Daemons with the faces of Angels (Maelion/Project Uriel)

[Enyo Typhos]

[member="Project Uriel"]


BAAM BAAAM BAAAM In the explosive firepower unleashed by Uriel and amidst the roar of the bolter, Onderonian guards perished. Assuredly their sacrifice for the fatherland would be remembered and their families would get a letter about how they had died honourably guarding an ancient ruin.


However, unfortunately the little fire fight also had the effect of raising the alarm and mobilising the small guard contingent. Within moments the troopers were swarming out to meet the intruders. However, the HRDs had the tactical advantage in the sense that only one of their groups was known. Still, improvisation and speed would be key. The longer they languished here the more time the Onderonians and Jedi would have to rally and gather reinforcements. While HRDs were tough and durable death machines, they were not invincible.


One of the advantages of being a death machine was a lack of temper and passion. So rather than go on an understandable but misplaced tirade Callisto simply adjusted and acted as her scanners picked up on Onderonian soldiers quickly moving towards their position, gripping her shatter gun. Right now the angry but confused Onderonians were out in the open in the crossfire and thus in a perfect kill zone, but this situation would not last forever.


CRACK There was a sound of..well, actually there was not much in terms of sound, excluding the groan of the point man of the unit. One of the fine soldiers fell to the ground with bloody shower,something slammed and crashed through his chest, the enemy was unseen and unheard. Before they could realize what was happening, another grievous sound of sickly, beautiful death. Then another soldier had his armor burst open like a carapace of a lobster getting pierced with a spike, a third died when a bullet pierced his helmet and hit him between the eyes.


"Terminate opposition and link up with me. We are moving in." Confused and seemingly attacked by several snipers the Onderonian soldiers sought cover behind wrecks lying around and began lobbing in grenades. Of course, since they could not see their opponents yet their precision was a bit lacking. Callisto gripped her vibrosword, wanting to fall upon them, but then she heard the tell-tale flash of two lightsabres being ignited....

 

[Project Uriel]

“Uriel Unit 1.3b advancing,” stepping down from the rock she walked from the opposite side as the fourth HRD unit, so there was essentially a three way crossfire on the unfortunate soldiers, her companion droid took a unlucky frag grenade to the leg, fell, then got back up. Uriel barely registered the shrapnel coming her way, taking a layer of shrapnel herself but much to the soldiers lobbing the grenades horror, she wasn’t actually stopping or slowing.

On her vision ahead three circles formed, she tracked the likely trajectory of the grenades to predict three of her targets behind the wrecks, and analysing the weakest point of the metal they were using for cover, she fired into them. She would never have known to do this if not for her test run for the hutts cartel, and her docking bay battle.

The metal shattered, in a particularly nasty way for some of the men. A hissing sound came from behind her, as one of the Jedi appeared, or rather their lightsaber did, cutting off the arm of her companion to her side, and disarming him. Before Uriel could target her new assailant, the Jedi had disappeared again. Though Uriel learned something new that day, walking backwards, so she could complete her orders, while tracking her gun ahead, which probably saved this drone’s operational life all things considered.

“One HRD Model damaged, lost tracking on Jedi.” She stated arriving to Callisto, her companion arriving later, minus its arm.

Uriel Unit:
Damage to Combat Chassis 4%
Primary Systems Green
Combat Capability 99%

[member="Callisto Scarlett"]​

 

[Enyo Typhos]

[member="Project Uriel"]


It was purge time. Jedi were formidable opponents, when they were not being held back by their illogical religious beliefs. Their 'Force powers' made them tenacious and rather unpredictable since it was often difficult for droids to assess the danger they posed. The machines had to rely on prior experiences when fighting such esoteric threats. However, at the same time the droids had advantages of their own. For one, they were strong, durable and would not tire.


Moreover, they were immune to a number of esoteric Force techniques such as those relating to the mind. Callisto had dispatched a number of Onderonian soldiers and then received the transmission from Uriel, noting that the drone's companion was damaged when she arrived. A Jedi vanishing could mean a number of things. Perhaps it was simply the superior speed of the mage at work, perhaps the power to turn themselves invisible.


In some cases there were ways around that. "Activate heat vision," she spoke blandly. "Terminate the Jedi." These words had left her lip and then suddenly the droid was hit by a powerful shockwave that sent her along with her companion flying through the air as it impacted with the force of a battering ram. Her shatter gun fell out of her hand but Callisto still reacted quickly and reached for a grenade attached to her belt. It was an anti-force user grenade loaded with frag. Due to the design of the small ball of explosives, any change in acceleration would result in it detonating prematurely. Tossing one loaded with vaporized Ixetal Cilona had been tempting, but the Jedi might have just held her breath.


