"GLYPH welcomes you to your new permanent position within our rapidly expanding family -"
"GOD NO! NO! LET ME OUT!"
" - but it should be noted that your rental of our 'genesis suit' does incur significant debt -"
"I'M NOT WORKING FOR YOU!"
" - and you are expected to work to earn your keep. Should you fail to meet your rental payments, you will be expunged from company property."
The nomad's fingers were pried painfully from the edge of the machinery as her arm, her last grasp at freedom, was forced inside the suit. It snapped shut around her body like a bear trap as the suit's layers weaved their way around her, sealing her inside.
"This one needs time. Her fight will fade." The foreman affirmed from the rear of the forces. His suit was considerably more nimble than the other lumbering models that made up the bulk of the GLYPH forces marauding through the docks, but it still carried the same signature brass colouration, and an aesthetic caught somewhere between medieval surgical equipment and deep-sea bell diver. His beady eyes were just about visible through the haze of his dome-like helmet. "Delay the expunge. Monitor her cortisol levels."
He turned his attention away from the GLYPH recruitment vessel and back to the docks of Garon Moonstop, watching as his loyal 'employees' dragged unwilling nomads towards the stationed 'fingers' of the GLYPH ships, currently gripping onto the sides of the dock walkways. He briefly glanced up towards many heads of the elite mercs above, happy right now just to watch the action, for now.
Good. You stay there. No need to cross each-other's paths. Yet.
Suddenly, his visor flashed red, and he diverted his attention back to the docks.
A dissatisfied grunt escaped from between his dry, cracked lips.
*
"Get your fucking hands off me!" The nomad screamed, his finger pulling repeatedly on the trigger of his shaking pistol, emptying the whole magazine into the side of the GLYPH suit. But the creaking brass bastard continued on, unabated as the bullets pinged off its shell. It had the nomad by the leg, dragging him like a screaming child across the floor, one thudding step after another towards his future forever job.
And it wasn't just him. All around, many others were in the same situation, either being dragged towards the ships, fighting for their lives, or undocking as quickly as they could to get to safety. The lower docks filled with the pop of traditional firearms, hopelessly ineffective against the thick metal exterior of the GLYPH suits. As a result, GLYPH had remained non-lethal, opting to use a mix of stun rods and blinding sprays on the poor nomads docked closest to their vessels.
As the suit thudded towards its destination, an ear-splitting CRACK suddenly filled the nomad's eardrums. The suit's fist sprang open, releasing its grip around the nomad's shin. He glanced up, to see a melon-sized hole in the suit's chest as it stumbled forwards and collapsed into a chest-shaking slam against the dock. It rapidly began to gush a foul-smelling green fluid - and blood - over the metal walkway as its motion ceased.
"GET BACK! GET TO SAFETY!" Seeth yelled as she cycled the SAFU's thick foregrip. The nomad complied immediately and crawled away from the ruptured suit, keeping his head low. The towering Controller landed her gun sights on another suit, a strider-sized one this time, which pulled its attention away from cutting a ship door open with a drill and turned to face her. It raised its makeshift weapon, an oversized nail-gun built into the suit's arm, the silver tips of the nails glimmering under the dock lights.
But the Controller was far quicker than the ponderous brass invader.
BLAM
A solid slug of meta-steel punched straight through the suit's dome-shaped helmet with a resonating clang, sending a cone of shredded shrapnel out of the slug's exit wound. A blast of steam hissed from the wound as the suit collapsed to the ground, its metallic groaning only ceasing once it finally came to a rest.
Seeth cycled the shotgun again and quickly slipped in a couple of new slugs underneath, just as Venner and Oxyi appeared at her sides. Both were wielding shotguns themselves, although far more appropriately sized than the SAFU.
There was a collective, unsettling creak from the sprawling docks as the GLYPH suits turned in unison towards Seeth, their non-lethal approach ending quite suddenly as the sound of gunfire intensified across the lower docks. All out chaos ensued, as more and more nomads began to fight back, with some of them even seeing success as larger, more dangerous weapons were brought to bear.
