BLUE GENDER
"Children of the Blue"
20. Götterdämmerung
High towers, fair temples, goodly theaters,
Strong walls, rich porches, princely palaces,
Fine streets, brave houses, sacred sepulchres,
Sure gates, sweet gardens, stately galleries—
All these, (Oh pity!) now are turn'd to dust
And overgrown with black Oblivion's rust
-- Spenser's Fairy Queen
---
A shudder—a tremor—went through the nest at the Whiteshell Nuclear Establishment.
The Blue inside knew it was time. It had all been leading to this.
They poured forth from the massive den by the dozens…then the hundreds…then by the thousands.
The flying Blue were like a swarm of massive locusts, blocking out the sun as they moved. The ground forces were even more impressive; every imaginable type of Blue: Choppers, Tank Beetles, lumbering Man Eaters, massive Double Boats, Spring Worms, and even dozens of the gigantic armor-plated Land Whales.
The Earth trembled.
As they marched forward the nest began to collapse, its shaggy exoskeleton crumbling and falling to dust—discarded because it was no longer needed.
The final battle was to begin.
The end has arrived.
---
"Will you do this for me? Please?"
Marlene put a hand on Gunther's shoulder. She knew how desperately he wanted to be there, by her side. But someone had to stay behind and watch Takashi and they had one more pilot than they had shrikes anyhow.
Gunther bowed his head then nodded slowly, "Ya."
"Thank you."
He grabbed her wrist softly as she pulled away.
"Marks," he said to her. "You get 'em good, but you come back to your boy, ya?"
She stood on her tiptoes and planted a soft peck on his forehead.
The massive Gunther Gerhardt blushed.
"I protect Takashi with my life."
"I know."
The group was in full battle armor. Yuji and Captain Junker were going over a few last details of the plan.
"So you got in last time just pretending you were part of the mercs and they let you through, right?" Yuji asked.
"Yep."
"Of course, that plan would work again easily, right?" Yuji's sarcasm was quite evident.
Junker nodded.
Yuji finished: "So you think our prisoners will be willing to help us out?"
The old soldier smiled and answered: "I bet they're just dying to help us."
---
Gunther stood at the shuttle's cargo hatch and watched his comrades drive off into the forest. He could feel the electricity in the air. How many battles had he been a part of? Too many to count. This one seemed so…so final.
Something unfolded above Gunther. Something hung down from the roof of the shuttle. He didn't see it coming, but he felt the pink tentacle as it wrapped around his throat.
The last thing Gunther Gerhardt saw as his neck snapped was the wicked grin of a half-mutant Dr. Charles Gamble.
---
The mercenary lieutenant walked the perimeter wall, the afternoon sun—with a few clouds scattered about—hung far over head. He glanced around at his remaining forces—they had gone from so many to so few so fast.
It was unnerving.
He felt what the other men in the group felt; it was far past time to leave this place. This place had a stench about it…a stench of death.
Something emerged from the forest. He used his field glasses to see a red and white armored shrike and one of the hardtop utility vehicles approaching. These had been the vehicles used by the pursuit team.
The team he was sure had been wiped out.
The man operated his communications gear: "General Deeves…I've got one of our shrikes approaching and a vehicle. Looks like ours…but…"
"But," the General's voice crackled over the radio. "They've used this trick before. Let me tell you something, lieutenant, if the perimeter is breached again I'm going to string you up by your testicles and feed you to one of the Professor's failed experiments. Understand that?"
The man gulped. The frequency went dead.
The mercenary officer called his troops together above the eastern gate. The convoy approached.
He opened a radio channel: "Approaching vehicles, identify yourselves and provide security clearance codes."
The vehicles did not respond. Yet the officer could see a human pilot moving in the shrike and two more men in the front cabin of the car. They were waving.
That's right—wave as if we're all part of one big happy family. I'm not falling for this one again.
"Hostiles! I'm declaring them hostiles!"
"What? Are you nutz, Billy?" One of the rank and file grunts spat.
"Shut up and blast them. I'm not falling for this again. Rocket guns, take out that shrike. Now damn it!"
The remaining members of the mercenary squad—all twelve of them—opened fire on the approaching vehicles.
Two rocket launchers fired projectiles. One hit the cockpit of the red and white modified Heavy Duty shrike. The pilot was instantly destroyed and the upper half of the shrike fell to pieces.
The second projectile hit the motor car right in the cabin. It rolled forward while its front end burned until it flipped off the road and came to a rest.
The mercenaries cheered their victory.
---
Pistol Jones' Grapple—modified to be handled by only one driver--held the legs of Marlene's Bullseye all while Yuji's Heavy Duty unit was parked off to the side and Captain Junker's own Heavy Duty kept watch nearby. Yuji himself was being held by the Bullseye's arms as he tried to get over the top of the Southern wall.
