Metal Deep: Infinite - Metal Wing: Episode 5 by GX Knight Page A

were salivating to get her under a microscope, and they had sent waves of man and beast to bring her in. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find anyone who could fix her up and keep her in the air who wouldn’t try to turn her in for the bounty on her hull.

    The irony of trading one government aggressor for another was not lost on me.

    I tried my best, with her instruction, to keep her flightworthy, but there were tools and supplies we needed we just didn’t have and couldn’t get. I settled into the seat worn to my body shape, and just sat there thinking. Things had not gone the way we hoped they would over the past year.

    “I don’t know what to do,” I said.

    “We’re in real trouble this time,” Sabra agreed.

    Then from the cave entrance a voice held aloft by age, strength, and confidence chimed into the conversation, “Perhaps I could be of assistance.”

    I jumped from my seat and yanked my pistols from the holsters on my legs. I pointed them at the intruder and fired two bolts at a man with salt-and-pepper hair and beard. He stood confidently in an expensive maroon suit. He never budged. Faster than my plasma, a female fighter, armored similarly in color to Sabra, appeared out nowhere with a set of swords that ran the length of her arm. She blocked the shots with each of the blades, and then launched toward me. I fired again, but she deflected the attack before tackling me from the cockpit. I struggled, but since my warsuit had taken catastrophic damage on a job three months ago, I had not been able to recharge my NX-8. I was helpless in her grasp. She flew us around the cave, and then finally set me down from the bear hug in front of the suited man, who was puffing on his pipe in amusement.

    A fight was useless. I’d lose. I shoved my guns back into their home with an unhappy grunt. Satisfied that I had finished, the female warrior sheathed her blades behind her in an upside down scabbard built into her armor. She headed back toward the entrance of our little watery cavern to let me and the older man talk.

    “Been a rough year, has it Rayce? I’m assuming Earth isn’t quite what you had expected.” The man said knowingly.

    I tried to read this guy, but I was getting nothing off him. Still, there was a disarming quality about him that didn’t set off my internal alarm. “You know me?”

    “I know of you. I think would be fairer to say.”

    “How?”

    “All in good time. I’m afraid I’m on something of a tight schedule.”

    “Then make it fast. What do you want?”

    He pulled out of his suit coat a picture of a plain silver box. It reminded me very much of the one my clips had been presented to me in. On the back of the picture there was an address, pertinent security information, and his contact number, “There’s a collector in New York who I have been trying to acquire this case from. He has not been willing to sell. I need what’s in this case within the next two weeks. Get it for me, and I will pay you what I offered him. Further, I will arrange for you to have a safe, equipped facility to handle all of the repairs you need for your jet and your personal equipment.”

    We were interrupted by the warrior girl, before I could question his intimate knowledge of me and my situation. “Sorry, sir,” her mirrored-helmet’s voice distorter rumbled, “But we’ve got confirmation. They’ve stopped in Colorado. They’re moving faster than we thought. It looks like they’ve already started the procedure.”

    The older man’s pale eyes seemed to pale even more before he composed himself. I got the impression that he wasn’t surprised often, but whatever was happening had just spun him a bit. He placed his hands on the shoulder of the girl that stood taller than him because of her armor, “Those fools,” He huffed. “Go as fast as you can. Don’t think about conserving energy. Don’t think about stopping. Do whatever is necessary to save him. If you don’t have enough energy to