Giant Robots? Say no more. I’m in. Volume 2: Chapter 2

Giant Robots? Say no more. I’m in.

Volume 2: Chapter 2

…

Word count: 2500

…

The most common bug variant is the ‘Ceros.’

Probably short for rhinoceros, since it was kind of like a rhinoceros beetle.

They had strong, ablative shells, limited amounts of fluid that can vaporize, and sectioned-off parts and pieces. They come out by the dozen and beetles, but with many more legs. Besides the toughness, they have plenty of firepower, too. One bio-plasma launcher, spinally mounted, that they had to turn to fire, supplemented by acid-spitters on their sides that can melt power armor infantry from up to a hundred meters away.

They go around in packs of thirty, coordinate to create firing lines, and even charge together when needed. Normal human vehicles are easily flipped by them, infantry gets routed very quickly, and they even have the accuracy to shoot at combat helicopter equivalents. Bug advances typically have thousands of them charging across the land like a carpet made of black shells.

Their shell could bounce small calibers like 12mm, and you’d need armor piercing on 75mm if you didn’t want to spend all day shooting them. They had gel-like blood and had multiple pumping organs all over that moved the stuff through their whole bodies. If you wanted to blow them up with a high-power laser, you’d need to commit a lot of reactor power, get some cabling going, and lose a lot of mobility thanks to heat sinks. Finally, they had redundant everything inside their shell, so even with explosives, you needed direct hits to do meaningful damage.

Apparently, though, most of those changes and improvements were over the course of centuries of warfare against humanity.

The original version was all about numbers.

The Ceros in the frozen waste had far weaker shells that could be pierced with point-defense weapons. Throwing some explosives their way made whole groups of them explode in a violent fashion with their acidic, green blood. Lasers raked over them and made bits and pieces of them explode. Heck, just flying over them with boosters on full burn set them alight, and they were so dumb they ran into each other. Their main guns were like peashooters that couldn’t ablate a millimeter of armor, while their acid sprayers couldn’t harm my paint.

Yeah.

“Wow, you guys are a letdown.” I had a bit of fun for like five minutes, but I could’ve just hovered over the battlefield, let my point defenses rip, and killed them all. Kicking them was enough to make them explode into gooey green chunks. I spent like two of the five minutes killing them that way. “You can’t even sync your shots.”

They were probably threats in the early years. The swarm I faced was three times bigger than the usual Ceros column. Swarms of these guys, with the skies controlled by the bug’s explosive fliers, would probably easily overwhelm most defensive perimeters without incredible amounts of sustained artillery support. The bugs hit the planet around the time when everyone was about precision munitions, and if one ballistic missile killed fifty bugs, the bugs won the economic exchange.

But nowadays most walls were touting ‘light’ artillery in the 105mm range, and they were operated by AI, had incredible materials so the barrels would take a long time to burn out, and were fully automatic. These Ceros would be mulched by a couple of standard defensive turrets on an outpost. Meanwhile, a column of modern-day Ceros getting past the defensive perimeter would have someone lose their job, and an interception would need to be made before they wreaked havoc.

Fighting these guys just made me want to fight the modern version.

6/10 event enemy. If they had some confetti after they popped or wore Santa hats, they’d be a good temporary mob to fill the screen.

Thankfully, though, the last couple of minutes of my extraction proved to have something interesting pop up.

A juggernaut-class bug.

“Oh, hello there.” juggernaut -classes were in the history books as the most massive of the bugs. They were sent out as pseudo-officers. Their abdomens were mostly brains, and they were like extensions of the will of the hive queens. Wherever they went, the bugs would operate more fiercely, respond to threats better, and even strategize. Nowadays, most bugs could do that on their own. However, the titan class was known to be pretty lethal and tough back then. “Let’s see how you do.”

I got notified that the pickup was two minutes away.

Plenty of time to kill a giant monster.