"A…little…further…" he groaned as he reached.
Finally he got a grip, hauled himself up, and was on top of the perimeter wall.
Far away—hundreds of yards, in fact—he saw the mercenary soldiers as they fired down on the approaching convoy.
Yuji didn't have time to watch the success of their diversion, yet he couldn't help be impressed at how simply removing all ammunition and disconnecting all radio frequencies had produced these results.
They had handed over the captured vehicles to their prisoners and told them to deliver a message to the Professor—the message was that Yuji and his troop were leaving and warned Gorski not to follow.
It was a lie, but it meant the merc prisoners would not suspect that they were the cheese in a big rat trap.
It obviously worked.
Yuji found the activation switch and opened the southern gate. It would take only a few minutes to get his team inside.
"Yuji, do you hear that?" It was Marlene's voice on the radio.
Yuji Kaido listened. It was the sound of an airship.
While the mercs on the eastern wall descended and exited the gate to go see their prize, an air ship floated over that eastern wall and parked on the airstrip.
Yuji's group watched in horror as Dr. Gamble exited that ship with Takashi in tow.
Gunther was dead—that is something they all realized at once—and this mission just became a lot harder.
Marlene seemed ready to reveal their position and rampage across the tarmac to intercept the doctor. Yuji stopped her.
"Wait," he reasoned. "They won't hurt him. Once we're done cleaning this place up he can walk out of there with the rest of us."
The team agreed. They moved toward the compound.
---
General Deeves was with Professor Gorski in the Great Hall. Dr. Gamble joined them with Takashi.
"Ah, welcome back, Takashi," Professor Gorski said while Deeves received a radio call from his troops stationed outside. "No problems, Doctor?"
"None," Gamble replied. He was in complete human form.
"No sign of Yuji and the rest, I assume?" Gorski led.
Takashi answered: "They are coming…they're going to make things right."
"Oh yes," Gorski seemed amused. "Your father is coming but—"
"Not just my father," Takashi announced. "They are all coming. It will be ending now."
Gorski went from amused to angry.
"You're right, child, it all ends now," Gorski held aloft a large syringe. It was filled with a liquid.
"The process is complete," Ivan announced. "Your DNA and my binding agent. This mixture will give me your genetic structure. It will combine with what I already have become and I will be like you Takashi—only stronger, older, and wiser."
Deeves slammed his fist into the table.
"Those fools!"
"What? Did Yuji Kaido get the better of your men once again?" Gorski teased.
"The idiots! They thought it was Yuji—never mind," Deeves regained his control.
"It matters not. Your new toy is ready, General," Gorski announced. "Why don't you go get it. You're probably going to need it when Yuji and Marlene get here."
Before the General could answer the calm voice of the computer defense net made an announcement.
"INCOMING BLUE ATTACK…ENEMY UNITS ESTIMATED AT 150…CORRECTION—ENEMY UNITS ESTIMATED AT 500… CORRECTION—ENEMY UNITS ESTIMATED AT 850…CORRECTION—"
The computer continued to make its corrections.
"…CORRECTION—UNABLE TO DETERMINE ENEMY UNIT STRENGTH…AUTOMATED DEFENSIVE EMPLACEMENTS ACTIVATED…"
Takashi was smiling.
"General?" Gorski questioned.
Deeves turned his radio on: "Lieutenant. Do you have visual on an incoming Blue attack? The computer defense grid seems to have developed an error."
The lieutenant's voice came over the radio. It was panicked and horrified.
"Oh my God…oh sweet Jesus…they're coming…I've never seen so many! I can't see the sky there's so many! There must be hundreds…thousands…help us! Help us!…"
The sound of the roar of Blue wings began to overpower the voice on the other end of the radio.
Deeves turned off his communicator.
"I told you," Takashi said in his child's voice. "They're coming for you, Professor. For all of you. Where will you hide?"
---
"Yuji, my scanners are picking up—"
"Yeah, I see it, too," Yuji told Marlene.
The scanners were filled with Blue approaching the base.
"It doesn't change anything," Yuji said. "And we're almost there."
---
The Elysians in the Community Dome—about a dozen of them--listened to their computer. They could hear the guns start to fire. They weren't sure how to react. Every Blue attack before had been beaten back. Surely this one would be, too?
"…INITIATING LOCK DOWN…SEALING OFF ALL EXTERIOR EXITS…PRIMARY DEFENSE EMPLACEMENTS AT 75%…"
The door to the Community Dome smashed open. Four armored shrikes came in, rolling forward in a half-kneeling position to fit under the hallway's roof. When they entered the dome there was plenty of headspace.
