Mechanical Monsters!!!

I had no time to get shocked or recover from it. I shouted into my mic, “Mumbo and Jumbo, clear out your nearest platoons asap and switch to stealth mode. Get out of the compound. We need to redo our strategy.”

Jonas shouted back on the radio, “What the hell happened chief? Why are we turning back our asses?”

“Because if you don’t, there won’t be anything left of your asses to salvage. Now move it.”

Even though I had given orders to regroup, I couldn’t resist myself from taking a swing at one of those mechs. The onboard computer of my armour had been constantly making observations and analysing the robots since the moment I first saw them. Each of them, a mechanical monster, standing on legs resembling those of an ostrich but were as wide as stone columns and made of thick metal frame built around a complex network of hydraulics. The upper body started just above the knees which seemed to house a cooling system around the abdominal region and rocket launchers built inside the chest. The chest and abdomen were segregated, held together by a rotating joint. The arms were almost as thick as the legs and built similarly though, elbows were replaced with rotary cannons built inside a cooling system supported by metal frames. They had a fixed glass dome for a head which formed a housing for eight cameras which provided 360 degrees field of vision.

I saw the letters GOL2A on the bot nearest to me. I couldn’t reckon what those letters might stand for but it was clear that they were identifications. I marked it for attack. The robots had already started progressing towards Jonas’s team. I ran silently towards the marked one. Two soldiers jogged alongside each Goliath which itself moved with a certain air of brutish demeanor, the barrels of the gun rotating slowly. The hydraulics hissed with each step, steam being ejected from the cooling system at regular intervals. The metallic frame of their bodies gleamed under the floodlights. I could hear the soldiers tally with each other through the crackle of their comm systems. I was within a distance of thirty feet from GOL2A which stopped for a moment and looked in my direction. I could tell because two more cameras inside the dome had positioned above and below the two which were in my direction.

I stopped immediately, the soldiers had taken position besides the robot. Slowly, the torso turned facing me. It raised its arms and the cannons pointed towards me, the barrels spinning slowly. The mech stayed like that for a while which seemed like an eternity until the torso rotated back to its initial orientation and the mech started walking towards its original destination. I heaved a sigh of relief, I had made the armour based on precise calculations but hadn’t really had the time to test it. It was completed almost at the last moment. I didn’t know what would happen if I got hit by a missile or a grenade. I didn’t have to wait for too long.

I started jogging towards my target again and accessed the rifles on my arms with their silencer attachment activated. The guns sprang up from the flexor regions and slid along the wrist into my hands. The rifle butts unfolded from the rear of the weapons and got extended to rest on my shoulders. The problem with my armour while using the weapons was the stealth being lost in the regions near them. Attaching projectors on the concealed weapons and their controlling mechanisms had not been possible. While moving, the targetting system zoomed in on the two soldiers and marked their heads. I pointed my arms and fired the shots. The next thing I saw was the soldiers’ heads bursting like a watermelon and their bodies dropping followed by their mashed up brains. The robot turned around, four red cameras looking in my direction. I didn’t lose time and fired a missile at its head. The marker for the missile moved on the screen of my hood and then I saw it exploding on the mech’s glass dome. I was waiting for the robot to fall down but it didn’t happen. As the smoke cleared, I saw the cannons of the robot pointed at me, their rotation picking up speed. Before I could process, I saw a ring of smoke emanating from one of the barrels and everything shook around me with a loud boom. The next thing I felt was the ground disappearing from beneath my feet. I looked around and I saw myself flying in the air. Then came a loud thud. I had hit the boundary wall and now was falling down. I think I blacked out for a moment. I regained my senses after another thud. I could hear a faint screaming. I could recognise the voice as the screaming became louder. It was Jonas, “Chief, where the hell are you?” Everything was red around me. Soon, I realised, those red flashes were warnings projected by my suit’s security systems.

I spoke into my mic, “I’ll reach your location in a few minutes. I was hit”, and started system diagnostics. The nanotube structure was intact. Main brunt of the hit was taken by the outer layer which caused the titanium scales at the back to malfunction. The cloak was down because the projectors on the scales had shutdown under emergency protocol. The armour was restructuring itself. It was going to take sometime. The diagnostics hadn’t finished calculating the damage.

I turned my head to look at the wall behind. A crater stared back at me. I turned my head in the other direction to look at the mech and there was another boom. I was flung against the wall again, making that crater deeper and larger. Sirens were blaring all around me.

