“Holy bleep,” Chase said breathlessly. He expressed what all of them were feeling.
At the center of the workshop, hanging from chains with links the size of a juggernaut’s arm, was the largest robotic object Reggie had ever seen. It was a torso and head to a juggernaut that could have swallowed any of them whole if it had a mouth in that colossal cranium.
“There’s a door out the far side,” June pointed out, aiming Artemis’s finger past where the behemoth hung lifelessly. The passageway beyond was lit with a soft blue glow.
“All right,” Reggie said. “Enough gawking. Move out.”
But just as he was giving the order, the door across the workshop slammed shut. Then the one they’d just entered by did likewise.
“Pain in my bleep,” Frank muttered. “I’ll just bash it down. Easy as duck soup.”
Then the chains overhead rattled with a crunch that echoed through the workshop. The eyes of the gigantic juggernaut lit, and it began to move.
CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN
“It’s a Yamato,” Chase supplied helpfully as he and the rest of the platoon rushed to get out of its line of fire. “Sort of a Spruce Goose of a juggernaut. They’re mostly bosses for campaign content. Too big for practical use.”
“Where the bleep did this bleep get a hold of one,” Lin demanded angrily as the Yamato’s shoulder-mounted DF Ballistic Cannon-460 tracked Yulong’s movements.
“Not the time to debate,” Reggie barked.
[Yamato - 100% To Hit - Head: 1154/1200]
Reggie fired.
Yamato Head: 1147/1200
It felt like scratching through a prison bar with a car key. Sure, it might work, but he might die of old age, first.
The workshop shook as the Yamato fired. An armor-piercing round slammed into the wall where Yulong had been half a second earlier.
Or, Reggie mused, he might die of that gun.
“You lot go ahead,” Frank offered. “I’ll hang in long enough for the rest of you to make it out and get that bleep.”
“Frank, it’ll kill you,” June pointed out. The Yamato had given up trying to aim at the Artemis, settling on the Yulong as the right combination of large and not impossibly fast.
“Bark is worse than its bite,” Frank countered. “Reckon I’ll take a few shots the rest of your pansies would wilt under. Now… scoot.”
Yulong paused in front of the door that led deeper into the fortress.
“What are you doing?” June shouted. “Keep moving!”
Yulong dove just as the Yamato fired. It’s missed shot ripped through the door. “Just making our exit quicker. Frank, bringing it around your way.”
The Yamato twisted on its chains, using the actuators from missing arms to pull itself into firing position.
“Roger that, little lady,” Frank replied.
Reggie, Chase, and June snuck around the far side of the Yamato’s firing arc on their way to the door.
“You’re a good man, Frank,” Chase said. “Catch you on the other side of this one.”
Reggie felt the lump in his stomach. This bitter pill wasn’t sitting well.
ASHARI popped in. “Sgt. King, your stress levels are rising disproportionately to the situation. Frank’s sacrifice should have come as a relief. The rest of your platoon is safe. Your chances to escape the Yamato increased by 15 percent.”
“But, he’s going to die,” Reggie whispered.
“You don’t have to be quiet,” ASHARI assured him. “I can tell when you address me, and I filter out the microphone input. And Frank isn’t going to die as in dead forever. He will respawn at a Star League medical facility, missing his most recent XP. Gremlin is fully insured; his only loss will be on the mission rewards, which will largely be scrap metal.”
“You gonna help here?” Lin asked, tearing open the hole left by the 460mm shell the Yamato had fired.
“It’s just a game,” ASHARI added.
She was right. Armored Souls was just a game. That meant that Reggie couldn’t die either. That meant that The Mechromancer would be dead for all of about three hours. This was all just an exercise in proving The Mechromancer couldn’t push Reggie around anymore.
Personal vengeance wasn’t worth Frank sacrificing himself over.
“No,” Reggie said firmly. “We’re not leaving him. Lin, draw the Yamato’s fire. Everyone else, keep clear of its line of fire and hammer away.”
“Um,” Frank said. “Trying to play the hero over here. You’re crampin’ my style, kid.”
