Star Conqueror: An Epic Space Adventure Read online

  Too bad for them.

  There was no need for tricks, no need for subtlety now. In Star Conqueror, the dragon form provided insane boosts to damage resistance, strength, speed, and so much more that lesser enemies were as dangerous as gnats. I simply stalked forward, building up the flammable, napalm-like oil in my snout, bullets and blasts bouncing off me. In a deep, gravelly growl, the voice of my dragon, I roared, “If you’re listening, Matriarchs, if you can see what these poor Quibs can, know that I’m coming for you!”

  The rear most Quib saw the fire dripping out of my mouth, dropped his rifle, and ran. He didn’t get far, though. Now that all attention was on me, Tulip popped out of cover, her guns surging with golden light, and pulled the triggers. The muzzle flashes were golden explosions, the tell-tale sign of the Magic Bullet skill from Star Conqueror, and the bullets flew with unerring accuracy, curving around the doorframe, past a Quib in the way, and drilled the fleeing Quib right in the back of the neck.

  Tulip’s voice was ecstatic as she aimed at the next Quib. “The dragons have returned! Show them your fire, David!”

  Well, I sure as hell wasn’t going to keep the lady waiting. I breathed in, my chest expanding far beyond the limits of any human lungs, and the disorganized rhythm of the Elites’ barrage cut out entirely as paralyzing fear rushed over them at was to come. The air in my mighty lungs mixed with that blazing inner fire in my heart, that fire stoked even hotter by the power of my Ascension skills and roared up through my throat. Right before it rushed through my snout, I instinctively opened my jaws wide, spewing the napalm-like dragon oil outward.

  Just like an Earth flamethrower, the force of my breath atomized the oil into a sticky mist, just as the blazing air in my lungs struck it. What resulted was a raging inferno, white-hot flames spewing out in a cone of death. The intense heat began to melt through the Quib Elites’ armor on contact. Where the fiery fuel hit directly, it clung and burned like white phosphorus, furrowing right through armor and undersuit, right into the soft flesh underneath.

  Screams filled the air as the front rank of three were fully engulfed. They didn’t last a moment before collapsing into a burning heap of stinking, burning meat and slagging metal. The dragonfire consumed them faster than any flamethrower or incendiary I had ever seen in my time in the Marines. More so, if you believed the lore of the game, dragonfire burned on the spiritual level as well, melting away the souls of the sinful, and while I had thought that was just fluff before, the terrible screams of the Quibs turned me into a believer fast.

  The last two fared better, with enough time to throw themselves backward despite their fear. Even still, they were both caught by splatters of sticky, burning oil. Even those little bits of dragonfire started to consume the pieces of armor they stuck to.

  “I-it’s impossible,” one of the two shouted hysterically, swinging his Stinger up to fire another volley of lasers into my chest. The little flashing lights only discolored my chestplate, most of the heat damage absorbed my now-enhanced Breath of the Wilds.

  His buddy was more coherent and, realizing that the little guns were worthless, snatched a Banger Elite frag grenade from his belt. Bangers were a lot like Earth fragmentation grenades but mixed with an explosive far more potent than anything we had back home, with shrapnel made of nano-steel. Even in dragon form, that could hurt, and while I had never faced one with both dragon form and the added damage resistance of an Ascension build before, I wasn’t sure I wanted to find out.

  As my flames faded, I pushed off with my immensely powerful legs towards Mr. Banger. I took off like a rocket, rearing back with one arm, golden talons glinting in the dull sun. Seemingly inspired by my might, Tulip matched me move for move, leaping at the panicking Quib, shifting into a giant panther mid-pounce.

  She took her target to the ground, his rifle spiraling off across the street as her jaws sunk into the soft plates of his neck guard. As for my target, he tried to fire at me, but his attacks just flashed harmlessly against my armor. Bringing my clawed hand around in a broad swipe, my talons tore cleanly through his thick armor, ruby red blood a shade too bright to be human gushing from the wound as I tore through muscle and bone.

  Mr. Banger’s eyes went wide as he fell onto his back, letting out one final gasp. Maybe it was instinct on his part or a conscious act of defiance, but with that last gasp, his thumb pressed hard on the fuse of the grenade.

