Sweet Venom Arc

Seeth and Diego approached the stairs cautiously, SAFU and baton drawn as they ascended together. They stepped into the orange lit stone work, their silhouettes dancing on the wall behind them under flickering torch light. The next floor unveiled itself as a sprawling library. The tower once again seemed to expand past its actual geometry on the inside in multiple directions, as where the outer wall should have been, there were instead towering floor-to-ceiling pillars, and extra space behind them to skirt the edge of the room. Coating the flat wall and expanding into east and west wings respectively were rows of bookshelves, all of which had red-brass metal doors locked via a padlock on the front, with glimpses of multi-coloured book spines peaking from between the patterned metal. It was a spacious and inviting area, also lined with the same fiery crystal torches as downstairs. Deeper into the wings were bursts of twinkling colours dancing over the heavy wooden floors, cast from grand stained-glass windows which peaked between the breaks in the shelving.

Flanking a large fireplace against the flat half of the semi-circular design were once again two more staircases again leading further upwards.

It was like something out of a fairytale.

But before Seeth and Wex could admire their surroundings, the sound of rushing fluid, clicking gears and harmonious hydraulics cut through the cosy quiet of the room. A fourth figure was lurking, standing just a little way off to the side and facing away from the gang. Half in shadow, its looming silhouette creaked unsettlingly in its stillness.

It was only as the gang stepped forward, cautiously, silently, trying to get a better look, that they realised there was one substantial difference between the figure, and the rest of the room. Despite it being seemingly still -

- it didn't have the same coating of dust that the rest of the library did.

And without warning the creature suddenly whirred to life, its armoured bulk shifted with alarming speed, a faint crackle of power shimmering over it as it swung its heavy chassis aggressively to face them.

It was an enormous silver bi-pedal battlesuit, thick with shaped metal armour plating and numerous dripping ports across its frame. Its construction was meticulous and well-honed, a far cry away from the plodding suits of GLYPH. What stood out the most though was the giant ghost-green dome that made up its 'head,' spanning from shoulder to shoulder and textured with diamond-shaped panels that hummed with energy. Clutched in one of its hands was a huge rifle made from the same silver metal, which the machine dragged up from the floor and hoisted into the air as Seeth felt its gaze land on her.

Wait - does this thing... have a pilot?!

"Geist!"

It towered above all of them, standing at least fourteen feet tall as it came to life. With each movement it made it groaned from its cello vocal chords, like an unholy orchestra serenading its behemothic motions. Every movement it made sent several tons of war-forged metal moving as it began to approach the team, its every step shaking the tower with its presence.

Diego roared aloud with a defiant thump of his chest, coating the team with his golden protection.

"Enemy?!" Wex asked, pistols already aimed at the Geist's dome.

"Enemy!" Diego confirmed, raising his shield.

Wex and Seeth opened fire, the crack of the pistols and the thunderous boom of the SAFU. Their shots struck true, impacting the dome directly with a series of loud pings and pangs.

And yet, the Geist was unmoved. The carriage simply stood still and watched, waited, learnt, leaning back slightly to accommodate the sheer size and weight of its own enormous rifle.

Tungsten pellets bounced and sparked off the carriage without so much as leaving a blemish. Finally, as their shots ceased it bellowed in retaliation with its harrowing, orchestral, booming laugh, before lowering its rifle towards the crew.

"INTO COVER!"

They dived behind the pillars opposite the Geist as it took aim, and fired. A pulse of searing energy erupted from the barrel with an obstreperous, core shaking bell-toll that rattled the entire tower. The blast rang against the pillars, shaking not just the room but shifting the tower's foundations with the force of its impact.

The pillars were luckily not damaged, but the sheer noise would've been deafening if it weren't for Diego's psyonic shielding.

Seeth frantically ejected her shells from the SAFU and retrieved fresh armour piercing slugs from an ammo strap on her thigh. She quickly loaded in a full mag of rounds, each one clicking into the port with the same satisfying shhh-clunk before she checked the corner and took aim.

As the Geist nudged the tip of its rifle and fired another blast at Diego and Wex, shaking the room violently in much the same way it did before, Seeth took her shot.

BLAM!

Another perfect shot, right to the centre of the dome.

