by Vowron Prime
“He is,” Nova said firmly. “Regardless of what may have transpired in the past, his involvement is crucial for our continued success.”
“Then I shall suppress my resentment. For now. But I hope you appreciate the delicacy of my situation. Leaving a trail of blood, I overthrew the corrupt despots that ruled Sorath. I sought a better government, one that would fairly judge and try all its citizens, no matter how wealthy or poor. Magnus’s transgressions fly in the face of all that I have fought for, and I am utterly powerless to do anything about it.”
“I understand, Xika. Thank you for your patience. I swear to you that we are all working toward the same goal. Give Magnus a chance to make amends.”
The empress nodded, and they continued their stroll in silence, appreciating the breathtaking view of Kyron’s myriad lights from their unique vantage. Far in the distance, merchant caravans arriving at the city braved the cold, going about their business. Nova realized that Kyron truly was a terrible place for a capital city. She only hoped she could ease her only friend’s burden by aiding Magnus’s attempt to restore the Resistance.
When Nova returned from her walk, the girls couldn’t resist another dip in the empress’s bath, and by the time they retired to their rooms, Nova and Nina had made up their minds—they would pressure Magnus to build them a royal bath. After all, they were worth it. His resistance would be futile.
Twenty-Nine
MC came knocking on the castle doors early the next morning. Xikanika had already commanded her guards to allow him in, but between his shiny gold Tier Two card, his no-nonsense glare, and his reputation as Dervegen’s hero, they could hardly have refused him.
He found the two girls wrapping up with breakfast at a table inside a sprawling dining hall. Royal attendants milled about, taking care of their every need.
“Looks like you two had some fun. But there’s work to do, so let’s get down to business.”
“Aww, did you miss me, bro? Or Nova, maybe? I’ll bet you missed snuggling her fluffy white wings.”
“Funny,” he deadpanned. “When are we meeting the empress?”
“We have already concluded negotiations with Xika,” Nova replied. “She has graciously agreed to provide us with a hundred of her imperial troops and two dozen mages, though it will take some time to organize them. She will contact us via the portal when ready.”
“Well, color me impressed. Good work, you two.”
“It was all Nina’s doing. Her negotiation skills are truly impressive.”
“Oh, please. Without your influence, I wouldn’t have been able to do jack shit. Good job, sister,” she said, punching Nova’s shoulder. The two girls broke out in a fit of giggles.
“So we just need a place to secure the portal. I’m thinking we bury it in the mountain range somewhere, but I’m worried about the Harvesters detecting it. We could also leave it inside the snowfield to the south, but I don’t know if I want it in such an exposed area.”
“We took care of that, too. Apparently, you have a manor now, Mr. Hero of Dervegen!” Nina said, holding up a pair of large steel keys.
MC had to stare at them for a second before he understood just what the heck they were. Physical keys hadn’t existed for almost a century.
“Quaint. Where’s the house?”
“Sir, if you would allow me, I would be happy to guide you to your new domicile,” an immaculately dressed Zevan said. As promised, their guide dutifully showed them the way to their manor, a three-story affair about the size of a modern-day mansion, located on a quiet residential street in the inner district’s Undercity.
The subterranean district was even more lavish than the others he’d visited in the outer parts of the city. Vast buildings soared to the ceiling, and glowing moss covered the cobblestone sidewalks, cavern walls, and ceiling. For a moment, he thought he’d stepped into some kind of underground fantasy forest.
“And here we are, sir. Normally, a manor of this size would come with a staff of butlers and servants, but the empress supposed that you would prefer to hire your own staff.”
Well, she was right about that one. But was the empress being considerate, or only petty?
The guide left, leaving the trio on their own. A vast atrium with double spiral stairs and massive chandeliers greeted them as they entered the mansion. Each of its many rooms proved to be no less impressive. Be it the waiting rooms, the dining halls, or the bedrooms, the mansion came fully furnished with ornate tables, chairs, and beds. The girls gawked at the opulence, but MC paid little heed to such distractions. They’d likely gut and replace everything in here when they turned it into a forward operating base.
