protected by heavy rear plating. It lacked a head, instead a great camera inset into its chest. Abreon pointing to the back of the unit, “A controller’s seat is in there, you can barely see it, but it is there. It is positioned just above the unit’s power units, protected by more shielding. The chair has the units control modules mounted to a dash. It also has a heads up display, everything superimposed by the imagery from the forward facing camera.”
Nece impressed, “Okay.”
Abreon pointing again, “And we just installed a new rearward secondary camera. We are still working to patch it into the heads up display software.”
“Oh.”
Abreon kicked one of its huge steel toes, “You know what it is, don’t you?”
Nece knew because they worked in the recycling facility and in the recycling silos, “Sure, they drop down on control tethers from the sky cranes and scavenge for recyclables. About five or six cranes can be controlled from a single boom housing six technicians. These units do the work of those who could not because of safety restrictions. They can be used when toxic materials are found as well. They shove toxic refuse in sealed tanks we had on their dorsal spine.”
Abreon, glancing over at a technician with a computer: “We just severed the tether on this one. Now just the rider in the rear of the machine controls it. We have three, we are hoping for a total of forty.”
Nece discouraged, “That’s all, Abreon?”
“Unfortunately, Nece. We have hundreds, but we have to outfit them and then patch them into new onboard computers. All this takes time. We don't have much of that, but it could make all the difference. What should we call these machines?”
Nece thought for a moment, “How about tanks?”
Eight
Abreon watched from the top floor of the company’s corporate center, down and across the way, the battle field two kilometers away. Next to Abreon stood Nece and President Avanar all watching the field before them through binoculars. The room was kept dark so that they could see out toward the battlefield and assess what they thought would be the last battle of the war between the Dru and the Tamar. Abreon watched as the Tamar fought the Dru valiantly holding their own among the flashes of red and white plasma, laser and needle gunfire. The Dru dug slashed and dug through the razor wire, the constructed walls and then the Tanar trenches. The Tanar poured down the Decaro hills to push them back into their trenches and pin them to the rear of their concrete bulkheads. The Tanar held off the Dru, some forty thousand Xelon Dru, against twenty thousand Tanar. The Tanar held them off their own hills until both armies tired and wounded a stalemate emerged between them. An hour passed and then two. Avanar to Abreon, anxious as the Dru continued to push wearing out the remaining Tanar soldiers, “When are we going to introduce the Tanks, Abreon?”
Abreon watched as the Tanar struggled, another hour passing and the battle seeming to slip away from the Tanar. As the sun began to lower itself behind the hills. Then, when the stalemate seemed to be broken in favor of the Xelon Dru, the Tanar sent in the tanks, down the hill and in a wedge formation along the battlefields flanks. Nece pointed, “I see the tanks!”
Abreon watched as alternating pairs of plasma shots burning, streaked across the walls over them and into fields. The Xelon Dru pushed forward into the Tanar with their mix of weapons, their protection suits and then their tanks. The tanks pushed toward the Xelon infantry, pinning them back as they fired cannons at them. They took their toll on the tanks and the remaining Tanar soldiers, but it was too much, the Xelon lines crumbled. The Tanar ran the last of the Dru to the walls, back from the fields.
A technician entered the office of Avanar whispering to him and then leaving. He lowered his binoculars and smiled turning to Abreon, “We have won.”
Nece, “The Corporation is saved.”
Then something happened. In the seconds which were to follow, a massive blast from the Xelon Dru, which ripped through the Tanars defensive walls. Three four legged units, machines than moved out from the entrance created through the center of the blast site and into the mass of Xelon Dru, Tanar and tanks. Each Dru machine extending multiple arms, each arm with multiple line, ejecting, grappling soldiers or tanks, current riding them to disable electronics and kill their victims.
Abreon looking through his binoculars, “What are those things?”
Avanar, “What’s happening?”
Abreon looking out at the clots of flickering light, the Dru having some type of new weapon system. The machines shot out their reticulating claws with electric force destroying what it touched and then drawing the back. It appeared that each arm had six filaments, in a shotgun style array.
