He looked forward to seeing the best that FEMA City had to offer in a fair fight.
Chapter Seventy-Nine
His boots touched the bottom of the shaft and he shifted aside a little more as the rest of his men carved into the mechs that tried to hold the elevator area against them. They wore the same kinds of mechs and colors as those they had fought on the surface but there were fewer than the Prophet imagined there would be.
This close to the city, he would have thought they would have put more numbers into the defense, especially as the chambers grew smaller and tighter.
Thus far, the Desert Warriors experienced little difficulty. They thoroughly outnumbered the group they were attacking. The defenders struggled to retreat and assume defensive positions, but they weren't given any room to maneuver. Swords and buzz saws shredded their armor and spat showers of sparks that illuminated the chamber they pushed into.
"I really thought they would put more resistance down here," the Prophet grumbled and scanned the surroundings as he reloaded his assault rifle.
Of course, Robert7 hadn't known what they could expect with these defenses, which was perfectly reasonable. The young pilot hadn’t been privy to the strategic planning and tactics, after all. It merely meant that whatever they encountered this deep into the city's defenses, they would simply have to find a way to push through or around it.
For now, they waited for Jessica13's team to make their impact. Not that he expected them to make it this soon but a part of him had hoped they might. He would have preferred to maintain the momentum rather than have even a few moments to think.
The last of the fighters of the company that had been the first to engage the Desert Warriors were taken apart, prevented from retreating, and killed. They didn't even try to surrender, of course, which left his troops with no choice but to kill them to a man.
He wasn't sure where his sudden doubts about the decision came from. Maybe he had spent too much time around Hammerhand and his Knights and their morality had begun to rub off on him. It was all well and good in this area in the world but it would get them killed in the desert when they returned.
If they returned.
The Prophet steeled himself as they worked to get the elevators functioning once more. The last of the Desert Warriors were allowed to descend, which gave them the chance to fully repair and put their mechs together again before they turned their attention to the massive gate that now impeded their passage.
He couldn't help the feeling that they had merely cleared the chaff from the wheat, the scraps from the larger force they were about to face when they pushed through the barriers.
They could only be described as gates and stood almost three times as tall as his mech and wide enough for ten mechs to march through shoulder to shoulder. Grapplers were fired into and attached to the gates, and the groups combined their efforts to pull them open.
There was some resistance as the magnetic locks tried to keep them closed, but the strength of dozens of mechs was enough to accomplish their goal.
His eyes narrowed, he zoomed in on the group that had already assumed formation on the other side of the chamber revealed behind the gates.
The cavern looked natural, although it was supported by massive columns. Lighting appeared to come from the ceiling by way of nuclear-powered lamps.
The Prophet had never seen this much space that wasn't out in the open. Whoever had built it had likely found these caverns already formed and made use of them. Otherwise, he couldn't begin to imagine the amount of work that would go into the excavation required for something of this magnitude.
The troop they faced looked a good deal more formidable than those they had encountered earlier, even though they were far inferior in number.
For one thing, they looked more organized.
Four companies of four Quadrupeds each were formed up in front of another gate. They were massive, larger even than the Excalibur Hammerhand piloted. They were painted all in black, and from what he could see, they carried more armor than most Quadrupeds did—which was saying something since they were the heaviest mechs ever produced.
A couple of assault mechs and two heavy mechs that supported them almost seemed tiny by comparison.
A few other modifications were discernible but he couldn't make out the details. Still, the attack had come this far and he had no intention to stop now. They would find a way through them.
"Form up, you sons of bitches!" the Prophet called to his troops and leveled his assault rifle at the mechs opposite him. The Desert Warriors moved in beside him and set their shields up for an advance. They stood about fifty meters away from their adversaries, which meant a short charge. Once they were in close enough, his men were better prepared for melee combat than the huge Quadrupeds.
Something groaned behind them, and he turned quickly as the gates they had opened now closed again behind them with a heavy thump.
It appeared that they were trapped in the chamber with the defenders, an interesting proposition although not something he’d expected.
He turned to face the enemy when they began to beat mechanical fists against something positioned at their sides. Low, deep chants emitted from the mechs themselves as they took a step forward and set themselves into place.
One by one, they pushed the heavy metal plates that were at their sides out in front to act like shields. They were a good deal thicker and taller than those the Desert Warriors carried. The mechs shuffled a little closer and sections of the shields interlocked to form a perfectly solid barrier between the attackers and the gate behind them.
The Prophet suppressed a hint of trepidation. Even with those shields, they were still at a disadvantage when it came to melee combat. Once his troops closed the distance, gaps would be found or made as necessary and they would break through the lines.
"My warriors!" he called, raised his rifle, and lowered it slowly to point at the opposing shield wall. "Give them hell!"
