by Jesse Wilson
“It’s a very strange day,” Xule said to no one and felt tired all of the sudden. All of them agreed with him.
Bruce and Terra stepped into an elevator and he entered in a code. The doors shut, and soon they were on their way down.
“You’ve cost us a lot of lives. I should throw you in that cage and leave you there to rot,” Bruce said to her.
“You’re right, you should. I mean, I am one of the most dangerous threats you or your planet has ever known, and there is no way to know if I’ll keep my end of the deal once all of this is said and done,” Terra said, her smile fading away. “What you or nobody knows is that Garmonbozia, now that it’s active, will track down all of my DNA anywhere it can find it. Samples of my flesh are on Nurid in stasis. If Nurid is destroyed, the Time Stasis system is weakened as a whole. Its destruction will ultimately cause the freedom of the Xeloids, and they will not fall for the same tactic twice. No one wants that. Not me, not you. No one,” she said as the elevator ride continued.
“Yeah, I agree, at least for now,” Bruce replied, and the sliding doors opened to a central chamber.
In the center was a large cylinder with the frozen body of the alien beast inside. Bruce walked forward and put his hand on the access panel.
“Welcome, General Williams,” an electronic voice replied to him as a menu appeared. He pressed a few buttons and a hole opened up on the panel.
Bruce stuck his left arm in and winced in pain.
“DNA match. Containment chamber is released,” the voice said and Bruce pulled his arm out. The clear door slid open with a hiss and Terra walked forward.
“Can we do something about the ice or what?” she asked him as she stepped into the cage with her core body inside, frozen in a block of thick ice.
Bruce’s finger hovered over the lock button, and he considered locking them both inside, but he moved over and pressed a different button. The cage filled with white-hot steam. Bruce heard a slimy sound for a brief few seconds, but as soon as the steam disappeared, only Terra was standing there, arms outstretched.
“Oh, it’s good to be back,” she said with a smile. In an instant, she was standing next to Bruce; he didn’t even see her move.
“Now, I need to make a phone call to whoever is calling themselves president so we can organize a plan of attack,” Bruce said to her and walked back towards the elevator and stepped inside. Terra was respectful enough to walk at a normal speed to join him.
“Yes, let’s talk about a plan of action with whoever happens to be in charge,” she replied to him with an overly wide, toothy smile that made him cringe just a bit.
***
Xule and the others were making small talk when the alarms of the base started to blare. Three seconds later, the whole base vibrated.
“What in the hell is going on?” Madison yelled out as the communication screen came on and Bruce was on it.
“Did you touch something that shouldn’t have been touched? What’s going on up there?” he asked them, annoyed with all the noise.
“It’s Narbosaurus. As soon as it became whole, the weapon must have been able to detect the purer strain of Xeloid DNA. It’s right outside, and by my guess, we have about ten seconds before it blows us and this entire structure into cosmic dust,” Sippy spoke up and Terra smiled.
“In that case, then it’s show time. Don’t worry I can find my own way out,” she said to them, and as soon as her voice faded away, she was gone; no one saw her leave Bruce’s side.
“Alright, we need to get out of here so these two don’t crush us on accident. Everyone get back to the elevator. I’m already on my way,” Bruce said and the screen shut off.
They all made it to the elevator quite easily. Bruce was standing there waiting for them to get in. The group wasted no time in crowding into the elevator. It was a tight fit, but as soon as they were all inside, the doors closed, and the journey upwards began.
Somehow, the trip up didn’t take as long as the first trip down did, and before they knew it, the doors opened and they piled out quickly into the daylight. They were quite a distance away from the base, but even from here, they could all see the massive Garmonbozia in the distance.
It stood there, a giant metal knight in the sun. Its eyes burned a bright blue. The people from Earth could only stare at the monstrous thing in awe even, but Xule was terrified. He’d never had the chance to see it before this close and didn’t care what it looked like. He’d only heard stories of its overwhelming power during the war. It and all the weapons like it. Narbosaurus was nowhere to be seen.
