Authors: Nick Kelly
Not waiting for introductions, Cat pressed back against the doorframe.
“Son of a bitch.”
The approaching being lumbered on its arms more than its legs like a giant gorilla. It pounded the ground, sending mechanical vibrations in each direction. Its head pitched forward between its shoulders. The Titan roared and beat its chest, and the sound rattled Cat’s teeth and shook through his body. This thing was enormous. From what he could make out, it was some kind of mechanized Titan, complete with an army of Corporate Security forces trying to put it down permanently.
From where he crouched, Cat could make out the percussion of gunfire and the wailing of sirens. These sounds were the soundtrack of Downtown, but now they were close and coming closer. An enormous Police Hovertank motored over the street, and Catwalk steeled himself against the force and sound of its engines. The Titan landed on the street just in front of the bar, crushing the remains of a taxi. No screams. Hopefully, the cabbie had enough sense to beat feet once the shooting started.
The Titan swept the taxi aside. Cat leapt backward as the car smashed against the front of the bar. Shattered glass and trashed bar stools clanked all around. A mechanical growl rose within Catwalk, and he knew his eyes flashed yellow. He looked out at the Titan. It was easily ten meters tall. The gunfire had torn away areas of its skin and flesh, revealing the unmistakable robotic skeleton of a MetaHuman. The mechanical primate slammed its fists into the pavement and then launched into the air, continuing down the street, away from the pursuing security forces.
The swarming Hovertanks continued to fire on it, and on anyone caught in the crossfire.
“Rest in Peace, Emory,” Cat muttered under his breath.
He took in a breath and ran from the cover of the bar. Catwalk changed filters in his Cyberoptics and began recording everything he could. Explosions and muzzle flashes prevented him from getting a clear enough image to run against his databases. Another Hovertank raced overhead, and Cat braced against the side of a shelled-out delivery van to avoid becoming collateral damage. He focused on the Hovertank, able to snap an image for later analysis. It looked different than the first one that had passed overhead. That meant there was more than one corporate security team attacking the same target. Multiple Security Teams. Multiple jurisdictions. That could be a very bad thing.
Gunfire from the pursuing Hovertanks peppered the parked vehicles and piles of rubble along the street. Brick and mortar flicked into the air as the shells struck the walls on both side of the road. Cat dove back across the pavement. He rolled, landing on one knee. The sidewalk was hot, waves of humidity rose from its surface. The wind from the Hovertank engines tossed debris into the air. He was caught in the pure static that attacked sight and hearing. He pushed himself up to his feet, looking each way for a potential exit. He turned to the opposite side of the street. He needed to get the shock out of there. Now.
Cat bolted. He would have to cross the street, get between the two-parked cars and over the rusty fence to reach his ride. Another Hovertank came into view, auto-cannons firing thousands of rounds. Cat grabbed the damaged fender of the car the Titan had struck and slid underneath the vehicle. A plague of bullets rained down, peppering the asphalt, the vehicles and the storefronts. The pavement beside the car disintegrated under the hail of automatic weapons. He heard a Hovertank pass overhead, then another and a third. Faster, lighter buzzing followed, the engines of the media teams covering the event. The sound of the Titan’s footsteps moved further away. It roared again, the sound audible above the cacophony of engines and gunfire.
The sounds died down—the calm between the newsworthy event and the combination of emergency teams and scavengers who would follow. Cat lifted his knees to his chest, pressing his feet against the bottom of the car. Grunting loudly, he kicked with both legs, and the car rolled off of him, landing on its hood like a desperate turtle. He watched the fading visions of the machine and the pursuing security forces.
Choosing self-preservation over curiosity, Catwalk leapt over the rusty fence and landed next to his armored motorcycle. He donned his helmet, and the bike roared to life. Cat needed information, and he wanted to see how this confrontation would end. As close as he had come, this wasn’t his case, so a ringside seat wasn’t priority. He sped out along the damaged streets of Downtown, his chest on the motorcycle’s gas tank, the needle in the red. He wanted to get somewhere safe before the battle between the enormous beast and the hired corporate guns ended.
