Akira smirked; Bran was clearly alive which confirmed that the body that was ‘cooked’ in the explosion had been a fake as they had suspected but had not been able to confirm before everything went boom.
Bran was equally surprised to see them in return. He admitted that he’d never expected to see anyone other than an assassin at the outpost door and he seemed relieved that they weren’t there to kill him.
So this was what a master hacker looked like, thought Paragon as he took in the massive crocodilian alien standing in front of them. The question was what side was he on? His recorded announcement before the apartment exploded claimed he was (had been?) a supporter of the invaders, a collaborator, yet here he was hiding out alone here, away from everyone. What did that mean, really?
Akira pushed his way inside and took off his respirator mask, “You’re supposed to be dead. You look good for a zombie.”
“Yeah, I faked my death using a realistic decoy. That synthetic body wasn’t cheap. Still totally worth it, hopefully.”
“We need to know the truth Bran, where do your loyalties lie?”
Bran looked at the floor, seemingly in embarrassment. “With myself first and foremost.” He muttered. Akira pressed the point. “Do you serve anyone other than yourself?”
“Does anyone?” he replied. “Some people do,” responded a confused Akira. “Really?” said Bran. “Where does your self-interest lie then?” was Akira’s response.
“I, then, ah… Look, I figured it would get a pay cheque and give one to the authorities.” As he spoke, he raised his middle index claw in a rude gesture to indicate what he meant. Akira nodded. “Yeah, I can understand where you’re coming from.”
“You know what, this is a really bad time for me to be snarky, sorry I get nervous around like authority figures or whatever. What were we talking about?” He paused then continued, “but I didn’t really expect things to go as far as it has. I thought Daedalus or somebody like you guys would sweep in and stop it before things got serious. I don’t mean to be so good at my job. I’m not making this sound any better, I know. Trust me. In my head, you guys would have totally loved this.”
Akira probed, “If you could see yourself receiving some sort of reward..? “ A now very agitated Bran interrupted him, “I’d just be happy not being locked up for the rest of my life, or executed. I’m rather fond of this head of mine. I like how it sits on my shoulders, you know? At some point, someone is going to realise that it was me that programmed the robots and realise that I signed up with Kona and her thugs and then someone will want to see me executed or locked away for a very long time and I really don’t want that. I’m really not keen on being locked away until my scales turn grey and my canines start to fall out.”
Akira smiled, “We’ve earned a lot of good will and are owed a few favours here and there, if you help us we should be able to help you in return.”
Paragon butted in, “Undoing your programming and reversing the robots’ loyalty would go a long way to helping your case.”
“The main issue is the robots, yes? They need to be reprogrammed, or should that be re-reprogrammed? It’s a pretty intense program I wrote. It messes with their shared network, switches off the combat inhibitors, amplifies their on-board computers to weapons grade coordination, and gives them a massive taste for iron grip dictators. I’d be pretty rad if they weren’t, you know, trying to kill everybody.”
“Did you intend to program them to attack everyone?” asked Banshee.
“Sort of, I guess. I mean I don’t want anything like this to happen, at least not while I was still there. Oh, that sounds bad. I just mean, oh I don’t know what I mean. If I succeed though, I don’t want to face prison or execution or any such finality, you know? You should be totally just like let me go and not arrest me or anything. Yeah? I mean, that would be super cool of you. We got a deal?”
Akira didn’t know what to say and finally blurted out, “If the authorities agreed, I don’t want to make promises we can’t keep. The authorities have said that they would reward us if we succeeded and they may well be happy for you to live out your days peacefully, but if not how would you feel about coming back to Earth with us?”
Bran spat, “Back to that scumhole? I’d be placed back on Star island, in Camp E.T. wouldn’t I? It’s not like I can blend in with the planetary population can I?”
“So you’d rather stay here?” Bran looked nervous, “You know what it’s like, being an alien on your planet? The looks you get even when you go to get a drink? Then the authorities grab you off the streets and lock you away on that windswept island in the middle of nowhere. Xenophobes and hypocrites all, okay, maybe just most of you Huu-mans!”
