Edward

  “Edward of House Mars. We will not leave this place… not when we are fully equipped with weaponry on this ship, and Warcaskets,” Maelia shouted. Her arm cut through the air like a blade, fingers pointed toward the storm of violence unfolding in the black beyond the hull.

  Jacen’s flagship burned in the void. A floating leviathan, spewing fire and wreckage. The rest of the Sons of Mars were present—except Wilbur, whose knee was being sewn back together in the medbay, and Henryk, who hadn’t yet made contact.

  That last part planted a fresh line of worry on Edward’s brow. He sat rigid in the captain’s helm, fingers tapping along the console. Maelia stood behind him, fists perched on her hips, blood trailing from her temple and soaking deep into the fur lining her dress. The crimson ran in rivulets, catching the light.

  She thrust her hand forward again. “People are being enslaved. Slaughtered. And we’re just going to watch?”

  Ed sighed, the weight of a thousand years of Martian law pressing down on his chest. “Princess… you’re the last heir. The last of the true royal bloodline.”

  Maelia scoffed like it left a sour taste in her mouth, but Ed didn’t stop.

  “With Mathias gone, you’re it. The Emperor—crazy as he is—is still giving us a window to rebuild. The Martians need someone with true blood to rally behind. And we’ve never had a problem following a Queen.”

  Maelia bared her teeth in something between a smirk and a snarl. “Then a Queen doesn’t stand by while innocents are butchered.”

  “A Queen protects her people first,” Ed replied. “She protects herself first—then everyone else.”

  “I don’t need a lecture from you, Edward of Mars.”

  Before Ed could respond, a voice cut through the tension like a guillotine.

  “She’s right, Edward.”

  It was Arthur. But the bard was gone. No Shakespearean lilt, no drunk’s laugh behind the words. His tone was flat. Cold steel.

  “She is acting Queen. True royal heir. That means we follow whatever command she gives.”

  Everyone turned. Axel, Tyson, Franklin, Mateo. All eyes on Arthur.

  “A-Arthur… you, of all people, should know how important she is,” Ed said, his voice rising with disbelief.

  Arthur nodded slowly, his eyes never leaving Maelia’s. “I do. That’s why I say this: being President of House Mars does not give you the right or the decree to question our Queen.”

  Then, he dropped to one knee.

  “Forgive me, my Queen,” he said. “Whatever you ask of myself and my knight-brothers, we will do. Without falter. Without hesitation. Even if it means falling on our own blades.” He turned his gaze to Edward now, sharp as a drawn sword. “This woman is our Queen. I will follow her orders without question.”

  Maelia stared. One hand rose to her lips. She wasn’t used to this—this loyalty, this devotion. Not after all she’d endured. Not after all she’d been told she was not.

  “Likewise…”

  Axel stepped forward, gaze flicking to the chaos outside.

  “That’s Jacen’s flagship,” he said. “The real one. The bastard responsible for half the raids in the sector. What the hell is he doing here?”

  Ed exhaled hard, rubbing at his temple. “It’s obvious. He’s part of this assault. Coordinated it, most likely. More slaves, more profit.” He turned to Franklin. “Frank, enlarge the scope. I want a headcount on those being taken. Mateo, keep the comms open. I want to hear the second Henryk checks in. And if Bea or Adaline reach out—patch them through immediately.”

  Mateo frowned at the display, eyes narrowing. “That Jacen guy... my instructors used to show us his files. He’s a war criminal. Certified.”

  “And there’s a bounty on his head with more zeroes than you could count,” Franklin muttered, not looking up. “Makes you wonder what taking him down would do for our rep.”

  A heavy silence fell over the room. Tense. Electric.

  Then Maelia felt it—like a prickling static along the front of her skull. A pulse. She turned to the viewport. Something angular was moving fast, slicing through the black just off the back-left quadrant. No one else had seen it yet.

  Then—

  “What the hell?” Mateo muttered, his voice barely audible over the sudden static. All their heads turned as the speakers crackled to life, hissing like an old record player touched by God.

  “…now I'm in the mist, oblivion, riding with the best… boy who you be testing!”

  It was Henryk.

  His voice, warped and corroded by distance and transmission lag, rang through the bridge like a ghost from the 1920s—raspy, defiant, alive.

  “…try and get me… never needed to put down the cup, never even picked it up…”

  Edward’s lips curled into a smirk, teeth bared with the grin of a man who’d just heard from a long-lost brother. “Should’ve known,” he muttered. “Bastard always survives.”

