Zlata laughed out loud, nearly spilling the soda as the bad guy’s wrench on the screen missed the hero’s head after the man ducked to pick up a coin. The evildoer lost his footing on the slippery floor and tumbled over the railing, mounting a cannon several meters below. His speed took the shocked man into the spin, while his mouth was opened in a wordless cry. Little ones in the cinema cheered as the oblivious hero went about his day, oblivious to the attempt on his life.
Hot popcorn showered over a sitting close cub, and the boy whirled, returning the favor in kind to his friends who had sneaked up on him. Their parents began apologizing, but Zlata simply shook off the popcorn stuck in her fur and stuck out her tongue at the mischievous youth, too absorbed by the atmosphere of joy in the cinema. Old movies were fun!
She had eased up in the latest weeks and deeply regretted that none of her friends could come up today. The wolf hag eagerly picked up phrases from the films and hungrily studied the ancient architecture, shocked to the core at the sheer safety of the ancient times. There were no skinwalkers prowling in the darkness, no ravenous monsters lurking beneath the sand, and no rampant slave gangs trying to carve out a nation for themselves. It was a paradise, and it saddened her how much the humans didn’t appreciate what they had.
But truth be told, she was guilty of the same vice. Was she not the one who shunned doctors, like the Blessed Mother? Not anymore; once they returned to the villages, she’d do her best to change the Wolfkins’ perception of their trusted allies.
A gunshot jerked Zlata out of her blissful mood. She was already on her feet before a hole appeared in the screen. People stopped their laughter, standing up to the faint screams coming from the corridor.
“Is this part of a show…” asked a blond man in a black leather jacket.
“No,” Zlata said, narrowing her eyes at the fist side hole in the doors. “To the emergency exit, at once!” she snapped and grabbed the confused man by the collar. “Don’t just stand there; lead everyone out…”
The world shook, and the doors came apart in an explosion of burning wood. A triangle shone in the swirling smoke, and Zlata growled, recognizing a visor pattern. It was a mistake; her growl alerted the intruder, and bullets raced through the smoke, spearing her chair as the wolf hag jumped. She pushed the panicked crowd out of her mind, ignoring a little one being trampled by the bodies rushing to the second exit, the dead and wounded falling, light shining through the holes in their bodies. Zlata kept her focus even when a bullet hit a little one between the eyes and her brain splattered on the seat.
Don’t anguish in a battle. Do what is possible to preserve lives. This was Martyshkina creed, and Zlata bounced off the ceiling, landing in the swirling smoke. Her claws raked against the metal, gouging deep lines into the suit. A metal hand grabbed her by the wrist, and she was kicked in the stomach, hard enough to make her spit blood. No matter, she still lived. Zlata broke free, shuddering from the shot to her stomach, and stabbed into one place she was certain her claws could penetrate.
The visor. Her eyes adjusted to the smoke, and she saw a large, chubby even, figure bedecked into the heavy plate. The tips of her claws shattered the reinforced glass, and she plunged her fingers to the full length into the eyes of the screaming enemy, falling alongside him into the corridor. A burst of gunfire ripped through her abdomen, and splinters rained down from above.
It was a slaughterhouse there. Mere twenty minutes ago, the corridor was full of the running cubs, cartoon cutouts, adults, and personnel roleplaying as the movies’ characters. There was life, calmness, and a tasty smell of hot butter. Broken bodies now lay on the floor, arms and legs missing. The disgusting odor of released bowels permeated everything. Three more fat bastards fired indiscriminately, downing everyone in sight. There was no logic, no sense in it; the armored freaks simply enjoyed butchering, and it enraged Zlata. She twisted her claws, ending her opponent, and snatched his oversized machinegun from the dead hand.
A burst of fire cracked power armor and tore chunks of flesh from her left leg. Zlata rolled aside, scowling at the realization that her femur was shattered in several places. She lifted the dead invader and used him as a shield while she fired at his fellows. The one she aimed at was thrown a step back. Dents covered his chest plate, and a trickle of blood appeared from the joint of his elbow.
“Useless garbage,” Zlata muttered the words, struggling for a breath. Her knee joint was torn, and the leg dangled on a string of muscles. “Shardguns are the best.” T The battered bastard reached for a grenade. “Good, meat.” Her vision dimmed, but the wolf hag took aim and fired, exploding the grenade in the steel fingers.
She embraced the rage. It was what kept her alive and awake. Holes, more than she cared to count, covered her body; one lung gave out completely and she was kneeling in a pool of her own blood, her insides slithering out. That was it, the last test of her mettle. Ravager often asked: ‘What were they willing to sacrifice to protect the helpless?’ Zlata was willing to deny death for it, savagely tormenting her body for another second of life, embracing fear for those in the hall, and using it to fuel her life.
