Chapter 44 - Apex Predator

So, apparently dragon blood will spontaneously combust upon contact with air. That’s one thing I never learned from chemistry class, back in school. Goes to show yet another way in which the institution of public education had failed me.

Let me tell you, there are few things more disconcerting than watching your own flesh catch on fire. I’ve been fired at, fired on, and fired after, but very seldom have I actually been on fire. This, and the pesky little matter of finding an appropriate landing site while avoiding the dragon voraciously pouncing on my ass were just a few of the priorities in my life, for the time being.

Had I been a knowledgeable mage, powerful knight or hell, dare I hope, maybe even the vaunted dragon slayer, I’m sure I would have been better prepared for this task. However, for now I had to make do with the tools at hand, and that meant resorting back to what I was most familiar with.

I estimated that I had less than 3 seconds left before either Sharinne spat another glob of fire and vaporized me in mid air, or I disintegrated against the ground with a world-rending impact. Well, rending for me. I’m sure the world would keep on going just fine.

That meant I had time to summon the power of my will for one thing, and one thing only. I needed to focus, but this is where we go back to just how disconcerting it is to actually be on fire. I could imagine a mage attempting to chant the complex arcane words of power needed to cast a spell, then failing miserably as they saw their flesh literally melting right off their bones as the eager flames licked at them.

Of course, I was Seth the Godslayer. I was made of sterner stuff. Well, that and the fact that I suspected the broken sword I still held in my hands had some sort of enchantment that warded its wielder against the power of fire. My suspicions were proven correct as I felt the dying sparks of my sword had a direct correlation to the suddenly spiking heat of the flames coating every inch of my body.

So, for the few extra seconds my enchanted sword could persist, I would be safe against the flames. Still, I couldn’t help but squeeze my eyes shut as I summoned forth the extreme concentration needed to grasp the handle of that hammer of inexorable will in my mind and bring it down in a resounding blow against the roaring anvil of my raging heart. My bloodshot eyes popped open and sparks flew, dark motes of shadow flickering into life all around me, but were instantly extinguished as the dragonblood flames licked at my focus.

It was getting hot in here!

God damn stupid overgrown lizard and your twice be damned flaming stinking blood!

“Again!” I roared in my mind, and this time a veritable shower of sparks danced in the air as a semi-translucent sphere flickered momentarily around me before fading away. In its afterglow, I caught a glimpse of Sharinne’s giant maw stretching open and her great expanding chest quivering slightly as though it were filled to capacity, just about ready to let forth with the next formidable stream of dragon flames.

Notwithstanding the fact that whatever enchantment powered my sword seemed to be on its last dying breaths, there was simply no way in hell I would survive a point-blank blast of that fearsome dragon’s fiery breath.

It was time for a life-or-death gamble. I wasn’t even sure if this was going to work or not.

Aw, screw it.

With a final roar of defiance, I reversed my grip on the broken sword, holding it above my shoulder and taking careful aim as though I were holding a lance, then I willed it into flaming life for one final time. Good old champ, it didn’t quit on me and eager blue eldritch flames sprang into life along the length of the blade, with the shimmering energy blade jutting out of the broken portion of the sword into a razor sharp point. Without a second’s hesitation, I threw the blade as hard as I could point first towards the tiniest window of opportunity I managed to spot right as Sharinne began to lower her head to burst forth with another dragon breath.

“Eat this, you bitch!” I cried, all righteous fury and indignation.

Holy crap, it got hot without that enchanted sword. Whatever afterpower lingered, it was rapidly being consumed by the flames enveloping me. Thus, I had no time to track the flight of my projectile as I closed my eyes again to turn my focus inward and stubbornly brought down that metaphysical hammer of will crashing down against my soul one final time.

BOOOM!

With a blinding surge of static a shimmering sphere of light came into being around me, directly hovering over my skin and projecting itself outward as it effortlessly brushed off every last bit of that stinking dragon blood and delivering me from the pitiful fate of roasting alive in dragon juice.

Holy crap, I can’t believe this worked! I exulted, almost delirious in my joy.

Powerful ripples shook the air around me as a dark metallic exo-skeleton began to materialize itself over my chest, spreading to my back, then over my extremities. It was over in an instant, but my skin shivered in the quiet afterglow.

It was almost like sex, only better.

“Aetna, systems report,” I whispered, slowly flexing my fists and relishing in the familiar feel of cool burnished metal against my rough, calloused skin.

“Systems are initializing. Running diagnostics. All systems nominal. Please state your command,” came the suave, impassive voice - music to my ears.

“Engage flight mode,” I immediately instructed.

“Propulsion system, online. Thrusters at 100% efficiency. Inertial dampeners, engaged.”

Twin blue-white jets of fire roared into life under me as my headlong tumble along the air came to a smooth stop. As I soundlessly hovered in midair, I basked in the nearly sexual ecstasy of operating one of the deadliest and most advanced military grade combat exoskeleton prototypes I’d ever had the pleasure to experience.

Oh yeah, this was more like it.