  Maelia leaned in, eyes locked on the comm panel. “That’s…?”

  But she didn’t need to finish.

  A wall of teal-green light washed over them from the left, bleeding across the bridge windows in an electric wave. A visor flared. Sleek, wide, angular. A Warcasket—not just any, but something bipedal and monstrous, moving like a goddamn comet. Yellow rollout colors still fresh, a thick laser assault rifle gripped in one arm. The limbs locked into place as if finishing a transformation sequence mid-flight.

  “Miss me?” Henryk’s voice rode in like thunder, clear now.

  Arthur threw his head back with a cackle. “Nice suit, Druid! How’s it feel?”

  Henryk’s reply hit like artillery. “Fucking immaculate! Now this—this is a Warcasket!”

  Edward let out a long exhale, the kind that carried centuries of war and weariness. “Glad you like it,” he said. Then, after a beat, he added, “Maelia wants to support the Block. She’s ready to push Jacen’s pirates back. You’re already out there…”

  “Oh, I’m in,” Henryk said without hesitation. There was a whistle over the comms, followed by the unmistakable scrape of metal as his fingers brushed the cockpit interior. He was grinning. They couldn’t see it, but they could hear it in every syllable. Space no longer moved around him. He moved it.

  Edward snapped his fingers. “Bet. Who’s suiting up?”

  Arthur didn’t even wait for the echo to fade. He was already on his feet, the smirk on his face feral as he disappeared down the corridor like a man possessed.

  Axel chuckled, cutting a glance toward Mateo. “Those two are gonna raise hell together. I could use a backup.”

  Mateo flicked his bangs out of his eyes with a roll of his fingers. “Isaac wasn’t the only one trained at a Milacademy.”

  Axel raised a brow. “Oh? Man of many talents, huh?”

  “You have no idea,” Mateo muttered, smirking as he followed.

  Axel waved him on. “Come on. Let’s crack some pirate skulls. Make a little extra scratch while we’re at it.” He paused, eyes drifting toward Maelia, then back to Ed. “Wouldn’t hurt if the satellites picked up a little proof that the Knights of Mars still defend the people.”

  “We’ll make it rain blood tonight, Princess,” he added with a cocky nod.

  “Most definitely,” Mateo agreed, his voice light, but hungry. The two of them strode side by side, Axel elbowing him playfully as they vanished toward the hangar.

  Edward watched them go, then looked to Franklin. “When the hell did those two get so chummy?”

  Franklin shrugged, eyes never leaving the readouts. “No clue. Must’ve been all the near-death experiences.”

  Edward leaned back, muttering, “Where’s Kieren?”

  Maelia’s gaze sharpened as she scanned the bridge. “Isn’t that the boy who was supposed to lead Executor?”

  Edward rolled his eyes, waving a dismissive hand. “Thought we were past that. Henryk leads Executor now. You win.”

  Maelia sneered, dragging herself off the console with the grace of a lioness made of scars and fury. “Like I give a shit. You handed the Spikes to an honest-to-God coward.” Her voice was venom wrapped in velvet.

  Beyond the glass, Jacen’s flagship continued vomiting out Warcaskets and strange, jagged transports—steel vultures grabbing vessels and dragging them screaming into its belly. It looked like a machine designed to consume everything that breathed.

  Maelia’s claws gripped the rails tight enough to creak them.

  “Jesus fucking Christ…” Franklin whistled low as his fingers flew across the keyboard. “Yeah. It’s a goddamn nightmare.”

  Maelia stepped back, chest heaving, then turned.

  “Enough of this,” she snapped and stormed out.

  “Maelia—Maelia!” Edward called from the captain’s chair, already half-standing. “Where the hell are you going?”

  She didn’t slow. “To do something instead of sitting on my ass!”

  “Maelia, don’t you dare crawl into a Warcasket! I swear to God if you—”

  She spun mid-stride, flipped him the finger, and gave him a grin that was more teeth than smile.

  “As acting Queen, you—President of House Mars…” she said, her voice rolling like thunder over steel. Her smirk sharpened into something primal, her fur-framed face framed by loose waves of blood-dampened hair. “You follow. I act.”

  Henryk

  The term Full Powered in Warcasket construction referred to units that had been stripped down to their base frame and rebuilt with layered armor, overdriven thrusters, and weapons systems that most navies would call unethical. Some said the label only applied when over 90% of the offensive and defensive systems were covered in mods. But in truth, it didn’t matter. Everyone agreed on one thing.