  Tulip let out a roar of feline surprise and fear, looking up from her own prey at the soft beep of the grenade. Me, well, I knew what I had to do. Without a second thought, I threw my massive draconic body on top of the Elite Banger as I scooped it up against my chest tightly. I could only hope that my nearly-half-ton of thick scales, muscle, and power armor would soak the shockwave entirely or else …

  My brain didn’t complete that thought as the thing exploded. The soft voice of my suit’s computer was more urgent now, as it cried out with multiple damage warnings, the impact of the grenade hitting me like a sledgehammer. I let out a sputter of flames as the air was blown out of my lungs and pain radiated through my chest and arms.

  And yet, I wasn’t dead. In fact, as I rolled over and groaned a little, I realized that while my power suit had taken some rough hits, between my draconic resilience and the amplified power of Scaled Victor, not only was my suit operational, but I wasn’t seriously hurt.

  I was already starting to sit up, propping myself up on massive elbows, when Tulip leaped from her downed Quib to land next to me, shifting back to her humanoid form in a crouch. “David! Are you …?”

  “I’m okay,” I rumbled, picking a hunk of shrapnel out of my scales. Already, the nanorepair units in the armor were going to work, slowly mending over the few breeches from shrapnel in the undersuit and plates. “Takes more than an Elite grenade to stop a dragon.”

  Relief welled up in Tulip’s feline eyes and she ran her hands over my snout, careful to avoid the drops of burning oil, and down along my ridged cheeks. It felt good, soothing, and almost, well … sensual.

  In response, I put my arms around her, giving her a massive dragon hug as I stood. “Are you okay yourself?”

  Tulip purred as she hugged my neck. “I don’t have a scratch on me.” She pulled back. “Thanks to you.”

  I smiled, well, I think I did. It was hard to tell if a draconic smile was pleasant or terrifying. “You can pay me back later. Nice Gunslinger move, by the way.” I tilted my snout towards the dead runner as I set her down.

  “Well, I may not be a dragon,” she said with a smirk, “but I’m not all hacking and shapeshifting, you know.”

  “I do now.” I turned in a slow circle, taking in the immediate area with my vastly enhanced draconic senses. Burning flesh, spilled blood, melting electronics, and my own fire dominated the scents of the area, but I could smell both fear and awe scattered along the buildings. Ar’abi and others were watching us from all sides, so I decided with the time I had left to make a bit of a show of it.

  “Salvage what weapons and loot you can, Tulip,” I growled. “I have to make a statement.”

  She smiled and nodded. “Yes, you do.” With that weird reverence she had shown before, she stepped away, unable to fully take her eyes off me as she started to pick through the corpses. Well, if I truly was a legend come back to life, I guess I couldn’t blame her.

  Speaking of that legend, I turned to face as much of the street I could and raised my mighty voice, bellowing out, “People of Balarian, this is not a trick you’re seeing! I am the dragon returned! Know that the Matriarchy’s days are numbered! If you prize freedom, if you wish to live your own lives again, take heart and be ready to join us! Join the Resistance! The first blow will be struck today!”

  With that proclamation, I unleashed a tremendous gout of flames into the sky, a fiery beacon that would hopefully spark revolution on this planet. While I couldn’t be 100% certain that the prophecy Tulip spoke about was universal throughout the galaxy, this was still a display of rebellion against
the Matriarchy that could catch the attention of the normal people here. At the least, it would focus the security force’s attention here … and not the sewer entrance we would be running to in a moment.

  As I turned back from my little speech, Tulip had slung one of the undamaged Stinger pulse rifles over her shoulder and stood up, a glowing power suit battery in each hand. I guess glowing crystals dropping out of a dead Quib wasn’t how it happened in real life. “I channeled the power units from each suit into the intact batteries. We can siphon the credits once we’re under cover.”

  I nodded my snout at her as I began to jog toward our final target. “Thank you, Tulip.” I’d fade back to humanity in a minute, before we got there, but that was good. We’d be mostly incognito before we reached our target, so hopefully we could get a moment to breathe and reestablish our stealthy approach.

