The correct way to command a Hound is with fear and wholesale dehumanization.
Down (Handler/Fear)
There are no second chances for a Hound under your command.
Hound (Fear)
Your Handler is God. Gods do not show mercy.
Asset (Hound/Fear)
Your handler will not let her Asset die in the cockpit.
Handler (Adoration)
The correct way to command a Hound is by instilling admiration, obsession, and controlled dehumanization.
Down (Handler/Adoration)
There are no second chances for your Hound. Not anymore.
Hound (Adoration)
Your Handler is God. Your value in life lies in how well you can please Her, the number of corpses you can lay at her feet.
Asset (Hound/Adoration)
Your handler will not let her Hound die in the cockpit.
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#sweetestsix mechpost writings
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#sweetestsix mechpost asks
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SweetestSixShooter Crossovers (Contain consang):
Analog
A decommissioned mech pilot does a psych-drift with the personality matrix of her deceased sister, and finds that her sister had secrets that she never shared.
Hunter/Killer
The prodigal Hunter-Killer mech piloting skills of a mother and her Hound daughter elicit the creation of a new 'bonded-pair' unit in an effort to see if allowing a space for… abnormal bonding practices can create similar results. Two sisters are inducted into the program, and combat puts their intimate bond to the test, until they're forced to decide between the special privileges of their unit and their morals.
Cultural Exchange (No consang)
A transport mech's pilot makes friends with one of the newer generations of neuro pilots.
The principle adaptation of the lunar tissue extracted from the cores of the moons that were lucky enough to harbor it was, most certainly, for warfare purposes, but that never stopped the UE’s Tidal Gestalt program from incubating other novel uses for the material. Perhaps the greatest medical breakthrough achieved with the help of such a material is the field of Psychemedicine and a much more well-rounded understanding of human exceptionalism. Practitioners of this science—Aespers—are incredibly few and far between, but are highly valued by both the UE government and medical supercorps.
In the modern day, the human body is understood to maintain a polar field not dissimilar to a gravitational pull, which anchors the “soul” (not a literal religious soul, but rather, the human “””spark””” that is developed through emotional experience) to the mortal form. Damage to this Psyche both allows the human spark to leak out and the radiant entropy of the universe to seep in, a condition that can become fatal without intervention. Modern psychescience is still a fringe, experimental field, but shows great promise in filling in the gaps of neuroscience and psychology.
The “spark” within, finite as it may be, is a readily-accessible fuel source for the Remnant Walkers that scourge the sanctioned warzone to this day.
. . .
Lincoln, followed closely by Spider, sprinted across the access gangway towards Whisper's peeled-back form. Neither took the time to don radiation suits. The mech stood idle in its bay, blood-splattered and contented after another successful mission on the surface. The onboard cameras dotting its form tracked both tiny bodies as they ran eagerly into its waiting maw, straight to the plugcell at the back of its peritoneal cavity.
Lincoln gripped the hatch with both hands, pressing one boot against the steel spine of the mech for leverage. Behind her, Spider placed a portable biomonitor on the catwalk. Two hands rifled through one of the side pouches while a third powered on the device and began adjusting the settings.
The plug opened with a vile hiss, spilling stale air into the hangar. Within, criss-crossed by the overhead spotlights, Fours twitched lifelessly in her harness. Several red lights within flashed, vestigial monitors throwing up countless warning messages that the pilot would never have been capable of reading. Above the Battery's unresponsive head, Lincoln strained to pull the emergency release, and braced herself to catch the body that began to sag downwards as the metal supports retracted. The glassy pupils of the pilot gave no reaction to the light that poured in, nor the shade of Lincoln's body subsuming her.
One failed neural flash wasn't terribly uncommon.
Two failed neural flashes typically required a few hours of monitoring for health.
Five failed neural flashes is the pilot support system's polite way of communicating that its pilot had become unrecoverable.
Lincoln stepped up into the plugcell, awkwardly bracing herself against the rim of the hatch. She gripped a handhold above with one arm, placing her other hand against the back of Fours’ head to bow it forwards. Resting against the clone’s spine, as expected, the mech’s onboard neurospike was cleanly contacting with her spinal buffer at the base of her neck.
"It's not a connection issue, I don't think."
"How many flashes has it tried?"
Lincoln twisted herself around to check one of the auxiliary monitors, tabbing through the screens to find an answer. When the answer did appear, she rather quickly tabbed past it. Only briefly did it warn of its ninth failed flash before the indicator was exchanged for an empty radar screen. Her heart began to race.
"Two."
Spider either didn't notice her uncomfortably fast response (or chose to ignore it), instead pulling a cable free from his portable biomonitor and offering it up to the woman halfway inside the cockpit. Lincoln hung back to grab it, although she had to stretch a little to pull it to the walker's external hookup. The mech's onboard support systems suddenly losing their capacity to squeeze the digitized psyche of the clone back into its head could only truly boil down to one of two failures: either there was a mechanical fault with the PSS' neuroflash suite or there was a fault with Fours' own neurology.
One meant her pilot's spirit was trapped within the mech's synaptic clipboard, waiting to be pasted back into a brain that would fit it. One meant that her pilot’s soul was fleeting through irreparable tears in the ephemeral barriers that were meant to contain the self. There wasn’t much she could do about either. This wasn’t how Lincoln wanted to lose her latest pilot.
While Spider began troubleshooting Fours’ body, Karabin adjusted her stance against the front of the hatch to get better access to the mech’s diagnostics. Her hand trembled as she began pulling diagnostics and reading through the system’s event log, picking through every line for any indication of a hardware fault. Maybe the verification scan was misidentifying Fours’ brain? Maybe there was a dirty neurospike that couldn’t secure a connection? Maybe the flash wasn’t fully charging? No matter how far she stretched her imagination, the system log gave no indication of a fault.
