“Good, the code works here, too. That means the Soone family also ruled here,” Orin said.
“But how is that possible?”
“I’m not sure. We’ve lost so much of our historical information because of the war. When I was a child there were stories told by the oldest members of our clan. They said we had not always been on our home world. They spoke of a migration, but that’s about all I can remember.”
“Well, where do we start?” Tiet asked, turning his attention to the computer database.
“How about with those strange spheres we encountered?”
Orin typed in the word spheres and instantly a list of subcategories scrolled across the display. Among the data entries were schematics and weapon systems capabilities for a massive attack vehicle. It must have measured three miles in diameter and looked just like the smaller spheres which they had witnessed earlier destroying the space fleet of the Vorn.
When the information on the Sphere’s origin came across, they were shocked to find that it was the long dead Barudii of this planet who had constructed the huge machine. They scanned page after page of data, hardly able to fathom their findings.
“I can’t believe they built this thing,” Tiet said in amazement.
“To fight the Vorn, or avenge themselves-either way, a very deadly weapon to unleash on anyone.”
“Yeah, but we never saw this one-only the smaller drones.”
“You can be sure it’s out there,” Orin said. “It’s probably directly responsible for the destruction of the space station we witnessed. It appears they launched it just prior to being wiped out by the Vorn. It was sent to attack their home world of Demigoth then pursue the remainder of their clan and annihilate them.”
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-it’s still transmitting data back to its creators,” Orin said.
“Look at this tactical map. Isn’t that Mt. Vaseer and the Saberhawk in the southern valley?”
“Yes, and on a direct trajectory from the Sphere down to the valley is a massive group of drones!” said Orin.
“Look at that, coming in from the northern pass. It looks like a ground army and their moving toward the southern valley, too!”
“Orin to Saberhawk, dust off immediately! I say dust off immediately!” Orin commanded. “Enemy forces are closing rapidly on your position!”
“We’ve got to get down there to them!” Tiet shouted. He scrambled out of the room and down the corridor.
Orin followed, still trying to get through to the ship.
“Millo to Orin…are you there?”
“Yes, Millo! I hear you! You’ve got to get 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, they heard the noise of battle in the valley below. Many of the spheres were already attacking the Saberhawk. The ship was pinned down by a swarm of drones strafing at it with their energy weapons.
Another group of spheres landed in the valley and began a terrible transformation. Long arms emerged from their sides lifting their bodies and acting 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 appeared to be Horva, but Tiet noticed that these were different. They were dark skinned men like the Vorn and Horva he had seen, but they were an organized fighting force-not like the brutes they had encountered back home at all.
The Horva drove forward by the thousands against the large robots, who in turn were spraying them with wave after wave of laser fire. Tiet saw the Horva using the same electromagnetic shield generators he and Dorian had on their uniforms. Laser fire sprayed into Horva ranks, but killed very few.
They moved in close to engage the sphere robots with larger pulse cannons mounted upon hydraulic arms attached to their vests. The pulse cannons did damage to the hulking robots. It seemed to Tiet that the pulse wavelength modulated continually to match the shield wavelengths of the robots, allowing them to penetrate.
All the combatants laid siege to the Saberhawk, even though the Horva and the sphere robots were more interested in one another.
Tiet ran down the main path of the city toward the valley with Orin following hard after him. The Saberhawk hovered forty feet off of the ground, but the sky above them was too congested with enemy vessels to get clear of the battle. Tiet saw the Saberhawk returning fire in all directions, but it was greatly outnumbered. He knew their shields must be losing power reserves fast at this rate. Before long, they would be taking hits directly to the hull. Then it would all be over.
Tiet ran with all his strength trying to get to Dorian. He had to protect her. He leaped away from the path at a nearby ledge overlooking a thirty foot drop down to the fighting already raging below. Tiet landed right in the middle of a group of clones firing on a nearby robot. The dark skinned clones immediately reacted to his presence, bringing their weapons to bear on him.
Tiet’s kemsticks leaped to his hands from their leg clips as he landed among the men. He sliced one rifle in two, while deflecting another shot at point blank range. He swept his body downward under the barrel of another clone who fired and killed a fellow soldier standing ready on the other side. With a complete sweep of his kemstick, Tiet cut the man down at the knees. He wasted little time dispatching two others then quickly ran off to reach the Saberhawk.
“We’re the biggest thing out here!” Millo complained.
Dorian blasted away with the Saberhawk’s weapons while Millo looked for a clearing in the congestion overhead.
“If we’re so big, 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 had 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 losses, they continued to blast away at the automatons. For every ten Horva getting killed, a robot was brought down.
Vale and his doubles were fiercely engaged in the ground battle. The three androids moved swiftly through the battlefield toward the position of the Saberhawk. Vale remembered his defeat by the Barudii warrior on the same vessel. There was little doubt he could acquire his target there again. The triplet androids moved independently as though separate beings, yet all were under the control of Vale and the Sphere.
Vale noticed the ship veering away from the fight and heading toward their position.
Vale-one and two pulled hypermagnetic grapples and fired them at the ship as it passed low overhead. Vale-three was still fighting with a Horva warrior as the hull-implanted grapples pulled the other two androids up and away from the battlefield. Vale-one and two retracted their grapple cables until they reached the hull.