The hushed sound of repulsors faintly made Chief aware that the drone had crept up behind him. “First chance our friend has, he is going to make you wish we had ghosted you instead of the other guy.”
Twenty-One
Brother Berezin flew into the central chamber of the mesa. Despite a bionic frame easily weighing hundreds of kilos, each step barely registered in the dirt floor. He swung his right arm in a wide arc. Power field tech built into his fists, hummed and spat with each stroke. When the first arc was complete, Berezin threw another back hand to complete the circle he had started.
Cas had ducked the first strike. He then lunged forward as the backhand had its turn, sneaking behind his former comrade. Cas drew both hands into fists, positioning them at his waist, before delivering a double-fisted punch to the back of the cyborg. An enormous clang echoed in the hollowed space of the mesa. The sound dislodged dirt and debris down to the floor. The cyborg was propelled forward several meters, taken from his feet. He rolled across the floor to find his feet and face the monk.“You think these petty powers granted to you by faith will be enough for this?” He shook his head and spat into the dust. “I was built for war, monk. You stand no chance!” Berezin aimed his palm at the monk, shooting bolts from a blast emitter in his hand. They danced toward Cas, like deadly versions of the Fire-Wings that had delighted the crowd hours earlier.
Cas held out both hands, one an open palm and the other a closed fist. The air seemed to grow heavy around him as the blaster bolts slid by like grav-trains on rails. The bolts flew harmlessly around the monk, taking their deadly payload toward Lasher.
Lasher had landed in a crouch, thrown by one of the lanky CR-331 Prowler Mechs. A second mech had entered and now stood side by side with its counterpart. Patterns in the Crucible shifted, showing Lasher his next moves in the Way. He cut to the right and bladed his body, allowing the shots to fly past him into the waiting Prowlers. Unlike a marshal or Vernai monk, the robots were not connected to cosmic forces, granting them foresight. The bolts slammed into one of them, burning its left arm, almost severing it from its servo-mounts.
The uninjured mech leapt forward, easily crossing the distance to Lasher. The mongrel pulled his Chimera pistol, leveling the weapon to rip into the oncoming bot. He wasn't able to outpace the machine as it caught him by the hand, deviating the burst from his pistol. The rounds skipped into the nearby wall, tearing off a decent chunk of stone, a consolation for a missed target.
The Prowler punched forward, easily deflected by Lasher at the last second. The mech's foiled attack turned to its advantage. It reached around to grab him by the shoulder. The vise-like grip caused the shoulder strap of Lasher's armor to creak, a warning sign that his clavicle could break under the strain at any moment. Lasher adjusted his body weight to counter-attack the mech. It dropped to a knee to hoist him into the air, spinning one hundred and eighty degrees at the waist to face the opposite direction. It brought Lasher down face forward into the dirt-covered floor.
Berezin jumped to his left, then right, then launched forward at Cas. The bionic monk leveled a flurry of blows toward his counterpart, constantly changing the gait of the attack. Blows descended to head, midsection, then chest before constantly finding new paths of attack. Cas, empowered through the Way, saw each blow as though the ’borg was telegraphing them. Every time a hit launched, Cas used his power-field-enhanced gauntlets to deflect and redirect.
The last strike was a whirling chop to Cas' neck. The Vernai dropped to grab the offered wrist. Using his momentum and the power of the Crucible, the monk hefted the cyborg by his chopping arm to throw him into a nearby wall. Berezin slammed into it, cracking the surface before falling into the dust.
As bionic fury gave way to the might of the Crucible, the second Prowler advanced on Lasher. Its one good arm produced a blade from its fist. A snap-flash preceded the blade glowing red, swallowed by a plasma field that could tear anything in its path. It stopped just shy of Lasher on the ground, raising its arm to strike into his back.
Cas screamed in defiance of it ending this way. No more Lasher meant no more answers. If he perished, a key piece of the puzzle would be gone. It would be next to impossible to seek justice for the fallen without him. He reached into the Crucible, looking to shape the molten energy of the Way to his desires. As the mech tried to plunge the knife into Lasher's back it was held in place by an invisible force. Servomotors and ultra-strand muscle fiber strained against the ghostly force holding it back.