“Its NP wave is pretty much flat, I’m guessing the Psyche’s totally shot. That last flash was hardly a blip.”
Karabin turned her attention from the monitor to Fours’ unresponsive, twitching body, then down to Spider.
"Get her back."
“What? Linc, it’s not a medical issue, I—“
“Get her back or leave.”
“I’m not an aesper, we’ve got the money for a new one. There’s nothing I can do.”
“Leave.”
Spider’s response died in his throat as Lincoln pulled the portable biomon’s cable from the mech and let it loudly retract into the device on the catwalk. The echo of the elastic whine rippled across the hangar exactly as long as Spider stood there, before the man squatted down to pick the monitor up.
Lincoln turned back into the cockpit, stepping one foot against Fours’ harness to boost high enough to pull the internal controls. With a sinister whine, the open cavity of the walker began to slide shut.
Spider watched as Lincoln disappeared into the mech. The shade blotting out all but the glare of her eyes did little to deter the simmering frustration he felt towards her recklessness. He knew she couldn’t be objective about this, but it still never failed to bother him. Perhaps she simply wasn’t made to be the rational sort. None of those things were ever rational.
No sooner had she vanished into the machine than he began jogging back down the catwalk. He had no desire to end up just as diseased as those clones they fed to the walker.
. . .
Fours pulled her knees closer to her chest. Her hands didn’t look like her own. Sharpened, bladed fingertips scratched at her iron-plated skin. Her muscles were sore. The entire planet was silent and dark.
The KRIEGSHIRN hadn’t spoken a word in hours. She couldn’t feel its calculations white hot against the inside of her head. She couldn’t feel the throbbing of dozens of IVs taped to her arms. She couldn’t see.
She didn’t know where she was. It wasn’t hell—the suffering of the walker was replaced with naught but the unfamiliar sensation of normalcy. She couldn’t feel her burns, or her headaches, or her nausea, or her wounds.
It wasn’t heaven, either—Lincoln wasn’t sitting by her side.
A hand gently clasped around her shoulder.
The pilot whipped around, blindly swinging her hands outwards, but the thing behind her remained still and calm. Her head whipped ferociously, a growl emanating deep from her core. She had no mouth with which to snap.
In the indistinct void too dark to be black, a single figure stood, crystal clear and thrice as tall as she. Her snow-white body hovered barely a foot away, so far out of reach yet so close as to be suffocating. Its gravity dwarfed hers, even as she felt her psylune engine rev to its maximum to compensate. It was unmoving, unyielding, the featureless face of a god poised to crush her beneath its thumb.
It didn’t feel hostile. A glossy, smooth, devoid black head rested atop its shoulders. The towering thing stood out as a single focal point in the absence that surrounded it. Its movements were slow and graceful, as though afraid even the gentlest brush might break Fours.
When it spoke, it spoke with the voice of the only god the clone could fathom believing in.
Often observed as one of the most tragic and senseless events of the Durban Coup, the destruction of the Kitsukami Superorbital Megamall at MARS L5 is still memorialized every December 9th across United Earths territory.
The evening before, three Tidal Gestalt units launched without permission from the Icaran Crater Anchorage on Mars, and were lost within a matter of minutes. Early the following morning, astroseismic sensors aboard Kitsukami registered several gravitic spikes, which triggered an automatic response by nearby UE peacekeeping vessels. In the forty minutes between the automated hail and the arrival of the UES Prometheus, the entirety of the station—a complex of over 400 square miles occupied by 2.3 million people at the time of the incident—was reduced to a field of debris.
The motivation to commit such an act, and even which Tidal Gestalt units took part in it, remain unconfirmed to this day.
. . .
Hand clenched tightly over Karabin’s, Fours eagerly trotted at the side of her handler.
Sabbaticals to local ports was a scant luxury for the clone, even more so those not concerning her health in some way. Almost every time she was taken off the ship, it was to see an eclectic doctor for some illness that Spider couldn’t correct on-board, an experience rarely more pleasant than just living with the pain. Today, the two were engaging in a neolithic human custom known as “window shopping.”
Fours couldn’t see much around her, but there was more than enough sensation to keep her thoroughly engrossed. The sounds of music and advertisements mingled with the ambient drum of a crowd that extended as far as she could perceive in every direction. Smells of street food vendors frying in a thousand types of oils and exotic perfumes made from the flora of dozens of worlds were a welcome reprieve from stale, recycled ship nitrogen. Even the gravity—centrifugal rather than magnetic—tickled her body with the sensation of her clothes draping across her shoulders rather than floating loose around her.
One small luxury of operating within the sanctioned warzone as an unregistered mercenary company is that there’s no need to sign in and out of the war with the UE naval blockade that surrounds it. Smuggling wartime contraband in and out of Hjkor is a lucrative side-hustle for those with the stomach for it, and considering the bastardmech aboard is just about the most illegal thing one could possibly be caught transporting, some weapons or aid stashed alongside is hardly worth stressing over. Pockets flush with the profits of an arms deal carried out deep in the bowels of the station, Karabin’s wandering eye had become much less guarded to the small market pleasures of a consumer port.
Fours felt a slight tug at her hand guiding her out of the main thoroughfare and towards one of the glowing storefronts to her left. She couldn't see exactly what it was supposed to be (just about every inch of visible space was plastered with glaring neon billboards that made discerning anything through her hazy vision quite a challenge), but she could most certainly smell a minty, gentle, verdant aroma that reminded her of the conservatory Lincoln had taken her to visit the last time they stopped at a starport.
Judging by the line she was pretty sure she'd been pulled into, this didn't seem like it was another conservatory.
