SAM

“No. No. No!” Sam’s chin fell.

No. Milo had to come back. What would Milo’s old man think of the Final Sight’s great Captain now? He had let his kid die after he had made a promise to keep him safe. This goddamn world was not fair.

Sam growled and shook his head.

A hand landed on his rig’s shoulder. “I know how it feels. Expect it to hurt even more.”

Sam turned to her, staring with rage, his hands trembled inside the gauntlets. “You fucking piece of shit. That shiny metal skin will not protect you when I shove a nuke down your throat. You went on and on about how he failed you. He was the good one of us. And you shoved him over the edge. Making him feel useless. Goddamn you. What gave you the right to do something like that? Your goddamn strength, is that it? Is your tongue made out of metal? Because I am going to pull it out.”

His gauntleted hand tensed into a fist, making mechanical sounds.

“Hey, hey,” Beth said, raising that ugly mace of hers. “We still have to deal with the stowaways.”

He only needed to move fast enough. To reach down her throat before she got a hold of him.

The ship shook. Sam fell to the side.

“Capt’n. The dreadnought just exploded,” Leo said, turned to the main view screen. “Capt’n, the stowaways. Please.”

Diego and Birgitta sat quiet behind the pilot. Cowards.

Claire stepped up to him. “We have to save the ship. Capt’n, at least we can do that.”

“Goddamnit!” Sam yelled. “Come with me, you metal bitch. Let’s plow through these fuckers. Can you do that, at least?”

Beth stared back.

“Then I will deal with you,” Sam said, pulling out his hand terminal. “Claire, front and center with me. Tern and Beth will rush forward and we will support them, bulldoze through them.”

Claire nodded. “Roger. But what about your helmet, Capt’n? It’s busted.”

“I will be alright.” Sam gritted his teeth.

Beth skin flowed into metal and she spun the mace with the cord. “I am ready.”

“They are just outside that bulkhead door, Capt’n,” Leo said. “Two handfuls of combat suits with Lisa and Carl at the front.”

Sam stepped forward to the door and went down on one knee to give him better stability, the motor muscles in the legs locked rigid. “Claire, knee down and spin up your cannon. Leo, prepare to open the door. Diego, Birgitta, stay the fuck back.” He placed his hand on the trigger grip inside the gauntlet and the laser cannon started spinning up. He locked the elbow against the side of his rig. Claire stepped up to his side and adopted a similar position.

“Go.” Sam grunted.

The door slid to the side. Sam squeezed the trigger and his laser cannon spewed superheated beams, filling the corridor with red death. Claire followed his lead, their bombardment sizzling against Carl’s and Lisa’s barriers. Beth and Tern rushed forward, her mace struck Carl, launching him back through the corridor. Tern crashed into Lisa, his microwave emitter cooking soldiers inside their rigs as it glanced off her barrier.

“Die!” Sam yelled.

A warning popped into his view, the coolant system of his cannon was failing. He ignored it. It was time for violence, not caution. An ice shard flew past his helmet, mere inches from his exposed face. He even felt the cold against his skin.

The heat from the cannon bled into his arm, but Sam only bit down harder on his teeth. A combat suit stepped forward from the carnage, lining up its own cannon.

“Goddamn, you!” Sam shoved his lightning rod forward, between two damaged armor plates. The coils lit up and the lightning bolt killed the soldier inside instantaneous. The rig landed heavily on the floor. Milo had died because of these fucking people. Sam slammed down the lightning rod on the corpse and its rig. Again and again. “Fuck you!” Lightning bolts surged into his dead victim. It smelled of vengeance and burnt human flesh.

Another combat suit stepped forward, Sam leapt forward and toppled him to the floor. Sam slammed the rig’s left gauntlet and the laser cannon’s muzzle at the soldier’s helmet. At the third impact, the helmet shattered into pieces and the fourth impact crushed the soldier’s head. He kept slamming the gauntlet down, cracks started to grow in it. At the eight impact, the gauntlet came apart and his cybernetic hand and arm became exposed.

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“Not so fast!” Beth yelled in the corridor.

Sam looked up. The corridor was in a carnage of crumpled and slagged metal, rigs were in pieces and the soldiers dead or dying in screaming agony. Good.

Tern weighted down Carl to the floor while Beth slammed her mace down on his barrier of molten rock. The barrier was weakening and Carl was not able to attack back. She roared as her mace came down again. But his barrier was holding.

Elizabeth could not do anything properly, the metal bitch.

“Give me that!” Sam said. “And hold him down.”