A blaster bolt hit Cas in the back but struck him in the armor under his robes, where the force would be dissipated. However, the force of Berezin's shot knocked him onto his knees, his robes catching fire. He dropped to his side to roll on the floor, extinguishing most of the flames. Tumbling to his feet, he rid himself of the garment.
Cas' eyes went wide as he saw the mech regain control of its weapon arm. The Prowler retracted back beyond its shoulder so it could deliver a full-blown strike to the downed fugitive.
In the second it took to raise its arm, the eerie machine became awash in a brilliant white light. It flooded the chamber, casting shadows and illuminating dust hanging in the air. The bots and cyborg, drenched in darkness a millisecond before, slammed ocular filters into place to protect their sensitive cyber vision. A grim voice, loud and terrible, like the voice of an angry titan, filled the chamber.
“I... am Doom-Snuggle!”
The intense beam coming from Doom-Snuggle's floodlight shut off after his introduction. The mechs in the room had shielded their sensory systems from the intense light with ocular filters. As the light cut out, the system scrambled to compensate, using active ultrasonics and vibration detection. The booming announcement of Doom-Snuggle's arrival echoing in the mesa, combined with a ten-meter leap, rendered all of it inadequate.
The Doom Cat slammed into the offending Prowler, locking its jaws around the spot that would be a human's neck. Resicarbon plating shattered under the onslaught of the cat, the Prowler's prosteel rods crumbled on impact. The weight of the new mech blew it from its feet, sending the two careening toward the monks. An explosion of dust and resicarbon followed the two bots tumbling into the chamber. At the end of the death roll, the Prowler lay face down in the dirt, shredded and motionless.
The Doom Cat catapulted into the air. Whirring and slamming noises signaled rapid changes in the mech. Rods slammed into place as armored plating shifted. Limbs elongated along guide rail paths to paws pulling back into fingers. The cat rotated in the air as it reconfigured its form. Its left foot, a taloned monstrosity that looked more bird-like than feline, slammed into the broken head of the downed Prowler before crushing it into the stone. What was once the mechanical representation of a predatory nightmare now stood on hind legs like a techno-man-panther.
Everyone in the cavern froze. Those educated in battlefield tech knew that versa-technology was the pinnacle of modern close combat. It had been encompassed into vehicles and mechs, allowing them to change shape to perform different functions. As the Prowler's skull was crushed under the foot of the massive three-meter-tall mech, the cat loosed a digital roar similar to its real-world counterpart. Amplified by its sound systems and given a mechanical grit, the howl filled all in the chamber with dread. The roar died down to a deep chesty growl while targeting algorithms sighted on the cyborg. Doom-Snuggle ripped the head free from its prey, kicking it toward Berezin, who had still to recover from being blasted into the wall. The skull cracked next to the cyborg's head, splintering the stone before landing at his feet.
A rushing sound, like wind through a tunnel, now filled the hall of the mesa. The stone block that had been blown from the wall by Lasher's diverted pistol burst began to shutter and twitch. The block, easily weighing tens of kilograms, launched through the space, bashing the remaining Prowler in the head. The mech toppled to its side, releasing its grip on his pistol-wielding hand.
A burst from the pistol tore into its chest, explosive rounds savaging the outer armor
. As the roar of the high-yield explosive burst echoed in the chamber, the mech lost its remaining grip. Lasher got his toes into the sand-covered stone enough to execute a forward roll, finishing the movement in a long dive. “Fluff!”
The dorsal cannons on the Doom Cat roared to life, pulse firing into the Prowler. Several blasts continued to chew into its armor before it raised an energy shield to deflect the rounds. The robot reached down for a gyroscopic rod to place a heavy auto-pistol in its hand from a compartment in its back. The Prowler returned fire, only to have the torrent of blaster bolts deflected toward the cringing Berezin by Lasher using the Way.
Lasher got to his feet and the world slowed to a crawl. Bits of light coming over the horizon were creeping into the entryway of the mesa, highlighting floating debris traveling along their intended path. Blaster bolts seemed to freeze in the air, easy to dodge and move around. Step after step, fueled by rage and the power of the Crucible, drove Lasher into the maelstrom that was the firing Prowler. As he ran, he transferred the pistol so his strongest arm was free and unfettered.
