Cavalier's Gambit -ch 2- (Patreon)

Wayne frowned and picked up the weight after realizing that he wouldn’t need to brace himself against the load. His Walker’s skeletal hand closed around the large cement filled pipe and he lifted it easily.

Half of his job required him to understand just how much his Walker could hold, in what position, and what it’s relative distribution would need to be.

He’d often wondered if he’d missed his true calling as a load master for the big space cargo ships that often broke atmosphere with their hauls.

“Good. Go ahead and lift it up to defend yourself,” droned on the proctor. “The servo will strike you three times. Defend yourself as best as you can.”

Err… right.

Right.

Defend myself.

Yeah.

Yeah! I mean… this is what being a Walkie is about.

Defend myself!

Wayne had trained himself on the basics with the available training and tutorial classes he could get ahold of.

More than a few were a waste of time but he’d found a few that’d helped him. A hand full that’d given him the foundation to not looking as if he knew nothing at all.

Or so he hoped.

The large pillar that hung down from the ceiling moved toward him.’

This pillar was actually a wired up drone that provided mock combat for trainees or those that wanted to practice. An arm swung around and expanded outward.

Forming itself into a club of sorts as it brought it back behind itself.

Gritting his teeth and wondering if this was all a mistake, Wayne readied himself.

Then the drone stuck.

It struck so fast that Wayne couldn’t even manage to bring the pipe around. He instead backstepped, his natural inclination to get away overriding everything else.

“One,” intoned the test-giver off to the side.

Charging at him the drone didn’t relent. It wound up its arm once again.

Wayne was trying in almost vain to get the Walker to respond to him. His mind flailing at the controls in a weird way.

In fact it reminded him of the head injury he’d gotten when he was a kid. All four of his limbs didn’t want to respond to his commands and it’d taken him weeks before he felt normal again.

The arm of the drone slammed into the side of Wayne’s walker and knocked him a step to the side.

Though only a single step.

Enough force and speed to test him, but not enough to actually damage or harm him.

“Two,” remarked the proctor.

Panting, not wanting to fail the next attack, Wayne focused entirely on the drone. Watching as it began to move again.

This time it did something strange to him.

Something that made no sense even as he watched.

It folded in on itself. The hinge swinging at an almost impossible angle so that the club-like arm came out behind itself.

A lunge.

The thought was like a lightning bolt crashing down into Wayne’s awareness.

His mind posited the direction of the blow, angle, and speed in the same instant that he determined what it was.

Not waiting to see if he was right, because if he was he was already out of time, he instead slipped his weapon in front of himself and brought it around the front of his body.

The arm and the pole intersected perfectly.

Clanging to one side, the drone was knocked clear.

Out of habit and training the move repeatedly, Wayne awkwardly counter-attacked without realizing it. His weapon coming up from below and clanging off the bottom of the drone with an odd sounding ping.

Doing nothing at all.

“Three,” said the proctor, unphased and unbothered. “Very good. Your results have been logged. Please proceed to the next stage of the test. Thank you.”

Letting out a ragged breath Wayne chuckled.

“That way. Please. Thank you,” repeated the woman who clearly was quite well and truly done with him.

Wayne nodded his head and left the chamber. Moving in the indicated direction he glanced down to the tablet he’d taped into place in the interior of his Walker.

Given the requirements of the test, only a tablet was allowed to be hooked into his Walker right now, though it was being done by a peripheral port with an adapter.

All the normal data ports were being utilized by wireless data transfer devices.

As he exited the chamber and entered the next, he saw that there was another proctor standing next to an odd metallic cabinet, and one other Walker here.

It was a woman in her late thirties. She was dressed in a tank-top and loose pants that looked like they belonged to some type of uniform.

Wayne didn’t pay much attention to her as he didn’t think she wanted any right now.

Or so he guessed, given the way she turned her head away partially as he walked up. As if she didn’t even want to make eye contact.

“Hello. Participant Wayne Hesh?” asked the proctor. It was a man in his early fifties Wayne would guess.

There wasn’t anyone on this backwards world that’d had de-aging treatments so he felt fairly sure about his guess on age.

“Yeah,” Wayne confirmed moving up to the proctor.

“Great. This is probably your easiest test today,” the man said. He gestured at the cabinet. “Just go ahead and get out of the walker but leave it operational please. Go ahead and step into the module and take a moment for yourself.

“It’s literally a dark box that does nothing but measure you. Body mass, weight, blood pressure, all that stuff.

“If it’s a medical measurement, it’ll get it.”

“Uh huh, I don’t quite believe that but alright,” Wayne murmured and started to clamber out of his Walker.

“No really! It’ll get it,” professed the man.

“Great, let me know how that sperm count comes out,” Wayne quipped and then hit the ground with a pop.

