Once both pilots signaled that they were ready for the match to begin, the broadcast started and the Mech Battling Federation's signature music sang out over the NETCOM system. "Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to this special MBF pay-per-view broadcast event! I'm Clinton Slough, bringing you live to the Long Marsh where the Malrain kids are already looking ready to face their mystery opponents! A lot of speculation's been going around as to what kind of duo could take on such a team: both son and daughter to the legendary Mattias Malrain, Alister has been consistently at the top of the scoreboards for the last several seasons, and little sister Mira's already made quite a showing coming into to her very first season with us!<br/><br/>"But speak of the devil, it looks like it's time to reveal our opposing team!" The announcer went silent as, rather than entering through the normal hanger doors at the edge of the field, a massive, spherical mech (http://www.mahq.net/mecha/zoe/zoe2/zakat.jpg) descended onto the battlefield from the clouds above, easily far larger than any mech the league had seen before. The technology it was crafted from was top-of-the-line, employing anti-gravity in both its movement and its structure and looking like something that would take years and millions of dollars to develop.<br/><br/>"Yes, ladies and gentlemen, for the first time, the MBF is allowing a multi-pilot unit to be tested for entry into the brackets! For decades, the rulebook has banned this set-up, but with a new era of space exploration right on the horizon, we're ready to test new limits of what our technology can do! The behemoth marvel of machinery you see before you is known as the Hades, and it has pilots with the credentials to match its power! The main pilot in charge of the mech's maneuverability is the best in the world when it comes to handling the largest Mobile Weapons around, champion of the Texan Monsterweight League for the past two years, the new major league-comer Hobo McCree! And in charge of the Hades' nearly endless weapons systems is a man of our own fold, veteran strong-armer and heavy-hitter of the MBF, weaponmaster Alex Axelson!<br/><br/>"Now it's nearly time for the match to begin! Let's listen in and see what our pilots have to say to each other!"<br/><br/><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Spoiler: Click to Show/Hide</div><div class="spoiler_body">For size comparison, here's an average-sized mech fighting the one this one is taken from:<br/><br/>Jehuty vs Zakat (Zone of the Enders 2) (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcHYT7jAxV0#ws)</div></div>---<br/><br/>(Works for me.)<br/><br/>Anastasia was in a sunken mood as she walked the beach that evening, trying to relax and clear her head of the whole Jillian situation. Normally, the purple-haired girl wouldn't have missed the opportunity to be home watching the match of epic proportions that was promised to unfold between the Malrains and some mystery mech, but she couldn't focus on such things when she was still unable to decide whether she was guilty or angry with Jillian for what had gone down about a week ago, or just angry with herself. Mainly, she was trying to decide whether or not to call her and see if they were still going to be running together the following morning.<br/><br/>As she thought this over, she soon found herself bumping into Jareth (almost literally), surprised to see a friendly face around here. "Oh, Jareth! I thought you would be busy spectating tonight's match or something."