It barely even scratched it. The projectile shattered on contact, sending shrapnel back scattering into the air. The attack caught the carriage's attention though, and it turned to face her, and swung the barrel towards Seeth with a menacing air of enjoyment.

She quickly ducked behind the pillar, fumbling for rounds that might have more penetration power, when an unusual... feeling gripped her. A tingle ran down her back, as though someone were dragging a violin bow across her spine.

Something grabbed her by the arm and forcibly tugged her out from behind the pillar. She stumbled out into the open, staring in horror as she dropped directly in the path of the rifle. Her head filled with the sound of the bell as it tolled its imminent approach...

When a black blur slammed into Geist and forced it backwards. Diego smacked the gun away with his baton and raised his shield, which the Geist reacted to with surprising speed. It backhanded Diego, slamming its heavy gauntlet straight into his shield and sending the lizard flying towards one of the library wings, and immediately swung its rifle at the new target instead. Seeth raised her SAFU, aiming for the rifle instead -

- and they pulled their triggers.

Diego was sent hurtling backwards, disappearing into the east wing with a distant thud, but the SAFU had done its job; the Geist's rifle shattered, its metal remnants sparking and hissing with a static fizzle as it died.

"Diego?!?"

The Geist let out a deep, dissatisfied bellow as it turned again to face Seeth, discarding its rifle angrily as it heaved its entire chassis into a thunderous charge. Each step rattled the floor as it threw itself at Seeth, the Controller barely dodging the charge as it smashed into the pillar. The sheer impact force sent a stinging sensation up Wex's feet and through his legs, as the captain flanked around the room to keep some distance and continue firing. He felt utterly useless, his pistols were doing nothing to the carriage, no matter where he shot.

"... Keep... fighting!" Diego called out, his voice echoing around the room.

Despite its ferocious impact with the pillar, the Geist continued its combat unabated and spun on the spot to engage Seeth, bullying her backwards, throwing punch after punch at her. Seeth skipped back, nimbling dodging its assault until, all too soon, she felt the bump of the wall behind her... She was cornered. It raised its fists and threw them down at her, victory all but certain -

- when the Controller met its fists, the fierce ringing of metal on metal echoed sharply around the chamber as her new knuckle dusters blocked the attack, centimetres from her head.

She trembled under the Geist's strength, barely holding on as the carriage pushed her backwards against the wall...

... But she held.

It forced more and more weight onto her, bearing down on the Controller as it tried to crush her. Her teeth grit, muscles shaking as it pushed her to the limit, before she eventually managed to raise her leg and kick off the wall, using all of her body weight to throw the Geist back, if only by a couple of feet.

Fuck! This thing is strong!

It paused for a moment. It seemed surprised. Calculative. Angry. Despite having no visible face or eyes, Seeth could absolutely feel it staring straight at her.

As Seeth brought her fists up and began to move forward, the Geist took a single step back and raised one of its gauntlets, clenching it in front of Seeth. That same pulling feeling rippled down her spine again, like coarse hair being dragged across her spinal cord -

And Seeth was suddenly swept off her feet by an immense force, the SAFU clattered from her back, tumbling to the floor loudly. The metal doors on the bookshelves began to shake loudly all around them, filling the room with an ear-splitting rattle as Seeth rose helplessly into the air.

It reeled her forward, so she was hovering just in front of it, barely out of reach. It bellowed another deep, cello note, sickly green fluid trickling from the various ports across its chassis and drizzling over the floor, when a cracking noise joined the rattling chorus.

The psyonic scales across Seeth's body began to crack and break, being forcibly stripped away from her as the Geist clutched its fists tighter. Crack after crack, strip after strip, Diego's psyonic protection was torn away, leaving Seeth floating defencelessly before the Geist. Desperate now she reached for a grenade, strapped to a belt across her thigh and pulled it free, but like the SAFU, this too was quickly, forcibly torn from her grip before she had a chance to pull the pin. The grenade floated in front of the Geist too. It stared at it almost quizzically for a brief moment...

Before it was swiftly and violently crushed.

The grenade shattered and splintered, and was dropped to the floor with a discarding thud. Useless, and broken.

The Geist turned its attention to Seeth once more.

"Oh no you don't!"

