StarFall Comics
In Association with El Queso Productions
Proudly Presents:
Metal Fire
#3: Assault on the Pentagon, Part 2: Have I-Form, Will Travel
cover: Metal Fire stands spotlighted in the center of a run-down mexican saloon, bracing for battle as three large men and one woman rush in to attack.
Eight miles high and suddenly she's feeling guilty.
Kim Roberts soars through the air like a rocket. That's what she's been feeling like . . . fast . . . powerful . . . even deadly. This is the longest she's ever worn the Human-I-Form, the mechanical suit her Father designed. Someone has kidnaped her Father and demanded she bring the I-Form to the outskirts of Tijuana, Mexico, so that's where she's going.
She's been in the air for a little over four hours . . . the most thrilling four hours of her life. She'd flown in the I-Form before but not at top speed. The longer and faster she flew, it seemed the better she got at it and the more she enjoyed it. Flying felt like freedom . . . freedom from gravity . . . freedom from the earth. She had actually relaxed for the first time in days.
The suit felt so comfortable. She didn't feel the metal against her skin anymore. She felt a warmth that was similar to flesh. The I-Form was soothing . . . like a cocoon. Inside the temperature was always perfect and she could breathe easily despite the fact that she was several miles up, flying at a tremendous speed.
She'd practiced using the I-Form but she hadn't realized how much her Father had put into the suit. She'd learned some rudimentary use of the suit's defense systems but now she'd made some amazing accidental discoveries. Periodically, she had zoomed down to check highway signs to make sure she was headed in the right direction. Straining her eyes to see the signs she somehow activated enhanced optics in the eyepiece. If she concentrated, it was like she was looking through high powered binoculars. Now she could do it at will. When she began to worry that she was going to smack into a plane, she started picking up radio signals . . . airports . . planes . . . and finally a cool alternative station in Texas!
Screaming through the air with Blur's "Song #2" blaring in her helmet, she found herself smiling and laughing. Suddenly she yelled, "Yeah-eah! Metal Fire is on the way!" That's when it hit her . . . a wave of guilt that felt like a Tsunami. "Good God girl, think about what you're doing," she thought to herself, "This ain't a joyride, your Father's been kidnaped!"
Sobering up from her euphoria, she did a quick scan for Tijuana's air traffic control. She was close, very close. "I gotta find this El Dorado saloon that the kidnappers picked as the rendezvous. It'll be dark soon, " she thought. "Time to grow up Kimmy," she said to herself and went into a steady dive.
Inside an old, abandoned and dilapidated saloon, four cold-hearted killers waited. Three of them passed the time by telling tales about past hits. One sat in expressionless silence.
" . . . in his pants right before the grenade went off. So it was like, Ppprrrppp! Whoom! Bwha ha ha! I'm standing dare laughing like an idiot," Rice was saying as he cleaned his .38 snubnose.
Hernandez through his massive head back and laughed like a Mack truck backfiring while McLoughlin wiped a tear from his eye.
"That's the funniest hit I have ever heard man," said McLoughlin.
"HAR . . . HAR . . . HAR . . . PPPRRPPP! WHOOM! HEE . . . HEE . . . HO," said Hernandez.
"Whasamatta Ro-man-o," asked Rice, "Ain't ya got no sense uh humor?"
Romano fixed Rice with her cold blue eyes. He felt a shiver down his spine that wiped away his grin. McLoughlin and Hernandez shutup too.
"I've been thinking Rice," Romano stated, "Something's wrong."
"Wrong? Whaddaya mean? We gotta pass the time somehow, " Rice replied.
"I'm not talking about your moronic stories. I'm talking about why we're here," said Romano.
"We're here to kill some college girl and take her weapon back to that SOB Mussmoth. What's wrong, you don't like killing little girls?" asked McLoughlin.
"What's wrong is us. Why does one girl with a battle suit take the four best hitmen in North America?" asked Romano.
"Well, you heard. She's got plasma blasts and a laser cannon," said Rice.
"And we've got enough firepower and expertise to take out a dozen of her. She's got no experience, other than threatening that lackey Jakobssen. She's probably never even had a fight in the schoolyard," said Romano.
The four killers sat in silence as they pondered Romano's words. The silence was broken by a loud SWOOSH that came from above. It hovered briefly overhead and then descended outside the front door.
Kim stood outside in a cloud of dust and listened . . . concentrated and listened. Still, no radio signals from the decrepit saloon. She thought she'd pick up a military signal of some kind . . . no luck.
"Don't worry Dad," she said aloud, "I'll get us out of this."