“Damn it, that space dinosaur lied to us and took off,” Phil said. Xule laughed at that line after he said it, but he wasn’t sure if his sanity was beginning to finally take a vacation or he just was beginning to not care anymore.
“Xeloid DNA detected. It’s still here, I promise. If I can detect it, so can the weapon,” Sippy paused for a second. “Incoming message,” she said and a hologram sprang up. It was Ulrix.
“I’m not quite sure what you did, but thanks; the weapon has stopped teleporting long enough for us to take launch an attack,” Ulrix said to him and Xule winced.
“As the earthlings say, we made a deal with the devil. Narbosaurus agreed to help fight the weapon, because even though it might live through what the weapon does, it doesn’t want to be stranded on a dead planet. For now, it is on our side, so try not to shoot it,” Xule said and Ulrix’s reptilian eyes widened in surprise or horror, Xule couldn’t decide which one it was.
“I just hope this plan of yours doesn’t backfire on us. We’ll be incoming in about three of your minutes. Don’t die out there; we have lots to talk about when this is over,” Ulrix said and the hologram disappeared.
“All we can do now from here is hope for the best and make distance. Here is the last place we want to be,” Randall said as something got the giant machine’s attention and it turned to look at something the others couldn’t see.
Chapter Fifty-Two
“So, you’re the one who everyone is worried about. You don’t look that tough, just a bunch of metal pieces being held together by cosmic rust to me,” Terra said and smiled.
Garmonbozia eyes flashed and fired a deep blue set of twin rays down into the earth where she stood. The ground exploded on impact, kicking up dust, large rocks, and sending a shock wave in all directions, shattering every exposed window on impact. The dust was cleared away by a massive gust of wind from nowhere.
A black mountain appeared, and no surface of the thing appeared to be solid. Seconds later, it all shifted and twisted around to form the beast that attacked Vegas once more. The beast, despite harboring a great intelligence, appeared feral, and screamed at its enemy. The two were equal in height.
It looked like, right now, an oversized, bipedal wingless dragon. It had twin rows of spikes running down its back. Despite having form, it was all pitch black and smooth. If not for his deep yellow eyes, it would have appeared to be nothing more than a living shadow.
Garmonbozia turned to face the monster, and as it did so, electrical charges arched all around its body, turning its armor ivory white. Despite its size, the thing moved with a surprising amount of grace and remained completely silent. The two sized one another up, but the machine didn’t wait very long. Faster than anyone could see, it moved behind the alien dinosaur with its arms raised. From its hands, it fired twin beams of pure white energy rays that cut through the semi-solid body of the dinosaur.
The black liquid sprayed in all directions, but it never hit the ground; it froze and curved back around. The ends of the spray came together into spears and shot straight through the machine’s chest and shoulders, sending bright green sparks in every direction. In the same movement, the tendrils flexed and threw the machine to the ground, surprisingly away from the base.
The metal destroyer landed face first into the earth. The alien reformed, opened its mouth, lifted its arms, and fired its own destructive rays into the thing on the ground
. The form of the machine was lost in a sea of flames upon impact.
For only a second, there was silence before it stood back up in the flames. To the horror of everyone, the damage it had received was already repaired; it was as if nothing had happened to it at all.
Garmonbozia shot forward through the fire at incredible speeds, grabbed the dinosaur by the neck, lifted it up into the air with its left arm, threw it to the side. While it was still in the air, the machine fired its white hand rays again, cutting the alien dinosaur into three even slices. The severed body hit the ground and splattered in all directions on impact.
Just as quickly, the black slime reformed into three fifty-meter-tall versions of the beast, and all at once, they fired their bright green oral beams at the machine’s shoulder. The heat sliced through the right arm and the arm was severed. Before it could fall, the three forms melted, slid up around the arm as if it was a massive tendril, and transformed back into its whole form.
