He risked a peek.
A string of clanging and pinging against the side of his helmet quickly sent him right back down into cover.
“Wells, you fucking idiot, keep your head down!”
The Warrant always barked, but he was usually right. He ducked down, swapped out the magazine in his rifle for a fresh one.
Paused.
He ran the Seraph armor’s fingers over the helmet, brushing across the four slitted eyes with their optics units hidden within. The haptic feedback prickled his fingers and thumbs a good foot away as he grazed across the punched-deep dents in the metal, three of them in a staggered pattern. Each was marked on his HUD in red – almost breaking through to the insulation layer beneath the plating. The A.I. in the suit was chirping a soft warning as it highlighted the helmet in orange on the armor display.
The pulsing of plasma rifles and the chatter of gunfire started and stopped haltingly over the trenches. Lots of time to plan the next move in a chess match like this. Wells pulled the bullet still lodged near his neck out of the armor, the seal layer within repressurising shortly after with a soft hiss.
“Negative, sir, losing altitude, we-”
The chatter wasn’t good.
Never was, usually. But it was good to know what was happening. What little air support they had was grounded, being too dangerous to take to the skies.
Silver lining to wearing a suit of power armor. You had all the bells and whistles you could ask for. Didn’t matter if this was an older MK XVIII, it still came with everything from inner crystal-gel-layer temperature control to a full comms suite. His quick peek had quickly tagged and then lost a small red square, positioned as a gunner up over the edge of the trench. The battlenet’s web of A.I.s would keep track as best they could from there.
He had thought Shocktrooper armor was spiffy, but the day he loaded into a Seraph, it felt like one of God’s chosen angels on the day of reckoning.
The crack of a high caliber rifle. The red square disappeared from the small map in the top left of his HUD.
“Thanks Wells.”
“No problem Kels. Just a few new dents to hammer out.”
The Hand of Wrath had been pinned here for over a month. Broken Orchid was a hellhole of a world, beset by localized Beast infestations and inhabited by only the most crazed farmers and ranchers who still defended their badland homesteads with as much salvaged weaponry as they could find.
Tyrone Wells and The Hand of Wrath had been deployed by Serania, The God of Justice herself – to push the front towards more favorable terrain. Out of the hills and towards the coast. The initial drop had been grim, with entrenched planetside railguns and missile batteries making short work of any starship stupid enough to linger too long near the airspace.
One frigate of three made it out, with the other two laying across the nearby landscapes as skeletal husks of their former glory. The dust had lingered for the better part of a day, creating sandstorm conditions. Then The Hand had lost a third of their number when the formation of Agathas were picked out of the sky one by one in spectacular displays of flak.
Then it had been weeks of trench fighting across barren badlands, the dry, rocky, brush-covered terrain barely being in the early terraforming stages before war consumed poor Orchid.
“Warrant Officer Typhus? Chayot Adem Henrik, 14th Armored Corps.”
“Go ahead, Henrik.”
“I’m three lines back, but my A.I. found an ammo cache that hit ground close by in the last supply drop from orbit. Think you and your squad could help me get it active? Would be nice to be able to provide some artillery support again. We tried twice already and failed.”
“Come to us, Hanks. We’ll talk details off the air.”
“Yes sir.”
The Hand of Wrath regrouped, swapping out with a half-squad of Shocktroopers who remained standing at positions. The Warrant’s helmet slid open with a hiss to reveal his scarred face. Then he drew his kukri and started dragging lines in the dirt.
“Now we know once we push past this ridge, and capture that forward operating base, we have the higher ground advantage for the next push towards the coast. Armada scored some reinforcements from some Aggies that flew up low and fast from somewhere deep behind enemy lines. Possibly a seaside airfield. Recon spotted an officer of some kind hopping off, and missed the shot.”
“A minor god, sir?”
“Let’s hope not, Coggs.”
Wells moved his knife across the dirt map.
“Sir, this FOB is where their AA guns are set up, correct? If we could capture them, it would turn this whole valley. We could get reinforcements from the next valley over.”
“Good point Wells, and I think Henrik is just the man to help get us there. I’ve served with him before. So – we locate the ammo cache, refill our Chayot’s canisters and artillery capability, and push to the FOB with his artillery support. I can muster three Shocktrooper squads at most for this.”
Coggs drew trench lines where Harlequins and Dread Knights had been spotted.
“We know they have at least one squad of Knights as countermeasures for us Seraphs. We know it’s Dreads and Harlequins. Not just Berserkers and soldiers.”
“We’re The Hand of Wrath, Coggs. We cut our teeth on Knights.”
Coggs smiled behind his helmet.
“Sir, with Kelsey on overwatch, I think we can secure the ammo crate with antigrav clamps and get it back here to prep for our assault. We’ve been using scavenged weaponry for a week now.”
Warrant Officer Typhus nodded.
“One hour to prep, desuit for maintenance, reload. Back here for mission launch. Wells, get those dents looked at – Hulk, you’re on suit mechanic.”
Hulk shrugged, and clapped his gauntlet onto Well’s shoulder, leading him back to the nearby concrete bunker they had been using as a barracks.
