The boiling runoff churned against the edge of the elevated passenger platform. Thick white steam rose from the flooded transit tracks, completely obscuring the concrete floor below.
Caleb pulled his heavy surplus boots over the ledge. He rolled onto his back against the cracked tiles, dragging hot, ozone-laced air into his burning lungs. The dead weight of his waterlogged canvas trousers anchored him to the floor.
A few feet away, Iharu knelt near the edge of the stairs. He kept the barrel of his scatter-gun leveled at the dense fog. Kikaru sat slumped against a shattered advertising billboard. Her pristine white armor bore a deep, jagged scorch mark across the breastplate. She pressed a trembling hand tightly against her ribs.
Hiro stood frozen near the handrail. He stared down into the white mist.
The mechanical clatter of gunfire had completely died out. The only sound in the subterranean tunnel was the hiss of the cooking water.
Then, a voice echoed from the shadows at the far end of the long concrete platform.
"Help me. Please."
It was Hiro's voice.
Caleb watched the color drain entirely from Hiro's face. The younger recruit gripped his rifle tight against his chest, his eyes wide with horror as he listened to his own nervous, cracking pitch echoing from the dark.
"I dropped my rifle," the voice pleaded from the gloom beyond the flickering emergency lights. "I can't get up."
The creature had not stayed in the water. It had scaled the elevated walkway further down the transit line, using the thick steam rolling off its own superheated plating to mask its movements.
Caleb forced himself up onto his knees. A sharp, tearing pain radiated through his right shoulder. He had ripped the stabilizing muscles around his collarbone when he tackled Kikaru out of the beast's path minutes ago.
The biological anomaly under his sternum reacted to the fresh tissue damage.
A hollow, violent starvation opened in Caleb's stomach. Acid pushed up the back of his throat. His body demanded an immense influx of calories to fuel the rapid cellular repair, ruthlessly stripping the remaining energy directly from his bloodstream. A wave of dizziness hit him. He locked his jaw, forcing himself to breathe through his nose to fight the severe nausea.
He pulled his heavy combat knife from his canvas belt. He had lost his rifle in the flooded tracks during the retreat.
"Where is it?" Iharu whispered. He racked the pump of his scatter-gun. The metallic clack sounded incredibly loud in the enclosed space.
"Do not shoot blindly," Kikaru ordered. She struggled to stand, wincing as she put weight on her braced leg. "The kinetic slugs will ricochet off the support pillars. We hold this position until the surface divisions secure the breach."
Caleb looked up at the massive crater in the ceiling. Smoke and pulverized asphalt continued to rain down from the upper streets.
"The surface divisions think the zone is secure," Caleb said. The severe caloric drain left his voice rough and quiet. "We are on our own."
He checked the top right corner of his cracked visor.
The public broadcast icon glowed a steady green. The algorithm was heavily pushing his feed. The viewer count rolled over like a slot machine.
Forty thousand. Sixty-five thousand. Eighty thousand.
The public chat log flooded his peripheral vision in a blur of white text.
User99: What the hell is that thing?!TitanSlayer: The surface feed missed this! The tunnels are breached!RedLine: Look at the scrubber! He just crippled a Class-8 with a pipe!Vanguard_fan: 80k watching a Rank F stream. Insane.
Caleb stared at the numbers. The fifty-thousand-credit monthly debt penalty hung over his family. If he died down here, or if he washed out of the mobilization empty-handed, the collection agencies would seize his mother's housing sector. They would repossess his brother's life support augments by morning. He needed those public engagement points to convert into credits.
He pushed himself to his feet. He stepped past Iharu and placed himself at the front of the group.
"What are you doing?" Iharu hissed. "You have a knife."
Caleb kept his eyes focused on the dark end of the walkway. "Keeping it busy."
"Caleb," the voice whispered from the left side of the platform.
He recognized the wet, clicking resonance vibrating beneath the mimicked word. The sound bounced off the tiled wall, intentionally masking its exact origin.
A massive shadow detached itself from the gloom.
The beast stood over twenty feet tall. Its segmented, obsidian carapace glowed with an internal, molten heat. The sheer thermal radiation baked the damp air, drying the sweat on Caleb's face.
It charged.
The heavy claws tore gouges into the concrete tiles. It swung a massive, bladed limb in a horizontal arc aimed straight at Caleb's neck.
Caleb dropped his weight. He let the heavy obsidian blade shear through the air directly above his helmet. The synthetic fibers in his surplus suit whined, channeling the pathetic one-point-two percent kinetic boost entirely into his legs.
He drove his body upward. Five years of breaking down carcasses in the disposal yards guided his hand. He bypassed the impenetrable chest armor and aimed his combat knife at the soft, pale membrane hidden just behind the creature's armored knee joint.
He plunged the steel blade deep into the synovial sac and twisted his wrist.
Scalding black fluid erupted from the ruptured joint. It splashed across Caleb's gloves and canvas jacket, burning the fabric.
The monster let out a deafening screech that sounded like tearing steel. It thrashed wildly. Its massive bulk smashed into a concrete support pillar. The ceiling groaned, dropping a sheet of gray dust over the platform.
Caleb ripped his knife free and scrambled backward. He put ten yards of distance between himself and the flailing limbs.
His chest heaved. The biological tax of the sudden, explosive movement hit him like a physical blow. Black spots danced in the corners of his vision. His legs felt like lead. If the fight dragged on for another sixty seconds, his energy reserves would completely bottom out. He would collapse on the tiles.
The monster regained its balance. It dragged its ruptured leg, hissing as the acidic blood melted the floor tiles. It turned its multi-faceted eyes back toward Caleb.
It opened its split mandible.
"Secure the perimeter," it said, perfectly mimicking Captain Kade's authoritative voice.
It lunged forward, dragging its ruined limb across the concrete.
Caleb backed up toward the edge of the platform. He checked the structural integrity of the concrete beneath his boots. The beast's earlier impact had spider-webbed the flooring with deep, jagged cracks.
He lacked the physical strength to pierce another joint. His vision swam. He had to use the environment.
"Iharu!" Caleb shouted, pointing at the cracked base of the support column. "Shoot the pillar!"
Iharu swung his scatter-gun upward and pulled the trigger.
A deafening blast echoed through the station. Heavy kinetic slugs pulverized the damaged concrete support column.
The creature stepped onto the compromised section of the platform just as the pillar gave way. Millions of tons of pressure snapped the flooring. The concrete ledge collapsed entirely.
The monster shrieked, losing its footing. Its massive, heavy carapace dragged it downward. It plunged off the edge and crashed heavily into the boiling floodwater below. Slabs of concrete and twisted rebar rained down on top of it, burying the glowing carapace under tons of debris.
A blinding geyser of steam erupted upward, showering the remaining platform in hot rain.
Caleb stumbled away from the crumbling edge.
He dropped his knife. His knees buckled, and he hit the tiles hard. His empty stomach heaved, forcing him to lean over and vomit a stream of bitter acid onto the floor. The severe caloric drain left his muscles trembling uncontrollably. He braced his hands against the cold tile, dragging oxygen through his teeth until the black spots faded from his vision.
He wiped his mouth with the back of his glove. He checked his visor one last time.
One hundred and fifteen thousand viewers.
Caleb closed his eyes, letting the cool draft from the surface street wash over his sweating face. The debt was covered for another month.