She wasn't entirely sure what they were waiting for, and Lincoln's other hand was occupied tapping away at her phone. The sounds of people talking, occasionally punctuated by a handful of the same voices calling out a number, didn't lend the clone much context as to where she'd been taken.
"...What is this place...?"
Lincoln's attention returned to the pilot she was guiding. Dressed in civilian clothes and free from the innards of Whisper, the thing looked almost like a regular person. She wasn't sure if she liked how that made her feel.
“Remember, the other night, when I was telling you about all the different things we use trees for?”
Four looked towards the indistinct, white frame of Lincoln’s hair. She nodded.
"This is one of those things. They use leaves to make drinks. I thought you might like one."
The wait in line wasn't terribly long, and waiting off to the side for their order to complete was even quicker. Fours wasn't entirely sure what they were waiting for, but she was cautiously optimistic about the prospect of drinking something that (hopefully?) didn't have gravmag powder sprinkled inside of it.
When Lincoln placed the drink she'd been ordered in her hands, Fours wasn't entirely sure what to make of it. The lid of the plastic cup occluded whatever it was supposed to smell like, leaving her with nothing but the faded green image of some sort of liquid in hand. It was pleasantly cold and slightly damp to the touch, topped with what looked like some sort of flat film rather than a lid. Punched through the top was a mercifully bright, distinct, wide red straw.
By the time Fours worked up the nerve to actually try what she’d been handed, the two had meandered out of the store and found a spot on a bench near the main thoroughfare. No matter how good she got at practicing a normal routine, watching the masses of humans going about their days never lost its appeal to her. Fours couldn’t make much of the glacial stampede, but being seated on a bench meant she could remain assured that Lincoln was nearby with her hip rather than sparing a hand for the task. All around, a win for all parties involved.
Fours took a cautious sip.
The drink was sweet—different from the dehydrated cocoa squares the medic gave her every so often—with a bitterness that tasted how dirt smelled. It smelled like a leaf and tasted like a milk-dipped flower, a sensation that fascinated her enough to go for a second, much less anticipatory sip.
Her second go was interrupted by the surprise appearance of a rubbery, gummy ball launching itself into her mouth, chased by a sudden murmur of surprise as she tried to figure out what she’d just unwillingly eaten. Karabin turned her attention over in worry. As soon as she'd cleared her mouth of whatever it was, the clone gave an awkward 'bleh', still fighting the ghost of a sensation in her throat. Something smooth and gooey had hitched a ride in the drink.
"Are you okay?"
"It... has something inside it."
Karabin stared at her for half a second before the realization hit. A sharp snort escaped her nose despite herself, quickly collapsing into muffled laughter behind one hand. She probably should have felt bad for not forewarning the hapless clone about it, but the thought genuinely never crossed her mind.
Fours' eyes remained crossed with worry. She didn't seem to appreciate the schadenfreude at her plight.
"You swallowed a tapioca pearl."
"...A what...?"
"The little balls at the bottom."
"...There are more?"
"They're supposed to be there. You eat them."
"...Why?"
Karabin opened her mouth, paused, then shrugged slightly.
"I don't know. Texture, I guess."
Fours considered this development. Slowly, carefully, she poked the straw back into the drink and gave it an experimental stir. Now that she was feeling for it, she could feel the resistance of a multitude more floating towards the bottom.
"...Are they plants too?"
"I think so? They're made of sugar, I think. I don't really know."
The pilot took another cautious sip. This time, when one of the pearls shot up the straw, she was ready for it. She didn't expect it to be as gummy as it was, but paired with another mouthful of the creamy tea, it certainly made a better second impression.
Karabin watched the clone chew with the sort of concentration she didn't think she'd ever seen it make in the cockpit. A small nausea had begun to brew in her own stomach, enough so that she set her own caramel taro tea down for the time being. She didn't know how much longer she could do this.
Fours swallowed.
"...It is weird..."
"Do you like it?"
Lincoln's head was facing Fours, but her attention was fixated on one of the trash cans a few meters beyond the clone.
Fours made an indistinct noise, and after a pause for some contemplative chewing, she went back for another sip.
The exact methods used to arm and operate Remnant Walkers isn't standardized, but almost all solutions to get them running require some form of human* element to bridge the gap between traditional walker construction and the psylithic musculature that elevates them to superweapon status. Despite the tight inventory controls and legal status that typically protects such valuable product, there still exists an underworld pipeline that provides these ethically-sourced meatbags into the hands of the least ethical warfighters in the sanctioned warzone.
*See United Earths Charter of Human Identity for guidelines pertaining to legal humanity.
. . .
I see you. You want to know how you can end up in your very own plugcell, don't you? It's a tough gig to nail down, but if you're so inclined, here's a handy six-step guide to surrendering your body, persona, and metaphysical self to the embrace of a radioactive moon's eager arms...
Step 1: Don’t be a “real” person.
While it can sometimes be difficult to define what makes someone “real”, your best bet is to be a recombinant clone or a genebank—something that’s made of all the same parts as a human, but without the natural gestation or any citizenship to speak of. Robots and aliens lacking a centralized nervous system need not apply; Gestalt inhabitance interfaces were only really designed with humanlike neurology in mind.
Step 2: Fall through the cracks.
Human genestock is a high-value product, and the multi-billion Yero companies that deal in organ synthesis or full-body replacement generally do a pretty good job keeping track of their inventory. Every so often, whether due to a corrupt insider or robbery in transit, these bodies have been known to leak beyond medical application and into black markets. If you want a shot at being within twenty feet of a psylune engine, you've got to lose (or, perhaps by your perspective, win) this logistical lottery.
Step 3: End up in the hands of a dealer with Remnant Corps connections.