I had to get out of there. I checked for the drone in my back and fortunately it hadn’t been affected yet. I released it into the air to study GOL2A and I ran using the maximum power of my suit towards the rear wall to throw my pursuers off. The rendezvous for our team could not be compromised under any circumstances and escaping from the farthest point in was the best option for now. I heard a loud bang behind me. Another shot had hit the spot where I was standing seconds ago. The mech was powerful but slow. I was moving too fast for it to target precisely. Within a few seconds I approached the walls at the rear. The robot was still chasing me, its each step creating small tremors on the ground. A beep at the rear of my head alerted me of an incoming rocket. I swerved to the left as the rocket zoomed past my right shoulder, hitting the wall in front of me, and exploded into a ball of fire and smoke. I could feel the shockwaves from the explosion as I ran towards the crater created by it. I checked my cloaking system which was now seconds away from realignment. As I reached the wall, I dropped a smoke grenade and fired two missiles from the launchers attached to my shoulders targetting the weakest points of the depression in the wall.

The missiles struck the crater creating a hole in the wall large enough for me to pass through. I ran at full speed towards the opening and with one hard push to the ground I lurched through it, landing on my hands at the other side. The cloak icon blinked green on the display of my hood. I switched it on and huffed into the mic, “Jonas, I’ll be there in two minutes.”

“Sorry Chief, we were getting a little paranoid as to what happened to you.”

“Don’t worry, I am not gonna die on this godforsaken planet.” I had already reached the middle of the wall at the side of the entrance. I heard the wall break and fall down. I switched on my drone’s feed and saw the mech had broken down the part of the wall from where I had come out. It couldn’t gauge my direction obviously because my heat signatures were hidden but it had also become slower than when it had started chasing me. The drone had marked a crack on the dome which as per the previous two minutes’ data was increasing and certain parts of the mech had started malfunctioning causing it to slow down. It meant my attack worked but it would take sometime for the huge machine to go down. I made a mental note of the strategy to follow and ran ahead. The mech on the other hand moved slowly in the opposite direction in its futile pursuit to find me. I instructed the computer to continue observation via my drone till the robot stopped moving. I had reached almost the end of the side wall.

As I turned left, I could see the rest of the team waiting at our rendezvous. I ran as fast as I could. The mech flatlined just before I reached my mates. The acid had eaten it from inside. I switched off my cloak as I entered the area marked under the cloaking drones of the rest. Husky leapt at me and I had to hold him to calm him down.

“People, there is good news and bad news. I believe you know about those huge robots by now. Well, they are strong and heavily armed.”

Jonas asked, “This is the bad news? I guess we can take them down.”

I laughed, “No, this is not the bad news. I tried hitting one. First I used my guns which were useless and then I hit it with one of my missiles armed with AT (aqua tabificus) payload. It took a direct hit, it still stood still and then I took a direct hit. I was flung on the wall. My systems malfunctioned. Then I had to run. It chased me. I had to dodge its missiles for about two minutes till I could reach the perimeter wall and could use my cloak. The mech ‘died’ a few seconds ago.”

I took a breath, let everyone understand what happened and then continued, “That means the good news is that the monsters can be brought down and the bad news is it takes a long damn time to go down.”

Nate spoke in a low voice, “There are forty soldiers more now and twenty of those robots as per the drones’ feed. The assassins could deal with the soldiers and the infantry could take out the mechs using the remote explosives but we can’t strike all of them at the same time not to mention the time those mechs take to die. Then there’s the issue of them being able to kill us that too with ease”

Jonas said, “The machine gunners can create a diversion but they have to be ready to bear the brunt of those angry monsters. The machine gunners should retreat as soon as fifteen of those mechs are hit. As soon as all our targets are hit, we evacuate.”

I thought for a while and replied, “Alright, let’s chalk out a step by step plan and then move out. We got quite a few monsters to kill.”

I, ofcourse took Husky along with me. He could help in taking out the soldiers and then proceed to the interior of the facility for a closer look using his drone. The recon drones showed the robots in a defensive formation behind the inner walls adjacent to the entrance. A group of eight mechs and twenty soldiers stood just after the entrance, prepared to blow anything that crosses the gate to smithereens. Another group was positioned a few metres away to provide support fire.

We formed a plan to minimise the losses. I felt immensely unequipped for the first time in years. What was supposed to be a small covert mission turned out to be a major battle and it had just started. I had no idea what lay inside and we didn’t have any backup.

I should have arranged for backup, I got overconfident. Whole of my team would have to compensate for my mistake. It was eating me but I didn’t have any other option. The closest help was in Dome City and hours away. I talked about it with the rest and nobody was ready to retreat. So, we needed a foolproof strategy that too in a few minutes. We did formulate a strategy, it was more or less functional. At least we are still alive to tell the tale.

