EZ-018 Saicurtis
Type: Insect
Height: 3.7 Meters
Length: 11.9 Meters
Weight: 17.4 Tons
Top Speed: 390 km/h (flying) 210 km/h (running)

Equipment:
AZ Dual Beam Cannon
Twin Small-Bore Particle Beam Cannons
Frontal Strike Horn
Composite Sensor Unit
Twin Flexible Thruster Binders

Armour Description:
One of the first aerial Zoids created by the fledgling Guylos Empire, the Saicurtis is a lightweight scout and recon Zoid, made for zipping across the skies in search of information. It is a low altitude flying Zoid, meaning it is capable of flying to a height of 300 meters, but no more. The design of the Saicurtis also allows it to move on land, albeit at a reduced speed.

The Saicurtis, being both a flying and reconnaissance Zoid, has very light armour indeed, and not too much of it, mostly focused around the cockpit and the back. The back armour is separated into segmented plates that actually contain powerful Magnesser panels. When the armour is rasied, revealing the panels and the Flexible Thruster Binders, the Saicurtis can zip through the air, but this means that the delicate equipment is rendered vulnerable to attack. The actual structure of the Saicurtis is actually rather tough, as the Frontal Strike Horn has all sorts of supportive equipment and toughened apparatus worked through the Saicurtis.

Mobility and Power Source:
The Saicurtis, being an insect-type Zoid, sports excellent agility, able to move with ease on the ground, and turn on a dime. With six legs, this means that the Saicurtis can even afford to loose a few without an overly great reduction in agility. It can even move backwards at around 150 km/h, and of course, the back armour can be raised to utilize the Flexible Thruster Binders. These thruster units allow the Saicurtis to sideslip, strafe, and generally run rings around many other Zoids on the ground.

These Flexible Thruster Binders and the magnesser panels on the undersides of the back armour panels give the Saicurtis the ability to fly, meaning that it can weave and fly with incredible agility, even at its top speed. It can hover and spin in place using the panels and binders, and can do all sorts of wonderful things.

All of this wonderful agility is powered by the Zoid core, which is a rather small one, given that insects are not prone to burning prodigious amounts of energy in short periods of time. The core is an endurance model, designed to power the Saicurtis for longer periods of time, but sporting a rather slow recuperation rate. Because of this, it is unwise to run the Flexible Thruster Binders for more than six seconds at a time, with roughly equal recharge time after using them for any length of time. The same goes with the weapons, which happen to be rather power-hungry beam weapons. With the types of weapons they are, it is actually quite easy to stall the Saicurtis if you don’t use the weapons carefully.

AZ Dual Beam Cannon
Mounted on top of the Frontal Striker Horn, facing directly forwards, is this Dual Beam Cannon. Sporting a 35mm caliber, and able to shoot four times per second, this cannon is accurate out to a kilometer and highly useful for softening up a Zoid before coming in with the Striker Horn. Of course, being a beam weapon, it means that the Saicurtis will use up a lot of power and generate a rather large amount of heat if this weapon is fired at its maximum capabilities for too long. While flying, the heating problem is not an issue, due to air cooling, but energy consumption is always a delicate issue with such a Zoid as this.

Twin Small-Bore Particle Beam Cannons
Mounted on either side of the Saicurtis’ cockpit zone is a 30mm cannon capable of firing three shots a second. Able to rotate up and down 90 degrees, these cannons are excellent defensive cannons, but due to being beam weapons, these draw very heavily from the power supply of the Saicurtis, and so must be used with caution.

Frontal Strike Horn
The most obvious, and most unique, part of the Saicurtis’ weaponry is the five-meter-long toughened alloy strike horn that extends from the front of the Zoid. This horn is a large, long and flattened shape that ends in a flaring sort of scoop, on top of which is mounted the Dual Beam Cannon. This horn is excellent for slamming into enemies, but it has an even more useful ability. Incorporated into the base of the Strike Horn is a hydraulic system that allows the horn to piston forward, up, down, left or right to an angle of 45 degrees, with massive smashing force behind it. Due to the design of the horn, the front, left and right swings are very useful for cracking and splitting armour, because of the tapered edges.

The downward blow has been proved excellent for bringing Zoids to their knees, slamming down with such force that it feels like a Rev Raptor is being hurled down onto the Zoid. This means that the assaulted Zoid is brought down to the ground usually, due to the structural integrity being ruined by the sudden imparting of momentum. Of course, the most famous use for the Strike Horn is using the scoop shape it sports to hurl Zoids bodily into the air. Whilst it can’t really hurl Zoids heavier than 50 tons, anything less than this will be hurled over the top of the Saicurtis and behind it, usually to crash down with rather forceful impacts.

Composite Sensor Unit
Installed into the Saicurtis is a sensor package that provides it with an aerial radar and infrared tracking, for better accuracy. The aerial radar has a range of five kilometers, and maps terrain from a top-down view, including the Zoids on it. The more cluttered the terrain, the less useful the radar is.

Twin Flexible Thruster Binders
Attached to the back of the Saicurtis, protected beneath the Magnesser Shell Panels, are two thruster units that each provide it with 50km/h of thrust whilst in the air and allow it to become airborne. While exposed to attack, the open placement of the thrusters allows them to be easily pivoted, for good movement. The movement of the thrusters is linked, so they both move the same way.