"Should we even be shooting these dudes?" Oxyi asked as she dived behind a stack of metal crates, peering at the oncoming forces shuffling towards their particular walkway. Nails and red-hot metal prongs saturated the air, along with the stifling stench of hot iron and warm blood. The retaliatory volley clattered against Oxyi's cover loudly, standing her fur to attention under her armour.
"Yeah. It would be a mercy for these lot. You can tell the newbies from the 'grey eyes' from how they move." Venner pointed across at a sizable squad of GLYPH employees marching off one of their ships, blocking the lower decks from the Garon Moonstop station. Each suit had a lumbering, almost zombie-like gait to it, humanity long since drained from the people trapped inside. They didn't even flinch as bullets plinked off their shells in a splash of sparks, only continuing to press forward under the command of the foreman, who was currently taking shelter behind one of the giant brass hands that gripped the walkway. "They only use the broken staff for grab operations. People who'll just do what they're told, else they might risk insubordination. We had security alerts on Barru X about this lot."
"How the fuck do we stop them?!" Oxyi yelled, raising her weapon to her shoulder.
"Make it cost ineffective for them to continue." Venner replied bluntly. "They're a business. They'll stop when it hits their pockets."
Oxyi shuffled uncomfortably in her armour and swallowed loudly. If it wasn't a horde of sex zombies chasing her down, it was a mega-corp hellbent on shoving people into walking prisons, where deathrow was a mere push of a button away.
Before her anxiety could build any further though, she felt a golden warm fill her chest as the familiar sound of Diego's warcry filled her ears. A second shimmering skin covered her frame as her movements became lighter and easier, the shotgun clasped in her hands felt feather light. It was a roar to life as much as it was a call to action.
"Holy moly, that's… nice!" She exclaimed, her eyes landing on Diego as he bounded out on the ramp to the destroyer and charged down the walkway. He rammed the nearest GLYPH suit to the ground with his forearm, and as it attempted to wrestle him off, he snatched a heavy looking metal hammer free from its belt and crushed its dome-helmet in with a single shimmer-red strike. Nails and slithers of rebar pinged off him, ineffective against his psyonic defense.
The team advanced together; Diego at the front with the looted hammer, Seeth behind him with her SAFU raised high, and Venner and Oxyi just behind her. More GLYPH suits emerged from the perpendicular walkways attached to the main route, where the other nomad ships were docked, redirecting their attention from breaching the ships to combat the main threat. But as they choked the walkway with their hulking frames, raising their various tools and weapons ready to engage, the forward squad was swept off their feet. The overwhelming force of the SAFU crashed through their ranks. A single slug punched through three of them in a row, sending them all scuttling backwards before collapsing to the ground with a heavy thud. Between the deafening BOOM of the SAFU, the smaller shotguns played out of repeated succession, covering their big sister. Even if their impact wasn't as thunderous or devastating, they still successfully punched into the suits.
Both Oxyi and Venner kept Seeth's flanks well protected, landing solid hits on GLYPH suits trying to get an angle of the team. At the front, nails and metal shrapnel pinged off Diego's glimmering armour as he kept the bulk of the enemies' attention on him. For anyone suit who got too close, they were met with a crushing THWACK from the unwieldy metal mallet clutched tightly in Diego's hand. Despite the mallet's awful weight distribution, Diego handled it with surprising grace. He looked more natural with the mallet than he had any bladed weapon so far, with his tail swinging in counter-balance to each feracious slam of the metal chunk. Between the four of them, it only took a couple of minutes to clear their walkway almost entirely. Seeth's height and firepower made her a towering sentinel, able to leverage the anti-tank level firepower of the SAFU without fear whilst under the protective shimmer of Diego's psyonics. But, as their victory began to swell, in the corner of her eye, a fiery yellow light caught her attention.
A huge wall of metal flew through the air and aimed its stubby feet at the walkway. An oversized GLYPH construction mech, closer to a walking building than anything remotely humanoid. It featured two large mechanical arms with oversized scrap pincers, likely intended for tearing into wreckages or ships. It had no central head, instead having a cockpit on each shoulder, heavily armoured from the front with sheer slabs of steel, with letterbox-like slits at the pilots' eye level. These cockpits were otherwise open top, but both pilots were clad in the formidable GLYPH suits all the same, making them rather more hardy than pilots in traditional gear.
