Mortal Steel: Episode 3

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Mortal Steel: Episode 3
Source: collected/015-mortal-steel-episode-3.mp3
SHA-256: b843ae4736acc21ab74c8507ce026a847a1f2793bad41142a5ea50cd44e2e5c7
Model: scribe_v2 | Transcribed: 2026-10-10T18:11:47.539313+00:00
Machine transcript — uncorrected. Speaker labels are local to this recording and do not identify people.

[00:00:00.600] Speaker 1: [rock music]

[00:00:46.800] Speaker 1: Mortal Steel. [suspenseful music] Episode three, part four: Hail Mary. Ethan watched as a demon swooped toward him.

[00:01:02.060] Speaker 2: Overclock!

[00:01:04.360] Speaker 1: There was no reason to shout. He could have turned it on with a thought, but there was a layer of performance here that mattered to his second mind for some reason. The bio-overclocking kicked in, and time slowed to a near standstill. The swooping demon froze in mid-flight, its bat-like wings beating the air as if it were made of molasses now. Its elephant-like trunk was parted, the thousands of needle teeth dripping some vile green fluid. A dozen more like it circled above him. Below them, 23 humans in biker

[00:01:39.420] Speaker 1: leather were mounting rusted motorcycles in slow motion. Only seven of them had visible signs of demonic tainting, the same bone-like protrusions piercing the skin around the faces, necks, and hands.

[00:01:52.840] Speaker 2: Give me an inventory.

[00:01:54.900] Speaker 1: Icons covered Ethan's HUD. Most of them were gray with red crosses through them. Apparently, he was missing most of his arsenal. Weapons, The Messenger, Holy Fire, grenades, and something called Trinity. Below that was another category of tools called combat mods. Again, most of these were grayed out. It seemed pointlessly cruel to flaunt his full potential in front of him like this. Perhaps the nuns could explain it later, if he survived.

[00:02:30.220] Speaker 1: Of the 23 combat mods listed, only three were available. Neck Cracker, Tether Grapple, Hydraulic Heel.

[00:02:39.560] Speaker 2: Explain Neck Cracker.

[00:02:41.240] Speaker 1: Instead of a verbal explanation, his field of vision was overlaid with a hologram depicting his body and an enemy combatant, not unlike the combat simulations. If the hologram could be trusted, the Neck Cracker looked to be gruesomely effective at close range.

[00:02:59.200] Speaker 2: Explain Tether Grapple.

[00:03:01.660] Speaker 1: Another hologram. This time, Ethan actually laughed. He couldn't remember the last time he'd laughed. Why didn't he laugh anymore? He was watching a demonstration of the suggested uses for Holy Fire when his second mind started chirping. "Bio-overclock warning. Heat build-up. Danger." If he didn't release the overclock now, the excess heat would cook his own brain.

[00:03:29.260] Speaker 2: Release overclock.

[00:03:30.840] Speaker 1: Time started again. The flying demon parted its tentacle mouth. It was large enough to wrap around 10 people. They would be eviscerated in short order as well. Ethan glanced up at the circling demons. He made no move to dodge the dive. Instead, he stepped forward to meet it.

[00:03:51.540] Speaker 2: Hey, ugly.

[00:03:53.320] Speaker 1: 200 pounds of drooling demonic flesh slammed into him.

[00:03:57.600] Speaker 2: Ugh!

[00:03:57.720] Speaker 1: They both went flying from the impact, but Ethan held onto the beast by the base of the flapping mouth-

[00:04:03.540] Speaker 2: Ah!

[00:04:03.860] Speaker 1: ... preventing it from closing around him. They rolled around on the ground outside the church as the creature screamed and flailed to get free. He finally let it go, then stepped out of range of the gnashing talons. When he looked down, his right hand was missing. Exactly as planned. The demon took to the air again. The creatures were embarrassingly uncoordinated on the ground. A half-centimeter wire ran from the demon back to the stump of Ethan's right hand.

[00:04:35.940] Speaker 2: Come on and give me a lift.