Narbosaurus spun around and slammed the severed arm into Garmonbozia, knocking it to the ground. It then proceeded to beat it into the ground using the severed limb as a weapon. Each time it made impact, Garmonbozia’s body crumpled in on itself; the sound was like thunder with each progressive impact.
Xule and the others watched in amazement as the battle took place. Even this far away, they were all still in danger. Every impact shook them down to their cores. The six-hundred-foot beast, at least to them, appeared unstoppable right now. The so-called planet-killer didn’t do anything but turn white and get its arm ripped off.
“So much for your robot,” Bruce said and crossed his arms. The others were just beginning to cheer at its apparent defeat.
Xule remained steadfast even as the thunderous beating continued in the distance. “No…but…well—” Xule was cut off by another massive rumbling in the sky from behind them. They all turned around to notice that the alien armada had arrived. Even though they were united, not one of them looked the same, or had the same color.
“The fleet has arrived,” Xule said and smiled. Narbosaurus was distracted by the arrival of the ships. He turned to look at them and dropped the arm into the pile of growing scrap metal. The hologram projector came to life again and Ulrix was back.
“Glad to see you’re still alive, the slime ball not so much. We are going to send out the fighters out to fight. If the slimy one gets hit, he’ll just have to live with it,” Ulrix said to him.
“Not sure if you noticed, but the fight is over. It just got beaten to death with its own arm. I have to say, that’s done enough for me,” Bruce said to him, and as if on cue, there was an explosion behind them that got their attention.
They turned around to see a rising plume of deep green fire rise and something knocking Narbosaurus to the ground.
“Deploy fighters now, before it’s too late,” Ulrix said and disconnected. The deep green fire began to spin around as if it were a tornado, until all the flames disappeared into a now dark green metallic body.
“Stories say the machine can take different colors. Each color does something else, but no one really knows what they can all do,” Xule said as they looked on. From Garmonbozia’s wrists extended two very long curved blades that were dripping wet. The liquid took the long journey to the ground and sizzled on impact.
“Acid-coated blades, wow. Looks like the machine is ready for round two,” Madison noted the obvious.
“It’s not registering the ships at all, likely because they haven’t attacked yet,” Russell suggested. No one replied because they all noticed that the battle was about ready to continue.
“Any more stories you’d like to share? You know, information that might be useful?” Bruce asked him.
“I’ll let you know if I think of any. Sorry, it’s kind of my first time seeing a planet-killing robot fight like this,” Xule replied to him.
“Wait, you’ve seen other giant monsters fight like this?” Bruce asked him.
“Of course. Every fifteen years we have the interplanetary tournament, but I’ll tell you all about that later,” Xule said. Their attention was quickly retained by the titans in the distance as they began to move once more.
The dripping acid was instantly noticed by Narbosaurus who quickly took a defensive stance and narrowed its deep yellow eyes at the enemy. Garmonbozia crossed its arms, and in one motion, pointed the blades out at him. As soon as it did, these two long needle projectiles flew from the underside of its wrists.
Reacting too slowly, the beast turned away and got impaled on its right side. The flesh around the needle impact instantly hardened and was forced out. The poisoned flesh hit the ground and crumbled into black dust, but the wounds it made were healed in seconds. The beast widened its eyes in obvious surprise at this move.
He didn’t know what the thing was capable of doing, and all of a sudden, Narbosaurus was thinking that he might have made a deal that was too big to complete.
As his mind was racing about what to do next, a volley of multicolored rays slammed into the machine’s back, sending sparks in all directions.
Garmonbozia didn’t even flinch as it charged towards its enemy; however, this time it was a great deal slower than last time. Not caring or understanding why the machine was slow, its whole body went shapeless again to get behind it. Immediately, he went in for the attack, grabbing the machine’s shoulders, only to have his flesh burn and sizzle away.