The vast majority of human simulacra that end up in the galactic smuggling network find their way into the hands of those who can't get their hands on a human body through legitimate means. While Remnant Corps are one such group, the galaxy is full of other organized criminal groups, disavowed humanitarian organizations, and NGOs that have both more money and more necessity to scoop up just about anything they can get their hands on. Should your cryobag land in the inventory of one of the few bodysale groups with unregistered mercenary companies on their list of customers, you're in the right place.
Step 4: Survive.
Presuming you're picked up by a Remnant Corp, you're likely part of a bulk order. Those who can afford it tend to purchase a few bodies at a time, so you'd better hope you're the most psychically apt of the bunch. While death during the cyberization process is unlikely, you'll next be exposed to a bevy of psychistimulants and egostatic compounds to prepare you for your first contact with a lune-infused Gestalt inhabitance inteface--a first date you're statistically unlikely to survive and guaranteed to come away from different than you were before.
Step 5: Keep surviving.
Your new life in the hotseat is one of constant mental strain. Your ego is the fuel that powers the machine you're now part of, and the team supporting you is going to do everything they can to keep your spring of willpower flowing. Your primary contact, typically a pilot liaison or drop captain, will tailor your every interaction with them to manipulate you into blind, zealous loyalty. While your body will inevitably break, the idea is to keep you determined and willing to continue the fight no matter how sickly you become, no matter how much pain you're in, and no matter how loudly your basic human instincts are begging you to quit. You will fall in love. You will dream of the day the war ends. She will be your world.
Step 6: Stop surviving.
How you die isn't particularly important, but it is inevitable. Most Battery pilots succumb to lune poisoning or experience terminal psychic erosion, neither of which are particularly pleasant ways to go. Odds are you'll die with your boots on--your handler's not about to lose out on one last deployment, no matter how frail and sickly you are when you're shoved back into the plugcell. You'll promise you're going to complete the mission for her, and when you fail to resuscitate or your neural flash fails to adhere properly, you'll end up either dumped in space or cut up and sold under the table to clandestine research institutes. Your handler probably won't remember you; she doesn't have that luxury.
You were never real, and so long as that remains true, nothing you said to her has to be real either.
Remnant Walkers are incredibly expensive to maintain, which encourages many companies that furnish them to hold a level of risk-aversion one wouldn't expect for a group of people with a superweapon on a leash. While these machines are quite adept at bowling over infantry forces, traditional armored walkers, and even entire fortified outposts, the expense of damage and the risk of losing access to their small investment in the finite supply of lune components means tussling with an equal is enough of a reason for Remnant Walkers to rarely—if ever—engage each other without significant motivation.
Should two companies find that the verbiage of their contracts don't directly conflict, unplanned encounters between these brutish mechs typically end quite civilly.
. . .
As Whisper approached the target strongpoint, the ravenous combat walker slowed to a gentle jog. Its sunken head fixated across the tundra, locked firmly onto the silhouette of an equally-grotesque lune-infused machine that approached to oppose it.
"Stand down, Whisper. We’re negotiating a walk-past, do not engage.”
Not engaging didn’t mean it couldn’t advance, and advance it most certainly did. Both machines practically galloped towards each other, neither daring enough to move with enough gusto to signal a threat, neither willing to admit they were slower than the other.
Where they met, in a shallow valley between two dunes of salt, there was no room between them for anything more than muzzled malice.
The mechs stared daggers across the dozen meters separating them.
The thousands of sensors dotted all across Whisper picked and preened data from every visible surface of its opponent. Even as the biosupport system pivoted from stimulants to suppressants and rapidly flushed Fours’ body of all the irritant drugs it could, the mech couldn’t help but hunger for the kill it was actively being denied.
Whisper began to pace a slow circle, prompting the other mech to do the same. Its claws twitched with hunger, engine pulsing with the same weighty bass of a predator’s growl. The other mech’s back parted, spewing forth a short burst of flares. The rev of their psylune engines left fractal imprints in the white sand below, suspending particles between their opposing gravity wells. The two dogs circled each other, each snapping just gently enough so as to not incur the wrath of those above them.
Separated from the chemical and psychic influence of the walker, Fours was practically broken to Lincoln’s every syllable. Even jacked up on dozen of combat drugs and mind-melded with a superintelligence designed to kill, the woman’s voice cut through in a way that the faceless command operators simply couldn’t. The most dangerous parts of these encounters was the strain such a counterintuitive command put on whatever ad-hoc pilot was buried inside—but any group with the technical ability to maintain and deploy one of these wretched mechs certainly had the ability to effectively brainwash the single dumb, silly little peon that’d be driving it.
Within the internal structure of Whisper, microgravity flutters rippled. She was being probed, tested by the other creature for a weakness with which to exploit. Fours did much the same, gently pulling small pockets of space in awkward, fourth-dimensional directions to feel her way towards something fragile within the lumbering shape opposing she. It didn’t take either combat system long to feel their way straight to the cockpit, tiny gravitational ripples like the barrel of a gun pressed against the heads of the biological conduits within. Whisper knew its trigger finger was faster. Fear was a blacklisted emotional response. All she needed was the command. One word and she’d splatter that weakling against the side of its own plugcell. Any second now. Just say it. Just say it. Please. Please say it. Please let m
“Disarm and get moving, they’re playing ball with us. Your objective isn’t here.”
Both mechs came to a stop, heads mere yards apart. The imperceptibly light, fluttering pressure over Fours’ chest loitered for a moment too long, then faded. Before she could even process the words, Whisper’s own gravity engine sank back to idle.
