Read Metal Deep: Infinite - Metal Wing: Episode 5 for Free Online

until I was standing face-to-face with an overly-enthused scientist, who was all but dancing at the opportunity to finally get to test the formula on me, did I learn little “extras” about the top secret serum they were pumping into me. There were two points of interest I did not already know. First, NX-8 was not native to this planet. Second, and the most exciting to me , it was going to make professional performance enhancers seem like chewable vitamins. I worked so many years to gain my strength naturally, but now I was embracing this new edge the scientists were giving me. I kept telling myself I wasn’t doing this for me. It was all for her . I’d be lying if I said didn’t want the power though.

    I took my shots to get ready for some mission, but all I could think about was how much fun this stuff would be during a Laser Ball match. I probably should have questioned the introduction of alien substances into my body. I think the part of me that cared died with my friends. Even if I left this room and returned to the arena, things would never be the same. My girl was hurt, and I had been robbed of my team, my family. I’d shoot up whatever needle was put in front of me to have juice-enough to bring the person responsible to justice.

    During the testing phase, I punched a brick into dust, I hit the bullseye of the dartboard every time, and I burned the motor out on the treadmill. I felt like I could do anything. Unfortunately, the effects of NX-8 only lasted about an hour before I needed a recharge. My body burned through the nanogem energy with frightening expediency.

    I didn’t expect my skin to tear like paper by the force used to crush the bricks. Thankfully, there was a healing boost from the NX-8. After the seventh dose my stitches were already out, my burns were well on the mend, and the scrapes from the brick tests had already turned into pink scar tissue. I held up my hands to the scientists as if to ask “What do you plan on doing about this?” They assured me they had it handled.

    Once done with all the pokes and prods, I was taken into another laboratory where a host of hairless scientist, toes to an invisible line, waited to jump at the slightest word for the next phase in my transformation. Someone said “Go” and then it was as if a race horn had sounded. Before I could react or protest, I was naked and taken into a small room where I was stuffed into a charcoal-black, inch-thick, skin-tight warsuit of ballistics armor called Fiberprene. It was flexible, but tough. It came with a utility belt, plenty of gadget-filled pockets, and glossy black armored boots, gloves, and neck shield. Looks like they did have the skin-thing handled. I felt like a human tank.

    Getting into the warsuit was only half the struggle. Turning it on was the other. It took about thirty seconds for the built-in gear of the suit to boot up. I was getting comfortable until the thing hissed and I jumped as if my skin had been pricked by a thousand tiny needles. Turns out it had. Once my body burned through the energy of my NX-8, the suit recharged the elements with a series of microinjections done by needles built into it. The nanogems never left my system. They just became dormant after I used them through exertion. As long as I wore the warsuit, I would have use of the biological enhancements indefinitely. No suit, and I only had about an hour before turning back into regular old Rayce.

    A bald scientist retrieved a goggled-and-masked helmet unit from a shelf that also displayed various components of the same head piece. They were the spare parts for the helmet. Another scientist joined the one holding the helmet, but in his hand was a razor. He started for my head, but I backed away in protest. Military or not, no way was I shaving my head. To make sure I got my point across, I raised an exclamatory armored fist. The guy with the razor took a step back. Message received.

    “Captain, we need to shave your head so that