Chapter 14: Unexpected Company — Part 1

Orchid woke up with a start, the raging boom of a powerful explosion ripping into her ears. She felt the pulse of the blast to her very core, her bender suit flying from its resting position on the bedside table to her chest. It groped its way over her body, providing her its fullest armor capability and preparing her for the inevitability of battle. Orchid ran down the hallway toward the explosion, all the while assessing the situation as new details came available. She was forced to an abrupt halt when she came to the end of the manor, metal soles digging into concrete through the carpet above it. With a precision unimagined, the explosive mechanisms used had blown the entire north wall off the manor, leaving the structural supports intact. Though smoke from the blast filled the air, there were few fires to put out, and the repair drones for the mansion were tending to them. The sheer number of biodroid soldiers having burst their way into her private home filled Orchid with a deep, blood chilling terror. With her nerves numb, her rapidly spooling mind sought the offensive. Orchid ordered Spunky into battle against the enemy, engaging the nearest biodroid with her bare hands.

Nearby, Jun and Joanie were fighting to guard Kamau, Ren, and Toni from a squadron of biodroids, and Master Alon, battle hammer in hand, worked his way through the enemy toward his daughter, crushing skulls with brutal efficiency. The Blue Dragon rose with his kin from the forests to the south, the horde of death dropping from the air and cutting off an entire squadron before it could come down on the occupants within the mansion. Among the biodroids were hume and android troopers, armed and armored for lengthy combat. Outside, explosions could be heard all over Whetherbridge, and the small manor began to burn to the ground. Bamboo, working with Glyph, coordinated a desperate attempt to save the children from the attack.

Yap and Blue fought toward the children even as the hume squadron pinned them down. Bamboo took a mortar round to the chest as Glyph was crushed in the fist of a biodroid. Bamboo fell back against a wall, winded and injured. Jun saw him go down and screamed in rage, killing everything in her path to get to her lover’s side. The children stayed near her, fear in their eyes, terrified of the death and horror around them. Swift was nowhere to be seen. Jun dodged a bullet fired by a hume trooper, then brought her sword up into his belly, splitting the man’s chest and armor from solar plexus to throat. The man collapsed, gasping for air. The hope for his life lay in the mansion’s medical drones. They would not work on him until they had him fully sedated and detained, and they would not focus on him while residents in the mansion needed attention. Soon Yap, Blue, Jun and Joanie were back to back with the children between them, and Master Alon was still fighting to get to them.

Bamboo managed to rise, fight his way back toward Jun and Orchid. He heard Jun’s scream as Master Alon was skewered in the chest by a biodroid dagger. Master Blue lost all the boidroids in his command, the majority of the three hundred having perished in an explosive attack outside the building. Blue fought his way violently around the cornered party, struggling with damage from multiple assailants and under fire from a variety of weapons. The dragon put himself between Orchid and Bamboo, seeking to protect them to the very end, his keen eyes seeing every weakness in an enemy that had so few. Tail and teeth and claw lashed out, while plasma burst forth from Blue’s mouth, but the enemy overpowered and beat him down with clubs and swords. Clawing and fighting his way in retreat, Master Blue Dragon fell in behind Orchid, blasting the enemy with dwindling reserves.

Spunky took a blow that knocked it to the ground, where it fizzled and cursed, unable to rise or to aim its weapons. Orchid had no time to worry as the enemy closed in. Brutally intelligent, the enemy pinned residents into a corner. Soon Pearl was with them, fighting in her own unique way, spheres of plasma flying out from her hands, pieces of metal rising up under the influence of her mind, killing anything that tried to get to Sissy or the children who were proving the focus of the attack. Joanie fell from a bullet wound, unable to scream despite the pain. Jun fought even as a pool of her own blood flooded in under her feet. Something bright and burning caught Jun square in the chest, and she went down with a grunt, her hand reaching out to take Bamboo’s, who had fallen early in the fight, and could not move or speak due to his injuries.