>SUIT ERROR! Assisted Mechanized Plate self scanners . . . OFFLINE
The Exin warrior was incredibly strong and was managing to peel him like a can of sardines with its claws. Dane tried to pull away, but another shooting pain up his legs sapped him of all strength, though not his determination. He was pulled forward, dragged by the creature, as there was another cascade of sparks, and one entire section of his breastplate tore apart . . .
No. No. No . . .
Dane knew he was probably going to die out here. He was just going to be one more dead human Marine on the dirt of this alien planet, while the Exin continued their slow conquest of everything that moved . . .
But even as he struggled, his eyes once again caught a glimpse of Bruce’s body off to one side. There was movement! Bruce had half turned in his torment, and none of the other watching Exin workers or the supposed prophet had seen it, so entranced were they in the fight that Dane was caught in the middle of.
Bruce is alive!? That thought changed everything for Dane. He had thought to do as much damage as he was able to with his tortured, injured, and infected frame—before he was finally overrun by the enemy. He didn’t seriously believe that winning this bout would change the fact that he would die at the Exin worker’s hands—or claws.
But now, Dane also had a reason to win. And not only to win, but to stay alive for as long as possible. He had to stay alive and cause so much chaos that he would lead the enemy away from Bruce. If he could distract them for long enough, then maybe Bruce would have a chance of escaping unnoticed . . .
“Sssss . . . !” With a sudden pull of strength, the Exin warrior, its head scales fractured and bleeding a thick, dark ichor, pulled Dane intimately close. It chittered into his face, spilling mucous and saliva and bloody ichor against his faceplate. Dane knew, even across the species divide, that the being was revelling in its imminent victory and was gloating in its own savage way . . .
“Frack this!” Dane did the only thing that he could do. If this was a duel, then he cheated.
>Assisted Mechanized Plate equipment . . . Duo pulse thrusters . . . ACTIVATED
With a fierce whisper of words into his heads-up display, Dane suddenly let go of one of the Exin’s wrists and clamped his arm around the thing’s shoulder and neck, as if hugging it.
But this was no act of affection. Dane thumped the creature close, refusing to let go as he burned through the remaining power left in the pulse thrusters on his back. With a violent kick of yellow-and-orange light, he was thrown into the air, along with the Exin warrior.
“Ssekh!?” The creature suddenly sounded very confused indeed as it rocketed upwards with Dane, ten feet, twenty, thirty—
And then, with a stuttering flash of light, the double pulse engines on Dane’s back gave out, and he was rolling over, the momentum threatening to break him apart from the Exin warrior.
It shouted in chittering outrage.
They were both falling, tumbling back towards the ground.
The creature dropped its last blade as Dane held onto his, and the creature was scrabbling at him for purchase as they plummeted towards the welcoming earth . . .
Dane twisted in the moment before impact, driving his Field Blade down so that when they smacked into the jungle floor, his Field Blade punched through the heart of the warrior as he landed on top of it, before being thrown aside from the impact.
>Suit impact! ERROR . . .
>Suit impact! ERROR . . .
His suit’s scanners were broken, but he felt the world crash into him like he was a pebble thrown down the side of a rocky ravine. He bounced, his fist still clutching the Field Blade. He heard a curiously clear sound like a snap of twigs, and for a second, felt—nothing—before a sudden, deep, throbbing agony ran through one arm.
He had broken something. His other arm. Something in his wrist as he had tumbled.
“Sckr! Sckr!” But now the worker Exin shouted with fury at the sight of their dead champion, and Dane was staggering up to his feet, one arm held uselessly at his side as he swung the blade into their number.
The smaller Exin were confused, surprised, shocked, and several fell under his blade as he forged a path through, away from the small clearing, and away from Bruce’s body.
Suddenly, as one of them fell under his stomping boots, he saw the clear jungle behind. He had made it to the other side! He lurched forward—
“Sckragkh!” There was a sudden, mighty shout of fury as something grabbed at his shoulder and hauled him back. It was one of the Exin for sure, and it was stronger than any of the others that Dane had so far fought—even the four-armed warrior . . .
Dane twisted as he was pulled backwards, turning so that he swung the blade around in a glittering arc with every fiber of his being.
“Urk!” Dane jerked to a stop as his good sword arm was caught in midswipe by an alien hand. He was being held by his neck and by his sword arm by none other than the prophet Exin in the midnight blue robes. Even now, he could feel its grip tightening as it lifted him, suit and all, bodily into the air.
“Ssss . . .” Dane saw the being’s eyes flicker and narrow in hatred, and he felt the strain pull across his arms and the muscles of his back as the creature pulled his arm outwards.
“Aaargh!” Dane felt like his arm was going to be plucked from his body.
Phwoosh!
But suddenly, there was a noise like the very fabric of the world was tearing—a terrible thunder as light lit them up.
Huh?
“Sss?”
Both he and the Exin looked up to see multiple plumes of fire burning across the sky, then zigzagging, and then firing smaller darts of burning light . . . There was a ship battle going on up there in the higher atmosphere, Dane was sure of it. And not just one or two ships, based on the burning trails of rockets and pulse engines. It was a full-scale engagement.