A low roar issued from the men as they began their advance without horns or fanfare. They could almost taste victory.
He’d no sooner thought that when the Quadrupeds tightened their formation and adjusted their shields. Gaps were created around ten meters from the ground and once they appeared, huge barrels emerged.
A strong sense of foreboding swept over him, but he steeled himself and continued the advance with his warriors.
The first volley felt like an earthquake ripped through the room and clouds of dust puffed loose from the ceiling.
The rounds savaged his group. Their shields offered little resistance and huge holes allowed the ordnance to plow into the mechs that were behind them. Chunks of metal exploded from the impact, and mechs fell to pieces, unable to withstand the force.
"Shit!" He growled his frustration and fury. The reason for shutting the gates behind them now made sense since there was no cover between them and the attackers. Their shields wouldn’t do them any good, and all they could count on was their mobility to avoid complete annihilation.
The Prophet scowled and hastily scanned their surroundings as another volley of rounds obliterated their shields and felled a group of his warriors. The floor shuddered beneath their feet in a series of aftershocks.
"Evasive maneuvers!" he shouted over the comms, and his men were only too glad to comply. They immediately broke formation and separated to make use of as much room as the cavern gave them while they advanced.
The fact that there was no retreat available to them was known to every member, so the only way was forward and through. Of course, there was no way through, not unless Jessica13 and Robert7's team did what they had been sent to do.
"Don't you dumbasses let me down," he muttered and hoped they would somehow hear him. His heart heavy, he pushed his Argonaut forward to attack.
Chapter Eighty
There was no other place for the central control facility to be. It stood at the dead center of the city and its structure rose like the spire directly above
it. Although considerably less impressive, of course, it was still extremely effective.
It was likely in place to control the spire and would be exactly what the Prophet needed to aid in his assault.
Jessica13 slipped into the Minato and moved them toward the entrance. They had expected defenses but the sight of a couple of assault mechs standing at the ready at the front of the building made her take a quick step back.
"Do you have any suggestions?" Mini asked.
She shook her head. "Nope. How about you?"
"I do, but I didn't want to step on any metaphorical toes in case you had something in mind."
"The mech is yours."
"That is appreciated."
Mini took control and guided the Minato into the open street ahead of the control facility. He kept to the shadows as the two mechs appeared to be very much on the alert thanks to the shrill alarms that continued to blare through the city. All the citizens had apparently been drawn into their homes for safety, which made this maneuver far simpler.
After a moment, she had an idea of what Mini attempted to do. He snuck in closer to the tall building and deliberately added enough stealth to the movement to make sure the two guards would see them.
They wouldn’t ask questions, not when a strange mech with no known markings appeared while the entire city was on high alert. They immediately swung their weapons, aimed quickly, and opened fire.
Mini was already on the move. He darted to the right and immediately to the left before he shifted seamlessly into Bulletfoot mode and bounded off the wall with all four limbs and landed in front of the two defensive mechs.
They fired where the Minato had been rather than where it had gone, and most of their rounds missed. A few connected but deflected off the armor. The AI had brought them in a little too close for comfort, but she already knew what her role was. She disconnected the dart from their grappler, waited, and braced herself inside the cockpit.
He shoulder-charged the closer of the two mechs, shoved it to the side, and resumed the Minato’s bipedal stance as she immediately aimed the grappler's air gun into the chest of the other mech and fired.
It was enough to make them stagger a couple of steps and hopefully make the enemy assume that the tiny support mech had rethought the concept of attacking the assault mechs.
The Minato turned tail and sprinted away while it lowered to all fours and remained mobile enough to make sure they couldn't land any solid strikes. Mini moved quickly and constantly to prevent their opponents from finding solid aim while he forced them to immediately begin pursuit.
Both of them obliged and she reminded herself it was a good thing. That was the aim, after all.
As they circled into the dead-end street where they'd started, Jessica13 clutched the controls of the mech a little tighter—not to take control but to keep herself from being thrown around the cockpit when Mini punched up and forced them into a vertical leap.
The two mechs rushed in and opened fire as soon as they were around the corner. They stopped shooting immediately, however, and seemed confused by the lack of a target in the street that supposedly had no exit.
"Well played." She chuckled and felt a little breathless.
"Your compliment is noted and appreciated."
As the assault mechs moved deeper into the alley and tried to determine where the Minato had disappeared to, another two assault mechs clambered down the sides of the building using the cord she had sacrificed from her grappler. They moved fast so stealth wasn't an option, and the two assault mechs turned quickly but were unalarmed by mechs wearing their colors.
More descended from all sides, and it wasn't long before the two guard mechs were captured and forced slowly to the ground. Their weapons were removed and handed to some of the other mechs.
