Work Text:
CAST
THE MECHANIC: Late 30s or possibly early 50s, butch, visibly drunk.
PLACE
Exterior city sidewalk, Fódlan, a few years after the end of the war.
TIME
Late.
THE MECHANIC
Where were you when the Empire revolted? I was in a tavern in Garreg Mach town, drunk as a skunk and wearing my tightest white undershirt. Seteth said it was “unbecoming of our Chief Golem Mechanic” to have to be rolled back to the garage, but it was my day off. How was I to know there’d be a war on?
So there I was, still drunk and sweatin’ like I was in Ailell, trying to coax the old girls into motion. I kept ‘em in top form—I’m good at my job—but it’d been a long time since they’d had to fight, so I had to make sure they were perfect. And they were. They’re good girls. They always made me proud. You ask anybody who was there that day—they did more than their fair share in holding the line as long as they could.
Sure sucked that we lost the monastery. I had my techs grabbing whatever tools and materials we could and then sprinting out of there before the Adrestians rolled in. Wish we could’ve taken the lift, but you sure get killer biceps from haulin’ up three-hundred-pound metal skirts by hand all the time. Check these puppies.
(THE MECHANIC flexes a bicep.)
I was the last out of the lab. Shoved somethin’ like five hundred pounds of plate into one of the girls and threw myself in another to smuggle me out. Closest I’ve ever come to piloting one myself. You bet I added better soundproofing after I heard all them arrows pingin’ off the armor. Loud as shit!
You know, I used to wish I was a cardinal, if only so I could pilot a golem, just once. ‘S moot, really—even if I had a Crest, I never was no saint—but I wonder sometimes what it’d be like to merge like that. Really get in there, you know? Like I get up in there regularly—it’s my job. But like that...
Anyway, what was I saying?
Oh yeah—It’s not to say I’m happy we were at war, but the next five-odd years sure were a lot more interesting. The girls got plenty of exercise and my fingers stayed busy patchin’ ‘em up. Spent every day covered in grease, fist-deep in a golem chest and goin’ home only to sleep. Good days. Real good days.
Stung real bad whenever one of the girls didn’t make it back home, though. You always wonder if there was more you could’ve done. We were making do in the Fhirdiad lab, but without materials, we were fucked from the start. Eh, well. Ain’t no point dwellin’ on “what ifs.”
Hey, you got any cigarettes?
Around year three we started hearin’ whispers from R&D about a new line. Revived old line actually—hasn’t been a proper new one in a millennium—but might as well have been for all the rework what had to be done. I was skeptical, sure, but the potential got to me. It was a chance to make a mark, y’know?
You know any fire spells, by the way? Think I left my flint somewhere.
The next two years were real fun. Which I feel a little bad sayin’, ‘cause it sure doesn’t sound like anybody else in the Church was havin’ a good one. But Lady Rhea and ol’ Seteth saw fit to actually fund our department for once, so that was the best we ever had it. I was king of the world. You shoulda seen our lab in Fhirdiad. Some weirdo had a tinker shop right in the palace and King Dimitri let us at it. It was a glorified work shed when we got there, and we souped that sucker up into the real deal. Nothin’ like what we had at the monastery, but was nice to get to design it myself.
And the new golem models? Badass. Stronger, more efficient, and with the best barriers ever developed. I’d been saying for years how we could make huge improvements in anti-magic armor with just a little more funding, and we finally got it. Fuckin’ sucks it took a war to make it happen. What can ya do?
The integrations on these were nuts, though. I knew the pilots were supposed to be legendary warriors, but I never expected them to be, like, literal legendary warriors. The kind of power they drew through those javelins would get anybody hot and bothered. Definitely not just me. Took us a full two years to get ‘em ready. Which was ahead of schedule, actually—we just had the passion. We were workin’ day and night, takin’ lunch while still up to our elbows in chest capsules and shoulder joints, and still doin’ repairs on all the girls. You shoulda seen us. Beautiful machines.
And them, the new crew? Incredible. Never felt emotion like the first time we fired ‘em up for a test fight. They obliterated all their pilots—way too big a power draw, we had to correct for that—but for a few minutes, they were glorious. The whole time I was hosing out their capsules, I felt high.
They were ready by Arianrhod, you know. I was pushin’ to deploy then, but the dork what used to run the Fhirdiad tinker shop insisted she had it under control. Obviously didn’t, given how that ended up.
I was real cool. Never told Seteth, “I told you so.” Hadn’t seen him around for a minute, to be fair.
At least Lady Rhea listened and let us send one out for Tailtean. Wish I coulda been there to see her maiden battle. She didn’t come back to us, and that near broke my heart. But I heard she was beautiful.
Fuck. I wish I’d been there. I would’ve liked to see that. It must have been fucking amazing. I dream about it sometimes—like if it were me in the capsule, what I woulda done, how it woulda felt. Casting light, being part of the body. I’d be paste in seconds, I know. I know. Still. ‘S a nice dream.
You got another cigarette I could bum?
‘Course after that, everybody came back to Fhirdiad. It was the moment of truth for our whole team, put us in that now-or-never frame of mind. We showed up to work those days like we never have. Perfect. Focused. Ready. We put everything we had left into those last golems. Bled on ‘em, even, in Petyr’s case—he lost a finger in a finger joint. Which is kinda funny, if you think about it. Fair credit to Seteth—he was annoying, but we had way fewer accidents when he was around.
What happened to him, anyway? Did he die? Huh.
You know, Lady Rhea herself came by to inspect about two hours before deployment, just before the pilots came in. Said we were “doing the Goddess’s work” and She was “smiling down on us.” I dunno about all that, but I reckon the way Gajus looked down at me probably felt about the same.
Of course, ol’ Chevy was throwin’ a fit as usual. Didn’t want to integrate with the body. Didn’t so much as flicker at Lady Rhea’s pep talk, either. I just said, “fuck it,” and sealed the hood on. No time for slackers, the frickin’ continent’s at stake. Chevalier was pissed, sure, but went to work. Always did.
While all that was goin’ on, What’s-Her-Name came by to work out some aggression or whatever like I had all the free time in the world. Kickin’ my leg, askin’ for one more go while I was half-under Iris’s skirt. Said she had to “go burn the city.” I said, I’m busy too. Never saw her again, and good riddance. No respect for my work. I sent the last of the girls out into the streets to hold off the main army, then did my final checks on the newbies. The order to deploy came, and well, I... I hesitated.
Never gonna forget the way Willie looked at me. It was like he knew. He saw me startin’ toward the door and said, “No following.” So I stayed.
I ain’t ashamed to say I cried like a bitch when I got back to the lab, knowin’ the last of my babies were gone. Told my techs thanks, wished ‘em luck, and sent them home, too. We knew the Empire was comin’, but that didn’t make it any easier. End of an era always stings.
Once the last of my techs fucked off, I went to close the lab up myself. Took a good look around there one last time, hung my belt up, doused the lanterns, locked the doors, and ran outside right into the fuckin’ fire.
What’s-Her-Name’s crazy ass really did go and burn the city. Like, what the fuck?
Well, anywho, long live the Empire or whatever. If the great and glorious Crimson Bitch’s vision for the bright new dawn should happen to include a place for an out-of-work golem mechanic, you know where to find me. Drunk, probably, in my tightest white undershirt. Hey, this used to be white, I promise.
END