A/Ns: First, the most important thing prior to any fan-fic; "The Disclaimer"! Mekton, the world of Algol setting, and any mechs and / or characters that are relevant, are property of R. Talsorian Games. This is a piece of fan fiction, and as such is not-for-profit. I ain't getting a dime for this ;-)p
Secondly, this is my first contribution to the fan-fic community and may be "a bit rough around the edges", and updates may be sporadic at best. Do try and be understanding, and leave comments with constructive criticism only. Aside from that, enjoy!
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Prologue:
4, 26, AY 1521.
It was finished. The fools had won their little victory, killed him and stopped his plan. Dremond laughed at the absurdity of the situation; here he was looking down at his own corpse and that of the Elaran bitch he had mind-crushed, both sprawled inside of the organic hallways of the alien ship. Dremond watched as the life force of the female mech pilot wafted away on the aether and grimaced. If not for his strength of will, he would have been joining her in dissolution.
He would not. Too much pain and too much effort had been spent on his part to let a paltry thing like his body's ruin stop him.
Pain.
No pain?
Dremond's shadow-being raised its hand to where its face should have been. There! It Felt odd like touching ones self while encased in foam, but definitely there was some sensation . No pain though. The scarred side of his face did not radiate the dull ache Dremond had lived with for almost 20 years of his life.
"Being dead must have some advantages."
Again Dremond laughed, and allowed his 'sight' to enter deeper into the shadow-plane. He watched as the UAA Rimfire tried fruitlessly to blast apart the alien dreadnaught, letting his aetheral mirth echo into the infinite when he saw the beam-cannon 'wounds' heal almost as soon as they were made.
"Fools..."
-WHO? WHERE? WHO?-
"Hell-spite! What was that?" Dremond felt his shadow-being buffeted as if by a hurricane. Not a voice, or even voices, so much as cacophony of primal thought.
-NOT US! NOT US NOT US NOT US!-
-HUNGER! KILL! HUNT, YES HUNT!-
-NO CENTRE...no centre...not whole-
Dremond gathered his will and projected as much force as he could into communicating with the daemonic chorus. "Who are you? Are you the Aggendi?"
-Aggendi. Hunters. Alone.-
"Are you the leader of the Aggendi?"
-NO LEADER! ONLY THE MASSMIND!-
-MASSMINDGONEMASSMINDGONEMASSMINDGONE!-
"So you are all the Aggendi?" He winced at the continuing babble of non-voices and the almost physical effect they had on his new state of being. "I heard the cry of one of your children. One of the last warriors you had sent. I felt it die just after it had reawakened, and followed where it called. I found you."
-NOT US! WHO?-
"I am Lord Dremond, and I am here to give you back something you have lost" He looked over at where his body lay then turned his sight towards the column of light. What he had at first thought of as the Aggendi vessels' computer. He knew better now; now that he could 'see' it properly. It wasn't a computer. It was the ships soul, and streamers of reddish light connected every war machine, every Aggendi in stasis, to the pillar.
Dremond waited for the voices. They had grown faint and whispery, and the aether grew still. He realized why the Aggendi hadn't awoken when their lost scout machine had 'died'. It wasn't because of apathy, it was because there was no consensus. Not even enough to decide on re-activating. They were like hive insects without a queen, but too stubborn to die so they just went to sleep. waiting for another to bring their thoughts to one goal.
-WHAT?-
The soul-pillar rippled, its manifold tendrils quivering in sympathy to the mind voices. One voice made of many.
Dremond approached the Aggendi gestalt throwing open his arms. "I bring you that which you have craved for so long." A new thread of Aggendi soul-stuff touched his shadow-being, twining with his will.
"I bring you purpose!"
Thousands of inhuman throats, techno-organic speakers and even the hallways of the great leviathan gave rise to one voice. A scream of a new-born. The birth cry of Algols' doom.
Chapter 1.: A bad day.
4, 26, AY 1528. 04:35 Arcadian Time.
Lt. (jg.) Kanata Musashi was having a bad day. Check that. He was having a Kregor Dragon scale steaming load of a day. First there was 'The Nightmare'. The same damn one he'd been having for nearly a week straight.
Freaky tall man that looks like he's made out of black fog or shadows. Voice that seems to be echoing inside of a cathedral or cave made out of glowing green rock, an pillar of white light. Sense of impending doom... and that scream at the end! Damn! Head hurts just thinking about that scream.
Second layer of manure; the news bytes. Kanata blearily gazed at the flat-screen vid, laying on his side wondering when the hurting would stop. Note to self: When waking up from screaming nightmares, do NOT watch the news nets if you want to be cheered up.
"...made his official statement today on bill number 24601. Lord Delany of the Elaran Peace Party, and third in line to the throne of Elrara, promised his constituents he would cut back military spending by fifty percent and attempt more 'diplomatic' avenues to reopen negotiations with the Nearside Fede..."
Click
"...Lord Falmak Kynis had this to say about the sudden disappearance of several Nearside Federation mining ships; "The people of the orbital communities will not tolerate any act of terrorism or piracy against it's members! If any organization or government is found to be responsible for these 'lost ships', they will be puni..."
