Sgt. Golem: Royal Mech Hussar - Books 2 & 3

I checked my guns before stepping out into the corridor. All three were ready, and I had several spare magazines tucked away in the magazine pouches I had bought at the shop in Budapest were tucked up under my jacket for quick access.

I moved down the corridor with my weapon at the ready. Distant explosions rumbled. Somewhere in the castle, someone was firing heavy weapons. It didn't sound close, but it was hard to tell in these concrete halls. Doorways were helpfully labeled, but that didn't help me navigate. It only meant I didn't have to look inside every room.

I had landed on the upper floor, so I needed to go down. After all, this was Dr. Frankenstein, so his workshops had to be in the basements, right? Or would he have a tower laboratory, better to harness the lightning?

He’d definitely struck me as a “bodies in the basement” kind of guy. Down it was. I came to a flight of stairs and descended, trying to step as quietly as I could while still moving quickly. I worked my way down one flight, then another, fetching up on a landing with a heavy door and more stairs leading down. I was about to try the door when I heard stamping feet coming up from below.

I held still and thought quickly. The angles were terrible. The metal latch of the door looked noisy, and I didn't dare risk giving away my position before springing an ambush. This wasn't a good place for one, but it would have to do.

I moved back into the corner of the landing and ducked as low as I could. I needed to get as many of them into my field of fire as I could before they saw me.

I drew my second 1911, hefting one in each hand. The tramping feet grew louder. From the sound, I guessed there were at least three, probably more golems like me.

I waited till the last possible moment and then straightened up from my crouch and took a step forward. It wasn't a perfect ambush, but I went from being completely out of sight to having three golems under my guns instantly.

The ones I'd faced before had bodies similar to my old one, whereas these three looked much the same as my new, bigger, stronger body.

Their eyes glowed red. Their reflexes were also improved: all three held long-barreled machine guns, and all three swung them at me at the same time, blindingly fast. But no matter how big and strong they were, a machine gun was still more unwieldy than a pistol.

I had always been a right-handed shooter, though I practiced often with my left. This new body didn't seem to care which hand was which. I didn't aim; I just pointed and fired.

My left-hand gun lined up on the first golem, center of mass, and I fired it one, two, three times. Even before the third shot went off, my right-hand gun was on the second golem in line. He was farther down the stairs, and I was in a hurry. I shot him between the eyes.

The first golem staggered back. It stumbled down a step while struggling to bring its machine gun to bear. The second one stumbled and didn't go down, even with a bullet between his eyes. It blinked blood out of his vision and tried to fire the machine gun. How hard was its skull? Fortunately, being shot in the head had thrown off his aim.

My second round went through his left eye socket, and I stepped quickly to the side. Machine gun rounds ripped into the wall of the stairwell behind me, and one burned a line across my ribs.

I had given the third golem too much time. Its machine gun roared in a long burst, shredding the door and wall behind me. It stood on the landing below me, so I was able to duck low and get out of its line of fire. I threw myself flat as it started up the stairs. It didn't let off its machine gun burst as it marched two steps higher. The bullets walked down the wall behind me.

I poked my right-hand gun over the lip of the landing and emptied my magazine into the golem. Its machine gun ran dry just before my slide locked back. I dropped my right gun and came up to my knees. The second 1911’s slide was still forward, and there are at least two rounds left in it by my count.

I lined up on the stairwell below. The first golem was down. He had toppled backwards and landed on the crumpled body of the second golem. That one lay slumped over, its remaining eye wide and its face a mask of blood.

The final living golem was riddled with bullets, its torso soaking with blood, but it was still struggling to reload its machine gun. I put two rounds through its face before my left-hand gun locked back.

I drew my final pistol from my waistband holster. Pulling a new gun was always the fastest form of reload. The golem's left arm was as bloody as its chest, and it fumbled with its new magazine. I put four more rounds into it before it gave up the task and decided to just die.

The problem with shooting multiple guns at the same time is reload time. With the immediate threat removed, I was able to take my time and reload all three of my handguns. With practiced ease and advanced reflexes, it only took a few breaths. I was running low on full magazines, but I tucked away the empty ones. 1911 mags might become hard to acquire.

Reload accomplished, I went to check the bodies. These were a new type of golem. Their bodies appeared to be essentially identical to my own new one, slightly taller and stronger than my old one. Better looking, too, I thought, with a slightly less bulbous nose. Some of the machine guns had been struck by my gunfire, but one was intact. Why Frankenstein thought overly muscled troops wielding Lewis guns in close quarters was remotely a good idea made no sense to me. But his judgment was questionable at best.

I picked one of the Lewis guns and grabbed two full drums of ammunition. There were no more golems in sight. I slung on one of the golem’s satchels with my magazines and hefted my new weapon.

"Now I have a machine gun," I muttered to myself, resisting an urge to add in a yippie-ki-yay.

I made it down two more flights of stairs before a doorway somewhere far below slammed open. More pounding feet started up the stairs. These were not as heavy as the usual golem tramp and they moved quickly.

There was another doorway on this landing and I ducked through, trying to be as quiet with the door as I could. It opened easily and didn’t close behind me. I stepped out into a wide open, richly-appointed hall. The scarlet carpet was thick. Tapestries and suits of armor lined the walls. The walls themselves were a rich wood paneling, unlike the utilitarian concrete of most of the fortress.