The eight-legged creature was the height of half a skyscraper, and its legs were thickly covered in armor. Its back was bristling with numerous pods, which proceeded to launch living munitions with wings at me that were engaged by my point defenses. They arced through the air, leaving glowing neon-green trails of acid blood, and my bright-red tracers tracked the efforts of my PD to shoot them down. Meanwhile, its ‘head’ was an ovoid with two protruding horns, between which was an orb of crackling lightning. It stopped skittering my way and fired a pulse of electricity at me… that didn’t even make my systems flicker.

EMP to take down PD after firing a missile salvo?

Good tactic.

Unfortunately, it was out of date thanks to progress defenses over the centuries.

The giant creature noticed that I didn’t go down and get slammed with its barrage of living missiles, and it decided with all its intellect to turn tail and run. The ‘back’ armor it presented was thick and sloped, so it was actually running away while protecting itself.

I contemplated just shooting with an anti-armor missile, but looking at the behemoth… I realized I can do the thing.

Without a moment’s hesitation, I let my boosters flare as I surged towards the creature.

It had a plan for this, giving off a screech, and the buildings I was flying past disgorged swarms of smaller bugs. They threw themselves at me, obviously trying to die while dousing my mech with acidic blood. The tactic surprisingly slowed me down a bit and took off some armor integrity while also muddling some sensors. However, despite the deluge of bodies slamming into my mech, I was barely slowed down… But suddenly my sensors warned me of a seismic movement.

I almost looked at my feet, then a chunk of building fell off to one side, and I realized that the juggernaut had taunted me, let loose with its infantry, and lured me in to try and crush me beneath two skyscrapers.

“Holy shit, you guys really are smart!” I dove down to street level, and the snow burst to reveal more bugs hidden and in wait. Two skyscrapers were bearing down on me. Calculations showed that if I had just flown straight at the juggernaut, I’d have been caught in the falling rubble. It knew that I’d go to ground, so it set up an ambush. It would’ve slowed me down enough to get hit with the rubble… Whenever I descended with bugs around, I always set off explosives to clear my landing site. The ambush was crippled before it sprang, and by going as flat as possible with my mech, I slid beneath the two crashing buildings and exited out the other side… where the juggernaut was waiting with two giant legs raised up to try and crush me beneath all its weight. “Nice!”

This wasn’t a disappointment anymore.

If modern bugs could plan and strategize like this, they’d be way crazier to fight!

So, why weren’t these guys around anymore?

Only a single answer came to mind.

“Oh, I get it. It’s because you guys were too smart and became threats to the queens.” I set off an explosive to give my mech an explosive updraft. The massive legs of the creature went straight through ruined asphalt and caved it in. The back of the giant insect fired off a salvo of living missiles instantly. My PD dealt with it, but we both knew I’d already won the exchange. Its missiles hadn’t worked before. So, it had just tried valiantly to live. “Yeah, we’re keeping you.”

I wanted to get on its back, shoot a hole into it, and drop a mech-sized explosive into its guts.

Instead, I aimed for its leg joints with both arm weapons, and from my chest piece activated two explosive spikes that burrowed into the creature and connected it to my mech with two very robust wires… that allowed me to shock the creature with about a tenth of the output of my fusion engine.

To the creature’s credit, it tried to turn and run again, but between having its legs blown off and a fusion-powered taser coursing electricity through its veins?

Yeah.

You’re mine now, boy!

Either we figure out how to control bugs, or you escape as a mutant strapped to the gills with guns and give me a fun boss fight!

…

Interlude: The Heiress: Madelynn Harris

…

Despite leaving my service, OS-549 still casts a long shadow over all my efforts.

The Empress saw fit to elevate my family to her direct service. A move that tied the hands of my parents. We received acclaim and wealth, but they had to man the battlements at home to prevent the political tidal wave from drowning us. If we did not use our new wealth and power, then we could only drown beneath all those who wished to take our place.

That wealth and power was also tied to the Empress’s whims.

It was a masterstroke.

