Chapter 30: Through the Fire and Flames

Kella banked hard, the sudden force throwing her into her restraints as she dodged a salvo of incoming missiles.  She launched flares and immediately banked again in the opposite direction.  Some of the missiles took the bait, but not all.  The warning buzzer sounded shrill over her ragged breathing as she forced her Scythe into a vicious half-barrel roll followed by a hard climb.  The missiles couldn’t keep up with the maneuvering and having lost target lock, detonated.  She felt the shockwaves roll over the mech and was instantly glad they hadn’t been any closer.

Appendix Entry #2

Sentinel Appendix

Entry #2: Technology #2: Mech Tech

Mirror Shield / Reflective Shielding – A variation on holographic technology that refracts all light directed at it, used as a counter to Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation (LASER or laser) weapons.  These devices can safely negate beam weaponry (within certain limits); however, their power consumption makes them highly localized, covering only a small area, making them difficult to use effectively.  Pilots generally outfit the mirror shield to one of their mech forearms and use them much like a traditional shield, but other implementation methods are not uncommon.  Since incoming beams travel at the speed of light, most mecha are also painted in a light-scattering reflective coating that can help to dissipate the beam (into fuzzy light) in order to give the pilot enough reaction time to bring up the mirror shield and reflect the rest of the light safely away.  If a pilot is too slow in raising the shield, the beam will quickly burn past the reflective coating and cause moderate to critical damage depending on the power of the beam and the longer it sits in one location.

  

As a side note: Mirror shields are useful only against other mechs that have beam weapons with comparable power capacity.  These defenses are utterly useless against Capital Class beam armaments where the size and power are nearly inexhaustible and the best defense is dodging the weapons altogether.  Dodging a weapon that travels at light speed is accomplished by moving quicker than the turret can track, or using sensor shadows to prevent a lock on.  Outrun the system, not the weapon.  Some Capital Ship gunners, however, take great pride in the number of mecha they destroy with beam weapons because of the natural difficulty of the target.  

Chapter 29: Enemy of My Enemy

“Gavin,” Hughes called in over the vox channel from outside.  “This ship is a mess.  Didn’t anyone teach you how to make evasive maneuvers?” 

“Stow it,” Gavin growled back.  Granted Hughes hadn’t been aboard it at the time, but it had been the Gladius that had done the damage.  Hughes had been running around the upper hull of the Praetorian with a small army of repair bots in a mad dash to get the giant plane repaired and had stopped no less than three times to point out Gavin’s flaws in evasive technique.

“Are you sure it’s ok to have him out there?” Kella repeated for the second time from the commander’s chair.  She was busy coordinating the repair bots with Hughes allowing Gavin to concentrate on the internal repairs that needed his attention, but had been listening to the chatter.

“No,” Gavin admitted.  “But there is a reason to my madness.”

Kella nodded without looking at the remote.  “I’ll trust your instinct.  Can’t be any worse than mine, right?”