[00:04:37.700] Speaker 1: The Tether Grapple stopped reeling out wire-

[00:04:39.900] Speaker 2: Ah!

[00:04:40.000] Speaker 1: ... and he was pulled violently across the sidewalk.

[00:04:42.520] Speaker 2: Ugh.

[00:04:43.340] Speaker 1: Dragged backward on his heels, the sound of roaring motorcycles drowned out the screaming demons. [motorcycle engines running] A pack of four humans rode toward him at full throttle as he was dragged along the ground, helpless to get away from them. They stood up on their bikes, nail bats raised. The first biker rolled up to him and swung her nail bat down at his exposed stomach. Ethan caught the bat and pulled. The woman fell from her bike, slamming into the church's sign with bone-crunching force. Her bike kept rolling for a dozen feet, then toppled over,

[00:05:18.360] Speaker 1: which gave him an idea. The second biker was smarter. He feinted with the club once-

[00:05:25.660] Speaker 2: Whoa

[00:05:26.220] Speaker 1: ... then buried it in Ethan's chest. The nail bat stuck, and the rider sped past, circling back for another pass. Pain and damage sensors lit up in Ethan's HUD, but his face didn't so much as twitch. Pain was only information now.

[00:05:43.420] Speaker 2: [inhales] Ah.

[00:05:46.240] Speaker 1: Ethan still slid backward, moving farther away from the church down the street as the flying demon struggled to climb higher. Apparently, he'd misjudged how much they could carry. Or maybe it was just dragging him along intentionally. Either way, he couldn't get his hand loose. The third biker tried the same trick as the second, feinting for his first swing. Ethan kicked off the ground, lunged, and grabbed the tainted man's arm instead of the bat. The man had just enough time to look terrified. Then Ethan ripped him off the

[00:06:20.824] Speaker 1: motorcycle, using the momentum of the falling man to mount the bike himself. He swung onto the seat and gripped the sides of the bike with his heels to keep that useless flying creature from pulling him off it. The fourth biker sped up next to Ethan and flashed a toothy, yellowing smile. She lifted her nail bat, intending to bring it down on his head, steadying herself on the motorcycle with the other hand. No thanks. I've already got a ride. Then he drew the messenger and shot out her front tire. The wheel was

[00:06:55.844] Speaker 1: shred to shrapnel, and the rider flipped over the handlebars and smashed into the side of the brick building. Ethan lifted the messenger to the sky. Time to put this thing out of its misery. Then he lowered the gun. Perhaps it just needed a little more motivation. He gripped the sides of the motorcycle with his legs as hard as he could without crushing it. Then he used his combined mass as leverage to pull back on the flying demon. There was a distant screech, and then Ethan swung the demon with his tether grapple,

[00:07:31.344] Speaker 1: pulling it off course as easy as pulling a kite. He smashed his living kite into another, the crunch of hollowed bones audible even at street level. All the while, he rode down the ruined streets of old Los Angeles, weaving between rusted cars. He swung the tangle of two creatures into a third with another sickening crunch. There were three of them at the end of his tether now. A tangled screeching mass of pale flesh a hundred feet above him. Ethan swerved to avoid a bus, its

[00:08:06.124] Speaker 1: rusted frame sagging on long deflated tires. The flying counterweight lurched left in the air. Ethan and his bike were slammed against the rusty bus. His shoulder was torn apart down to the titanium endoskeleton. This time, he screamed. Aim was information. Of course, a lot of information. Sparks flew as he tore through the side of the bus, dragged by the monsters. The sound of rending

[00:08:41.024] Speaker 1: metal filled his ears and the messenger was nearly torn from his hip. He was finally pulled through the other end of the bus, busting through the last of the rusting metal frame. It was then that the demons finally realized what was holding them down. In that moment, they stopped fighting to get free of the tangled tether and flapping in unison to climb higher into the air. Uh-oh. Then Ethan was lifted into the air, motorcycle and all. He had a moment to

