The Mech Touch

　　After Ves planted a kiss on his daughter's head, he allowed her to crawl around and explore the personal workshop after making sure that the security settings prevented her from approaching anything dangerous.

　　"Wuuhaaa! Bubuaabaaa!"

　　His energetic and adventurous daughter immediately took advantage of her freedom to crawl at every curiosity in the vicinity.

　　Given her proclivity for moving about on her own, Gloriana had fashioned a pink onesie for the baby that perfectly covered her extremities and made it more bearable to crawl on solid metal deck surfaces.

　　"Miaow~"

　　Clixie escorted the Aurelia as usual while also providing additional entertainment for the little girl.

　　Ves and Gloriana both smiled at the cute sight for a moment before turning their attention back to the finished mech.

　　Previously, Ves had been the one to admire Gloriana's handiwork. Now, it was her turn to critique her husband's efforts.

　　"Well, our stylistic choices differ as widely as ever, though I'm glad to see you've inherited a greater portion of my nuances."

　　He shrugged. "I am happy with my own style, but that does not mean I am unwilling to learn from other people's best practices. As long as it is good and does not conflict with my style, I am more than happy to absorb it. I think my mech is certainly better for it without compromising the essence of my style."

　　The Deceptor Project had to be a good representation of his own design style. He needed to show that he had improved without losing his original self in the process. This was much harder than it sounded but he figured he had struck a good balance.

　　Gloriana continued to study the new mech from top to bottom. "I think your new work is still rough around the edges, but I admit that your quality standards have gone up. Your Deceptor Project will perform reliably in all but the most intense situations. What weaknesses it possesses is mostly derived from its weight class rather than your execution. It is still a bit light and fragile though. Are you truly confident it will survive on the battlefield?"

　　Ves confidently nodded. "The Deceptor Project possesses excellent agility and evasion characteristics, so it should allow mech pilots to dodge and minimize most incoming fire. While it is true that it won't last long if a single mech gets focused upon by hundreds of enemy rifleman mechs, casualties will occur regardless of what happens when our forces are arrayed against so many enemies. In most circumstances I believe it can get close enough without getting cut to pieces."

　　"That is assuming that it doesn't get assailed by enemy light skirmishers. It is still as defenseless against melee mechs than ever and its relatively lackluster acceleration won't help."

　　"That is why I hope the Flagrant Vandals will never deploy it alone. It is really made to team up with the Ferocious Piranha at all times."

　　They already had this discussion before. Ves knew what he was getting into when he configured the Deceptor Project in this fashion. The benefits of developing greater synergies with the Ferocious Piranha was worth the tradeoffs. Gloriana knew that as well so she did not address it any further.

　　She instead turned her critical gaze towards the main armament of the Deceptor Project.

　　"I see you have also decided to stick with the submachine gun."

　　"Yes, but it's not a standard one. This is a luminar crystal weapon of my own design. Not only does it pack a greater punch than regular energy-based submachine guns, I've also made sure it can charge its shots for greater penetration."

　　His wife looked skeptical at the light and slim weapon model. "The gun is too small. How can you properly implement a high-powered firing mode in such a slim frame?"

　　"It's not a proper hand cannon." Ves admitted. "I just added it in as a backup option should the Deceptor Project fail to inflict effective damage against its opponents. The penetration power is higher but the process is much more inefficient. The mech can't keep it up for long. Either the gun will overheat, endure too much stress or drain the light mech's energy reserves at a rapid rate. When you have to employ the Deceptor Project against an enormous defensive fortification, then something has already gone wrong on our side."

　　The gun worked best when it was put in its normal firing mode. The gun was able to fire out energy beams at a high rate for a long duration. This made it ideal for applying constant pressure and harassment. It also allowed the mech to chew through lightly-armored targets at great efficiency.

　　Gloriana called up Ves' design schematics in order to study the submachine gun design and the accompanying supporting systems in greater detail.

　　"The damage tolerance of these systems isn't particularly high." She remarked. "I can see you put effort into making the mech more robust, and while it is able to endure internal stresses to a decent level, it is less able to defend against external stresses."

　　In other words, as long as the enemy managed to hit the Deceptor Project, the mech was more prone to losing functionality than even the Ferocious Piranha!

　　"This is yet another tradeoff I've made. In order to align it with its main theme, I had to use up valuable capacity for passive and active ECM systems. This comes at the expense of solid armor and other defensive features. I think it's worth it, though. The mech employs multiple different ways to confound and frustrate any enemies attempting to target this mech."

　　The entire reason why the Deceptor Project was called this way was because it was supposed to excel at misdirecting enemy mechs!

　　Reducing its chances of getting hit by distracting their opponents was its best form of defense!

　　Though Gloriana understood her husband's intentions, she still reserved her judgment. "We'll see how effective the Deceptor Project can avoid enemy fire in the upcoming testing session. The prototype testing sessions haven't yielded any dramatic results."

