The office itself was very much as drab as the rest of the silo, a boxy room with the same tile floor and low ceiling as the rest of the building. Dusty documents fluttered about, disturbed for the first time in years, and an empty beer bottle rolled across the damaged floor, tapping against my right foot as if to greet me. There was a large shard of metal embedded into the far wall of the room, piercing a tactical map of some kind. Placing a hand on the wall, I hobbled over, trying to get a good look at the shard. Well, that explained how the door had been destroyed. The metal piece, easily the size and length of my upper body, was part of the barrel from a railgun. It was broken at one end, a twisted spire of black steel, and still hot to the touch. Now I understood what had hit me. The unlucky mech who had owned this gun had caused so much damage that it was likely no longer fit for battle. It had nearly taken me with it, knocking me down and sending the very tip of the gun's r

I whistled, temporarily forgetting my desire to stay silent as I gazed up at the massive mech that stood before me. The dim light of my makeshift flashlight failed to do its size justice. The Spartan. Where was it from? "There's an old mech in here," I whispered, speaking quietly once more. "What?" Lucas coughed. "It can't be. Axion wouldn't just leave a mech lying around." He paused. "What is it, a Goliath?" "I've never seen it before," I responded, "but the designation calls it Spartan." Lucas' voice grew faint as he leaned away from the comm set. "Does the name Spartan ring any bells, Dan?" I didn't hear Dan's response, but Lucas confirmed it. According to Dan, he'd never heard of a prototype named Spartan during his time working for Axion. For all we knew, it wasn't supposed to exist. I gazed up at the enigma of mech, squinting to see its top. "Its construction doesn't look American," I mused, gazing up and down the blue-tinted body. "It also doesn't resemble anything use

The Spartan's quiet hum became a roar as its nuclear reactor hit full power. The entire hangar was bathed in red as its cameras started up, giving me a look at the Goliath I'd expected. The Goliath's pilot clearly hadn't anticipated me to be inside the mech, as the brown mech was busy methodically stomping apart row after row of computers. The hangar bay was large, but not large enough that it missed the massive motion that was the Spartan jerking to life. It rotated toward me, plasma cannons blazing with unreleased energy. My fingers instinctively mashed the Spartan's firing controls. I received only error messages. No guns, no combat. Only escape. Pushing forward on the controls, I smashed my way free of the scaffolding that had been erected around the mech. Part of the metal construction frame broke free with a riotous screech and caught on the Spartan's empty shoulder pauldron, swinging out in front of me like a hammer. The massive metal doors were fully open now, and mechs fr

Report: FiskThe Nevada Desert.Arizona.Axion manufacturing base.Designation: "The Forge"The circular command centre was filled with row upon row of powerful computers, each filled by a skilled technician. At the front of the room, a tactical team analyzed footage streamed onto a massive monitor.None of them could stop the inbound warhead.As the command center around me exploded into a panicked frenzy, calculating trajectory, bracing the ship for impact, I simply stood quiet.A man of finance knows when a loss is simply unavoidable. This was one of those times.Project Terminus hung suspended in the inky void of space. When observed closely by the approved personnel, it was easy to see that the warship had taken its influence from the modern dropship-Terminus' frame and form were of the same angular, streamline design. The difference, however, was in both the size and power of the vessels. Where a dropship utilized four jet thrusters on its bottom and the end of its fuselage, Ter

I approached the lift in better spirits than I had been an hour ago. Our plan for tomorrow was set-Martin, Sojwa and I had convened with Mallet and were sure of our strategy.Curiously enough, Laura had been oddly absent from the meeting. I hadn't seen her slip away, so I was unsure what had transpired.Martin, for his part, had done his best to seem unaffected by whatever discussion he and Laura had had during the briefing. However, it hadn't been hard to catch his focus drifting from time to time.Sojwa was as ready as any of us. Her squadron of nine was a welcome addition to our Alliance's struggling ranks, and their Xiezhi would be powerful assets in the battle to come. Interestingly enough, Mallet and Sojwa had been on very good terms during the meeting; considering Sojwa's surprise arrival at our supposedly hidden base, I was beginning to suspect that Mallet had long since known Taewi's past.Strategy set and plans prepared, all that was left to do was wait. Although time was of