Trabajar con Datos Remotos vía Ajax

Violet knows that everyone else has primarily short to medium range Mecha. Realizing that they’re probably going to be torn apart by anything that overwhelms them from a distance, Violet decides her giant robot will be a beam specialist with an emphasis on long distance combat.

Michiko will tentatively name Michiko’s Gear the Queen Minerva, alluding to her character’s wisdom and refined talent for battle. For Attributes, she’s thinking (from highest to lowest) 6 Energy, 5 Threshold, 4 Guard, 4 Systems, 2 Might and 1 Speed. She will be slow, but as long as she hangs around the back things should work out, but she thinks she’ll bump up Might and Speed as soon as she gets the chance.

She has 30 MP to spend on Upgrades or Weapons and, thanks to her Power Level of 1, another 30 to use however she sees fit. Violet is going to use Beams, and because they are pretty expensive she settles down on just having two of them plus an Experimental Reactor. Queen Minerva will have a Powered Rifle for use as a general Weapon and Radiant Fist as a finisher.

This leaves her with 30 MP left to use freely in either more Upgrades and Weapons or pure Attributes. Violet grabs an Absolute Barrier to use during the Turns that Michiko will spend Aiming and not using the rest of her Energy. She then de-cides to raise her Attributes with her remaining MP. First of all she wants that Might to go up, all the way to 6 for a whoop-ing 18 MP. She spends 2 points to brwhoop-ing Speed up by 1 more point. Minerva is still slow, but her reach and firepower are tremendous to compensate.

Now she has to install these Upgrades and Weapons: Experimental Reactor is Internal, so it must go in the Core. Every-thing else is External, so she has to decide what to do with it. After giving it some thought, Violet figures that the Powered Rifle can represent Eye Beams and thus goes in the Head. Radiant Fist will of course go where it belongs in the arms.

Her specialty made Absolute Barrier will centralize its power in the Torso, because that is where it makes most sense. This leaves her only Area without any Upgrades or Weapons as the Legs. Violet makes a note to install a duo of Over-Booster and Anti-Gravity Upgrades there later to fix her Speed issues and fly around with rocket boots.

Ingham looks over to check if everything is going alright, and notices that Violet is in no danger of crippling herself with an unfun, useless Unit. She has two powerful Weapons and plenty of Energy to both use them effectively and defend herself with afterwards. Because of My Pain is your Pain she knows that anyone who goes all out on her can expect some harsh consequences out of it.

Lastly there’s the cosmetic and story details. Her giant robot resembles an armored humanoid, with a human face akin to a Roman-styled statue of a woman. Queen Minerva runs a new type of Gygravagnite reactor that she has agreed to field test for the R&D Team at her Father’s Institute. She intends to prove the power of Queen Minerva, and grant her R&D Team the funds necessary to mass produce the Gear that will destroy the Outsiders.

Ingham okays Violet’s Mecha and begins to plot about throwing some sniper-themed Enemies into the mix during the next battle. That way Michiko has a chance to shine with a dramatic first entrance and save the day.

The dust had barely settled by the time that Wong stepped out of the VTOL. He took a moment to resist the urge to brush the remaining sticky flecks off of his suit. Smearing them would only make things worse.

Under different circumstances, the abandoned airbase before him may have been almost pleasant. Those circumstances were called ‘trees’. Without them, the erosion of the soil had turned the whole facility into a dustbowl, and lent it a uniquely solemn air of depression and disuse. In a way, it was almost genius.

Wong instructed his pilot to listen for any suspicious radio chatter during his meeting, and his personal guards to follow him out. Mr. Beats lacked the conventional form of respect to come and meet an expected visitor upon arrival, especially one who was as well-known as a Wong. Even with all of the changes in recent years, basic human needs and urges never change. There was a demand for opium before the invention of electricity, and there would continue to be one long after Gears have been replaced by the next advance in weapons technology. As ever, the more enjoyable substances were rigorously controlled by those in au-thority. Fascists. But the demand was there. And Wong met that demand, for a price.

Meeting that demand was not always easy. Trafficking his product between zones and across oceans required hardware that attracted attention. Occasionally, those with more testosterone than wits thought that they could muscle Wong out of his market. For these things and more, Wong found it necessary to use force. And when using force, it paid to use it in an overwhelming amount.

That is where Benjamin Beats entered the life story of Jianguo Wong. Walking deeper into the base, Wong and his guards caught sight of a middle aged man walking toward them, out of one of the nearby buildings.

Balding and sweating in the heat, the mechanic’s jumpsuit he wore was halfway unzipped, the sleeves of them tied around his waist rather than letting them dangle.

The worn grey suit may have been white once. Wong noted his displeasure at the lack of decorum, but de-corum was not Beats’s specialty. Wong could make such allowances for an old partner. “Afternoon Wong.”

