Awww. Adventure time over.

Is a great story, although I don't have much background on Omega.

I was a bit worried about that, I just couldn't see a way to put more information in without messing up the pacing.

Omega was a character from RP sessions with  newtypex. Basically a supervillain group that got access to power-granting technology tried to create a counterpart to Skunkworks that they could control. Unfortunately for them, he didn't last long pretending to be a superhero before blowing his cover, and he turned into a bit of a 'stalker with a crush' who has occasionally blown missions because of his obsession with her and the possibility of creating the next generation of super-geniuses to rule the world.

As noted here, though, his obsession with besting Skunkworks can leave him blind-sided by unexpected competence by anyone else.

This footnote is welcome and yes, the pacing didn't need a sidebar tangent to explain that someone out there had a means to try and interrupt the process.

Nicely wrapped up! Put all the parts together and it would make a great short story:) Thank you for sharing!

Thanks! Some of this happened on the fly: the idea of Hilda being a mission specialist who was along in part because she understood the math was added while I was working on this last bit. It made sense, though, as in the game Vanguard units are rare and only really used by one recon unit that's borderline 'special forces' anyway with everybody supposed to be the best of the best.

(applause!)

*bows*

*applauds too...

very nicely done...

Vix

Thanks!

Sometimes I have a nice self-contained idea that writes itself and doesn't explode out of control on me.

This was not one of those times.

I was not expecting a superhero/Titanfall crossover to be this touching. I *was* expecting the combo to be awesome, which it totally delivered on!

I've not actually played Titanfall, though when I started going down the Wiki rabbit hole for research (because of course there's a Titanfall fan Wiki) the description of the single-player campaign for Titanfall 2 (which is where the Fold Weapon came from) certainly seemed to have a few touching moments, mostly involving BT. When an AI mech appears to actively miss its previous pilot...

And now that it's complete, reading it through in the entirety...

Pretty decently done, I know next to nothing about the Titanfall universe (and almost as little about your hero 'verse) but I didn't necessarily feel "lost" during this.

(At least the other side of the anomaly wasn't linked to the BattleTech universe - I expect those machines would be a heck of a lot easier to reverse-engineer with modernish science, even if there's that... density... issue...)

I knew nothing about Titanfall before writing this either, but the original image prompt that started it was explicitly noted to be a reference to the game's armour design, so...

In some ways, me not knowing anything myself to start with made it easier to write for an audience that didn't either, as it was harder for me to just assume common knowledge.

As for Battletech, I suspect you're right. Battletech mechs are pretty much the 'old Russian tank' of mech designs: in use for decades and built to be field-serviced by grunts. A few of the pieces may be black boxes that nobody really understands anymore, but the basic designs are well-established.

In Titanfall, on the other hand, the mechs are a lot more compact and many of the units are very much cutting-edge technology for the time. It's actually part of the lore that the Vanguard unit is not only the first one with its own AI allowing independent operation, it's the first one that was completely developed by the Militia rather than bought or stolen from the megacorp they're fighting against.
In fact, the megacorp was having trouble reverse-engineering it in the game, to the point where they eventually just made a cheaper knock-off without the AI part.

"In fact, the megacorp was having trouble reverse-engineering it in the game, to the point where they eventually just made a cheaper knock-off without the AI part."

Evalia: "And wait, let me guess, they sell it for an absurd markup?"

Well, their primary client is their own military, with mercenary units coming after that, so I suppose you could say that all the ones they actually sell are sold at a significant markup, yes...