The Mech Touch (Web Novel)

5632 Unnatural Reproduction

Ves became thoroughly impressed by Alexa Streon's ideas.

She did not let him down at all. Alexa studied him carefully over the months, and clearly adopted a number of his best practices.

His design philosophy, his values, his work approach and above all his courage all became objects of study to her. This encouraged her to show less restraint in her work.

The Project S1 and the Project S2 both contained a lot of subversive elements as a result!

Though the two mech designs contained a lot of extremes that might cause a lot of mech pilots to be taken aback, Ves believed that there should definitely be people who appreciated the value that her design philosophy could bring to the table.

Adding procreation and inheritance to living mechs might not be everyone's cup of tea, but he believed that there was definitely a market for this sort of product.

The Terrans and many other groups that valued family, legacy and generational accumulation would likely embrace Alexa's specialty products as long as they had proven their worth.

Ves definitely became convinced that her work had a place in the Larkinson Clan! He had always been a strong adherent to investing in the long-term. Many of his early efforts had already begun to pay off, while others would probably take a few decades if not a century before delivering powerful results.

What mattered was that Ves had set up a lot of stuff in motion that would constantly provide benefits to him and his clan over time. This compounded their growth and prevented them from backsliding so long as the investments did not go awry.

Investing in living mech dynasties fit exactly in his calculus.

Alexa definitely had the Larkinsons as her first customers, as no one valued living mechs more than her fellow clansmen!

Unfortunately, not every group valued long-term interests over more immediate concerns, so Alexa was bound to have problems with pushing her products onto other audiences, especially if her design applications compromised the combat power of her work to an extent.

Ves just had to take a close look at the Project S2 to prove his point.

While the Project S1 was perfectly fine as it was able to procreate by changing its form and the configuration of its nanomachines, the Project S2 was a different story!

Ves definitely had a lot to say about the design choices that Alexa made when she cooked up the Project S2, but he first addressed the S1 as it represented her starting point.

"The Project S1 is likely the mech that embodies your concepts the best, but… I do not believe it is the most practical of products." He said. "How much does it cost? Even if this mech design is just a proof of concept that you do not intend to realize at all, I do not believe you have spent so much time on fleshing out your design philosophy without knowing how much this costs. I can tell this smart metal product is not cheap. It is too tough, flexible and fault-tolerant."

Alexa's prideful smile dropped a bit. "You are correct. The target audience for his mech design is exceedingly small as a result. The estimated production cost of the S1 is at 150 million MTA credits if it consists entirely of the strongest and most difficult to produce first-generation nanomachines, but its effective performance in the field is only equivalent to a first-class mech that costs at around 30 million MTA credits."

In other words, as long as Ves ignored all of the fancy smart metal gimmicks, the S1 was overpriced by at least 5 times!

Was the capacity to alter its configuration and regenerate its battle damage in the field in a matter of seconds worth the enormous price premium?

The answer wasn't as clear-cut as it seemed. Smart metal mechs generally tended to outperform their regular counterparts so long as they did not fight against mechs with overwhelming offensive power.

Smart metal mechs tended to fare well in battles of attrition!

However, their extravagant upfront expenses made it so that they were more of a luxury product that only the wealthiest customers considered them to be a viable addition to their mech rosters.

"Your design philosophy is highly geared towards mass production models." Ves remarked as gazed as the smart metal mech with a more critical eye. "The performance of the S1 does not appear to be remarkable. It does not possess any pronounced strengths compared to similar products on the market. Few people with the money to spare will want to invest in a mech that will only really begin to 'pay' off decades from the time of purchase, especially if the upfront costs are so high. It will be very difficult to purchase or produce enough copies of these expensive models to form an actual living mech dynasty. Even I cannot bear the thought of committing my clan to such an action."

Though Alexa already deduced this rationale, it was still hard for a creator to hear one of her babies being disparaged, especially from an authority figure she respected.

"The S1 has already served its purpose as far as I am concerned." She said. "It would be fantastic if I can gain the opportunity to fabricate it, but I cannot justify the expenditure. This is also one of the reasons why I had already begun the development of the S2 before I completed its predecessor."

There was nothing much for Ves to comment on. The S1 had plenty of good points. He believed that its offensive and defensive capabilities could easily be upgraded with the help and cooperation of several lead designers, but it was all moot. All of the tweaks in performance would not change the fundamental flaw that it was too damn expensive to be utilized on a wider scale!

The Project S2 was a more practical mech. Ves did not possess a full understanding of how first-class multipurpose mechs worked, but the S2 was configured as a simple rifleman mech, so its complexity was much reduced.

Alexa possessed solid fundamentals, so the S2's design was pretty clean and devoid of any unnecessary frills. Though its combat parameters were relatively balanced and unexceptional as a result, the resulting stability provided a better platform for her to add the optional 'reproduction modules' to the mech.