  She kept pace with me and smiled. “No, thank you, David.” I was about to object about the life-saving bit again, that was what you were supposed to do when you were squadmates after all, but she cut me off. “Not for me, but for what you just did. These people are being oppressed and now, well, you’ve given them hope. That’s what fuels the Resistance, and you just added a can of gasoline to that flame.”

  “Then I’m doing my job, right?” I rumble-chuckled.

  “In spades!” she purred back.

  It was only a few moments later, as we got within a block of our target, that a sudden beeping sounded off in my ear, followed by the soft voice of my suit. “Dragon form limit reached. Transformation reverting. Five minutes until available again.”

  I groaned as I almost stumbled, my face, body, and organs changing and shifting, until I was human once more. The whole world seemed to dull as my enhanced senses retreated. The colors were dimmer, the sounds less crisp, and the smells around me faded into an indistinguishable mishmash. My size shrunk down and while I felt less powerful, part of me was happy to back in my own skin. After all, I liked being me.

  Tulip watched in awe before taking a deep breath, wiping at her eyes. “Remarkable! I, well, I only wish it lasted longer. Not that I don’t like you the way you are but …”

  “I know what you mean.” I nodded as I took stock of the situation. “The power of the dragon, it can do so much that I wish I had it all the time too. Still, I know what we have to deal with now, and more importantly” – I flexed a gloved hand – “I know the power I have in me. We can, and we will win this.”

  She nodded firmly, resolve in her eyes. “We’ll do it, and make the Matriarchy pay for every wounded soldier, every dead freedom fighter, and every kidnapped daughter.”

  12

  “Come on,” Tulip said as she broke into a run, breaking cover from the alley we had gone down once I’d returned to human form. The sewer access that had been our goal all long was prominent in the street ahead. “I can’t believe they don’t have sewer lines running out to the slums. It just shows how cruel the Matriarchs are, depriving the worst-off beings of proper sanitation and plumbing.”

  I grunted my agreement as I stayed right on her heels, and we skidded to a halt in front of the heavy metal lid. The streets had been eerily silent save for sounds of slamming doors and closing windows as we had made it the last block here. We had done enough damage that no one dared mess with us, and the innocents, well, they were taking for cover, just in case.

  That was for the best.

  Kneeling next to the sewer lid, I put my rifle on a back mount as I searched for a good handhold. “Any security alarms or other countermeasures on this thing before I open it?”

  Tulip’s fingers were already flying over her wrist-mounted tablet before I finished my question. “Nope. We’re still at the fringes of the security net, so protections are at a minimum. This is ancient construction, hundreds of years old, so I guess the Matriarchs are too stuck up to update it.” She smirked at me as she shut down the tablet. “Their arrogance is our gain.”

  “Amen, sister,” I said with a grin. Finding a few intact finger holes, I stuffed my armored fingers in, got a good grip, and pulled.

  Darkness loomed below us. Rusty metal rungs were set deep in the wet stone of the yawning hole. At least it had a ladder.

  “Ladies first.” I gestured to the ladder.

  Tulip didn’t hesitate. “Why, thank you, David!” She smirked at me as she slunk down the ladder with seductive feline grace.

  I let out a low whistle before I collected myself enough to follow. Pulling the lid shut over us, I hurried after her, just in case there were unexpected surprises waiting for us.

  Darkness swallowed us as we continued down the ladder. It must have been twenty feet down before a final step took me off the metal ladder and onto the wet, slimy floor. I’d never been happier to have my suit on.

  “Lights,” we both said, almost in unison. With that command, the darkness was pushed back, as the twin lights mounted to each of our shoulders unfolded from our suits and lit up. What we saw wasn’t pleasant, but at least it wasn’t full of guns pointed at our faces.

  We were standing in a concrete tube, about six feet around. Once we moved out of the ladder shaft, I’d have to duck my head a tad, but we could still move through it quickly. The lower walls of the sewer had a green, algae growth on it that sunk into the slow-moving stream of feces, piss, and whatever else was sent down their pipes.

