Butterflies leap around my stomach, flapping irritating wings at each number. A few days of rest are all we need to max out and create a strike force capable of counterattacking the Azhurai Conglomerate and sweeping the continent. Project Odin will take a few weeks by itself, but we have shielded Juggernauts to tide us over in the meanwhile.
I’m so wrapped up in daydreaming about the safety of a shielded Odin -no one-off mech with nuclear armaments deserves any lesser name!- that I don’t notice when we pass the bunker’s entrance, or the Tulverian guards currently staffing it. Not even the disconcerting hooting coming from Wormface can rouse me.
But the pile of dead and wounded Tulverians succeeds where all else has failed. They have no medical supplies, which is when I start paying attention. Not because the wounded, but because Wormface requests a dozen symbiotes be teleported into him, and Hygieia approves the request, sending them directly to my sergeant’s armor. Only for the little parasites to slither out, quickly infesting the most wounded Tulverians.
It feels wrong to infest your ally, like you’re holding the knife that’s already buried in their back. But only the living can complain. Save them today, remove the symbiotes tomorrow. I think.
“You can curse me later. Once I'm stomping about in a freaking SHIELDED ODIN!” I cry, enjoying how the words echo around my helmet.
In starcraft 2 the Thor is the single strongest ground unit in the game, but since they are a Terran vehicle you rarely have the opportunity to use them or purchase upgrades that make them more effective. Only the Coop Commander Swann has a version that can be enjoyed, albeit one that has significantly increased health, greater range, an immediate bombardment ability, and multiple autorepair functions.
Which highlights the achilles heel of the Thor. As the strongest, it is also the most American ground unit, obese from all the enormous guns and high explosive payloads it carries. Like a freshly retired veteran after twelve courses of Taco Bell’s finest bean burritos, something is certain to explode. Good luck guessing what.
Unless you have shields!
Booyah!
I’ll still wear armor while piloting the Odin, cause getting shot hurts every time. But shields are a synergistic key the Thor desperately needed. As Thors generally won fights but took damage, slowly chipping away their health,weakening them over time until they died to anything, shields regenerate, able to blunt damage from one fight and recharging so they could buffer the next fight as well; effectively negating the majority of damage and turning the Thor into an enduring stable of the battlefield. To the point we might have to consider multiple pilots so one can sleep while the other fights.
Sure you would need to fight strategically, pull back periodically to recover shielding, but that is infinitely easier than returning to base for rebuilding.
Not only that, but we’re putting it on the first and greatest supersized Thor, the Odin, meaning more power for shielding, potentially creating a scenario where only massed armies could pose a threat to the super heavy walker. That, or starships orbiting the planet.
“That’s a problem for future me.” I mutter, reveling in the victory.
Infantry can hold ground, our tanks and mechs can take ground, leaving only the skies above. Hygieia’s method of ship construction is starting to show its deficiencies, as we lack infinite biomass. Syrak-9 simply has too many scars, too much pollution from the perpetual conflict.
We finally have factory tech, but no way to relocate back to Earth. As our buildings are incapable of lifting off and flying home. What we need is a biopool back home, somewhere safe, with tons of biomass.
Of all the Nat Geo documentaries running through my brain only the rainforests of South America seem to have the potential for shipbuilding on an industrial scale. If we could somehow land Hygieia, then in theory, we could warp biomass back to Syrak on a scale grand enough to Swarm across the planet, claiming it for good since we’ll have to fight off the thousand ships in orbit, one at a time.
Not an ideal location for defending against intergalactic raiders. Although, neither is the Amazon rainforest, especially when we know the Technomancy battlespheres are nuclearly armed and willing to deploy them. My next thought is for a starport in the asteroid belt. Far more accessible by ship, and carries the added bonus of providing the required materials for real shipbuilding. With the not insignificant upside of avoiding fallout if a thousand nuclear warheads are used to obliterate it.
I’m so lost in thought I lose track of where we are. Feet carrying me into the line of fire.
A hand catches my shoulder, yanking me back, scooping me into the arms of Spiderman. I shudder, then cower as five railguns crack, vapor trails blinking through where I had stood only seconds earlier.
Six reapers boost through the air, each taking a different height -some low, some high- to hose down this particular tunnel with plasma pistols. Railguns crack in their distinctive way, light armor, light body, and lighter guns all means these reapers are something targeting computers have never seen before. All missing the slightly too quick Emus by a hair. A lucky twist that will only happen once.
