The hard earth beneath Dirk's feet erupted into a mass of rocky fragments and coarse dirt, blasting all of the soldiers back. A tall, ominous shadow loomed out from amidst the thick debris. Massive, deadly mandibles snapped up a scrumptious, metallic, snack while a hundred stubby legs squirmed in the air. As the dust thinned out, the form of a massive, 20 metre long, centipede showed itself, and in its revolting maw was the body of Dirk. His armour was like paper before the cruel mandibles of the gigantic centipede, completely unable to protect his fragile body.

Grim-faced, the rest of the team unleashed their payload onto the great centipede, but, an odd, sand-coloured barrier, congealed around the body of the centipede, looking like a layer of illustrious lacquer. Even the oversized bullets, hurtling at the beast at a speed of 2000 m/s, couldn't penetrate the strange barrier. Fel hefted up his own rifle, firing stunning blue lasers at the centipede, yet even those powerful lasers, previously able to vaporise the dense quills of a cannon porcupine, could only barely thin out the centipede's barrier.

Shelab yelled into her mic while hurriedly retreating away from the centipede, 'Fel, we've lost the initiative on the target, we have to switch to Plan B otherwise we're doomed!'

'Very, well,' replied Fel solemnly, 'Tsvan, Warren, George, initiate Plan B, we'll cover you.'

'Yes, captain!'

The determination in their voices was strong, yet the fear within was equally clear.

Three figures dashed out from the encirclement. The soldiers behind them shot out red-hot bullets and brilliant lasers that flew past their shoulders and hurtled into the menacing centipede. Although the damage caused by the covering fire was minimal, it was at least able to distract the centipede for a few, precious, moments. The centipede sprayed out a cloud of green, glowing, and corrosive venom that encased most of the battlefield in mere moments. The figures plunged into the incoming death trap, ignoring their rapidly corroding armour. Before long the figures were only a few metres away from the great centipede. In the next moment, a mere arm-span. Warren himself was only a hands-breadth away from being able to grasp the centipede's body, yet, just before he brushed the surface of the centipede's carapace, the point of one of the centipede's legs penetrated his back, crushing through the weird cylinder on his back and emerging out from his chest, pinning him to the ground. A towering pillar of bright-blue flames burst out from the hole in the cylinder, reducing both the centipede's leg and Warren's body to cinders. A swift stream of acid sprayed out from the centipede's mouth at Tsvan but George shoved him out of the way, receiving the stream of acid instead. His already corroded armour couldn't withstand any more stress and dissipated into the green mists around him, his body melting into a puddle of toxic green goo.

Tsvan, the only one left of the three, finally reached the centipede after what seemed to be a lifetime. He hugged onto what he could of the centipede while the machinations inside the cylinder on his back cycled at blistering speeds, whirring crazily and emitting a mysterious light-blue glow.

'It was an honour to be with you captain,' sobbed Tsvan, his straight face crumbling during his last moments.

The whirring of the strange cylinder rose into a new octave, every nook and cranny of his armour began to emit blinding rays of bright-blue light. The centipede seemed to sense a great danger, twisting and writhing, in an attempt to shake off Tsvan. But he had plastered himself to the surface of the centipede's body, too close for its legs and acid to attack him without damaging itself. Thin cracks emerged across the entire suit, forming unique, web-like patterns. Moments later there was a sound of smashed glass and following that, was a massive explosion. An earth-shattering shock wave charged out, overturning immovable rocks, vaporising the ground and sending the centipede flying high into the sky. Unstoppable waves of brilliant, blue flames melted gargantuan boulders into insignificant puddles, forming a lake of molten earth within the crater of the explosion. The flames clung to the centipede as it flew through the air, chewing out its powerful barrier.

Fel bowed his head and silently prayed, 'May we meet in a better place, in our next lives.'

Kneeling on the ground, he hefted up his gun and flicked a well-disguised button. A whirring sound emerged from the rifle, not too dissimilar of that emitted by Tsvan's armour during the last moments of his life. Bright blue light, only just visible and seemingly intangible, streamed towards elegantly concealed air intakes. Illusory bolts of semi-transparent silky cloth embraced Fel's body, the resulting angelic image, contrasting with his aggressive militaristic equipment.

The centipede smashed back into the ground, its impact spewing out molten rock everywhere that landed mere feet away from the soldiers. As if it could sense a great danger, the centipede scuttled through the molten crater towards Fel, desperately trying to interrupt whatever he was doing.

'Hold it back! We can't let the monster interrupt the charged shot! Use your binding grenades to delay it!' yelled Royce

In response, the soldiers lobbed three dodecahedron shaped objects to locations around the centipede, forming a hexagonal formation. Strange white light flashed out from the gaps between the plates of the grenades, exploding into a magnificent light show. A high pitched sound, similar to glass breaking, rang out while thick white beams of light connected the grenades together, forming a 2d triangle above the centipede, with its face parallel to the ground. The centipede slowed down and looked around it, unable to make heads or tails of what was happening. The intensity of the triangular formation abruptly increased by tenfold and inside, thousands of fine grey-white lines flickered into existence. It was as if they had bound the space within, the centipede ground to a halt as if sealed by innumerable chains. However, in the next instant, the strange thin lines shook and bent while a deep rumbling permeated the soldiers' surroundings, the dust at their feet dancing to and fro.

