Alternate Iron #300: The Legion of Iron Men

by Matthew Malek

Chapter Seven: Within the Enemy

2:24 AM

Inside Ultimo, War Machine took a moment to orient himself. Access to the titan was beginning to seem easier than he had hoped. The back of Ultimo's mouth contained some sort of weird elevator shaft. In fact, it reminded Rhodey a lot of the "Jeffries Tubes" he had once seen on a late-night rerun of Star Trek. Rather than wait for any elevator to come to him, War Machine ripped though the tubing and proceeded down the alien robot's "neck". Like the rest of Ultimo's innards, the tube was lit only by a dim greenish glow. This eerie light was not sufficient to provide more than a few feet of visibility; War Machine switched on a full complement of internal sensors and slid his starlite lenses into place. Flying down the tube shaft, he tried to gauge how far he was traveling. He guessed that the shaft extend downwards to the middle of Ultimo's "chest".

Once War Machine had reached the lower end of the tube, things didn't seem so easy anymore. Whoever designed Ultimo had equipped their Doomsday machine with defenses within as a complement to the offensive weaponry without. As he exited from the shaft, War Machine was beset from all sides by small flying globules of various sorts. "Probably a precaution against just this sort of thing," War Machine thought. There were globs of different shapes, and each variety seemed to mount a different type of attack. The spherical ones fired energy weapons at him, but the armor's heavy refractory coating seemed to handle that threat adequately (for now). How long it could continue to do so was anybody's guess. Other formless globs were trying to envelop War Machine within them. He had no idea what would happen if one of them succeeded in this, and he had no intention of finding out. He had come inside Ultimo to dismantle it from within; on the assumption that it would be more vulnerable from the inside. Even facing this squadron of internal defenses, he was convinced that his logic held true. The strange globules looked formidable, but much less so than the titan they were within. War Machine shot an repulsor blast through one blob, and it shattered. No, they were definitely a lesser threat than Ultimo itself.

Now that he had determined that these defense systems could be shattered, War Machine unleashed a tremendous assault! His gatling gun raged, and his flame-thrower sliced through the flying cells. One shoulder cannon fired adamantium-tipped missiles, while the other discharged an electric plasma. His unibeam glowed white-hot and his helmet laser, usually used merely for targeting, was switched into offensive mode. In a short time, he reduced dozens of the odd creatures to glimmering masses on the "floor" of Ultimo. Rhodey had to admit to himself that he was enjoying this somewhat. It wasn't very often that he was able to cut loose to such an extent. Moreover, he was releasing a lot of pent-up tension and frustration, as well as distracting himself from his headache.

More of the bizarre gelatinous creatures amassed in front of War Machine, but it only encouraged him to proceed onwards. If these things were trying so hard to prevent him from going forward, then there must be something there that he wasn't supposed to reach, which made him determined to reach whatever it was! War Machine gained ground; while slaughtering more of the freaky globules. Once he was convinced that he could make progress through their attack, he began to divert some of his weaponry away from the cells and towards the walls of Ultimo's being. Not knowing what parts of Ultimo's guts were vulnerable, he simply fired indiscriminately; in the hopes that he would break something important and halt the giant's rampage of destruction.

Suddenly, War Machine's sensors flashed, warning him of an attack from behind. He swirled around to find that the defensive cells he had shattered were reforming and preparing to continue their assault. Rhodey cursed himself for not anticipating this, and cursed his headache for distracting him from such caution. He was not fighting at the peak of his abilities right now, and he knew it. Simultaneously combating a horde behind him and in front of him would not be easy. He began to spread his attack out in both directions, but was unable to prevent one of the formless globules from wrapping itself around him. Once it completely enshrouded him, the cell began gleaming eerily.

Almost immediately, the armor's internal sensors began blaring a warning at him. The odd globule was somehow secreting a strong acid onto his armor! "This is not good!" War Machine thought angrily. Being stuck with a damaged or disabled armor inside of Ultimo was not what he had planned for. For a moment, it occurred to Rhodey that he'd gone off on his own; instead of "playing nice with others", just as he had earlier accused Tony Stark of doing. In fact, the consequences of his doing so might even prove equally fatal! Rhodey shoved the fleeting thought out of his mind. He rejected the idea that he was acting similarly to Stark; his actions had been motivated by a desire to protect his teammates. Furthermore, such thoughts were counterproductive right now; he needed to focus on the problems at hand! With his awareness heightened by a sudden surge of adrenaline, War Machine took swift action. He electrified the outside of his armor to shock the blob-thing off of his armor. This action was quite effective, and the cell shattered once again. A quick glance at the armor's readout display showed that he had acted quickly enough; the armor's integrity had not been breached. Still, Rhodey didn't feel quite right; he couldn't place it, but something felt changed. Time itself seemed to flow differently, somewhat slower. He had no idea what the pseudo-cell had done to him to cause this, but one thing was now perfectly clear. Forcefully pressing his way into the inner chambers of Ultimo was not going to be as straightforward as he had once thought.