The grenade flew through the air as she tossed right at the feet of her opponent. The Jedi, a white-haired woman with Echani features, seemed to anticipate her move and somersaulted to dodge, escaping the threat of getting bits blown off, but could not escape the piece of shrapnel that lodged itself into her thigh. Ouch. That hurt a lot. See, shrapnel is nasty. Likewise the impact of the shockwave, though mitigated, thrust her back. For her part Callisto crashed into a piece of debris. A machine could not feel pain, but it stood to reason that the crash would have an impact on her functionality.


Without a sound escaping her mouth she arose and quickly jumped to her feet. Her armour had been damaged and dented by the fall, but was still functional. The Jedi had likewise rallied herself, using her Force to still the pain she must be feeling from the impact. However, it would become clear that she had not yet noticed that Callisto was a droid when she launched a mental attack. It was an onslaught directed at the heart of Callisto's psyche, aiming to induce paralysis into her and make her grow weaker and weaker until she had been driven into a state of unconsciousness. Against an organic this would have perhaps been a powerful attack...but Callisto was a machine.


One with organic essence encased in a mechanical shell, but controlled and directed by a droid mind. Her soul, if she had done, was a fathomless abyss. She registered that the Jedi was trying to use her 'magic', then simply gripped her bolter and squeezed the trigger. BAAAM BAAAM Two explosive bolts were quickly ejected from the weapon and surged towards the Jedi, who ceased her attempts at casting and, lacking the time, to run, threw up a Force shield. It absorbed the brunt of the first bolt, but the barrier had been hastily improvised and so the second blasted it apart.


These bolts were nasty and so damage ensued. The shockwave thrust the Jedi back hard and shrapnel showered her. Her robes were splattered with blood and her shoulder seemed dislocated from the explosion and the stab of shrapnel. The woman coughed and spat out blood, her lips stained and bruised, as she got to her feet, her robes torn and smoking, then suddenly she leapt into the air. Boltgun held tight in both hands Callisto advanced; her finger was on the trigger and she fired, aiming to pump the Jedi full with rounds, enhanced machine targeting and trackers quickly adjusting to following the moves of the mage. One magazine could hold ten bolts, two had been expended, eight remained and would be used to great effect. Besides, she could reload quite fast.

 

[Project Uriel]

Eyes going deep blue, heatvision tracking was in place now, filtering between regular and deep blue screening, to highlight the red warmth that stood out against the colder air. HRD’s were heavy, uriel was even heavier due to her design flaw, and in her armor the weight of a small tank, she was flung back but stopped up a bit shorter than Callisto given the extra weight in her endoskeleton.

While Callisto dispatched the first target, Uriel faced the organics counterpart, who this time had picked her up in the force and hurled her to be separated from the group, which given how heavy she was, took her straight through two trees, her vice like grip hanging on to her weapon, even as the drone thudded against a rockface to halt her progress.

Again she could not see her target, not in the regular visual spectrum, her own Jedi opponent seemed versed in illusions and misdirection, she hadn’t even caught more than a glimpse at the grey colored Zabrak she was facing. His heat however, he wasn’t masking… firing several shots towards a red glow ahead, sent the zabrak jumping away for his life

But he had another trick up his sleeve… Force Doppleganger, or Similfuturus, two copies in fact, as a blue shadowed welled up around him, and the man seemingly split into three.

“Jedi is multiplying,” Uriel relayed to Callisto, as both Doppelgangers threw rocks at her, the real Jedi moving away. Callisto’s update on Jedi tactics had shown her many possible scenarios but this one was not in her files. She fired at one of the dopplegangers and he dodged, while the second one approached… how did she tell between them, because she was now facing three!

[member="Callisto Scarlett"]​

 

[Enyo Typhos]

[member="Project Uriel"]


The Force was the pathway to many abilities some consider to be unnatural...or terribly annoying. One of these was the ability to cast terribly realistic illusions. Some of them were so vivid and 'real' that it would even feel like you were taking damage if you were attacked by one of them. It was one of the reasons Force-users could be such formidable opponents if they applied their powers intelligently.


Did droids have moods? Well, Callisto was feeling something close to annoyance. "Only one is real. High probability these two are illusions. Damage on impact should dissipate them. Drone one and two will deal with them. Find the real Zabrak," Callisto responded blandly. The HRD minions with her put the doppelgangers under fire, using armour-shredding APE rounds.


