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7.4 - Casnel Part 1
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THUD!
"Hoki, Hoki!"
THUD!
Hoki awoke with an arrested start, struggling to raise an arm out of her sleeping bag, up to wipe her tired eyes. She slowly moved her hand over to the wall mounted monitor next to her and pressed the receiver on;
"I-I'm up, what's wrong?"
"What's wrong?! They're here that's what, the Casnel! Five bloody days of waiting, I'll kill old man Nilas for all this waiting! Now wake yere'self up, Plan A is a-go!"
Scarlet said back in a voice of alarmingly gleeful excitement.
After that Hoki was quick to shake the sleep from herself - They had practised the drill of what was to be done if the enemy arrived while asleep and now she put that into action. Quickly changing back into her uniform and grabbing her handheld, Hoki headed for the door with only a minor, wistful look towards the toilet she knew she would not see again for some time.
Making her way through the rounded tunnel that connected the Vijaiks to the field camp, she landed into her pilot's chair - Carefully sealing the airlock of the cabin behind her.
"I'm in Scarlet, sitrep?"
Before Hoki had even said it she could hear the faint whir of the connecting tunnel being disconnected, Scarlet having obviously activated the removal process on her end. The tunnels were soon retracted and the camp's small set of thrusters activated, propelling it off back towards where the fleet lie in waiting - Leaving only the thin and easily snap-able comms-cable behind.
It had been another day since Hoki and Scarlet had opened up to one another and said day had been as uneventful as all the others, though with more easy-going conversations between herself and Scarlet. As promised they had gone over the plan, Scarlet soon droping her aloof attitude to give all sorts of advice - At times they had neared bickering but overall Hoki was confident on the arrangement they'd decided on.
"Computer says T-Minus 2 minutes until the Casnel is in estimated firing range Ma'am. Visuals should be coming over to you as we speak".
Scarlet's formal report took Hoki slightly aback but she had little time to think on it. Her mech had been left in stand-by and as she now flicked everything back on she watched each screen spring to life and smelled the faint scent of hydraulics and machine oil beginning to move about - All to the sound of crunching and whirring through-out her mech.
While much of what her and Scarlet had discussed had in reality been strengths and weaknesses they had already known about each other - One thing of note worthiness had been Scarlet's high level of tech-savviness. Despite her continued disdain for using simulators to train, the woman actually had quite the grasp for noughts and ones.
As planned rather then immediately charging towards the enemy, Scarlet's mech waited silently beside Hoki's, while she herself worked with the on-board AI to calculate the enemies trajectory and where the submarine should be hiding. Indeed, all evidence thus far indicated their invisible foe never strayed far from its prototype Casnel accomplice.
110
Hoki glanced at the main monitor, now springing to life with the data from Scarlet. What appeared was like a landscape painting of black nothingness - But for the green crescent-moon shape of the Clover to the right side - And of course it. At their current distance the Casnel was little more than an ill-defined blur but Hoki could still make it out for the most-part.
Like the Neo-Vijaiks, it had two arms and two legs - Accompanied by a two eyed, sloping head piece. Unlike the Vijaiks, it was painted in an array of blacks and greys along with some silver highlights as though to blend in with space - Something it almost achieved but for the green glow behind it. For all the sleek, slim black machine seemed to cut through the night like a knife, behind it large thrusters threw out a bright green colour that left behind it a faint wavy line - Almost like the contrails of regular planes in atmosphere, might leave behind them.
Said green drew a narrow line that almost divided Hoki's screen in half, with the Casnel at its front creating an almost arrow like effect, pointing towards the unsuspecting - Semi-defenceless Clover.
The Casnel's Approach [https://i.imgur.com/SSiF0hK.jpg]
100
Hoki didn't have to try hard to imagine what it must look like in Scarlet's cabin right now, no doubt her hands, much like Hoki's own, were a blur moving from keyboard to keyboard - All carefully laid out in front of her in a semi-circle pattern, with the machine's actual control handles pushed almost out of reach to make more space for the work that needed to be done.
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As Hoki had been taught it, there was three principles to using a 'Vijaik long-range rifle'. These three were what made them so very rare, to the point of Hoki being the only operator among the 15 pilots of the Tristian Flotilla.
First was the separation. Imagine the feeling of holding something, not necessarily a weapon but simply a hot-poker or a walking stick. Now think of how much control you lose when wearing a pair of heavy gloves or marigolds.