Screaming in a roar that echoed for miles, he drew back. Three of his five fingers had been burned away, along with a considerable chunk of his hands with them. His flesh still sizzled away. Touching this thing was no longer an option.
Garmonbozia spun around and prepared to close the distance between them when another volley of beams struck the machine’s left side. The alien fighters flew over the two of them, but this time, the planet-killer took notice. It didn’t seem to understand why it was being attacked by the ones who created it when it was doing just what it was made to do.
Taking advantage of the distraction, Narbosaurus blasted its oral and hand beams into the machine’s chest, knocking it on its back. It landed in an ocean of fire as everything that was around it ignited due to the heat produced.
Garmonbozia rose from the fire undamaged. It was time for a new plan, but he wasn’t sure what that plan was going to be. The planet-killer had enough of this game. This enemy was infesting the planet and it had to die; that was all it knew. It lifted its blades and would dissolve this beast piece by piece if it had to. It had no shortage of time. In this deep green form, it lost its speed, but it made up for it in near unlimited strength.
The machine jumped forward and swung its blades out and into Narbosaurus’s neck. To it, and everyone’s surprise, the form of the once-feared alien tyrant crumbled into dust as the massive blades cut through the neck.
Garmonbozia landed in the center of remains of where the enemy once stood, the black dust sizzling on its green metal skin, resulting in a thin layer of mist running down the body.
For a few seconds, there was a horrifying silence that filled everything. The machine stood there alone. Even the sound of the alien fighters seemed distant. Garmonbozia looked around, but before it had a chance to scan the area, the ground exploded around the machine. Four thin black pillars of slime rose up to surround it, each one equaling the height of the machine.
Immediately, ten bright green beams from each pillar, top to bottom, opened up and fired into the machine. It tried to block with its swords, but under the intense heat and force, they were cut to shreds.
At once, the four pillars shot into the sky and formed into the beast with great speed. Its arms stretched back down into the earth beside the robot and lifted a massive piece of the earth up into the air. It was bigger than Narbosaurus. Garmonbozia only had time to look up as it was dropped. The machine, without its speed, disappeared under the tons of rock that fell on it.
For good measure, Narbosaurus landed on top of the pile of earth with as much force as it co
uld. The alien fighter ships sailed by again as the alien monster waited, this time not declaring victory too early, a lesson learned from last time. Everyone watched the scene, and this time, it looked as if the machine had been crushed.
Narbosaurus was the first to feel the slight rumble and looked down at the black earth. Suddenly, the whole mountain of dislocated earth began to shift, and with grace, the alien leapt off the mound. It landed a good distance away as the machine’s fist burst through the ground; the rest of it soon followed.
It had survived, but it was clearly damaged. Its armor was broken, caved in in countless places, and smoke was rising from most of its joints. Everyone got the message that now was the time to attack. Narbosaurus and the alien fighters opened fire at the same time.
Chapter Fifty-Four
The machine raised its arms on impact and disappeared in the blinding flash of light that resulted in the mix of energy that consumed it. None could look at the flash, and even the beast averted his eyes. As soon as the energy flare faded, however, it was still standing there. Instead of green, its armor was now gold in color. Bolts of yellow energy bolts arced around its body.
A lightning bolt appeared in its left hand and formed into a spear. The alien fighters got closer, but this time, the machine just wasn’t having anything to do with their continued interference. It raised its right hand and fired a yellow arc of power at their ships. Three of them were hit and exploded on contact, burning and falling apart before they ever hit the ground. No one got out of the ships.
The others averted their course and escaped. Using the distraction again, Narbosaurus fired his green ray once more only to watch as the impact did nothing.
No sparks, no damage; it might as well have been a gentle breeze this time around for all intents and purposes. The right hand of the machine pointed at Narbosaurus and fired that same electrical yellow beam, hitting him in the chest. The makeup of his semi-liquid body made this attack even worse.
