by Unknown
A small illuminated box on the display began to blink as Orin continued scanning the data. He tapped the box with his finger, causing more data to appear.
“This appears to be a live feed from the Sphere itself.�
“Look at that tactical map. Isn’t that Mt. Vaseer and the Saberhawk in the valley to the south of us?�
“Yes, and on a direct trajectory from the large Sphere down to the valley is a massive group of those drones!�
“Look at that, coming in from the northern pass. It looks like a ground army and they are heading toward the southern valley, too!�
“Orin to Saberhawk, dust off immediately! I say dust off immediately! Enemy forces are closing rapidly on your position!�
“We’ve got to get down there to them,� shouted Tiet as he scrambled out of the room and down the corridor.
Orin followed, while still trying to get through to the ship, but there was only static.
Suddenly he heard a reply.
“Millo to Orin…are you there?�
“Yes Millo! I hear you! There are two different groups of combatants converging on your location. You’ve got to get yourselves out of there now!� shouted Orin into the headset as he tried to keep up with Tiet through the corridors leading to the surface.
“I’ve got them on scans already. Shields are at maximum and weapons systems have been armed. I’m trying to lift off but some of those drones are already within visual range and closing fast on us.�
“Do your best. We’re on our way!�
When Tiet and Orin reached the main gate, they found it blasted almost completely away. As the pair emerged into the open air again they could already hear the noise of battle in the valley below. Many of the spheres were engaged in combat with the hovering Saberhawk. It appeared to be pinned down by the swarm of drones strafing at it with their energy weapons.
The other group of spheres landing in the valley threw large arms out of their sides that lifted their bodies and acted as legs to carry them and fight with. Blasters popped out of the tops to lay down laser fire against the masses of Horva.
The pass from the north to the southern valley was flooded completely with ground forces that greatly resembled the Horva, but Tiet noticed that these were different. They were dark skinned men like the Vorn but stronger looking and they wore uniforms and moved more like an organized fighting force; not like the brutes they had encountered back home at all. They were utilizing pulse weapons to fire on the sphere robots as the two sides of the struggle engaged one another.
The Horva were swarming in massive numbers upon the large robots, who in turn were spraying them with wave after wave of automatic laser fire. Tiet could see that the Horva were also using similar portable shield generators like the ones used by the Barudii.
They moved in close to engage the sphere robots with larger pulse cannons mounted upon hydraulic arms that attached to their vests. The pulse cannons were doing some definite damage to the hulking robots. It appeared to Orin as though the pulse wavelength was modulating continually to match the shield wavelengths of the robots, allowing them to penetrate.
All of the combatants were laying siege to the Saberhawk, even though the Horva and the sphere robots were more interested in each other. Tiet ran down the main path of the city toward the valley with Orin following hard after him. The Saberhawk was hovering about forty feet off of the ground but the sky above them was too congested with enemy vessels to get clear of the battle.
Tiet could see that the ship was returning fire in all directions, but it was greatly outnumbered on the battlefield. He knew that their shields were losing power reserves fast at this pace, and before long they would be taking hits directly to the hull and it would all be over.
Tiet was running with all his might to get to her; to protect her. He leapt away from the path from a nearby ledge that took a drop thirty feet down to the fighting already raging below. He landed right in the middle of a group of several Horva that were firing on a distant sphere robot. They immediately reacted to his presence, bringing their weapons to bear on him.
His kemsticks leapt to his hands as he landed among them. He sliced one rifle in two, severing its owners hand at the wrist while deflecting another shot at point blank range. He swept downward under the barrel of one of them who fired and killed another Horva that had been standing ready on the other side, and with a complete sweep of his kemstick, cut the Horva down at the knees. He wasted little time dispatching two others, and then quickly moved onward to try and get to the Saberhawk.
“WE’RE the biggest thing out here!� said Millo in frustration.
Dorian blasted away at the weapons controls while Millo looked for a clearing in the congestion overhead.
“If we’re so big, then can’t we just plow through those other ships?�
“After seeing those spheres ramming into the Vorn ships I’d rather not take any chances. I’m going to try and move us out of the battle at this altitude.�
“Well, you better hurry; our shields are already down to thirty percent power!�
The battlefield was overrun with Horva warriors, fighting furiously against the robots. Although the Horva were taking heavy losses, they continued to blast away at the automatons. For every twenty or more Horva getting killed, a robot was brought down. The Horva vastly outnumbered the robots and at least thirty thousand had rushed into the valley by now.
VALE and his doubles were fiercely engaged in the ground battle. The androids under Vale’s mind were swiftly moving through the battlefield on foot toward the position of the Saberhawk. He knew that he had faced the Barudii warrior on the same vessel and had been defeated. He had no doubt that he could acquire his target there again. The triplet androids moved independently as though separate beings; yet all were under the one mind of Vale with the Sphere.
Combatant after combatant was cut down as they moved swiftly toward the Barudii ship; only engaging in close combat as necessary. Then Vale noticed that the ship was veering away from the fight and heading toward them, apparently trying to escape the situation.