  They were heavy. Monstrous. Expensive.

  And slow. Like dragging a starship through tar.

  “Let’s go, Squire Henryk!” Arthur bellowed through the comms, the sound edged with wild laughter.

  Henryk couldn’t help but grin. The adrenaline in Arthur’s voice was infectious. Pure Martian madness. Before them, the stars weren’t even pinpricks anymore—they were streaks, endless banners of light bending and breaking across the canopy as they tore through the void.

  Arthur's Warcasket was mounted atop Henryk’s Stargazer in full cruise mode, the knight’s mech straddling the back like some insane war surfer. One gauntlet gripped the hardpoint rail. The other braced the twin-barreled rifle across his lap. Together they arrowed through space, two Martians on one machine, hurtling toward the maelstrom.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  The targeting sensors flared green, then yellow. Shapes began to form—contacts, heat signatures, Warcaskets. Henryk flicked a switch and keyed the comms.

  “Mercurian and Block Forces, this is Henryk Brown and Sir Arthur of House Mars,” he said. His grin spread wider. “We’re in the fight.”

  A dozen voices crackled across the radio. Chaos. Screaming. Orders overlapping. He scrolled through the channels, scanning for clarity.

  Then—he found it.

  “Marcus,” Henryk muttered. A moment later, he heard that familiar chuckle.

  “Good to know you’re still breathing,” Marcus said. “Didn’t expect you to come back looking for another round.”

  Before Henryk could reply, Arthur's voice boomed over the feed. “A Martian does not shy from battle! And this Jacen—he is no mere pirate. He is a beast wearing a man’s skin. A butcher of colonies. A monster whose name stinks across every starport!”

  Marcus went quiet. Henryk imagined his brow twitching, eyes wide as saucers.

  Another voice filtered in.

  “This is Squad Leader Tara of the 34th. Good to make your acquaintance, Knight Martians.”

  “Likewise,” Henryk answered, eyes scanning the killzone ahead. “What’s the status? Are the bastards swarming the hangars?”

  “They’re snatching civvies and pulling them into the main carrier,” Tara replied. “We’re clipping transports when we can, but—”

  Arthur’s voice cut in, seething. “They’ve actually captured people?”

  “Yes,” Tara said bluntly.

  “You’d think the Block could field pilots worth a damn,” Arthur growled.

  Tara and Marcus both bristled.

  “They’re being slaughtered,” Tara snapped. “By your side.”

  “Calm yourself,” Arthur replied, voice softening just enough. His Warcasket turned, eye-to-eye with Henryk’s. “Henryk. I’m thinking we carve our way through and free whoever we can. And this Jacen? His name echoes far and wide, yes?”

  “Yeah,” Marcus answered. “He’s got a bounty that makes planetary governors drool.”

  Arthur chuckled, wicked and bloodthirsty. “Then we take him dead. The Martian way.”

  Tara’s voice tightened. “He’s a symbol. Putting him on trial matters.”

  “The Knights of Mars don’t do trials,” Arthur said. “Henryk, mute this woman. We shoot slavers on sight.”

  Henryk knew he shouldn’t laugh—but he did. Low, amused, dangerous.

  “You heard him, Marcus,” Henryk said. “Death to pirates and slavers.”

  The channel erupted with shouts. Rage. Approval.

  “They burned our homes!”

  “They took our sisters!”

  “They die here!”

  A cascade of voices roared back at them through the comms, Martian and Mercurian alike. Henryk felt the blood rise in his chest like fire. Arthur’s laughter climbed with the chorus, wild as a war drum.

  They dropped into formation, ripping through the gravity wells of nearby debris. The Stargazer’s sensors pinged a half-dozen shapes ahead—some fleeing, some closing.

  “They’re moving too fast,” came Mari’s voice, Squad 3’s youngest pilot. “What the hell was that?” she asked, eyes wide in her cockpit.

  Tara’s gaze rose to her screens. Her pupils dilated.

  “It’s them,” she whispered. “It’s Henryk and Arthur. They just passed us like we weren’t even there.”

  Their Warcaskets blurred across the outer sensors, light bending off their armor, missiles following like the tails of meteors.

  They were moving so fast they tore right over the Mercurian line without anyone realizing it until it was too late.

  “W-what the hell was that?” Mari blurted over comms, her voice jittery in her helmet. Her Warcasket turned instinctively, visor dragging after the twin streaks of light that blurred past like ghosts on fire.