Simultaneously, I would have to hit as many mechs as possible. The infantry was going to move in as soon as the assassins were done with the soldiers and attach the remote explosives they were carrying on the heads of the remaining mechs. Easier said than done. They had to jump to a height of fifteen feet to do that. Thankfully, they had actuators that pushed the pneumatics in the legs to do the needful. In the meantime, the machine gunners would position themselves at the entrance and fire at the mechs causing the necessary distraction. Everyone was to evacuate as soon as all the mechs were hit.

We moved fast and positioned ourselves along the outer boundary. I ran ahead with Husky, with the rest of the platoon behind me. I swiftly took position near the inner entrance and signalled the assassins. Their first step was to climb atop the walls. I stayed in cover and waited for the assassins to get in position. The display of my hood showed their markers float up to the top of the wall. The infantry led by Nate stayed behind the perimeter wall and waited for my orders. Stealth was imperative till all the soldiers were neutralized. I jogged in slowly, two grenades in each hand. Eight mechanical brutes stood in a zigzag pattern facing me. The barrels of their guns were spinning slowly, ready to fire. The soldiers knelt alongside, with their guns pointed at the entrance. Of course, they didn’t know about my presence yet which wasn’t about to change soon either.

Husky moved slowly towards the left sticking to the inner perimeter wall keeping his head low. I jogged slowly through the gate, turned left and kept moving towards the enemy platoon. As soon as I was in the range of the first group, I lopped two grenades just in centre of them and leapt sideways. I softly moved towards the next group while the ones near the entrance started firing towards their front. They hadn’t realised what was going on. I jumped towards their back, targeted the closest two robots and fired missiles at them. The second group had started mobilising when they saw the commotion but before they could understand I threw the remaining two grenades at them.

The assassins had jumped down by then and began their assault, with their katanas swiveling about their wrists, going through the soldiers like hot knife through butter. Husky was doing his part by taking out chunks out of them, one at a time. The mechs couldn’t target precisely and shooting in a general direction would only mean friendly fire. The assassins shot whatever they couldn’t find in the range of their katanas. The three musketeers worked in tandem with each other, moving in circles, striking with one hand and shooting with the other. Husky was smart enough to stay out of the gun sights of the soldiers. I hit two more robots while dodging rockets. My stealth was gone obviously and the mechs fired at the one target they could see. I jumped about a lot, trying to save myself from a direct hit. My armour had taken a lot of damage and repairing wasn’t an option. Even one hit could put an end to all our plans.

Only a handful enemy soldiers remained now, firing in every direction they could see but it didn’t help them much. It only must have been about five minutes. The assassins moved fast and with their cloaks, there was no point in even trying to shoot. They ran on the walls when they couldn’t find clear ground, swiftly swinging their katanas. The musketeers had lived up to the reputation created by Dumas.

The blood was everywhere dotted with fallen heads or parts of them. It was oddly satisfying. The first two mechs to get struck had already started malfunctioning, slowing down gradually. I guided two more missiles towards their cracked domes to speed up the process. Suddenly, there was a boom followed by sounds of falling debris. One of the mechs had hit the wall behind me with a rocket and it was collapsing. I braced for impact as the concrete pieces fell on me. My head was knocked against the ground as a chunk hit it followed by another that fell on my back. I fell down to the ground but the damage wasn’t much. The suit was really strong, it absorbed most of the shock but I did feel some of the brunt. My shoulder singed but I ignored it and got up, pushing myself away from the ground. Small pieces of concrete fell from my head and rolled down my neck. I jerked my hands and walked over the jagged pieces of the broken wall. The clone soldiers had been dealt with.

I spoke into my comm, “Nate, it’s your turn.” The assassins were running towards the rear, a few mechs firing in their direction, few others firing in other directions and the rest running about arbitrarily among which three were slowing down. Four mechs lied like lumps, smoke rising from their burnt insides. I targeted two robots firing at the assassins, to draw attention towards me.

Just then infantry moved in, followed by the machine gunners. The gunners took position twenty metres inside the perimeter and started firing at the robots. It was all so fast. Then, I saw Nate do something incredible. He caught the arm of a mech in front of him and pulled himself up on its neck. I saw the cameras inside the dome of the bot rearranging themselves to pinpoint Nate’s location. By the time the robot could target, Nate had stuck the explosive on the dome and jumped down, detonating the bomb just before landing. The others climbed up either by grabbing the robots’s neck or by taking support of the mechs’ shoulders. One of them managed to trip a mech over and kept on firing his rifles at the dome till it cracked. Then he took out the cameras and put the explosive inside and fired it. I hit the remaining, two at a time. It was time to disappear and we had to stay hidden till the monster robots fell.

Husky had infiltrated the main building and was silently gathering data. The assassins were back at our base. I decided to stay inside the perimeter to provide backup to Husky if needed. I ordered the rest of my unit to return back to the base.

I had to wait for Husky’s data and then analyse it.

To be continued…