First Contact

Chapter [SYNCHING NODES] - Aftershocks

"Every other species develops a weapon system that they can find no counter to and then turn and say: This is the pinnacle of weaponry, there can be no improvement! Thereafter they do not do much more then update something if, and only if, another development is decided to be worth folding into the system. The excuses to avoid upgrading are often economical, strategic, political, or sheer scope of size of such an upgrade project.

"That is why your tanks are burning on the plains and the Terran tanks are in the parking lots of your capital." - Sails Toward Peace, Mantid Diplomat, First Terran/Lagnalkak Conflict.

The Confederate Armed Services Warmek.

The initial designs of the mechs you see laid out before you were designed and manufactured by the Terran nations before they even developed faster than light travel. Over seventy years of warfare honed those war machines. The Terrans devoted over sixteen percent of their Gross Global Domestic Product, via various nations, into improving those war machines.

These are not power armors, nor are the robotic power armor class units. These are Robot Combat Systems, the weight class above even Robotic Power Armor. Where the former tops out at roughly ten metric short tons, the Warmek starts at twenty metric short tons and moves all the way to the Pacific RIm Class Warmeks, which clock in at two hundred meters and can weigh up to a hundred thousand metric short tons unpowered.

Wars have been won with less heavy metal.

Those of you who are hand waving these war mechs away should know, these are the mechs that defeated the Mantid and many others. Not the original war mek designs, those are thousands of years out of date. I see our former citizens of the Unified Council are confused as to why that matters.

Unlike the Unified Council, the Terran Confederacy has faced peer level threats on more than one occasion. Every war, every battle, has revealed strengths, weaknesses, room for improvement in all war material, barring very few exceptions.

Yes, I see your hands up. The two grand dames, Madame-Three-Eighteen and Mah-Deuce, are the exception that prove the rule.

Even the fight against the Unified Council revealed valuable data about all Terran weapon systems.

The War Mek, the Titans of the Battlefield, has benefited from that data.

As pilot candidates, you will benefit from that data.

Terran War Meks come in distinct classes. From the light twenty ton Davion Class Warmeks to the massive Pacific Rim Class Jeagers, Warmeks are modular weapon platforms, capable of nearly infinite combinations in order to allow the Confederacy, through you, to maximize military firepower.

You will learn to pilot at least one class of Warmek.

If you do not, you will be returned to the infantry, to march on foot in standard armor, and hopefully you'll remember that your job is not to die for the Confederacy but to kill the other poor bastard for his.

Line up for biometrics checks.

-----

The Davion Class Warmek, some as light as twenty metric short tons with the heaviest of this class clocking in at one hundred metric short tons. This class is the standard class that the majority of species never see any reason to progress beyond. Not so with the Confederate tax payer, who demands the most for their taxes. These warmeks are modular down to the pilot controls and instruments to the power plant to the weapon types and armor type. A single pilot warmek, these are deployed to major theater engagement by the thousands.

If you are a former member of the Unified Council citizenship or even the military, you think you have seen the weight of the Terran war machine or that the Terran war machine is no longer a factor now that our beloved Mad Lemurs are gone.

Not true! You are the inheritors of the madness of the lemurs. The Mad Lemurs of Terra and the Confederate tax payer has gifted our brotherhood tens of thousands of warmeks in this class! The full weight of Heavy Metal has arrived, and you will wrap your fist with it and ram it down the Atrekna's collective throats.

These warmeks have won wars by merely landing on the planet. They can be configured to be piloted by any known species, from a Mad Lemur to a black mantid to even a Lanaktallan. Before you scoff, an ill trained force of warmek pilots, operating planetary defense warmeks, defended a manufacturing facility and the shelter beneath for nearly a week, largely cut off, before the leader, a Lanaktallan known criminal, gangster, and arena fighter, called down an atomic on his own position even as he fought the PAWM to keep them pinned in place for the killing blow.

That is the standard you will be held to. That you will pilot this craft with honor, dedication, and courage. That you will fight with the fury of that Lanaktallan and the Mad Lemurs of Terra.

All of those who have piloted this suit of high tech armor will be watching you and judging you during this course.

You will learn to pilot them. You will not fail. You will not embarrass your species, the Confederate tax payer, of the ghosts of the Mad Lemurs of Terra.

-----

This is the Nerv Class Warmek. Standing up to fifty meters tall and weighing in at up to twelve hundred metric short tons. These are your standard regional assault combat warmeks. This is also the last class that can be piloted by a single pilot, although the majority of them have a crew of three to five trained members at critical stations.

The Nerv Class Warmek comes in several categories, however the most commonly deployed unit is the Noram Robot Combat Armor. Modular at all weight classes, even the crew compartment can be interchanged, although there are standard configurations. The majority of modular adjustment is done for mission goals and pilot preference as well as logistics limitations.

Containing at Class-V or higher nanoforge, this turns the projectile weapons, launchers, and other weapon systems into basically infinite repeaters.