Akira tried to persuade him to at least consider what he assumed was the easiest option that they would be able to guarantee, even if they had to smuggle the creature off-world to do so.
In the end, Bran had to settle for a promise that they’d make sure he wasn’t executed for his part in the attack and that’d do their best to prevent him from being incarcerated.
They had to acknowledge that he was very good at hacking and might, just might, be their best option in dealing with the rebellious robots. Without their loyalty and support, the BloodRavagers were outnumbered by the Havenites (though still better armed).
He just had to figure out how to get round the firewalls that he’d upgraded and reverse the robots new programming. He’d been working on it since he’d arrived at Facetwild, but he hadn’t really expected that he’d have to when he’d initially built the original program so hadn’t built in a back door when he’d created it in the first place. Something he really should have considered with 60-60 hindsight, he sighed.
Akira asked him what assistance he needed other than motivation. Bran smiled, a gruesome sight in such a snout as his lips curled back to display a dental nightmare of canines and oversized incisors.
“Time. Help. Any of you able to code or run an encrypter? A compiler? Then if successful, we need to find a way to download the package into their system. Thankfully, Starhaven has a dark fibre network across the city that allows for upgrading of program systems so if we can download it, the programming will spread across the outpost like a plague of Skarls, infecting all of the robots – the problem will be uploading it in the first place. There are only two ways to do that. Through the master computer in the Forge or using Daedalus’ wrist console which overrides all of the city systems. I imagine the Forge access has been smashed?”
Paragon nodded. “Thought so, so we’d need to repair the access port and patch in a computer which, if successful, would allow us to shut down all of the robots. If you wanted to re-program them to your side then you need to download the hack directly into Daedalus’ own master control console and that will be on Kona’s wrist 85-7… never leaving her possession at any time.”
It took Banshee a minute or two to realise that Bran was meaning the local version of 24-7 given a Europa day was 85 Terran hours long, the measurement that the residents had adopted after Star Island and a typical working week here consisted of seven units they divided into local days!
Meanwhile Bran was discussing the person who’d originally hired him even as he returned to his coding. “I only ever got a codename, veil. Whoever they were, they were smart. They left me things in physical dead drops around town. Never reached out to me electronically. Do you know how much I hate going outside, especially here? I think they knew I’d figure out who they were if we talked online, you know? It definitely had some major feels about the Khanate taking over the Galaxy thing going on though. Like five big thumbs up.
If I had to guess, I think it would be Sun-Ren who was behind this. He loves the imperium but will happily co-exist under the thumb of the Khanate, as long as he’s on top. Either way it’s not good.
This Veil mentioned setting up a chain of explosives around a couple of key locations to enable Kona to hold the outpost to ransom. They mentioned booby-trapping the Robot Forge, the primary power generator nodes, what the locals jokingly call Sewer and Light and the atmosphere generator, what Daedalus named the Propylaea for some reason. If Sewer and Light goes down then we all freeze within minutes and if the Propylaea goes boom then everyone suffocates assuming the hydrogen tanks don’t explode first. Either way Starhaven would be doomed. If anything goes wrong with their plans, it gives them the ability to kill us all. That’s one of the reasons I fled the city and came here.”
Akira had to admit it was a good plan. They still had their warship to flee back to, even if it wasn’t spaceworthy at the moment. However, it was just a matter of time before it was repaired and could head out seeking reinforcements. At present, Starhaven was only a vague, mysterious legend but if the BloodRavagers escaped then it was only a matter of time before they returned with the full force of the Khanate Empire.
Meanwhile Bran had begun to discuss how he’d helped Xern find the outpost. He seemed determined to confess everything, possibly seeking some form of absolution.
Both Akira and Banshee started to help with the programming, using the code assembler to decode and reverse commands embedded in the original override program. It was grunt work but fairly easy to do and it left Bran time to work on the more complex sections of the program.
“We can take over the warship can’t we?” asked Akira as he worked. “At the same time as disarming the explosives? Surely attacking the warship has to come after disarming the explosives, otherwise what’s the point if everyone is already dead?” muttered Bran.
