Inktober21 Furious

a/n: Doug, Alexa, and Doug's couch are my BrOTP threesome.

All the good things belong to Monolith Soft, and a big thank you to Hiroyuki Sawano for the music.

It had taken one pizza, most of a six-pack, and three short skell documentaries to calm Alexa down. She'd talked nonstop during the videos, repeating her grievances. Doug sat on the couch next to her, humming sympathy when appropriate. He knew she was still furious because she didn't stop for her favorite clip, the one comparing science fiction robot suits to early prototype designs. In fact, she snapped the video off suddenly.

"Gah! I can't stand to even look at this!"

"Whoa there. You don't want to look at skells? We need to get you into the Maintenance Center, stat."

"It's not funny."

"Unless you're a Definan imposter, masquerading as my favorite Outfitter." He reached over and palmed the top of her head, giving it a gentle squeeze. "Nope. Still pointy. You're the real thing."

She swatted his hand away. "Ha, ha. NOT FUNNY," she growled. "That clip rubs me wrong. Calling skells science fiction. I already heard enough of that today. Fantasy. Pipe dream. Gah!" She flung the remote at the screen and stood up.

"Hold on. Don't break my stuff."

"Fine. I'm gonna go throw rocks at the Manufacturers' Building. Or BLADE tower. Do you know which window is Nagi's?"

"Alexa, you need to chill," he said peaceably.

She flopped back against the sofa. "Ahhhhhh! I have worked for months on that concept and they accused me of watching too many old skell movies."

"You do watch a lot of skell movies."

He remained calm as she popped onto her knees and leaned in towards him, hissing. "This wasn't any dream. This is what we need to do. This is what skells deserve."

"Two pilots."

"Absofluffinglutely."

"I remember a certain movie series from when I was a kid…"

"Nothing stupid like split brain nonsense, Doug. Yuck. That was just an excuse to throw some dumb childhood montages into otherwise excellent giant robot movies. No, I mean it, two pilots. No, scratch that, let me be clear, one pilot, all about maneuvering the skell, and one gunner, all about hitting the target, and hard."

"Skells hit hard enough."

"Don't you get it? The loadout is so inefficient. For big fights, each weapon is a one-time use. Push the button and move on to the next weapon. Sure, they hit hard, but it's so slow and god forbid you need to hit a second time. A good ground fighter can do twice the damage in half the time."

Doug grinned slyly. "Did you just say that I'm better than skells?"

Alexa backhanded his arm with a stinging smack. He was relieved to see her struggle not to laugh. "Skells rule, now and forever. But we can't keep loading them up heavier and heavier and think we can catch up. Just imagine Speedy the Skell, still with only four weapons, but each one lighter and faster and with two or three possible attacks. You'd have one BLADE focused on getting the most out of each one, and the pilot focused on getting into the best position. We'd blow the ground pounders out of the water."

"That metaphor needs help."

"Listen to me, Doug! I'm telling you: this is the direction we need to go!"

"I believe you. It sounds great. I call shotgun."

She slumped against him, banging her forehead on his shoulder. "Then why couldn't I convince Sakuraba on that point? They didn't even let me finish the presentation. Just patted me on the head and told me to go back to my anime."

"Manga is better. Sorry about my head pat, Alexa."

"Oh, I know what you meant, Doug." She sighed against him. "I'm angry and it's hopeless. They've pulled me off skell design before and they'll probably pull me off again. If they haven't already." She shifted away and paused for a moment. Then she said in a firm voice, "I'm not going to give up. Not on this. I saw their point on the changes for the Ares. But I can't let them ignore this."

"Atta girl. Make them say sorry they didn't listen."

"I'm make them crawl. I'll build a prototype of my own. With my teeth, if necessary."

There was a knock at the door. Alexa and Doug exchanged a questioning glance. Doug shrugged. "I'll get it. Might be Frye." Alexa muttered something about borrowing a cup of vodka as he moved away.

It wasn't Frye. An anonymous grunt with a Sakuraba nametag stood there, holding a folder full of papers and blueprints. "Ms. Alexa left this behind at her presentation. I'm supposed to deliver it." Alexa shoved past Doug to snatch the packet out of the delivery man's hands. "Thanks for bringing them. Have a nice night," Doug said and quickly shut the door.

Alexa was glaring at the folder on the coffee table. "These are copies. To keep and look at. I didn't need them back. They really want to tell me no."

"Well, at least I get to enjoy them. Power point me, Alexa." Doug wandered into the kitchenette, returning with a fresh beer for each of them.

They sifted through the papers together, Alexa pointing out this feature or that. Finally, they sat in silence. Alexa stared glumly at a spreadsheet of percentages and abbreviations. Doug shuffled a few loose sheets, admiring the diagrams. Then he noticed a slightly smaller page. "Huh. This one is different."

"What's that?"

"This skematic. I like it. It's different. Less technical than your others."

"That's not part of my presentation."

"It was in the packet." Doug examined the detailed drawing of a double pilot's seat. "Looks comfy. Like an oversized bean bag chair." He passed the paper over to Alexa.

"That's not mine. That's …" She lurched forward, laying the paper flat on the table and peering down at it. "It's not my handwriting. I didn't do this. I never thought about using insulation to protect the pilots."

"Pffft. Typical," muttered Doug.

"This isn't mine!" she almost shouted.

"Whose is it?"

She was squinting at a corner of the page. "I – s – o …" she spelled out. "Doug! Doug! I think that's Mr. Isobe's signature.

"So?"

"He's the lead researcher on skells. Was. He's semi-retired. You know! He was the guy that fixed the flight module."

"Lin did that," Doug growled, instantly defensive.

"He did the last 1% that kept the thing from exploding."

"Oh, yeah." Doug sighed. "I remember the explosions."

Alexa was looking feverishly at the sparse text. "It's dated 2053. Before we left Earth. These plans are old, Doug. Holy mother of marmalade, do you know what this means? Do you know what this means, Doug?!"

"Yup. You need a coffee date with Mr. Isobe tomorrow morning. Early."

a/n: Ahhhhhh. Written with 01 on loop, because I needed something to get the job DONE. Shameless plug time: "Modern Bromance/4" for the time Alexa was pulled off skells, and "Doug and Alexa do a test" for why (rated M for I'm not sure what happened there). And, yes, the skell seat in the XCX secret artbook looks a lot like a beanbag chair to me….

Next up: Trail. Please, let it be short. (All I can think of is trail mix…. Nopon trail mix….)