The mech landed with a heavy clatter, metal on metal as its heaving chassis whirred into life.
Seeth pulled the front back on the SAFU and ejected the live shell, stowing it on her hips before pulling out a black shell with a white skull on it and slipping it into the chamber. The way she moved, you'd forget these things weighed six to ten kilograms a piece, as she handled the munitions as though they were paperweights.
But before she could slam the pump forward, aid came from above.
Crack-Crack, Crack-Crack.
Two shots, two times, both pilots were double-tapped from the walk-way above. The first shot cracked their armoured domes, the second silenced them. The mech immediately stuttered to a stop before it had even had a chance to start.
"Keep pushing forward! We'll cover you!" A voice called out from above.
A second mech was already flying in, pushed through the air by two giant rocket thrusters attached to its back, but this one was heading to the walkway above, where the aid came from.
"Watch your heads!" Seeth yelled back, aiming the SAFU at the approaching mech.
The shell erupted from the oversized shotgun with a resonating BOOM and punched straight into one of the huge tanks on the incoming mech's back. It immediately exploded in a giant red fireball, soaring off course and completely missing the walkways entirely. It barrelled into the cosmos with an applause of crackling fuel and screeching metal as its bodywork came apart and left the atmospheric bubble that engulfed Garon Moonstop, soon to join the other wreckages on the moon.
More GLYPH suits were marching down from the mothership further up as the fighting above them intensified, splitting equally between their squad and the group fighting above. Seeth rallied forward, slamming for shells into the SAFU and spearheading the push forward. She quickly glanced back to check on the others, Oxyi and Venner were locked at her flanks but Diego… Diego was stood, stone still a fair way behind them. His gaze was locked onto the walkway above, his ears flicking repeatedly. She couldn't quite place the emotion on his face, he looked one part confused, one part frightened, and the rest was almost… sad…
"Diego! You okay?!"
A wavering insecurity possessed him for a few seconds more, before he suddenly seemed to remember where he was as a nail flew past his head, and he dived forward. As a squad, they shouldered up against the mech's square legs, using them as cover against the increasing wall of sharp, hot metal flying through the air. Beams of amber firelight began to light up the walkway as additional lumbering suits arrived, wielding what looked like jury-rigged laser cutters. The beams scorched against the pillar-like legs of the mech, leaving trails in the metalwork as Oxyi and Venner opened fire on the approaching forces. Armour-piercing slugs punched into the suits, each one leaving a hissing hole in their shuddering brass frames.
Diego disappeared for a brief second, climbing up the mech's front. A screeching noise rang out amongst the outright firefight, along with a bright flash of red light and he landed back behind the girls, with a solid slab of metal in his hands. His arms shimmered red as he pulled a bar of metal around the slab, forming a makeshift industrial shield easily as tall as he was.
He darted between the mech's legs, his new weapon-shield gripped tightly in his palms and advanced on the intruders.
"Try not to get hit! I'm not sure how long my warcry will last!" Diego called out, his grip tightening on the shield as nails and lasers slammed in the metal plating, playing an almost musical plinking tune. A carpet of blunted and bent nails littered the ground in front of him as he advanced closer to the suits ahead. They were holding a set of stairs that lead to the primary walkway to the space station, where the mothership and foreman were holding ground.
The sound of the SAFU thundered above all, each meaty clack of its foregrip resulting in another burst GLYPH suit, popping like grapes under the sheer force of each slug. The roaming forces on the other branches quickly turned their attention to their walkway, and the one above. Whilst not punctuated by the roar of the SAFU and its smaller sister shotguns, the walkway above was alive with gunfire. The dual pinch of pistols was a far cry from the thunder below, but its efficacy was quickly measured by the rattle of GLYPH suits tumbling to the floor.