The other machine stared for a second more, before turning to depart. Whisper did the same. Even as the quiet settled back across the tundra, the barely-lucid pilot’s whimpers of desperation were imperceptible over the wind.
ever had a pistol in your mouth? it's suprisingly comforting. cold, hard, unyeilding steel covered by warmer, softer polymer. it was dragged across my tounge and pushed into my throat by a very shouty woman. she was asking me questions, which i thought was a bit silly, but she didn't seem concerned. she had a wild look in her eye, and even if i could talk, i doubt she'd listen.
"having fun?"
she backed up, leaving a trail of spit connecting me to her gun. i wanted it back. i turned to look at her comrade, the woman leaning in the corner by the door. she was taller, long blonde hair, wearing the same off-white tank top, olive cargo pants, and combat boots as her friend. rebels.
"fuck off!! why'd you call me in here anyway? this thing doesn't know shit." she smacked me with her gun.
"who said this was an interrogation?"
"wh- how the fuck is it not an interrogation? she's tied to a chair, we're in a concrete room, what else could it be?"
the woman smiled. she was heating her knife with a lighter, turning it in her hands. "you looked so excited! i didn't want to spoil it."
gun lady was turning red. "i-im not a pervert like you are!! i was doing my duty for the rebellion!" she crossed her arms with a hmph.
knife lady smiled. "look down."
she did, and she saw the erection poking up from my tied-together thighs. she was staring for a bit too long.
chuckling from the corner. "not at her, you idiot."
i looked too. her situation wasn't much different from mine. she'd managed to turn redder.
"f-fuck you!! why'd you bring me here?!" she was pouting a bit.
the woman turned to her, letting her smile drop. "you wanted to know about what i do here, right?"
"y-yeah..."
she gestured at me with the knife. it'd just begun to glow a little. "this one's a hound. we picked her up about a month ago. shes in for reconditoning; she's doing quite well, if you can believe it. she's close to picking out a name." she turned to me, with a small smile on her face. it made me smile too.
"what, you're gonna make it normal again?"
the woman's smile faded, and she sighed. "previous rehabilitation techniques failed because they tried to rebuild a construct of what a person once was. that person is gone, gone forever. there's no more 'normal' for it to return to." she turned to look at me again. "we need to meet it where it is. we need to let it grow, redevelop its autonomy." she flicked her lighter closed, and stood up. "observe."
she walked over to me. slowly, deliberately. she reached her hand up behind my hair, stroking my head gently. the tip of knife's spine rose to my throat; i could feel the heat radiating off it. she was smiling again, looking me in the eye. "ready?"
i took a moment to steel myself, before nodding. burning pain shot through my neck, and the warmth radiated through my whole body. i was shaking, twitching, gasping, moaning. everything blended together. i tried to move my head, but she held me firm, forcing me to look her in the eyes. she was grinning wider than ever, biting her lip slightly, muttering pleasant reassurances into my ear. it was good. it hurt. it hurt. i wanted to be good for her. it hurt. it... it hurt. it hurts. i tapped my hand on the chair, and immediately she withdrew the knife and loosened her grip.
"good girl! you did so well!" she cooed, petting me with her free hand. i smiled and panted, barking a bit. she turned to look at her comrade, beaming. "see that? that was a safeword. she wouldn't have done that a month ago."
"what the fuck? you're a gods-damn pervert!"
"so what?" she was still grinning ear to ear. "you think the fucking imps are any better? they could've made her into anything. they made her into this."
"wh-why the freak sex stuff? isn't that bad for them?"
"quite the opposite. they need it." she pet me affectionately. "soon enough, it'll be able to ask for it. right now, it just begs with its eyes." she squatted down next to me, and i rubbed my head into her hand. "its healthier to recontextualize than to repress. like i said, we need to meet them where they are. the imps would have us believe there are only people to lead, and dogs to follow. they're wrong. we're all people."
"oh, yeah. and it's total coincidence that this worldview of yours lets you torture girls for fun."
a cruel glint flashed in her smile. "the world can be a beautiful place sometimes."
She's so sweet and bubbly. Adorable, even. Always so polite and proper, especially to her superiors.
Which is why it's so jarring, bordering on sickening, when you're paired with her for a mission. The pure, bloody carnage on the battlefield is a stark contrast to the precious little thing you know back at base.
She's laughing as she rips yet another enemy mech limb from limb. Giggling like a child playing with her toys. It sends a chill down your spine. You can't even hear the screams anymore. Just laughing.
You always wondered why she's always wearing a muzzle, always leashed to the one everyone calls "Handler." Now you know. And you thank whatever cosmic powers may be every day that the two of you are on the same side.
The prodigal Hunter-Killer mech piloting skills of a mother and her Hound daughter elicit the creation of a new 'bonded-pair' unit in an effort to see if chemically and fiscally encouraged 'abnormal bonding practices' can create similar results. Two sisters are inducted into the program, and combat puts their intimate bond to the test, until they're forced to decide between the special privileges of their unit and their morals.
I've had Hunter/Killer linked as a 'crossover' in my pinned post over here, but I was recently prompted to return to it, so I went back and fixed some things and made improvements, and added another layer of mechsploitation subtext to it that I think makes things more interesting to think about. I also created a chapter break and disclaimer to allow readers to skip over the non-plot-critical smut section.
As such, I wanted to make a proper post promoting it over here! It's very action focused, features a hound conditioned to her mother as the antagonists, and has subtle aspects of psychological and chemical manipulation of familial relationships.
It's one of my proudest works, particularly considering that our primary book influences over the last 10 years has been an action thriller series, and I think it came out really well! I'd love for y'all to check it out if you haven't yet 😁
"It's been months since we lost her. One of our own got spooked, figured it'd be safer to sell us out to the Imps, get some cash, safety, and leave all this behind. They repaid her with that first rail-cannon shot, assuming it's the imps and not some mercs taking their place. Wasn't long before other bodies started dropping too. But... that... dumbass. She stayed behind, to make sure everyone else got out. Said she's the only one who could do that, and get out, to trust her. We searched for weeks afterwards, and found nothing. I kinda hoped they killed her quick at least.