Meanwhile Callisto was dealing with the flying Jedi in white. Force flight was another one of those annoying powers some Force-users had. Alas in this case it was not just show but actually efficient as the Jedi woman moved in a blur, even as Callisto bombarded her with bolter rounds. Weaving and dodging she swept through the air at a speed that was extremely fast even for her sophisticated tracking sensors and sight. Explosions resonated across the ruined base, rubble was thrown up or blasted apart.


Her robes smoking the Jedi landed on her feet right before Callisto, just as the HRD had been lining up for another shot. Her lightsabre hummed in a blaze of green light and in a quick swipe sliced Callisto's bolter in half. However, the death machine did not even blink when she suddenly found herself deprived of a weapon, but instead acted. Instead she moved in what seemed like a blur and gripped the Jedi's arm just when the lightsabre was inches away from the droid's head.


The human struggled in the iron grip of the droid as Callisto roughly pulled her arm backward at an unnatural speed and length, then twisted hard. There was a sickeningly loud crunch and the Jedi cried out in pain when Callisto broke her arm, her lightsabre falling to the ground uselessly since it was not being used anymore. Her free hand had gripped the flamethrower attached to her thigh and the droid brought it up. A telekinetic push slammed into her chest and made her tumble but as she fell Callisto activated her flamer and sent a surge of blazing heat leaping towards the Jedi, encasing her in fire. Given how short the distance was between them, dodging would not be much of an option right now, so the Jedi would burn and roast like a barbeque.

 

[Project Uriel]

Terribly annoying was right, to a drone programed to observe the movements of organics and react accordingly, illusions were a completely different problem to calculate, momentary confusion was righted when the drones began coordinated fire limiting the angles the Jedi could use to move. The dopplegangers had their ground slowly taken from them until they were struck and sent flying, disappearing midair.

Tracking lost on primary target…. “Coordinate a search using parameter XTS” XTS being a standard spacing search for their Jedi target, spaced enough to avoid bolter fire but cover each other should they come across one. A snap hiss of the saber had caught the HRD assisting her off guard, and this one lost its head, Uriel turned to fire, but the Jedi was faster than she could have predicted, and she was trying to match his speed.

Recalculating necessary angle of fire…

Firing further ahead of him she hit one home and he screamed out, thrown behind some rocks. The thudding approach of the HRD and her steady advance to finish off the organic was all too easy to hear. Bloodied and bruised, he span up rotating, cuting her bolter and one of her hands free, leaving her just a sparking right hand. Uriel lunged to grip his wrist in her left hand catching it, and squeezing, pressurizing his joint. The Jedi's main hand was taken from him the same way she’d lost hers, not vengeance, simply learning that disarming was effective in combat. Her severed limb was recalculated as a clubbing weapon, and began smashing the Jedi, once, twice in the face.

Sadly for Uriel she had become too caught up in her work!

One of the surviving troopers had got behind her, picked up the bolter that her armless comrade had left in the field, and begun to fire it into Uriel’s back. The explosion and recoil from the resulting impact, sent her and her Jedi target flying forward, though he landed much less heavily than she did… calling his lightsaber to his remaining arm and readying to strike.

Uriel Unit:
Damage to Combat Chassis 19%
Armor status: Shrapnel Breach at the Rear
Primary Systems Status: Critical Damage to right hand, minor damage to back spinal relays.
Combat Capability 73%

[member="Callisto Scarlett"]​

 

[Enyo Typhos]

[member="Project Uriel"]


It was time to roast a Jedi. At this close range, there was no escaping the blazing heat and fire unleashed by her flamethrower. Doubtless the Jedi was trying to use something as esoteric as 'Force Shield' or 'tutaminis' in order to have her space magic provide a barrier against the fiery onslaught, but she had been weakened by the battle as well, as her screams showed. The screams were...more beautiful and satisfying than Callisto than they should have been for an ordinary HRD.


But then she was not ordinary, not completely. In a sense she was more human than her counterparts. She remembered the betrayal at Contruum, the war crimes at Manaan and fighting Jedi on O'reen. So it was very satisfying to her to see one of these 'Holy Knights' brought so low. More satisfying than it should have been. She could see the Jedi was weakening as her shimmering barrier seemed to first flicker then dissipate completely. The screams became louder when the woman was engulfed by blazing flames and ignited. The cleansing fires burnt through her robes and roasted her skin even as she tried to call upon her powers. Gripped by fear the Jedi tried to roll across the ground in an attempt to put out the fire but then the boot of Callisto connected to her side.