As Diego advanced forward, shield held high, a GLYPH suit charged towards him, feet thumping loudly against the walkway as it raised a square, solid metal hammer. At the apex of its swing, a second GLYPH suit fell on it with a loud clatter from the walkway above, its chassis hissing loudly as fluid spilled from a bullet hole on its head. Diego rammed the shield forward and shunted both suits off the deck with a shrill metallic screech in one movement.
Seeth, Venner and Oxyi quickly loaded their respective weapons and directed their attention to the next walkway over as the resistance in front of Diego had been firmly levelled already. The walkway was littered with the hissing, decompressing wreckages, oozing with various oils and hydraulic fluids from their punctures. But as Diego continued forward towards the foreman, a hover carriage pulled up next to him, not unlike a window cleaner's platform, but suspended by bright orange jets. Onboard were three more GLYPH suits, raising a variety of both lethal and non-lethal weapons.
"Watch your flank!" The same voice called from above. But this time, an entire ensemble of gunfire rained down on the carriage.
Amongst the chaos, the same pistol shots rang true. Two shots, three times. Precise and effective.
But the sheer volume of fire, including a mix of ballistic rounds and cobalt blue energy fire, completely drowned the carriage and it was torn apart. Whoever was above were better armed and trained than your average nomad.
Diego paused again upon hearing the voice, bracing the makeshift shield tightly as he glanced up to try and see who was talking.
I-It can't be. He's dead. They're all dead. I-I checked!
His ears flicked, his heart thumped in his chest painfully but the battle simply wouldn't allow him a moment of peace. His fingers squeezed around the handle of the mallet tightly, his knuckles fading into white.
No. I'll believe it when I see it.
In the heat of the fight though, Seeth stood tall and unwavering. Like a lighthouse in a storm of red hot rebar and a tide of nine-inch nails. GLYPH's firepower pinged off her golden second skin and was returned in kind, with the precise, oversized slugs of the SAFU downing suit after suit. Her movements were quicker, her load lighter, uplifted by Diego's warcry. The result was an obelisk of unrelenting firepower, nigh-invincible under her lover's protection, moving far faster than a person of that size and strength should have been able to. Seeth was already blisteringly quick for a strider of her gait, making others of her size-class look like lumbering buffoons for the most part, but this?
This many kilograms of tungsten death had no right to move with such grace.
They advanced towards the stairs ahead of them, only to hear a deep, rumbling fog-horn sound through-out the entire docks. It emanated from the main ship, signalling a mass retreat of all the remaining employees, their dwindling numbers far thinner than they were just minutes ago. The meager squad ahead of them, using the benches and partially unloaded cargo for cover, turned and ran. For a lot of them, it was more a stumble forward, barely keeping upright as they dashed for the ship.
In the retreating chaos, Seeth felt a pair of eyes land on her directly ahead. Her gaze locked onto the GLYPH foreman, his beady dead eyes laced with an intense hatred.
He remained perfectly still as Seeth brought the SAFU's barrel to face him and unleashed a round straight at his head.
A loud, reverberating BUZZZZZ filled the air as the slug pinged off the mothership's shields. As powerful as the SAFU was, it wasn't able to punch through ship shields of this strength. A dissatisfied growl crept out of Seeth's throat as the foreman continued to stare her down, never once flinching as his hands gripped onto one of the motherships 'fingers'. The craft hissed loudly as it released itself from the dock. The remaining GLYPH suits stumbled desperately towards their means of escape, latching onto what they could in a similar manner to the foreman.
All, but one.
One of them wrenched itself free of the restraints and ran back towards the nomads, gunning straight for Diego. It waved its arms frantically, shedding its weapons and tools from its belt to the ground as its tumbling walk sped up.
With the remaining nomads taking potshots at the retreating units, the single advancing suit ran desperately towards Diego, before suddenly seizing up. Its limbs froze and extended, collapsing to the floor as if it were a solid block of iron and from within, a muffled called out.
"GET ME OUT! THE FOREMAN'S PURGING ME!"
Diego dropped his shield and hammer, pressing his hand to the front of the suit.
"Stay calm! We're gonna get you out, I promise."