But a few weeks ago, we started getting reports of a mech matching hers, a bit different but still mostly the same, tearing through supply depots, a few outposts, a handful of mechs here and there too.
At first, I shrugged it off. It couldn't be her, imps or one of their pet merc companies probably just used her mech after dealing with her. But then, another report. And another. Eventually? Realised that whoever was piloting her mech was... angry. That's when it clicked. We left her for dead, back then. Everyone knew it, she must have known too. What we're dealing with is her ghost, brought back by those- fuck what's the word... Handlers, right. But what they did to her... that ain't a person anymore, I'm telling you. It's a demon. It wants revenge on us for leaving her behind, for not fighting hard enough to look for her, for barely even trying. We made her just as much as that Handler. Must be nice not having to worry bout whether you're gonna make it out. Tryna focus on the small mercies I guess.
So. I'm gonna go take my old rust bucket and take a few swings at that "hound". Maybe I put whatever's left of her out of her misery, that'd be nice. But if it kills me? I'll deserve it." - The recovered personal log of Captain #####, hours before being 'volunteered' to the revised Hound Program.
"It's been months since we lost her. One of our own got spooked, figured it'd be safer to sell us out to the Imps, get some cash, safety, and leave all this behind. They repaid her with that first rail-cannon shot, assuming it's the imps and not some mercs taking their place. Wasn't long before other bodies started dropping too. But... that... dumbass. She stayed behind, to make sure everyone else got out. Said she's the only one who could do that, and get out, to trust her. We searched for weeks afterwards, and found nothing. I kinda hoped they killed her quick at least.
But a few weeks ago, we started getting reports of a mech matching hers, a bit different but still mostly the same, tearing through supply depots, a few outposts, a handful of mechs here and there too.
At first, I shrugged it off. It couldn't be her, imps or one of their pet merc companies probably just used her mech after dealing with her. But then, another report. And another. Eventually? Realised that whoever was piloting her mech was... angry. That's when it clicked. We left her for dead, back then. Everyone knew it, she must have known too. What we're dealing with is her ghost, brought back by those- fuck what's the word... Handlers, right. But what they did to her... that ain't a person anymore, I'm telling you. It's a demon. It wants revenge on us for leaving her behind, for not fighting hard enough to look for her, for barely even trying. We made her just as much as that Handler. Must be nice not having to worry bout whether you're gonna make it out. Tryna focus on the small mercies I guess.
So. I'm gonna go take my old rust bucket and take a few swings at that "hound". Maybe I put whatever's left of her out of her misery, that'd be nice. But if it kills me? I'll deserve it." - The recovered personal log of Captain #####, hours before being 'volunteered' to the revised Hound Program.
She looked around at the battlefield, at the shattered husks of the ‘enemy’ frames. They weren’t always her enemies though. She remembered eating the awful gruel they served in the cantina with them, sharing jokes about the patrols they-
“Don’t look away puppy. Look at them.”
The radio crackled as the handler gave her new orders. As she looked at the mass of blood and gore tangled within the metal, she remembered its pilot. How one night, they looked up at the stars together. She remembered the dream they told her, and how a bit of her was jealous she didn’t have one of her own. Outside the obvious desire for victory.
“I didn’t even tell you to do this to them. Your orders were to disable the base, not kill everyone in it. Did you really hate them that much?”
She started to cry. She didn’t hate them, she didn’t! She ate with them, slept with them- they were just in the way- she had to finish her mission, or else she’s worthless, if she can’t be useful, can’t pull her weight then she- she-
“Aww… you don’t have to cry puppy, it’s ok. It’ll all be ok. They’re gone now. But I’m still here. I’ll always be here. You did a very good job today, so back to base for your treat, ok?”
Yes- Handler- Handler will always be there- she wiped her tears away. She didn’t want to hurt her former allies, but… but she had to be a good dog. Handler will take the hurt away, like she has before- it’ll be ok- Handler is always there for her, even when she’s a useless dog that can’t follow orders properly…
She just needs to rely on Handler, and everything will be ok.
This one was much harder to reconfigure for the Adoration series, it pretty much required a full rewrite that just touched on some of the same words and ending concept. We may not be able to create parallel entries in both series forever, but for now it's proving to be a very interesting venture!
Thanks to the lovely @marassong for beta feedback 😁
There are no second chances for your Hound. Not anymore.
Massive clamps lock around the sparking chassis of your Hound's bulbous mech, the struts barely able to support its weight at the awkward angle created by its failing double-jointed leg. A lone technician in dirty overalls immediately rushes past you with a high powered plasma torch to burn away the destroyed latches on the exit hatch. A medical officer in a scuffed blue jumpsuit waits behind them, stepping forward the moment the latch is removed, but over the sharp clicking of your boots on the deck you call out "Don't. Don't touch her."
You reach the hatch and brace to crank it open yourself, and your Hound immediately lurches past you and collapses to her knees on the deck, bone crunching against the hard steel, blood spattering out of her mouth, hands smearing red prints onto the grey steel. You circle around to her front, and at the sound of your boots she immediately huffs and growls as she forces one leg up, bracing her hands on it to push her torso up, and her left eye focuses like a laser as soon as she can see you, though the right lags as it attempts to keep up. She grunts again and manages to stand all the way onto weak legs, one arm shakily attempting to reach a salute, failing and hovering halfway beside her face.
