Apriltober 2022 03 Trial part 1

a/n: Randall the OC versus everyone's favorite super tyrant. He'll be fine!

All the good things belong to Monolith Soft, except for Randall.

If the administration caught him, he'd be toast, but he wasn't going to think about that. If he wanted in with this team, the one that was gunning for top of the Harriers, over Barret, over that old lion, he had to do this.

He'd gotten the invitation last night. He and his friends had pooled their knowledge, collected augments and tickets, used the few hours to polish up his skell into something that had a chance, just a chance of surviving. Randall shook his head, looking up the waterfall that formed the last leg of the approach. No, he had to do more than survive. He wanted this spot and he needed to prove his skills. He needed to win.

He was met by three other skells at the lip of the waterfall. One floated gracefully, swerving towards a small rise overlooking the jungle so far below. He followed, the movements of his mech jerky and inexperienced. It should have been a relief to step out, but the cool morning air made him shiver.

They noticed, just as he noticed the dismissive side inspection of his skell, the bored rattle of the terms. "Three stages. Last that long, we'll consider you. Rory here (a nod toward a bulky pilot with a bulkier skell) will help you get its attention, then you gotta make it to the third stage. Air, ground, air."

"Unless you kill it before then," Rory said with a juicy laugh, as if that was the biggest joke on Mira.

He'd followed Rory's skell into the sky, through the red branches that pulsed and twisted. He didn't look away from his guide until they were free of the tangle, scanning the horizon just in time to spot a diamond-tipped wing tracing where cliffs met air.

A few blasts from Rory's skell later, followed by his quick exit, and Randall was locked in combat with the guardian of the planet, the Endbringer. "Run if you gotta, kid." Rory's parting words hung in the pilot's capsule. "You won't be alone."

The strategy he'd worked out with his friends proved effective. He kept to the edge of the the Telethia's range, timing his attacks so that he'd dodge the worst of what the monster offered. It managed to catch him with a sucking wave of energy that drained his fuel, but Randall was ready with an emergency supply, a reluctant gift from his bunkmate. The light was long past dawn when the Telethia begin its glide to the lagoon's shore.

Randall shut off his skell mid-flight and drifted behind it. The faster he let the skell's systems focus on repair and refueling, the better. He felt more confidence about his ground build anyway. He should be: everyone had chipped in their best defensive augments. He might be a patchwork of resistances, but it added up to something that could stand against Telethia.

He wasn't so proud by the end of that stage. He'd been ready for all attacks, ether or gravity. He wasn't ready to have the creature swing its tail and flip him like a puppet. He'd landed head first in the lagoon. He was drowning with a helmet full of water after he got to his feet, wavelets lapping at his ankle. All he could do was hit the exhaust button over and over, hoping that the helmet still offered some protection and that the beast didn't launch a full attack. He cleared his view to watch it floating upward.

Back in the skell, he was shaking so hard that the controls slipped in his hands. He missed an easy chance to dodge, a precious window to repair. The skell creaked unnaturally. He punched the engines, burning a little fuel he couldn't spare, to build a gap between himself and the claws and wings and knife-like beak. He dodged an obvious swipe, only to run directly into a sleep-inducing cloud.

Randall kept his eyes open, mostly because they were locked into position the same as every other part of his body. The next attack would be it. He'd lose, he'd drag himself home to NLA, and he let go of his dreams of leading the Harriers. Light filled the pilot's capsule and Randall was falling.

a/n: Such a good fight. Took me a month to figure out because I have the attention of a small frog when it comes to tricky fights.

Next up: More Randall.