As she tried to crawl away the redheaded death machine was quick in pursuit. No longer directly aiming at the Jedi she sought to engulf the entire area around her in flames, giving her no retreat. Then suddenly bolts of electrical judgement leapt from the fingertips of the Echani Jedi. It was a torrent of electricity that leapt straight for Callisto, who tried to evade but failed since it was a wide-spread, area of effect attack. Under the electrical onslaught the flamethrower suddenly blew up.


For the bolts of electricity struck the fuel tank of the flamer and it burst open with a loud crunching sound, with the effect being that hot, burning fuel was sprayed onto them both. Callisto twitched strongly as the unexpected volley of fuel hit her. She had been wearing ultrachrome armour, which meant that it was resistant to lightsabres and blasters due to being superconductive, but the wave of fuel meant that the armour began to melt in places. The air around them was soon rank with the smell of burnt fuel and roasted flesh and damaged electronics. What was left of the wrecked flamer cluttered uselessly to the ground, part of which was ignited as a last stream of flame had escaped the weapon in the same moment as it was destroyed.



Such had been the electrical onslaught that it had passed through the internal shield generator and damaged vital circuits inside her, forcing the droid to her knees as she twitched badly. The burnt and battered Jedi lay there sprawled across the ground, a spent force for the explosion of fuel had probably hurt her a lot more than Callisto, with burns spread across her face and one of her legs looking like it had been thoroughly cooked. Then slowly Callisto arose and advanced towards the Jedi. The Jedi tried to pull her lightsabre towards her with a telekinetic tug but Callisto simply brought down her vibrosword and sliced her burnt hand off. Then she stomped upon the woman's throat with her durasteel foot. There was a loud gurgle as the Jedi perished.

 

[Project Uriel]

The trooper and the remaining HRD unit two HRD exchanged bolter fire, which the trooper obviously lost. Unit one was headless and unit four was missing its weapon and an arm, which gave the remaining troopers some hope, but it would be short lived if the HRD’s reached them in melee which they were starting to.

Uriel and Callisto both in their own battles, but each battle taught the drone more about Jedi techniques, the lightsaber being cut toward her was registered as a high level threat, and before it fell, she kicked upward knocking the Jedi off of her. She had no weapon, so it was hand to hand, or in this case one hand vs the Jedi lightsaber’s, not great odds but she hadn't yet registered how effective her armor was.

He’d backed off to sit a few feet away facing her, Uriel picked herself up, noting some minor damage to her left leg from the explosion, and slowly walked toward him. She stopped studying the Jedi, curious as to what he was doing. Noting some of his bruises actually reversing, some of the damage to the organic repaired.

“Organic is self-repairing.” Uriel relayed, and advanced to melee range, the saber came up, and thanks to her analysis of Jedi techniques she was ready to step back, and step back again when he swept forward. This time it bounced off her breastplate, and she registered the armor as effective against lightsabers, taking a more aggressive approach.

The Jedi suddenly was on the back foot, she punched, he rolled aside and attacked her legs, which again bounced the saber, the Zabrak back flipping away, Uriel simply couldn’t keep up, even at her run. She’d lost him again in the undergrowth, but he hadn’t lost her….

"Target lost entering tracking mode.

[member="Callisto Scarlett"]​

 

[Enyo Typhos]

[member="Project Uriel"]


Another annoying trait of force-users was their ability to regenerate and heal injuries. Almost as annoying as the illusions they were able to cast. The obvious solution was the application of overwhelmning firepower that was so destructive they would be unable to heal because their limbs had been blown off.


While Uriel faced the illusionist with healing powers Callisto dealt with the problem of a couple annoying Onderonian soldiers who did not yet comprehend their place in things. It would be far easier if they realised that it was to their benefit to be liberated from the shackles of organic life. Callisto was in no mood to muck around and so she made short work of a particularly obnoxious soldier who was trying to riddle her with blaster bolts by ripping the weapon out of his hands and then bashing his skull against a rock with such force it cracked.


Ouch. That hurt. Another soldier got his arm quite literally torn off and then slammed into his throat with great force. One soldier, evidently driven into such a fury by his comrades being so cruelly murdered on this hellish, awful moon, charged her with a yell. As luck would have it, she only registered his presence after he had rammed the blade into her chest and was trying to run her through.