Beth handed him the mace, Sam grabbing it with his rig’s remaining gauntlet and his cybernetic hand, metal fingers came around the handle. Motor muscles grew warm from the struggle of the mace’s weight, but the dexterity in the cybernetic hand gave him an improved grip.

Beth pulled and held down Carl’s fiery body with the help of Tern.

“Fire incarnate, my ass,” Sam said.

Sam slammed down the mace with all the strength the motor muscles mustered. Again. Sparks and droplets of molten rock shot to the sides as he slowly cracked it apart.

“These goddamn powered people,” Sam muttered under his panting.

The mace came down again.

“They think the world belongs to them,” Sam grunted.

Again.

“You think you are so goddamn strong,” Sam said. “But I can be stronger.”

He triggered the lightning rod, its coils lit up and sent the electricity into the mace. The mace impacted Carl’s barrier again, the electrical tendrils thundered into him. Carl’s barrier faded. His deposits drained.

Again.

The barrier shattered. Carl’s scared face came into view.

“Ugly piece of shit.” Sam let the mace fall to the floor. “Hold his shoulders,” Sam ordered. “Open that mouth wide now, boy.”

Sam grabbed Carl’s face with the whole gauntlet and held the laser cannon right above Carl’s mouth. With a pull the lips came apart, showing white teeth. He shoved the laser cannon into Carl’s mouth. Carl screamed, his lips bleeding as they cracked and the teeth shattered underneath the pressure. Sam shoved, the cannon slipping even deeper. Carl screamed, but the sound was muffled with a multi barrelled cannon in his mouth and throat.

“You think this is painful,” Sam said. “Then you have not felt the next part. I can be stronger than your goddamn lot. Your goddamn powers. This is how it feels to burn.”

Sam squeezed the trigger.

The laser cannon spun, its barrels spewing out superheated beams, melting and burning through Carl’s body. There was an initial scream and convulsion, but the body turned into a crispy corpse. He let go of the trigger, the cannon coming to stop.

He fell back, letting the rig land its bottom on the floor. Breathing grew slower. Empty. He felt empty. If he had been strong enough, Milo would not have needed to sacrifice himself. Stronger than these powered kids. Then Milo would still be alive. These clowns had not served on Mars during the wars. He was Captain Samuels, goddamn, Adam. But he could be even stronger, even deadlier.

“Lisa came loose, I will go after her,” Someone said, but Sam was not listening anymore.

Beth must have moved away, because when he looked up she was nowhere in sight. She would be dealt with later.

The stench of burnt human flesh. Carl’s corpse still smoldered on the floor. Good riddance. Sam spit on the corpse through his cracked helmet.

The bridge door slid open.

“Captain!” Diego said, stepping forward with a rifle in his hands. The Doc had been forced to take violence into his hands, Sam had not noticed him helping. Freeing, no doubt.

The rig’s back segmented and opened, Sam stepped out from the damaged combat suit.

He pushed his cybernetic arm forward to Diego. “You see this?”

The Doc nodded.

“I need more. I am going to be stronger. Faster. Deadlier.” Sam brandishing the arm in front of Diego. “You will fix this. All of me. I will be strong enough.”

Doc hesitated. “I don’t know, Capt’n.”

“You will do what I tell you or I will saw off the limbs and pieces of my own body and you will be forced to fix me. Your goddamn choice. Either way, I will become strong enough,” Sam said.

“Alright, then,” Diego said. “I can do it.”

“Good, lad.” Sam nodded.

Birgitta put a hand on his cybernetic arm. “Sam, are you sure about this?”

“Don’t you ‘Sam’ me.” Sam shoved away her hand.

“I feel responsible for his death,” Diego said, shaking his head. “I don’t know.”

Sam stared hard. “It’s not your fault. Both me and him pushed you into it. It’s not your fault. If you want to blame someone, blame me. I can take it. Now upgrade me and it will never goddamn happen again.”

“But, you saw and heard him. He felt like he had failed us, and this was his moment to pay us back,” Diego said, tears trickling down his face. ”But it was we who failed him. We pushed him too far!”

Sam’s jaw hurt as he bit down, holding back his anger and immediate need of punching Diego in the face. They had failed him, that was true. But Milo had saved their lives too, without his sacrifice that goddamn dreadnought would have shot the Final Sight to smithereens.

“Shut up, Diego. Get your tools and scanners, we have work to do,” Sam said, turning to Claire. “Claire, I want you to create a search algorithm that spans the space where The Breach exploded. I am not giving up on Blue too easily. Then patch up the reactor core.”

Claire nodded.