Nina and Nova quickly disappeared, intent on exploring all of the mysteries of the vast abode. MC also toured the building, but for a very different purpose. Several minutes later, he found what he’d been looking for—a suitable location for the portal. Yet just as he set the small portal down, several loud knocks called his attention to the front door. Ducking into an adjacent room, he spied four Imperial knights along with a Zar’shad-drawn wagon.
“How can I help you?” he asked, teleporting outside of the house, appearing behind them.
The lead knight spun around, clearly flabbergasted at MC’s sudden entrance.
“H-Hero of Dervegen! It is an honor to make your acquaintance,” the knight declared, bowing with respect. “We come bearing your contract reward from your exploits at Dervegen. As that particular contract was issued by the state, the twenty-two thousand gold comes directly from the Royal Treasury itself. I assure you that the sum has been tallied by the empress’s finest pursers.”
“I’ll bet it has. Thank you, soldier. Just leave the bags here, I’ll take care of them.”
The knights unloaded the half-dozen coin sacks into the great entrance hall before saluting and departing as quickly as they’d arrived. MC had been planning on badgering the Contractor’s Hall to pay up, so this turn of events surprised him greatly. Maybe that empress wasn’t as much of a sleazebag as he’d thought.
MC hoisted the sacks and teleported back to the portal, carrying the coin with him back to Sanctuary’s hangar. He’d have to have a chat with Nina about their finances at some point. Gold wasn’t something he ever thought he’d need, but as Sanctuary grew, money would no doubt grease their interactions with the locals. Too bad his own wealth back on Earth accounted for nothing out here.
When he returned through the portal, he carried something entirely different—tripod-mounted Gatling drones, one under each arm. Heavily armored and armed, each was intended to function as portable point defenses.
MC set them down and activated them, their dual Gatling guns deploying like viper strikes. He relocated a floor-to-ceiling wall of rock from the ground immediately in front of the portal, leaving one drone on either side of the wall. One would patrol the premises while the other would serve as a nasty surprise for anyone who managed to drill or chisel through his reinforced wall.
The drones were of course networked back to Sanctuary, so with their infrared and thermal imaging, Sanctuary would know the instant anyone tried to break into the mansion. Still, as effective as they were, he fully intended to have troops stationed there full-time, as soon as they had the manpower for it.
He then spent another five minutes searching the massive house to locate the girls. He could’ve sworn they were trying to mess with him—stalling for time so they could explore as much of the house as they could. They were unsuccessful.
“You seriously thought you could hide from someone who can teleport and use radar?”
“What did you expect? This house is incredible! I mean, I love Sanctuary and all, but holy shit! I would not mind living here.”
“This manor is indeed remarkable,” Nova agreed. “I too am quite impressed by the beautiful decor.”
“Well, you’ll have all the time in the world to appreciate it later. The manor’s secure, so let’s go find us some allies.”
Invisible and so
undless, Reaver rose out of its icy berth, its noise having been canceled by MC’s stealth field. From his pilot’s seat, he relocated snow back into the gaping hole that was the makeshift hangar. Just a precaution.
The VTOL engines propelled the craft upward. They broke through the clouds.
“Please, I do not want to experience such discomfort again. We still have six hours until the designated meeting time. Can we fly more slowly this time?”
MC sighed dramatically. “Fine. Fine! I understand that there exists a type of coldblooded organism that lacks a beating heart. Tragic.”
“That’s so mean, bro!” Nina said, but she was barely restraining her laughter herself. A fact that only made Nova pout harder.
“Point of fact: I have two hearts,” she mumbled.
“Al, fly us along a course to get us to our destination in five hours sharp.”
“Autopilot engaged. Target velocity: Mach 2.5. Target cruising altitude: 35,000 ft.”