The grenade exploded, tossing the fatty aside. Two of his fingers cracked, and his companions lost their footing. That was the limit of Zlata’s lucky shot, and she accepted it, running her trembling paw over the dead man’s belt. The amber embers of her eyes flickered and faded, but the wolf hag wildly grinned, activated the grenades, and threw them in the general direction of the enemy. She didn’t see the bright explosion that collapsed the entrance and flung the armored forms outside. She barely recognized the steel beams and the ceiling that came crashing down on her. Zlata fought for every breath, trying to find a weapon even buried under the rubble when her paws stopped.
Wolf Hag Zlata of the Martyshkina Pack bled out, stalling the attackers to give the citizens time to escape.
****
“Everything is in order.” Till Ingo rolled his eyes at the data on the screen. The consoles’ operators reported stability of the power grid. “Pointless.” He frowned. “Where are these voltage drop disturbances, Agent Piam?” he eyed the woman looming over the operator.
Ingo was in a foul mood since the morning, and the summon only served to sour it even further. The dragon, that flying vehicle of the dead Horde’s leader, refused to yield its secrets. He took it apart, marveling at the exotic reactor of this ship. The researcher had expected it to be a regular plasma reactor, but it was a rudimentary proton engine, a technology long stuck in Iterna’s grasp. If he could understand how it worked, the Reclamation Army would be one step closer to unlocking the secrets of the wireless energy transfer. The implants in his head urged Ingo to continue, infected by his enthusiasm, but the scientist remained cautious. Slow and steady wins the race.
The cursed soldier of the First had woken up every victim of Techno Queen, and his students reported that the children had befriended Banshee’s siblings and often played ball with them. This disturbed Ingo to no end, for if the information about their inhuman origins were to reach the press, it would leave a mark on their lives. In an act of petty revenge, Till Ingo immediately gave the order to test the heavy ordinance on Daion, using his volunteer guinea pig to test the abilities of the recreated combat intelligence, whose schematics he had gleaned from Techno Queen’s knowledge.
Finally, this. There was a power outage yesterday, suspiciously timed to coincide with the attempted bank robbery. It reached a hospital in the south, and several patients in the emergency ward died during this short period. Furious, Till Ingo sent an official complaint to the Dynast, demanding the removal of the Minister of Health if the woman was dumb enough not to supply hospitals with the additional generators. Then came the invitation from the Investigation Bureau.
Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
“The reports didn’t lie,” Piam said in a steely voice; her artificial eye gleamed. “There was interference. If we have a virus or a backdoor in the system…”
Till Ingo raised a finger, halting the woman. Reports filled his eyes about spatial anomalies happening all around the city. He slowed his perception of time, trying to make sense of the situation when an elbow rammed him into the chest.
“Dad, duck!” Banshee screamed. “Watch out everyone!”
Sizzling cracks appeared on the platforms that overlooked the Operations Center. They widened into lines, and before Till Ingo could say a word, armored bodies stomped out of them, carrying oversized rifles. The researcher gulped, expecting an offer of surrender or anything. These iron-clad giants stood three meters tall, and the helpers in his head readily confirmed that, based on their expanded bulk, these New Breeds shared the same heritage as those who had attacked the settlement.
The Horde wasn’t done. It came for them.
There were no battle cries or taunts. The invaders aimed their weapons down and fired with deadly efficiency, eradicating the trying-to-run operators, while three of their number jumped down. Their hands slammed into the helmets of the security guards, pinning the men to the walls, and weapons barked, sowing death. An Orais threw an operator into the opened corridor and closed the distance to the nearest giant, grunting as the projectiles drummed over his plate.
His opponent was still turning after killing a Normie guard, and the Orais’ foot caught the Horde soldier in the knee, sending him sprawling. Long arms, each capable of shredding power armor without the added aid of the security suit’s synthetic fibers and servo motors, closed in on the helmet. The Horde soldier’s head was jerked aside, his gorget and neck cracked under the pressure, reaching for his shotgun.
“Piam, get out of the open…” Ingo shouted, and his daughter grabbed him by the shoulder and pushed him behind a console.
“Dad,” she hissed, “the bitch is with them.”
He looked at her incredulously, thinking that Banshee went crazy from the stress when Piam’s head swayed from side to side, her features flowing and reforming into the face of an unknown woman, her hair growing longer, and the artificial eye falling to the ground. Even her uniform melted and solidified into a green trench coat.
“That Khan,” the woman masquerading as Piam hissed, “it wasn’t needed.”
She nodded after an armored giant shouted at her words in an unknown language. The woman headed for the control center, and the Orais tried to bar her path. His shotgun fired, and armor-piercing slugs disappeared into the depths of the green coat, bringing the woman no discomfort. She swung her arm; fleshy growths sprouted on the leather, spitting out bone blades that impaled the guard. Legs, arms, chest. Against his will, Ingo marveled at the precision with which the bones were immobilized without damaging the arteries. The bones turned into elastic muscle whips, and the false Piam flung her opponent into the open corridor. She continued her advance; the elastic muscle whips shifted to become barbed living wire, and it whipped at the guards trying to stop the creature. Legs snapped, arms bent at impossible angles, blindingly fast whips bisected weapons, but left the guards alive.