[00:09:15.884] Speaker 1: reflect on his situation as the ruined cars and buildings grew smaller beneath him. Why was he riding a motorcycle in the sky? Why had he grappled these monsters instead of simply putting them all down with the messenger? Real life wasn't like those old action movies. When you had a targeting computer, you didn't miss. His second mind, which usually confined itself to answering direct questions, spoke up. It didn't use words. There was no need to use words. It

[00:09:50.924] Speaker 1: spoke directly to his intuition. Because presentation mattered. Far below, thirty-seven dirty human faces were pressed to the windows of the Church of Immaculate Conception, looking up at the man riding a motorcycle through the sky, leashed to monsters like it was something he did every day. Ethan pulled on the motorcycle's throttle. Though the wheel spun uselessly in midair, it made the engine whirr.

[00:10:26.864] Speaker 1: Because presentation mattered. He let go of the throttle and pulled the messenger. The trio of demons swung him and his bike in a wide arc through the sky, turning him almost horizontal at the end of his tether, with a perfect view of the biker gang far below, gawking up at him. He dropped seven bikers in as many shots, the blue line showing estimated bullet trajectories ending in satisfying sprays of red blood.

[00:11:03.784] Speaker 1: He continued sailing in an arc over their heads, gripping the bike with his legs and waiting to see what they would do. As he'd hoped, with half their number already dead, the tainted bikers decided they'd had enough. They sped away from him down the car-choked streets. Unlike their more twisted cousins in the sky, these people still felt fear. A proximity alarm forced Ethan to look up. The flat side of a concrete building was flying toward him at lethal speed.

[00:11:38.764] Speaker 1: Overclock! Time slowed to a crawl, with Ethan and his motorcycle just twenty feet and one short second away from becoming a stain on the side of the building. He queried his second mind. Well, now what? A tactical hologram flashed in front of him. He watched it, then grimaced. Was this really the only option? He watched a few different simulations, most of which ended with him mangled at the foot of the building in front

[00:12:13.744] Speaker 1: of him, next to the burning wreckage of his motorcycle. He got the feeling his second mind showed them more for emphasis than actual strategy. This was his only option.

[00:12:28.480] Speaker 2: I better not get a ticket for this.

[00:12:31.260] Speaker 1: Time unfroze. Ethan's second mind helpfully notified him that if the old world laws still applied, he had already accrued 73 traffic violations. But since this was the side of a building and not the road, he was safe up here, legally speaking anyway. The building flew at him. Ethan leaned back on the bike and extended his heels. He waited for the moment of impact and... [motorcycle revving] [building crashing] He fired the hydraulic heels. Two sets of three-inch

[00:13:06.020] Speaker 1: steel plates shot out of his heels and smashed into the building. 37 tons of crushing force counteracted the impact. The side of the building imploded. Head-sized chunks of concrete showered the interior. There was a quick zipping sound on the other side of the building as the flying demons were diced into pieces, the sudden force causing the wire to cut through them like a scalpel. Even if they were dead, there was enough mass to act as a counterweight. He hung off the side of

[00:13:41.080] Speaker 1: the building, suspended by the tether next to the gaping hole he'd kicked in. His second mind warned of hairline fractures through his titanium endoskeleton in his legs, hips, and spine. He ignored them and, still gripping the motorcycle between his unreasonably powerful thighs, pulled back on the throttle. The machine roared. [motorcycle roaring] The spinning tires met concrete, and he used the counterweight of the tether to pull the motorcycle against the wall. Then he

[00:14:16.060] Speaker 1: drove up the side of the building. He raced past blown-out windows toward the open sky, where the rest of the flying demons circled above. Ethan smiled. They were just more corpses waiting to happen. [upbeat music] Part five, Almost Invincible. Xorkek the Imp, servant of The Chained One, bowed before the possessed human who called

[00:14:51.040] Speaker 1: himself The Stalker. Xorkek was almost three feet tall, which was tall for an imp, but still dwarfed by the possessed, even when seated on his throne. The Stalker's right side, his holy side, was beautifully transformed. His right arm was twice the length of a normal human. The elongated fingers on that hand had a tendency to move around on their own, constantly feeling the world around it as if he were blind. Xorkek supposed

