56 Chapter 56

Loyd stepped into the first warehouse and looked around. Most of the shelves were empty but further down they seemed to be almost overflowing with canned goods.

"This warehouse hasn't been used in nearly eighty years but we thought it might make a good place for you to repair any damage to that weird mech you were piloting. Also, your abominations, at least that's what they said you called them, said they'd be in warehouse seventeen," the boy announced.

"So, what else did they tell you?" Loyd asked, his body still returning to its human state.

"That you knew how to kill the swarm." The boy smiled from ear to ear expectantly.

"I have an idea as to how to kill it but we'll see if it works when I do it. Now is this what I have to expect from the rest of the warehouses?"

"No, most of the other warehouses are even more empty than this one. The only one that's full is warehouse one and that's where we keep the building materials," the boy answered nervously.

"Figures. You people do still need to survive till the next harvest after all." Loyd sighed. "I need one more thing from your people, assuming my barge isn't already equipped with it."

"What do you need?"

"I need a nuclear resonator pump." Loyd looked down at the boy's puzzled expression before realizing Earth technology had stood still and had even degraded in certain areas. "I need a dirty bomb in a vacuum piston with a focusing cylinder."

"What does that do?" the boy asked taking a step back.

"It should, in theory, disable any form of communication between the swarmlings and the big thing controlling them," Loyd explained.

"You need a radio jammer? We have plenty of those around the perimeter. I should just have to ask for one."

Loyd's mouth fell open. "How long ago did your jammers get made?"

"We finished them last week and we haven't had to worry about the swarm's attacks ever since."

Lloyd smiled, his fangs and claws growing back out. "Then I've got some work to do."

xX can anyone else hear training montage music? Xx

Loyd was busy directing his ever-growing number of abominations as they stockpiled and ate the food from the warehouses. Once each abomination had nearly doubled in weight, they would divide in half, creating two daughter abominations in the same way a cell might. Once Loyd had gathered and processed all of the food, he sent the abominations to mop up the blood from where Beast had been injured. He made sure they did not touch any of the human pilots' remains, and then started toying around with one of the abominations that had come back from informing the rest of the city of his actions.

He ripped it open to reveal its insides and began digging through them. In his search, he noticed the liver of the abomination was nearly three times the size it should've been and it had grown a third lung to assist in breathing the vile atmosphere of Earth. Using his claws, he cut into the liver and found it full of solid junk that the body was unable to expel properly. From its blackened appearance, it looked like it had been coated in excess iron from the blood. Upon closer inspection, the tiny pellets broke apart into a yellowish powder that started to burn Loyd's skin.

"So, they have mutated in a way to have high sulfur amounts be compacted inside their livers? How interesting. And the iron oxide capsules are probably formed slowly over the course of several hundred days, judging from the inconsistency in the powder's coloration," Sara said while watching over Loyd's shoulder.

Loyd stood up and looked over at her. Her hair had been cut way back to where it barely reached her shoulders and was returning to its cinnamon color. Her eye color was also turning a cinnamon color but her left eye was growing far darker than her right one. Her figure was rather slim and the bodysuit, the pilot before she had taken over was wearing, was nearly skin-tight leaving little to Loyd's imagination.

"Well, what do you think? I'm not done morphing into my preferred self but this is pretty close," Sara asked.

"Do you really need those boobs? They just restrict moveme-!" Loyd cradled his cheek. "What was that for!?"

"One does not discuss with women about chest size!" Sara retorted.

"But they're useless when you don't breastfeed! And they restrict movement when piloting!" Loyd protested.

"That's not the point, Loyd," Charlette chuckled. "You've been inside a girl's head; you should know that."

"You don't count!" both Sara and Loyd exclaimed.

Loyd turned back to the abomination, who was patiently waiting for the argument to be over and pulled out a fist full of sulfur pellets. "If you hadn't noticed, I've found something that could be quite useful at getting more food from these people in the future!"

"Change the subject, why don't you!" Sara shouted as she walked off leaving Loyd's face even redder.

"Sara, remember you can control your hormones manually!" Charlotte shouted after her before returning her attention to Loyd. "I've got a feeling that when you were fighting that girl, before Sara took her over, she was probably going through something prior to our attack."