Banshee peeked out of hiding and fired her coil gun Ingo had handcrafted for her. Blue energy flew out of the barrel, hitting the Horde soldier on the platform top right in the head. A round hole appeared in the helmet, and the body toppled down, while Banshee screamed in pain, clutching her shoulder, lightly nicked by a ricocheting bullet. Another shot hit bounced off her bone ridge, and the third sheared off her earrings and a piece of flesh from her ear.
Till Ingo punched the console before him in frustration, got up quickly, and dragged the wounded operator to safety. The woman was missing everything below the waist. The scientist calmly injected her with the experimental nanomachines. It was an unfinished product, one that fell short of his expectations due to its immaturity. Instead of creating metal legs, it will simply stop the bleeding and preserve the host’s life at all costs. After that, it will take another injection of another set of nanomachines to remove the first ones from the bloodstream so that prosthetics can be installed.
Screams, gunfire, hissing wires and explosions surrounded Till Ingo, but he wasn’t afraid for himself. Not anymore. These degenerates had turned his precious student into a killer. Banshee was crafted for war; the readiness to kill was in her very DNA, but he came to respect and care for the pale-skinned girl, trying to guide her to a better future, first according to Ravager’s wishes and then, surprisingly, his own. He often scowled and mocked her for falling asleep during lessons, and yet something in him drove him to cover her with a blanket more than once.
She deserved better. The people here deserved better.
They stole her innocence. An implant responsible for survival took over, joined by virtual combat intelligence. They killed his countrymen and brought war to his city. A cluster of nanomachines in Ingo’s body synthesized stimulants, causing his forehead to glow. The researcher essentially relinquished control of his body to the helpers and receded into the background.
Hunting mode enabled.
Ingo’s arm moved into his coat on its own, closing around the toxic gun. Just when the implants calculated that no one would pay attention to the spot to his left, his body slid there. The implants briefly navigated his body to appear from behind the ruined console terminal and fire at the wires behind two Horde soldiers on the platform above. A concentrated, searing beam of acid traveling at two thousand kilometers per hour burned through the wires, causing them to explode, sparks obscuring the soldiers’ view. Ingo aimed quickly and fired twice at each of them, once to damage the armor over the heart and the second time to kill.
“Hide the wounded behind the terminals!” Ingo shouted as his body fired again, melting away the top of one console so Banshee could take a shot. His student didn’t miss the opportunity, and another dead body dropped to the ground. “Activate the emergency, summon…”
He stopped talking, too shocked to his very core when his connection to the city’s system was abruptly cut off. He received no panic calls from the police or the mayor’s office, and there was no connection to the Net. White static filled the channels. The alarm systems weren’t directing civilians to shelters; rudimentary artificial intelligence assistants didn’t guide the police, forcing the officers to rely on old-fashioned radio communications. Advertisements blinked and disappeared, and one glitch after another piled up in Houstad as automated systems, under the conflicting commands of the unknown malware, began to create emergencies. Gas pipes exploded, traffic lights flashed brightly and spat sparks, massive displays relayed unknown messages.
This unknown malware only spared three locations in Houstad. Iternian Embassy, which came as no surprise. The terraformation complex’s systems had held, saved by the software provided as part of the joint restoration treaty. And the last was the Inevitable, as the behemoth’s crew had severed its connection to the city’s network. The ruination was spreading; Till Ingo’s implants nearly failed prey to it, and they whispered, angrily, in the back of his mind, trying their best to figure out what horror of the Old World had been unleashed today.
It was irrelevant. The source of this poison came from the control room, and Till Ingo stood up.
“Stay in cover,” he ordered Banshee.
Many people called him a cold person. Even his sisters doubted his intentions. And there was a grain of truth in those doubts; Ingo almost stumbled countless times on the path of learning. He often dismissed good advice, forced his will onto others, and nearly ended his creation in his arrogance. There were allies who helped him stay human, and as a human, he intended to help keep Houstad safe.
A splitting headache gripped Ingo’s brain; his forehead glittered like a New Year’s decoration. The New Breed security team was already in the hall, and Orais faced up against the bulky giants. Despite the threat coming from the arriving reinforcements, many of the Horde troops sought to end Ingo, and his body jerked, manipulated by the helpers, dodging bullets before they left the barrel.
Cuts appeared on his body. It was a funny thing about precognition. If he had been able to predict the future flawlessly, and the simulations of his implants were far from that level, his body was still that of an overweight Normie. Knowledge was useless if he couldn’t keep up, and as a shell hit his shoulder, Till realized that he certainly wasn’t fast enough. His cut limb fell, and he braced himself for the inevitable death as a shot landed in the shooter’s stomach and the second blue flash left a wide gash in his eye.
“You never make things easy for me, do you, Dad?” Banshee asked, helping Ingo walk. “Why are you risking your bacon out here?”
“Don’t,” he said hoarsely. “Don’t call me dad, student. We need to flush the virus out of the system before half of Houstad is set on fire.”
They marched on together.