In both variants of the S2, Alexa had chosen to treat many of the additional elements as optional modules that any crew of mech technicians could easily attach and dismount from the machines.

"When you designed the S2, you chose to prioritize function over form, is that correct?" Ves asked.

Alexa nodded. "I think that most customers will not be able to stomach the idea that they have to pilot a weakened and less combat capable mech just so that they can produce a child mech that promises better performance in the future. I am not ignorant of the fact that most ordinary customers do not want to be bothered by all of these vague long-term promises when they are living on the edge in battle. The male variant of the S2 is the simplest. Its contribution to the reproduction process is minimal. It is enough to reserve a small pocket on the mech that can hold the instruments that are needed to produce a physical seed that will serve as the carrier of the mech's equivalent of 'genetic material'."

"What will this seed be made of?" Ves asked.

"It has to be at least partially made out of hyper materials." Alexa immediately replied. "The physical aspect of the seed material is not as important as its spiritual aspect. It is the latter that contains much of the spiritual strength and teachings that the male living mech wants to pass on to its child. The only point of uncertainty is that I do not know how long it will take for the male S2 to create a proper seed material once it has started this process. It may take an hour, a day or even a month. There is a distinct possibility that the male S2 may be forced to engage in battle while it is still forming its seed material."

Ves gained more interest when he heard that. "This might not be a bad development. Whatever the male S2 experiences in battle can be directly passed on to the unfinished seed material."

"We will have to see." His student replied in a noncommittal tone. "Once the male S2 has completed its process, it must pass on its seed material to the female S2. This handover process can be done in many ways, but for the sake of simplicity, it is enough to transfer the seed material in the same manner as installing a spare part on the recipient. As you can see, the main reproduction chamber of the female S2 is designed as an external module that is largely mounted on the lower back. This will impose minimal hindrance to the first-

class multipurpose mech as it fits. If it ever receives any battle damage, its developing child mech is less likely to incur damage."

"What if the female S2 turns around and attempts to flee a powerful opponent?"

"Then I suppose the reproduction chamber can serve as a makeshift physical barrier that can help the fleeing mech resist more attacks." Alexa said in a resigned tone. "This is only assuming that the formation of a new living mech baby takes an extended period of time. Until I have fabricated the prototypes of both variants of the S2 and put them through an extended testing period, I will not have the necessary empirical data to determine how long it takes for my machines to complete all of these theoretical processes."

In other words, everything she conceived so far still remained a fantasy. The lack of proof generated so much uncertainty that Alexa probably wouldn't be able to advance to Journeyman until she had actually solved this essential requirement.

Ves continued to observe the female S2 design with an odd expression. He just couldn't get over the unusually inhuman appearance of this machine.

"From a cursory look, the technical design appears to be in order." He commented. "The design choices that you have made are both logical and rational enough that I can hardly fault them. It is just… neither mechs look like they are supposed to. Most humanoid mechs are designed to imitate human physiology to varying degrees. It looks extremely jarring to see a male mech without a codpiece and a female mech whose baby bump is located on the back rather than the front. Don't you think it looks… ugly?"

The young woman gazed at her mentor with a puzzled expression. "I cannot deny that it does not conform to human aesthetic standards, but is this truly a legitimate concern when the more natural-looking alternatives impose heavier burdens on performance?"

"It's really important, Alexa! Your designs are fine when your target audience is a bunch of unfeeling bots, but if you want to market your product to actual people, then you need to make them more comfortable with your work by conforming to their tastes! If there is one major fault to your work that I have to mention, it is that you have completely neglected the role of the human mech pilots in your equation!"

That caused Alexa to be taken aback. "How so? The mech pilots of the S2 are not meant to play an active role in the reproduction process."

Ves shook his head when he heard that. "You are treating mechs as standalone products when you talk like that. This is wrong! Mechs are only complete when they are interfaced with a human mech pilot. When these machines procreate, do you expect them to do everything while letting their pilots remain bystanders?"

"Yes…"

"That is too short-sighted! These mechs are not independent entities. They are assets owned by humans. The least you can do is mandate their involvement in the procreation process, if only so that they can supervise and control this potentially dangerous activity. Also, do not underestimate how much the mech pilot can contribute to the child mech. I think the next generations of living mechs can become even more attuned to humans if actual mech pilots have contributed to their formation."

"That is an unsubstantiated theory, sir. You are adding a large amount of complexity to my framework."

"I know, but this is a necessary measure in my opinion. Do not forget about the original purpose of mechs. They exist to serve mech pilots. If you leave them out of consideration, then your living mechs will begin to deviate from the norms and values of the mech community. Do you really want to go this far, Alexa?"

That caused the woman to fall silent.

Ves crossed his arms. "Besides, there is another major fault to your mech design. It is too cold and inhuman! I highly suggest that it should mimic the human process of procreation more closely!"

His words sounded baffling to Alexa. Did he not realize how extensively his suggestion would impact the combat performance of her works?

"Why?"