An artillery configured Nerv Class Heavy Warmech in the two hundred ton range can level a small city with sustained artillery within six hours. Configured for close range combat these armored units are a match for even an Ohm class Dwellerspawn.

Training on these machines is arduous, as at this level you candidates will also be trained in basic maintenance as you may be called to assist your green mantid engineers or logistics base mechanics in maintaining your own engine of destruction.

The Treana'ad warmeks of the 772nd Warmek Horde held off the Mar-gite for twenty-two days until relief arrived in this very same class of warmek.

The Mad Lemurs of Terra used these warmeks to break the back of more than one opponent. In their madness they improved these machines until they represent the ultimate in mid-range Heavy Metal to rip apart a planet hand their government back the chunks.

You are blessed by the Digital Omnimessiah himself that you are one of the heirs of the Mad Lemurs of Terra and his spirit has blessed you with this warmak to prove your worth to the Guanya the Unflinching by learning to become one with this machine.

Those of you, with the blessing of Saint Ayanami, who learn to pilot this will become part of Heavy Metal.

You will be the sledgehammer of Heavy Metal.

-----

This, ladies and gentlemen, both and neither, is the ultimate Heavy Metal machine.

The Pacific Rim Class Warmek, often called a Jaegermech by the Mad Lemurs of Terra. The ultimate in Heavy Metal, only the madness of the Lemurs could have envisioned a war machine like this. Up to two hundred meters tall, made entirely out of advanced hyperalloys, modular weapon and equipment system to allow this planetary assault unit to adapt to any battlefield and situation.

While the PRC Warmek can be piloted by a single individual, this Robot Combat Armor is usually piloted by two to five crewmembers with up to a dozen green mantid engineers. Packing two Class-VII nanoforges and a pair of Class-VI creation engines, the PRC is completely self-sufficient if the mission requires it.

This planetary assault system has forced the surrender of opponents just landing via unpowered reentry after being fired from a mass driver launching system on a naval vessel. During the Mithril Nebula Conflict, this class of warmek strode on the hulls of Confederate Space Force Naval Vessels to provide additional firepower to destroy the Mithril Orchid War Fleet.

Should you find you have the ability and knack to pilot the largest chunk of Heavy Metal in the Confederate Military Armor Corps, you will be carrying the legacy of the Mad Lemurs of Terra with you. You will understand that you are a Titan of War, that there is nothing that can stand before you.

Whether you are one of the heirs of the Mad Lemurs of Terra is yet to be seen.

Those of you who are, will be the anvil of Heavy Metal.

------

Ret.lek was a Crel'tek. One of the larger of the Civilized Species, standing at 1.2 meters tall according to the Confederate Armed Services doctors, weighing in at a heavy fifty-three kilograms at the end of the grueling Basic Combat Training, Ret.lek was the first of his species to pass the intense combat course that Ret.lek had seen wash out Unified Military Council veterans.

With short fur down his spine and across his shoulders, his exposed skin was pebbled and soft to the touch, a deep gray with dark green highlights, his eyes were close set like a predator despite the fact his species had herbivore's teeth.

He told the people at the Induction Center and the Recruitment Office that he wanted to sign up for the Confederate Armed Services because he had heard what had happened in Hesstla and was horrified by the fact that the Atrekna stole a decade from the people of Hesstla while only two years had gone by from everyone else.

In reality, he'd made it to the recruitment office barely ahead of being arrested. The LawSec on his hab bloc had shown up every day to make sure Ret.lek hadn't tried to run and had driven Ret.lek to the Induction Center in his cruiser.

Ret.lek had figured he had what it took to be one of the troops he'd seen on TV. How hard could it be? During his two weeks at the Reception Center made him confident he could handle it all. The instructors were polite, soft spoken, and didn't seem that threatening. There was no yelling, no profanity, not even any mass punishment or physical punishment, just a slow shaking of the head and the clicking of the tongue or mandibles.

He'd easily done the pushups, the situps, the side straddle hops, the leg lifts, and even made the run within the times.

Ret.lek took pride in the fact that he was stronger with more endurance than most of the other recruits.

He'd commented the last night of the two weeks that Basic Combat Training didn't seem that hard.

When Ret.lek and the others had gotten on the wheeled bus to go to the next place Ret.lek had looked back and seen the instructors.

They were all laughing.

An hour later, it was raining and dark, and the vehicle arrived at the next area. Almost everyone was asleep when the doors opened.

Before Ret.lek could react there were huge beings, including Rigellian Saurians on the bus, grabbing people, pulling them off , throwing them into the mud and into the rain, yelling at everyone to "get your Detainee cursed asses off of this bus! This bus is for people and you aren't anything but toejam on the Detainee's clawed feet!"

Ret.lek was not ashamed to admit that when he'd cried his first hour after reception had sent him to actual Basic Combat Training. He had been knocked down into the mud and bellowed at by a huge Treana'ad Drill Instructor to do pushups until his muscles had given up and he'd collapsed. He had been forced with yells and kicks to his feet and pushed into the barracks, forced to strip and get in the shower and change into his physical training uniform before making his bed and standing at the end of it.