Vales one and two quickly pulled hypermagnetic grapples and fired them at the ship as it passed low overhead. The third was still engaged with a Horva warrior as the hull-planted grapples pulled the other two androids up and away from the battlefield. Vales one and two retracted the grapple cables to bring themselves up to the hull.
Activating their hypermagnetic discs beneath their android skin, they each clung to the hull of the Saberhawk. The ship’s shields did not prevent them since they only repulsed energy weapons. The two androids avoided any attempt to cut through the hull with Barudii blades as it would no doubt cause a repulsion charge from the shields that would fling them off the hull or vaporize them. They made their way quickly across the hull on their bellies as the shields snapped back energetically above them at the incoming pulse laser blasts from the battle.
They recalled the entry code for the outer hull hatch that Vale had gone through before and keyed it in when they reached the door. The door obeyed and both androids entered the ship without incident. Vale recognized the cargo hold as the place of his defeat at the hands of the Barudii warrior.
Wasting no time, the robots moved to the doorway of the cargo hold and found it locked. The second Vale brought his blade to bear on the door and proceeded to cut a portal through. The pair proceeded down the corridor toward the bridge, even as the ship shuddered under the enemy fire raining upon it from all directions. The bridge door was closed and the androids could hear voices from beyond it; a man and a woman. Without trying the lock, the pair sliced through the door.
Dorian whirled around, hearing the sound of ignited Barudii blades, and the crackling of molecular bonds bursting at their touch. From her hand flew a spicor disc toward the door and the an
droid coming in through a newly cut hole. Trapped within the confines of the portal it had just cut, the first Vale caught the spicor disc in the upper torso. The tightly controlled burst pattern vaporized all but its arms above the waist.
Dorian quickly pulled her blade as the second robot moved in fast over its fallen twin. She could feel the pressure and the pain building in her fractured arm as she brought it to join the other on the hilt of her sword.
Millo looked back from the controls, as he heard the spicor explode behind him. The ship was still taking a beating from the sporadic weapons fire erupting from the battlefield below them; there was no way he could leave the controls. Vale pulled his pulse blaster with his free hand and sprayed laser fire in all directions across the bridge. The electromagnetic shield on Dorian’s forearm blazed to life to repel the incoming blasts.
Millo held the controls of the Saberhawk, as the firestorm swept across the bridge. Several shots pierced his flight chair and his body. He arched at the pain as he slumped forward over the controls and his life drained away from him.
The ship lurched upward and back, causing Vale to stumble a moment. As he brought the blaster back to bear on Dorian, it met her blade in flight; slicing through both the weapon and the android’s hand. Without any notion of pain, Vale brought his own blade down upon Dorian’s shoulder, only to find her blade barring the way. With Millo slumped over the controls and many of the flight controls destroyed by laser fire, the Saberhawk began backwards from its course, descending clumsily toward the battlefield.
TIET could see the Saberhawk under fire from the battlefield and the sky; and still it was driving hard away from the fight. Soon she would be safe, and away from the danger. In his heart he urged the ship on to escape with his love safe inside. He and Orin had been separated by a small distance, and were furiously taking down Horva after Horva.
These were men, not like the brutish wild beasts back home on Castai. They had a definite measure of intelligence about them that could be seen just in their fighting techniques. But still, they were no match for the skills of Barudii warriors and their kinetic powers.
Neither Orin nor Tiet had made any attempt to fight against the sphere robots, since they were only built to attack the Vorn. The Sphere’s fight was their fight. The Saberhawk was still some two hundred yards away as it trailed low over the battlefield to get away.
The entire valley before Mt. Vaseer was ablaze with laser fire, and overhead a multitude of aerial combatants were tearing each other out of the sky. Wreckage was dropping onto the battlefield at regular intervals as the sphere drones and the Vorn attack fighters exchanged blows.
A Horva warrior strafed at Tiet with its pulse rifle. He deflected several blasts with kemsticks as he whirled them about his body and then he let one go toward his attacker. It caught the Horva’s gun as it proceeded on to swipe across his chest and cut him down. The ignited kemstick rebounded back to Tiet’s waiting hand in time to parry an incoming battle staff in the hands of another Horva. His second kemstick dispatched the opponent quickly with a straight thrust to the chest.
Orin too, was fairing well in the battle; evading laser fire through the use of his kinesis and tearing down multiple opponents with his blade. Tiet kept a visual on the ship. Its path was leading it off the battlefield to the east and he was glad Millo was getting them out.
Suddenly the ship slowed, arching nose up and coming back around from its former course. Something was wrong. Tiet’s heart dropped in his chest as he noticed pulse laser fire flashing repeatedly from the bridge windows. “No!!�
The ship fell back from its escape run and began clumsily descending into the battlefield. If they didn’t recover quickly they were going to crash for sure, and Tiet was too far away to do anything to help them. Several men approached to attack from multiple angles. Tiet repelled them all with a three hundred and sixty degree kinetic blast; sending them backward with crushing force.
