Chromium

10.5

First draft

"Oh my god..."Dia whispered, her throat making an odd noise like she was gargling, or choking, as her nightmare became reality.

However, it was worse this time. At least on the Siren, she had been able to run, but now? She was helpless, paralyzed by a fear that had never really left her since the day she had escaped from the mech's clutches. Thanks to the Coffin's automated system, continuously pumping drugs into her veins, she was awake but pathetically weak. Which meant she could do nothing except lie down and watch as the foe from her dream took corporal form.

No, not foe, but foes.

There were three of them, though only one was already in the wagon while the other two were still hovering outside, their backpack rockets matching the train's speed.

"Target acquired." The mech's voice rumbled as its sensors locked on Gibson. "Primary directive: Elimination."

It lifted its Gatling laser and was about to shoot when the sliding door behind it, the one connecting their wagon with the next one, opened. Dia stared at what lay on the other side in dismay. It was a small army, dozens of droids that started charging at the mech like a swarm of locusts, their artificial limbs clanging loudly as they ran across the wagon. The mech turned, the four barrels of its Gatling spinning at high velocity as it mowed them down, turning them into scraps.

"Keep it up! It can't destroy all of you!" Gibson incited, though the robots didn't need much prompting.

They weren't human soldiers and knew nothing about surrender, pain, and fear. They just followed the orders and even when they lost their limbs, even when the mech's Gatling dismantled them, or its blowtorch turned their bodies into molten metal, they kept going, charging at it like the waves of an unstoppable tide.

But why aren't they firing back?

Granted, engaging in melee combat rendered the other two mechs virtually useless since they couldn't open fire without hitting one of their own, but it was still odd.

It seems like...a suicide charge?

Then Dia noticed every one of them carried an odd cylinder.

"What the hell is..." She wondered when two of Gibson's droids managed to get past the Gatling barrage and jumped on the mech.

The Collective's terminator caught one of them midair, wringing its neck before throwing it against the incoming wave of robots like a cannonball, but it was too late to stop the second. Just like what had happened with Dia on the Siren, the mech's shields remained inactive when the droid jumped onto its back and started clinging to it like a leech.

"Oh shit!" She exclaimed when a light started flashing at the top of the cylinder, finally understanding what that thing really was.

The explosion that followed wasn't particularly big, not enough to endanger them at least, but the wagon still swerved a bit, the train coming dangerously close to derailing when the device detonated. Dia felt a burst of heat and squeezed her eyes shut, blinded by the sudden light.

Then she coughed, a cloud of black smoke lingering in the wagon for a second or two before dispersing in the air. When Dia reopened her eyes, she saw that the mech was still standing, though half of its body was missing while the other half was just a smoldering heap of twisted metal.

"Pr...i...mary...Dir..e...ctive" It stuttered, wobbling like it was about to collapse.

However, the mech didn't fall yet, and even had the strength, or the power, to lift the Gatling as it aimed at Gibson. It didn't come even close to hit its target before falling apart, most of the laser beams hitting the walls or the floor. Most of them but not all of them.