Jovial as always, Beats. “I thought we worked out the details on the phone?”

Wong made a show of looking around. “Of the job, yes. But I wish to see your… materials firsthand.” Beats smiled a toothy grin. “What, you don’t trust me? Me, your only friend in this cruel and terrible world?” No reaction. Wong was too professional for that during anything official. “I do not trust fortune, Benjamin.”

Benjamin Beats let out a laugh that made him sound twice as big as he was, and waved for Wong and his men to follow. Beats understood the score as well as anyone else.

Benjamin Beats and the small but loyal team of men who worked for him held a position unique to them on Earth. Building and maintaining a Gear took considerable money, and even more infrastructure. Without those, fielding a Gear was virtually impossible. But in the age of Gears, who wanted anything else?

Benjamin Beats had Gears, after a fashion. They were dirty, ugly things built from the shattered corpses of Gears that had been destroyed and left to rust on the battlefield. Filled with electronics from planes 15 years out of date, and armed with weapons salvaged from virtually anything. No upstanding organization would allow them to pass even a routine maintenance inspection. Then again, no upstanding organization would take the sort of jobs that Beats’s boys would. Wong appreciated the service they provided, and the favors that Beats had done for him in the beginning. Favors he had long since repaid.

But the peculiar nature of Beats’s operation meant that how many Gears he had, and what those Gears were equipped to handle, varied wildly after any and every job they performed. Limbs lost, parts salvaged, am-munition used up and weapons destroyed all added up to a constant flux. It was an uncertainty in perfor-mance ability that Wong had never brought himself to fully trust.

Beats came to a stop in front of what was originally designed to be an airplane hanger. With the thick dust and some tastefully cosmetic lack of repairs, you would never know it was currently in use for a much more advanced form of weapon. Benjamin whistled. The door to the hanger slid open, revealing the shockingly clean workshop inside. In the sterile white light beneath them, two vaguely humanoid junkheaps stood tall.

“Only two?” Wong asked. “It’s not been the best year for us.” Beats admitted with a shrug. “But I am ex-pecting some extra capital pretty soon. We can put together another one then. Anyway, two is plenty for this job.”

Wong had his doubts, but Beats didn’t make promises he could not keep. “And their condition?” “Better than they look.” Beats said. “The one on the left is a Bravery, mostly. More like about 7 Braveries, held to-gether with parts we got out of a Dominion.” Wong quickly checked what he knew about military hardware.

“I thought the Dominion was a tank, not a gear?”

“Like I said, not the best year. That other one, though, is a thing of beauty. Somebody took on more than they could handle and ended up on the wrong side of town with one of the Federation’s new test models.

These come from one of those fancy ones the Guerillas use, a Dvorak. God knows how they got it, but turns out it was a steal. Sucker is built to swap out anything for anything else, let me tell you. In fact...” Beats cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled out to someone in the hanger. “Penny! Bring out Big Red.” It took surprisingly little time for the former-Dvorak to lumber out into the daylight. It was, in fact, very red.

“See that on the back?” Beats asked Wong, pointing. “Missile Launcher we ripped off a UEF Gunboat. Built to be anti-air, but simple enough to repurpose.” Wong nodded. “Very impress-”

He was cut off mid-sentence by a sound like the air being set ablaze as a pillar of flame launched from the back of Big Red into the air, before diving toward the ground. The dust at Wong’s feet leapt into the air halfheartedly from the force of the explosion. “And that,” Beats continued “was your ride out of here.”

Big Red turned toward Wong and raised an arm. Wong fought to maintain his composure as he looked down the barrel of a gun that he could probably crawl into if he tried. This didn’t make any sense. It had to be a joke. It had to be a mistake. His guards had already drawn their guns, but even they knew it was a wasted effort. There was nothing they could do to stop even this poor excuse for a Gear, and shooting Benjamin would only guarantee their own deaths.

Wong swallowed, and turned to his only friend in this cruel and terrible world. His eyes asked the question before his words had a chance. At least Benjamin looked torn up about it. “I don’t have anything against you, Wong. I think you are a heck of a guy. You and me, we did alright by each other. The problem is, we did that a little too often. Word got out that I am your man. And, well… you have a lot of enemies, Wong.”

Wong went to speak, and realized his mouth was dry. He wanted to blame the dust, but in truth he had not been this terrified since he was a child. The world was falling away beneath his feet. He swallowed again.

“I can pay you double what they-” “It isn’t about the money. They know my address. We have history, but they made it a pretty clear choice between you or me. And that is no choice at all.”

A dull roar filled the air. VTOLs. More than one, coming in from the south. “If it makes you feel any better, I plan on naming the new Gear after you…”

CHAPTER 4