He reached out in desperation with his kinesis to seize the ship and keep it aloft, but the Saberhawk’s engines were fighting to drive it downward into the valley floor. Another Horva approached unnoticed from behind. His heart seized violently just before he could bring his battle staff down on Tiet. Orin watched him drop to the ground as he released him from his own mental grip from fifty yards away. He could see Tiet fixed upon the descending Saberhawk, trying to hold it up, but to no avail. There was simply no time to stop it.
The ship slammed into the valley floor, crushing several of the sphere robots and dozens of Horva warriors caught in its path. The Saberhawk burst into several large pieces as it tumbled over twice.
Tiet felt all strength leave his body at the thought of Dorian going down to her death in that fireball.
Then the conviction that she wasn’t dead gripped him and he burst away from his position with blazing speed. Tiet was moving swiftly through engaged combatants and making only the slightest effort to dispatch anyone who turned to engage him while on his way. Quickly he closed the distance between himself and the wreckage. He wasn’t sure why, but he knew that Dorian was not dead. He began to sense her location in the wreckage as he drew nearer; he sensed great pain.
Suddenly from the wreckage before him, a familiar adversary emerged with the majority of its synthetic skin burned away. It was the android again. This thing was responsible for the wreck. It had hurt her. Before the robot even spotted him, Tiet hit it with a kinetic burst fueled by pure rage that sent it flying against a large section of the Saberhawk’s hull. Before the android could recover, he pinned its head to the wreckage with his father’s blade. Its body jerked with mechanical aftershocks and moved no more.
Tiet backed away and quickly found Dorian pinned underneath a metal support pillar. He waved it off of her with his mind and was at her side. Dorian was barely conscious when she looked at him. She tried to speak, but did not have the strength.
Tiet could not find words, as tears welled up and escaped down his anguished face. He held her hand, and could feel it grow cold as life began to leave her. Dorian reached to touch the donjarr on Tiet’s wrist, and then she touched his lips. Her fingertips lingered there only a moment as her body went limp and her gaze became void of life. Tiet’s mind was racing without any coherent thoughts. He was completely numb in his senses. His love was dead before him. Sorrow filled his mind and despair gripped his heart.
He could still hear the battle raging around him, then something else, like heavy footsteps running across the wreckage; too heavy for a man. He looked back to find the android still lifeless and pinned to the hull by his father’s sword. Then he looked toward the approaching sound to see another android coming at him with its own blade ready to strike. Without hesitation he reached for his imbedded blade, which obediently dislodged itself and leapt to his hand in time to meet the android’s strike.
He wondered only a moment at how there seemed to be quite a few of these things. But the fight was on. Tiet slashed furiously at the deadly android, finding every strike countered. He was completely enraged, as the thought of Dorian lying here dead on this battlefield tore through his mind. He screamed out in fury at the robot. “Die!!�
His rage burst forth as a wave of psychokinetic energy that hit the third android with astonishing force; sending it flying through the air into a pile of the Saberhawk’s wreckage. Tiet had never felt so powerful. His power was being fueled by his rage over Dorian’s death and he could not contain it. The Vale android regained its composure and headed for him again. He lowered his father’s blade to his side and let the kinetic power flow freely.
The Vale robot was coming closer with its own blade ready to strike. Suddenly the Barudii blade it carried extinguished itself.
The puzzled android stopped for a moment, trying to re-ignite the weapon’s dispersion field. Tiet looked on with grim satisfaction, knowing he had just crushed the crystal in the
hilt of the sword with his thoughts. He summoned the wreckage around him to attack the robot.
Large, man-sized pieces of the debris flew off the ground toward Vale; striking the robot repeatedly. The jagged hunks of metal tore away the android’s veneer of humanity, exposing the adomen skeleton beneath. The projectiles pummeled the robot again and again, tearing off an arm and parts of its torso.
Tiet scowled at his prey as he launched the mental attack but nothing could dull the pain of losing her. He quickly tired of the game and sent his father’s blade spinning toward the robot. The blade pierced its adomen skull and stopped when the hilt impacted its metal cranium. The android fell over as dead as a mechanical could be and did not move again. The battle still raged on around Tiet, as he knelt down near Dorian’s body and sobbed.
The_Chronicl-ir_to_the_King
VI
MALEC surveyed his monitors again to be sure. It was unwise to give the General premature information. He was a great leader, but not a patient man. “General, the weapons are fully charged, sir, and we have locked onto the orbital location of the giant Barudii Sphere,� said Malec.
But the General did not acknowledge his words at all. He was watching something taking place on the battlefield that he had not expected to see.
“Sir?�
“Yes, Malec, I heard you,� said Grod.
“Shall I order the weapons to fire General? “
“Wait just a moment.�
“But sir, the window of opportunity is closing fast. Our junk satellites will drift beyond the Sphere’s location if we don’t act now,� said Malec with more urgency.