  Tulip pinched her nose, which was probably far more sensitive than my own outside of dragon form. “Well, I can’t argue, not when I plotted the route. Helmet up!” Her force screen helmet snapped back into place, as she unhooked the two batteries from the magnetic clamps on her suit, tossing them to me one at a time. “Here you go.”

  Blinking in surprise, I still managed to catch them before they splashed into the muck. “Uh, shouldn’t you keep one of these? These are for power credits, right?”

  Her cat ears twitched as she arched an eyebrow. “Well, sure, but I have the Remote Transfer upgrade. It’s one of the first things I bought when I started.” She pointed at the glowing meter on the side of each battery. “I was actually surprised to find any charge on the suits, because I figured you had the same thing.”

  I chuckled and shook my head. Despite my annoyance at what should have been common sense, it was also kind of funny. “Well, remember to tell the Doc when we meet her that she should have programmed that into Star Conqueror, because we just had credit pickups to run over.”

  Much like the power lead for my rifle, a cable snaked out from my suit’s chestplate and linked up to the first battery, the glowing line going down as the power credit readout in the corner of my HUD pushed upward. At least the numbers seemed equivalent, as I was getting about as many power credits as I expected to get from the Elites, assuming a standard squad cut with Tulip.

  “Duly noted,” Tulip grinned as she detached her tablet from her arm. “I did point that out to her, but she mumbled something about gamification, ease of play, and marketing. I kind of tuned out at that point.” Her fingers tapped at her screen. “Security forces have been dispatched from the arcology to sweep the slums. A lot of them, actually.” She grinned over at me. “You made a big impression.”

  I discarded the empty battery and attached the second. “Yeah, it would have been annoying to have to spend credits on something so basic as remote credit gain. The players would have bitched up a storm.” Mulling over the rest of what Tulip reported, I shared that grin of hers. “Good. That was the idea. Not just to ignite some hope in the people here, but to draw security out from the arcology. Hopefully between that and this Resistance contact on the inside, we’ll make it through without too much more trouble.”

  Now, I knew better. My time in the Marines had taught me that no plan survives first contact with the enemy. We’d see action, rough action ahead, but no matter how crazy things got, a solid plan would make it easier. Which was what brought the next thing to mind.

  “We better make the most of this reprieve,” I said, glancing at the upgrades menu of my
HUD as the last battery went dead. I had nearly two-hundred power credits now. “Let’s catch our breaths, take a look at what we can upgrade, and fully recharge before we run into more trouble.”

  “Smart thinking,” Tulip said with a smile, her fingers gliding over her tablet. “You don’t know how happy I am that you’re more than simply someone attuned to the dragon.”

  I looked past the HUD and the menus, right at Tulip. “Oh?” She blinked up at me and I smiled. “I mean, I’m happy I am attuned to it. The dragon is, well, awesome, but …”

  She reached out and stroked her hand down my arm in that Fertish way of hers. “I’m happy that you’re smart too, and also that you care about the people out there. Star Conqueror was a test, sure, but a test of combat skill and affinity to the dragon. Morals, well, those really couldn’t be tested. The game assigned you to the Resistance and you couldn’t change that.” She smiled softly at me. “You? You would have chosen it, wouldn’t you?”

  I smiled back and mimed what she had been doing with me, running my gauntleted hand along her neck and stroking her shoulder. Hey, when in Rome, right? “I see what you mean, and yeah, yeah I would have. What the Matriarchy is doing to the people of this city, this planet, hell, this corner of the galaxy, well, I don’t cotton to bullies.”

  We each took a step closer to one another and if we hadn’t been in a sewer, well, I would have kissed her. But for the sake of both of our noses, we kept the helmets up for the moment.

  Tulip winked at me as she stepped back. “We better do that upgrading.”

  “We should,” I chuckled. “We still have a mission to complete.”

  We’d continue this conversation later, somewhere a lot cleaner. I forced myself to focus not on Tulip’s curve-hugging power suit but on the upgrade HUD.

  My first choice was blatantly obvious. In the general tree, the Remote Transfer upgrade stared tauntingly at me.

  Remote Transfer