[00:15:26.280] Speaker 1: he was, in a way. Even after all these months, the transformation was still incomplete. The left side of The Stalker's body was that of a normal human, the remains of the original host. Annoyingly, that man barred one of The Chained One's children from entering this world. He could not understand why The Stalker was delaying in such a beautiful process. What purpose was there in holding on to human weakness? There were still so many humans crawling around in this city. Had they

[00:16:01.200] Speaker 1: done anything redeeming recently? No. The strongest of them had died decades ago. Perhaps that was why The Stalker was losing his territory war. Still too human. Well, whether Xorkek served this host or the next, it didn't matter. A child was ready to be born, and he would see it into this world.

[00:16:26.940] Speaker 2: Get up, Xorkek. You said I should bow. I said you should show respect. I am. You're incapable of respect. I am here to serve you.

[00:16:40.580] Speaker 1: Then The Stalker snatched Xorkek off the floor.

[00:16:43.300] Speaker 2: Ah.

[00:16:43.660] Speaker 1: A mix of emotions flooded him, elation at being noticed by his holy half, and terror that his elongated fingers wrapped around him, threatening to crush him.

[00:16:56.980] Speaker 2: What happens if I [Xorkek grunts] kill you again? Uh, war. I'm already at war. I am an emissary, protected. The hordes will converge on you, expunge you like human cancer. Ah.

[00:17:12.920] Speaker 1: The Stalker opened his hand, and Xorkek fell to the floor. He let the arm drop to his side, so long the elbow nearly brushed the floor.

[00:17:23.400] Speaker 2: Report. I hate looking at your kind.

[00:17:26.560] Speaker 1: And not for the first time, Xorkek wondered if he'd chosen the wrong human as host. Gaining inside knowledge of a human stronghold had been an offer too good to pass up. It wouldn't matter in a few more months anyway. No host could resist forever.

[00:17:46.140] Speaker 2: A human priest gave an unholy sermon in your territory. He desecrated a building with it. He was looking for you.

[00:17:54.200] Speaker 1: Though his transform half continued its blind, ambient touching, the human half of The Stalker went unusually still, just for a moment.

[00:18:06.040] Speaker 2: Did he seem unusual in any way? [growls]

[00:18:11.380] Speaker 1: How was he supposed to know? What did it matter anyway? The Stalker stood abruptly.

[00:18:17.700] Speaker 2: Send an emissary team. Ah. Bring him straight to me, unharmed. That is important

[00:18:24.084] Speaker 1: Xorkek waved his barbed tail around nervously. This was not good. He was becoming less and less certain this possessed would honor his pact. Um, I have bad news, Holy One. He destroyed half of the riders I sent to kill him. Some mixers were there as well. The stalker grimaced. Such a human expression. Even though half of his face was covered in bone plating, he brought his human hand to his face, contemplative instead of furious. Fortunately- In that

[00:18:58.844] Speaker 1: case, send the strongest demon we have. That would be the spine eater, which was insane overkill. This was the kind of weapon you used against buildings, not people. The spine eater. Send it. Holy One, forgive me, but it's just one man. The stalker narrowed his eyes and Xorkek considered running. This one was unhinged, even for a possessed. Not anymore. And if he's what I think he is, we're going to need more

[00:19:33.564] Speaker 1: spine eaters. Xorkek bowed again, still uncertain whether that won him any favor, then rushed off to release the weapon. He didn't relish the thought of having to round it up again later, but at least he wouldn't have to feed it for a while. It was a pain gathering living humans every day. They were so fragile, and the spine eater wasted so many of them. But he wasn't gonna be the one to tell it to stop playing with its food. It sucks.