Sheer impact knocked the droid back and she twitched, then calmly pulled the sword out. Fear and terror gripped the features of the soldier. Then he started furiously punching her in the face. The droid shook her head as if trying to throw an insect off, but the blows did not hurt her at all and hurt him a lot since it was like hitting a durasteel wall. Finally she had enough and broke his fingers, then broke his neck. Unit two was instructed to deal with the remaining soldiers in close combat, Callisto moved to link up with Uriel.


"I am joining you. The Jedi must be close. We shall try to come at him from two sides and cut off his escape," she said blandly, picking up a discarded bolter and loading it with APE rounds. Entering tracking mode she activated her heat vision.

 

[Project Uriel]

“Acknowledged,” she replied to Callisto all the HRD’s in their various states of repair surrounded the Jedi. Whoever she was fighting he was a cunning and deadly opponent, and he seemed to be learning how to deal with the HRD, misdirection and illusion, a floating saber on its own hurled its way out of a bush, she raised a gauntlet to block and it bounced off her arm. Ducking her head, as the floating weapon went for the quick kill, it raised up and then tried to pierce down. The one thing about telekinetic saber attacks is there was no body to worry about behind it, Uriel found her own drawn vibrosword cut clean in two, the rotating teeth sent flying to imbed in her armor and cheek. The drone went to grasp the end of the saber and it rotated around tapping off her armored forearm.

She upgraded the Jedi’s threat level - Target Classification: Deadly.

That day she learned how to defend against a saber with her armored forearms bouncing attacks in melee, and was slowly gaining a routine, she kept learning until she was able to do it while walking forward to where she found the Jedi… but he had one final technique to use on her.

Force flash. His saber dropped, the Jedi was tiring, exhausted, a bright disabling flash able to fry electrical tracking systems was sent, only his was weak, but it did slow her. The Jedi couldn’t have expected Callisto or the HRD unit two that found him next, hitting him square in the face… to his credit, she couldn’t have expected the ion grenade he shoved in her face either, which hit everyone nearby Unit 2, Uriel and the Jedi. HRD Unit Two was fried, literally its head blowing out all its circuits, Uriel having been hit by Ion grenades before tried to move when he switched his concentration. She was running and jumped back but not far enough, she caught the outer edges of the flash. Losing the use of her damaged right arm completely, it blew out all her audio recognition circuits, effectively making her deaf.

The Jedi was stunned, laying prone and groaning, to be honest there was no better candidate for cloning than this Zabrak, not that Uriel thought of such things she just had a job to do. “Jedi is down, presumed stunned, HRD Unit 2 non functional, Uriel unit unable to receive voice commands.” Which meant Callisto had to find a clever way to communicate non verbally, there was always binary of course!

“Ready to resume main mission.” Uriel stated, leaving the fate of the organic up to Callisto at her feet.

Uriel Unit:
Damage to Combat Chassis 23%
Armor status: Shrapnel Breach at the Rear
Primary Systems Status: Severed right hand, Critical Damage to Right arm, Critical damage to audio sensory facilities (Deaf), Minor damage to back spinal relays. Minor Damage to Target Tracking System
Combat Capability: 51%

[member="Callisto Scarlett"]​

 

[Enyo Typhos]

[member="Project Uriel"]


Callisto approached the stunned Zabrak Jedi, noticeably limping and twitching. She had caught the outer edge of the flash caused by the ion detonation and thus not emerged unscathed, as the damage her leg had suffered indicated. Likewise one of her eyes had gone haywire and was now nonfunctional. Still, the machines stood victorious and their foes were defeated. There had been casualties but they, to put it plainly did not matter.


Death machines were not the sort to mourn fallen comrades or something similarly wasteful. While Uriel was deaf, fortunately they had binary communication, which was more efficient anyway. Callisto looked upon the stunned Jedi, then shot him twice with a stun blaster, just to be certain. Then she quickly cuffed him with TerentAttackCuffs. Suffice to say if he tried to use the Force to break free of his restraints this would go very badly for him! The Jedi could look forward to waking up in an orderly energe cage inside the cell block of the Lightbringer, with a ysalamiri perched above his head. Undoubtedly he would be interrogated by an HRD, then eventually processed into a death machine so that he could serve the Age of Steel. He may also end up being cloned as part of Archangel's recent foray into experimenting with Force clones.


