The television droned from every corner of the world.
"Casualties continue to rise, estimates suggest over two million dead globally in the first day alone…"
The anchor's voice was steady, but her eyes betrayed the weight behind it. Images played in sequence: cities reduced to ash, seas boiling with hive-ships, entire townships swallowed by alien burrows.
"Thanks to rapid nuclear strikes on major crash sites, the initial spread has been slowed. But experts warn the swarm has adapted splinter groups continue to burrow underground, making extermination nearly impossible."
The screen cut to an aerial shot: blackened craters where nukes had dropped, followed by shaky handheld footage of automatons Ethan's constructs scaling ruined skyscrapers, bounding across rooftops, and diving into nests.
The footage slowed, replayed, analyzed.
"What you're seeing now are the so-called 'constructs' deployed in United States. Officials insist they are machines of domestic origin, built under contract by a private defense contractor. However, international leaders are demanding access to these assets. Some accuse the United States of hoarding weapons of war while humanity burns."
The feed shifted again. Politicians at podiums. Angry voices.
The Iraq delegate, pale and stern: "If these machines are truly built to defend humanity, then humanity must have them not only the US."
A French minister, voice clipped and brittle: "We demand cooperation. Otherwise, you leave us no choice but to believe these… machines… are the beginning of a monopoly."
A Russian general, red-faced and shouting: "Share the schematics, or admit this is not cooperation, but colonization!"
The American spokesperson smiled too tightly into the cameras. "As previously stated, these machines are a proprietary development. The government has entered into an agreement with a private company, and at this time, deployment remains a domestic operation."
The screen dissolved into chaos reporters shouting, translators shouting over them, delegates storming out.
---
Ethan watched from the side of the rattling helicopter, the glow of the phone reflecting faintly across his visor. His thumb paused over a message thread old friends from a world that already felt like it was years behind him.
Where the hell are you, man?
You see the news? This shit's insane. Are you okay?
Ethan??
His fingers hovered, hesitating. Then he typed, slowly.
I'm in the military now, I'm sorry but I won't be around for a while. Don't wait on me.
He stared at the words, then hit send. Silence followed. No more notifications.
The phone dimmed. Ethan let it fall into his lap.
His other hand lifted the gauntlet, its dull glow pulsing faintly. At his touch, the UI flickered into existence across his visor.
[Tier Advancement: 24% - Tier 2]
The percentage blinked steady, a quiet reminder.
He exhaled once, the respirator hissing softly. Almost a quarter of the way there. But the world outside was burning faster than he was building.
---
The co-pilot's voice broke the hum of rotor blades. "Approaching the Great Basin outpost. ETA three minutes."
Ethan leaned slightly, peering through the scratched glass of the helicopter window.
The desert stretched endless beneath him, ridges and salt flats rolling out like bones of a long-dead titan. And in the middle of it, a wound in the land concrete slabs, hangars, and fencing marked the skeleton of the military base. Not far from it, a wide, empty plain where nothing yet stood. His land. His base.
The pilot's voice crackled over comms. "Command says you'll have direct supply convoys routed here. Fuel, metals, whatever the eggheads think you need, you'll have space. "
Ethan didn't answer. His gaze remained fixed on the desert floor.
The co-pilot glanced back, trying for small talk. "Crazy times, huh? Never thought I'd live to see the day nukes were called containment measures. Whole world's flipping out. Folks up there" he jerked a thumb skyward "say the swarm on Mars makes Earth's infestation look like a warm-up."
The pilot chuckled darkly. "Hell, I'm still trying to wrap my head around that. Mars. Not some sci-fi movie, not some conspiracy forum. Mars. Overrun. Like we're fighting neighbors we never knew we had."
Ethan finally spoke, his voice low beneath the respirator's hiss.
"They aren't neighbors. Neighbors knock before they move in."
The cockpit went quiet.
---
The helicopter began its descent, wheels kicking dust across the desert floor. Soldiers waited below, uniforms rippling in the downwash. Some watched with awe, some with suspicion, most with fear.
Ethan rose, the gauntlet's glow casting faint lines against the cabin walls. He tightened his grip once, feeling the hum of the constructs still linked to him across miles.
This place would be his forge.
And above the sky, Mars boiled with a colony already too vast to imagine.
The helicopter's skids hit dirt with a shudder. The ramp dropped, and heat from the desert bled into the cabin.
Ethan stepped down first. The rotors whipped sand into spirals around him, the respirator hissing with each measured breath.
A convoy of trucks was parked along the perimeter, their beds stacked with crates stamped HAZARD – ALLOY and COMPOSITE MATERIALS. Forklifts rumbled past, their beeping drowned by the rotor wash, as crews in grease-stained uniforms waved each other through.
One soldier muttered as Ethan passed, voice low but not low enough.
"Christ… they weren't kidding."
Ethan ignored them. His visor swept across the outpost sandbagged walls sagging under the sun, two massive hangar-like structures with iron gates that rattled faintly in the wind. For all its raw edges, it was space. His space.
He paused before the nearest building. A pair of MPs flanked the entrance, rifles slung, eyes sharp. One shifted his stance nervously as Ethan approached.
"Uh sir, this building's been cleared for your use. Command said… well, they said to let you do what you do."
Ethan inclined his head once, a silent acknowledgment, and pushed the gate open.
The hangar swallowed him in shadow.
Inside, the air smelled of oil, dust, and hot metal. Vast, open floor. Forklifts moving in and out, workers sweating as they stacked crates into neat rows. The noise of clanging tools echoed against steel rafters, the place alive with motion.
Ethan stood still, scanning. Every angle, every line of space. Then his visor tilted toward the far end, where a smaller metal door stood half ajar.
He crossed the hangar in measured steps, ignoring the looks that followed him. The workers slowed, one even whispering:
"Is that...? That's him, right?"
"Don't look at him. Just work."
Ethan opened the door.
Beyond was a wide garage bare concrete, a pit for vehicles in the center, chains and hooks hanging from ceiling tracks.
He exhaled, the sound long and even.
"This will do."
For the first time since he stepped off the helicopter, his head dipped in a small nod.
Yes. This would be his room. His forge.
He touched the gauntlet. At once, ten of his automatons stirred to life outside metal claws clicking, four-armed silhouettes casting alien shadows against the desert sun.
Through the link, his command was clear. Bring the crates. One by one. Inside.
The automatons obeyed, filing into the hangar. Workers stopped in their tracks, forklifts stalling as the constructs moved past scaling effortlessly over stacked pallets, carrying heavy loads with mechanical grace.
"Holy hell…" a worker muttered, backing against the wall.
"Are those… are those really his?"
"Shut up. Just let them work."
Ethan stood at the garage entrance, watching silently as his machines ferried materials into the room.
No one else would see what happened behind this door.
How the machines were born. How they multiplied.
That secret would remain his alone.