War Machine made a tactical assessment of his situation and decided that a change of plans was called for. Rather than force his way forward, he decided to break through the floor and directly enter the chambers below him. Missiles at short range were not terribly effective, so he resorted to pure physical might. With a solid blow to the ground, he shattered the structure beneath his feet and descended to the layer beneath.

What Rhodey found there was unlike anything he had ever seen before. War Machine was now inside an enormous chamber, which seemed to fill the bulk of Ultimo. Inside this chamber were thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of these strange pseudocelluar things. The formless ones and the spherical ones were there. Some string-like cells were also present. The blobs skitted to and fro inside of Ultimo and seemed to be performing different tasks. The electrical spheroids attached themselves to receptacles and waited; it almost seemed like they were powering Ultimo's various systems. The string-like cells appeared to function in teams, almost like muscular sinews. Hovering in the center of this chamber was an enormous orb-like object, which shone brightly. The blobs that weren't scuttling about performing certain tasks congregated about this orb. Was it some sort of generator recharging them? How did Ultimo keep itself powered up for all of these eons, anyway?

War Machine felt Ultimo bend over. As the robot did so, a large team of string-like globs congregated to near the rear of the chamber accomplish the maneuver. In short, it appeared that these pseudocells were more than a simple anti-intruder system; they were actually components that made Ultimo run! As impressive as all of this seemed, War Machine decided not to proceed any further into this large chamber. The one or two hundred cells he had faced up above had proved dangerous enough. He didn't believe he could successfully challenge ten thousand self-repairing cells. War Machine did an abrupt about-face and darted up past the hall he had been fighting in, back into the "Jeffries Tube". Inside, he scanned to see if any of the creatures were following him and found that they had not proceeded upwards. "Good," Rhodey thought. "If they don't want to go far from that central room, then I'll explore further upwards."

War Machine went up the shaft, reaching the branching point that led to the mouth. Some streaks of light from outside were visible as they entered between the spaces where Ultimo's "teeth" met. He decided to go further, and ascended the shaft until he reached the top. He aimed a repulsor at the door and braced himself for an encounter with more of the pseduocellular beings. If there were too many, he was prepared to go back down and exit from Ultimo's body.

"SHRAK!" The door crumbled before War Machine's repulsor blast. Scanning the other side, Rhodey found no trace of the odd cells that had been so numerous below. "Why aren't they up here?" he thought. No clear answer suggested itself. Perhaps if these creatures were the drones responsible for moving Ultimo, they weren't really necessary in the cranial region? In any case, it didn't matter. War Machine was no scientist. Here was here to stop Ultimo, not to analyze the behemoth!

"SHRAK!!" War Machine fired a double-repulsor blast at the walls of this chamber. Maybe he could shatter something here that would shut Ultimo down. Unfortunately, the walls of the room seemed to absorb the blast perfectly, with no visible damage. "Was this why no defenses are needed up here? Is it impossible to damage this place?" War Machine changed his approach from energy weapons to projectiles. "Surely an adamantium missile can shake this place apart!" To his surprise, War Machine watched his missile slowly creep through the air and cross the room. As it traveled, its energy got sapped; until it finally fell harmlessly to the ground; without ever hitting its target.

War Machine began to consider just how formidable an opponent Ultimo truly was. From the outside, he seemed like nothing more than an extremely powerful robot with one weapon: the eyebeams. Only from the inside could Rhodey begin to sense the sophisticated construction techniques of the aliens who created this monster. Although Ultimo's origin was a mystery, it was known that the Doomsday machine was quite ancient, perhaps older than human civilization. Rhodey began to wonder if the Ultimo they now faced was actually a run-down and decrepit creature who had fallen far from its peak capacity after millions of years. This was a sobering thought; how unstoppable a juggernaut would Ultimo have been when it was created? Who had built such a tool? And why? Where was this alien race now? And, most chilling of all, had they made more than one of these hideous things?

Since brute force had failed once more as an effective tool inside Ultimo, Rhodey began searching this cranial cavity for anything that could prove useful in teaching them how to halt the monster. Although he was not a scientist, Rhodey was quite intelligent and talented with machines. When it came to cars or planes, he was an ace mechanic, with tinkering skills beyond even those of Tony Stark. Maybe those skills could be put to use in here.