"PLEASE! IT'S GOING TO KILL ME! Oh god! I can feel something on my neck!"
The helm of the suit flashed red with an exclamation mark visible on its dome and the suit began to whirr loudly, still locked stiff. There was an unsettling hydraulic whirring noise emanating from the suit's innards.
Diego roared loudly and thumped his chest, his hand still pressed against the suit. A surge of golden energy flowed into the suit and disappeared.
"This will protect you! Seeth! I need you! We need to pull this suit apart!"
Tac-Tac-Tac-Tac-Tac-Tac-Tac
A repeated pinching noise played from within the shell as the occupant screamed loudly. But her screaming at least was a sign she was still alive…
Seeth ran over as the remaining GLYPH forces departed, finally breaking her stare-down with the foreman, holstering her SAFU and locked her hands onto the front frame of the suit. Diego followed her, his skin shimmering red as they both pulled at the metal. It groaned in protest as it began to rip open, the two of them heaving together to pull the material back. Yet the more they pulled, the tighter the suit seemed to grip its occupant, like the very material itself was unwilling to let her go. But its defensive hug was lined with steel teeth and spring loaded jaws, squeezing tighter and tighter on the person within.
With another flash of red and a mighty heave from Seeth, the chest plate caved under their combined strength and allowed Diego to slip his fingers under the dome helmet, which he ripped off in a single motion.
Within was a terrified serpent, shaking with fear as an oversized metal prong repeatedly tried to stab her in the back of the neck. Its piercing tip was caught by Diego's protective field, but it was hammering against it relentlessly, pushing a little closer to the snake's scales with every mechanical jab.
Tac-Tac-Tac-Tac-Tac
Diego reached in and grabbed the device, crushing it as Seeth dug her claws into the suit and heaved outwards again, eventually shredding through its material to reveal some of the snake's body and the inner workings of the suit. What was once protective bracing across her limbs buckled and turned inwards, creating a network of shredding brass hooks, all with the intention of preventing the occupant from being forcibly removed. If it wasn't for Diego's psyonic protection, the snake would have been turned into giblets already.
She managed to pull one of her arms free of its suit sleeve and reached up towards Diego, who grabbed her firmly and gave one strong yank as Seeth held the suit down.
The snake was pulled free of her hellish prison, slipping out of its jagged grasp in ooze coated motion as the suit bled its hydraulic fluid over her, almost like some sort of hellish newborn calf.
"Holy FUCK! Holy I–I-" She tried to stand, but was quickly swept up by Diego and laid flat onto a nearby bench, underneath the dock soft lights.
"Easy now. We got you. Rest for a bit."
The entire lower dock breathed a collective sigh of relief as the chorus of carnage finally ceased.
"T-They were going to t-take me… T-Thank you… sir…" She stuttered, her body quivering from head to toe. But before the moment could breathe, a swarm of nomads arrived on the walkway, including a medic team sent from Garon Moonstop, who quickly took over the snake's care. Some were rushing over to their docked ships, worried if their vessels had taken any stray shots. But others were pruning over the fallen GLYPH suits, quickly patting their exteriors down for any salvageable material and tools. As it turned out, many of the suits had rustling belts of usable scrap and tools, which were picked clean in almost a matter of seconds by the scavengers. But they were as quick to leave as they were to arrive, aware of the scathing looks they were receiving from the bulk of the crowd.
The crew gathered back up and brushed themselves down, holstering their weapons as everything appeared safe once again. The GLYPH ships retreated into the darkness of space before blipping out of existence entirely in a flash of hazard yellow. As Oxyi and Venner checked themselves over for any injuries, there was a sudden round of applause from the crowd gathering ahead of them.
"You showed those brass pricks who's boss!" One of the nomads called out, raising his fist in cheer.
"Big shotgun does big damage!" Another shouted, apparently lost in the smokey wafts of the SAFU's afterglow.
Seeth, Diego, Oxyi and Venner padded up the stairs just ahead of them, joining the rest of the celebrating nomads. It seemed that their quick response had prevented GLYPH from taking anyone. Their only successful capture was the snake girl and she was sitting pretty with the medics, shaken but not taken.