Everyone in the Community Dome—the Elysians and Yuji's team—knew what was to happen. There was no discussion. There was no hesitation.
Yuji and Marlene—the two who had seen the mutations in person—didn't bother to wait for them to change. They opened fire.
Immediately three of the scantly clad forms were cut to shreds.
Pistol Jones and Captain Junker were horrified to see Yuji and Marlene slaughter what looked like unarmed civilians. But in a moment they understood why.
The Elysians morphed into the sickening beasts they truly were. They grew their tentacles and pinchers and showed their cores. As they did most of them also increased their mass, nearly equaling the shrikes in size.
They hopped like gigantic bugs onto the walls and climbed high up the cupola, others slithered forward.
"What in the name of..?" Jones understood.
The shrikes began to fan out. They had taken the Elysians by tactical surprise, but the denizens of this warped world were well equipped for the battle.
One beast that had chopper mandibles growing from its shoulders clamped down on Marlene's cockpit cage. Jones swung the Grapple's heavy arms and knocked it flying, a blow that would usual kill a Blue. But this thing scampered to its feet and charged Jones, hissing all the way.
His main gun blasted it to shreds.
Captain Junker fired missiles from his Heavy Duty's shoulder-mounted launcher. The rounds slammed into the sides of the dome, knocking out debris and sending a cloud of dust through the air. Yet he missed his target—a serpent-like Elysian with eyes all along its spine. It moved too quickly.
Yuji growled and moved forward, smashing over sculptures and easels. His main gun blasted a hybrid with a Spring Worm's mouth where her chest should be. It quivered and shook as it died.
Marlene took careful aim and hit a spidery being as it jumped from the wall toward her. The first shot knocked it to the floor, but it regained its feet and charged. A burst from Yuji's gattling gun finished the job just as it lashed a pointed tongue at Marlene's cockpit.
Pistol Jones fired and fired. The sights he was seeing—the mutated bodies of half human/half blue...it had been one thing to hear Marlene and Yuji describe them…another to see it in person.
Now he had no doubt. He had no doubt that these things had to be exterminated. They just weren't meant to be. They were, as Yuji had said, abominations.
Yet seeing these things was pushing him too far. He was having trouble being disciplined. He was firing and firing but not aiming carefully.
The result was that he missed a large pink thing with a thousand tendrils as it rammed into the side of his vehicle. He crashed side ways.
It's disgusting round head squirmed in towards his cockpit and showed red fangs dripping with acid.
Pistol pulled his twin side arms and fired.
"AHHH…GET AWAY YOU FRIGGIN' MONSTER!"
It fell dead and slid off his cockpit as he brought his machine back to its feet.
More of the Elysians came pouring into the Community Dome. Another dozen, easy, all changing into their true selves as they rushed to join the battle.
In the background, behind the blaring of the shrike guns, over the horrid battle cries of the half-human monsters, was the automated voice of the defense computer offering a chilling account of the conflict that was happening on the outside of the compound.
"PRIMARY DEFENSIVE EMPLACEMENTS OPERATING AT 85%… HOSTILE FORCE HAS PENETRATED OUTER DEFENSIVE PERIMETER… UNABLE TO QUANTIFY HOSTILE STRENGTH…WARNING…PRIMARY DEFENSIVE EMPLACEMENTS OPERATING AT 100%…HOSTILE FORCE HAS PENETRATED OUTER DEFENSIVE PERIMETER…"
"Good God, how many of these beasts are there?!" Junker screamed as two leapt at him from the walls.
He fell one with a burst from his gattling gun but the second slammed hard into his machine. It stumbled and he could hear the thing ripping at power cords and other systems.
"A…little…help!"
Marlene took aim and fired a careful round. It hit the creature and knocked it free but it scampered away to fight again.
As Yuji fired and fired he felt his blood boil. It wasn't quite like being in the Double Edge, but it was close. He could feel his purpose coming to the forefront again. He could feel his duty and it wasn't coming from artificial stimulation.
BAM!
Yuji obliterated a flying worm with a woman's head as it spat acid at his cockpit. That acid splattered against the interior console and fried his scanners. He hoped that was all.
Pistol Jones' unit was running hot. Marlene was so busy dodging leaping mutations that she was having difficulty finding targets. Captain Junker's mech had taken damage on the right side.
They had killed at least a dozen of the things, yet the battle was turning against them.
Things were about to get worse.
---
The door to the chamber stood twenty feet tall. It raised.
General Deeves looked at his final payment. Its massive red form pulsated in the darkness of the chamber.
He moved forward.
Time to take this baby for a test drive.