“There, now we’re flying with all the fun of a commercial airliner. Still, I do want to get us there at least an hour early to scout the place. This could be a trap for all we know.”
The gunship compressed and the Scramjets kicked in, though their acceleration was far less this time around. Unfortunately, Nova’s relief at traveling at lower speeds soon waned as the monotonous boredom set in.
They each took turns stretching their legs in the rear of the cabin that housed the walking tank rigs. They’d brought three of them out this time—the X42, and two others.
The drab olive M33s were a much older design, lacking most of the doodads the X42 boasted. But even without active camo or jump jets, they still turned UFN soldiers into supersoldiers on the battlefield. An unstoppable force against infantry, they could tank small arms fire almost indefinitely while carrying many thousands of rounds of ammunition themselves.
While Nina was proficient in its use, Nova had barely had an hour to train back at Sanctuary. She still struggled with locomotion, but as long as she could stay upright and walk, the rest didn’t matter much. If this excursion turned into a firefight, they’d book it back to Sanctuary. There was no way he’d let the girls meet an unknown party without armor.
“All right, let’s suit up,” he declared.
“Is it safe to leave the craft to your autopilot?” Nova asked.
“The ship’s AI is patched into my suit’s helmet. I can give it remote commands and take manual control if need be.”
“I see.”
“Look, it’ll be fine. Just do it like we practiced. You just need to keep yourself upright, and if you can’t do that, we can always set the AI to follow one of us. You’ll be a hell of a lot safer in there if shit hits the fan.”
“When what hits the fan?”
“He means when things don’t go as planned,” Nina helpfully explained.
Nova’s pure disgust at the turn of phrase left MC feeling oddly satisfied.
He spent the next thirty minutes convincing Nova that she would fit inside with her wings bound. Their first attempt had not left a good impression in her mind. And as if that wasn’t enough, she peppered him with a deluge of questions on the suit’s various components, expecting detailed answers before she was satisfied.
MC did eventually manage to stuff her inside, just as the gunship dropped subsonic, expanding to its original size as they neared their destination. The ship’s sensors projected onto all of their HUDs, giving them a view of the outside world.
A barren desert raced under them, cracked and dry. Craggy mesas loomed in the distance. As the gunship circled the Resistance’s coordinates, they saw no visible structures of any kind. MC panned the ship’s cameras, switching to infrared to thermal imaging, yet nothing appeared.
Thirty minutes passed.
“Something’s wrong,” Nova said through their suits’ interlinked comms system. “I am picking up a new signal, bearing the Resistance signature thirty miles away from here.”
“What does it say?”
“I am decoding it now,” she responded, doing her best to manipulate her handheld terminal with the suit’s giant hands. After much hushed cursing and grumbling—something that came through loud and clear over comms—she managed it.
“Oh no. This is… a distress signal, asking for any and all Resistance members in the area to come to their aid.”
“Legitimate?” MC asked.
“It is difficult to say, but I believe it is.”
“All right, the mission’s changed. We’ll scout the base, and if it looks like a tractable situation, I’ll see if I can mount a rescue.”
“You sure that’s safe, bro?”
“I’m not overly enthused about going in with such limited intel, but this could just be our chance to have the Resistance owe us one. Al, lead the way. Oh, and arm primary weapons.”
“Command confirmed.”
The twin 20mm Vulcan cannons extended from their hidden berths in the nose of the ship, their six barrels ready to deliver depleted uranium into the enemy at over fifty rounds a second.
The gunship’s massive artillery, normally hidden for both aerodynamic and protective reasons, now revealed itself. The dual 40mm portside rail guns deployed from the belly of the craft, extending their ten-foot-long barrels down towards the surface, ready to decimate whatever poor soul happened to come into their lines of fire.
The journey to the base was a short one. Nestled against a large mesa, it was immediately obvious that something was wrong. Smoke rose from several spots on the ground where some kind of facility was visible. Debris lay strewn everywhere.