He didn’t know that they’d already disabled the explosives in the Forge and they didn’t feel inclined to tell him. Could the other two sites be similarly armed?
Paragon suggested that he fly back now and deal with them on his own but the others were concerned he might set off the explosives. They also still had to finish the code and didn’t want to alert the BloodRavagers before they were ready. If they went to the Forge then they would need to gain entry and then rebuild the computer interface to enable them to download the program but then they would realise something was up when all the robots stopped functioning.
Better to find this ‘Kona the Librarian’ and covertly download the program into the wrist controller, especially if the robots continued functioning initially as though nothing had changed.
As Akira asked Bran if that was possible, an alarm went off and Bran turned on a monitor on his workbench. He explained that Daedalus had laid a fibre optic cable connecting a series of cameras in Starhaven to here so that he could continue to monitor what was happening there, while here. That was how he knew that Kona had successfully laid siege to the city as one of the cameras had seen her holographic announcement and alerted him. It was doing the same now. The monitor showed another hologram projected onto the roof of the dome as she had done previously – Kona stood on the balcony of the Governor’s Office at Preserver Hall. Behind her stood Sun-Ren and his assistant Vay-La, the female they had bumped into previously.
Paragon muttered, “I should go rip her arm off and get the controller.”
Kona spoke to remind all those still resisting her that the city of Starhaven was now under her complete authority and control and for every one of her soldiers attacked she would execute ten Havenites from this day forward. Resistance was futile. “If necessary we can blow up the city’s atmosphere and electricity generators so you all die. You have been warned.” She said.
Then Sun-Ren stepped forward. Kona introduced him as the city’s acting Governor and that he had a message for the citizens of this outpost.
He asked his fellow Havenites to stop resisting, to lay down their weapons and stop any furthe acts of sabotage so as to allow him to negotiate a surrender agreement on their behalf and agree terms for their subsequent integration into the Khanate Empire. They turned and headed back inside as the camera watched a group of civilians, mostly non-human aliens, being gathered into the plaza below by the invaders. They were presumably there to guarantee no further trouble, otherwise they would be the first to be executed in response.
Bran and the team turned away from the screen in disgust, though whether at the invaders intention to execute innocent civilians or Sun-Ren’s collaboration they weren’t sure. Akira and Banshee worked with Bran on the program even as a frustrated Paragon marched back and forth across the room, as he threatened to blast things with his newfound electrical attack. The next few hours went by slowly as they worked. Finally Bran called a halt while he ran the program through the assembler.
They discussed what they should do next even as they checked the program code for themselves to see how close they were to their goal.
As far as they could tell, Bran and they had succeeded in creating a program that could power down the robots if they somehow successfully managed to upload the program into their control matrix. An additional subroutine had now been added that meant that if they somehow managed to load it using Daedalus’ master controller it would subvert the robots loyalty back to the Havenites rather than just shut them down. Clearly regaining control of the robots would be more useful.
Gaining access to the wrist controller was obviously the better option if they could do so without Kona killing everyone in response. Paragon was strongly of the opinion that they needed to disarm the bombs first.
Leaving Bran to continue checking the code and to finish compiling the program, they suited up again and headed passed the crystalline growths and the crawling, skittering entities that appeared as they flew towards the frozen surface of the crevasse. Leaving Bran alone was a risk, but they felt sure he wouldn’t run. Where could he run to even if he wanted to?
They flew invisible and together back towards the city dome, where Banshee insubstantialised herself and her teammates and flew them inside before they headed over the Green and its inhabitants, towards the centre of the city.
It was obvious that the invasion had been more successful that they would have liked. Even the holdout areas had entered into an uneasy truce, for the present at least. The preserver AI, nicknamed VIRA, had been reactivated so hardwired communications were back up though not to everywhere as the invaders tried to isolate the areas they believed still harboured rebel cells.
Kona had clearly consolidated her hold over the outpost.