"Wait a minute! I know you! You're Lockblade! You're the one who drove the Barons back!" Another nomad called out excitedly. "And now you're taking on GLYPH?!"
"You didn't tell me you'd been killing Barons, Seeth!" Diego grinned, surprised but proud, wrapping his arm around her waist tightly. "And you definitely didn't tell me you had a merc name, either!"
"I didn't choose it. It just sorta… happened." The Controller's face flushed red as the applause around her continued. Diego went to move his hand off her, but the Controller quickly caught his wrist and placed his hand firmly back on her. "What do you think? Should I keep the name?"
"Fuck yeah, you should. Usually if your name gets chosen for you, it's something super lame like 'The Nibbler' or 'Bone-man.' Lockblade actually sounds pretty good." Diego laughed back.
"Hmm, you seem to know quite a bit about that. Do you have one?" Seeth smirked, her arm finding its way around his shoulders.
"Me? Nomad famous? No idea what you're talking about." Diego replied, a cheeky, mysterious glint in his eye. But the pair were interrupted before Seeth could ask any more.
"Did I hear 'Lockblade?'" A voice called out ahead. The nomad crowd parted quickly, to reveal the second group that had been fighting above approaching them. And in the middle of the group…
…stood another coralith komodo.
His complexion was remarkably similar to Diego, with crow-coloured smooth scales and feathery coal hair, but his locks were lined with gold, and a sweeping fringe glanced the frame of his face. The remainder of his hair was bunched into a thick, chaotic pony tail that had the same blonde edging as his fringe. His eyes were a vivid shade of blood red, and he carried the same half-handsome, half-cute composition that Diego did, minus the sabre fangs. Although his large, bat-like ears had the same milky tone to their insides as Diego, they were pierced with various golden bars and jewelry, including a weaving snake that flowed in and out of his cartilage.
He was dressed immaculately, with a long flowing pirate coat that matched the complexion of his eyes, trimmed with white and gold, and a tight pair of trousers and boots to match and complete his ensemble. A pair of impressive-looking pistols hung from the holsters of his hips, a gentle waft of smoke still flowing from their cooling barrels. He greeted Seeth's gaze with a friendly smile, just showing the peak of his fangs behind his lips. He was a little smaller and trimmer than Diego was, but carried himself with an immense, intoxicating confidence that slowly seeped into those around him. Behind him stood a mixed crew of pirates, six in total, including a human hybrid axolotl girl in mechanic gear, and a larger, taller tar-coloured bear who was only a bit shorter than Seeth.
"Damn! The rumours didn't do you justice!" The komodo approached, extending his hand towards Seeth confidently. "There aren't many striders who'd dare take on the Barons, nevermind win! You -"
He froze. His face dropped from a welcoming smirk, to one of sheer disbelief.
Diego stepped out from behind Seeth, his face just as lost as the doppelganger in front of him.
Both komodos inched forward, tears pricking in the corners of their eyes as they looked each-other up and down.
"It… It can't be… Diego…?" The captain's voice dropped, his confidence immediately shattered and replaced with a deep vulnerability.
"Wex…?"
Their ears pricked at the sound of each-other's names. Their throats creaked with a further thousand words, left unspoken all at once, but no sound came out. Their legs were moving before their minds, or hearts, could even process what they were feeling.
They threw themselves at one-another, wrapping their arms tightly around the other, holding each-other close, an unspoken promise to never let go again. Their hearts thumped together against their chests as the realisation fulminated within them.
Finally they pulled away, holding each-other at arm's length, a rising, almost child-like smile spreading across both their faces at the same time.
"Diego?" Seeth inched forward, almost cautiously, Oxyi close behind her.
"After all this time…"
Opposite, the pirate crew mirrored Seeth, slowly approaching their captain with the same look of concern and uncertainty on their faces.
"Wex…Is this who I think it is?" The axolotl asked, tentatively.
Tears were pricking in the corners of the komodos' eyes, as finally, affirmation croaked from their mouths.
"This… This is my brother…"