She walked to the door, thought about blasting it away but decided just to open it and walk in. There was a large man in a spandex shirt sitting at a table toward the back of the saloon. He sat facing her with his hands beneath a table. On the table sat a camping lamp. She could feel other eyes upon her but couldn't see anyone else in the darkness of the room. Kim started to wonder if her Father had installed night vision in the helmet as well, but then the man spoke.
"Have a nice flight dare kiddo?" he asked.
"Where's my Father?" Kim replied.
"You'll be wid him soon sweetheart. Just give me da battle suit. It'll be an even trade . . . no problem," said Rice.
"I have to see him first. Who the hell are you anyway? You're not Air Force," said Kim.
"Ya know what kid? Yer right. I'm just a guy tryin' ta make a livin'," he said, "Give me da suit NOW!"
"No! I have to see muuhh!" Kim exclaimed as the man pulled out a pistol and began firing. Instinctively she recoiled, but the shower of sparks made her remember that bullets couldn't penetrate the I-Form. She turned back around and fired a plasma blast from her left palm at the man behind the table. He dove into the darkness while the blast flipped the table toward the back of the room and extinguished the lamp.
Kim concentrated to see if the I-Form's vision system could penetrate the darkness. She could make out a faint greenish glow, but not where than man had gone. This was off to the right side of the room. Suddenly there was another green image just to her left . . . getting bigger.
WHAM!
Kim was knocked face down on all fours toward the center of the room. She started to get to her feet but there was someone on her back now holding her in a choke hold.
"Just keep those palms on the floor girl," said a voice beside her head, "Or I'll ram this blade through your eyepiece!"
Kim was wondering if the eyepieces could be penetrated with a blade, when she saw the blade. It was the same as the knife she had found with the ransom note . . . black with a blood red pentagram. Kim felt her anger rise up like she had never felt it before. She quickly brought her fist up from the floor in an arc over her right shoulder and bashed the guy on the top of his head as hard as she could. He relaxed his grip and Kim flipped over on her back. She saw a large blond man holding the blade. He was staggering backwards, shaking his head. He stopped and lunged at Kim. Kim tucked in her knees, pointing her feet at the blond man, then she fired up the flight system. The blonde man sailed off, making a large hole in the ceiling.
Laughter came from behind her. She started to get up when suddenly everything turned a bright blue and she felt every muscle in her body contract. Kim couldn't move. The distorted image of the spandex shirt guy came into view.
"I gotta hand it to ya kid," he said, "Ha ha ha, that was funny!" He stopped laughing for a moment. "Gee I hope dis electric rod don't damage da suit," he said "I just want it to damage you. Ha ha ha!"
The pain was intense, but there was something else about it. It was like she could almost feel the I-Form's pain as well as her own. She fought off the feeling that her muscles were turning into beef jerky as best she could and tried to think. "Come on Kim use the energy absorbers," she thought, "No. They're overloading. Think . . . think . . . c'mon! Too much power . . re-route it . . . yeah, a circuit, be a circuit!"
PHWOOM!
The power rod Rice was holding Kim down with exploded in his hand and Rice was thrown back to the floor. He wasn't moving . . . he wouldn't be for a while. Kim slowly got up from the floor and suddenly there was a foot flying at her.
WHAP!
She was stumbling backwards, weak and off balance. The blows kept coming. It was a woman this time but she was so fast Kim could barely get a look at her. The kicks and hits came in a flurry. Kim felt like she was falling out of a tree and hitting every branch.
KEERASH!
Kim was outside again . . . she'd been knocked through the back wall of the saloon. She lay face down in the dirt. Then there was a weight on her legs and her right arm was being twisted behind her. She tried to turn her left palm toward where she imagined her attacker must be positioned but her right arm was suddenly almost twisted out of it's socket.
"Keep the palm on the ground," said a cold female voice. Kim could do nothing but oblige, the pain was excruciating. "Now," said the voice, "Let's get this thing off of you."
She could feel a hand reaching around trying to find the helmet latch. Kim felt her anger rising again. It was even stronger, as if she was consumed by hate for the woman on her back. She cursed aloud in frustration. Even through the pain in her right shoulder she could feel her ears and face flushing with heat. "White hot heat," she thought, "If I can control the I-Form's internal temperature, why not the external?" She began to concentrate on her wrist that was held tight in the woman's grip. She could feel the heat begin to increase. "C'mon," she thought, "Burn her! Burn Her!"
"Ah!" Romano cried out. She looked at the huge blisters already rising up on her hand. Kim brought up her left palm and blindly fired a plasma blast . . . it connected. The weight gone from her legs, Kim rolled over to see the woman struggling to get up several yards away. The anger still roared within her. Ignoring the pain in her shoulder, she lay on her side and outstretched her arms sending a plasma blast from both palms. The woman was knocked even farther away.