  Tara lifted her gaze from the targeting reticle. She didn’t blink. “Marcus,” she said, voice tight. “What is he piloting? I’ve never seen anything move like that. That isn’t Mercurian. That’s not even Martian tech—what the hell is that?”

  Marcus whistled through his teeth. “That’s the shit I’ve been warning you about. The Stargazer. Iman’s old prototype. They finished the bastard.”

  On every screen, in every command bay, across Block control and the outer fleets, even in the noses of floating broadcast ships with lenses the size of dinner tables—Henryk and Arthur were lighting up the void.

  “Are you seeing this?!” barked a voice from the inter-fleet relay. “Are you seeing that?”

  And they were. From the deep core of humanity’s cradled worlds to the frontier colonies barely recognized by the Empire, they all watched. Even on some distant mudball where two of Henryk’s sisters were just getting out of school, children crowded around a cracked monitor. The feed was grainy. But the colors burned through.

  The Block was collapsing. But it wasn’t going quietly.

  The battlefield had split into three zones. Behind them, the Block itself—a dying hulk trailing atmosphere and smoke. Ahead, the main front: Mercurian and Block soldiers shoulder to shoulder, ducking behind wreckage, returning fire with ancient beam rifles and jury-rigged cannons.

  But Henryk and Arthur rode through the middle—a meat grinder of no man’s land, where enemy Warcaskets picked off anything that dared move.

  The Stargazer howled.

  Rocket trails whipped past their screens. Flak detonated in clusters the size of houses. Henryk’s grip was white-knuckled on the controls, sweat pouring into his collar as he jerked hard left.

  “H-Henryk, it’s getting kind of hot out here!” Arthur barked.

  “Trust me,” Henryk growled through clenched teeth, the entire cockpit rattling like it was about to come apart. “I know.”

  He cut low, spinning the Stargazer behind a broken asteroid. Dozens of missiles exploded against its shadow, turning it into a molten smokescreen. They burst through the other side, wreathed in fire, Arthur’s laughter coming in wild and ragged.

  “Now this is the fury! Show them why we believe you to be the greatest of us! Show them, Executor!”

  He didn’t realize his comms were still open.

  There was a pause—just a beat, a heartbeat of silence in the madness.

  “Wait… did he just say Executor?” Tavian’s voice sliced in, sharp with disbelief.

  Cassie muttered something under her breath. “You mean the Executor? Henryk’s the one the Mercurian files redacted?”

  Jordan’s voice came next, low and cold. “I thought he was a myth.”

  “He’s not,” Tara said. “He’s real. And he’s out for blood.”

  Then came the roar of Gatling fire—sheets of red and yellow tracer rounds tearing across the void.

  “WarArmor!” Henryk shouted.

  A pirate mech had embedded itself into a floating asteroid, using it like cover. Big and brutish, patched together with salvaged plating and oversized rotary cannons. Its shoulders bristled with guns. Its arms were pure violence.

  “These bastards are cooking in ambushes now?” Arthur spat. “Poor dogs!”

  He didn’t aim for the WarArmor. He aimed for the asteroid beneath it.

  His twin-barreled laser rifle let loose, the beams slicing deep into the rock’s core. A second later, the entire asteroid erupted like a buried mine. The WarArmor didn’t even get a chance to scream before it was atomized in the heat.

  Another burst of tracers came from above. Arthur’s armor pinged with impact.

  “They’re dug in deep!” he shouted, voice growing feral. “Whole squadrons clinging to debris!”

  Henryk grimaced, dodging around a chunk of spinning metal. “Then we burn them out. Keep firing. We cut the line.”

  Behind them, Marcus opened his comms to the fleet.

  “Follow the Martians!” he shouted. “They’re clearing a corridor!”

  Tara’s eyes narrowed. “Paige, Mari, Megan—tighten formation. We’re not letting those two take all the credit.”

  “Yes, ma’am!” Paige called out.

  Mari clicked her comms. “Let’s run it.”

  Megan’s voice was a little quieter, but no less sharp. “Following their wake.”

  And then more voices joined them. Pilots. Squads. Entire patrols from Block and Mercury.

  “Following the Martians!”

  “Martian spearhead—cut through!”

  “Ride the breach! Go!”

  Henryk dropped altitude. The Stargazer dipped low, skating along the wreckage like a phantom. The pirate Warcaskets ahead opened fire with SMGs and crude rifles, trying to intercept—but it was like shooting wind.