Cat swept the motorcycle across several lanes of traffic, taking an exit that offered him a higher vantage point. He slowed the H-S enough to triangulate the position of the mechanical primate through the lights, flames and explosions. His heads-up-display centered on the beast’s silhouette, filtering out the white noise while recording the festivities. An instant later, the image turned to static, and Cat shifted the filters off. His helmet popped open, offering his Cyberoptics a direct look at the confrontation below.
Fire and shrapnel erupted a hundred meters into the air in a fireworks display that would make New Year’s Eve jealous. Gas pumps morphed into oversized bottle rockets. The screams of civilians cut through the air. As the echo of explosions faded, they were replaced with a hollow groan as the service station framework cracked and gave way under the angered steps of the Titan.
The metallic beast rose to the height of its ten meter frame, batting aside an abandoned car and a dumpster with no effort. It pounded the ground.
Bullets rattled off of its chest as it leveled its red gaze at its assailants.
Figures scattered around behind it, panicking and fleeing the destruction. The Nitro City Police Department fired round after round of standard and armor piercing ammunition, with no effect other than shredding the fake skin of the cybernetic being’s exoskeleton.
From this distance, Cat could safely start guessing at what he saw. Sure, it looked like a giant gorilla, but almost all natural animals were extinct on Earth, moved safely to off-world colonies. Someone may have constructed a giant, robotic gorilla, but that wasn’t likely. This thing was chaotic and destructive. He’d seen this type of psychosis before. That murderous, mechanical being had started out human, but its human brain couldn’t control the machine it had become. Cybernetics overwrote its ability to feel, to think, to relate – like a virus wiping away its very humanity.
Cat filtered out individual screams. He heard an old man with a thick accent, a woman’s voice whispering soft, playful words, and a shaking voice betraying outright fear. Each was a different component of humanity executed at the hands of the mechanical behemoth. Cat wondered for a moment where exactly he tipped the scales. His own body was the marriage of human and machine, and he knew that marriage often ended badly. In his case, the jury was still out.
This particular gigantic war machine had crossed over the line, deciding in the process to let any normal human in its wake follow its sanity into the afterlife. Cat had seen it before, but never on this scale.
Impressed, Cat watched the manic MetaHuman grab one of the armored Hovercars in mid-flight and shake it violently then toss the inhabitants aside like unwelcome parasites on its last supper. The enormous war machine clapped its hands together, crushing the Hovercar like a beer can.
Enough was enough. The Titan couldn’t last much longer, and the battleground was growing, and it was moving back in his direction. Cat gunned the motorcycle, racing out of the line of fire as two more armored vehicles approached. He flipped his comm to the open channel, listening to the media coverage and watching the proceedings in a small pop-up in his display.
The battle continued for another fifteen minutes. Cat made a note. There was no way that thing should still be moving, let alone raging and causing property damage and loss of life. No MH he had ever fought had sustained such injuries and remained upright. Finally, a combination of armor-piercing rounds and Electro-Magnetic Pulse attacks in succession caused it to slow and stumble. In an effort to escape, it leapt, and the camera lost the shot as the MH fell off of the highway overpass.
By the time the camera crew got the target back in frame, it was lying prone near an enormous building bathed in blue. Additional attacks came from the arriving security forces, leaving the magnificent machine, formerly human, nothing more than a smoking pile of rent flesh and decimated cybernetics. Cat smirked. Emory’s ghost might take small solace in one fact: the city would save money on a trial.
Within seconds, the media covering the assault started in with a superlative-laden description rivaling the end of civilization. Ratings still ruled above all else, and the reporters were compensated by keeping viewers. Accuracy always played second fiddle to speculation when it came to such an event. Conjecture rolled forth like a tsunami, and Cat lost interest.
He pulled the H-S into the parking garage of his building, typing a few keys to disarm the warning systems, and rolled right into the freight elevator. As fanaticism outweighed the facts, Catwalk hit a switch, and the media feed went dead. He pushed the button for the loft, lifted his helmet and rubbed his neck. The elevator door opened, and a small confirmation indicated his residence was safe.
