I had just enough time to raise my arms and use the propulsion units at full force to blast away from the face of the Union metal wall in front of me. The bulk of the worm rose in front of me. Jaws snapped closed where I had been hovering a second earlier. The worm twisted in the air to try to get me on its way down, but I was already too far away. Without thinking, the Gazer was in my hand and I was firing, holding the trigger down as I fed the weapon from the armor's integrated power supply. Unlike before, the Gazer could fire a very long time before I had to stop. The beam sparked and dug into the worm’s armor, but the damage was superficial.
I had hoped to take my time, but the worm wasn't going to let me. My Gazer wasn't doing much to it and if I extended this fight longer, more of his friends might show up. For all I knew, there was an entire city full of these things just below the lava surface. Maybe I had been fighting a baby. I didn't want to be here when Mommy Worm decided to show up.
As the worm was still falling I stuck the Gazer to my chest and moved back to a stop just in front of the exposed wall of the base. I slapped my hand to the surface of the wall and executed the salvage operation that I had queued a moment before. Nanites flowed out of my hand in a stream, sinking into the surface of the wall. The outflowing stream was much slower than I liked, seeming like it was slow motion.
Behind me, my two drones continued to fire at the worm as it settled into the lava and then disappeared, diving beneath the surface and righting itself, I had no doubt, for another leap.
The Nanites finished streaming out of me, and the cut was already twenty percent finished. Pushing off, I flew away from the Union base. I had no idea how smart this worm was, but I didn't want to find out the hard way. It turned out, it was smarter than I liked.
The next time the worm jumped, it wasn't where I had been. It barreled out of the lava at an angle, flying toward me. The long, black body was extended in a straight line, the sheer bulk of it nearly filling the narrowed canyon entirely.
My escape options were limited. If I went back toward where the turret had been, there was the possibility that I would bring more worms to the fight. I really didn't want that. If I went up and out of the rift I'd get shot by the base defenses, without a doubt. Down was right out. Lava was bad for me.
The worm had been clever and a wall of worm flesh was flying at me. Even if it didn't get me in its jaws, its body slamming into me certainly wouldn't do good things.
The gap between the worm's body in the wall on either side of him was narrow. Narrow enough that I didn't want to chance flying through it. It would almost certainly squish me into the wall if it noticed what I was doing. That might not kill me, but if I allowed it to drag me down into the lava below I'd be as good as dead.
Instead, I did something stupid.
I dipped below the clashing jaws and flew forward, landing hard on the wall of black worm flesh. I engaged the gecko pads on my palms and feet and stuck hard. In the armor HUD my boots and gauntlets immediately went yellow as the intense heat of the lava worm's body conducted through my armor. I knew that it couldn't cause my armor any permanent damage, but it could certainly cook my flesh given enough time. I wouldn't give it that time.
I locked all of the Krigar Assault Armor's joints in place, hoping it would be enough and with a thought I triggered the gravity plates in my arms and legs. The left side I set to push away from Mercury as hard as it could while the right side I set to the opposite.
There was a sickening jolt of motion and a barely felt crash as the worm twisted, the motion smushing me momentarily between the side of the canyon and the hard, black flesh of the lava worm. The gravity units had done their job and I emerged on the other side of the worm. I released the gecko pads and flew free a tad later than I liked. I skipped along the side of the canyon, breaking free chunks of black rock before I regained control and stopped myself. The worm was falling toward the lava, but I knew it would be after me again shortly. I boosted toward the hatch that I was making in the side of the base. The cut was at eighty percent now, but I didn't have time to wait for it to finish. Crossing my arms in front of me, I flew directly toward the hatch my salvage UI had outlined on the wall.
There was a tremendous jolt through the armor as I slammed into the wall at high speed. The compromised panel gave way, folding out of the way as the metal of one of the four sides still hadn't been fully cut through.
I hit the opposite wall of the internal corridor hard and left a Jake-sized dent. I lost consciousness for a moment. My brain, although augmented, was still mostly human. And human brains didn't like concussive force.
The unconsciousness only lasted a moment before my greatly enhanced regeneration and Transcendent Flesh came to my rescue from what might've been a fatal concussive injury to a normal human.
My three
