Richard's Reversal

Richard limped into the darkness. Around him, the cargo bay was expansive, filled with rich blackness. There was no motion but for his own and that of his enemy. Mister Pump loomed even here. A giant amidst the loading machines and crates.

“Nowhere to go, Mister Gearheart. A dead end.”

“Yeah,” Richard said. He was still backing up. Further and further towards the far wall. His gaze swivelled. Where were they? Come on, come on! He hadn’t come this far just to die now!

“You wish to die in the dark?”

“You keep saying that you’re going to kill me, but here I am still breathing.”

“An error that I will now correct.”

Pump swung, his massive fists balled. Richard had no doubt that if he took a direct hit, it would end things there and then.

He managed to duck back just enough. The next attack hammered from the right and he half-collapsed, it screamed through the air over his head. He pushed himself back another few steps. Staggering, weak. At his very limit.

Pump’s massive fist caught the side of his body, clipping it as it swept past. Richard felt an explosion of pain. The breath was torn from his lung but he managed to stay on his feet. His body was aching now. His mind was aflame. His heart beat a ****, final tempo.

And then he saw what he was looking for.

The alcoves set into the wall. The trailing pipes of hissing steam and clicking gears which framed the massive forms, slumbering until they were needed.

And if they had ever been needed, that time was now.

“Conquerors!” Richard roared, flashing the signet ring. “Combat mode! Tear him limb from limb!”

“Conquerors?” For the first time, a flash of uncertainty showed in Pump’s face. There came the sound of whining. Of frenzied clicking and twisting metal.

The Conquerors pulled themselves free of their alcoves. Each was a massive thing; a creature of bronze and brass and metal. Many-limbed like a spider with multiple arms and crushing fists. Pump was a giant, but they were bigger even than him.

Richard gestured again, as if killing machines needed to be told twice.

“War mode,” he croaked. He wasn’t even sure if the captain had the authority to set that, but right now he didn’t care. “Maximum prejudice.”

The burning eyes of the Conquerors blazed.

“Parameters accepted. Target selected.”

And then they moved. This was no playing around like before. No trying to capture, no trying to take him alive. Richard had worked alongside Conquerors before and this was why he found them terrifying.

They were blurs of motion. Trailing steam, their eyes burning like the fires of hell. One leapt at Pump, its body was heavier than a damn steam carriage and it still easily carried itself across the distance!

He smashed a fist into it, knocked it aside and it tumbled to the ground. But it was a war machine, and it picked itself up again without even a scratch. The second one joined the fight. Pacing and circling. Pump stood in the middle. Now his stance was different. Now he also was no longer playing.

“This will not save you, Mister Gear-”

The Conqueror lunged, its metal body propelled it faster than the eye could follow. It smashed into him with its full weight, and one of its jagged legs ran Pump through, pulling him close. His hand closed around its shoulder and tore off one of its arms but the other one pounced on him from behind. A dozen jagged holes were ripped into his back,

Pump’s hands closed around the metal face of one of the Conquerors and its sculpted skull fractured, deep rends and cracks running through the metal. But Conquerors did not die easily and in return, it put one bladed limb through his leg. Pump collapsed under his own weight and the killing machine ran him through, pinning him to the ground. The other one descended on him like a frenzied beast.

Against all odds, Pump was still fighting. He was giving as good as he was getting and both Conquerors now bore jagged wounds. But it was two against one, and for the first time Pump was facing equals. The result was not in question.

Richard didn’t have time to watch it play out. Slowly, he backed away, the sound of the fight filled the cargo bay until he used his ring to close the massive door and lock it tight.

Just to be sure.

Limping, bleeding, but somehow still alive, Richard made his way back to the captain’s dock. Where the Nautiloid waited, and with it his ticket away from here.