[201-400] THE MECH'S TOUCH

Chapter 293: Stalemate

The loss of Hoyler and the way he died left the Whalers in a somber mood. Ves hoped their rude awakening would push them to work more meticulously, but the Whalers showed a remarkable ability to move on from tragedy.

They held a festive party over the night where over half of the Whalers drunk themselves into a stupor. By the time they woke up the next morning, the pain at losing Hoyler had become a distant pang.

Everything went back to normal, although the Whalers heightened their alertness. No more pirate vessels fell from the sky in their vicinity.

In fact, every descending carrier aimed to land in the middle of unclaimed terrain. The ships that crashed near the Vesians or the Brighters had been forced to veer from their original trajectories due to the damage they suffered from the battle up in space.

This left everyone with a bit of reprieve. Until the pirates recovered from their landings and gathered together, they posed no threat to the Whalers.

Fadah and Ves gathered at the stables where the Blackbeak rested. The mech didn't suffer anything more than a couple of scratches at the hands of the pirates. It actually sustained more damage from its fall when Hoyler's mech blew up, and that had to be fixed.

"I can fix the Blackbeak up in half a day." He said, eying his own work with a new sense of appreciation. The lack of armor didn't seem so bad now that he knew that Fadah would be able to make the most of it on the Glowing Planet. "Is there anything else you'd like to be modified while I'm at it?"

"No." Fadah lethargically shook his head. "The Blackbeak is still in a pretty good shape. Just do the basics and move on to fixing the other mechs."

"Alright."

Ves quietly went to work, though inwardly he sighed again. Fadah expected too much from him. He wasn't a miracle worker. The Whalers piloted cheap and badly maintained mechs. Their workshops lacked a lot of advanced tools and the mech technicians resembled bums more than professionals.

Still, he kept his complaints to himself and tried to make the best of it, knowing that he might need to get accustomed to working under trying circumstances.

With his penchant for diving into trouble, he might be put into situations where he'd be forced to work on a mech without any tools or supplies.

A couple of days went by as Ves modified mech after mech. Nothing much happened on the ground.

The pirates that landed on the surface gathered up and formed a series of underground bases. Occasionally, the Mech Corps and the Mech Legion up in orbit bombarded their positions, but the sheer amount of distance and some unknown influences from the Glowing Planet caused most shots to miss their mark.

It was a waste of time and energy to bombard the pirates unless they gathered at least an entire regiment.

However, whenever they did so, the pirate fleet that remained in the vicinity of the Glowing Planet would move in and threaten the mechs. This led to complicated orbital maneuvering where the three sides tried to box each other in to no avail. All of the fruitless course adjustments frustrated the pilots that had to remain on standby like Ghanso.

"When will this ever end?!" He moaned inside his Vhedra-S.

"It'll end when the pirates slip up." Old Man Alex replied.

"Like that'll ever happen. Those Dragons of the Void bastards are cunning as hell, and slippery to booth. They keep bluffing us over and over and we keep falling for their tricks."

"That's spaceborn combat for you. It's not as if we're on land where we'll halt our movement once we shut off our engines. Everything is in motion. In order to thrive in space, you have to understand the mechanics behind all this stuff."