War Machine hoped that the rest of the Iron Legion was faring well against Ultimo from the outside, but he had no way of knowing. Although the entrance chamber to this upper region was mostly bare, the next space resembled some sort of hybrid between an office and a control room. It was a large oval chamber, perhaps ten feet tall, which was mostly empty. In one corner, there was a chair above which a skullcap hung suspended by a cable. There was a pulsing field of red energy next to the chair. The energy field was contained within a circular niche that ran from floor to ceiling. In the center of the space, there was a simple desk, with several books laying upon it. "Books?!" thought Rhodey incredulously. "Now why would they ever need books up here? And why wouldn't an alien society this advanced have everything be electronic, or something." He shook his head in disbelief. "Books."

It occurred to Rhodey that these books might be manuals describing how to operate Ultimo. He picked them up, noting the unusual substance from which they were made; it was definitely not paper! Rhodey quickly browsed through the texts, but he couldn't understand any of the words or symbols within. Many pages contained diagrams, confirming his belief that these were indeed operating manuals. However, Rhodey could not decipher the conventions followed by the diagrams, rendering this source of information useless to the current crisis. "Alien books. Of course." murmured Rhodey. "What else would you find in an alien robot? Well, I'm afraid I wasn't raised to speak in alien." Rather than place the books back on the desk, War Machine opened one of his utility compartments and stored them there. If the Iron Legion managed to survive this encounter with Ultimo, perhaps one of the big brains in the Avengers would be able to make some sense of them. He searched the desk further, looking for drawers which might contain valuable tools. The alien desk did seem to contain compartments, yet they would not open. No keyhole was visible; apparently the aliens used more advanced security measures. War Machine struck the front of one drawer, and a force shield glittered around it, deflecting his blow. The aliens used much more advanced security on their documents. War Machine wondered why the books he had found had been left carelessly unprotected. He also didn't understand why they hadn't fallen off the desk at some point during the passing years.

The next obvious choice of objects that could be useful was the chair with the headset/skullcap. It looked very much like a control chair, with a panel of buttons resting on the arm. Rhodey sat down and, after a cautious look about, removed his helmet. In its place, he lowered the skullcap onto his head. An alien voice began speaking in his ear. The high pitched voice reverberated slightly as it spoke in an almost musical fashion. The presence of this voice; and the incomprehensible instructions that it gave; convinced War Machine that this was indeed the system by which Ultimo could be manually controlled. "And why not?" mused Rhodey. "If I were an alien who wanted to build a killer robot, wouldn't I install a manual override, too?"

Encouraged by this belief, Rhodey tried hard to bring Ultimo to a halt. The instructions or requests made by the voice were as indecipherable as the text of the books had been. Instead, Rhodey pressed various combinations of the buttons on the chair's panel. Unfortunately, his actions produced no visible effects. Disappointedly giving up on this idea as well, Rhodey removed the skullcap, silencing the alien voice babbling its unknown message in his ears. Only one other item in this room seemed to have any potential: the glowing energy field next to the chair. If that couldn't be useful, he would have to decide whether to proceed further into Ultimo; or to emerge and assist his teammates. Rhodey put his own helmet back on; and regarded the pulsing field carefully. It actually looked a lot like the energy that was focused through Ultimo's eyebeams. Was it the same?

As he cautiously studied the red energy, the entire room shook. Before he had a chance to regain his balance, the floor turned nearly ninety degrees and War Machine was hurled into the gleaming red light. When he fell in, the field's glow flared up and expanded, but it died down quickly thereafter. It was no longer pulsing.

"I wonder what that was!" War Machine thought. "Feels like the Legion really dealt Ultimo a nice blow! Well, good for them! Go team, and all that... Now the only thing left is this wee little problem. How do I get out of this laser light show?"

War Machine tried to leave the bright redness, but was unable to do so. It was as if the energy field had attached itself to the armor, or even directly to him. He could move, but only a limited amount, and could not go anywhere near the boundary of the light. When strength wouldn't work, he resorted to weaponry; and cybernetically triggered his repulsors. They worked fine, the blast sped directly out of the red zone and had no effect on it. "Wait a second! I could actually see the repulsors moving. But that's just energy -- it's light! You can't slow light down and watch as it moves! Weird stuff... Anyway, it isn't getting me free any faster, so let's see if a shoulder missile will do the trick." War Machine used the automatic loader to lock another missile into place. Yet when he signaled it to launch, nothing happened. "So physical objects can't leave, huh. But energy can, at a really slow pace. Whoever built this thing had some really bizarre ideas."

"Still, if a repulsor blast can leave, then maybe radio waves can, too." Frustrated; and nearly out of ideas; War Machine began broadcasting on all frequencies, sending out a message to the Legionnaires outside asking for help.