More alarms made themselves known, alongside a series of red warning lights spanning Dignity's control bank. "What the hell does all that mean?" Phase swore.
"Temperature's rising, must be a glitch!" Dignity's system readouts were a veritable maze where they sprawled across Vincent's computer, to the point diagnosing was as much guesswork as actual deducing. Thinking fast, he offered, "Try to keep Dignity's pressure down, you'll rupture a pipe if the steam buildup runs away on us."
Phase wanted to make a smart remark about Vincent keeping
her pressure down, but there wasn't time to think of it. Instead she reached for the temperature dial and cranked it as low as it would go. Dignity's reservoir immediately cranked out a deluge of rime enough to spill to the ground and freeze underfoot, but the temperature of Dignity's internal pipeworks continued to rise unabated. "Well that didn't work!" she complained, shoving her shoulder into the right butterfly grip to set Dignity back into a strafe. If nothing else, the ice underfoot was making it easier on the mech, her gyros automatically compensating for the frozen ground and resolving the awkward stomping into a smoother, skating gait. All the while she eyed the temperature - even standing on ice, the buildup continued. "Vincent, how do I fix it before something ruptures?"
"I'm working on it! Just keep up the movement - wait for the cannonball virus to open up!" Vincent got another grumbled cuss for his efforts.Making the cockpit as complex to control had perhaps been an oversight, he mused as he watched Phase flail between controls. Perhaps the control scheme needed updating, but Phase was at least making it work for now, Dignity strafing across her icy runoff with as much grace as could be expected of a piston-legged colossus. From his view Vincent could see her aim: she was trying to put the Mimic between her and the DeadHead, so as to hit them both. Now she had a hand free to load the Battlechip - yes, there, Dignity's cannon was re-configuring.
Net-side, Phase found herself too short of breath for comfort. The heat in the cockpit was oppressive, and the leather of her pilot suit trapped the steam and sweat against her skin in a way that was quickly becoming unbearable. Her hands slipped on the hot metal grips - irritated, she wiped them on her hands and focused on aiming. Thankfully nothing was moving, she had enough to worry about without having to track moving targets, so long as the Mimic loomed before her. Instinct screamed to retreat and gain distance, but between the speed of the Mimic's beam and the effective range of the DeadHead, distance wouldn't make her any safer. Better to strafe, and try to line the two viruses up to get the most use of her Battlechip. She'd given the DeadHead time to try loosing a shot on her, now it was time to return fire before she had to see what taking a cannonball felt like.
The lightning rod Dignity's cannon had unfurled sparked with enough raw juice to destroy the virus twice-over, if she could just line up her shot, clenching the control until it hurt so as not to risk her sweaty hands slipping. Upon pulling the trigger, the DollThunder blasted forth in a jagged, fluorescent-bright streak, piercing unabated to the far end of the arena where the DeadHead sat. Phase could smell the ozone even twenty-some feet above the thunderbolt, blinking glare from her eyes as she returned her attention to the Mimic. Over the whining pipes she yelled, "Vincent, it's getting pretty damn hot in here! You got anything or not?"
From the speaker Vincent's voice crackled, "It's in your buster systems! Use Dignity's cannon on its own without Battlechips, and the pressure should let off." Without leaving room for second thoughts, Phase levelled Dignity's cannon on the Mimic and fired off a shot, quick and underwhelming as base busters always were, and with no visible changes to Dignity's pressure. "No, the - the secondary trigger behind the primary, hold that one down! That primes Dignity's reservoir for a charged shot!" She found the trigger in question, and was relieved to hear at least one alarm cut out. On the other hand, the temperature in the cockpit immediately increased further, as close as Dignity's cockpit was to the reservoir where steam was building.
With one final curse to Vincent's design sense and need to over-complicate what didn't need to be complicated, Phase contorted her fingers into the controls until she found the condition to fire, and wasted no time letting it fly. Dignity's temperature immediately dropped, all the pent-up heat and pressure converting into a powerful burst of boiling water directly in the Mimic's abstract face. Phase noisily gusted a sigh of relief, leaning back in her seat and taking her hands off the controls to scrub at her face. "Man, if that didn't do it, I'm gonna be pissed," she muttered, mostly to herself, but the microphone caught it anyway. Vincent sighed in reply, but didn't comment.
-Turn Summary-*SetIce [Large Ice Terrain centred on Dignity]
*Overheated Buster* [Buster Charge]
1. Dodge right
2. Line up Mimic & DeadHead
3. DollThunder2Damage: 100 + Line-Attack5
Accuracy: B
Description: Fires a powerful bolt of lightning that pierces through objects and enemies alike.
Duration: Once
Element: Elec
Trader Rank: C: DeadHead, Mimic [100 Elec {B}, Line Attack 5]
4. Buster Shot: Mimic [10 Null {A}]
5. Buster Charge
6. Charge Shot: Mimic [40 Aqua {A}]