He punched the mech square in the chest. The Crucible-powered strike caused the chest plate to splinter before cracking and erupting. Securing bolts popped from their moorings, flying out at odd angles. Resicarbon plating shredded a nanosecond before prosteel and duradium struts crumbled. Wires burst from their housing alongside shredded hoses whose coolants sprayed droplets that seem to linger in the air, like a slow motion scene playing out from a favorite action video.
In Lasher's perspective, the Prowler began to leave its footing behind, like an invisible parent slowly picking up a child from the floor. As more distance came between the mech and the ground, more of its body ruptured, splintered, and caved in. The bot, easily weighing in at several hundred kilograms, traveled almost three meters before bouncing to a skidding halt on the floor.
Time seemed to return to normal, bringing pain and awareness that Lasher was roaring, much in the vein of the Doom Cat. Blood seeped from ruptured knuckles to form dirty red droplets on the mesa floor. He didn't have to look to know his hand was broken. Even the monks knew that the body could only take so much strain powered by the Way. That was why they wore their powered vambraces and augmented gauntlets. You can't continue the fight when you constantly break your hands.
Lasher turned to face the Doom Cat and the monks beyond. He walked forward to stand by his friend, the demonic Doom-Snuggle. Cas backed up, standing on the other side of the massive mech. Back-mounted auto-blasters rose and locked over the cat's shoulder, aiming at the downed cybernetic monk.
Lasher hissed at the cyborg. “Berezin. On your knees and face the wall with your hands behind you. I plan on taking you prisoner. If you resist, I will take you by force. I sincerely hope you resist.”
Doom-Snuggle spun through the air, relying on auto-gyros to relay proper targeting data for the ground. The mech reoriented itself to land on its feet. A digital growl that sounded like a volcano reverberated from the machine, signaling its distaste for the current situation. It trailed black smoke, a crushed auto-cannon sparking its end before failing completely from the damage it sustained. Doom-Snuggle ripped the offending turret from its back.
Berezin was in full combat mode, bringing cyber-fueled destruction to the three allies. After crushing one of the auto-cannons, he flung the RIM-IV almost completely out of the room. He faced Lasher, ignoring that Cas was trying to rise from a blow to his leg that was causing a considerable limp.
He aimed his palm. The port inside opened up again, aimed at Lasher. Cas pulled the cyborg's arm using the Way. A burst of blaster fire ripped into the bottom section of one of the lower housing units built into the mesa. Chunks of stone and mortar slammed into the ground. Dust and rock fragments scattered in all directions, highlighted by the early morning sun.
The cyborg roared his anger at the Way-adapted monk. A small port opened up in his left arm, revealing what looked like a mechanical enclosure with a minuscule lens. A piercing whine preceded a green glow before a beam of continuous jade light poured forth. The beam was arced one way and then another before the second stream ended. As the green light faded, a part of the opposite lower housing hit the floor along with Cas.
The laser had not only cut into a portion of the environment, it had raked across the left side of Cas' body. While he had managed to deflect the majority of the beam with the power field from his gauntlet, a portion of the light wave settled in the gap between armored plate and pauldron. It severed the shoulder strap, cooking the meat and slicing into his clavicle.
The iridescent glow from the laser faded, replaced by a pulsating stream of blaster fire from Doom-Snuggle. The machine was strafing his adversary, shifting shape to keep his attacks mobile. The mech morphed into its cat form before taking several bounds onto the wall. It leapt from the facade, shifting back into its hybrid form to land on the ground and deliver another burst before shifting again to dart away in a blur.
Lasher took advantage of the distraction to focus the Crucible into the shadows of the mesa. He could feel the handle of his Plasmaxe waiting for him. The molten power of the Crucible formed into strands that could be pulled. He tucked the pistol under his right arm as the weapon flew across the room through the Way. The handle hit his palm, a loud pop and a hissing whoosh announced the glowing blade coming to life.
