The Mech Touch

Journeymen were the heart of the Larkinson Clan's renowned Design Department.

In the absence of Seniors and Masters, Journeymen wielded great authority within this highly productive department.

Their titles already showed how much leeway they obtained. Every Journeyman in the Design Department automatically received the title and position of lead designer.

Though each of them needed to undergo a small assessment period, as long as they proved their abilities, Ves was more than willing to let them loose and decide on their own projects and work assignments.

This was a level of freedom and autonomy that mech design organizations rarely granted to Journeymen!

In institutions where Masters and Seniors were in charge, Journeymen were simply higher-level assistants who could be entrusted with more complicated design tasks.

The latter rarely received more comprehensive opportunities to design brand-new original mechs where they could implement their own ideas and design philosophies!

As such, many Journeymen that went on to become lead designers in the Larkinson Clan began to love their jobs!

This was also one of the primary means that Ves employed to keep the growing number of Journeymen in the Design Department happy and unwilling to leave.

Though every member of the Larkinson Clan was loyal to it by default, Ves wasn't willing to take any chances and test the boundaries of his personnel.

As the amount of commitments of the Design Department increased, everyone's workload continued to increase. More and more lead designers were needed in order to keep everyone's time schedules reasonable!

Fortunately, a steady trickle of Journeymen joined the Design Department through two different channels.

These channels consisted of both internal promotion and external recruitment. 

There were advantages and disadvantages to both channels.

Internal promotion allowed the Larkinson Clan to obtain trustworthy Journeymen among those who had worked in the Design Department for years.

They had not only acclimated to the Larkinson Clan and the Design Department, but were also heavily influenced by the work of Ves, Gloriana and other established lead designers.

This meant that they immediately fit into their new positions and knew exactly how to fulfill their new work responsibilities!

Their loyalty was never in doubt since their time in the clan had thoroughly influenced their thoughts when they were still fairly impressionable.

However, the downside to this was that they were so similar to other long-standing members of the Larkinson Clan that there wasn't enough diversity in opinion and thought.

Internal lead designers were also less spectacular to those that were recruited from outside of the clan.

While every Journeyman started off as a Novice and Apprentice, there were still differences in talent, qualifications and motivation.

The ones that advanced within the Design Department possessed relatively modest to average backgrounds. No matter how many skills they learned while they diligently worked to advance to the next rank, there was only so much they could do to widen their knowledge base.

Gloriana even considered them to be rather dull and uninspiring due to the relative lack of imagination and innovation in their works.

Ves was not so quick to dismiss the value of these 'boring' mech designers.

Not everyone needed to be a superstar and the Design Department could use a lot more solid and stable personalities in order to counterbalance the more crazy ones such as himself!

The quintessential representative of this class of mech designers was Miles Tovar-Larkinson.

The man had been a Journeyman candidate within the Design Department for years.

In fact, Miles showed so little progress and ingenuity since he became a Journeyman candidate Ves and Gloriana frankly forgot about the former highborn Brighter!

It was hard not to feel disappointed in Miles. He had become a Journeyman candidate at roughly the same period of time as Ketis. While the latter had broken through a long time ago and designed one innovative swordsman mech after another, Miles was still mucking about as an Apprentice who had gotten stuck in the mud!

Therefore, no one expected Miles to break through to Journeyman a few years after the Larkinson Clan temporarily settled in Davute.

"You sure took your time." Ves simply said as he met with the man who belatedly advanced to Journeyman.

Miles looked fairly hapless despite reaching the same rank as his superior. "To be honest, I did not expect to become a Journeyman Mech Designer myself. I had just completed another aerial mech design for the Emergent Boutique. I had higher hopes for it than my other projects, but never did I realize that it would be the design that would push me forward."

"Can I take a look at your design?"

"Ah, certainly. Here you go, sir."

Ves studied the design schematic as well as the supplementary documents.

"This flight system looks odd."

"It's my own original design." Miles Tovar said with a hint of pride. "While Miss Juliet Stameros admittedly provided me with a lot of help, I worked on this flight system after learning many lessons in my previous independent mech designs. It not only encompasses the design solutions that I had developed a long time ago, I also combined it with other, newer solutions that make use of clever techniques and interesting materials."

"I can see that, Miles. If I am guessing this right, this flight system is fairly low-powered but also stealthier than normal."

"That is completely right. Though it is still a work-in-progress in my eyes, this flight system represents the future direction of my design philosophy. I have chosen to specialize in designing mechs that are equipped with low-profile, low-powered and low-emission flight systems. They are best paired with stealth-oriented mechs but they can also play a useful role to mechs assigned to flanking and sabotage missions. The goal is to provide enhanced mobility while not turning the mech into a beacon on enemy sensors."

