The Mech Touch (Web Novel)

5827 Escort Carriers

Ves came away from his remote discussion with the CEO of Starfarer Berth with a much deeper understanding of support link technology than before.

The public had a bit of awareness of what it entailed, but the Red Two had done a good job preventing outsiders from learning too many details.

It was not that useful for most people to know how much better the mechers and the fleeters fought with the help of technology that they clearly did not intend to share.

From what Ves had learned from Mr. Eric Poderin, he fully understood this approach.

He felt so jealous that the high-and-mighty Red Two continued to keep this valuable tech for themselves while leaving others to struggle without the advanced features that could increase their success rate.

It was understandable for the Red Two to deny support link technology to second-raters and third-raters.

The key principles of data link technology, shield link technology and energy link technology relied on the powerful specifications of very scarce materials as well as the special attributes of insanely complicated high-tech parts.

However, these reasons fell through when it came to arming other first-class mech forces.

The Terrans, fleeters and ordinary first-raters all possessed the wealth and the sophistication to field at least small amounts of elite support linked units.

Even if the demand for materials required to produce support link systems multiplied by several times, it should at least give the best Terran and Rubarthan mech units a greater edge on the battlefield, thereby increasing red humanity's ability to keep the alien invaders at bay.

Alas, the Red Two still priorities their own interests over the greater good.

It was no wonder the Terrans and the Rubarthans supported the establishment of the Red Collective so much. The promise of controlling a large superorganization where both groups finally gained an excuse to join hands against their current oppressors was too much to resist.

In any case, Ves was glad that he had aligned himself to the Red Association for the most part. He did not suffer the same problem as his honorary membership was evidently enough for him to earn the right to utilize support link technology.

This was a huge attraction as well as a strong binding mechanism.

Ves did not miss the implications of finally earning the right to implement support link technology in his first-class mechs and starships.

As long as he played nice with the Red Association, he could continue to enjoy progressively greater benefits that every other mecher enjoyed.

The fact that the Association saw fit to treat him like a dog that needed to be trained in a Pavlovian fashion was rather insulting.

It also worked.

The mechers employed plenty of carrots and sticks to ensure that he continued to serve as their asset. Though they did not trap him in a physical sense, they sure did so in a metaphorical fashion.

It frustrated him, but what could he do? He lacked the hard power needed to stand his own ground.

The best thing that Ves could say about the mechers was that they still gave him ample enough room to grow.

The hope of developing his personal abilities and his power base motivated him into working harder.

He wanted to become powerful enough to the point where he no longer had to dance to the tune of the mechers anymore.

Yet there was a part of him that suspected that the mechers already took that into account. He was afraid that the Association gave him the illusion of an escape hatch, only to slam it shut when he was on the cusp of jumping out of their birdcage.

Ves inwardly shook his head. This was not a productive line of thought. The future was still in flux. The division and the restructuring sparked by the completely unexpected proposal to form the Red Collective had scrambled many people's carefully laid plans.

Right now, a lot of powers were scrambling to readjust their plans and secure an important foothold in the future rival of the Red Association and the Red Fleet.

The all-encompassing initiative ranked so high in priority that it served as an excellent distraction.

From the gossip that Jovy and Vector passed on to Ves, his old adversaries no longer trained their sights on Ves anymore.

Not only had he proven to be an incredibly annoying individual who had a proven habit of spoiling people's schemes, his list of backers had grown since the public inquiry.

Even though Ves had to forge new pacts and give away a chunk of his company shares, the sacrifices were worthwhile so long as it kept the likes of Fleet Admiral Amelie Jameson off his back for the foreseeable future.

As the Bluejay Fleet continued to venture closer to the border regions, Ves held another virtual meeting with the leader of the E-66 Experimental Shipyard.

Different from Starfarer Bay, the much larger shipyard was anything but a well-oiled machine.

The contrast between the two shipyards was too great.

Starfarer Bay under the leadership of CEO Eric Poderin ran like clockwork. Every piece and every process was so well-

planned and optimized that there was very little waste. This mattered a lot when the sub-capital shipyard operated in one of the most expensive star systems in human-occupied space. The profit margins of high-end starships may be generous, but the shipyard's massive costs could easily drag it down if everyone started to take it easy.

The E-66 Experimental Yard possessed a completely different atmosphere. None of the shipwrights, engineers and scientists were lazy or incompetent. They wouldn't have been hired in the first place. However, when Ves' virtual projection toured the shipyard as it was completing its latest order, it became clear that the various work teams were more interested in figuring out how to apply incremental improvements to existing design elements than actually getting the job done.

Chief Shipwright Keziramous Demodian or simply 'Kezi' noticed his impending new superior's consternation.