A loud hiss emanated from the Geist's back as the fizzling blue glow of a plasma charge began to drill into its armour. The attack was smart, but inevitably futile, and before the weapon could even begin to crack the suit's shell, it was plucked away by the same seemingly invisible force that suspended Seeth, and slung it back at Wex.

The captain narrowly dodged the charge, bending backwards as it flew between his ears and disappeared into the west library wing.

"I can't damage the fucking thing! I got nothing!" Wex cried out, running over and drawing a heated blade from his belt. He drove the blade into the back of the carriage's knee and forced it as deep as he could. The blade snapped as the Geist adjusted its stance, its gaze fixed on Seeth's twisting body, caught helplessly in its grasp.

"I-It's fucking ignoring me! Seeth! Fight back!"

The Controller swung with all her might, but there was nothing to hit... She reached out as far as she could but it merely floated her backwards in response.

It was toying with her, and they all knew it.

Suddenly, she felt an immense pressure across the entire surface of her body as the Geist squeezed its fist again, forcibly curling her into a foetal position. It was like being in a car compactor, pressing on her from every direction with immense force.

Seeth screamed in pain as she felt her eyes trying to pop free of their sockets, her bones twisting and creaking under her skin, her blood vessels beginning to burst and the air from her lungs forcibly squeezed out.

"I can't stop it! Seeth!" Wex cried out, fumbling for any ordnance he had on him. The captain unloaded every shot his pistols had into its knee joint, but they all pinged off, ineffective and useless. "SEETH!"

Her vision started to cloud with darkness, she fought back with all the strength she had, pushing out against the endless weight, but it was hopeless. She could feel her neck being forcibly twisted to the side, further and further, her body shaking furiously as she tried to resist -

- when the Geist was launched across the room! A brief but heavy silence followed its thudding impact as the bookcases stopped rattling, chunks of destroyed baton slamming against the wall like a shotgun blast. The Geist soared through the middle of the room and impacted the ground like a car crash, its metal screeching across the stone as it came to a stop. But it immediately brought itself to its feet with a cello groan. Seeth gasped for air as she fell to the floor, scrambling towards the SAFU and scooping it up as the battle was far from over.

"You okay?" Diego called out, rolling his shoulders in anticipation.

"Y-Yeah. Fine."

Diego growled loudly as threw the handle of the now broken baton to the floor, a trickle of blood dripped down his nose and from his ear as he stood his around against the Geist, directing his scathing words at it as if they were weapons themselves.

"Honourless vermin. You'll fall like your empire did." Diego spat.

The Geist had no words to return. It raised its fist once more and clenched it tightly... that same feeling as before vibrated through the entire room this time, making both Seeth and Wex bristle uncomfortably.

Yet, Diego did not move.

His runes flared and shone across his body in response, the golden rings in his eyes intensified, and the lizard remained flat against the floor, clicking his knuckles in response.

"That's all you got?"

An enraged bellow followed as the Geist charged straight at him, thudding across the room with the grace of a freight train. It raised both its fists once again and slammed them down onto Diego with all the force its shuddering chassis could afford, but the lizard caught the machine by its arms as his body flushed bright red with psyonic power.

It lashed out and booted Diego firmly in the chest with one of its metal, hooven feet, but the lizard tanked the blow and retained his grip, rooting the Geist in place.

"GO FOR THE UNDERARMS!" He yelled, forcing the Geist's arms up to expose his designated targets.

Seeth and Wex instantly leapt into action, ducking round the side of the Geist as Seeth shoved the SAFU into the chassis' armpit, and unleashed an armour-piercing round.

Finally, with a resonant boom, the round actually punctured the suit, disappearing into its body and leaving a significant hole in the thick wires and alien hydraulics that made up its internal frame. The Geist responded in kind and thrashed around more violently, struggling against Diego and trying to free its arms from his grip. Seeth felt its ghostly grip claw at her spine once again, but a fresh surge of psyonic golden power arced through the suit, and its grip slipped away from her. The bookcases began to rattle violently again, multi-coloured sparks rained from the cabinets as chunks of rubble rose into the air and a fireplace chair hurtled towards the side of Diego's head.

FFFTANG

Moments before the collision, Wex drew his pistols and fired a repulsor round, sending the chair skittering across the room and smashing into bits against the far wall.