The woman who was in the walker that’d been staring at a tablet burst out in laughter at that and glanced at him. Her face had several fine thin scars across it and a large one at the base of her neck.

She had short black hair and pale brown eyes.

“I… yes,” the man murmured, then chuckled. “Get in, damn it.”

Wayne grinned, shrugged, then motioned at the cabinet.

“No door handle. Did you want me to ask it nicely? Maybe out to dinner since it’s gonna count up my swimmers? Or does it like a good smack,” Wayne continued.

Now the woman was laughing outright and loudly, leaning back in her Walker. Causing the whole thing to shift with her.

Groaning, the proctor a square on the front of the cabinet that was apparently how to open it. Wayne had just thought it was some sort of decorative piece or a pop-off-cap for an access key.

There was a seat in the cabinet.

The woman in the Walker was walking away now, laughing all the while.

Wayne felt rather gratified for making her laugh.

She was older than he’d be interested in, but making a woman laugh was always a good thing to Wayne.

Clambering in he sat down and looked out.

Only for the door to click shut and plunged Wayne into darkness.

“Alright Mr. Hesh. Just lean back. That’s all you need to do,” advised the proctor. “Oh, how’d you do on the previous exam by the way?”

“Uh,” Wayne started with stunning intellect.

“Ah, get you all three times, huh? I wouldn’t worry about it,” the man attempted to soothingly say. “The goal isn’t really to dodge them. It’s just to show your walker isn’t garbage and will fall apart with three strikes.

“I mean, think about the test. It wasn’t much, was it.”

Now that the man had said it, Wayne considered it. He let his mine go over the test from start to finish and back to the start again.

It didn’t actually make much sense now that he was really thinking about it.

The results of it wouldn’t have done much of anything other than show he was a brand new Walker pilot. One without much experience if any and that was the expected starting point.

“Yeah, even this test. It’s a medical device that takes all your stats, right?” asked the proctor. “That’s exactly what it is, too. It just measures everything.

“This isn’t so much a test as it is to make sure you’re fit enough to pilot a working Walker, get a license for it, and get placed on millions of watch lists.

“Congrats?”

Wayne winced at the words.

All of that made sense, too.

The fact that he had gotten the Walker into the testing area, through all the stupid areas they’d sent him through, and here, in one piece, was already a test in and of itself. If you didn’t know how to pilot, you wouldn’t have made it.

“It’s just a shakedown to make sure I’m legit,” Wayne lamely surmised.

“Exactly. All done,” the man said and the door opened. “And here are your results. By and large you’re at average, just slightly above, or slightly below.

“Even in having some above and some below, you’re average.”

Peering out of the cabinet Wayne looked the man standing there.

Only now did Wayne realize the man was casually dressed and had a tablet that doubled as a printer in his hand. His other hand held out a piece of paper that’d likely just been spat out.

Grunting, Wayne got to his feet and took the paper.

There was a great many things here and none of it made any sense to him. They were all listed in medical terms and really didn’t matter to him other than to know they were “expected within norms”, above by a smidge, or below by a smidge.

Just as he’d been told.

Except for one black bar at the bottom of the sheet. It covered the entirety of the page.

“Whats this?” Wayne asked and flipped the paper around to show it to the man.

“That? Oh. Chip-communication,” the man said with a grunt. “The short version is your brain doesn’t process signals like a normal person does.

“It isn’t smooth or as clearly signaled as a normal person would. It won’t matter much to you, but you’ll likely end up hating any AI you ever get partnered with. I wouldn’t be looking forward to that if I was you.”

Snorting, Wayne wanted to laugh at that.

The idea of him having an AI partner was laughable.

That’d require him joining the military he’d imagine and they didn’t want him.

“Nah… not me. I’m just looking to make some money and maybe live a bit easier than what I’ve been doing,” explained Wayne with a small nod of his head.

“Well, your rig’s got a number of errors it’s throwing. Most of it just looks like damaged sensors. Nothing that’ll keep you from getting work but,” the man paused and then shrugged his shoulders. “Might help getting those cleared since they’ll show up in your database entry.”

“First thing I’ll do when I get some chits,” Wayne promised. He didn’t disagree with the man.

Frowning, the man reached into his back pocket and pulled out a wallet. An actual leather wallet, it looked like.

He flipped through a series of cards inside the fold and then paused. Pulling it out he inspected it, grinned, then held it out to Wayne.

“Here, take it. It’s a free service and work-up,” the man explained. “This’ll take care of almost every error you were throwing. I get them for free every now and then to hand out to drum up business. Won’t cost you a dime.”

Wayne took the card and looked to the man.

Then he smiled.

“Thanks, by the way, what’s your name, friend?” Wayne asked.

***

Chester had been right.

The card he’d given to Wayne had done exactly what he said it would.