“No heroes today,” Reggie said. “Heroes are the guys who don’t get to go home. Today, we win together or die together.”
CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT
Yamato Head: 1090/1200
This wasn’t going well. Reggie knew that the giant, half-assembled juggernaut was going to be trouble, but the rate at which it was catching them with lucky shots looked like it would run the platoon out of juggernauts before it ran out of hit points.
It also didn’t help that, on the move, Reggie kept missing.
It wasn’t that Reggie’s Gunnery skill was horrible. It was more that the game really wanted him to hit the torso that partially obscured the head from weaponry on the ground below.
“Lin, can you please keep its attention?” Chase asked in exasperation. Diablo was missing his left arm, which eliminated a good chuck of Chase’s firepower and threw off his balance when running.
“At least you’re pecking away at it,” June snapped. “That laminated armor plating is reducing my shells to 1 damage each.”
“Maybe you all should run away,” Lin suggested. “I can solo this bleep.”
“It’s hit you three times,” June pointed out.
Yulong shrugged as it evaded another shot. “So? I’m getting better at timing my dodges. And my Anti-Matter Cannon does real damage.”
“Not fast enough,” Chase sniped from the conversation’s sidelines.
“No bickering,” Reggie barked. “Not the time or the place. Keep up fire. I think Lin’s right; she’s gone more than five minutes without it catching her.”
“I wish I could get up there, maybe poke it in the eye,” Frank grumbled. His long-range weaponry was better suited to catching light, nimble targets than slugging it out like battleships in standoff combat.
“I could with my Extended Jump Boost,” June radioed. “I considered it. But I’m more likely to fall off than damage it at point-blank range.”
Fall…?
That just might work.
“New plan,” Reggie announced. “Target the chains.”
“Holy bleep!” Chase shouted triumphantly. “Why didn’t I think of that?”
“Too busy whining like a little bleep, maybe?” Lin suggested helpfully.
“If we can drop that thing, there’s no way it’ll be able to twist itself around to fire at us,” Reggie continued. “We can either open it like a tin can or just leave it.”
“Could be great loot,” Chase suggested.
“How about we put that cart back behind the horse,” Frank shot back.
[Inanimate Target - 33% To Hit - Chain: 30/30]
Reggie fired, and his first blast of plasma went wide. Rather than open fire with Beam Cannon-M as well, he let his heat sinks do their work between shots.
If only it had been as cold inside the base as out in the mountains, but the workshop was a sweltering 55°C.
The Yamato jerked and twisted, sending the chain jangling and making it a harder target. Frank missed with a laser salvo. June clipped it with a high-explosive shell to little effect. Lin missed it with her Anti-Matter Projector.
“Bleeping noobs,” Chase jeered. He took aim with his Plasma Launcher and fired a shot.
Chain: 23/30
“Too bad you’ve got a pea-shooter,” Lin snarked.
But Reggie was happy enough with the result.
[Inanimate Target - 23% To Hit - Chain: 23/30]
On his next shot, Reggie got lucky. Just as the chain jerked, he
fired. What might have been an errant shot connected instead.
Chain: 23/30
“What the—?” Reggie didn’t even get as far as the bleep.
“You hit a different link,” June pointed out.
“Oh, for bleep’s sake,” Reggie said with a sigh.
Yulong dodged another shell that rocked the workshop. The recoil set the Yamato gently swaying.
“New plan,” Reggie announced. “Everyone fire at the top link, the one attached to the gantry.”
“The what?” Lin asked.
Chase fielded her question. “The overhead crane on rails. It was in the tutorial on hangars.”
“I skip all tutorials,” Lin replied indignantly. “Professional pride.”
“Who cares?” Reggie asked. “Just retarget and fire.”
[Inanimate Target - 95% To Hit - Chain: 30/30]
That was more like it. Stationary target. Something everyone could agree on. Reggie fired.
Chain: 23/30
Lin fired.
Chain: 3/30
Frank fired.