  Tracer rounds zipped past him, red-yellow trails whipping around the Stargazer like silk streamers.

  Then one of the pirate suits stepped into his path, raising a scrap-welded cannon.

  Henryk didn’t hesitate.

  “Out of our way!” he roared, and let the missile pod scream.

  Four missiles spat from the Stargazer’s shoulders, one after another in staggered succession. They struck the pirate suit center mass, legs, arms, head—ripping it apart piece by piece. The suit went nova in a bloom of fire and air.

  Arthur whooped, unhooking from the Stargazer’s back mid-drift. “Now this is war!”

  “Fury and more—more and fury!” Arthur bellowed, releasing his grip on Henryk’s Warcasket and pulling a massive bazooka from the lock on his waist. He squeezed the trigger and slammed his palm down on the console’s release, unleashing a storm of missiles that swarmed ahead like angry fireflies.

  “The missiles can’t even keep up with how fast we’re moving, Druid!” Arthur roared, his laugh manic and unhinged, lost somewhere between elation and madness.

  Bolts of laser fire stitched across his armor. A few struck home, flaring against his shield plating—but the suit held. Arthur didn't flinch. He thrived on it.

  Henryk yanked the throttle hard. The engines groaned with strain, sending them screaming downward at a sharp angle, the starlight above streaking into bent lines, like the heavens themselves were being pulled into a vortex behind them.

  “Don’t stop, don’t stop!” Henryk shouted, sweat stinging his eyes. Arthur’s wild laughter echoed through the comms, a sound that didn’t belong in the vacuum of space but somehow made it there anyway.

  Ahead, a civilian vessel was in trouble—two grabber Warcaskets latched onto its hull like leeches. Henryk snarled, slammed a fist into the weapons console, and watched as four missiles streaked out from the Stargazer’s undercarriage. They spiraled in, arced around each other, then smashed into the enemy suits. Explosions bloomed like ruptured suns. Metal turned to fire and vapor.

  Henryk flipped the Stargazer sideways, skimming so close to the transport’s hull he could see weld marks in its plating.

  “Thank you, Martians!” the civilian captain crackled through the comms. Behind them, the escape vessel kicked its engines into full burn, streaking into the dark, trailing its wounded but living crew.

  The Mercurian and Block forces mopped up what was left—stragglers, cowards, broken suits—while the battlefront surged forward.

  Then they saw it.

  Not a satellite. Not just a flagship. This was a floating fortress—half station, half war machine, bristling with hardpoints and glowing engines, like a sleeping god preparing to wake.

  Arthur didn’t see it until too late.

  “F-Fuck!” he cursed, just as a stubby missile slammed into his shield arm. The blast hurled him backward, detaching him from the Stargazer. He tumbled through space, suit systems scrambling to restabilize.

  Tracer fire laced the dark around Henryk. Dozens of Gatling rounds stitched a grid around his position. Red lights screamed across his HUD.

  Still in Stargazer flight mode.

  He slammed the transformation button. Nothing.

  “Transformation sequence aborted. Transformation aborted,” the machine’s voice droned in his ears.

  “What the fuck!” Henryk roared, jinking left, then down, then up, dodging like he was dancing through a hailstorm. His fingers pounded the panel again and again, the suit groaning as it tried to shift—arms twitching, joints creaking—but nothing would lock.

  “Arthur, you alright?!” Henryk shouted, voice nearly drowned by alarm sirens.

  Arthur grunted as he dove behind a chunk of burning debris. His SMG was half-melted. He tossed it aside like garbage and drew his twin-barreled laser rifle with both hands, snapping off rapid shots. One, two, five pirate suits lit up like Roman candles, their screams silent in space.

  “I’m fine, you lunatic druid!” Arthur shouted back.

  Henryk’s knuckles were bone-white. “I can’t transform. There’s a glitch in the code—I’m stuck in this damn flight mode!”

  A silence rippled across the comms. Everyone listening. Squad 3. Marcus. Even Tara.

  “Fuck it,” Henryk said, steadying his breath. “Where’s the opening? I’ll punch a hole straight through the bastard. Sink it, and this fight’s over.”

  “You don’t get it,” Tara snapped. “That thing’s armored like a planet. You’d need a clear line—”

  “Kill the fucker and the rest of the body dies!” Arthur shouted, laughing again.

  Tara hissed audibly through the channel.

  Henryk nosed the Stargazer down, weaving through flak fire. His fingers danced across the weapons array. A red light ignited across his screen.

