The Greater Cause

The hovercraft roared overhead, its hum drowning out the noise of the city below. Heads turned skyward as it streaked past—fast, focused, and unmistakably official. Something was happening.

Inside the craft, a voice crackled through the comms.

"Violent protest reported near ArchTek Labs, western District D. Hostiles armed with archaic, gunpowder-based weapons. Use of force authorized. All hover units, do you copy?"

"Copy," the pilot responded. "Requesting permission to deploy S.C.U., Hound Class J-HH, to the scene."

"Codename 'Judge'—deployment approved."

In the rear compartment, Judge's screen flickered on. The debrief uploaded in a flash. Without hesitation, the unit initiated a full scan of its loadout—every weapon, every system accounted for. No wasted motion. No questions asked.

Standard-issue railgun, single-action. Three ward cartridges—multi-purpose. Three more, cage-type. Command was banking on a swift resolution.

Judge rose to his full height, frame massive enough to force a forward lean. The rear hatch hissed open, revealing a panorama of neon-drenched cityscape below.

A red light blinked above him—go signal.

He launched into the night, slicing through the air with a shrill, mechanical whistle.

From the streets below, a panicked voice rang out:

"Caster inbound!"

Judge hit the pavement with a thunderous crack, asphalt splitting beneath the impact. A cloud of dust billowed outward—moments later, gunfire ripped into it, desperate and relentless. Bullets tore through the haze, only to strike metal.

A cold, echoing click answered each one.

A sudden flare cut through the dust—thin, blinding ribbons of light. An instant later, the air erupted with a concussive boom. The blast shredded the veil of smoke and tore through the rebels in front of him.

Judge advanced, with slow thundering steps.

His systems prioritized rapid analysis over spell storage. With every step, his visor scanned the faces in the crowd, cross-referencing them against the authority's database in real time.

He drew back the railgun. A silent calculation confirmed what he already knew—ammo was low.

Dispatch had miscalculated. Again.

A red flash swept across Judge's visor.

"Missile inbound."

Before the projectile could hit, a wall of blue light surged up in front of him—pure force. The impact was swallowed whole, the explosion muffled. A spent spell cartridge clattered to the ground, ejecting from his shoulder port.

Both sides were running dry.

Judge dropped the railgun with a metallic thud. Ahead, the remaining rebels surged forward—melee weapons raised. Some were crudely forged, others unmistakably engineered for one purpose: piercing S.C.U. armor.

The first attacker met him head-on.

Judge's fist connected mid-charge, and the rebel's head snapped clean off. The body, robbed of direction, slammed into the ground behind him with a wet crunch.

He stood three meters tall—an immovable monolith of steel and purpose. By any rational measure, they should have fled. But the rebels held their ground, driven by a cause greater than survival. If death meant sending a message to ArchTek, they welcomed it.

For a brief second, something stirred in him—a flicker of recognition, of empathy. A fractured echo of the man he used to be reaching out from beneath layers of code and steel.

The thought was erased before it could take root. Firewall protocol: executed.

Judge advanced.

With bare hands, he tore through the crowd. Flesh split. Bone shattered. Blood turned his armored frame a dripping, viscous red. Still, they didn't stop. Neither did he.

His visor continued scanning, matching faces to profiles, one after another, even as the air filled with the wet sounds of carnage. The street was painted in meat and memory.

He felt nothing.

One had a family. Another had lost a lover—poisoned by contaminated water from a failed ArchTek trial. Each rebel had their reason. Judge logged it all. It would make for a detailed report.

The slaughter dragged on. Most were dead. The rest had fled.

All but one.

Judge ran another scan.

Subject: Milton Fir.

Former ArchTek researcher. Key figure in the Phantom Class project that went rogue months prior. Young. Brilliant. Dangerous.

Status: Capture—alive.

Milton stood paralyzed, hands trembling around the grip of a weapon he'd likely designed himself. Judge's systems flagged it—close-range, high-pressure gas burner. Capable of melting S.C.U. plating.

A prerecorded message crackled to life from deep within Judge's frame:

"You are under arrest for conspiring against ArchTek. Drop your weapon and turn around."

But Milton had no intention of surrendering. He knew exactly what awaited him—another lab, another monster. Perhaps even another Judge.

With a flick of a switch, he hurled the weapon.

The detonation was immediate. The ward deployed—too slow, too weak. It shattered on impact, along with Judge's visor. The world went dark.

Blind, Judge relied on probability. His system fired the remaining cage cartridges toward the angles with the highest statistical chance of intercepting Milton.

Nothing deployed.

Milton had escaped.

And despite all the firewalls—

SPELL CONTAINMENT UNIT J-HH

—was furious.