Chain: 0/30
The chain snapped, and the chain plummeted. Four members of the platoon scattered for cover. Frank, cackling like a madman out in a thunderstorm, stood there watching. The chain fell within meters of crushing Gremlin, but he wasn’t hit.
The Yamato lurched, now dangling by only two chains. It fired off an errant shot so wild that Reggie couldn’t tell who had been the target.
“Two more, and we’re done here.”
The remaining chains held stable. The Yamato aimed again.
“Heads up,” Lin warned.
“I’m not getting left out this time,” Chase insisted.
The Yamato fired. Diablo’s right arm was torn from the torso.
“Oh, come on!” Chase whined. He fired with shoulder-mounted Beam Cannon-Ms instead.
Chain: 27/30
Chain: 24/30
Yulong fired her Anti-Matter Projector with cyborg precision.
Chain: 4/30
June even snapped off a shot from her DF Ballistic Cannon-150.
Chain: 1/30
“Care to do the honors?” Frank asked.
Reggie fired.
His plasma blast struck home. The second chain snapped loose of the crane. Again, everyone scrambled for cover as links half the size of their juggernauts cascaded down. This time, even Frank had the sense to get his ass in gear and get well clear of the kill zone.
Reggie’s surprise was that rather than swinging wildly on the lone remaining chain, the sudden jerk and extra weight snapped it, too.
The cavern shook and loose rock rained from the ceiling. Lights flickered out, pitching the workshop into darkness lit only by the glow of open smelters down at the far end. Seconds later, emergency power came on, and the lights came back.
“Everyone all right?” Reggie asked, even though he could see from the platoon status screen that they were all up and mobile. He was more concerned with the state of the pilots.
“Well, yah,” Lin said sarcastically. “It was that thing that crashed, not us.”
“Fit as a fiddle,” Frank reported.
June radioed in her status as well. “Yeah, Reggie. All good here. Nice plan.”
“Just don’t expect me to help opening that door,” Chase said, waggling the shattered, exposed ends of his arm actuators.
“Let’s end this,” Reggie said, and Vortex strode for the door.
CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE
The corridor beyond the workshop was long but straightforward. There were no side passages, no turns, and thankfully no more juggernauts trying to stop them.
At the end of the corridor, there was a tiny, man-sized door beside a giant one sized for juggernauts.
Vortex gestured to Gremlin, stepping aside. “Care to knock?”
Gremlin took a courtly bow. “I’d be—” but Frank didn’t get to finish his gracious acceptance. The door opened.
“Well played, warriors,” The Mechromancer congratulated them. He was standing in the room beyond, which was a one-juggernaut hangar that fit like a glove around the custom ride.
Instantly, Reggie’s whole platoon brought weapons to bear. But something felt off.
“Hold your fire!” Reggie ordered. Then he realized what was odd. “He’s powered down.”
“Sweeeet!” Chase said. “Dibs on piloting it.”
“Come here, King,” The Mechromancer ordered. “I want to meet my vanquisher face to face. You’ve bested me, and I want to die knowing the man I’ve forged into more than the sniveling coward I first met.”
“Don’t trust him,” Frank warned. “This slimy rat’s more two-faced than a trick coin. He’s got more faces than we could have faced in—”
“Knock it off, gramps,” Chase snapped. “This is Reggie’s call. If the guy ices him with some trick up his sleeve, we’ve still got the last laugh.”
“Meet him. Don’t meet him. Who gives a bleep,” Lin said. “I’m losing my adrenaline rush here.”
“Go ahead, Reggie,” June said reassuringly. “You’ll always wonder if you don’t.”
That was the last push Reggie needed. He walked Vortex up to the larger juggernaut—no, he sauntered over. He swaggered. This was his moment of triumph.
With a hiss of released gas pressure and plumes of steam, the seal around The Mechromancer’s cockpit began to open. While Reggie sat in Vortex’s head, this heavy juggernaut kept its cockpit in the torso. They were almost directly across from one another.
Reggie flicked the release for his own cockpit and unbuckled from the chair. He wanted to be on his feet to look his tormentor in the eye.