“Think it’s an Armada god, Hulk?”
Hulk shrugged, disassembling Wells’ armor in mere minutes after he had folded up the rabbit legs and stepped back out of the power armor in just his bodysuit.
“Isn’t it heresy to kill a god?”
Hulk chuckled.
“Only our gods, Wells.”
Wells furrowed his brow. He felt conflicted at the thought of killing a chosen ascendant of God. Even if that god served the betrayer. How could an angel killing a god not be heresy?…
“Serania has blessed us, brother. We act directly in her name.”
Hulk always knew what to say to make him feel better. Sometimes he found himself thinking too much. It distracted him from his missions, and daydreaming had gotten friends killed before, back when he had been a Shocktrooper and a private. His faith was all he needed to win.
“This one puncture is dangerous. I’ll seal it as best I can, as your suit still has pressure. But don’t get hit in the neck again or the underlayer seal might fail.”
Wells held up the bullet he had kept.
“I’m gonna make it a necklace, I think.”
Hulk smiled.
“I have a better idea.”
He moved to the workbench attachment connected to his suit’s cold fusion reactor, a janky tabletop affixed to the armor like the legs of a centaur.
“This saves me from scavenging for some scrap.”
Within minutes, Hulk had melted down the partially crushed bullet and used it to patch the plating above the insulation layer of Tyrone’s suit.
“It’ll hold. I’d just abstain from going vacuum until you get this thing checked out properly.”
Wells smiled.
“Ol’ Tiberius has kept me alive this long, hasn’t he? Besides, God will protect me.”
Hulk nodded sagely.
“Now eat something, you doofus. Boots on in ten.”
Wells clasped hulk’s forearm in thanks, as was custom as a Seraph, and pulled himself back into the armor’s open back. He opened his helmet, extended his long rabbit-like spurs to raise himself up to the full seven feet height of the suit, and bumbled off to find an MRE.
Fifteen minutes later, he had reloaded his magazines, done a suit diagnostic, shoved some food in his face, and stood with the rest of The Hand.
For all their unit’s prestige, the various iconography, stenciled quotes and scriptures, and the height and armor of their Seraph suits, The Hand still looked tired and beat up. Moreso than they usually did in the field. Several breastplates and arm guards bore superficial scratches, dents, and scuff-marks. Kelsey’s helmet was the only one with a working rifle link, which was why she was the one with the sniper rifle and smart scope. The rest were a sorry collection of different armor eras and beaten up modifications towards specialist leanings.
Henrik had arrived, and his bulky Chayot armor was a stark contrast to his lankier Seraph cousins. Chayots were emblazoned with red atop the traditional white, with everything from hazard signs denoting the different canisters they fired, to even more extremist iconography compared to much of what even the Seraphs wore.
Being a power-armored walking bomb suit came with a zeal that only the bravest of armored corps soldiers could muster. Wells had considered it, at one point. To be able to reign holy fire down upon the enemies of God was truly a blessing. But the idea of walking around with all those high-yield explosives, chemicals, and propellants on your body still seemed crazy, even with the suit’s design.
“So, Henrik says he saw the crates at the crash site of a Gloria about a third of the way into the current stretch of No Man’s Land. Luckily for us, the Gloria itself provides some cover. Unluckily for us, the enemy seems to have multiple machine gun nests and snipers, and Henrik has lost six troopers trying to get even one of the crates back to the trenches.”
Typhus was drawing in the dirt again.
“As we’ll have the cover of The Gloria, with the proximity of the crash site to the enemy’s FOB, we’re going to secure the crash site, and then once Henrik is loaded up and we’ve re-armed, we’ll push onwards to the FOB. We’re spreading our lines thin for this, so if we can’t do it here, the counterattack might break us.”
“High risk, high reward, sir.”
“That’s right Kelsey. You’re going to stay behind as overwatch, and join us once we’ve broken the trench lines and begin moving up towards the base on the ridge. Henrik will be moving with us for artillery cover. I don’t need to explain danger close rules for Chayot integration? Once we get the crates and clear the next trench line, Shocktrooper teams will pull the artillery gear back to our trenches for the next push.”
The squad nodded. Such strategies had been covered at the academy on Venus long before they ever stepped into power armor for the first time. Most of them had experienced the strange sensation of charging headlong into the falling artillery shells to break enemy lines. Shock and awe tactics were a Seraph specialty.
“Chances are there’s a Seraph cache alongside the Chayot supplies, and we’ll have access to some weapons, meaning we can turn the tide fairly quickly with a lightning raid. The Armada is too slow without numbers, skiffs, or ZQs, having expended their armor reserves earlier on in the conflict. And we can use that to our advantage. We’ve called in the one Harbinger we have left in working order to back us up alongside the troopers and fill the gap once we’ve punched through. Got word from the engineers that they’ve welded her back up to a rough semblance of fighting shape.”
He drew in the dirt as he spoke, dragging a line from where the trenches started to the FOB, following an offline of the trench system that was likely used as a supply line.