CLICK!
"Here at James T. Harleys', the Mecha-Jocks friend, I have a galaxy of deals for y..."
CLICK! THWUD...Bump
"Idiots..." Dragging his sorry ass out of bed, Kanata stumbled across his loft towards the bathroom. There he discovered the final topping on his shit-sundae. Looking back at him was a red-eyed, purple haired wreck of a man. The eyes were no problem; he had naturally red iris', a fairly common genetic trait from his family. Same could be said about his hair colour. Dark purple was perfectly respectable for an Algolian humae born on the continent of Elara. It could have been white.
No. Lt. Musashi's problem wasn't the colour... It was the condition. As in 'lack-of'.
He was having a bad hair day.
"No wonder you don't have a steady girl friend dude." He addressed the mirror doppelganger; "You wake up looking like a death-grass victim, after being sat on by a Gunfark". Flipping his mirror twin an obscene gesture, Kanata ran a finger along the tracery of scars on the left side of his chest.
No pain today. Good. That means no pills.
After a bit of water splashed across his offending face and hair, the weary mech pilot ambled towards his kitchen unit and dialled in an extra strong brew of kafe. The astringent brown drink went down like sweet-death; hot and nasty. The view outside of the floor to ceiling windows was fairly empty; the lights of the Arcadia Archology glimmered in the pre-dawn mist, while a pair of fan-carriers slowly manoeuvred south along the Ymri canal, eventually to the open ocean.
Hmm... 'wonder if I could just ditch this mess. Go away and join the free-lancers. No no. Fathers' spirit would come and haunt my ass for 3 incarnations if I left my 'duty'. Floater shit, but am I in a bad mood!
"Well, no use complaining! Let's double check my mail and make sure I wasn't hallucinating it yesterday, and then go check on BT." With those words spoken aloud, Kanata punched in the pass-code to his comp-net account and read the offending message.
The reason behind his 'bad-hair day
To: LT. (jg.) Musashi. Subject: Reactivation of Military Commission.
You are hereby informed as of 16:00, 4th. month, 25th. day, Algol Year 1528, that your commission as a member of the Elaran Defence Forces has been re-activated. Your place of employment has been notified of this fact, and has agreed to suspend your contract with them for up to 6 months, upon which the contract with said employer will require re-negotiation.
You are to report to Kandar Mech Academy West wing by 24:00, 4, 27, AY1528 for evaluation and re-instatement.
-By order of Major. L. Kynis, EDF SF RRATT1.
Message ends.
"Huh...so I guess they're desperate enough to drag even a shellshock case like me back into the service. Budget MUST be tight." That thought elicited a grim chuckle out of him. It had been over four years since he had last been on active duty. Just over seven years since he had been 'damaged'. Not just the outer scars; the scars the went into his soul. It was why the psych-officers had red-stamped his commission.
'Irreconcilable feelings of anger and aggression.'
'Survivors guilt and thoughts of vendetta.'
'Unsuited to frontline or SF operations.'
'Recommend employment in a career /vocation that can utilize subjects aptitude with Mekton systems, in a peace-time setting'
Yup. Four years working at Nissian Advance Design Group, with room for promotion. Sure, I wouldn't see combat outside of a sim-unit testing new systems, or the occasional Gunfark hunt, but hey! It paid the bills. No what's all been shit-canned because they now think I'm useful as a killer again. Damn...
Kanata looked over at the shrine by the East facing wall of his loft. A micro-tree, a 'Banzai' in the language of his family, sat before the holograph of his father and mother. Just underneath the holo, rested his legacy...well, a part of his legacy. The Musashi family sword. If he was to believe the rumours, it's blade had been forged from the alloys of the Black-Tower of Muria; the wrecked colony-ship that had brought humae to Algol many thousands of years ago. He had to admit, 'Yamato' was unique in appearance, glossy black like basalt and the edge never dulled. Almost as sharp as a mono-sword, but without the fragility.
Picking up the sword, bowing to his parents images, Kanata walked out of the apartment and towards the nearest express-pod to the Mech & Aerodyne bays. It was time to go wake up an old friend.
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Okay people. Thus ends chapter 1 of 'Dark Awakenings', my first ever fan-fic posting, and from what I can tell, the first ever Mekton story posted on the site as well.
YAY me! ;-)p
If you can ever find the books, second hand or gathering dust in the remainder bins of your local hoby store, I highly recomend Mekton-Zeta and the source books for that game line. It is a bit number-crunching heavy for neophyte RPG'rs, but for a generic anime based game (that isn't free-form like B.E.S.M.) it can't be beat for flexability of character creation and mech design.
I hope the M. Pondsmith and the boys at R. Talsorian get their act together and re-print the game series again someday :-
Anyways, thanks for reading, and feel free the leave any 'constructive' comments in the area provided. ;-)
I'll be back with more angst, mystery, poltical & social intrigue w/ giant robots soon.
Until then, Keep it surreal!
-DhAkael