“The base’s optical camouflage is offline. They must have taken heavy damage,” Nova said.
“Reaver’s radar isn’t picking anything up.” He activated Midar as well, but realized the futility of that endeavor. Unlike the M37 with its exposed left arm, the X42 completely encased the operator. Even if that wasn’t the case, Reaver itself would’ve blocked any outgoing pings.
“Magnus? I hear something. Another signal.”
“Resistance?”
“I do not know; it is very faint. And I—I cannot make it out. Here, let me patch it to your suits.”
A long moment passed in silence.
“I don’t hear anything,” Nina said.
“Nova, can you boost the volume?”
Crackling static assaulted their ears, but there was something else there too. Nonsensical whispers that made their hair stand on end, and it wasn’t just one voice. There were several of them.
All of a sudden, a shrill cry pierced their ears, its volume amplified by the headset.
“Shut it off!” MC roared. Nova killed the transmission.
“What the hell was that?”
“There’s something down there,” Nina whispered.
MC took a deep breath. “Well, whatever it is, I guess we’re about to find out. I’m going down.”
Thirty
Lights strobed red. Sirens wailed. The X42 walking tank hung suspended by roof-mounted rafter clamps. Al counted the last few seconds aloud; he liked to spice things up a bit.
“Five… Four…”
The bomb-bay floor retracted under the suspended suit, revealing a darkening desert far below under the waning light of Second Dusk.
Nova and Nina stood aside, watching.
“Three… Two… One…
Launch.”
The clamps detached. The suit dropped, its thrusters firing to keep the heavy machine upright against the wind.
MC retrieved the tactical shotgun from the suit’s back as he fell. The supersized one-gauge shotgun weighed almost forty pounds—far too unwieldy for a human; just about right for a powered suit.
The desert floor rapidly approached. MC squinted. Undulating movements.
But radar didn’t pick anything up...
“Al, LZ is hostile. Go for impact. Hard.”
“Hostile LZ confirmed. Impact detonation active,” Al reported.
MC didn’t bother
to kill the suit’s momentum; in fact, he welcomed it.
Eight rockets sprung from the suit’s back, screaming towards the earth. The impact charges penetrated into the ground, detonating in unison and sending sand sky high.
Flames erupted a split second before the suit hit the ground. The jump jets fired at their max setting, adding to the carnage wreaked by the bombs. They incinerated anything that happened to be below, sending a shock wave rippling out.
When the debris cleared, only the X42 remained, swiveling its giant armored head from one side to the other, shotgun ready.
“Showoff.”
“Could he not have simply teleported down to the facility?” Nova asked.
“Yeah. He totally could’ve. He probably should’ve. But he’s a hopeless adrenaline junkie so noooo, he’s gotta do things the flashy way.”
“It’s not flashy if it works. Look.” He gestured the shotgun’s muzzle at piles of detritus. The remains of whatever worm-like creature that had burrowed beneath the desert lay strewn about.
“What the hell is that thing?”
“Dead meat, now. Some kind of burrowing worm by the looks of it. Mutated as well. Seems that this continent is just as hostile as the rest.”
“Magnus, you sure this is a good idea? We could just leave, you know? We don’t have to do this,” his sister said.
“I got this,” he replied, sending a ground-penetrating radar ping through the sand. Midar might not work, but it didn’t really need to—the X42 had its own active radar systems. They may not yield the same ‘sixth sense’ that Midar did, but it was a helluva lot better than nothing. “The suit’s picking nothing else up in the immediate vicinity. Besides, the Resistance outpost should be reinforced. Don’t think I’ll encounter any of these fuckers there.”
“That is correct. Dyn metals would not be so easily destroyed, even if the facility is compromised.”
“It’s not the mindless sand monsters I’m worried about, though,” he replied.
The moon was dim tonight behind the clouds, barely illuminating the desert. The X42’s sensors easily compensated for that.