"Cynthia." At the word she attempts to complete the salute, bringing her hand down, but something cracks sickeningly in her shoulder and she stumbles, almost falling, but she recovers and grits her teeth through pain as she tucks both arms behind her as far as they can go, pushing her chest out with as much pride as her fracturing body can manage. "Did we-"
Her face goes pale halfway through her sentence and she starts to waver, in danger of collapsing again. "Down." Visible relief pours down her face and she starts to crouch down and neatly tuck her legs under her to sit on her calves, but you can hear cartilage snap and see pain shoot across her face like lightning, and you dart forward to catch her before she collides with the deck. At your contact the air expels itself out of her lungs in one big burst, and for a moment you worry that the damage is so severe that she won't get even these final moments. "Breathe."
Her pupils are dinner plates at this much physical touch and intimacy, but she calms herself and breathes. Her mouth and nose are wet with blood, and through the ocean of admiration in her eyes you can see fear. Her right eye is starting to dilate of its own accord, and you can see her start to sense her brain starting to fail her alongside her body. You sit the two of you down on the deck, making sure to angle her on your thighs to avoid more pain. Warning klaxons kick on in the distance and you can feel her tense up in your arms, but you snap a gloved finger twice beside your head, and her attention locks back on you with the rigidity of an electromagnet. Her gaze does not move as the technicians starts to sprint toward the exit and the medical officer rushes over to you to frantically insist "Ma'am, you should evacuate! Ma'am! Major Fare-"
"Dismissed!"
You look away from your subordinate and back down at your Hound, clumsily pulling off a gloves to place your hand on her cheek, granting her rare skin-on-skin contact. You can see her start to salivate through her cracked lips and lean into the contact, and you softly caress her face. She closes her green eyes for a moment, and you let her have that moment amid sirens and spinning red lights as nearby hangar doors start to slam shut in a cacophony of iron that your Hound in your arms is dutifully ignoring to focus entirely on you.
The blood running out of a jagged cut on her wrist is starting to slow. Her eyes open when you command "Up." It's clearly a massive strain for her, but she raises her body, and you're able to untuck your right leg and prop it up, very quietly pulling the handgun out of your thigh holster. "Down." She lies back against your leg, providing her face a luxurious proximity to your face while simultaneously creating the proper angle to gently place the steel tip an inch from the back of her head. She returns to the question she attempted before her collapse, managing to get it out this time. "Did we succeed? Did the second wave finish the mission after I extracted?" A distant explosion echoes through the base, and from her lack of response to it and the way her eyes are starting to stare right through your head at something a million kilometers away, you can tell that she's slipping.
Nearly gone.
"Yes." A lie, a small mercy after a decade of control and manipulation and force. There was no second wave. You ordered her to return on her own, the datapad displaying her vitals flashing with nearly as much red as the screen beside it showing the crimson tide of Resistance mechs pouring down the mountainside, a mere two hours away from reaching the Consortium command outpost.
"Did I, do well?"
"Yes, you were a very good Hound tonight." After so many commands, so much indoctrination and appearance of perfect control and affected deification, you let a little compassion into your voice, and you can see it instantly draw tears from her eyes. The liquid trailing from her right eye stains her face red. Time to debrief.
Your voice returns to the crisp dictation she's learned to expect. "State your name."
"Cynthia."
"That's right." Her cheeks flush slightly. You continue.
"State your designation."
"My designation is ZX-Six-Six-Alpha." She nearly coughs out the last word.
You nod. "State your purpose."
She's starting to wheeze in between words. "To-go to war-and destroy-the foes of the-Cecilian Consortium."
"That's correct. State your value."
She takes one massive breath and recites her most poignant indoctrination. "My only value is in how many of your enemies I crush and maim under your command."
"No."
Fear blossoms across her face, but before she can panic, you correct her with an words she's never heard before. One that no one under your command or even in the entire Consortium has ever heard from you or any other commanding officer. "Your value is in being a good Hound for your Handler. And you've been a very good Hound for me."
New tears blossom in her eyes, and you can see love and fulfillment wash over her features.
You'll grant her one last grace. "Your last name."
"Hounds have no last name." A recitation of an old tenet, but she holds a mote of curiosity in her failing voice.
"You do. Farenheit."
"Cynthia Farenheit."
Recoil.
Another explosion rocks the hangar, and the massive bulk of Cynthia's mech collapses down out of its berth, crushing a transport vehicle beside it a story below you. You don't flinch.
You don't flinch as rocks start to crash down from the ceiling from the artillery bombardment.
You sit with your most loyal Hound. The one whose wounds overcame her at the battle's most pivotal moment. Whose mech became too damaged to fight even as she tried to force it past its limits. Whose failure cost the Coalition the war.
Who cost you your life.
There are no second chances for a Hound in your command. She failed you. She lost.
She lies limp in your arms. A Hound. An animal. A weapon. A tool. A designation.
A single name granted to her as a slice of personhood.
The barracks were unusually quiet, the air devoid of soft chattering or conversation. Softly thumping boots didn't pad on the floors, officers didn't inspect or mingle.
Beds were empty and pristine, foot lockers shut tight. Uniforms and equipment put up neatly or absent, patrol caps were missing from the bunk posts.
The Hangars didn't let out their mechanical choir, no welding or riveting to fill the night air. The mechanics aren't at their stations, and the stations were without silent sweating or toiling to keep a metal army going.
Mech bays left empty, ominous arches loom hollow of the giants that were once within them. Spare parts scattered about the base of these empty monoliths, parts with nothing to repair.
The Base was a shell of itself, no lights or comms speak to be observed. Flagpoles left in shambles, and a scarce few NPU flags fluttered about. Tattered and maimed from a lack of upkeep and maintenance.
Panic starts to set within, heart hammering inside it's damaged cage. The overwhelming absence screaming in inaudible agony, the voices of the abyss call out in accusation. Demanding, pleading, crying. All whilst the feeling of treason and time, start to begin to fill the vicinity with a toxic miasma. Breathing becomes near impossible, sharp shards of frozen air rip through throat and lung alike.