Bran had warned them before they had set off that the Robot Forge would recommence operation soon and then would restart its appointed task of churning out more and more of the battle-adapted robots. If they failed to switch the robots programming, that could be disastrous.
They agreed to head to the primary power generating nodes first. Rather than rely on centralised utility hubs, the Preservers had built a distributed network of water reclamation plants, power generators, atmospheric scrubbers and waste recyclers across the city. The majority of the primary power generator systems converged in a central, very secure building. The sensors there however controlled all of the other generating facilities across the city. The locals jokingly referred to this facility as Sewer and Light since as well as controlling heating, lighting and energy across the city, it also controlled the water reclamation and disposal systems.
The found the building quickly enough. It was easy to spot, surrounded by soldiers and robots but they knew the building was likely empty inside. They wouldn’t want to risk setting off the explosives accidentally.
This was where the Balance shined, when stealth won over sheer violent confrontation.Invisible and floating, Banshee insubstantialised them both and took them through the roof into the main hall. As they’d suspected, the building was running on automatic, no technicians though there were security cameras – where did they feed through to though? Was it to a security office inside the building or was someone currently monitoring it remotely?
They looked around. Unlike at the Forge there were multiple cables strung everywhere as well as conduits and tubes, most labelled in Lor or Vilani, which none of them could read.
There were literally thousands of power cables everywhere and no obvious flashing lights. There were sensor units lining almost every square metre of the walls, many apparently jerry-rigged by the outposts eclectic group of technicians. Several super-cooled computer rooms, each monitoring specific utility, were located throughout the centre of the building, seemingly located at random.
VIRA, the City’s AI’s datalink was also routed through the building where it was then distributed everywhere else, distinguishable by their black coloured fibre optic cables. The issue now was figuring out which cables were linked to the bombs and where inside the primary node the explosive devices were located.
Paragon suggested Akira could try viewing the past and hope he chanced on the planting of the explosives. Back to the bomb, if you will.
Before he could start the mental process he used to activate his postcognition ability, he noticed that some of the cables were less secure that the rest, and that they daisy chained around the walls without branching off like the rest. Could it be?
He walked over to the nearest looped cable and saw that someone had used a selection of cable ties and glue to fasten them onto and around the wall and each was looped through the larger sensor boxes on the wall. Once he knew what to look for it was easy to spot the amateur nature of their fastenings and how the cables had been strung. Gotcha!
He walked over to the nearest sensor box as Paragon suggested they rip the boxes off the wall, tie them together and fly them away before exploding them. Banshee and Akira suggested they needed to find a more discrete disposal method and thereby conceal their tampering for as long as possible.
They checked the boxes and couldn’t find any obvious anti-tamper devices so Paragon snapped the door locks gently so as to not bend the doors as Akira detached the explosives from the activation cables. He would have liked to have found and deactivated the activation device itself but couldn’t locate it. It was directly linked in so they were forced to follow the cable round the chamber walls deactivating each node in turn.
After the first few, the process became routine. The explosives did have to remain in situ unfortunately as each packet of explosives had been fitted with their own anti-tamper sensor that Akira couldn’t risk removing, but at least they could no longer be activated remotely. Like at the Forge someone could still set them off physically and it would likely cause the rest to explode as well but they would have to have a death wish to do so and that assumed they could spot that the detonator cables had been disconnected from the explosives in the first place. That was supposing that they didn’t send a robot to set off the bombs, but this was the best they could do and if nothing else it would delay things.
Having rendered any attempt to destroy the city’s power generators void they set off for the Propylaea across the city. As well as cracking ice into breathable oxygen, it also stored hydrogen and trace gases for use by the city’s industries. If they exploded, it will likely take out the entire outpost. Kona seemed to not have realised this and apparently assumed, erroneously, that if the Propylaea went up that the city would remain intact though its inhabitants would die from asphyxiation… That much hydrogen exploding would make a bloody big bang.
What was the chance that some of the hydrogen leaked into the atmosphere inside the Propylaea? Akira explained that once they were inside, no smoking and no sparks, especially from Paragon’s newly emerged power. “Might it be dangerous to inhale?” asked Paragon.