Did Corsoni manage to alert the Marine Corps? Have they come to liberate Planet 892?
The Exin prophet was shocked—meaning the creature was preoccupied for a moment. Dane kicked his boot forward in a desperate blow, connecting with the creature’s robed abdomen (or where he believed the abdomen to be) for the thing to cough in pain and double over. Dane was released to fall to the floor with a thump, his Field Blade skittering from his grasp across the dark earth.
No! Dane half turned, reached for it—
“Skragh!” As one three-taloned foot stamped on his outstretched arm. The Exin prophet was leaning down over him, holding him to the floor as it gnashed its three-part mandibles over his face.
“You’ll never win!” Dane snarled up at it.
“Sckrekh!” The creature slammed one of its fists down against the side of Dane’s faceplate, and everything went black.
Epilogue
“Captain? We’ve got a positive! One body!” said the shadowed form of Lance Corporal Hueza, bulky and black-clad in his Assisted Mechanized Plate. But Lance Corporal Hueza was no normal Orbital Marine. His suit was machine-painted dark tan colors and blotches of black. He was a member of Captain Otepi’s War Walker Unit, standing outside of his large War Mech right now, and scanning across the jungle floor for more signs of the enemy.
“I’m there! Is it . . . ?” a voice called out over the suit communicator. Captain Otepi, dressed in similar attire, sprang into the clearing with her pulse rifle high and her suit lights on. It was quiet in the skies now above Planet 892. The seven Exin seed crafts hadn’t put up much of a fight, and an entire squadron of Marine Corps starfighters, as well as the limping help of the Gladius, had been enough to see them off.
Which in itself had been worrying, Otepi had to concede angrily. Their attack squadron had managed to destroy all nine Exin seed crafts in the dogfight through the upper atmospheres of Planet 892, and they had only lost four Marine star crafts themselves . . .
But in the final throes of the battle, the Exin seed crafts had seemed to deliberately change tactics. They started to rush at the nearest of the
Marine fighters with apparent disregard for their own safety. Each one acting individually and with no thought for joint tactics or strategy.
And, since her attack group had been busy trying to neutralize several combat points at once, another ship—a much larger ship—had broken from 892’s atmosphere, gained escape velocity . . .
And had created its very own jump point, she had seen in horror. That meant that the Exin no longer needed the large jump stations. If they had ships that could do that, then they could attack Earth whenever and however they wanted . . .
But the ship had escaped before Otepi could fire upon it, and then they had to fight the remaining enemy. Every Exin seed craft had been destroyed.
Leaving them with the cleanup.
And the mystery of what—or who—was left on the surface of Planet 892.
“ID: Sergeant Bruce Cheng, Orbital Marines, Captain,” Hueza said, kneeling by the body of Sergeant Cheng and reading his suit’s indicators. Hueza started to unpack his own field medical kit.
“He’s pretty badly banged up, sir, but he should be all right if we can get him to a medical bed ASAP . . .” the Marine said as he started applying injections and small suit repairs on the large body of the man.
“Cheng,” the captain of the War Walkers said in a quieter voice behind them. Her eyes scanned the perimeter. A lot of churned-up dirt. And a wide circle of fallen Exin.
Both types, she registered. Worker and warrior caste . . .
“But no Sergeant Williams?” she said, frowning. If he wasn’t here, and if he hadn’t been with Pilot Engineer Corsoni on board the Gladius, and nor at the Expedition Base Camp or the Federal Beacon . . . then where had he gone?
It puzzled Otepi because even if Sergeant Williams had died somewhere in all of this alien forest, and even if his Assisted Mechanized Plate was deactivated, the advanced scanners of their ship would still find his suit, thanks to all of the unique ID chips worked into their design.
But Dane Williams was nowhere to be found, and as Captain Otepi thought of the man with the sometimes-worried frown and sometimes reckless grin, she felt a shiver of unease pass through her.
“They took him . . .” There was a muttered cough of a voice from the ground, and Otepi realized it came from Bruce Cheng himself.
“Easy there, fella. Be quiet now, and we’ll get you fixed up,” Lance Corporal Hueza was urging him.
“No, continue, Sergeant. What was that you said?” Otepi suddenly crouched beside the broken and damaged Marine. “What did you say happened to Sergeant Williams?”
“He . . . He destroyed one of their eggs. The king egg . . .” Bruce coughed.
What? Otepi thought, but didn’t interrupt the man.
“And then he killed their chosen warrior. When you attacked . . . they took him. The Exin took him . . .” Bruce whispered in horror.
The adventure continues Steel Cage and you can order it now on Amazon.
amazon.com/dp/B08XHY34DW
Thank You For Reading
Thanks for reading Hard as Steel, the fifth book in the epic Mech Fighter series. I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I really have a lot of fun writing about the amazing technology the future holds for us, and all the possible chaos :)
The next story in the series is called Steel Cage and you can order it now on Amazon.
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Metal Warrior: Precious Metal (Mech Fighter Book 5) Page 13