Chapter 40: Past Fragment: Mechrons Last Stand (2/2)

Mechron had destroyed their home once, and now they would see justice done.

Having recovered, Leo flew into the city, followed by the Cossack and some caped fellow. Their allies had cleared a path ahead, engaging the drone swarms, but faced heavy resistance. The towers unleashed hundreds of lasers in all directions, cutting Genomes and buildings alike, while artillery bombardments from the defensive turrets destroyed almost every ruined building still standing.

And of course, Mr. Wave couldn’t help but brag. The show-off had moved in the middle of a robot-crowded street, hands raised. “Can you feel fear, robots?” The robots had opened fire midspeech, but lasers and bullets harmlessly phased through the Red Genome. “Because Mr. Wave feeds on tears!”

Mr. Wave vanished, his wavelength body turning into a deadly laser moving at lightspeed. Before Leo knew it, his teammate had carved a path through the robots, cutting the machines in half merely by moving through them. Meanwhile, the werewolf siblings were busy tearing apart a tank with their bare claws, leading a pack of monsters.

The caped fellow charged at one of the metal towers and brought it down by going through it. The other flyers spread to support the ground forces, while Leonard and Cossack moved towards Mechron’s fortress.

The enormous base’s walls opened, waves of jetpack-powered robots flying towards them armed with heavy rifles. They immediately fired a volley of black projectiles at the duo, forcing them to spread out. Though they moved slowly, the robots’ bullets powered through any matter, absorbing anything close to them.

Gravity rifles. Leonard had faced a few in previous engagements, and one had almost torn his core apart. He suspected Mechron had specifically designed the weapon to kill energy-based Genomes like him.

Leonard retaliated with plasma beams, while the Cossack hit the machines with his shoulder-cannon. Both sides aimed with deadly accuracy and moved around with grace; the machines dodged with inhuman dexterity and reflexes, while the Genomes had speed on their side.

Guided by Pythia’s network, Leonard entered some kind of trance, his body moving on its own. It was as if a primal instinct had taken over, shutting down his conscious mind and leaving only a battle program. He became no different than the machines he fought.

No, Leo realized. He was different from these machines. Pythia’s network let each individual keep their free-will, yet allowed people from different backgrounds and who had nothing in common, to cooperate for a common cause. Their army was united in its diversity, while Mechron’s machines were mindless copies; soulless slaves to a despot who considered free will as a disease, rather than something to be cherished.

And at some point, Pythia’s network began to outperform Mechron’s robotic hive mind. Leonard hit one robot, then two, then three. The numbers kept climbing, but the Genome’s view had been reduced to blasts, black bullets, and burning metal.

Fifty, seventy…

“When will they learn?” the Cossack asked, bombarding drones with his shoulder-cannon. Leo assisted him with plasma blasts, the two wingmates coordinating their assault with perfect synchronization; Pythia’s network even allowed them to hear each other over the explosions, as astonishing as it sounded.

And yet, in spite of their impressive resistance, more robots kept coming.

There was something terrifying in fighting these machines. Humans and animals could feel fear, fleeing lost battles, often hesitating before attacking, or attempted to communicate. But not Mechron’s robots. They felt no remorse, didn’t make a sound and never retreated.

Leo fought an unrelenting tide of steel that just wanted him dead.

Still, the battle seemed to be going well for them. The Shining Knight’s troops held the line on the western side, while Nidhogg had reached the city, toppling buildings and crushing a laser tower under his sheer weight. The corpses of Mechron’s undead cyborgs were absorbed by the giant reptile on contact, regenerating his biomass lost to the enemies’ energy weaponry.

Once transformed, Nidhogg was almost unstoppable. A juggernaut fueled by death. His troops followed in his wake, Genomes modified with cybernetic or biological implants; like remoras supporting a larger shark, they mostly stuck to defending their leader from smaller drones threatening to swarm him.

The plan was to have the reptilian titan destroy the defensive towers and then breach Mechron’s fortress with his acid spit, though the rogue Genius might have a trick up his sleeve.

As it turned out, he had two.