“Henrik will shell the AA guns as soon as we can get close, and when they go down, that’s when the last of our Navy folks race in with the few Skyjacks, Justices, and Aggies they’ve got left – grounded back a few clicks.”
He paused, looking at the conglomeration of G.O.D. troops around him, Chayot, Seraph, and Shocktrooper alike. There was even a lone Judicator left amongst one of the trooper squads.
“Is that clear? The Guardians of Destiny can turn this fucking stalemate, and it all starts right here. With us capturing that FOB.”
There was a nodding amongst the crowd.
“Get in position, comms open. Wait for my signal. The Seraphs will secure the crash site with speed, protecting Henrik as we move. Once we push towards the opposite trenchline, that’s when Kelsey, the Harbinger, and you troopers will move to back us up. On my orders.”
People began moving every which way at a jog, preparing for the surge to soon come. Wells followed Hulk and Coggs, the veterans of the squad.
“Good luck boys.”
Kelsey called.
“Don’t forget to spot me while you’re out there, yeah? I’m doing my best Sentinel impression!”
Not that they would need to try, as by simply looking around, each Seraph had the simple Class 1 or 2 A.I. that handled comms banding and the Friend or Foe targeting. They’d highlight anything that crossed the HUD anyways for Kelsey to help with alongside her fellow Shocktroopers on the sniper team.
Typhus crossed over the airwaves in each helmet and earpiece.
“Over the top in twenty. When Henrik starts the mortar party with what he’s got left, that’s when we move.”
Wells counted down from twenty, waiting for the popping noises of the tiny shoulder mounted railguns of the Chayot suit.
The thumping of distant explosions across No Man’s Land came a few short seconds after hearing the loud cracks of the railguns.
“NOW, WRATH!”
Well’s thrusters and rabbit leg spurs launched him fifteen feet in a single leap up and over the trench lip with a pulling sensation of the underlayer – plastic and synthetic material beneath the armor plates stretching and straining with the G Force.
Gunfire spackled the furrowed badlands dirt and gravel around him, as he and his fellow Seraphs began bounding fifteen to twenty feet at a spring across the terrain. The leg extensions pumped and sprung the weight of the suit forward with each step as the cold fusion engines roared to power the thrusters across the suit of powered armor.
Hulk took the first glancing blow, as puffs of whitish-blue mist flared into orange across his side.
Plasma bolts, beyond their maximum range, popping into tiny fireballs against the armor before flaring out. Not much risk from plasma at this huge range.
Wells zig-zagged as he was taught, crossing with Hulk to draw the fire. A pinging of smaller caliber automatic fire peppered his form. This time, the armor held, sending sparks and ricochets in all directions. The immense bounding speed of a Seraph at full tilt was close to a hundred miles an hour, with the armor’s running speed and velocity keeping the suit consistently airborne through a combo of springlike spurred leg extensions and thruster power comparable to a transport ship.
Hundreds of pounds of armor was reduced to a mere featherlike flow for Wells as he bounded across the pockmarked badland terrain.
Each Seraph suit cost about the same as a Justice fighter to construct, of course. Power armor was hardly cheap to manufacture, even for the Guardians.
Wells crested the final small dip in terrain, and the Gloria sprung into view in a divot where it had furrowed to a halt. Shreds of the twin rotors were everywhere, and crates and bodies lay sprawled across the ground, some from the initial crash, while others were more clearly from other escape or salvage attempts. Several bodies lay in severed pieces, denoting the gruesome work of ZQs or Knights with bladed weapons.
The smell of fresh rot filled the air.
Coggs was first to arrive at the crash, ahead of Coggs and Wells, and moved to the fuselage of the fallen Gloria.
“Wait, do-”
Kelsey’s voice started, but didn’t finish, as Coggs moved through the deformed side door and blocked the green laser that faintly streamed along the doorframe, blocking ingress or egress.
The initial blast sheared the majority of Cogg’s torso and head from his form, easily disintegrating through the front side of the armor and shredding the meat and bone beneath. He flew a good ten feet backwards and what remained of his Seraph armor continued to smoke and burn. The crystal-gel underlayers of his armor were splattered and bubbling around him, the soft cyan blue mixing with the reds and pinks of his shattered body.
“Trapped…”
The hurt in Kelsey’s voice was clear, as a secondary explosion sent a black fireball upwards into the blue sky above, as crates within the Gloria full of Chayot and Seraph armaments erupted from the heat. Napalm, high yield explosives, and plasma cells continued to rupture and flare intermittently from within the wreckage.
“Fucking idiot. Didn’t check for traps.”
Hulk was angry. Hurt and angry simultaneously.
“No, he didn’t.”
Wells was sad, but knew better than to linger. Coggs was a good man, but lives were still on the line. Mourning could come later. The squad was already down to four in a unit with a traditionally high KIA count.
Hulk moved to slap anti-grav clamps on the remaining two boxes within reach, pulling them across the brushy badlands terrain away from the burning wreckage and the bodies.
“Status report.”
“Coggs is gone, sir. Armada trapped the crash site.”
“Dammit. And the cargo?”