“You fully in control of your electrical ability?” Akira replied, knowing full well he didn’t need to breathe. Paragon indicated he was, but really he didn’t know for sure. “Just keep your hands in your pockets at all times,” joked Akira as they again covertly headed across the city.
Again, they quietly bypassed the guards and robots securing the facility. They had made sure to disable any electrical equipment they might have on them such as their translating commdots and left their spacesuits nearby while they headed in.
The Propylaea was the city’s air reservoir. Massive pylons beneath the building bore down into the icy crust cracking it into breathable oxygen while storing the other gases in the massive globe-like tanks that nested around the control chamber; thousands of mega-litres of explosive gases. Five nested, seashell-like curls on the facility towered over the East Wing of the city, cycling the atmosphere and seeding the moisture and particulates needed for the city’s various ‘weather’ conditions.
Akira summoned Ahgrazul’s Compass while Paragon used his enhanced vision to identify where they needed to look for the bombs. Paragon quickly spotted a string of explosives around one of the storage tanks.
Akira also identified explosives. This time someone has placed them on the tips of two of the fins of the ‘shells’ and connected them by cable to Paragon’s discovery around the edge of one of the storage tanks and they had fitted some sort of trigger devices that meant each of the strings of explosives had to be disabled simultaneously. The difficulty for them was that they were too far apart for Bluetooth conductivity and the intercity commlinks locally and VIRA had been rechannelled or diverted from this region. With the city’s background interference blocking radio waves there was no easy way to synchronise the deactivations, though at least Akira realised that they were strung together in a now familiar way.
They had to split up and then somehow synchronise their actions, but how? To make things worse, Paragon could feel static building up in the air around him, making his fingers spark.
Damn, he just wished he wasn’t so attractive – to electricity at least. He focused and consciously dampened the build-up in his body. They needed to split up with Paragon heading to the first string of explosives while Akira and Banshee headed to the other two on the ‘seashells’.
That’s when Akira had a cunning plan – he opened a small portal linking Banshee and him with Paragon at the other end of facility. It was just big enough that he could use it to speak to both of his teammates and talk them through what to do to disable the explosives simultaneously with him. That was complicated when he realised that Banshee’s invisibility only worked when she was insubstantial and she needed to turn physical (and visual) to handle the bombs. Thankfully, she was able to stay in the shadow of the shell while she worked. Paragon, however was fully visible in the sky. They just had to hope no one looked up!
Akira explained what he wanted Banshee to do when he signalled then opened the portal to Paragon. They just had to deactivate the detonator together and hope no one hesitated. With everyone in position, he whispered a “Now!” into the mini-portal as he pulled his detonator free. He breathed a deep sigh of relief when nothing went boom. He looked down. The guards were still focused at street level and hadn’t glanced up. Good. They finished disconnecting their strings, as advised by Akira, no longer having to worry about synchronicity and then they rushed back to Akira who was able to turn Paragon invisible again.
From their elevated position above the Propylaea they could see that there was still fighting happening at the Starport, presumably the squadron of fighter pilots were still holding out against the invaders. That meant Kona was likely to start executing the civilians gathered outside Preserver Hall as she had threatened. What next?
They had at least delayed if not stopped Kona’s threat to destroy the city using the city’s own facilities but they still had the threat of the warship to contend with and they had to return for the hopefully completed program that they had left Bran to compile before they took on Kona and her allies. They had to make sure she had no other options open to her before that confrontation.
They set off back to pick up their spacesuits and then head back to Facetwild and Bran. The trip this time was relatively uneventful and they were glad to see that he had completed the programming.
They immediately headed back towards the city. At Paragon’s speed, the distance between the workshop and the city only took a short time and soon they were once more shredding their suits and looking at the warship, which seemed to have fixed at least some of the damage Paragon had inflicted on the ship previously. Unfortunately, its fighter squadron and cannons were still fully functional.
What now? If they took out the ship all Kona would have left would be the robots and her outnumbered troopers and they had an answer to the robots if they could figure out how to insert the override program into the master controller.