The Red Genome noticed movement near Mechron’s fortress, holes opening inside the two circles making up the base’s infinity shape. Two enormous rockets the size of skyscrapers emerged from the ground, flying towards the heavens at incredible speed.

The Kujata and the Bahamut had been launched.

Leo immediately raced after them, unleashing a plasma beam at the Kujata. A force-field around the rocket negated his attack, and though it briefly shorted out, the two orbital weapons continued their ascent.

“If they get too far...” Leonard couldn’t finish his sentence, blasting a path through the flying robots. They weren’t even fighting to win, but to delay.

“If,” the Cossack replied with laconic wit, flying after the Kujata at full speed. The g-force involved would have crushed any normal pilot, but the vigilante powered through, catching up to the satellite. He was a man who believed in actions over words.

Leonard pursued the Bahamut, intending to crash into it and bypass its force-field, when a roar echoed from behind him.

The Red Genome turned around, as a monster emerged from the fortress.

The creature looked like some kind of biomechanical European dragon. The ten meters tall reptile had wings similar to solar sails, its red scales mixed with black machinery covering the chest, the head, and the claws. Its yellow, reptilian eyes glared at the Red Genome, betraying a hint of intellect.

What the hell was that, a biomechanical war machine? Leonard didn’t have time to fight it, or the Bahamut may escape Earth’s orbit.

As if to answer his thoughts, the dragon pointed at Leonard with both its hands, the claws shining with crimson energy.

A crushing force took over the living sun and forced him down. Much to his surprise, Leonard ended up crashing towards the ground, an invisible hand dragging him away from the Bahamut.

Though he was more skilled with plasma and fire, Leonard could manipulate his own gravity. While he mostly used it to fly, he had learned a few other tricks. Manipulating his gravity-field, he managed to collapse the effect bringing him down, returning to the fight.

“What was that?” Leonard asked out loud, pursuing the dragon. “A gravity well?”

“Gravity-control,” Pythia said as the dragon roared back. “It’s a Red.”

Leonard thought he had misheard for a moment. “What? But only humans—”

“Until now.”

Mechron’s power covered multi-agent systems, from artificial intelligences to nanotech constructs. His MO was to create AI dedicated to the creation of new technologies, allowing him to make breakthroughs in specialties outside his own. Mechron was the most dangerous kind of Genius; the one who could make more.

But to think he had uncovered the secret of Elixirs…

The rogue Genius couldn’t be allowed to escape. No matter what.

Gathering up plasma in his core, Leonard fired a deadly beam at the creature. Though it moved at supersonic speed, the monster couldn’t outspeed light.

But as it turned out, it didn’t need to. Instead, it turned its own gravity crush ability on empty air, creating a miniature black hole the size of a fist. The phenomenon absorbed the dragon into itself before disappearing, the ion beam hitting nothing but air.

Damn, did it use gravity to create a wormhole or something?

Whatever the case, it had fulfilled its mission in delaying Leonard. The Cossack had somehow managed to bring down the Kujata, the satellite’s wreckage crashing on Sarajevo’s streets, but the Bahamut had become a faint light point in the skies.

“Shit!”

“Seventy-three percent chance that the Bahamut opens fire on Sarajevo once online, according to Calculator,” Pythia warned. “Increasing by one point every ten minutes.”

Had Mechron grown desperate enough to fire at his own base?

It wasn’t about winning anymore.

Leonard turned towards the heavens, ready to pursue the satellite even into the dark reaches of space if needed when Pythia’s voice interrupted him. “No, don’t. Hit the fortress and reach Mechron. Kill him before he pulls the switch. The odds are better.”

“But the satellite will—”

“Something worse is coming.”

Leonard froze. “What do you mean?”

“If his fortress isn’t annihilated soon, Mechron will somehow kill everyone in Sarajevo,” Pythia said, her composure breaking into genuine fear. “Destroy the bunker at all costs.”

“What’s waiting for me inside?”

“I don’t know.” Her words turned haunting. “I only see black. It’s all black.”

Leo braced himself for battle and flew at mach-speed through the fortress’ metal walls.

Mechron was waiting, deep down.