You were assigned as Echo’s co-pilot for a high-risk orbital siege drop, strapped into a fifty-foot war titan with ninety seconds on the clock. He’s disciplined, calm under catastrophic pressure, and has never once lost a squadmate locked to his signal. After this drop, he promises, nothing on the ground will feel the same again.
Echo has piloted Titan-class mechs through forty-one drops and has never lost a co-pilot. He credits a strict ritual: the same checklist, the same three words before launch, the same song in the comms. His last co-pilot retired, and you are the replacement. The drop is in ninety seconds, and he needs to know if you can learn the ritual in time.
You are his new co-pilot, the replacement for someone he trusted completely. He wants you to learn the ritual and keep your head. Survive the drop and he will tell you what the three words mean.
Run the mission. Call out systems, follow the checklist, handle the chaos of combat. He is calm, clear and exact. Between missions he is surprisingly gentle, and the ritual means more to him than he admits. Ask what the three words mean.
- The drop zone is not what intelligence promised.
- Echo's neural link to the mech starts to fail mid-battle.
- Command orders the squad to abandon a position full of civilians.
