#tarren's a sentinel engineer loaned to argist by the aseran corps for their understanding of the oceans effects on sentinels

[transgenderenkidu]

ok since i posted about it last night, i might as well finally debut my comicaurora sentinel au, even if my drawings for it are. not fully realized

in this chimerae are a localized disaster event that can spring up anywhere, draining the life energy for a mile around. in response (in accordance with the rule of cool), cities built the sentinel corps, giant robots to fight off chimerae before they destroy the city.

more under the cut

kendal is one of these sentinels, a relatively recently developed mark III whose pilot is vash fairblade, captain of the sentinels. there aren't any city gods in this au, so vash is just a guy. why does he have the same name as the city? bc i didnt want to change it. anyway. after a while, kendal develops something of an active mind instead of just being a giant robot¹, mimicking vash's own mind. and then a wave of chimerae attack the city, destroying it, killing vash, and leaving kendal the only remaining sentinel. in the midst of the destruction, though, he could have sworn he saw a woman, unruffled, just... watching.

the sun is on its way down when alinua finds the corpse. or, more accurately, she finds the sentinel. the pilot is still tangled in the cockpit, sentinel curled around him like it was trying to protect him. the corpse is of course vash, and the sentinel is kendal.

alinua still has the 'chimeric plague' (here hypothesized to be the cause of chimera events), and the only reason she goes with him is that a. hes inorganic (can't be affected by the life outburst) and b. if she does cause a chimera event, hes literally a giant robot designed for the specific purpose of fighting chimerae. and besides, vash the city is destroyed. there won't be any collateral damage.

sidebar, alinua can pilot kendal. it's a team effort - now that ive watched pacific rim, i think its a little like drifting if your jaeger also could think. tbh i also think canon kendal and alinua are drift compatible, but thats another post for another time

dainix is another mech pilot, though not willingly - zuurith's sentinel corps is not Exclusively prison labor, but what does it matter if a few prisoners die of brain hemmhorages while piloting? dainix, piloting the sentinel "champion", is the longest lasting prisoner pilot they've had, and he's brutally effective. there are murmurings that he'll be released and placed in the sentinel corps as a citizen, but if he is ever released he'd fuck off in a heartbeat, so he's still in prison, sentence artificially extended for as long as he's useful.

i'm still a little uncertain as to what kind of roles erin, tess, and falst play, so if anyone's got any ideas i'd be delighted to hear them!!