Abberax turned the corner. Ahead of him several combat thralls had already assembled, taking up positions on both sides of the hangar doors. When the Unmind ships had realised the dreadnought was dead their sides had opened, swarms of machines shrieking forth into the black. They had latched onto the hull like parasites, cracking through the stone and disgorging their cargo into the corridors of the ship.
“My lord,” the assembled thralls said in unison, bowing as Abberax approached. He waved his hand dismissively, Abberax had no time for ceremony.
“Someone give me a situation report,” Abberax said, his central crystal shimmering as he spoke. “You.” He pointed a talon at the nearest thrall.
“The hangar is breached, my lord. The enemy are deploying… machines.”
“Yes, I know that, but anything else? What kind of machines? How great a force.”
“I… I don’t know, my lord.” The thrall was shaking. Combat thralls were hardier stock than the standard thrall, bred for warfare. Still, a healthy fear of their Substrate lords had been drummed into them.
“Very well.” Abberax saw the thrall breathe a sigh of relief. It was good to know he still held sway over the lesser races despite the crisis he found himself in. If his ship was lost, Abberax was at least going to go out fighting. No Substrate lord had battled the Unmind directly before, simply abandoning any threatened worlds and thralls. At least this way his name would still mean something in the history prisms. “Open the doors.”
The metal bulkhead hissed as it slid open. Thralls poured through, their cybernetic weapons raised. Abberax followed them, striding confidently into the hangar beyond. He wasn’t armed, he didn’t need to be. The Unmind had come into his ship, his domain. To Abberax everything was a weapon.
The hangar bay held two shuttles. They looked like smaller versions of the dreadnought, shells of stone with dull steel components bolted to them. They looked like rocket-propelled flint arrowheads, simple, but effective. A large machine was clambering over one on its four long pointed legs. Its body hung from where the legs connected, curving upwards to look at the new arrivals with its glowing crimson eye.
“Lifeforms detected. Scanning. Multiple species already indexed. Complex cry-”
Its words were met with energy blasts from the thralls. Purple fire exploded against its torso and the machine stumbled, smoke and organic fluid pouring from the damaged sections. It fell from the top of the shuttle, crashing against the hangar floor.
At the far side of the hangar, a massive metal spike had punctured the door, opening like a blossom once inside. Another collector clambered out, followed by a third.
“Complex crystalline lifeform not indexed. Moving to collect,” the second machine said, picking up the first’s sentence.
Abberax knew it meant him. His true self was the glowing round crystal at the heart of his being. His imposing rocky body, like that of all Substrate, was simply an extension of his people’s geokenesis, the ability to manipulate rocks and minerals. It was a sham, an illusion, a fake form designed to terrify the lesser races. The Substrates real strength was far different from their impressive bodies.
There was a loud crack as Abberax decided to show the Unmind exactly what he was capable of. A section of the stone ceiling tore free, a segment easily as long as Abberax was tall. With simply a thought he launched the column towards the nearest machine. It crashed into the thing’s torso, buckling it instantly, crushing it under the force of the blow.
The remaining machine, realising the threat Abberax posed, unleashed a blast of searing energy towards him. Almost instantly the floor peeled back, the stone forming a solid wall that absorbed the blast, dust and shards flying outwards. Abberax launched the remaining sections of his shield, the barrage of stones clanging against the metal of the collector.
Another collector climbed free of the breaching device, followed by another. The thralls surged forwards; their morale boosted by the impressive feats of their lord. They unleashed their blasts as they did, purple energy filling the air of the hangar.
The collectors, now aware of what the thrall’s weapons could do began to scuttle about, trying to evade the shots. They returned fire, thrall’s turning to ash as they were struck by the pulses.
Abberax tore another section of the ceiling free, this time turning it lengthways. He flung the bar towards the nearest collector. It tried to evade but the stone shard crashed into one of the machine’s legs buckling it. The thralls were on it in moments, blasting the easy target apart.
One of his warriors cheered. They were winning, just one of the deadly machine’s remaining. Abberax resisted the urge to join the thrall in celebrating victory. This was just one of many boarding sites, and whilst the few Substrate warriors aboard would no doubt be reaping a toll as impressive as Abberax’s, they couldn’t be everywhere.
A noise within the boarding device seemed to answer the thrall’s triumphant cry. It was like heavy rain, a thunderstorm within the darkness of the opening. Its source became immediately apparent, a tide of smaller machines pouring into the hangar.
In moments everything changed. The thralls fired into the oncoming tide, but for every one they destroyed two more were right behind it. They clambered up the thralls, sharp legs jabbing into flesh exposed between fused armour plating. The cheering became a frenzied screaming as the swarm tore into the defenders.
Abberax pulled with all his might, sheering dozens of small fragments from the ground before him. He launched them, crushing machine and thrall alike. He focused himself on the task, constantly ripping free fist-sized chunks and launching them. He could feel his stamina draining, even a mighty Substrate lord had limits.
The heat would have been searing, if Abberax could feel it. His people had no concept of temperatures, their cores formed from incredible heat and pressure at the moment of their births. He had been too focused on the smaller machines and had paid the price. The collector had fired on him, and Abberax had missed it, neglecting to raise another shield. He wasn’t injured, or at least his core wasn’t, holding up against the energies of the Unmind weapon. The shot had caused Abberax to lose concentration though, and he had dropped everything his geokenisis was holding, including his physical form. His crystal hit the ground, rolling into a crack in the hangar floor formed by his own assault.
He felt himself being lifted. A metal tendril had wrapped itself around him. He was being pulled somewhere. Everything went dark and he felt something drilling into his side. He tried to protest, but without his body, Abberax could not speak. Something was working its way inside his crystal, breaching his true self. This was it, his final end. At least had fought to the last. That counted for something.
Waves of white energy poured from Clive’s hands into the cloud of lights that formed the Unmind’s core. It was fighting back, but it was losing. Clive was right, it was too rigid, too set in its ways to truly stop him. Every move it made to block, Clive was one step ahead. Around them, trees had begun to become visible, the files containing the Unmind’s consciousness collapsing, dissolving into the datascape.
“Unauthorised deletion in progress. Error. Error,” the Unmind said. Scarlet lightning lashed out, crashing into the ground around the pair.
“Come on, just accept it,” Clive said. His teeth were gritted. He had never been programmed with that expression. It was something he had learnt subconsciously from interacting with the others. “Just go peacefully. You know you want to. This isn’t right. You weren’t built for this.”