"E-66 is more of a lab than a production facility, sir. The holding company operating on behalf of the Inferno Spear Prince has always given us the allowance to take our time to design new ship classes and work out all of the kinks when we try to realize them. All of this iteration may seem redundant or excessive, but it is truly not. My engineers are trained and instructed to push the boundaries and expose flaws in an environment that can tolerate these activities. It is our shipyard's job to develop as many solutions and optimizations as possible. The work we do will save valuable time, resources and effort for other shipyards once they are tasked with producing the new ship classes that we have tested."

That… actually made a lot of sense. Producing starships was a lot more complicated than producing mechs. The testing and refining processes took a lot longer and required much greater commitment in order to ready a new ship design for full-scale production.

"How much longer does it take to produce a brand new ship class that contains plenty of new and untested technologies?" Ves inquired as they continued to tour the massive facility.

Discipline was a lot looser in the E-66 Experimental Shipyard.

While the workers on shift over at Starfarer Berth always kept their minds on their immediate jobs, the Rubarthans engineers and scientists often went off-track and debated about all kinds of wild and obscure technological principles that might not even make a difference in their current assignments.

"We try not to test the patience of the Inferno Spear Principality too much." Kezi responded with a strained smile. "We generally try to produce a new starship within the time it takes to produce three of them under normal circumstances. We have found that we can squash most problems and raise the quality of our new designs to an acceptable level within this timeframe. Any longer and the improvements become too marginal for us to bother. The Rubarthan armed forces are also unwilling to wait any longer to put their new ship classes into full production. You cannot imagine how busy we have been in the months just after the Great Severing. We had to work with extreme haste in order to explore the many possible applications of hyper technology in starships."

Those days were mostly over now. More than a year had passed since then. The E-66 Experimental Shipyard finally returned to a more regular routine where they spent the time to develop and produce a proper hyper starship.

Ves studied the hull in question. Even though E-66 was capable of producing 2.3 kilometer long fleet carriers, the current vessel was a lot smaller than that. Her length was only measured at around 800 meters and her width was remarkably thin.

"I've never seen this kind of carrier type up close. Most of the ones I see these days are either combat carriers or fleet carriers."

"The new Deireen-class escort carrier is more of a proof of concept of a proper hyper starship than anything else." Kezi explained when he noticed what his new superior was paying attention to. "Escort carriers straddle the line between combat carriers and fleet carriers. They usually lack the capability to land on the surface of terrestrial planets and are not as well-armored. Their main advantage is that they are more affordable and possess superior mobility. They are typically capable of carrying 60 to 100 mechs, but this is not a hard rule. The hull you see before you is on the lower end of that range due to her thin and narrow cross section."

Ves frowned when he heard that. "What purpose do escort carriers fulfill?"

The chief shipwright sighed. "Economics. Combat carriers are tough and hardy. They need to be in order to land mechs in contested warzones. Fleet carriers are not only much larger, but have to be able to withstand a certain degree of punishment as well, or else an opposing force can easily demolish the fragile hulls through sustained bombardment. Neither of these solutions are cheap. They are much safer, yes, but they require so much military-grade bulk alloys that not even the Rubarthan principalities are willing to produce them as frequently as before. If we want to keep up with the attrition rate of the current war, we need to resort to more cost-effective solutions."

This was a familiar argument. Ves had theorized about this possibility himself, but he did not expect to see others acting on it so soon!

"I see. Escort carriers are akin to light carriers, but bigger. They are more like cargo vessels that just happened to be specialized in transporting mechs from point A to point B. They hardly have any additional frills that seem like non-

essential luxuries in this day and age."

"Precisely, sir. Escort carriers are emphatically not designed to function as anything other than a mothership in a space battle. They need to be placed far beyond the effective range of enemy weapons as a few well-placed hits can easily tear through their comparatively thin energy shields and hull plating. The only parameters that matter is how many mechs they can carry inside their hulls and how little money must be spent to produce them. That makes them much more relevant in the current age. Hyper technology has made them much more viable as their defenses and mobility have improved to the point where they are considerably more fool-proof than before."

"Mhmm."

Ves thought about whether the Larkinson Clan should employ escort carriers as well. He did not really like them because of how fragile they were. Superior mobility alone was not enough to compensate for all of the downsides.

What Ves truly wanted was not a hypermobile light fleet whose only strength was to evade enemies more easily.

What he really wanted was to form a solid assault fleet that could crush formidable opponents like an indomitable fist!

Besides, support link technology worked best when starships shadowed mech formations at closer ranges.

For better or worse, the first-class mech fleet needed to consist of armored starships that were all designed to take beating!