I sported the toothiest, most wolfish grin I’d worn for a long, long while as a cry of agony shook the heavens and sent visible ripples through the air. As I raised my head to meet Sharinne’s gaze, only one ruby orb burned with some feral, primal instinct, as my sword-lance had flown true and embedded itself deeply within her other eye. A thick trail of blood and ichor flowed in rivulets over the dragon’s face, and slowly it ignited into a guttering line of fire, giving the whole scene a freakishly surreal feel.

“C’mon baby girl, this has only just started,” I cooed, as I casually lifted a finger and tapped a holographic display key hovering under my eager hands, instantly prompting a whole series of spine-tingling clicks and whirrs as various deadly contraptions of death and mayhem smoothly glided into place all around me.

“Combat mode activated, all weapons systems online. Target acquired. Please state your command,” came Aetna’s crisp, cool voice as a semi-reflective visor slowly lowered itself over my eyes and several targeting holographic displays lit up my vision.

For one endless moment, man faced off against dragon as their fighting wills clashed against one another, two monsters who stood at the apex of their respective worlds and dominated their own kind. No words were needed, for the embers burning deep within their eyes said it all.

They would fight, not because of some pact, or promise, or test. No, that was far, far behind them now. This was not about some petty squabble or even about saving the world.

It was an ancient ritual repeated endlessly throughout history. It was the inescapable fate of two tyrants, apex predators who ruled over their own domains, clashing against each other in order to defend their most prized possession in a final bid for supremacy: their pride.

Or more simply put, it simply came down to two children who would smack each other silly until only one remained standing, just because it is what children are wont to do.

“Let’s get this party started,” I grinned with a hungry fire burning in my eyes.

The massive dragon threw its head back and let out an earth-shaking roar, and I could hear both fury along with my own brand of insane ecstasy as it recognized another sovereign power and hungered for battle.

As soon as the dragon began to lower its head back down, I noticed it hadn’t bothered closing its maw.

Sneaky, sneaky. But I wasn’t born yesterday, you know?

I immediately swerved to the side while lifting my right arm and lining it up with the glowing red dot in my sights while I called out, “Switch to concussion grenades.”

“Concussion grenades, armed and ready.”

I barely had time to squeeze the trigger when a scorching stream of fire just barely brushed past my shields on the side, and alarms began blaring as a soft, female voice notified me:

“Warning: Shield integrity at 85%.”

Holy hell, I hadn’t even taken that one straight on. This EM field should be able to withstand the barrage of a laser cannon on full blast at point blank range. That just went to show how devastatingly powerful that blast of fire really was. I’d better not take that straight on or I’d be toast. Of course, far from discouraging me, this only served to send further tingles of pleasure down my spine.

This was more like it. No more wiping off insignificant bugs off my windshield for me, hell no.

As the heatwaves from the dragon’s breath began to dissipate, four individual trails of smoke drifted almost lazily through the sky. Sharinne glanced dismissively toward the incoming missiles, but her sole remaining eye suddenly flickered as though she’d recalled some recent unpleasant and very painful experience.

That’s right, you better not look down on me anymore, you over-the-hill dinosaur.

Sharinne displayed her surprising agility once more by leaping to her left and easily avoiding the projectiles, no mean feat for a giant of her size. Huge shards of shattered stone flew into the air as her massive claws found purchase on the ground while she slid a few dozen yards, leaving gaping furrows on the ground as though it were fresh concrete instead of hardy stone. Her expression seemed to be one of gloating superiority as she turned her gaze upon me once more, but her brows drew together as she read my own expression.

I shrugged indifferently, then pushed my thrusters on full. Immediately, I jolted forward in a streak of light towards the dumb-founded dragon. Of course, why would I draw closer to this massive beast of death when I would obviously lose the advantage?

“Aetna, armour-piercing rounds,” I hummed.

“Armour-piercing ammunition, activated.”

That’s when the concussion grenades went off with an ear-splitting BANG and several blinding flashes of light. Though Sharinne had managed to move herself out of the way of the missiles, she was still well within the effective range of these kinetic blast weapons. After all, these weren’t your run-of-the-mill grenades you bought at your discount military outlet store out in the woods. These were state of the art, prototype models designed for maximized efficiency and potency.

The shielded visor protected my eyes from the worst of the blast as I leisurely lined up my shot. Hell, I didn’t even need the targeting reticule. I could hardly miss a target the size of a small mountain, after all.

I grit my teeth in a ferocious grin as I squeezed the trigger and the twin miniguns mounted underneath each of my arms began to spit thunder and lightning at a hair-rising speed. Gouts of blue-white flame flickered from the gun barrel as the cylinders whirred with a furious whine, painting countless lances of light as tracer rounds indicated where I was laying on the hurting.

Sharinne howled in pain as she reflexively shut her eyes against the blinding glare of the grenades, but it was already too late. Meanwhile, my AP rounds wrecked havok along her chest as I trailed a merciless rain of bullets and blood up her torso and up towards her vulnerable neck.