[00:20:04.924] Speaker 1: [mysterious music] Ethan pulled the trigger of the messenger until the ammo ran dry, and still the demons came. Not just the flying ones, but nightmarish crawling things like giant cockroaches with human heads growing from their backs. Corpse nests, disgusting demon spawn made from human corpses. Ethan washed away another wave of

[00:20:39.944] Speaker 1: corpse nests as they crawled over the edge of the building. The burning napalm, consecrated by the nuns, did much more than burn the monsters. It simply disintegrated them. Then the napalm, dramatically titled Holy Fire on his HUD, ran dry too. Ethan searched frantically for more enemies. The hellish creatures had swarmed the rooftop in droves. It felt like the entire city had emptied itself of monsters to greet him. He was out of

[00:21:14.924] Speaker 1: ammo, out of grenades. He'd even used the motorcycle itself as a makeshift club until it had finally fallen to pieces. It was a shame it was too late to contact the manufacturer. Ethan would have enjoyed telling them just how far it had exceeded manufacturer standards. He waited a moment longer, but blessedly, there were no more demons. It was silent on the rooftop, except for the soft sound of smoldering

[00:21:49.844] Speaker 1: corpses. Music. He spun the messenger in his hand and holstered it, and spared a moment for a simmering look at the horizon. That was enough presentation for one day. He climbed down the building, careful not to strain his endoskeleton any further. The nuns had asked him not to get it too dented, after all. It seemed unkind to make them work any harder. Despite the duration of his escapade, it was a short walk back to the church.

[00:22:25.204] Speaker 1: It was evening turning twilight by then. The last rays of sunlight bled at the edges of the horizon, turning it a wicked purple by the time he started up the stairs to the church. A red warning sign flashed on Ethan's HUD. I told you to turn those off. The warning sign turned from red to black. His optics switched to infrared and Ethan stopped in his tracks. Class A demonic threat. Fifty combat

[00:22:59.904] Speaker 1: simulations ran in the instant it took his human brain to catch up. Fifty defeats. It was the sound of chewing that shook him from his stupor. Two bright orange eyes watched him with casual interest from the front doors of the church. The splintered, ruined front doors of the church. A dark river, nearly black in infrared, ran from the pile of human pieces next to the demon. It,

[00:23:35.924] Speaker 1: it had killed them. A booming voice rattled in Ethan's mind. A metal man. The demon rose from its haunches, standing at its full height. Ethan's second mind went wild, dumping information into his thoughts. Nine feet, seven inches, six hundred seven pounds, four-inch chitin armor, regenerative abilities, psychic abilities unknown, six hundred and twelve combat simulations completed, zero percent chance of combat success.

[00:24:11.784] Speaker 1: Shut up. Eight hundred and fifty combat simulations completed, zero percent chance of combat success. The demon took a step forward, letting the mangled person it was eating fall from its claws. Ethan selected Trinity from his weapons list, the only one remaining. Three spring-loaded blades shot out of his left arm, the points of a cross extending over his hand from the wrist and out to the left and

[00:24:46.548] Speaker 1: right. One thousand twenty-one combat simulations completed. Zero percent chance of success. Retreat advised. Instead, Ethan stepped forward to meet the monster.

[00:25:04.328] Speaker 1: [rock music]

[00:25:45.308] Speaker 1: Xorcax stepped through the burning portal into the holy realm. Stepping through portals wasn't like walking through a door. You were completely incinerated in the process. You were remade on the other side, assuming the power that resided there allowed it. A portal could be a fast death if you were not faithful or useful. So far, the Lord of Darkness itself had deigned to allow Xorcax continued existence. Xorcax climbed into his seat at the bar. A slave demon

[00:26:20.188] Speaker 1: poured a glass of blood for him without comment. Good. He was above this creature, at least. A few minutes later, two more imps wandered in from their own portals, looking nearly as troubled as he did. They were about Xorcax's size. A little smaller, maybe. Xorcax was pretty tall. They sat down in the high chairs on either side of him. Surely, the Holy Ones could find more suitable seating than this. A chair meant for a human baby was

[00:26:56.028] Speaker 1: simply not regal. He spilled some of his blood drink. Damn it. But the slave demon mopped it up quickly.

[00:27:06.708] Speaker 2: Hey, Xorc. Another tough day?

[00:27:12.808] Speaker 1: Oh, you have no idea.