The Warrant arrived as he spoke over comms, slowly bounding to a stop. Henrik soon after him, the pneumatic pistons of his suit straining with the exertion of carrying the heavily-armored Chayot suit in a dead sprint.
The two philosophies of the Armored Corps were on full display – strip it down to be fast, or armor it up to be tough. With the more guns the better on both sides, usually.
“We don’t have long before the enemy catches wind of the blast and checks it out with some Berserkers or Spyders. Henrik, get those railguns and canister lines refilled. No time to pull back to the trenches.”
Henrik jogged his bulky artillery armor over to the crates and began pulling out cases of ammunition, holding up and feeding strings of Chayot canisters and shells marked in all sorts of dangerous bright colors and symbols into his power armor. The Seraphs moved to racks of plasma rifles, high caliber machine guns, and other Seraph equipment.
“Hey, a plasma shield gauntlet!”
Hulk pulled a small rail-attachment from a rack of differently sized devices. Clearly this had been intended for The Hand, as no two devices appeared to be the same – mostly variations on specialist gear. He slid it onto the rails on his left forearm and after getting his A.I. to connect it, made a whipping motion with his arm to flash a blue buckler of plasma shielding to life. He helped himself to a long handle, which when engaged, flared to life as a brilliantly blue plasma sword to match the shield. He clipped it to the magnetic clamp at his waist, lifting a new plasma rifle and sighting it over the gap in the shield around his Seraph armor’s gauntlet.
“Kelsey, get the Harbinger and our Shocktroopers ready to move. Henrik will be the signal, once he starts sending the trenches running for cover, we’ll be breaching as your vanguard.”
“Yes sir.”
The comms cut her off as she began barking orders back towards the G.O.D. trenches.
The gunfire had picked up with the charge, pattering back and forth all around them behind the smoke cloud the burning Gloria was providing. Wells tossed the ugly old Shocktrooper rifle he had salvaged from a corpse a week and a half ago, helping himself to a high caliber machine gun with an extended magazine. Even in his Seraph armor it was a heft, designed for use as a mounted gun most likely. But despite the soft whining of servos, it maneuvered well.
“Wells, here!”
Hulk tossed him a long polearm, in a similar fashion to the sword. He caught it deftly. Unlike the handle, the blade was titanium and steel, sharp and angry looking. When Wells activated it, a white-hot cutting edge flared along the blade. He turned it back off and clamped it to the magnetic clamps on his shoulders, thankful for his spurs giving him the height to avoid dragging the shaft behind him in the dirt. He helped himself to a comms antennae as well, screwing it into his helmet to replace the more basic one he had lost in the drop.
Calibrating communications array…
Connecting.
Success. FoF AOE expanded.
His A.I. quickly reworked the HUD to scale up the size to incorporate the new FoF tags his armor was helping to collate within the battlenet. Dozens of Artificial intelligences grabbed onto his armor’s new signal to use his communications array to expand the FoF network.
“Wells, you get the spotter of the day award. Do you know how many new FoF tags just popped up thanks to you?”
“Just doing my job, Kels.”
“Good man. Stay alive until we catch up, okay?”
Wells felt the adrenaline pumping as he crouched for a spring and waited for Henrik to finish loading a nasty string of bright orange canisters into the Chayot’s suit feeders.
“Here we go boils and ghouls. May the council protect us with their blessings!”
Henrik crouched down and extended the struts on his armor’s legs – similar, yet different to that of the Seraphs. Whereas theirs were built for speed, Henrik’s suit spurs were designed purely to stabilize the bulky power armor whilst firing the heavy shoulder-mounted railguns.
“Recoil is a bitch.”
And with that, the first two shells vanished up and over the Gloria with loud cracks of superheated air. Wells watched on his HUD map as his Seraph’s armor A.I. worked in tandem with the Chayot’s suit A.I. to place the shots directly inside the trenches. A cluster of red squares vanished from the display, assumed killed or severely wounded within the blast radius.
“NOW, WRATH!”
Typhus led the charge – brandishing a gruesome looking forearm blade attached via rails to his Seraph’s right limb. In his other hand, a plasma rifle, safety off, charged to maximum. The armor would handle or mitigate the problems of one handed recoil and accuracy.
The three Seraphs vaulted through the cloud of smoke together, spurs extended. All three stuck the landing as they emerged through the other side, racing the remaining distance towards the trenches as Henrik continued laying down artillery cover behind them, adjusting as the trio’s power armor marked new targets for him.
“PRAISE GOD!”
Wells pushed ahead of Typhus, the older pilot settling into the gentle rolling gait of a Seraph at full speed. But Wells didn’t leave his movements to the armor, moving his limbs past the edges of the throttle and balance assist.
“100% output, Tiberius!”
His A.I. complied, pushing the cold fusion engines to maximum as Hulk struggled to keep up with Tyrone’s impossible pace across bumpy, cratered-badlands landscape.