Though I received an award, though we were elevated, and though OS-549’s training gave a band of powerful knights, we were bound to her. We received everything that we ever wanted, but it could all be taken away in an instant by Empress.   Even if we wanted to part ways, even if we left our current station for our previous one, we would have too much to maintain to retain the power we had. We would have to liquidate the vast majority and practically start anew.

In the lap of luxury, but still anew.

We could do no such thing, so we did as we were bid, and now I found myself in support of OS-549 as he led the charge to reclaim new lands.

New lands that were somehow inhabited by remains of the nation that called it home.

Whose representatives I had to meet with.

New lands that were filled to the brim with ancient forms of our enemies.

Enemies that he was studying, sending back corpses… and live specimens of.

Sometimes, I wondered if I should have let him perish instead of having him bring in the queen.

“My lady, your heart rate is spiking.” One of my servants informed me, and I took a measured breath. I closed my eyes, counted to twenty, and reopened them after taking a multitude of breaths. When I opened them once more, I was able to discard OS-549 from my mind. Instead, I looked upon my temporary ‘embassy.’ “Your elevated heart rate has ceased.”

The underground city was dilapidated and held together by grit and recycled scrap. They received mere materials as a grand gift and put it to use. A single fusion generator, one of a multitude of spares aboard my ship, was treated as a national treasure. The lights that it powered only made it clearer the dilapidated nature of the underground city.

I was no fool.

I saw the worth in these people.

“When is my next meeting?”

“Five minutes. The individual in question is here.”

“If they are ready, allow them in.”

The servant bowed, and in moments my next appointment arrived.

“Greetings, Lady Hariss.” The young woman wore modest clothes. Her family’s crest was on her chest. That of a white, winged horse. The Kinter family. They were merchants and scavengers. One that I sought to bring into the fold. “I am Danice of House Kinter.”

“You are the heiress of House Kinter. You must say such things in the presence of my people.” I instructed her, and her eyes widened. She had glasses on. The frame was well-maintained, but I could see that the lenses were new. Most other glasses I saw were cracked or resembled monocles. Some sort of manufacturing ability? Artisan lenses, perhaps. “They may say that they were misinformed on purpose regarding your status. That you aimed to fool them. Such a thing makes enemies.”

Her eyes widened, and she almost bowed, but she showcased her family’s worth by stopping herself.

“Good. You’ve learned from the mistakes and lessons of those who came before. Well done.” We were vetting the various houses that existed in this ‘nation.’ Their claims were without a doubt. This land was theirs. A few whispered that we should consider bringing them into the fold. The Empress stated that they stayed and held their land while most fled. They bowed to her statement and said no more. Now, we moved to make them the core of the new arcology that will be built. A whole arcology that will be fanatically loyal to the Empress. “I have read all that I can about your household. All that you are willing to admit with peers watching. Tell me what else I should know.”

Unlike many others who I asked, in the gaze of the young heiress, I saw suspicion and caution.

I raised my estimation of House Kinter at that moment, especially as she acknowledged my superiority without feeling anger.

“My household has eighty percent of the illicit operations in this barrow under our control. Through them, we have prepared for the last two generations a war chest to seize control.” She admitted the truth. We knew already. Drones and deep scans showcased their household’s vaults being particularly full. That led to an investigation of their actions in society, which unveiled their connection to the underbelly of this land. “We now hope to use this war chest to seize as much control as possible once we return to the surface.”

I nodded.

“Describe the planned coup. Your economic strategy is sound enough to warrant a large loan and a charter to become a corporation. What matters now is how highly that corporation is ranked.” Danice nodded sharply at my words. I activated a recorder just in case, but sat back and readied myself to listen. “Share with me this planned coup. If the plan is sound, your people can be entrusted with a small military force.”

She began to share, and I listened.

They were scavengers who hid beneath their broken nation, but despite it all, they have grown in population and strength across countless decades.

There was a film of dirt on every individual here, but with a bit of brushing, I was able to determine if a gemstone lay hidden behind the dirt.

I learned my lesson with OS-549.

No matter where they come from… there was always potential for someone to be an incredible asset.