In other words, Miles' specialty was fairly narrow and obscure. Though he was no doubt decent in his own niche, Ves did not see many cases where Miles could play a pivotal role.

Ves knew better than to underestimate any mech designer. No matter what, Miles Tovar had advanced to Journeyman on his own merits, therefore opening him up to a new world where he had a lot more possibilities at his disposal than before!

After talking to Miles a bit more, Ves confirmed that the newly-advanced mech designer could immediately get to work by leading a few design projects without needing any adjustment time.

The only thing that Ves needed to take into account was that he needed to provide his input on the projects as well in order to make them alive and decent enough to be piloted by other people.

"The current design round is still in progress, so for now I want you to lighten the burden of your fellow lead designers by supervising a few of our less complicated design projects. You can take the time to think about the first mech design projects that you will take charge of when we commence the next design round."

Miles looked surprised. "Would you entrust me with the responsibility of designing a mech for the clan or the LMC?"

"Why not? You are a Journeyman. You have already proven your competence. Besides, I can see from your latest design that you have polished your fundamentals to an admirable degree. I can already tell that your work will be solid enough to produce decent mech designs, though I think it is still necessary for you to collaborate with our more established lead designers in order to raise the standards of your work to a more satisfactory level."

"That… is understandable."

"Don't worry, Miles. As long as you begin to develop your own unique design solutions that leverage your design philosophy, then we will give you more leeway to implement your own vision on your own. Until then, it is best if you stick to collaborations."

Although it sounded as if Ves was trying to shackle Miles, both of them knew that this was for the best.

Even though all of the lead designers were nominally on the same level, in practice a hierarchy had already formed within their group!

Ves and Gloriana obviously stood at the top of the pyramid. Their authority and their design capabilities were the most impressive of anyone else's, so their opinions always came first.

A newly-advanced Journeyman with a relatively boring and niche design philosophy like Miles could not match Ves in design skill, talent, ingenuity and many other factors. He still needed to prove himself in order for his input to become more dominant within the Design Department.

Still, his new job responsibilities were already a major improvement compared to before. Unlike Apprentices, Journeymen possessed the right and privilege to provide meaningful contributions to any mech design. That was enough for Miles to get started as the most junior lead designer of the Design Department!

It turned out that Miles was not the only assistant mech designer to advance to Journeymen throughout this quiet period.

Several other notable personalities that Ves was familiar with had also made the life-changing leap from low-ranking mech designer to high-ranking mech designer!

"Congratulations, Merrill O'Brian-Larkinson." Ves warmly welcomed the rather stoic and rational mech designer to the fold. "I had a feeling that you would complete your ascension in the near future, especially since you were the one that suggested the Chiron design. You were always a bit brighter and more hardworking than the other assistants."

Despite climbing to a height that represented an immensely important turning point in her career, Miss Merrill maintained a completely neutral expression. It was as if breaking through was just another Tuesday as far as she was concerned!

"Thank you, patriarch. I have many new ideas that I have always wished to explore but couldn't. I hope you can grant me the room to experiment in my following assignments."

"You will get your chance. Just make sure they actually work and add value to the mech designs. I am sure you know the score already given that Miles has already gone ahead and adapted to his new responsibilities. Do you have any particular questions or requests or anything?"

"Not for the time being." Merrill shook her head. "I would like to take on my new duties as soon as possible."

"Uh, okay. You go ahead and do that. I have already updated your permissions so you can access more facilities and databases. I suggest you look that up and prepare for your next research projects."

Merrill O'Brian was certainly an oddball even in a clan that was filled with eccentric people. She possessed a rather mixed background and an unproven Class I design philosophy.

However, what particularly stood out to Ves was that Merrill had chosen to follow the path of a rational mech designer!

This threw Ves for a loop.

As one of the most defining example of a passionate mech designer, Ves had a lot of difficulty understanding the appeal of this radically different approach and outlook towards mech design.

Rational mech designers deliberately suppressed their passion and emotions, which usually resulted in worsening their ability to get excited over their own design philosophies.

The advantage of this was that they became so neutral that they could imitate the other design philosophies that they were familiar with to a decent degree of accuracy.

This possibility happened to make rational mech designers highly popular within the MTA, but even the mechers understood the need to employ enough passionate mech designers!

Though Ves initially had his doubts about Merrill's ability to excel in a clan and workplace where everyone else was fully passionate and invested in their own design philosophies, it did not take much time for the former pirate designer to prove her worth in the Design Department!

"What?! You can do that, Merrill?! How did you learn how to do this stuff so quickly?! I thought it would take years for you to be able to reach this point!"

Merrill's unexpected success caused Ves to develop a substantially different opinion towards rational mech designers!