Should they target the ship’s engines or? Thankfully, there would be no radio communication between those on the ship and those on the ground to worry about. If a fighter did manage to take off, Paragon was sure he’d be able to catch up with it and take it out with a punch or two, that was what he did, after all.
They could benefit from access to explosives and they remembered that Bran had to have had access to some which he’d used to booby trap his apartment. Might he have more, possibly in the warehouse where they’d first encountered the BloodRavager troopers?
They headed towards the warehouse and began their search. It didn’t take them long to find a large explosive device that would be big enough to take out the warships engines. If they used it they had to make sure they were elsewhere when it exploded, in fact they needed to make sure the warship was elsewhere when it exploded or the resulting collision would take out the domes as well as a large section of the city. Ideally, they wanted some sort of timer so they were available and ready to confront Kona and her cronies when it exploded.
They considered how to transport the bomb as well as themselves but the suggestions seemed to rely on them being some sort of a circus balancing act. In the end, they agreed to try to portal the bomb onboard once they reached the engine room.
It would mean Akira and Paragon would become visible while he was teleporting the bomb.
Again, they turned into Team Stealth – with an invisible Banshee insubstantialising the team even as Akira turned both Paragon and himself invisible – and they left the bomb at the warehouse and headed towards the hovering warship.
Again they used Banshee’s ability to enter the ship and that’s when they realised there was a further complication; the Zultasians were not technology-minded and kept slaves to run their ship. However with most of the Zultasian crew either on the surface subjugating the locals or flying the fighter craft, that meant that there was only a skeleton crew left aboard to oversee the running of the ship.
They drifted passed a couple of robots in the main corridor; not forgetting the subjugated ‘bots of course. They counted only six blue-skinned ‘masters’ and about twenty enslaved technicians as they stealthily travelled from the bow to the stern of the ship.
They found a quiet, unmonitored corner of the ship and had a whispered discussion about how best to proceed in light of this new information. They couldn’t allow the slaves to become ‘collateral damage’ and the fact that the ship was only being controlled by such a small number of invaders meant a re-evaluation of their plan. Paragon suggested they took over the ship, flew it out of range and then they could use it themselves to return home when the ‘dust finally settled’.
It was either “that or a jailbreak”, muttered Banshee. Could they trust the freed slaves though?
“No plan survives contact with the enemy, we need to disable the soldiers and see where we go from there” said Akira as they again set off towards the stern of the ship.
If ‘push’ came to ‘shove’ they could always portal the slaves to the warehouse – if necessary, ‘encouraged’ by Banshee and TK’d by Akira.
If they could keep the ship functional but out of the BloodRavagers’ hands, they would but they still had the bomb as a backup solution if necessary. They just didn’t want to risk killing the slaves in the process.
They went searching for the Zultasian masters and found three troopers. Paragon let go of Akira and Banshee and turned substantial and visible. He slammed into the first soldier even as he unleashed a shot from his blaster rifle. The blast bounced off Paragon’s chest without damage as a second soldier targeted him but again the shot did no real damage.
His punch missed its target so he slammed his elbow into the other soldier stunning him, causing him to trip over his own feet and collapse to the ground.
Banshee, still in stealth mode, drifted behind the other one, an officer apparently going by the amount of braid on his uniform, and turned solid even as she unleashed a corrupting touch on him. The unexpected attack immediately incapacitated him and he collapsed, unconscious to the ground.
Akira blasted the soldier that Paragon had failed to hit, leaving him stunned as he focused his mystical blast on the other soldier on the ground. That blast knocked the trooper unconscious.
The remaining conscious soldier unleashed another blast at Paragon. It hit him on the chest again and to his dismay, he actually felt this blast this time as it bruised and burnt him.
Damn, is that what it felt like to be hurt? It had been so long since he’d actually been hurt that he’d almost forgotten what pain was like. He had to wonder was this what others felt when he hit them? He almost, almost, felt sorry for them. Almost.
Banshee unleashed another of her corrupting touches but failed to make physical contact. Paragon decided to return the favour and bruise his attacker back. He slammed his foot into his chest but hit his right arm instead, shattering it. Akira compassionately put him out of his pain with a mystical blast.
