The Guild Conspiracy by Brooke Johnson Read Free Book Online Page B

a minute. “Well . . . Darrow’s sure to equip his mech with as many rules-­legal weapons as he can squeeze into it, so I would expect a barrage of assault weapons from him. You saw Selby’s mech—­sturdy build, relied on precision attacks, getting behind his opponent’s defenses and wrecking them from the inside. Fletcher—­the engineer Selby beat in that last round—­he relied on brute force, modeled his mech after the failed automaton project. It packed a hell of a punch. Beat all of his opponents to a pulp until Selby.”
    â€œWhat else?”
    â€œLet’s see . . . Lambert’s had hacksaws for arms; Salamanca tried some kind of protracted saber, but Greer damaged it when he rammed the thing. Most of the engineers went for sheer power over specialized weapons—­though I don’t expect many of them to use the same strategy again.”
    Petra chewed on the end of her pencil, thinking through defensive measures. Without knowing her opponents’ weapon choices, her best strategy was to equip her mech to survive anything—­double-­plated, reinforced frame, inner workings well protected. It would be slow, and she would need to maximize the engine efficiency just to get the mech in motion, but her first priority was survivability. She’d worry about the rest later.
    But that still left the matter of an offense.
    The goal of the fights was to incapacitate the other mech as quickly as possible—­disabling movement, gutting systems, or deactivating its power source. With a heavier machine, her strength was in her resilience, but she wasn’t really winning if all she did was outlast her opponent.
    She scowled at the dismantled mech, examining her half-­sketched designs for potential weapons, anything to add to the mech without jeopardizing the integrity of its defenses. The mech had two bulky arms she could fit with weapons, something to sabotage her opponent’s systems quickly and efficiently. A pneumatic fist, perhaps? She could overcome her mech’s lack of speed with a pressure-­charged punch. That could work; though she would need to calculate the recharge time between each punch. Perhaps one at the end of each arm?
    She pulled her drafting paper into her lap and scribbled a few notes, writing down a few other ideas—­electrified prongs, protractible saw-­blades, Darrow’s supercharged blowlamp. As much as she hated to take inspiration from her competition, she had no qualms against playing dirty, not when she had a score to settle with the other students.
    Rupert leaned close and looked over her shoulder as she sketched. He let out a low whistle. “Selby is going to regret letting you fight.”
    Petra set the designs on the desk. “What do you think?” she asked, pointing to the list of potential weapons. “Could we put this together?”
    â€œIf anyone could, you can,” he said with a grin.
    â€œThen let’s see what we can do.”
    By the end of the night, she had a rough draft sketched out for the new design—­mostly true to Rupert’s original design, with a few improvements and adjustments of her own. There were a few extra supplies she needed before she would be able to complete construction of some of the more complicated weaponry she had devised, but all things considered, she could build a workable, battle-­ready mech in time for the first fight, hopefully one sturdy enough to survive first contact with the enemy. It would be difficult, but with Rupert’s help, she was confident they could get it done.
    Once Rupert left the office for the evening, Petra remained behind, returning her attention to the war machine. She pulled her chair up to the desk and grabbed a fresh stack of drafting paper, her mind whirring with ideas now that she had a plan. She had been approaching the war machine all wrong, trying to create the best possible