The trench loomed large, and before he knew it, he was dropping on top of a crowd of five bodies, a mixture of Berserkers and Soldiers. The sickening crunch of his spurs condensing down on top of a head and neck hit his ears as he cushioned his fall with an unlucky enemy. The full weight of the power armor buried his landing pad deep into the dry sandy loam of the trench as Wells raised himself up to his full height and the machine gun began chattering.
Hulk and Typhus dropped in next to him, beginning to clear the right as Wells spewed hot death down the left. The crowd of soldiers and Berserkers moved too late, cut down as armor piercing bullets ripped them limb from limb and sent sprays of rock and dirt up wherever they connected.
“Push towards the FOB supply trench!”
Typhus was fighting a moving retreat from the right as Wells pushed forwards.
“Heads down, Seraphs.”
Henrik’s warning was almost too late, as the trench to the right collapsed in a sea of roiling soil. Soon after, there was a bright flash, and the collapsed trench was wreathed in napalm, which scattered out in droplets, igniting the Seraphs’ armor in patches.
“Danger close as fuck.”
Hulk swept flames from his armor as he murmured.
“Kelsey, get moving.”
“On it sir.”
Henrik continued shelling, as the trio of Seraphs pushed up the trenchline to the left. Resistance quickly mounted, and it became a slew of close quarters encounters. Hulk led with his buckler, providing cover to Typhus and Wells who fired from behind.
“Harlequins, 12!”
The first went down to a burst from Wells, but he had been too gung-ho when first hitting the trench lines, and was already dangerously low on ammo, as the belt fed feverishly from the box into the chamber with an ominously empty clicking sound.
The second Harlequin sent sprays of green and yellow plasma ricocheting off the buckler. Hulk was forced to duck up against the side of the trench as the buckler flared dangerously towards orange.
“I think I’m hit, Warrant.”
Wells’ A.I. brought up Hulk’s armor diagram in place of his, marking in red a failed section of armor near the thigh.
“Wells, covering fire.”
Wells raised himself up to full height, and began walking and firing simultaneously towards the Harlequin pack, shredding it and sending the remaining two monstrosities scrambling as the armor piercing rounds made short work of the cyborgs.
Yet right as he was feeling confident, the gun clicked empty.
He slung it onto his back and pulled the glaive, igniting it and charging with a roar.
“GOD IS GOOD!”
The first sweep of the lance connected with the hydraulic claws of one of two remaining Harlequins, as it vomited blood and black grease from puncture holes in it’s mechanized torso. Wells strained against the claw, torching the cutting edge through the claws and into the neck of the Harlequin Knight.
The mechanical monstrosity sputtered and died, sparking and drooling fluids.
The second Knight was quick to capitalize, as it brought a curved axe down atop Wells, who was barely able to get the shaft of the Glaive up in time. The axe scraped along the metal and plastic of the shaft and wedged a deep piece out of the Seraph’s deltoid plate, blue crystal gel seeping out to try and staunch the breached seal of the armor.
But Wells had fought Harlequin Knights before, and quickly ducked around his slower, bulkier opponent to shove the tip of his blade up through the steel jaw and into the circuitry and brain matter of the cyborg.
It shuddered and fell limp into a pile of flesh and metal at his feet.
“Get down, Wells.”
Wells threw himself to the ground just in time for the shell to impact the trench only fifteen feet from where he was. The concussion of the blast swept over him, carrying several body parts.
From there, the blood frenzy took over, as Wells rushed with his blade up the trenchline through flaming debris and delimbed bodies.
“Wells, hold the T-junction, we need the Harbinger and Chayot with us for the push to the FOB.”
His HUD map was dancing, as dozens of new FoF tags popped in and out of existence, flooding towards their position from either side of the front lines. They wouldn’t have much time to breach the Forward Operating Base before reinforcements swarmed the hole in the line.
He easily dispatched no less than six Berserkers who rushed his glaive headlong, each being easily dispatched with either a glaive thrust, or a quick volley of microseeker projectiles fired from his gauntlet and targeted by his A.I.
But then the Dread Knight came, a cruelly spiked morning star in one hand, and a submachine gun in the other. Some called them Dark Chayots in the Guardians, and the pitch-black armor and cruel adornments affixed to them definitely gave off vibes of death and hatred.
Tyrone was quick enough to tuck against the side of the trench and unload the remainder of his microseekers, which harmlessly collided and bounced off the incredibly thick plating of the Dread Knight’s power armor.
The volley that answered was accurate, and he felt his armor bang and twist with the hits that cracked or dented the armor plating. Of course the caliber was higher, as Dread Knights were Harlequins taken to the next step, capable of lifting even the heaviest of equipment. It only made sense they fired bullets so big that most regulars couldn’t even carry a single magazine.
“Wells, get down!”
Typhus and Hulk had regrouped, yet it was the subtle whumping that made Wells’ eyes go wide.
Henrik had caught up.
The canister erupted from Henrik’s forearm launcher, connecting dead center of mass with The Dread Knight and blowing a hole a good half-meter wide in his guts.
Testament to the resilience of most Dread Knights, it charged, firing at Henrik, even as it trampled their own intestines spilling out in ribbons beneath their boots.