They set off searching for the remaining crew. They found the remaining three crewmembers near the engine room supervising a couple of large maintenance robots.
Paragon immediately unleashed a shockwave at them, slamming his hands together with force even as he pulled free of Akira’s grip and turned substantial. The humans collapsed to the floor leaving the automatons to take the full force of the shockwave. It slammed one of them into the wall, shattering its rear-mounted CPU. The other staggered back under the onslaught.
Banshee immediately unleashed a Wail at everyone. Two of the soldiers dropped to the floor in terror, unable to respond as the scream washed over and incapacitated them. Their presence however in front of the last soldier has blocked him from receiving the full effects of Banshee’s assault and he raised his rifle in readiness and fired at Paragon. The blast splashed across his chest without inflicting any further injury.
Akira unleashed a series of mystical blasts, he missed the soldier that had fired at Paragon but his next two blasts hit the robots; knocking the functioning bot back against the wall again as the next blast severed the robot’s head from its shoulders. Unfortunately headless it could still function.
Banshee moved in and substantialised herself as she reached over and tried to unleash a corrupting touch on the last soldier. She had to dodge back as his rifle butt almost smashed into her ribs.
Paragon unleashed a lightning bolt from his hands straight at the robot. The blast washed over its chassis but failed to stop its advance. Akira Tk’d the robot off the ground slamming it into the ceiling before snookering it so that it fell on top of the last standing soldier. It was dazed by the illogical and unexpected slam into the roof and subsequent fall. The soldier standing beneath it managed to move so that he was only partially hit by the falling robot.
Banshee unleashed another Wail causing the soldier to go unconscious but still failed to stop the robot forcing Paragon to unleash a shockwave at it. It finally shattered leaving a shuddering pile of smouldering machinery scattered across the corridor.
They were reasonably sure that there were no more Zultasians to deal with. Now they had a ship, which they didn’t know how to run, and slaves that they had to convince were no longer enslaved.
They split up and searched the ship just in case while also rounding up and informing the technicians as they did so that they were no longer enslaved and needed to head towards the bridge.
Akira needed to know if they knew how to pilot the ship and if so, would they be willing to put it in orbit, away from the reach of the BloodRavagers but close enough for Paragon to reach once, hopefully the siege was ended? Then they could pilot the three of them back to Earth. In return they could be given sanctuary on Earth (they didn’t mention Star Island) until circumstances allowed them to return to their homeworlds.
There was always a possibility that the freed slaves would head off with their prize once the Balance was no longer around but they had to trust that whatever happened it wouldn’t make things worse.
Regardless of what they did next, the former slaves were free. They left them preparing to leave to head into orbit, abandoning the Zultasian fighter craft on the surface as the three of them headed once more in stealth mode for Preserver Hall.
They watched the warship heading into space as they landed on the balcony and entered the Governor’s office. The data chip was given to Akira to see if he could covertly insert it into a dataport on the master control unity on Kona’s wrist while Paragon tried to catch their attention.
They arrived only to find Kona was not alone, with her was the traitor Sun-Ren, his female assistant and Xern, the male Dantaran. Thankfully, there were no troopers in the office.
Paragon stepped away from the invisible Akira and immediately became corporeal causing Sun-Ren to scream in surprise. Interestingly the female assistant immediately took up a fighting stance as Kona laughed. “Finally something worthy of my abilities, I will skin you boy and use you as a wall ornament. I’ll kill you myself then I will execute the civilians as a lesson to the others to not risk my wrath.”
Before anyone could respond, Xern unleashed a crimson bio-blast from his hand at Paragon. The energy tingled and Paragon felt his skin itch from the blast but was otherwise unaffected. The female, Vay-La also appeared to be enhanced as she also unleashed a pulse of silver energy, though not at him, it was aimed at the still invisible Akira! It was almost as though she could see him. Caught by surprise, Akira was forced to dodge.