Hammerhand stood over them and aimed his assault rifle into their cockpits.
"You have two choices," he told them briskly. "Climb out yourselves or be carried out as corpses."
It wasn't much of a choice, and both pilots were quick to follow the man's instructions. They scrambled through the open hatches and slipped out and were quickly overpowered by a group of convicts. A couple of the prisoners climbed into the recently vacated mechs and added to their numbers of effective fighters, and Jessica13 moved out from the alley toward the control facility. She doubted they only had a couple of mechs in place to defend it but getting inside was a vital first step.
"Hammerhand," she called over their newly created comm channel. "Head back to the Knights. I have the feeling the Prophet will need your help."
"Do you think his attack is going well?"
"I'll take the fact that the alarms are still blaring as a good sign."
"Fair enough. Good luck, Jessie."
"Right back at you."
Chapter Eighty-One
More than anything, Jessica13 wanted to join the Knights. She felt like she had been apart from them for far too long, and when Hammerhand headed away to liberate his people and lead them into combat again, it didn't feel right. Everything in her said she should be with them but instead, she had to continue to sneak around the damn place.
She hesitated for a moment and watched from a distance as he broke through the fences that kept the prisoners contained. The captives themselves either expected something like this or were simply quick to take advantage and the few guards that remained were quickly overwhelmed.
They did call in for help and a group of mechs began to advance, but those mechs led by Hammerhand overwhelmed them efficiently and easily. He clearly had capturing the mechs in mind, and those under his command grappled the newcomers to the floor, disarmed them, and once again offered them the chance to exit their mechs peacefully or in pieces.
"What are you waiting for?" Robert7 asked when he noticed her hesitation.
"It’s only—nothing. It's nothing. Let's get this over with."
The conical building looked like it had been one of the first set up in the city, given the Cities-That-Were type of architecture, not unlike how things had been in the tunnels. There was a uniformity to it, however, and it was certainly better maintained than the subterranean passages had been. Sculptures of angels were carved into pale white marble and circled toward what appeared to be the only way up—a flight of stairs.
The walls were painted with a variety of angelic beings, from tall ones with swords and large wings to smaller ones that looked like babies with tiny wings and bows with arrows tipped with heart-shaped heads. All were illuminated by the light that streamed through stained-glass windows that added extra color to the whole structure.
They were all artistically decorated and for some reason, they were all naked too. She didn't quite understand that part, but who was she to question the artistic preferences of the people who had built it?
They moved rapidly up the steps, although it was almost instantly apparent that this was the only route to the top and there was a long, long way to go.
"Why don't you hop on the back?" she suggested and her companion complied with no small sense of relief.
The paintings and sculptures were less prolific the higher they went, although they didn’t vanish completely. It seemed like it somehow depicted an ascent that not all these angelic beings were capable of making. Whether it was intended to be a metaphor about the difficulty of reaching the top of the spire or not, it seemed fairly relevant.
"I detect more mechs ahead," Mini said and brought up a highlighted section of the steps where she identified two of the same kind of assault mechs standing guard at the top of the staircase.
Jessica13 scowled deeply. "Let me guess—you have a plan for this one too?"
"I think I have the same kind of plan you would have had," Mini replied. "We could use the windows."
"It seems a shame to break them. They're beautiful."
He had no response to that. Either he had no concept of what made art beautiful or he was focused on how they could use the windows to their benefit in the f
ight.
Either way, they needed to get the job done. The defenders most likely already knew someone was coming up the steps and would already have trained their weapons in anticipation of their entering range.
"You might want to dismount," Mini suggested to Robert7 and once again, he did as he was told. The mech shifted to all fours and surged up the last rounds of the steps.
As they came into view of the two mechs, Mini bounded onto the wall above one of the windows and shifted to regular mode in midair. He had timed the leap and already had the grappler primed and ready. It fired and launched its dart to catch the mech on the right. When it embedded itself securely, the AI twisted the mech's torso, pulled the captive, and yanked it down the steps.
It stumbled and tried to regain its balance before it tumbled down three more steps and shattered one of the gorgeous stained-glass windows before it spun out of the building and plummeted.
Mini twisted to land on all fours again as the remaining mech opened fire at them. Bullets punched chunks of marble from the structure around them as the Minato bounded up the remaining steps, leapt over their adversary, and kicked off from the wall above it.
The AI twisted again and launched the Minato against the defending mech while it still attempted to pivot to reengage. The smaller support mech managed to squeeze between the assault mech and the heavy wooden door it defended and used its legs to launch the heavier one down the steps and through the same window his comrade had fallen through.
Momentum and the same push had reduced the door behind them to splinters and they launched through to the other side and landed a little awkwardly. Fortunately, they regained their balance quickly.
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