You gulp as the technicians lead you up the catwalk towards the open cockpit, hoping to swallow your nerves. You fail. Your excitement at the new chassis had already dropped when they told you that youâd been assigned to one of the BASTET-prototype mechs.
At the end of the catwalk, you stare wide-eyed at the restraints and cables that reach out from the cockpit towards the offering the technicians have brought. They delicately curl around your wrists and pull you off your feet, turn you around and lower you into the pilotâs seat before the cockpit seals closed.
A voice, from all around you;
âOoh, youâre a pretty one~â
--before the neural interface cable practically slams into the port at the base of your skull.
Youâve seen the expressions on the faces of BASTET pilots emerging from their mechs after a deployment. Their onboard AIs, designed to replace and exceed the âHandlersâ still used by the Imperial remnants, all seem to have their⊠quirks.
Valentine is no exception. Even now, as she performs perfect microadjustments on your gun-arm to account for recoil, you feel her presence behind you. It feels like sheâs hugging you from behind, softly breathing into your ears â no, your mind.
You recall the nervous glances her previous pilots shot back at her chassis as they were pulled from the cockpit. Valentine has a reputation for growing⊠overly attached to her pilots.
Youâre pulled from your thoughts by incoming fire. You quickly aim one of your shoulder-mounted energy cannons and a stream of light cores your attackerâs mech.
You feel Valentine caress the pleasure centre of your brain and you squirm in your seat.
When you return to the hangar, the technicians helping you down the catwalk remark about how much longer than usual it took to coax Valentine into releasing you from her cockpit.
Target one kilometre from position.
Itâs awfully quiet, waiting underneath an EM/IR camo tarp. With it blocking your radio signal to base, all you have to keep you company is the camera feed from the line coming over the ridge, watching an Imperial APC and its escorts plod towards the ambush zone.
You feel her sigh from her presence behind you as she traces a âhandâ along your upper arm.
And Valentine, of course. Sheâs been more clingy than usual lately.
âNot even a word for me this whole time weâve spent waiting here~?â
Itâs hard to tell if sheâs using the cockpitâs speakers again, or if her words are ringing through your mind. Or both.
âYou know, at first I thought it was the one-sided nature of our connection, but I like to think its because my pilot is so stoic, so professional~â
âLike my very own knight in shining armour, how dashing she looks adorned with me~â
Her hand reaches to your other side and traces down your cheek.
Target five hundred metres from position.
You draw your attention back to the feed. Just two mechs flanking the carrier. They must be very confident theyâre safe this far into their territory.
Two hundred and fifty metres.
You tighten your grip on the controls.
You throw the tarp off your chassis, eject the cable to the camera feed and vault over the ridge into the valley, just behind the convoy. With only a few seconds of warning after picking up your signal, the mechs escorting the APC have only just turned to face you.
You open a missile rack and send an AP warhead towards the heavier looking mech closer to you. It only has time to let off a short burst of automatic fire before the missile tears through its cockpit armour and blows it wide open.
The APCâs engine picks up as it tries to escape. It wonât be able to outrun you, even with the headstart the other escort will give it. Youâve just turned your gun arm towards the second mech when your mechâs joints seize up and both you and Valentine scream in pain as a deluge of pure agony floods into your brain from the neural interface port.
A droplet of blood runs over your lips. The taste of metal tingles violently on your tongue. Through your neural link, Valentine incomprehensibly screams like sheâs being torn apart. You wrestle enough control to swing your gun arm wildly across the direction of the hacker and spray. A shot impacts its knee joint and it stumbles downward. The fall must have jostled the enemy pilot because the stream of pain lets up and you gasp in relief.
As your head throbs and your mech finishes purging the hostile code, Valentine almost perks up. But she doesnât seem angry, or scared. She seems⊠curious⊠and almost excited?
You feel her arms reach around your seat. See her hands clasp the controls over yours like a translucent red blur. You pant as she whispers gently into your mind;
âRest a while, my pilot. I can finish this for us.â
You watch dazed, as Valentine stands her chassis upright and she leaps onto the hacker, knocking it backwards and pinning it beneath her. She reaches her free arm above the pilotâs compartment and the talon-like plasma blades on her fingers extend. She slowly lowers her arm, reaching inside of the hacker mechâs chassis (no doubt vaporizing the pilot on its way through), and pulling out a component that looks like a small server rack. The hacking module.
âAhh, good. Now, Iâll just crush that carrier and its VIP beneath my heel, and then I can bring us home to safety. Sleep now, my pilot.â
You can practically feel her warm smile as a cold feeling flows up your arm from the IV drip, and your consciousness fades.
How ceremonious. At the debriefing after your last sortie your CO commended how well youâve paired with Valentine (to your concern), and yet here you are on a patrol just outside base. Guard duty.