Fel had only charged his gun a few seconds ago yet, as a result, large amounts of molten stone had stained the landscape, the earth was rumbling as if the apocalypse was near and beams strange, grey and white lights were shooting out left and right as the fine lines within the hexagonal formation distorted. The formation suddenly fluctuated, releasing a powerful shockwave that roared out towards Fel. Shelab dashed out in front of Fel and slammed out her armoured fist towards the shock wave. The force behind the fist split apart the shockwave, protecting motionless soldier.

'Cheers Shelab, I've locked on to the target and am prepared to fire as soon as it destroys the binding formation,' said Fel as he repositioned his rifle.

'Don't worry, we've got your back,' reassured Reyla, 'We'll lay down suppressive fire as soon as the formation breaks, won't we Donnick?'

She got a rather gruff grunt in reply

Miffed, she focused back onto the centipede but not before poking back at Donnick, 'As anti-social as ever.'

'Tch'

'What did you sa-'

'Now, now, we can sort out our grievances after we finish our mission? You won't have to wait long, see? The target is about to break free!' interrupted Royce, playing peacemaker as per usual.

A sound of glass shattering rang out, not too dissimilar to the sound that heard when the grenades exploded earlier. A massive shock wave bloomed out with the now broken formation as its epicentre. With a mind to fight fire with fire, Donnick threw out another odd-looking grenade, this time spherical, with a perfectly smooth surface. Just before it collided with the shock wave, it exploded and, from within, another shock wave burst out. The two shock waves collided, causing the surrounding airspace to plunge into chaos with the air fluctuating like crazy, sending swirls of dust into the sky and distorting the light around it. However, because of this, the shockwave didn't reach Fel, and the overall force of the distorting mess was not enough to cause their bullets to miss the massive target before them. At least, not enough for it to matter too much as long as they pumped out enough bullets.

'Ha Ha! Nice one Donnick! Open fire!' applauded Royce with glee

The centipede's barrier was now too thin for it to be able to shrug off the incoming bullets, which allowed for the previously near-useless attacks to buy time so that the fluctuations in the air could die down. They did not want to take any risks with this as if Fel's shot missed, they would've wasted all their effort.

'Everything is in order, firing charged shot, make sure you are not obstructing the projectile or you will disintegrate into a molecular state,' joked Fel as he put pressure on the trigger.

The sights were aligned and the trigger fully pressed in. Time seemed to slow. The rifle howled like a furious dragon and violent, piercing rays of bright blue light burst out from in between the plates on the rifle. Fierce, fast flames jetted out from the air intakes while large amounts of black-blue smog were shoved out along with the flames, kicking up sharp winds and catapulting small pebbles far, far away. An intense light travelled along the barrel of the gun. Only a thousandth of a second later, a dark, hulking bullet emerged from the barrel of the gun. It had mysterious blue lines carved on its surface that seemed to be artistic, yet deadly and practical at the same time. As it separated from the gun, a soft ring of bright blue dust expanded outwards from the tip of the barrel. Then, as if time had decided to work again, the massive force of the shot shoved Fel back, and the bullet pounced towards the centipede at a blistering speed of 4000 m/s. An illusory dragon formed around the bullet. Its body was long and snake-like, while its head was slim and sinister. Its roar was one with the sonic boom of the bullet and its power was infused with the will of the soldiers who had sacrificed themselves for this one shot.

The centipede didn't even have the change to react. Its body was blown apart by the sheer power of the bullet. The projection of the dragon seemed to open its terrifying maw, tearing apart swathes of the centipede's flesh. Two massive halves of the centipede fell to the ground, the two ends seemingly wriggled around, emitting a sickly green glow. Yet before long, they burst into glorious blue flames, rapidly deteriorating into a mass of ash and soot. Half a minute later, the centipede was no more. The team could only hear the echoes of the explosion and the sounds of a distant cliff crashing down in the distance.

Royce broke the silence first, 'Tsvan, Warren and George did not die in vain, we have eliminated a great threat to the main force!'

'We've got to get back to base, our Power Armour's are getting low on charge. Royce, give Fel the porcupine's core, it can never hurt to be too careful, this racket could've attracted trouble over,' replied Reyla

'Sure, Fel, catch!' said Royce as he tossed the brownish core to Fel

'Thanks, this'll only take a moment,' replied Fel as he strengthened his grip on the core. A potent energy ran up the armour on Fel's limbs in thin, brownish, crisscrossing lines. The cylindrical structure on his back began to whir while some concealed exhausts in the armour coughed out a dark brown smog.

'No matter how many times I see it, Evolved Power Armour is truly miraculous. The ability to process monster cores and recharge your reactor on the go alone is amazing,' praised Shelab

'It is nothing, after all, this armour is still in its experimental stage and still has a lot more polishing to do,' replied Fel modestly. 'Anyways, we have to move, we've spent enough time here.'

However, just before they could take a step forward, a silent scuttling sound echoed out from their surroundings. A great shadow loomed behind them with bright red eyes, full of rage and hate.