His heart began to race in anticipation. Reggie breathed deeply to steady himself.
When The Mechromancer’s cockpit opened fully, Reggie’s jaw dropped. “Doc?”
Dr. Zimmerman flashed a fleeting smile. “Well done, Sgt. King. You successfully led human pilots on a dangerous and potentially lethal mission.”
“This was all… a test?”
“What’s going on over there?” Chase’s voice squeaked from the radio, but Reggie ignored it.
“Not a test,” Dr. Zimmerman assured him. “Treatment. You could have progressed through Armored Souls normally, and I’d have left you be. But you chose to hide among the NPCs, shunning even virtual human contact. That wasn’t healthy.”
“All this time…” Reggie muttered to himself, then vented his fury directly at Dr. Zimmerman. “All this time you dogged me, beat me down, made me question what I was worth…”
“And you responded—eventually—in a productive manner,” Dr. Zimmerman said. “I’m sure you have so many questions you’d like to have answered, and once you get somewhere safe to log out, we can have a nice long chat. Cards on the table. Face up. No more little white lies.”
Reggie drew his coil pistol and trained it on the doctor’s head. “How about we have that talk right now?”
The twitchy smile came and went again in an instant. “I’m afraid we don’t have time. This base is self-destructing any minute. Here, take this.”
Dr. Zimmerman tossed Reggie a small digital display.
3:55
3:54
3:53
“It’s just a time-keeper,” Dr. Zimmerman explained cheerfully. “I’ll be blowing up with the base and logging out. It takes me about fifteen minutes to drive to the hospital. No need to rush back… well, beyond getting out of here in the next…” Dr. Zimmerman tilted his head to read the device in Reggie’s hand. “Three minutes, forty seconds.”
Reggie hesitated. It could be a bluff.
But why?
Bluffing didn’t make any sense. Reggie or any of his platoon could casually end The Mechromancer even as an afterthought on the way out. But Reggie sensed that, for once, Doc Zimmerman was playing it straight with him.
Diving back into the pilot’s chair, Reggie retracted the cockpit door and reached for the radio. “Evacuate! The base is gonna blow! Run for
it!”
If the base hadn’t been such a linear design, Reggie might have needed his friends to guide him out. As it was, he followed in a daze, struggling to process the fact that his therapist had been cyber bullying him into meeting people.
After they passed through the workshop with Frank battering down the sealed door, Reggie remembered something.
“ASHARI, turn on.”
The digitized blue face of ASHARI appeared upon command. “Sgt. King, I believe I know what you’re going to be asking.”
“Why did Dr. Zimmerman create The Mechromancer to ride my bleep?”
“That was the gist of the question, even if I had not anticipated its wording correctly,” ASHARI replied. “However, I would also caution you to hear Dr. Zimmerman out. I am programmed not to divulge any further information on this topic.”
ASHARI blinked off.
0:54
0:53
0:52
Reggie wanted answers. He needed answers. And in 50 seconds he could have them, so long as he stayed inside the base.
0:43
0:42
Vortex paused at the door. It had opened at some point while the five of them were inside. June and Lin had already evacuated. Reggie waved Chase past him. He waited for Gremlin, taking up the rear, and ushered Frank through ahead of him.
Frank was having none of it.
The Gremlin picked up Vortex and hauled him out bodily. “Sorry, boss. Doesn’t work like that.”
0:05
0:04
0:03
0:02
0:01
The valley rocked under the force of the blast. Jets of flame shot out of the entrance like a dragon’s breath. Gremlin shielded Vortex from harm.
All across the valley, juggernauts that had once worked for The Mechromancer self-destructed.
Chase’s theatrical sniff over the radio summed up the scene. “All that salvage… gone.”
[Mission Successful - 27,500 XP - 5,200Cr]
CHAPTER SEVENTY
Reggie had been on edge since the battle. The trek back to the drop ship, the flight back to base, even the walk from the hangar to his bedroom had seemed interminable.
Dead Mech Walking: a mech LitRPG novel (Armored Souls Book 1) Page 32