The depleted uranium armour piercing jackets were designed to pierce through fully armoured vehicles, and though the first few dozen might not have been able to crack through the mind-boggling resiliency of her scales, my gatling guns could easily pump out over 8,000 rounds per minute. That meant that in a mere second, over 130 razor sharp bullets had already smashed against her scales. The results were as expected, as diamond hard scales slowly bent, then ultimately shattered and vulnerable flesh lay in smoking, shredded ruins as I continued to rain hell upon my opponent.

The dragon roared in impotent fury as she sought to escape by vaulting backwards, her sole working wing flapping wildly as she tried to increase the distance from my devastating barrage. Of course, that was well within my plans, and this is why I had gotten a headstart by rocketing my way forward, all the while laying down a withering storm of bullets.

The dull yellow of spent shells rained like teardrops from the sky in an oddly fitting counterpart to the glittering rubies of dark dragon blood bursting into flame as they descended towards the broken earth below.

Aware that her last attempt to avoid me had been foiled, Sharinne once again attempted to escape my terrible clutches by suddenly switching directions and vaulting off. As I continued to pursue her without letting up my relentless stream of gunfire, she finally had enough and turned her back completely to me, mindlessly attempting to escape her tormentor.

That suited me just fine, as her front claws had already been guarding her most vulnerable neck and face, and I’d been reduced to pulping the flesh of her foreclaws. Now that she’d turned her back on me, I would switch targets to her sole functioning wing, crippling it before she could recover the other and thus ending my air superiority.

"Aetna, arm hellbuster missiles," I shouted, really into it now.

"Hellion ballistic superiority missile system, activated."

The Hellion missiles, or more fondly known as Hellbusters, were nightmares that could penetrate the thickest armor plating and spread a focused detonation that would liquefy anything and everything protected within. I really wanted to see what Sharinne's reaction would be when I literally tore her a new one.

However, gloating turned to panic when I saw a massive blur of frenzied motion out of the corner of my eye, and I almost wanted to smack myself on the head.

“Boost shields to maximum!” I cried out urgently while burning my thrusters at full, but it was too little, too late.

"Rerouting power to shi.."

I never quite got to hear the rest of that. Sharinne must have been able to roughly estimate my position by those couple leaps she took and the angle of fire, since by all rights she should still be blind and deaf. Even in that wretched state, I had to give her credit as she still managed to turn around and lure me in while her massive tail emerged like an avenging angel out of nowhere, and smashed against my shields with a bone-jarring impact that simply blasted the world out of existence for the next couple seconds or so.

EM fields were not designed for maximized kinetic impact resistance. Rather, they dealt mainly with energy-type weapons and the odd impact explosion here and there. A direct hit from a mortar round was nothing compared to the mass of several hundred tons of berserk dragon tail accelerated to eye-popping speeds. My shields roared in protest and actually bent at the point of impact, then shattered at the last moment as sparks flew everywhere and small explosions rocked my exo-skeleton.

My figure was flung headlong through the air at astonishing speeds, and it was only dumb luck that didn’t see me splattered against the side of one of the buildings rising up against the sky. Aetna's voice filled my ears as warnings repeadly rang in my head, and several windows popped up in the holographic display.

Warning! Shield has been compromised. Re-routing power to initialize emergency shield generator. Warning! Advise execution of emergency landing protocols.

I know, I know, dammit. Just as I was about to get to that, I swear, my dumb luck finally ran out and I found myself staring at a massive building starkly outlined against the sky growing larger and larger in my vision at an alarming rate.

“And shit hits the fa..” was as far as I got as I mashed the thruster controls, with wretched results: a brief sputtering before it belched some smoke and died off altogether. Fortunately, just as I was about to pancake myself against the solid granite, a thick sphere of shimmering blue light sprang to life around me.

Warning! Emergency shield, active. Advise extreme caution while main shield generator is re-initialized.

That final window crackled and popped, then disappeared altogether as I bodily rammed into the building, sending exploding fragments of rock and other debris all over the air. Like a human cannonball, I smashed through several walls in a dizzying blur of motion while the protesting whine of my overstressed shields once again crackled in my ears.

After crashing through the entire width of the building and barely managing to stretch out a hand as the last of the collision’s momentum dragged me along the floor and towards the deadly drop below, I blindly grasp an edge and held on for dear life. By the time I was finally wrenched into a stop, I found myself barely hanging on from a ledge with a ten-story drop below me.

Holy crap, that woman had a mean rear hook.

A titanic roar of relentless fury drowned out that thought as the dragon loudly announced that she was ready for round two.

“Aetna, status report,” I wheezed.

All the answer I got were a few buzzing crackles of static, before my holographic display abruptly died.

“Typical,” I muttered. “Always have to do things the hard way.”

Panting raggedly, I ignored the tearing pain in my limbs as I tried to move my other arm to climb over the ledge, but controls were non-responsive and I slowly felt myself sliding down, losing grip.

“Alright you bitch, I’ll give you your round two,” I growed, while reaching for the exo-skeleton's emergency release button.

And you know, after all this, I can’t say I was surprised to find a crazy grin plastered all over my blood-splattered face.

‘Cause, you know, this was just starting to get fun.