The adjacent level was a maintenance bay, a cavernous space of shadow and machinery, now illuminated by the sparks raining from the gash the Goliath had torn in the wall. The air smelled of ozone, hydraulic fluid, and the coppery tang of the Goliath's own internal lubricants leaking from its ruptured chassis.
The giant was already back on its feet, its systems rebooting with a series of clicks and whirs. Its single red eye fixed on Project Flame, and with a guttural roar of straining servos, it charged again. This time, it led with its good arm, a piston-driven fist the size of a sledgehammer aimed to pulverize.
Project Flame didn't move. He let it come.
The fist connected with his chest.
The sound was not of breaking bone, but of a great bell being struck. A deep, resonant GONG that shook the very air. The force of the blow would have turned a tank to scrap metal. Project Flame's feet didn't even slide back an inch. He absorbed the impact entirely, the muscles of his torso coiling and dissipating the kinetic energy with an efficiency that defied physics.
The Goliath's red eye flickered, its primitive logic circuits struggling to process the impossibility. It tried to retract its arm.
Project Flame's hand shot out, his fingers closing around the giant's metallic wrist. His grip did not look like it should have been able to hold the massive limb, but it was like a mountain had settled on it. The hydraulics screamed, then fell silent, crushed into uselessness.
He looked up at the hulking machine, his pale eyes glowing with a cold, inner light. There was no anger in his expression. Only a profound, weary contempt.
"You poor, dumb animal," he said, his voice a low rumble that vibrated through the metal he held. "They gave you strength but no mind. They made you a weapon but told you nothing of the war."
He began to apply pressure. The Goliath's arm, a marvel of alloy and engineering, started to compress, the metal groaning in protest.
"Do you even know who I am?" Project Flame asked, his voice dropping to a deadly whisper. "Do your masters whisper my name in their labs? Do they use my existence as the benchmark for their failures?"
With a sudden, violent twist, he ripped the entire arm from its socket. Wires and hydraulic lines snapped, spraying fluid like arterial blood. The Goliath staggered back, a garbled, electronic screech emitting from its vocalizer.
Project Flame advanced, holding the severed limb like a club.
"My name," he said, taking a swing that shattered the Goliath's leg and sent it crashing to the floor, "is Wolfen Welfric."
CRACK.
He brought the metal arm down on its back, buckling the central chassis.
"Son of Barlen Welfric."
CRUNCH.
He drove a foot through its chest plate, crushing the power core within. The red eye flickered and died.
Wolfen stood over the twitching, sparking ruin, the silence of the bay suddenly absolute. He dropped the severed arm with a clatter. He leaned down, his face inches from the dead machine's audio sensor, and delivered the final, chilling epitaph.
"And I am the one who is going to kill every last one of you."
He straightened up, his work done. The name, spoken aloud after so long, hung in the air like a declaration of war. Wolfen Welfric was no longer a project, an experiment, or a subject.
He was a son. He was an heir. And he had just come to collect his inheritance of fire and blood.