He locked the handle control, casting the weapon through the air. It rotated blade over handle several times before coming to rest in the cyborg's back, just to the side of its spine. Metal hissed and turned to slag from the Plasmaxe.
“Fluff!” Lasher roared.
The yell was enough to make the cyborg face Lasher before the emerald glow of the laser began to light the space. “The monk was lucky, but you're not wearing half of what...”
The Doom-Cat bounded into sight from the shadows, hurling itself into the air toward their opponent. It shifted shape, bringing its remaining auto-turret and its vibro-claws to bear against the metallic brute.
Berezin executed a back kick that stopped the mech's impending attack. The bot dropped to the floor, rolling out of reach. It reverted to its panther-mech form, leveling a digital roar and its remaining cannon.
The cyborg smiled as the jade glow faded. “I was built for this. I was built for you. You're all going to die,” he uttered before reaching to remove the offending weapon in his back. There was a slight flutter in his movement. The axe had bit deep, clearly damaging some vital motor function. There was a grating sound as the energy blade was pulled from his back. He studied it while testing the balance.
The unruined section of his back vented several holes, popping pellets onto the ground. The pellets spewed a glittering smoke into the air, quickly engulfing the massive entrance chamber of the mesa. As Berezin stepped backward into the smoke, the greenish glow of his eyes was the last thing to fade from view. He was acting every bit like a monster in a fairy tale.
“Red Man! I can't see him. The chaff in the smoke is diffusing my sensors,” Doom-Snuggle growled into the com.
Lasher's mind swarmed with memories of the arena from when he was younger. He whispered back, “Stay mobile. He can't see you either.”
A cough broke the conversation. Cas' tortured voice came through. “But we can see him.”
Cas sat upright, holding his good arm out toward the smoke. It started to move like it had a form and shape akin to a giant serpent. The serpent became a tornado as the quick-moving cloud yielded to the power of the Way. The swirling smoke expanded across the room, showing the stunned face of the cyborg. When he powered his palm blaster to take a shot at Cas, the smoke coalesced and returned to the tornado, obscuring him from view.
Doom-Snuggle bounded from floor to ceiling to wall, throwing torrents of blaster fire into the tornado. Periodically, a blaster bolt or laser beam would fire from the obfuscation, trying to rend the marauding feline.
Lasher was on the move as well, using quick starts and stops to stay away from the counter-ass
ault while holding the pistol under an arm to switch ammunition with his good hand. He jumped forward, rolling into a crouch and placing the pistol behind his knee. The pistol grip was aimed skyward as he slammed home the new magazine, before priming the weapon.
He took off at a run, circling the tornado counter to its rotation. “Now!”
Cas slid his hand across his view, causing the smoke to spread again. Berezin was facing him, waiting for his chance to deal with the trio once and for all. He rocketed out of the cloud, his right hand extended, ready to shoot Cas in the chest with the palm blaster. A droning hum moved through the chamber. Berezin swung the Plasmaxe back, ready to finish the job the blaster bolt would undoubtedly start.
Lasher fired the Chimera, a single round finding purchase in Berezin’s back. An explosive charge popped a sheering sound though the chamber. The grizzly round began to tear the cyborg in half as it took up where the energy axe left off. Berezin's jump was thrown off, knocking his shot from its intended victim. He whirled the Plasmaxe around to salvage the attack until Doom-Snuggle slammed into him. He slid to a dusty stop a hair's breadth away from Cas.
Doom-Snuggle's claws made a screeching sound as metal and fiber tore free from their holdings, spilling black ichor into the dirt. The cyborg screamed, “No!” But, he was pinned under the mech's weight, held in place by claws and rapidly coiled tendrils.
Lasher ran up, placing round after round into the connective joints of arms and legs. Each round hit home, followed by a small burst and more tearing. Each round shredded the monster apart.
The maelstrom ended as Doom-Snuggle tore the cyborg’s arms free. Lasher and Cas both combined their energy in the Way. The molten power that was the Crucible surged. Berezin's legs tore free, midway up the thigh. His battered torso flopped into the dirt, motionless except for a defeated gasping cough.
The Mongrel: A Military Sci-Fi Series (Hunter's Moon Book 1) Page 21