Mechs weren’t the first choice for humanity in the war against aliens. Conventional forms of firepower in the form of fleet carriers, tanks and foot troops were enough at the start against their foe.
Driving back their monstrous enemy from their cities with shells and bullets, unrelenting force was the paradigm that proved effective in driving back their foe!
Yet, as leaders of mankind continued their resistance and celebrated the liberation of their planet’s surface, the endless torrent of foes made them realize that the true battle resided in the skies above.
In the stars.
Cobbling together the wrecks of alien vessels, this war breached into the greater galaxy over years, the resident nations of Old Earth unifying all of their resources to establish a foothold in our milky way against this common threat.
Even with their enemy at their forebreast, it didn’t rid humans of their inherent greed or selfishness. Throughout it all, conflicting interests and opinions halted their defense into a stalemate that lasted for decades.
With war ongoing for so long, the top scientists and engineers racked their brains for the solution that would break this deadlock.
It wasn’t until Orion Cedran launched into the atmosphere in the first shuddering hulk of steel and destruction that flipped the table in terms of warfare that the tides turned.
The brutish machine was the perfect compromise. Equipped with enough heavy artillery to level a building, and clad in enough armor to withstand counterfire, it inspired a renaissance across human space with it’s dominating debut!
From that moment ‘mechs’ were the centerpiece of humanity!
Popular media shifted from the top celebrities in movies to gossiping about next uprising star in the mech scene. Radio announcers stopped presiding over football games and focused their work more on competitive mech duels!
In the military scene, the effective ratio between cost and performance, when compared with ordinary artillery and aircraft, couldn't be matched. Being able to control an entire battlefield with a single unit of mechs caused all past notions of armed forces to turn coat.
Indeed the human race at large was both enamored and made copious use of these new war machines.
The popularity of mechs rose to heights that cast shadows on every industry. Toys and games for adolescents sought to chase the power fantasy of having the privilege of interfacing with a mech to raze the ground.
Students in school disenrolled from their clubs and home education in favor of learning about the intricate sciences and confounding principles required to create a mech.
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Indeed, philosophers and thinkers of the time coined this time as ‘The Mecha Renaissance’!
In this time, expeditions and colonies sprung up across space in search of a world less crowded than their original rock. Hundreds of thousands of countries impregnated the distant barren plains and lush vegetation of worlds that could only be reached with their reverse-engineered vessels!
Unfortunately, it wasn’t also a utopia. Petty wars grew and pitted humanity against one another over finite resources and ego, as human nature dictates.
These beasts of war used incredible amounts of metal and resources discovered in this new frontier, enough that ordinary organizations couldn’t fund the creation of a single one, let alone afford the licensed and patented components that made up its chassis. The industry that developed around these machines viciously kept these permissions behind a baffling wall of costs and laws.
Much to the dismay of the younger generation that grew up idolizing mechs, few people could initialize the circuitry of a mech. The interface worked off an arbitrary factor that was present in a gifted few. Any other could only cry in frustration as the multiple-ton beauty of engineering remained inert.
There was no rhyme or reason to it; whether an individual was strong enough to lift 500 pounds or mentally sharp enough to solve the hardest problems had no impact on it.
As such, Governments and the independent powers that be hunted down these gifted individuals for their institutions and wars.
Analysts examined what little empirical evidence of the phenomena existed to scrounge up how many possessed this exceedingly valuable quality. Any person with a working Intranet connection could search up the sobering statistic that 1 percent of humanity had this mysterious ability.
With this in mind, the dynamic of human space practically worshiped these lucky elites when they were found, no matter if they were from the sumps of the poor or peaks of the rich.
Ben Murdock, like his peers, craved the pipedream of entering the cockpit. Whenever he could, he watched videos of his heroes in their majesty. His dreams didn't match well with his surroundings.
He winced as he felt the stinging pain of popped blisters from his hands from gripping the edge of the hood of his tractor for the umpteenth time that day. He was a farm boy. Most, if not all of his family and friends were fellow workers that cultivated crops.
“What’s wrong now, rust bucket?”
Sorting through soldered wires and oxidized casing, Ben frowned as he found the problem, easing the hood closed and settling down against the tire with a sigh.
Peeking through his fingers at the orange sun cresting over the jagged peaks of his home’s mountains, he wondered how he was going to break the news of a blown motor to his father. The fallow soil they were working on was in the vicinity of a road to the industrial district, it wasn’t out of reason for shards of metal to fall into the dirt.
A single jagged piece of steel made itself known in the armature of his family’s tractor, enough so that he couldn’t even open the frame, not that he would with it severing the voltage regulator of the alternator.
Ben tiredly stared at the first sinking dwarf star of the planet he called home, resting his head on crossed arms.
“I wish I could pilot a mech.”
Only the wind answered his words with a cold gust to his face. Taking a moment to compose himself, Ben stood up, and dusted himself off. It was time for the long walk home.