　　"That's because Kalo didn't exist yet for the majority of tests. Even then, he is still a newborn design spirit. In a few years he'll get up to speed. Even then, the Deceptor Project in its current form should already be a valuable addition to our lineup."

　　They would both find out soon enough anyway.

　　After Gloriana made a few more observations about the mech that Ves had fabricated, they both came closer to the machine in order to observe its craftsmanship up close.

　　She placed her hand on the surface of the oddly-coated mech.

　　"The pattern and color scheme is quite… special."

　　Ves shrugged. "The black-and-white checkerboard pattern will help with making it less distinguishable to the enemy, at least when relying on pure optical sensors."

　　"Enemy mechs don't rely solely on optical sensors to spot and track enemy mechs."

　　"I know. It's only a supplementary measure rather than a main feature. What it truly relies upon is the exterior that is made out of sensor-dampening materials and the various ECM systems integrated across its frame. As long as the Deceptor Project isn't operating at a high intensity, its heat emissions won't be high enough to compromise its ECM effectiveness."

　　Ves had spent a lot of time and effort into lowering the Deceptor Project's energy consumption and heat buildup. By making his mech more efficient in how it handled energy, it would radiate less waste energy that could serve as a beacon that painted a clear target on the mech's back.

　　The configuration of the Deceptor Project also supported this goal. The two biggest energy-eating parts were the flight system and the primary weapon. Both of them were designed and tuned to generate considerably less energy than comparable systems, though that inevitably came at the cost of peak performance.

　　After Gloriana surveyed the physical state of the mech, she tried to focus on the most distinctive properties of the Deceptor Project.

　　The mech possessed a distinct glow, but it was hard for her to get her grip around it. Furthermore, its effectiveness was much higher when the mech was being actively piloted against other mechs.

　　As far as living mechs went, the Deceptor Project sought to avoid drawing attention, which was quite the opposite compared to the other mechs designed by Ves.

　　"It's an interesting exercise to employ my design philosophy in a manner that is opposite to my usual approach." Ves explained. "Working on this project has made me realize that I have been designing way too many mechs that attract people's attention."

　　Gloriana snorted and crossed her arms. "I think that says a lot about you. There's a part inside you that just loves to command the public. That flows back in your work. I do not think this is bad, but it's definitely an aspect of your design style that you should be aware of. I am glad you have shown that you can also design subtler mechs when needed, though if I purely go by appearances, this mech of yours still can't help but attract attention."

　　"That's mainly due to its patterned surface."

　　The checkerboard pattern was just too odd compared to other mechs that were painted in simple solid color schemes.

　　Once the couple was done with examining the mech, they soon prepared to test it out. Ves had to make a few more arrangements by calling over the Flagrant Vandals and having them prepare a few test scenarios.

　　After a day of preparation, the first true deployment of the Deceptor Project was about to commence.

　　The Vandals already received word and information about the new mech during the prototype testing phase. Ves had been generous enough to provide them with virtual models of the earlier iterations of the Deceptor Project to use as simulation practice material.

　　They already trained a batch of mech pilots who were all proficient with the basic operation of the Deceptor Project. Ves picked a random man out of the Vandal lineup to pilot the completed version of the light harasser mech for the first time.

　　A few notable clansmen had gathered next to the workstation where Ves was operating from. As a pair of heavy-duty bots slowly dragged the inactive Deceptor Project out into space, the leader of the Flagrant Vandals harbored a lot of hope for the new mech model.

　　"If the Deceptor Project performs well, how many copies can we expect to receive?" Commander Abis Firelight asked.

　　Ves glanced at the dark-skinned man. While he wasn't very familiar with Firelight, the man had proven to be a competent leader who did not produce a lot of drama. He was quite opposite to Venerable Orfan in that regard.

　　"That's a difficult question to answer." He replied. "Currently, we're having difficulties sourcing the necessary raw materials. We can easily produce a squad's worth of my mech, but anything more will require our clan to secure an agreement with a solid and reliable material supplier."

　　That was not the news that Commander Firelight wanted to hear. "Just… ten?"

　　"Maybe more, maybe less. Some materials are more abundant but others are more scarce. I'll have to check our total inventory to be sure. We also need to reserve at least a proportion of them in case of emergencies, so that will also limit the amount of mechs we can build."

　　The Flagrant Vandals accompanying their legion commander all looked disappointed. They had learned of the new signature mech and eagerly wanted to put it into service!

　　Ves noticed their dissatisfaction and sighed. "Look, it won't take long for our fleet to reach the Davute System. Once we arrive, I will prioritize this matter. We need to secure a channel for materials and supplies for many more reasons aside from fabricating mechs. Hopefully, I'll be able to give you a more positive answer within a month."

　　"We'll hold you to that, patriarch." Commander Firelight slowly nodded. "There's nothing worse than not being able to pilot a useful new mech that is tailored to our needs."