Nece, her voice limp, “What's wrong Abreon?”
Abreon now turning to the Nece, “There destroying the Tanks! The men! Everything!”
Avanar turning to him, “How long?”
“An hour at most.”
Avanar, “We should leave!”
Abreon pushing him off, “How, how are we supposed to do that!”
“There’s terrain vehicles in the parking basements.”
Abreon yelling, “Where are you going to go? Where is anybody going to go! There is people left in this building, the woman and children and remaining civilians in their homes waiting! There is not enough vehicles.”
Avanar eyeing him, “I’m going!” running out of his office.
Nece to Abreon looking back at the doors Avanar ran through, “What are we to do?”
“There are still some workers left in the building. We have to round them up, create a militia and scrounge for weapons. I believe we have twenty needle guns in development. They just need to be assembled. They are in research and development ward C. A tank is also in ward C. We can take it up to the top of this building and fight there.”
Nece, “Why?”
“Because we can't let them win again. We can’t let them enslave another corporation. I’ve come too far to let them win again. There are five thousand of their soldiers left. It will take two weeks for assistance to reach them, another division of men. We can pick them off and still win this!”
“But, they still have twenty thousand troops in the Dru Territory, over the Zitar Nuo!”
Abreon holding his head, “I don’t know, maybe if we take back the recycling facility, they’ll leave us alone. Then we can gather the remains of the work force here and engage in a counter attack.”
Abreon running down the halls of the corporate lower, floor ten of sixty-five, running, opening every door, of every office, finding nothing, or sometimes somebody, finding one corporate worker in a corner, “‘Come on! Let’s go! We have to climb the building!”
Nece, “Come on!”
Abreon running again, turning back, “Come on everybody!” Others in commotion, some yelling, opening other doors behind him, one, “Come on!” Abreon running, Nece behind him, “We can’t climb all the floors, ourselves Abreon!” Abreon spinning holding his hands out, “Wait!” waving, “Wait, everybody!”
All slowing stopping, about twenty-five, one questioning, “What is wrong?”
“We need to spit up into teams.”
Another employee, “How many?”
Abreon thinking quickly, “Six of two each and one of three.” then pointing, “Your name?”
“Jake”
Abreon pointing to another, “You?”
That one, “Chy.”
Abreon again, “And you?”
She spoke to him, “Pethra.”
Abreon to them, “You’re leaders so pick more and form teams. Each of you take five floors and repeat it, when you get to floor sixty-five, stop and wait for the remaining pairs, report to me.” Then Abreon stopped again, “Okay, I need a barricade here!” Abreon pointing to the hallway, as a mass of forty workers were had arrived, “We also need a barricade here, two per floor!”
Chy was tall and lanky with streaks of blond hair. He scratched his head in confusion, “With what Abreon?”
“With
desks and anything more you can find!” Abreon yelled to Pethra. Pethra had long streaky, curly hair to her shoulders and a deeply accentuated face, “I want you and a few others to disable the elevators, but not the C cargo elevator; we need that to move the tank. Make sure the rest are made inoperable. Take out the elevator's computer intelligence that will make them junk.”
Pethra, “Will do.”
Abreon to them all of them, “I need twenty men to come with me. We need to take all the needle guns, assemble them and load them. We need to take the remaining suits and put them on. We need to take the Tank and bring it to the top floor. There we will make our last stand in the president’s office. Does everyone understand?”
One employee, “Yes sir!”
Another employee, “You bet!”
Abreon waited as the Xelon Dru soldiers made their way through the last blockade on floor below theirs. He could hear them as he picked on the green directional lines upon the floor of that level. Nece looked at the floor and at him, into his eyes: “I wish you could have learned more of our ways.”
Abreon to her, smiling, “I learned enough.”
“Yes.”
Jake was kneeling on the floor with a protection suit on, however, since there were only twenty weapons and sixty-five people, only twenty were positioned as the first defense. All twenty were suited. Abreon’s helmet next to him, Jake, “Should we position ourselves?”
Abreon stood, “All of you step back by ten meters from this spot, behind the desks before the barricade. Fight until they