I stepped out of line with the stairway door. Nothing stirred but this was not a tactically tenable position. Doors opened off the hallway in every direction. While there was no sign of movement, I could be flanked at any time.

The footsteps on the stairs grew louder. It sounded like one set, hurrying but unsteady. A landing or so down, they stumbled, and it sounded like someone fell. There was a sound somewhere between a whimper and a sob.

I was covering the stairwell door with my machine gun, ready to fire at a moment's notice. I wanted to fall back and find a better position, but there was no time. A person on the stairwell came up the last steps in a rush and burst through the door. My finger tightened on the trigger, but then I froze. A young woman stood there, her breathing heavy. She wore a rumpled beige smock and a terrified expression. She stumbled to a halt when she saw me, her eyes wild. Had she been a prisoner? She didn't have the look of a golem, but she wasn’t anyone I knew. I shifted my aim slightly to one side, not fully relaxing my guard but signaling that I wasn't necessarily hostile.

"Are you alright, ma'am?"

Relief flooded her face. "Oh, you're not one of them!" she gasped. She stumbled towards me. I tried to take a step back to bring my gun to bear. I wasn’t convinced this wasn’t a ruse. Somehow she brushed past the machine gun’s long barrel and slid in close before I could react.

She clutched at my shoulders and looked at me with wide, terrified eyes.

"You have to help me! There are --" She trailed off, her eyes wide, her expression hard to read. Something like lust or hunger flittered across her face. She pulled herself tight against me.

“Oh!” she said, the fear in her voice fading, and the sound came out like a purr. “You really aren’t one of them, are you? I’ve never liked golem taste.”

Something in her voice made me relax. The gun drooped in my fingers.

"But I'm so hungry.” A hand snaked up around the back of my neck, and she pulled my head down to her.

I felt an overpowering urge to hold her, to please her. The machine gun hung limp in my grip. My left hand came around her back, pulling her tight to me. She pulled my head down to her, but instead of going for a kiss, I felt her breath hot on my neck.

This wasn't right. I pushed at her gently.

"Ma'am, this isn't the time. We need to..."

The grip on the back of my head tightened with incredible strength. Her whole body stiffened, and her breath came out in a snake-like hiss.

The alarm bells turned into wailing sirens in my head. I shoved at her physically and, at the same time, pushed against the urge in my mind to relax and please her. The urge to submit. There was a flash of pain in my mind, and the urge was gone. Panic and adrenaline flooded me. My left hand flashed up and grabbed a handful of her hair and yanked back. Her mouth was open wide, her face twisted in an inhuman expression, and her mouth was full of fangs.

“Holy shit!” I tried to push her away, but she was impossibly strong. With her hands snaked around me, one leg hooked over my thigh, I couldn't get enough leverage, so I dropped the machine gun and grabbed at her shoulder, pushing away with all my strength.

Her hands were like steel vises. Her face twisted in rage and hunger, and she screamed right into my face. Her grip on my neck and shoulder was painful. It was like trying to escape from metal clamps. But whatever hold she had on my mind was gone now, and all that was left was Sam Anderson.

"You're mine!" she hissed as I pushed at her. Her grip was inescapable.

"No, ma'am. I belong to the Polish Royal Mech Hussars," I said, and then drove my forehead into the bridge of her nose. The pain shot through my hard skull. There was a sickening crunch. Her grip loosened, only fractionally, but enough for me to throw her off.

She flew back and tumbled into a decorative suit of armor, and they both went down in a crash of metal. I took two steps back as I drew my Colt .45. She was up in a flash, and I only got it to hip height before she was charging into me.

Her hands extended, and her bloody face twisted in a horrifying approximation of a snarling lion. I fired twice, and then she slammed into me. There'd been no way to miss at that range, but my bullets had no effect.

I tried to ward off her charge with my left hand, but she knocked it aside and leaped onto me. Her hands latched around my throat. The impact of her small body was like a freight train. I stumbled back two steps and almost fell, despite the difference in our mass. The neck of this body was muscled to make an NFL linebacker green with envy, but when her grasping fingers wrapped around my throat, they dug in with incredible force.

My vision blurred almost instantly as the air and blood were cut off. I desperately clubbed at her with a pistol still in my grip. I vaguely felt hard metal connecting with her skull and swung again. I scrabbled for a hold against her body with my left hand while I swung the pistol for her skull with my right over and over.

Darkness crowded my vision and my blows felt weak. No, I would not go out like this. Not here. I summoned the last dregs of my energy, and pushed at her with all my strength, swinging the gun as hard as I could.

I blacked out.

I was gone only for an instant, and I found myself leaning against the wall, gasping for breath. Black stars danced in my vision.

The woman, the vampire, was sprawled on the floor a few meters in front of me. My neck throbbed. Her head was a bloody mass, but she was still moving. Already she was climbing to her feet.

I raised my gun in a shaky hand and then saw with a shock that the entire frame was bent. I tried to pull the trigger, but it wouldn't move. I squeezed harder. Even as the jammed trigger started to grind, I realized with a shock that the entire frame was bent. The gun boomed one last time . The slide jammed partly back, stuck fast. I tossed the ruined gun aside.

The vampire was on her feet now. The bloody features of her crushed skull pulsed and reformed themselves.

Holy shit.

"Looks like it's time to double down."

I reached under my jacket and drew both of my remaining .45s.