Seeth quickly hammered every single shot she had loaded into the underarm of the Geist, punching three more gaping holes into it, before slamming her hands back into the dusters and punching the metal with all the strength she had. She felt like a blacksmith, relentlessly hammering at the ungiving metal for any sign of change, when she saw the shoulder armour shift - It was working.

And the Geist knew it too. The creature screeched, a long, harrowing sound as though someone were dragging screws down across its cello strings as more items were desperately hurled at her and Diego, chunks of wood and metal, the fireplace grating, another chair - but Wex repelled every single one, blasting the projectiles back and away from the team until finally -

PSSSSHH-CLANK

With a gout of fowl smelling steam and a splutter of its oozing green oil, the arm tore free and crashed to the ground. The Geist stumbled backwards as Diego's grip finally loosened, his red aura quickly fading.

It retreated a few steps, seemingly wounded, its cello voice sounding uneven, and maybe even tired.

"Holy shit... Nice one guys! We can finish this thing!" Wex called out with a happy flourish of his pistols.

"We need to do it fast. I'm very low on psyonic energy. I can't do that again." Diego replied, his gaze never once leaving the Geist's frame as it leaned against a wall for support.

"Diego, what the hell is this thing?" Seeth asked as she caught her breath. "Should I be gunning for the pilot?"

"There's no 'pilot.'" Diego panted. "Carriages have a sort of ghost co-pilot, an enslaved soul anchored into the chassis. It's how they use the psyonics, they hi-jack the soul's psyonic potential."

Wex and Seeth both felt an uncomfortable chill shudder down their spine.

"Great, necromancer warmachines. Fucking hell."

The titan grumbled again, its voice shaking the room and began to stumble towards the other staircase, when the creaking groan of old wood filled their ears from below.

From behind the Geist, the peak of a ghostly veil emerged from the staircase. Floating in an almost graceful manner, the Bride entered the room, standing in much the same manner as she'd done in the church, her hands crossed in front of her, completely cloaked in her veil.

"Shit..." Wex's eyes widened, his pistols falling back to his sides. "Sorry, I spoke too soon."

That screech - it was calling for back-up!

"Into cover! Stay with me!" Diego called out, falling back behind a pillar with Seeth and Wex. As Seeth peaked the corner with her SAFU, she felt Diego pull her back and shake his head.

"Don't aim at her. Or else she won't drop her guard..." The lizard took a deep breath and closed his eyes. "Gods... brace yourselves. The pillar will hold but..."

They heard together the shimmer of the veil dropping and the heavy clunk of weapons being deployed, before the most unholy roar of their lives ERUPTED across the room.

Twin bleaching black and white jets of fluid were fired at either side of the pillar, trapping them between each screeching, blaring wall of hell. It screeched like TV static, drowning out anything and everything else as the cannons blared their hell-siren.

"I have an idea!" Wex called out, his words all but drowned out as Diego forced his eyes open. But a bristle suddenly ran down his spine and a new panic suddenly took hold. Both Wex and Seeth felt that same spine tingle of the Geist grip them and attempt to drag them out from behind the pillar, straight into the monochrome wall of fizzling death that had them trapped.

Diego reached out towards both of them, gripping them tightly around the waist as he felt the Geist try to pull them out of cover.

Under the screech of the static cannons, Diego cried out as he felt Seeth slipping from his grasp, but when he hugged onto her tighter, Wex began to slip instead.

"I can't hold on!"

But the words simply didn't exist... All but drowned under the deafening hiss that surrounded them.

Seeth fumbled for another grenade, but the action made her slip further, just mere inches from the static now. The tips of her long dreadlocks made contact with one of the beams, and it sliced straight through the jelly flesh. Diego had been telling the truth. Anything that touched the static was annihilated.

And so she abandoned the idea, and clutched onto Diego tightly with all the strength she had. It was enough for Diego to focus his strength on Wex instead, throwing his arms around his brother tightly.

But just as the bleaching screech was reaching near unbearability, Wex drew his pistols, flicked some fresh rounds into them and aimed straight at one of the bookcase locks to their side. But he paused his shot as his arm twisted and bent, the Geist intent on ruining this shot.

Despite Wex fighting with every ounce of strength he had, it wasn't enough, the Geist was too strong to beat by force alone... At least with his arm fully extended... Instead, Wex fought and pulled his arm closer to his chest, using his ribcage to guide to the tip of the pistol...