"No, I smelt blood during our fight and I can confirm it wasn't from anyone else. That's probably the reason behind her current aggression," Loyd muttered. "And I'm done looking through this guy now, so let's get to work on reanimating Beast."

The abomination closed its open torso and hobbled over to the rest of the abominations.

Charlotte turned to Loyd and stopped him on the stairs. "While you were gone, you seem to have forgotten how to be a leader."

Loyd shrugged off her arm and walked past her. "I snapped, sis. You should know that by now. Beast puts a big enough strain on his pilot that it would kill anyone else. I guess I made my own drug when I started piloting him. His aggression became mine and my patience seeped into him."

Charlotte grabbed Loyd's shoulder again. "You made your polar opposite and overcame him. Your patience hasn't diminished and Beast has calmed way down. If you truly believe you broke then you should've seen Griffon. Just look up and see."

Loyd turned his head to the metal roof of the building and noticed the figures of every single one of his younglings. They were just floating there waiting for their orders. Loyd smiled to see so many familiar faces.

"Well? What are you all waiting for? Let's get to work!"

xX back to the crawlers! Xx

Griffon had nearly tripled in height and bulked up significantly. The last two people he needed to deal with had barricaded themselves inside the air filtration system where they thought he wouldn't come for them.

Reinhold held Linda closer to his chest as the monster they had once called Griffon stared down at them like some rabid demon.

Tiny watched as the demon tore apart the last of the other bioforms aboard the crawlers and then turned toward the hallway. His newest project required his attention now that there was only one bioform left. His arms had split at the shoulder, giving him four arms and his legs had reformed into their original bipedal form but bulked up to support the weight of his growing arms and torso. His head had receded to be between his shoulder plates and a lower jaw had started to form where his collar bone should be, in case Griffon turned on him as well.

Griffon finished eating the remaining threats to him and turned to a CTAS that he had modified heavily. The monstrosity opened its shattered cockpit hatch as Griffon drew closer and climbed inside.

Tiny entered the hangar and stared at the female Crystalid's grotesque form. She was going through a similar metamorphosis to Tiny's but on a much larger scale. He walked forward and examined a thruster that she was growing and ripped a chunk of it off as it began growing at an awkward angle. He brought the plate to her mouth like opening and forced her to reprocess it.

"Grow it correctly this time and spare yourself the pain," he muttered.

He went back to look over the thruster which continued growing at an even faster pace than before. A whirring behind his head caught his attention as the thruster finished.

"Die bastard!" the female Crystalid shouted as a bolt caster fired through Tiny's head.

Tiny merely shrugged off the attack and ripped the weapon out of her.

"I did not tell you to begin creating weapons yet." Tiny shoved the entire weapon into her mouth and stumbled back. "Don't test my patience. You'll find that well is nearly dry."

Tiny fell down, clutching at the hole where the left half of his head should be. He turned back to the female Crystalid who had yet another bolt caster aimed.

This bolt wasn't meant for Tiny however. The shot tore the female Crystalid from the cancerous growth that had been a fighter craft. She fell to the ground, her arms long since reduced to stubs, propped her up so she could look at Tiny. A growth where her mouth should have been, fell away revealing a mouth full of teeth designed to tear through Crystalid. Her stubs were enough to allow her to start crawling toward Tiny, rapidly closing the short distance between the two.

"NO!" Tiny shouted, overcoming his shock at what had just happened. He flew to his feet, grabbing the female Crystalid and tearing her apart as she struggled against him. He continued until only scrap plates remained and her glow had long since faded. He turned his attention to the hull of the ship which still maintained its glow but was fading quickly.

Tiny ran over to the ship, ripping his heart out and connecting it to the ship with what little energy he had afterward. His body crumpled to the floor as the ship's eye's opened and let out a piercing shriek. Its thrusters kicked on and it lifted off the ground. Griffon had abandoned the crawler so the new Tiny started to consume as much of it as he could, growing at cancerous levels as he added more metal to his ever-increasing body.

xX high orbit Xx

A ship began its deorbiting process as it scanned the wreckages of Loyd's crawlers. The human at its control stared down at the lumbering hulk of Griffon as he walked towards another attack wave of swarmlings and at the remains of the crawlers that seemed to be collapsing upon themselves when an energy spike shot out of it. A massive laser blast shot through the man and caused the ship to shut down as its nerve center was destroyed.