Dead Mech Read Online Free PDF

whacked it again. This
time he smiled and tossed the span-hammer aside.
    “Jethro! Put this heap back together! Try
not to fuck it up!”
    ***
    Bisby watched the wave of zombies crest the
hill and swarm towards him. There must have been hundreds.
    “Jeezus fuck! Where did they all come
from!?!” he cursed aloud.
    He tried to outrun them, but his mech was
not cooperating. Accepting the inevitable, Bisby double checked his
weapons, turned and made a stand.
    When the front of the undead horde was fifty
yards out he fired up the 50mms. Scorching hot lead ripped through
dead flesh, painting the wasteland grey and black.
    “DIE ALL YOU MOTHER FUCKERS!!!!!” he
screamed in his cockpit.
    Row upon row of zombies fell, finally
dead.
    ***
    “Need a hand,” Jethro asked, his grin
filling his voice.
    Jay struggled with the six cables he had
hopelessly tangled around his legs. Jethro just watched him,
eyebrows raised, waiting for Jay to give in.
    Within seconds, Jay’s shoulders slumped in
defeat. “Yes.”
    “Yes, what?” Jethro asked enjoying Jay’s
torture.
    “Yes, you can help me,” Jay growled.
    “What’s the magic word?”
    Jay whirled on Jethro, intending to throttle
him, but his feet stuck solid and he lost his balance.
    Jethro smirked and offered his hand. Jay
slapped it away. Jethro offered it again, unfazed.
    Jay gave up and laughed. “Thanks.”
    ***
    The right 50mm overheated within minutes.
Bisby watched it redline and swore as the gun froze up, metal
fusing. He flipped switches, sending all available ammunition to
the left gun without stopping the flow of bullets aimed at the
overwhelming zombie masses only yards away.
    Unbelievably a few zombies made it past his
onslaught, climbing his mech’s legs, fighting to get at the flesh
taunting them above.
    Bisby agilely picked off the zombies,
flinging each against the ground, pulverizing them.
    Eyes manic, Bisby grinned wickedly,
forgetting his loss and remembering why he had always dreamed of
being a mech pilot.
    ***
    Jay settled into the cockpit, secured his
limbs and powered up the mech.
    “So when do I get to do that?” Jethro asked
over the com.
    “When you become Chief Mechanic,” Jay
responded. “Only the Commander, the pilots and the Chief Mechanic
have their Reaper chips altered. You know that.”
    “Yeah, but you know how things are way out
here in the waste. Can’t rules be bent, just a little?”
    “Fuck that! Last thing I need is your zombie
ass coming after me. I like your chip just the way it is.”
    Smoke poured from the mech’s control
panels.
    “Fuck!”
    ***
    “Fuck this,” Bisby muttered. He started
flipping switches across his weapons array.
    He emptied the 50mm, started in with the
plasma cannons, tossed in some plasma charges, fractal grenades and
a little home made napalm Jay was kind enough to fit his mech
with.
    75 seconds was all that passed before
movement ceased on the valley floor.
    The already barren terrain was now a
blackened hell, littered with smoldering zombie husks.
    Bisby would have laid waste to God Himself
if He had been unlucky enough to be present. That wasn’t an issue;
Bisby had a bone to pick with God.
    ***
    Commander Capreze ended the briefing,
dismissing the pilots to their respective duties. Mathew hung back
waiting for the others to leave then approached Capreze.
    “Yes, Mathew?” Capreze asked, looking up
from his tablet.
    “Has Doc Themopolous talked to you about
Foggy Bottom?” Mathew asked.
    “No, why?”
    “Not sure. She asked me if I’d heard
anything from there in a while. She wouldn’t go into details, but,
I don’t know, her tone was off.”
    “How so?”
    “More fear than worry. When did we trade
with them last?”
    “Not sure, check the requisitions. Let me
know what you find out.”
    “Sure thing.”
    ***
    Bisby crested the ridge out of the valley
and turned his mech to survey the carnage he had wrought on the
landscape. His breath caught in his throat.
    Sifting through the