  “Back-mounted laser cannon online. Charging sequence initiated.”

  The cannon folded upward from the Stargazer’s spine, humming with power. Blue light began to pulse from its core, glowing brighter, fiercer, until it looked like the suit’s soul was on fire.

  Arthur, Marcus, even the pirate comms—everyone froze for just a second. Watching.

  Henryk’s suit looked like a comet wrapped in flame and fury.

  “Where’s the opening?” he growled, scanning the flagship. Rotating gun platforms. Interceptor turrets. A whole net of Gatling emplacements.

  “There is no opening,” Mari said finally, breath hitching. “It’s lit up from every side. You won’t make it.”

  “Then I’ll make my own opening,” Henryk said, eyes blazing. “I’ll carve a goddamn tunnel through the hull and fry it from the inside.”

  The plasma cannon fired.

  It didn’t shoot so much as erupt. A beam thicker than any laser, bluer than lightning, shrieked out and carved straight across the sky like a railgun gone feral. Atmosphere and vacuum couldn’t contain it. It bent the stars.

  “P-Plasma…” Marcus stammered. His voice had dropped to something like reverence.

  Even Tara, Mari, and the rest of Squad 3 stopped in their advance. For a moment, their weapons were still. Their Warcaskets froze mid-movement, silhouettes backlit by distant firestorms. They weren’t alone.

  Across every channel, the Block comms crackled with confusion. Mercurian commanders faltered in mid-breath. On public broadcasts, reporters stuttered over their words. The enemy even paused. Pirate pilots stared blankly at their readouts, as if they’d just watched a god fire from the heavens.

  “The Martians…” someone whispered over the comms, voice warbled, distant. “The Martians mastered plasma.”

  A hush rippled across the frequencies.

  “No one uses plasma anymore. It’s unstable.”

  “Too dangerous. Suicidal.”

  “Dead tech. Ancient tech.”

  And yet… here it was. Not in a prototype. Not in theory. But alive and weaponized, roaring from the back of a boy’s Warcasket and gutting a flagship like it was paper.

  There was no cheer. No anthem. Just silence. A silence laced with something between reverence and fear.

  The Martians—shamed, exiled, scattered—had just reminded the galaxy why they had once ruled entire star systems.

  Inside the Stargazer, Henryk’s HUD flooded with red. Warnings lit up like blood spatters on his visor. His suit's power reserves dipped dangerously low. The cannon's recoil had drained his core, ripped raw electricity from his limbs, and flooded the machine with static bursts that jittered the frame.

  His hands trembled as the heat bled into his cockpit. He couldn't see anything through the steam and glare. But he didn’t flinch.

  Then, the ship lurched.

  The neck section—far from the prisoner bays—had been struck dead-on. The blast had punched through both sides, vaporizing bulkheads and splitting floors. The station groaned, tilted, and began to yaw leftward. Henryk’s screen went white with motion—icons flickering, gravity warping. Bodies, dozens of them, maybe hundreds, were flung into space like discarded refuse. Some still moving. Most weren’t.

  They were sucked out through the hull breach—slaves, guards, pirates. Their screams, if any, never made it through the void. Just blips on a monitor. Just more dots gone.

  The wound Henryk left behind was massive. Lit with sparking wires, crackling arcs of blue lightning, and smoke trails that danced in zero-G like ghosts.

  That’s when it happened.

  “Transformation initialized,” the system finally announced in a mechanical voice, crisp and calm.

  “Fucking finally,” Henryk roared, voice cracking from adrenaline.

  Vertigo slammed into him like a hammer as the Stargazer shifted. The limbs extended, armored binders unfolding from his back like wings. The bipedal frame twisted into place. His hands grabbed hold of the blocky laser rifle as it locked into his palms, steam hissing from his shoulders.

  His thrusters kicked.

  The Warcasket launched forward, leaving behind the carnage and streaking into the wound he’d just carved open. It was like diving into a furnace’s throat. Metal bent around him, lights flickering past like stars, the walls narrow and scorched. The only illumination came from the burn of his thrusters and the faint glow of emergency lights dancing off oil-slick floors and broken catwalks.

  “Hell yeah!” Henryk shouted, the sound echoing even in his own ears like a battle cry. “Glory and honor to the Sons of House Mars!”

  He flew deeper into the beast. Alone.

  This was it. The final descent.

  The last charge of a backwater boy.

  The death of the child.

  The birth of the knight.