"Tasha...." A female voice calls out, a familiar tone echoing in from the distance. Though the overbearing wail of comrades is still too much...
"Tasha..." The voice gets nearer, all while the cold seems to burn all the more. Winds howling as snow cuts your eyes, the screeching of metal on metal cuts through the sounds of their voices. Agony crushes a once thundering heart, all while the alien feeling of emptiness begins to grow. Spreading throughout a once feared body, the scent of burnt metal and oil wells within ravaged lungs.
A woman's silhouette can be seen in the distance, the snow blotting out any key features. Turning slowly about, and through the snow.....those eyes....Hazel...pools of pure warmth...
"Tasha Kemynshki, wake up."
With a gasp and growl Tasha shot up, hand immediately reaching for her pistol. Or rather, where it would've been had she still possession of it. Sweat matted her shirt to her skin, leaving little to the imagination as she stole in each desperate breath. Panting heavily as she took in her surroundings.
A simple wardrobe, filled with both Imperial and NPU uniforms and attire. Her cot, lovingly bolted to the floor and wall. Her own basic amenities, and even some assorted luxuries. Then there was Her, standing next to the disheveled Tasha. Her leathers were as glossy as ever, her hair kept neat and short despite being allotted more than just ear length. Her skin still perfect, even under harsh halogen lights. And those eyes, those warm, comforting and cruel eyes. Their gaze bore directly into the broken woman's soul, or rather the chasm where there was one.
"Another nightmare, Miss Kemynshki? If they're this frequent, then you know we'll have to do something about this." She spoke softly, a seemingly kind act hiding the cold truth of Tasha's situation.
"Нет Handler, well ...yes nightmare. But not the kind you think, ran out of inhibitors during one of Major Holdt's assemblies." The mountain of a woman spoke, telling a simple lie that to most would seem believable.
She knew better, She always knows.
"Lie like that again, and I will not be able to protect you anymore." She stated clearly, her serpent eyes deceived with their care and warmth...
"Yes Handler...it was...the same nightmare...Handler.." Tasha relented, already feeling small in the presence of Her. She knew of her sins, of who she once was. And yet here Tasha sat, wallowing in insurmountable amounts of guilt. The voices still poisoning the surly woman's heart, endlessly reminding her of the damnation she chose.
The room began to spin and darken, the guilt of Lying to Her beginning to bleed into her skin. Her head began to feel light, and the room began to fade....
Her hand pressed gently to Tasha's chin, lifting up her gaze to meet Her's. "Tasha, I know it's hard...but don't worry. You've done well, now let me take it from here. We have a long day ahead of us, but until then..."
Tasha's heart sped up, her blood began to freeze in her veins with anticipation. Pressure began to build within her mind and chest, her breath quickening as she looked into Her eyes. She knew what was coming next, and she was oh so eager to hear those four ....little words...
"Tasha, out of the cage." She said softly, those four words striking Tasha like a freshly primed pilebunker.
For a moment she stilled, her breathing halted cold and her eyes glazed over. Her rugged form, reminiscent of a freshly sculpted statue....Until She woke up. Her hollow eyes blazing with frozen animosity, her jaw clenched tight while her fists balled tighter. And her gaze, never broke from Her Hazel eyes.
Tasha was absent once again, all that remained was the wounded bear. Anika's Ursa
Humans were never designed to interface with a psylune engine. The emissions output, even shielded by a thick cockpit wall and absorbent metamaterials, require only a few minutes of exposure to terminally poison any living being in its presence.
Within the sanctioned warzone, such a hazard is considered little more than a speedbump.
. . .
The first thing she ever felt was the stick of a ten gauge needle into the back of her left thigh.
Two hands held her down—one calloused flesh pressed roughly into the top of her leg, one cold plastic wrapped around her ankle. A third wiped away the blood from the injection, smearing it across her still-dripping skin.
The first thing she ever smelled was the chemical rank of room-temperature cryogel still clinging to her body.
A crumpled, clear plastic bag lay in tatters on the floor, the pale green stain of melted solution tinting what should have been perfectly translucent.
The first thing she ever tasted was stale, recycled air.
She didn’t realize she needed to breathe until she felt the pressure rising in her chest. Laying prone on the sterile(?) medical slab put a weight on her chest the clone wasn’t aware she’d have to press back against. Her first inhale brought with it a wet glob of cryogel up her nose.
When the gel slid up her nose, she coughed. It was reflexive in a way that frightened her—new, yet natural, like a sort of physical déjà vu. Her body rocked on the slab, arms twitching for the first time as she lifted herself up to ease the pressure on her chest. There was a voice behind her, loud, authoritative, but the words were lost in the shock of the moment. A hand she couldn’t see grabbed her bicep, another grabbed the side of her neck, a third wrapped under her opposite arm to stabilize her shaky arms.
She heaved. Eyes watered, and suddenly, fluttered open. She wanted to turn around to look at the person holding her, but the plastic hand gripping the bottom of her head held it firmly in place. Through the blinding light of the room against her fresh eyes, the impression of a face loomed close. The articulated plastic fingers roughly gripping her mandible released, replaced by two soft, warm hands that cupped her cheeks and lifted her face upwards. Softened by the heat of her body, she managed to hack the gel out.
The first thing she ever saw was the face of drop captain Lincoln Karabin leaning over her.
It was soft in a way nothing else was. It was inviting in a way she didn't quite know how to process. As the world slowly fell into focus, the white hair and gentle smile of the woman holding her eased her racing mind.
The first thing she ever heard (that meant anything to her) was the voice of that woman.