Scanner pings erupt through the tunnel, a hundred technicians, soldiers, and myself trying to understand.
Stealth isn’t an option here, so for the first time I leverage the full electronic suite of my armor. Constant sensor pings create a three dimensional overlay with a hundred times the resolution of tremorsense. Painting a picture of burning flesh through a monochromatic display.
Three armored grav sleds hover in distant alcoves, bristling with a hedgehog of medium railguns with a gentle sprinkling of high explosive launchers. At least fifty Novan’s in various roles, some without armor. Like we’ve interrupted a dozen scientists; and three medivacs worth of marines and marauders just rolled up to defend them.
Scientists and Starcraft mingle, reminding me of the hybrid experiments on Castanar. Which in turn reminds me of the Kerrigan clones currently imprisoned in acid and-
>Terran Thena: Hey, didn’t one of you have access to nerve gas grenades.
>Matriarch Hygieia: nervous grenades
>Matriarch Hygieia: yeah
>Terran Thena: Can I get one of those? Preferably one that doesn’t affect Tulverians.
>Matriarch Hygieia: eh iguanas are weird
Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.
>Matriarch Hygieia: give me five
You want five minutes? IN THE MIDDLE OF A FIREFIGHT!
It's enough to make me scream.
A Tulverian jabs his head out of a supply room, cracking off a shot with his pulse rifle. Too slow. His shot might have been good but six railguns target, adjust aim, and fire, piercing the shroud of plasma and fragmenting his shot before carrying on into the unluckly iguana. One enters his pulse rifle, bouncing up the collection tube until it punches through the chamber and into the magazine where hardened penetrator gives the compressed energy an unregulated output. In short, the iguana becomes a blue volcano for a split second, melting a fifteen foot radius of steel, dirt, mud, and reinforcement into char. So bright it confounds our sensors.
“No sensors… Spiderman! Can you get an angle? Help even the odds?” I ask.
He passes me to Wormface, who thankfully sets me down, guiding my unarmored self clear of danger. Far away from the ninety degree angle of these intersecting tunnels.
Spiderman skitters across the floor, claiming mud like a sniper claims ghillie with a golden beam of light. Like I once had, he’s gone full auto, emptying the thrice enlarged magazine in a single burst. Carving through the central grav sled. Green shields flare then pop as the overwhelming torrent of firepower slashes through armor, humans, and shields alike. He’s rolling behind me a second later, pulling me back a few paces as the other two grav sleds pelt the tunnel with every munition they have. Reapers scatter a second before twelve missiles land, doubling the width of the tunnel’s entrance with explosive filets.
Our world becomes a cacophony of fire and chaos, we scatter, roll, and duck. Several Tulverians vanish, blinking out of existence entirely. Others fall prone or into otherwise compromised positions. Then for several moments nothing moves, each side taking stock.
This would have been the perfect moment for a cloaked ghost. One who could sneak behind the grav sleds and destroy them without being detected. Like Nova’s supercloak from COOP, she could stroll through the wreckage and drop a demolition charge exactly where it would do maximum damage. I send the idea to Alaea and Hygieia, only to have a mental image of cloaked Spiderman lighting sticks of dynamite.
>Terran Thena: Well… That’s one way of hiding him… Not sure if invisible spiders is a relief or the worst kind of crawler.
I’m about to press my design harder when I see General Splendeur exit another 90 degree intersection farther up the tunnel. A cadre of large Tulverians accompanying him. Though only Splendeur sits atop a grav sled, with his dark scaled compatriot as pilot.
“I need armor, walking around in clothes makes me feel naked.” I say to Wormface, taking a moment to duck into a nearby supply closet where I can warp in armor without revealing my hand.
I’m not entirely sure why Alaea’s interference needs to be concealed, but I trust my-selves.
One peek at my sensors indicate no activity in two of the three tunnels on this side, meaning we are nearly finished. We’ve almost won.
Six Tulverian warriors are dragged past, scales scraping against the epoxy floors. Pulsers are yanked from their cooling hands, grenades and ammunition divided amongst the survivors. How have they survived this long? I wonder, seeing what a railgun does to their exposed hides. Flagellation is prettier.
Darkscale hoots orders at the others, rallying six different breeds of iguana, some large and heavily armored, others more newt-onian thin and almost iridescent with slime, while others still are covered in red scales, as if their essence is burning toxins.