Kim got to her feet and started walking toward the woman, her anger still overflowing. The woman moved her head, Kim fired a blast. Her hand twitched, Kim blasted her. When Kim got up to the woman it was obvious she was going to move again anytime soon. "See how it feels to be knocked around like a ragdoll, " Kim yelled, "Looks like you're gonna be unable to feel anything for a while!" Kim's anger was a searing flame in her heart.
She turned and looked back at the saloon. There was a huge man holding a rifle standing in the exit hole she had created. "You wanna piece of me?", she shouted, "C'mon big man. Take your best shot!" She starting walking toward him, feeling like she could take on the entire Air Force . . . the entire U.S. military. The I-Form buzzing . . . she was tingling all over. The man raised the rifle.
BLAM!
The shot hit her so hard it spun her around in place. She looked at her left shoulder. The shot hadn't penetrated the I-Form but it had left a large dent.
BLAM!
Kim cried out as her left knee buckled from the hit and she crashed to her knees.
"Aarrrrggghhhh!" Kim roared in frustration and anger. She didn't even think, she just fired up the flight system and took off like a missile toward the gunman. Another shot went just over her head. The gunman tried to move out of the way . . . he wasn't fast enough. Kim hit him hard in his massive chest and he went down on his back. "That had to break some ribs," she thought. Reaching down and grabbing the ridiculously large ammo belts strapped to him, she took off with him, straight up through the roof. Kim zoomed up about a mile and then stopped and hovered.
"Where's my Father?" she yelled.
"Ah! Señorita, no!" he cried.
"I'm only gonna ask this one more time and then I'm gonna see how big a greasy spot you leave," she said, "Now . . . Donde esta mi Padre, Dr. Roberts?"
"El Pentagon," Hernandez replied, "General Mussmoth! Señorita, por favor . . ."
Kim went into a fast dive as Hernandez screamed like a baby. When she was about twenty feet from what was left of the roof of the El Dorado Saloon she stopped, looked Hernandez in the eyes and said, "Gracias, fatboy." Then she let go and watched him destroy the rest of the roof.
She searched the saloon and did several quick flights around the area but found no one other than her four unconscious attackers. She sat down in the dusty road. She was exhausted and breathing hard but she felt so excited. "I did it, " she said, "I really did it!"
She thought about the guilt she'd felt earlier when she'd gotten so pumped up while flying, but this time she didn't feel guilty . . . she felt good about it. She reached up to unlatch the I-Form helmet . . . but it wouldn't unlatch. She tried again, no luck. "I'm just tired," she thought. She struggled with the latch for a few minutes, eventually using both hands pressing as hard as she could. Finally, the latch released. Kim then tried to remove the helmet from her head but found it just as difficult as the latch had been.
"Don't panic," she said aloud. She rested for a minute and then tried again. After several minutes of pushing the helmet came off but instead of the fresh air and relief she thought she'd get, Kim was suddenly racked with pain. All of the skin on her head and neck felt raw and inflamed. The hot Tijuana air seemed to burn into her flesh.
She looked down at the helmet in her hands and noticed a faint curve on the bottom section. "Oh crap," she thought, "The helmet's been dented too." She examined the dent and saw that it was uniform all the way around. It was similar to a faint jawline pattern.
"What the . . ." Kim muttered. The wind kicked up and so did the pain of her exposed skin. Kim winced and quickly replaced the helmet. It went on smoothly and latched automatically. The pain vanished within seconds. "Don't get excited Kim. Probably just a little burn from that jerk's cattle prod," she thought, "You just need a little lotion or something."
Kim looked at her left shoulder to examine the dent. It seemed much smaller than she remembered. "Maybe the excitement of the fight made it seem larger," she thought. Her knee showed no signs of damage.
Kim waited until she was breathing at a normal rate and then got to her feet. "Okay, Metal Fire," she said aloud, "Let's go find this General Mussmoth."
"You can go right in, Sergeant," Priscilla said.
Sergeant Jakobssen entered General Mussmoth's office.
"Sir, we just received word from Tijuana," said Jakobssen, "the mercs were all defeated by the girl."
"You can wipe that smug smile of your face Sergeant," Mussmoth barked, "Just because she beat them, it doesn't vindicate you for the fact that she already kicked your butt!"
"Sir, reports show that she may be headed this way," replied Jakobssen as his face turned red.
"Keep me posted," said Mussmoth, "Dismissed."
After Sergeant Jakobssen had left the room, the General picked up the phone and dialed.
"Tell Mr. Hamilton that everything is going as planned," he spoke into the phone smiling.