There was banging on the main doors as the guards, hearing the blasts attempted to gain entry only for Kona to scream that they were to stay outside, this was her fight and they had to respect the outcome. “So says Kona BloodRavager, daughter of the Khan, all praise his name and holy bloodline.”
Sun-Ren ducked and cowered behind the desk even as Banshee turned visible but remained insubstantial and unleashed an aura of fear, which flooded the room but didn’t stop the other three from attacking.
The still invisible Akira used the momentary confusion though to head behind Kona and try to slide the data chip into the computer on her wrist. He held his breath, as he got closer in case she was able to smell his presence and hoped the other female wouldn’t shoot him in the process.
He managed to insert the chip into the dataport, allowing the program to autoload without Kona realising but again the other female appeared to realise where he was standing. Her face appeared to morph before his eyes, changing into a more alien visage though still humanoid. She was apparently able to change her look psychically.
Paragon saw her move, saw her turn to look behind Kona even as Akira shouted, “She can see me.” As he looked, her face changed, becoming even more attractive than before, so much so that Paragon hesitated for a second then rushed the land shark Dantaran. He tried to punch the creature but the female distracted him and he missed. Kona pulled out her blaster pistol and fired it at him even as she tried to punch him in the forehead. He dodged and collided with Xern.
The blaster hit but didn’t really cause any injury though he could now see three slightly different, if gorgeous versions of the female standing where the assistant had stood before. As though in response one of the three slim beauties picked up the desk and threw it straight at Akira. He jumped out of the way; as it landed and splintered peppering Sun-Ren with hundreds of tiny, sharp fragments.
Banshee unleashed another aura of fear; it clearly affected Kona and Sun-Ren but had no effect on the other female. Akira used the confusion to unleash mystical blasts at Kona and the three women. Kona was hit by the blast leaving her dazed and caused the triplets to dissipate, leaving just a tall, skinny alien female who immediately ran out of the room. She ran passed the guards who were struggling against a couple of construction robots that had been re-reprogrammed when Akira had uploaded the chip.
Paragon slammed back into Xern, punching him several times hard to his gut. The blows staggered him as Kona tried to slam a blade into Paragon’s ribs. The blade snapped without piercing even as she tried to fire her blaster into his face and somehow missed. Plaster showered down on them from the resulting hole in the roof.
Xern unleashed another crimson blast at him but missed as Banshee slipped in behind Kona and unleashed a corrupting touch to her neck. She staggered back, shuddering. Akira blasted her and she collapsed to the ground unconscious.
Xern ran to the window and jumped over the balcony. He landed on his feet despite falling from three storeys up amidst an ongoing battle in the streets between the robots, the BloodRavagers and the civilians gathered in the square.
Banshee looked out the window and saw that the hostages fight were being supplemented by a militia of locals led by Tamira-Van and Daedalus. She smile when she saw that the militia included Peat, wielding a cricket bat while carefully holding his drink in his other tendril. Surprisingly she saw Bran leading a convoy of upgraded construction robots. He was ‘wearing’ a ravager’s armour taped together to try and fit his huge crocodilian form. She smiled. He likely faced prison time if his treachery was ever revealed but here and now he was ready to fight with the good guys.
Meanwhile Mama Kaiger was advancing from a different direction with a small army of mini-me’s armed with blaster rifles twice their own height. Xern rushed towards her only to be backhanded into the gutter and ignored. Banshee saw him get up, wipe the blood off his face and vanish into the sewer tunnels beneath the city, She considered following but decided he was the least of their problems at the moment.
She turned in time to see Kona trying to activate her bombs. She seemed surprised when there were no explosions occurring around the city. In response, Akira blasted Kona even as Paragon hit her most ungentlemanly with a punch that caused her to fly across the room where she lay unconscious. The siege of Starhaven was over, they’d won they just had to capture and imprison all of the bloodRavagers, starting with Kona.
Now to round up some technicians and possibly some bomb disposal experts and properly deactivate the explosives. Banshee had to wonder if the warship was still in orbit or had the freed slaves fled? Only time would tell.
Superhero Adventures, UK Style 