“Ahh…” I murmur, realizing they are a race that favors combined arms.
Armored and shielded battlesuits are meant to act as their eyes and ears. While the infantry are aquatic fodder. Great for general purpose combat on most worlds, but on Syrak they leave more than a little to be desired. They’re fighting with both arms tied behind their back and tails cut off. Like fighting with only lings. I love a zerg rush as much as Scarlet but the enemy knows how to build a wall, and came with rows of siege tanks. Fighting like this is asinine. Only possible due to their equally absurd plasma rifles.
>Terran Thena: Uhm… Tulverians aren’t great at fighting.
>Matriarch Hygieia: duh
>Matriarch Hygieia: reclaim their biomass and take those rifles
A frown crosses my face. She is right in every possible sense of the term. With the assistance of targeting computers any of my marines -even handicapped by a technician suit that replaced sensors and targeting hardware for tentacles and equipment manual holograms- can out shoot a dozen Tulverians. Those rifles would be better used by me. As would the biomass.
“General, get your men out of there or under cover!” I shout across to the approaching general.
Splendeur might be overconfidently rotund, but a slow wit he is not. Two hoots roll from his mouth, with each iguana issuing a piercing chirp in response. Already bulbous eyes go wide at the sound, registering something is wrong.
Then the general does the last thing I expect. A full on, ribbit. Identical in every way to your average bullfrog’s mating call.
The quips that come to mind seem endless, but I bite my tongue and pray the suit’s faceshield hides my chagrin. But if General Bologna is trying to whistle at me I might just blow off more than his tail.
Tulverians go silent for a moment, cooking a maneuver I should have considered earlier. Steel tickles against aluminium bodies as grenade pins are pulled then lobbed down epoxy tunneling. A few railguns fire, blasting the canisters out of the air and forcefully scattering the contents of chaff grenades. Only serving to spread the cloud prematurely.
Smoke billows through the tunnel, metallic particulates causing sensor pings to reflect in destructive harmonic convergence, effectively negating our systems. Through the cloud two score and seven iguanas escape the tunnel, falling back to a checkpoint near the wounded.
“Zat iz all of zem.” Calls Splendeur.
His stupid accent has never been so sweet. I warp in one of Hygieia’s nervous grenades, apparently something Zazathur carries around with him at all times and carefully heft it. My suit logs the weight of my projectile, providing recommended angels and required headroom to ‘fire’ the ‘grenade’ and gives me a firing solution to drop it right on top of the Novans.
Distant machinery starts up, growing louder like an approaching V8 musclecar. Reminiscent of a Juggernaut.
“RUN! CLEAR THE TUNNEL!” I shout, using the tentacles to form a sort of elongated baseball glove, something the suit calls a ‘chistera extension’.
I slam approve cause it nets me an extra twenty meters. Then let the suit take over, winding up and throwing the grenade near two hundred miles an hour, perfectly matching the firing solution. Then -promptly- fuck right off to the entrance, taking all my men with me.
Splendeur has already laid a trap with twenty iguanas, not enough to defeat a shielded Juggernaut in one volley, but he has no more reptiles to spare. Engines roar through the smoke, snorting clouds as it thunders closer.
Without warning, railguns crack, rockets explode, shaking the walls so violently I begin to fear a collapse and the engine belches black smoke, swirling the grey smoke like two flavors of ice cream.
Whatever it is, collides with the smokescreen, sucking in the sharp metallic cloud and spluttering. Any and all mufflers it was equipped with, immediately shits the bed and the roar becomes a screaming jet engine, sending its own reverberations our way.
A series of rockets explode, suddenly cutting off the engine’s whine. For several moments we wait, listening intently with far too many sensor pings. Nothing moves.
>Terran Thena: Hey, uhm… What does a nervous grenade actually do? And what’s the point of our suits if they don’t seal against biological warfare?
>Matriarch Hygieia: Zazathur would be complete shit if he couldn’t engineer a nervegas to kill weakass humans through a suit
>Matriarch Hygieia: you are not even wearing combat suits
>Terran Thena: uhm… I’m in the same tunnel.
>Matriarch Hygieia: guess that is one way to turn the iguanas into biomass
>Matriarch Hygieia: good job
>Matriarch Hygieia: did not think you had it in you
>Matriarch Hygieia: oh yeah… you should run
>Matriarch Hygieia: LIKE RIGHT THE HELL NOW