Wells thrust his glaive out as it passed him in blind fury towards the Chayot, and wrenched the cutting edge of the blade up and through the soft joints of the neck, decapitating the Dread Knight in a single vicious pull.
Typhus checked on Kelsey.
“Good work. Cho, where are you?”
“We’re here, boss, Harbinger is taking most of the fire, so I think we’ll have to push straight towards the FOB above the trench lines, can you sweep around the supply trench and attack from below?”
“Wilco.”
Typhus swept his wrist blade up the trenchline, and Hulk pulled the buckler attachment from his forearm rails with a click, handing it over to Wells. The older Seraph was bleeding and limping. Tradition was to fight through anything that didn’t kill you as a Seraph or Chayot, suicidal as it often was. The Hand of Wrath was smart enough to change up their formation for such things rather than allowing members to blindly martyr themselves in battle.
“You’re on point, bud.”
“For The Creator!”
Wells clipped the shield into place as his A.I. quickly calibrated it. Then with a swing of the arm, Wells ignited it, levelling the blade of his Glaive over the crook in the shielding around the gauntlet.
He charged, full of faith and fury, his spurs flexing and springing as he sprinted headlong up the trenchline towards the concrete and steel bunker looming at the top of the hill. Surprisingly, a Dread Knight was his first victim, as his momentum carried the shield into and the glaive point through the suit of power armor leading a squad towards them. The Dread Knight roared as she was skewered through and sent caterwauling back into the soldiers behind them, who were quickly finished off with violent thrusts of the glaive and slaps of the hot plasma buckler.
Gunfire began shortly after, a machine gun nest perched at the top of the trenches peppering Wells’ shield and forcing him to pick up the bulky rifle The Dread Knight had dropped. Each bullet looked to be the caliber of a small sniper rifle, and it weighed even more than the heavy machine gun had, somehow. His armor whined and strained with the recoil of each shot as he exchanged fire with the gunner in the nest.
Another thud, and the nest erupted in a torrent of dirt as Chayot Adem Henrik used his railguns; danger close. Wells found himself blinded as the dirt and rock rained down around him.
“War ain’t a solo game, kid.”
“Thank you, sir.”
He brushed as much grime from his moving joints as possible, and hefted the Dread Knight’s impossibly heavy rifle up, buckler engaged.
He could see the bunker entrance now, guarded by two sentry guns clearly manned by simple A.I. The door was a thick metal blast shielding that he’d need Henrik to punch through.
He pulled a grenade from his belt, igniting it and throwing it at one of the guns. Quick as a rattlesnake, the gun turned and shot it clean out of the air, sending fragmentation pellets and shrapnel everywhere. Then it turned and blind-fired where the grenade had come from, pushing Wells back even further.
“Little help? Two sentry guns at the blast doors.”
“I’m out of lower yield, can’t do much about this one without blowing us to kingdom come. Danger close would be an understatement, even with our armor.”
“Where’s the Harbinger?”
As if on cue, there was a heavy thumping of footfalls, and the squat body of a Harbinger limped over the edge of the trench, spinning to face the sentry guns. The twin barrels on each sentry whirled up and peppered the heavy armor of the Harbinger’s squat form to little avail, despite the heavy damage the harbinger had already suffered.
“Heads down, folks.”
The pilot raised an arm, and the RPG launcher on the inside of the wrist loosed a single rocket arcing towards the guns, shattering one across the door in a spray of flame and concussion.
The remaining gun continued firing harmlessly at the Harbinger, the caliber of ammunition being unable to do much more than dent the thick plating.
And then the blast doors slid open, revealing a Dread Knight with a projectile launcher of their own. Even as the Harbinger brought guns to bear, a single rocket trailed through the air and impacted the chassis, blowing an enormous hole in the side. There was no scream, merely the screeching of metal as the Harbinger slumped and stopped moving with the death of the pilot inside.
Another whump, and suddenly both the sentry gun and the Dread knight were engulfed in flames, as Henrik launched napalm canister after napalm canister into the doorway. The sentry gun continued firing even as it melted, the circuitry sparking and sizzling.
The Dread Knight merely threw the rocket launcher outwards from the doorway as the napalm ignited the remainder of it’s ammo, blowing a good portion of the trench walls down between Wells and the door.
“PUSH FORWARD!”
Typhus moved past Wells, firing his plasma rifle at the flaming Knight.
It seemed disoriented by the flames, but pulled a cruel looking scythe from the back and ignited it, the edge of the blade glowing blue like Tyrone’s glaive. Then it moved, rushing towards The Warrant Officer.
He met it with his blade, energized as it was, and the two squared off amidst the burning fire. The Knight almost immediately held the upper hand, and booted Typhus in the chest, sending him stumbling backwards. Dread Knights had much more bulk, armor, and raw power than the spindlier Seraph suits.
Wells stood up to engage, just as Adem Henrik trudged past, unloading canister after canister from both arm launchers into the Knight. The flames quenched, as canisters of acid mixed with smaller-yield explosives and staggered it backwards. Wells pulled Typhus back out of harms way, trying to put out the stray flames on his Seraph armor.