Imagine trying for example, to precisely move something with a garbage-picker - Its snappy two pronged head awkwardly clamping open and shut, fumbling around the handle of the walking stick - Imagine that much and you might start to get some idea of the First Principal.
Although the AI of the machine could handle some things, ultimately one had to trust in the machine's accuracy and their own calculations to move the mecha's two massive hands, hands larger than people, over the delicate surfaces of the sniper-rifle.
Then there was the visuals.
Unlike a real rifle, with a Vijaik you don't look through the scope but rather through a viewfinder, or literally the head of the Vijaik - Which in turn automatically adjusts for the difference of metres between where it and the rifle beneath it line up.
Almost like putting a periscope in front of a pair of binoculars - This disorientating process of looking at a screen that's been artificially un-focused was the second hurdle of the job.
80
Thirdly was the numbers. To be a sniper required one to both have the intuition, gusto and the natural talent of a frontline soldier, but also the mathematical prowess to computate streams upon reams of figures. The distance between her and the enemies wasn't just a 1000-metres like might be the case for a regular rifleman, but rather more like 10,000m.
Of-course being in space helped, with no atmospheric pressures or weather conditions to consider - But that could hardly account for the energy element. Where a conventional bullet could theoretically fly forever in space, an energy bolt would gradually dissipate, becoming less effective over range. Ordinarily this meant nothing for the distance this would take being far too great to be of concern to regular pilots - But for snipers every little detail had to be neatly considered.
60
Hoki pressed down the final equation, a faint message box appearing on one of the many screens to confirm it was done. She heard a stirring from Scarlet across the comms, as she too received the message.
56 - 14
There was another principal that Hoki knew past the first three, one no one ever said outright - For it was almost a contradiction to all the cold logic required for the rest of the sniping process. At the centre of all her keyboards lay the 'Auxiliary Control Stick'.
It was surreal to think her and Scarlet had, until just yesterday repurposed the gear-lever like objects for the use of playing cards on the big monitor. On it was a small red trigger.
The fourth step was obviously firing. All the numbers now in, the weapon positioned to a millimetre accuracy and a second timer starting its descent.
Hoki had never met a single marksmen who trusted it enough, the automatic fire function that is.
Too many things could go wrong, too many sequencing errors or AI glitches in the system.
No almost every sniper would pull the trigger themselves.
52 - 10
A faint crosshair outline was now overlaid on her monitor, a few paces away from it the Casnel still streaking its way forward - In the bottom right corner of the screen - The countdown clock.
48, 47, 46 - '46 seconds until it is in range of the Clover, in range of a space-station filled with 100s, maybe thousands of mostly defenceless civilians.' - 45 - 3.
44 - 2
43 - 1
BANG
The thin-line of brilliant blue ejected out of Hoki's rifle in a blinding flash of colour. In a second it began its short journey through the night sky, crossing kilometres in mere moments.
'Huh, look at that. I think that's my best shot ever. Beating a Casnel for my first ever proper space-battle, whatever will father think' - Hoki allowed herself a small grin, more of relief than pride.
Her aim had been perfect and even if the Casnel saw it coming, there would be no dodging at the speed it was moving - 40.
At worst the incredibly powerful shot would go straight through one of the machine's limbs, hampering its combat potential and killing its momentum. At best, as this shot indeed seemed to be - It would hit the mid-riff of the machine and either destroy the cockpit or cause a chain reaction to blow up the enemy's power-cells - 'Totally Victory just like that. All that waiting for just a single, clean shot.'
38.5
38
37.9
"Mother of--" Scarlet muttered aloud, taking the words from Hoki's own agape mouth. The shot had been perfect as estimated, and yet the Casnel didn't even have a scratch.
Hoki lurched forward, forcing all her viewing equipment to a maximum zoom. The Casnel was completely undamaged, even so far away from it she could tell that much. What had changed was the clock - It had stopped at '38'.
It dawned on Hoki that the Casnel had been pushed back at a ninety-degree angle to its original trajectory, all from the force of the blast.
Additionally a square-green shimmer now held around the machine, like some form of shield that had absorbed the blast on the Casnel's behalf, only causing it to be pushed back. With-out a mark to even prove it.
Hoki fell back into her chair - 'Blocked? Blocked! For Sun's sake you can't just block something like that with a shield, it's impossible!'
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