They got him in, did a work-up, knocked out a standard service, and put to rights a great many things that Wayne never would have had the time, or inclination, to get around to fixing. The only error that’d been left-over had been something about his manual controls not operating within parameters but that didn’t matter to him.

The problem was that he hadn’t been able to get any contracts since becoming a pilot. Every single job he’d applied for, that he knew he could handle, had been picked up by someone else or just remained dormant.

He couldn’t explain it, either.

Doubly so when he preemptively accepted the rates on posted jobs just to make sure he could get them. That if everyone else wanted to argue rates, he was already on board with them.

Even those contracts were taken by others or just never filled.

It made no sense to him at all.

When he’d spent some time to do a search or two, he’d found that this wasn’t new, or unique to him. Being new, and untested, the chances of him getting a job were slim to none until someone desperate enough took his contract.

Which would happen apparently. Everyone who’d complained on the few forums he’d found all reported that they got their “first job” and every job after that came faster and faster.

Groaning, Wayne leaned back in his Walker. Then threw his legs up over one side of the cockpit.

He’d been scrounging around in some of the dumps that didn’t cost to enter or pull things out of. Most of the good things had long since been picked over.

To him though, what he needed was likely to be here since few people would want what he was after.

Armor plates that he could attach and stack up to his walker. They weren’t going to do anything against actual gun fire but for beasts and bumps and scrapes it’d be perfect.

He was comfortably situated in the cockpit now and had only just finished putting on a plate on the upper canopy.

“Well… whatever,” Wayne grumbled and sighed. Then he folded his arms, shuffled around in his cockpit, and looked to the sky above him.

A distant cloud was scuttling by.

“You’ve received a contract acceptance email,” announced his diagnostic tablet.

“I did?” Wayne asked in surprise. Not quite believing that.

“Affirmative,” replied the voice.

“Which-which one is it?” he asked.

“General extermination. Four pilots have been chosen. Flat payment regardless of encounter. You accepted the terms already,” relayed the tablet.

“Well. Fantastic,” Wayne murmured with a wide smile. “My first… job. First gig. If it goes well… if it goes well and I get a good accreditation for it, I can turn it into another job.

“Okay, great. Is this the one that’s on my day off? Please tell me it is. I’d love to not have to move anything around for this.”

“It is,” confirmed the tablet.

“Oh even better. Even-better. Fantastic. Fan-fucking-tastic,” Wayne whooped and nearly unseated himself right out of his Walker.

“Fantastic,” he repeated, this time much more subdued. “Anything on the to-do list that I don’t know about?”

“You made the list,” answered the tablet unhelpfully.

“Guess that’s a no. Well. Let’s do some weight testing to make sure the plates are loaded right. Don’t want to end up tipping over later,” Wayne got out in a giddy tone.

The fact that he had his first gig was making him light headed.

That or he’d forgot to turn off the gas for the welding job he’d done.

Glancing down, he realized it was the latter.

The gas was still on.

“Shit.”

Getting out of the cockpit he turned off the gas then looked to his Walker.

It looked horrible.

Mismatched parts of armor, a lack of canopy glass, and a number of parts and pieces that were different colors. It was obvious that the whole thing was thrown together.

“Hey, I got your name finally,” Wayne laughed and nodded his head. He reached up and slapped a hand to the bottom armor plating of his Walker.

The whole thing looked like a strange fatman with a bulging gut and scrawny limbs.

“Patchwork. Because even when I finally get the money to get the right parts, it’ll still be whatever I can make work. Because you’re like… five different frames cobbled together,” murmured Wayne. “But hey… you look good on the inside.

“Your skeleton is pretty tough and the frame is perfectly made to take anything from Yatuni. Yatuni or or Laywend.

“I bet… I bet I could even get Prometheus Arms parts to fit. Just need adapters for all the joint-points.

“Though fuck am I absolutely screwed on anything from Mag-Lev. Haha… no. Space just won’t be an option but that’s not our goal. We just want to stay planetside and do shit that’ll make life easy. Easier.”

Blinking several times, Wayne couldn’t help but think about the contract.

This was exactly what he’d been waiting for this entire time.

“Err… are they providing ammo?” he asked, realizing there was one problem with his thoughts. There had been one contract that didn’t plan on providing armory support at all.

“No,” answered the tablet.

Sighing, Wayne realized that he was going to need to pull a few emergency shifts suddenly. Across multiple loading companies.

“Good thing there’s always someone hiring for loading work. Especially people with Land-Walker permits,” he lamented. His back was going to be fucked for a while after this. He’d need to end up spending some money to get himself fixed up.

Again.

“Fuck,” he groaned, remembering the last time he’d paid the butchers at the clinic to fix him up. It’d almost been as painful as living with it to have it fixed. “Man… she was hot as hell but… but… that really fucking hurt.

“And I didn’t even get her number, damnit. I don’t want to go back. Maybe if I just… be… careful about it?”