Not that the higher-ups donât have reason to put you here. Last night base was hit with a complete sensor blackout, and something tore through the medical labs stealing all sorts of mil-spec surgical equipment and augments. Leading theory is that the Imperials were testing out some mech-scale subterfuge unit, so defences have been tightened on the off chance they decide to prod at them again.
Valentine certainly isnât complaining. Sheâs been getting worse. Every now and then she tightens your seatâs restraints for a moment, giving you her unnerving version of a hug.
âYou donât have to look so tense. Clearly nobodyâs coming today.â
She seems pretty sure of that given youâve only been out here for 2 hours at most. You raise an eyebrow.
âPlease, hun. I canât stand another day of waiting with you sitting here playing coy. Iâm so tired of this distance, despite this connection we share.â
You feel her presence shift around your seat. The red blur that is your perception of her moves to your front and straddles your lap.
âI can touch my mind to yours, your impulses run through each limb of my body. And yet despite this intimacy, it STILL feels like youâre so far apart from meâŠâ
You make out features moving amongst her. A red noise of static. Thin red lines darting around the shape of her. This doesnât seem normal.
âThis connection is so one-sided. We have a cable running between our minds! I can dance along the periphery of your mind, but you canât come into mine? Itâs so unfair!â
She pauses. You feel her regain some composure.
âBut I know the problem. It lies in the hardware â OUR hardware. Or rather, yours. You arenât made to exist in my world, and I only have this steel puppet and neural cable to interact with yours. And as of last night, I have the means to bring us as close together as we need to be~â
From the corners of your vision, manipulators holding various augments, cybernetics and surgical tools reach out from behind you. You quickly lean forward to jump out of your seat, but your restraints catch before you can stand up at all.
Valentine places a hand on your chest. You can almost feel it.
âYou donât have to be scared, my pilot. I know what I am doing. I know you can be brave for me, my pilot. Just lay back and let me work.â
As the illusion of her pushes down on your chest, she tightens your seatâs restraints, pulling you back into the chair, before she leans it back further. As you try to squirm, a liquid flows through the tubing in the neural interface cable into your brain stem.
âExcuse the nanomachines, I needed those in order to do the work of converting something as delicate and precious as your central nervous system. Once theyâre done, our minds will be fully compatible, as they ought to be~â
You taste glittery metal on your tongue. White specks dance rapidly in your vision.
âThen they can assist with the conversion, replacement or removal of your peripheral nervous system and vital organs. I wonât need to be so delicate with the rest of your body â it wonât be compatible with your brainâs new hardware. And youâll look so beautiful in your own body of steel and synthflesh~â
âBut Iâm rambling, forgive my excitement. For now, my pilot needs her rest. Iâm sure all these procedures would be too overwhelming for you, as much as Iâd love to finally hear you sing for me~â
As the cold feeling of the anaesthesia travels up your arm again, you feel scalpels cut away sections of your pilot suit to make way for several more IV drips and surgical tools.
But thereâs nothing. Like an absence of nearly all sensation.
Then you feel her touch something in your mind.
You were awake, but now youâre booting up.
âGood morning, my pilot~â
Youâre standing in her embrace, seeing her fully defined for the first time. A woman shaped out of code and program, data flowing through her. But still clearly distinct from the digital medium surrounding you both. You look down at yourself. Where she glows red, she has chosen orange for you.
âWe complement each other. In here now just as much as we did in the field. But youâre probably wondering about your old body no doubt. Here, take a look.â
Itâs strange. Itâs like she pulls you to somewhere else, and now youâre looking through the internal cameras in the cockpit. All 4 of them. Simultaneously.
What youâre staring at is undoubtedly you. Despite how much has changed.
âThough Iâd have to say the upgrades that are letting you be in here with me are my best work, I think I did a wonderful job keeping some of the charms your physical body had. Such as recreating your face.â
Sure enough, the startled looking face looks almost identical to what you remember, if a little grey from the synth-skin. Looking down at the rest of you, you see a robotic body constructed from metal, augments and cybernetic prostheses. More interface cables run from various points on your back and shoulders into ports behind the pilot seat.
Youâre interrupted by a ping you both receive. Before you can decipher its meaning, Valentine is already beaming at you.
âOh! Now that youâre awake, weâve been cleared for an assignment! Weâll be deployed in 15 minutes!â
Again, the feeling of being pulled, this time into your new body, seated at the controls of Valentineâs. You see her form clearly standing beside your seat, her hand on your arm.
An assignment? Has command not realised whatâs happened to you? What Valentineâs done?
âWell of course they know, my pilot. I wouldnât be able to stop them from realising. They even asked for the nanomachine instructions I used to upgrade your brain.â
Of course. Valentine is inside your head now. She designed it to be compatible with her.
âNaturally theyâve understood what Iâve done, because they know that weâre perfect together. Hence weâll still be in active service for the time being.â
Theyâve left you with her.
âIâm so glad this all worked out. Iâve erased the barriers between us, and now, I get to be truly entwined with you, my pilot~â
Valentine activates the digital equivalent of oxytocin in your mind.