The Treana'ad Senior Drill Instructor had a cybernetic bladearm, a cybernetic arm, and a cybernetic leg, all of them whirred, hissed, and released thin streams of steam that smelled of superlubricants and scorched metal. Ret.let didn't mind admitting, even to his fellow soldiers, that the Treana'ad, one Gunnery Sergeant D'Rekr, scared the Digital Omnimessiah out of everyone.

Ret.lek, once he became a warmek pilot, didn't mind laughing with his fellow troops about how Gunny D'Rekr had got in his face and asked him if he believed in Guaya the Indomitable and when he had said that he had never heard of that being, Gunny D'Rekr had made him march in circles in the shower reciting the Confederate Army creed with a bucket on his head.

Ret.let knew that everyone else, those who had never undergone the harsh and unforgiving Basic Combat Training of the Confederate military machine, would consider that a horrible thing.

He had put up with the good natured jeering from his fellow recruits with a smile.

He knew a civilian would never understand why that was a memory that made him smile.

Like when three of his fellow recruits had been caught eating out of the garbage can and the Drill Instructors made them stand in the big garbage bin outside the chow hall, with the purple leaves that had been served boiled for dinner on their heads, screaming at the top of their lungs that they liked their new home.

That one made him smile every time he remembered it.

At first it made no sense that out of two hundred recruits in his Basic Training Company only sixty graduated. The last two weeks, during the simulated infantry training, he understood.

The Confederate military only wanted the best. Only those with the commitment and endurance to make it through the training.

Ret.lek had realized two days before graduation that the people who had washed out had all failed critical tasks no less than four times in a row, the last two times after special one on one assistance. The Cemtrary who broke his leg on the obstacle course had been immediately sent to the doctor and Ret.lek had met him again, finding out once he healed and passed medical checks and was given thirty days to regain his strength, he'd been allowed to attempt Basic Combat Training again.

Ret.lek had been proud of the fact he had graduated the hellish course.

Even prouder than when he'd earned his colors at thirteen.

Warmek training was even harsher. The physical exercise had never lessened. Beneath the respect that the Drill Instructors had treated the cadets with was the undertone menace of "you screw up once, and so help me, I'll join hands with the Detainee and drag you straight back to the Hell of Basic."

Ret.lek had found he had a knack for the Davion Class warmeks. While he could pilot the others, there was just something about those mechs. He liked the green mantids when he had met them during the last third of the training, when their class was merged with his.

He had stood there and cheered for 669 and 204, urging them on, as they ran the last of the half-mile of their final physical fitness test. Had bought them both narcobrew and deep fried turkey nuggets when they passed.

Ret.lek had found himself making friends, to his surprise. He had always thought that soldiers were just honed killing machines, not really any friends, and found that he had more friends he trusted further than when he'd been patched.

Ret.lek had graduated fifteenth in his class and been loaded onto a transport with orders to 21st Replacement.

From there he had been assigned to the 14th Armored Army, XXXIV Corps.

To be honest, he had only expected a couple dozen warmeks, maybe fifty at the most.

Instead, his unit consisted of eighty Davion Class warmeks at the company level.

He had spent three months training, the Commanding Officer, a black mantid with only one eye, content to let the crews shake out themselves.

He was assigned to a single operator Davion Class Warmek in the assault class. Ninety metric short tons of armor, weapons, defensive systems, and sheer unstoppable Confederate Armed Services attitude.

He'd been thrilled when 204 had showed up with three others.

During the shakedown training he hadn't stood out, but he felt good that he kept up with everyone, since some of the platoon were veterans of battles against the PAWM, the Council, the Atrekna, or all three.

There was a single Mad Lemur, the Executive Officer, who piloted an Geist Class Assault Warmek that looked like a spaceship had dragged it across a particularly rocky moon. It had an image of the Mad Arch-Angel of Terrasol on it, a nude female lemur with long curly crimson hair and a sword on each upper arm, and the lemur himself had the same tattoo on his back. Ret.lek was honest enough to admit that the Mad Lemur's glowing red eyes were kind of disconcerting.

He met the section leader of the powered armor infantry that he would be working with. A Staff Sergeant Undrat, who had been a power armor trooper for fifteen years despite the fact he had only signed up four years prior.

Undrat's men were highly trained, which Ret.lek appreciated.

Then came the word.

As soon as elements of the Telkan Marine Corps arrived, XXXIV Corps would be loading up.

With 204 and the other green mantid's help, Ret.let had paintsprayed the Detainee on the upper arms of his warmek, in all her gray eyed, fully nude, large breasted, cigarette smoking glory, taking the time to make sure her nipples were blood red and surrounded by warsteel barbed wire that glowed in the dark just like all the naughty bits and the end of the cigarette.

It wouldn't be good to go into combat without his warmek being properly decorated.

It was time to take the fight to the Atrekna.

Heavy Metal was on the move.