“Don’t get close!”
It was too late, as the Chayot full on tackled the Dread knight to the ground, the ugly hissing of extremely caustic acid against the plating of both suits of power armor adding to the cacophony of the blaze.
Henrik pulled a vicious looking knife from his shoulder and drove it down into the head and neck of the Dread knight again and again, even as it raised the shaft of the scythe and ignited it from beneath. Chayot armor was designed to be thick, fireproof, and bombproof, but it wasn’t invincible. The sound of torching metal and burning flesh soon fed in through the helmet filters, as Henrik slumped atop his dying foe, speared through the lungs…
“FUCK!”
The Dread Knight feebly tried to shunt the enormous weight of the Chayot off of it as it lay dying from stab wounds, bleeding profusely through the armor seals. Wells was quiet as he walked up and drove his glaive through the visor of the helmet, ending the Dread Knight’s disgusting half-life.
Typhus placed a hand on his shoulder.
“Chayot, Chayot.”
Wells knew the rest, chanting along.
“Burn like the sun.”
“Chayot, Chayot.”
“Scorched Earth ’til done.”
The three Seraphs dragged the Chayot to a sitting position by the now-open door, the LED-lit interior looming within. Typhus, being the only one with a newer set of armor – pulled the A.I. core to ride in his suit’s extra port.
“Rest easy, old soldier.”
Typhus had clearly known the man well.
“Go with god, Adem.”
Hulk was silent.
“Kelsey, we lost Henrik.”
“I’m sorry sir. We’re pinned down without the Harbinger near where you broke the lines. You may have to go it alone.”
“Hold tight. We’ll secure the FOB.”
Typhus led them into the concrete and steel corridor, taking the buckler from Wells to level his rifle on. The FOB was mysteriously quiet despite the shelling and gunfire outside in the trenches.
“Command center is up ahead, could be they’ve already evac-”
He descended into the sounds of strangulation, and then Typhus was pulled bodily through the double doors ahead, forcing the metal inwards and ripping one of the two doors off their hinges.
“Warrant! Typhus!”
The two remaining Seraphs rushed forward, smashing the remainder of the door with their gauntlets.
“Another trap!”
Three Beasts swarmed as they entered, with a thick plate-glass observation deck to the side now imprinted with Warrant Officer Typhus’ Seraph armor pulled tight against it. The glass was already cracking and straining as the armor was wrenched against it by invisible force.
Wells ignited his glaive, sweeping through one of the Beasts mid-leap and sending it slopping to the floor with a shrieking snarl and the wet sounds of greenish blood and organs hitting the floor. The other successfully clamped firmly onto Hulk’s face, scraping long needle-like teeth and claws across the four slitted eyes while dribbling acid liberally across the exterior from both palm and tongue glands.
“Can’t see! Acid killed my optics!”
Wells tried to sweep his glaive through the quadruped creature feverishly clawing and biting at Hulk’s head and neck, but only managed at succeeding in a single squeal as he severed the lolling and flailing segmented tail. The thick tan carapace and sharp syringe-like segmented tail fell to the ground with a clatter of said carapace on concrete.
He was able to thrust through the crest and head of the third, before turning to watch hulk fall to the ground, his helmet wrenched open and the interior coated thoroughly in smoldering acid.
He knew it was too late, even as he watched the dozens of needle-like fangs punch through Hulks temples with a sickening crunch. He brought the glaive down over his head as hard as his suit would allow, torching through the creature and Hulk alike.
No time to mourn.
No time to mourn.
He turned to face the plate-glass. Behind it was a figure dressed similar to any regular Black Armada Soldier, save the helmet was missing, and his hand was outstretched towards Typhus.
“Krk – Kilim!”
He knew what Typhus meant, and rushed to the plate glass, leaping and extending one of his Seraph’s spurs. Igniting his thrusters to punch through the glass in a brutal kick, the extra tension forced it into a shatter, and The Warrant dropped to the ground, pulled the rest of the way towards the back wall while desperately sucking for breath. Wells could see his armor was crumpled and crushed, as if by magic.
So this was indeed a god. He had powers.
“Surrender, Seraphs.”
“GOD IS GOOD!”
Wells swung his glaive from the hip, twisting and pushing the seething blade towards the god with all his might. Yet the god merely raised two hands with a grunt, one towards the glaive, and one towards Tyrone.
He stopped moving mid-motion, despite the whining of the servos and pneumatics of the power armor indicating his intent.
“WITCHCRAFT!”
He strained harder, frozen in place as he felt his armor begin to constrict and crumple inwards in weaker areas.
“No. Ascension.”
The man was clearly exerting himself as well, young as he was. He couldn’t be older than 18, with soft orange hair and smatterings of freckles across most of his face that framed his bright green eyes.
“Bow before The God of Quiet.”
He moved his hands lower, and Wells felt his armor collapse, falling to his knees. The force was all around him, crushing his armor, his lungs, his body. It was a struggle to breathe, even as his A.I. kicked on the life support for assisted breathing and forcefully inserted a tracheal tube down his windpipe.
