"Round two, you ugly cockroach."

He lunged forward, closing the distance between him and the Brood Mother Scarab. The Blood Mother Scarab was not a sitting duck; a shot of acid rain shot towards the Phantom Cloud.

Derek calmly controlled the mecha to duck and then lunged forward.

" Bang " He punched the splitting jaws of the Broodmother scarab, then controlled the mecha to move aside, dodging another acid rain

The Brood Mother Scarab shot forward, smashing into the mecha.

" Fuck " Derek cussed as the mecha was sent tumbling across the ground, smashing into several buildings.

Derek's vision darkened, as he found a huge darkness descend on him.

He commanded the Mecha to get up, but it didn't, or rather, it could not. The huge weight of the Broodmother was on him as it pinned the mecha down.

Acid brewed in its jaw, ready to be shot down.

" Not good ", Derek thought as he tried to free himself.

[ System Notification: You might wanna engage the Weapon System]

The system's voice rang in his mind.

"I have a weapon System? " Derek muttered, the system answered with a smug silence.

" Engage the weapons System ", Derek gave a neural command.

[Weapon System Engaged: Phantom Cloud-1]

A low hum reverberated through the cockpit as hidden compartments across the mecha's sleek armor hissed open. Vents along the arms expanded, revealing compact missile pods; from the shoulders, gleaming plasma cannons rose like mechanical wings of vengeance; and from the wrists—Derek's favourite part—retracted dual energy blades extended with a hiss of heated metal and raw intent.

The Broodmother froze for a half-second, her glowing eyes narrowing as the mecha's form lit up with a dangerous light.

"Yeah," Derek grinned, blood running down his temple. "Round two, with extras."

The mecha surged upward, metal limbs groaning under the Broodmother's grotesque weight, then slammed both plasma-charged fists into her swollen underbelly. Green ichor exploded from ruptured sacs as the Broodmother shrieked in fury and reeled back.

"Eat this!" Derek roared, locking on.

[Target Locked – Firing: Shoulder Cannons]

Two pulses of plasma energy blasted into the scarab's thorax. A chunk of her obsidian carapace shattered, revealing twitching muscle and exposed nerve clusters underneath. She screamed—a piercing, psychic sound that rattled Derek's skull.

The mecha sprang to its feet, claws gleaming. Derek spun the mecha's torso with a mental flick and unleashed a buzzsaw spin kick, its metal foot smashing into the Broodmother's side and sending her reeling into a half-collapsed skyscraper. The whole building creaked—then came down on top of her with a titanic crash.

Back at the Genesis Squad's location, someone whispered:

"Did that mecha just do a tornado kick?"

"Shut up and record this," Andrew muttered, eyes wide.

Suddenly, the rubble stirred.

She wasn't dead.

Of course not. That'd be too easy.

From the ruin rose the Broodmother, half her chitinous armor shattered, viscous green blood leaking from dozens of wounds. One of her claws had been severed, dangling by a tendon, but her eyes burned brighter, and something inside her pulsed.

"Oh hell," Derek muttered, feeling a bad premonition.

The Broodmother let out a gurgling hiss—and then her abdomen split open, revealing dozens of twitching, pulsating Brood Pods, each glowing with the same hate-filled fire as her eyes.

And from within the pods?

They began to hatch.

Tiny, fast, armour-plated insectoids no bigger than dogs—but there were hundreds of them.

"Of course, she has babies. Of course. Of course," Derek groaned. "This is why I hate bugs. This is why I always nuked Zerg rushes in RTS games!"

[System Alert – Incoming Broodlings. Suggest: Area-of-Effect Weaponry.]

"Oh. You have those too?"

The Mecha's system beeped affirmatively.

[Activating: Stormburst Protocol.]

Derek gave a wicked grin.

"You're my favourite AI."

The Phantom Cloud's chest opened, revealing a core reactor that pulsed once… twice… then unleashed a crackling electromagnetic storm in a massive radius. Electricity burst outward in a dome, arcing between buildings and lighting up the night like a god's flashbang.

The Broodlings exploded mid-air, their shells cracking like popcorn under the current. Several of the ones that made it to the mecha were shredded by the twin energy blades, Derek spinning like a cybernetic blender of justice.

In the centre of the chaos, the Broodmother stood her ground—but even she staggered under the onslaught, one leg collapsing beneath her.

She screeched, not in pain, but rage.

She wasn't just a monster; she was a mother, too.

"You're not the only one protecting something," Derek growled in hypocrisy. "But I'm not letting you take my city."

The mecha's reactor pulsed again, and Derek pulled the energy blades together into a single spear of concentrated plasma.

"Time to send you to bug hell." He charged.

Derek's breath fogged up the inside of his cockpit as heat surged through the Phantom Cloud. Warning icons blinked across the HUD like a Christmas tree gone nuclear, but he ignored them all.

The plasma spear in his hands pulsed like a star barely contained, threads of electric-blue fire coiling off the edges and cutting jagged scars into the air. The energy roared, alive, humming in sync with his heartbeat.

Outside, the battlefield was chaos incarnate. Burning buildings flickered like dying candles. Acid still sizzled in the streets, eating holes through concrete and steel. The reek of scorched insect flesh and ozone curled into Derek's nostrils through the filters—thick, foul, unforgettable.

The Broodmother roared back to her feet, limping, leaking, but defiant. Her shattered mandibles snapped wildly, one eye destroyed, the other glowing like a dying sun. Her entire body trembled with fury, the fractured armour along her back heaving as she prepared to fire another volley of acid—

Derek surged forward.

Time stretched.

Each footfall of the Phantom Cloud smashed into the earth with seismic force, leaving craters in the pavement. His view jostled violently, but his grip stayed steady. The mecha moved with fluid fury, like a sword swing made of titanium and vengeance.

The Broodmother raised her claw—

But to Derek, it was too slow.

He drove the plasma spear forward, and the world exploded into light.

The tip pierced through the centre of her chest, spearing into her thorax and through her back. A sound escaped her—half roar, half screech, all agony. Her limbs spasmed. Her tail arched. Acid sprayed skyward like a geyser, missing Derek by inches, splattering against a distant building that instantly melted in half.

Then the spear's containment broke.

And the core ignited.

A concussive pulse burst outward, fwoooom, warping the air itself. Derek watched as her body was consumed from the inside, her organs flash-vaporising in a brilliant detonation of green fire and iridescent plasma.

Her scream cut off mid-howl.

The Broodmother exploded, her massive frame collapsing inward before disintegrating into a maelstrom of shattered chitin, green mist, and blue-white flame. Shrapnel rained like glass confetti. One of her legs skidded down the block, impaling a flipped bus.

Silence followed.

A heavy, echoing and final silence..

Derek's mecha dropped to one knee, smoking, its shoulder plating curled and blackened from the overload. He exhaled—didn't realise he'd been holding his breath.

"…Ding-dong, the bug is dead," he muttered.

The Phantom Cloud's reactor dimmed.

Far above, the ash swirled like snowflakes in the burning sky.

And from the Genesis Squad's base, Evelyn whispered, "I think we just found our ace."

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