Anyhow, with the Zabrak nicely cuffed she turned her attention to Uriel. "Opposition has been terminated. The dig site is ahead of us. We should find the wreck of the Shadow Droid there. We shall take the Jedi with us when we leave. He will be useful. I have notified the Lightbringer to send reinforcements and pickup. All organic workers on the site must be terminated. We shall take the researchers prisoner." No one could be allowed to survive and tell the tale. Those who were not taken for processing would be eliminated outright. Further away from them, between decayed military buildings overgrown by foliage and vines, they would find the wreck that had evidently only recently been dug up, as indicated by the salvage and archaeological equipment that was strewn around.

 

[Project Uriel]

Metal lay where it lay, nothing to mourn or move on from, “mission updated.” Uriel received the binary stream of data, and re-programmed her command matrix to match her new parameters, while metal steps carried her over broken ground, crunching underfoot the dead or dying, at least those that needed checking on their way to their target. She picked up a bolter from the dead trooper, and reloaded it, using her teeth to hold the end.

Her vision lit up as they neared the dig site, filtering heat signatures to be framed by circular targeting reticules. All Organic workers = Priority Targets, capture research team. Her vision flickered a bit, as she had some minor damage to her tracking system, but mostly she was tracking her quarry accurately, searching for how many workers were here from a distance.

They’d obviously heard the gunfire outside, a voice from the distance called, “we surrender! We don’t want any trouble.” Uriel was about to learn subterfuge here perhaps, or just merciless methodical behaviour, either could be taught to the drone, and it was all in Callisto's hands.

Bolter extended in her good arm, the sparking form of her right arm was used as a balance for it, to secure the weapon in place. A female voice called next, “we’ve families here, we promise we’ll give you all our data!”

There it was, they might have useful data, Uriel had to decipher which were researchers and which were workers inside to effectively carry out her mission, which was proving difficult, as all organics looked alike to her. "Eighteen targets" Uriel read off, "probability of accurate count of workers, 42%" as there were doubtless people she couldn't yet see further in, "Error, identification of research team proving difficult, requiring additional input."

[member="Callisto Scarlett"]​

 

[Enyo Typhos]

[member="Project Uriel"]


"Information forthcoming momentarily. Hold fire for now. We will divide them into groups. Once the workers have helped us, kill them," Callisto transmitted to Uriel while she approached the organics. Mercy was not in the dictionary of the death machine. Subterfuge, however, was. Once they had gotten what they needed from them, those organics deemed superfluous would be murdered.


"Resistance and escape are futile. If you cooperate, you will not be harmed. Who is the head researcher here?" she spoke in a commanding tone. There was a moment of silence and she approached menacingly, bolter held in a tight grip. Then finally an older-looking, grey-haired woman stepped forward, dressed in a scientist uniform.



"I am Doctor Cortez, chief researcher of the project. Please...we are only simple scientists and workers. We'll give you what you want," she said, voice shaking. "All the data is on my datapad."


"They're Sith! They're gonna kill us all," one man dressed like a scientist cried out and, gripped by fear and terror, bolted and tried to make a run for it, as fast as his legs could carry him. Unfortunately for him, he did not get far at all before Callisto squeezed the trigger and put a buckshot round through his leg. He slumped to the ground and howled in pain, clutching his bleeding wound.


"If you cooperate you will live. If you don't, you'll die," Callisto said flatly. "Surrender all your comms, gather all members of your team and assemble them here and await," she said to Cortez. "The workers will help us transport the Shadow Droid, then assemble in the barracks. Do not attempt to resist or escape." The roar of engines could be heard and then a shadow upon the ground heralded the coming of a transport ship. "You, Doctor, will show us the wreck."


Within a few moments it had landed upon the ground and, once the landing ramp had lowered, four Archangel HRDs exited. They soon began herding the organics in the facility, selecting and dividing them into groups. Some organics were more reluctant to follow commands, but they were soon taught the error of their ways.


Doctor Cortez was sweating strongly and fear was coming off her in waves, but tried to stay composed outwardly, while she led the HRDs over to the dig site. Evidently the people had been digging here for quite a while, as indicated by the heavy equipment, and here it was that they found the wreck of the Shadow Droid. Once it would have looked like this, but by now it was a wreck that could easily be transported by a common freighter. Conveniently the scientists had some equipment and machines in place that would suffice to move the wreck. The wings of the Shadow Droid wreck were broken and what would have been the cockpit was a mess. Sparks still flew from the computer, but protective cocoon in which the organic's brain was stored had been broken, meaning the fluids had dripped out, but there was still valuable data to be gained.