“I said BOW.”
The young man doubled his efforts, and Tyrone fell forwards, dropping his glaive and falling to his knees.
Typhus was stirring against the far wall. Wells opened his helmet and ripped out the trachea tube.
“Who… Are You?”
Wells struggled to get the words out.
“I am Ernest Frau, The God of Silence. And I WILL TAKE BROKEN ORCHID FOR THE EMPEROR!”
Wells felt the force loosen slightly, as beads of sweat now prickled at the young man’s brow.
“Emperor Xex is… A HERETIC!”
The young man shoved with both hands, sending him backwards through the smatterings of broken plate-glass. The armor skidded against the concrete floor, sparks dancing as the white paint ground down to silvered metal plating beneath.
Wells hit the far wall and strained himself up to one knee, pushing against the force with all his might. But his armor was failing. The extra strength he was so used to having was dwindling as the Seraph suit’s servos and pneumatics succumbed to whatever evil magic was crushing him.
“Your powers… Won’t work…”
He flared his thrusters, several failing in spectacular pops of blue flame, but still giving him just enough force to get back to standing. His HUD was dancing across the inside of his helmet, the armor diagram flaring red or orange across almost the entire suit.
“You are merely pawns, sent to die by those clinging to the last vestiges of old power. Emperor Xex will bring the truest utopia to this Central Universe!”
Wells strained, and strained, and strained. He felt blood vessels popping and his vision was blurring. Breathing in was harder and harder.
“No, he’ll die as the traitor he is.”
Typhus stood behind the young ascendant, and sunk his kukri deep between the shoulderblades of The God of Quiet with one hand while burying his wrist blade just as deeply into his lower spine.
The pressure relented, and Wells was moving forwards before he could think.
He tackled the young man out of Typhus’ grip, bringing him to the ground in a straddle. Then he started punching.
Wells swung at his face, again and again. The crunch of gauntlets against meat and bone echoed across the chamber. At first, the god’s accelerated healing started knitting bone and healing flesh.
But seconds turned to minutes, and finally Typhus pulled him back from the disgusting mess of brain matter and shattered bone that had only moments prior been a living, breathing immortal.
“We’re not done yet, Wells.”
“I know.”
He grunted, ducking the swing.
The Chayot armor was heavy and bulky – more powerful, sure, but not as agile or as quick to respond as Ol’ Tiberius. He missed the MK XVIII already, as much of a writeoff as it had been.
Despite it being only training, he felt he had to prove himself whilst wearing it, for Adem’s sake.
Wells and Kelsey were doing some in-armor sparring in a mostly empty hangar aboard Durandal’s Legacy, a battlecruiser in orbit above Peace Cross. The tide on Broken Orchid had turned with the capture of the FOB, allowing G.O.D. forces to sweep towards the coast and claim the rest of the continent for the Guardians of Destiny. The battle for the planet was still far from over, but at least the front had shifted to allow for safer reinforcements and supplies.
“Kelsey, Wells, come look at this.”
Typhus gestured with his mug of hot black coffee to the holographic monitor blasting the Central News Group channel in the corner of the hangar near the coffee machine. He was only wearing his bodysuit.
“This is Billy Shotcroft, CNG Evening News.”
Kelsey pointed at the picture of Tyrone next to the newscaster.
“Oh shit! Tyrone!”
“It’s a new dawn today for the tired Guardian forces on the neutral world of Broken Orchid, as The Hand of Wrath, led by Warrant Officer Sergio Typhus has broken the stalemate for the continent of Geast. Sources close to the Guardians of Destiny high council say that under the direct orders of Serania, The God of Justice herself, The Hand – known as one of the most decorated squads within the G.O.D. ‘s Armored Corps – singlehandedly led the push across No Man’s Land.”
The graphics changed to show a battle map of the continent, alongside a smaller image of Tyrone and one of the god he had killed.
“It’s us!”
“Shhhhh!”
“Despite suffering heavy casualties, the squad was successful in capturing the Kirn Hills Armada stronghold. Incredibly, Sergeant Tyrone Wells, a veteran Seraph Pilot who has only recently joined The Hand of Wrath, was able to single-handedly eliminate an Armada target of interest – The God of Quiet. Relief and resupply operations are still underway, but G.O.D. and Neutral Territories can feel a little safer at night knowing The Black Armada is down one more immortal of their ever dwindling number. Thank you Sergeant Wells, and thank you to all the Guardian forces out there on the front – fighting for our continued freedom. Now, to the markets – The Junk & Rumblers Guild have new contract language, and Conversion Corp stock is rallying, folks-”
Tyrone Wells had never smiled so wide in his entire life.
“Helluva blessing, kid.”
“Helluva blessing! But… Warrant, you helped me.”
“I have enough medals.”
“Guess it’s your turn, Wells.”
Tyrone signed the symbol of the Abrahamic cross across his sternum as Kelsey slapped him across the back with the full force of her suit of power armor, sending him a full step or two forwards.
“Praise him!”
Sergio shrugged softly in response, then raised his mug of coffee silently, as a toast.
