Mech Touch novel Chapter 765

The completion of the C22 Earth Ant along with the upgrades to the armor worn by Ketis marked the end of his preparations.

After thanking Chief Mandelson for her generous assistance, Ves left the armory wearing his new and lightweight Earth Ant along with a replacement for his standard-issue comm.

Major Verle promised him a better comm, so Ves drew out an officer-grade comm that integrated neatly in the systems of his C22 Earth Ant. While it came with some extra features, Ves chose to go for a high-quality comm model with the most extensive security suite and remote signal hardening.

Having been burned by an unsecure comm before, Ves wanted to make sure he didn’t repeat his mistakes.

The officer-grade comm he received complimented his secure comm pretty well.

The officer-grade comm became his primary comm which he could use to connect to other Vandals remotely at a very long range.

Ves repurposed his secure comm as his ’offline’ backup device which he could use to access the contents of encrypted data chips which he couldn’t afford to leak. It had the ability to operate under intense jamming and other forms of electromagnetic interference, though its lack of remote connectivity wouldn’t allow him to call for help.

Not that the jamming and interference would let him in the first place.

In any case, Ves tentatively judged that he made adequate preparations to survive whatever hell the Aeon Corona System threw at him. He mentally listed out his full complement of gear.

The C22 Earth Ant needed no introduction, as his new suit of light armor surpassed any suit he had ever worn before. The greatly strengthened armor plating, the added integrated modules and the many dedicated storage slots for his weapons and his gadgets turned it into a veritable

For his weapons, he could rely on his Amastendira as his trump card and a backup laser pistol as his official weapon. While he was at the armory, he exchanged his barely-used ballistic pistol for a handy laser pistol compatible with his Earth Ant’s new targeting and aim assist modules.

"On a planet where everything weighs at least five times heavier, ballistic weapons are going to have a hard time."

Compared to a ballistic round that quickly sunk into the ground due to gravity, a laser beam would still travel straight ahead at shorter distances.

All of his remaining gadgets and equipment completed his loadout.

His signal jammer granted him some moments of privacy from the ubiquitous monitoring system.

His stealth detector enabled him to expose invisible bastards hiding under electronic stealth systems.

His military-issue multiscanner allowed him to scan all kinds of unknown objects and substances.

And finally, he possessed a spare ultracompact battery. He wanted to reserve its use for a third gadget, but Ves figured he wouldn’t have the time to design and fabricate an entirely new device.

"Oh well, I can use it to supplement the power supply of my Earth Ant."

One of the features he included in the design of the Earth Ant was a robust slot that could handle the power output of an ultracompact battery. Ves did not intend to direct an excess amount of power to any of the integrated systems in his suit. Instead, he reserved the battery as an emergency long-term source of energy if he ever got stranded and cut off from the Vandals.

Together with the completion of the Six-Sided Dice, Ves hoped that his preparations left him with enough tools to secure his life in the coming storm.

"You’re so obsessed with gearing yourself up." Ketis remarked as she witnessed Ves treating his gadgets and his new armor like precious treasures. "It’s like you’re one-hundred percent certain that we’ll lose all our ships and that we’re going to be stranded by ourselves with no mechs of allies to protect us from whatever you expect to find in the Aeon Corona System."

Ves pressed his lips. "If you’ve lived through all the battles the Flagrant Vandals have gone through ever since we entered Vesian space, you’ll grow as insecure as I. The fact of the matter is that the Flagrant Vandals is set up like a raiding regiment, and not a particularly good one either. They lack funding, skilled personnel, a good cadre of capable leaders, a martial tradition that has been tested over centuries and ample preparation. It’s that last one that’s really the cause of all of my brushes with death."

"Preparation?"

"Yes, preparation." Ves reiterated. "All of those earlier faults can be compensated to some level if the Flagrant Vandals had months or years to prepare for this mission. It’s obvious though that some higher-ups dropped this mission on their lap without giving them the time to prepare. Just look at the Vesian fleet. Even if we could only peek at them through long-ranged sensors, what we’ve already seen is that they’re superior in all the fronts I’ve mentioned even after the Church of Haatumak stabbed them in the back."

"Yet the spooky Vesians got stabbed in the back and not us. We took care of our ambush early." She pointed out. "Unlike those Vesians you Vandals are all so scared of, you’ve got us Swordmaidens to cover your back!"

He chuckled a bit. They hadn’t been very useful up to now. Their real strength lay in their landbound mechs and this advantage hadn’t come into play yet. "However much you believe in our combined strength, it is not comprehensive enough to protect us individually against every threat. The Vandals don’t care about me in particular. They care about themselves and their mission. I don’t blame them for their priorities, but this does leave me at an awkward position. The only person who cares about my life is myself."

"That’s not true. I care about you, Ves." She said.

"Ah, thank you for correcting me. I care about you too, perhaps more than any other Vandal that’s supposed to be on my own side." Ves smiled sardonically. "I guess I don’t quite fit in with the Vandals in the first place."

In his perspective, the Vandals exhibited a certain amount of cockiness to keep up morale. From what he could guess, Major Verle decided to maintain everyone’s level of morale in order to prevent them from questioning the purpose of their mission or start to realize how deep in alien space they had ventured.

Such a policy paid dividends. The levels of anxiety among the crew hadn’t boiled over yet, at least aboard the Shield of Hispania. This was despite the occasional turbulence that wracked the ship as she attempted to bore straight through a narrow channel of relative calm in the middle of a horrible spacetime storm.

The shaking and creaking of the combat carrier along with general wave of nausea and unpleasantness that did their best to unsettle the crew. If not for all the constant drilling and the frequent pep talk sessions, who knew if someone snapped.