Cat drove the H-S to its customary spot. He powered down the engine and hooked up the leads to do diagnostic testing and repair. He mounted his helmet on its perch, connecting similar wires so it could download the images captured earlier. The hitman was sore and tired, and he couldn’t figure out if he was more affected by losing a professional colleague or nearly becoming Nitro City’s newest pothole.
He decided that the best pain medication, as usual, was intoxication. He walked to the bar, leaving the hum of the video feed to die in darkness behind him. He mentally replayed some of the old cases he’d worked on as a cop, thinking back to the most tumultuous period of his life.
Cat drained the first glass as quickly as he poured it. He spent four years, four dangerous and chaotic years that nearly drove him insane putting down MetaHumans gone rogue. He’d never seen one as big as the Titan who’d just stormed through Downtown. It was a bomb whose fuse had run out. He poured a second glass, catching the reflection of his yellow eyes in the glass, cold, artificial, inhuman eyes. He took a long drink, swishing the liquor around in his mouth before swallowing it. The liquor burned as it hit his stomach reminding him that he was still human. He could still feel.
Cat walked to the window. Downtown sang to him its constant symphony of sirens, screams, and gunfire. He raised a silent toast to Emory, downing the rest of the glass. Emory Blake, Esquire – esteemed Assistant District Attorney, successful prosecutor, rising star snuffed out by a MetaHuman out of control.
Cat poured a third drink. MetaHuman out of control. Maybe they’d carve that on his tombstone when he followed the Titan’s path to insanity. He raised the glass to his lips, determined to drink until he stopped seeing himself as the next victim of cybernetics’ conquest over humanity.
CHAPTER TWO
The morning ride to the local precinct was comfortable, downright soothing at moments. Catwalk twisted his wrist slightly, and the armored Honda-Suzuki motorcycle answered his every request, cornering like a gazelle, sprinting like a cheetah, and responding with the devotion of a hunting dog.
Cat had called ahead, getting Will to agree to meet him on the premises. Will was a paranoid forensic anthropologist and medical examiner who obsessed over the details of every case. He was also willing to take some very thorough and unethical steps, for the right price. Cat had very few allies in Nitro City, but Will was as loyal as they came, as long as the checks never bounced. Cat trusted him from their first interaction, seeing a lot of himself in the slightly strange death investigator.
For some reason Cat never figured out, the mortician used the name Will N. Testament for all his proceedings. It was an odd title, but then again Cat’s own handle had nothing to do with his abilities. He was no male model. He couldn’t sustain himself on crackers and nose candy. Some fool cop had labeled him Catwalk after seeing the acrobatics provided by his cybernetics. The name stuck ever since.
Cat never really decided if he should be grateful or pissed. He’d been labeled by a fellow officer during his first week on duty. Despite every attempt, Cat stood out, and the moniker followed him like cheap cologne. Eventually, he accepted it. He wasn’t certain when, but he was relatively sure it was the first time one of his lovers had screamed, “Fuck me, Cat!” That was the sort of thing that made a man reevaluate how he was recognized.
When Cat arrived, he wasn’t surprised to see Will chugging black coffee, even in a room full of human remains, somewhat human parts, and leftovers only scientists could define. Will’s eyes were glossy, their undersides as black and leathery as the morgue’s body bags. He was visibly upset at being called to action before sundown. His shaved head was completely covered in a tattooed mural and barbed piercings, and his mood was as fiery as the giant MetaHuman on last night’s vid feed. Several parts of the Titan now covered the steel table.
Guitar-driven synth-rock filled the room loud enough to shake the steel trays containing forceps, scissors, chisels, and saws. Cat considered shooting the audio source, but thought twice when he realized it might be hardwired into Will’s skull. Instead, he picked up a clean bone mallet from the table next to him and whacked Will on the shoulder with it.
The mortician hardly flinched, but the music magically dropped a hundred decibels. “Please, please tell me you brought me here for a reason, Cat man?”