---
Yuji wasted one of the Elysians that had grown massive claws with fly-like eyes. It spat and sputtered in death convulsions as he brought his shrikes' leg down on its torso for good measure.
As he did he spotted Professor Gorski watching from the Great Hall. The man was standing there by the open bulkhead, observing the battle.
Takashi was next to him.
Gorski led Takashi out of view and back into the Great Hall.
"Marlene! I see Takashi!"
Marlene Angel answered as she fired two shots wide of a fat beetle thing that was spitting pellets in the same manner that shrikes fired bullets. Some of them pelted her mech's arm but failed to penetrate any major systems.
"Go get him, Yuji. We can handle this here…at least for now…"
None of them were sure of that. Especially Junker who had two beasties crawling on his back tearing into systems.
Marlene moved to help the Captain while speaking: "Just hurry back."
Yuji accelerated toward the archway that separated the two domes.
---
"GUN TURRET NUMBER FOUR NOW AT CRITICAL AMMUNITION SHORTAGE…DEFENSIVE PERIMETER BREECHED IN SECTOR D…PRIMARY DEFENSIVE EMPLACEMENTS NOW OPERATING AT 110%…WARNING…DEFENSIVE EMPLACEMENT FAILURE IMMENINENT..."
The battle on the outside of the compound was a rout. The Blue were dropping from the millions of rounds fired, but for every Blue that fell a hundred more took its place.
A Land Whale battered down the western gate…a Spring Worm used its massive tail like a coil and literally sprung itself up and onto the roof of one of the main buildings. There it crushed a turret.
Flying Blue tore away another emplacement while Tank Beetles hammered at the main entrance to the compound.
They kept coming…and coming…
---
Yuji rolled into the Great Hall. It appeared empty save for Professor Gorski and Takashi who were standing by the raised head table. Gorski was looking at Yuji's mech and smiling. He held a gun to Takashi.
Yuji stopped. He realized too late that it was an ambush.
Gamble had been hiding above the doorway. His mutated form dropped onto the shrike. His tentacles reached in and pulled Yuji out, throwing him to the floor.
Gamble then pounded the shrike's control board until it fizzled, flamed, then went dead. The mutant then pushed against the mecha and knocked its dead frame over.
"Welcome, Yuji."
The sounds of the fight in the adjacent Community Dome played as background as did the computer's voice: "WARNING…INTERNAL PERIMETER BREECHED IN MULTIPLE LOCATIONS…EVACUATION RECOMMENDED…"
"It ends here, now, today, Professor," Yuji explained as he strolled over to the two with Dr. Gamble lumbering along beside him.
"Yes, yes it does," Gorski held the syringe aloft.
"This," he explained. "Is the completion of a life time of work. With Takashi's DNA and my binding agent I will complete my own personal evolution. I will be a God among men. There will be no stopping me and what I can accomplish."
Takashi spoke: "You don't want to do that, Professor."
Gorski injected half the contents of the syringe into his arm.
---
The battle had become chaotic.
Junker, his unit half burning and his ammunition running low, moved quickly across the perimeter of the Community Dome. His gattling gun went dry as it peppered a slimy blob thing with two cores and a patch of blonde hair.
Marlene killed another creature and then another.
Pistol Jones, screaming and on the verge of insanity, avoided a massive tongue flicked at him by what looked like a feathered praying mantis.
Junker was watching to his left so intently that he didn't notice the large chamber open to his right. Some sort of freight access way. It brought a new player to the room.
Junker saw movement and turned in time to see a massive appendage grasp his unit's cockpit cage, hoist him high, and throw him like a rag doll across the dome.
The shrike landed and slid into the wall where it crumpled into a useless hulk.
"Captain!?" Marlene called.
She heard nothing in response. But she wasn't listening anyway…she was looking at the new horror that had entered the fray.
At first she thought it was a massive mutation: pulsating red flesh with creamy veins running everywhere. Four huge, thick tree-trunk like appendages. Massive shoulders with a series of eye-like sockets.
In the center of it all was what Marlene first thought was a mouth. But it wasn't. It was a cockpit. Inside that cockpit was General Deeves. Two sickly feelers came from the thing and were attached to his skull.
Marlene realized…this was some sort of biological shrike made from the genetics of the Blue. Perhaps even alive with Deeves at its controls.
The biological monstrosity took a heavy step into the room. The ground shook. It towered above the mechas.
The remaining Elysians—about half a dozen—took up positions on its flank.
"Now," Deeves announced. "I will kill you all."
NEXT FACTOR:
21. Evolution
Captain Junker: "Oh the poor kid…to come all this way, after all we've been through…to come this far and then, here at the end, for Takashi to have to see one of his parents killed like that…it just doesn't seem right…it just doesn't seem fair."