As we exited the derelict ship's airlock we came face to face with a shredded human corpse. The body was so disfigured it was impossible to tell if it had once been a man or a woman. The body floated in zero-G surrounded by a cloud of floating blood. Snapping my weapon up I swept the barrel of my N-1 across the passageway. The flashlight beam sweeping across the mangled forms of two other dead crew members. The lights were flickering between the red of emergency lighting and darkness.

"God damn." Trombley whispered over the tac-link.

"What could have done this?" Miiora asked from beside me as I nudged the body out of the way before creeping up the hall.

"No idea. Couldn't have been my people. More any race from Equis." Gutsy said sweeping her PDW across an open hatch. "Clear."

Remembering back to the incident on the Hellgan station an idea flashed through my head. "Sirens maybe?"

"Couldn't be. The bodies are too intact." Levoy said checking the magazine of his M66. "Look at the flesh. No signs of consumption, no bite marks or tears. No whatever did this was methodical."

"Mess hall up ahead." I called out moving up to the entrance with Miiora right behind me. "Set." Across from us Trombley and Gutsy stacked ready to enter the room.

"Go." X said before we began rushing into the room, weapons at the ready.

However, instead of coming around and seeing a room full of hostiles we walked into a horror show. Bodies lay strung across the tables or floating in the air. Clear signs of illegal weapons fire littered the walls, floor, and ceiling, all seemingly focused on one entranceway. On a hunch, I turned around to see the wall behind us littered with scorch and pockmarks, from what seemed to be weapons discharge from slugthrowers and blasters.

"This must have been one hellacious fight." Trombley mused as we moved through the room checking the bodies taking and disarming whatever weapons we could for later use.

"Woah, Sergeant come look at this."

Turning from inspecting a body with Miiora I turned to see Gutsy standing next to a corpse who's mag boots had him secured to the ceiling. "What is it Gutsy?"

"Look at this wound. It has all the hallmarks of one of your blaster weapons but it's too clean. And it doesn't have any of the residual magical aurae of a blazer." She explained holding the head so I could see it better.

"Well, it could…" I began before Levoy cut me off.

Stepping forward he aligned the body with another that was standing on a table almost five feet behind the first. "That's not all. Look at the trajectory. Whatever shot him didn't just kill him."

"Think you could make it?" I asked trying to piece together what could have done this.

"Maybe? If given time and a controlled environment. But whatever did this was on the move. Look…" the synthetic began taking a step back and began pantomiming, gesturing to several bodies in sequence.

"Whatever did this killed them. Then shifted and shot them, then these two. All while under fire, and all the while it was on the move, presumably taking concentrated fire. Whatever killed these people was tough. Nothing I can think of can do that even our best machines have a margin of error." He concluded.

"Ideas?" I asked

"Lo… Sargent, it very well could be…" Miiora began before a horrible screech sounded throughout the ship.

"What the hell was that?" I demanded as we all snapped up our weapons.

Silence filled the room as everyone listened to what was going on around us. As I listened, I began to hear a faint clomping noise, coming from down the main artery. Turning I saw everyone else had heard it as well and as we took up positions I turned to X for orders, only to see his visor had depolarised. His face was white as a ghost but I didn't see the fear in his eyes, no I saw something else, something I couldn't place.

"Get back to the ship. I know what did this." He began before slinging his NK-2 and opening a side compartment on his armor before retrieving what looked to be an old revolver style hand cannon.

"What?" Gutsy asked. Before she bumped one of the bodies. Instantly what could only be a recorded message began to play.

"To anyone hearing this message my name is captain James Reynolds. Several days ago my crew stumbled across a damaged cargo hauler at the edge of the western combat zone. We boarded and found the crew dead, we had thought they had been killed by pirates, or maybe clop raiders. We were wrong.

Onboard, we found an open cargo container of some kind. When we swept the ship we found more bodies and four bots. They were like nothing we had ever seen, far too advanced to be UEC made, and alien to be something made by humans. We had thought it was some kind of prototype war bot so we took it on board with hopes of selling it on the black market.

Two days later what I assume was the leader came alive and told us to surrender the ship so it could alert it's manufactured. We, of course, said no, and after that, it started killing the crew. My teams have destroyed the engine coupling and disabled controls to the helm. There are Formers on board, children and families below decks. We can't let those things find them. We've set a trap and are gonna try to take them down. We've already launched all of the escape pods, so we're down to this.

If you're hearing this then we've failed. Get off and destroy this ship. We can't let those things get to where they need to go. Tell my daughter I'm sorry, tell her daddy did this to keep her safe.

This is Caption, James L. Reynolds signing off. This message repeats."

"X?" I asked turning to the man after listening to the message.

"Cybar." The old helldiver said through gritted teeth.

"The hells a cyba…" Trombley began before a storm of white energy tore from down the hall and through his armor. Almost instantly his vitals flatlined, as he went limp hanging awkwardly in the air.

"Fuck!" I yelled in a mild panic scrambling to the side dragging his body to the with me.

Turning Trombley's body over I tore off his bucket and pulled his tags. Sighing with relief when I saw the glowing brass colored coin was still intact, I stuffed the neural backup disk into my suit pocket and returned fire.

"Habu sling that rifle it won't do any good firing gell rounds. Use that M-99 armor-piercing and shaped charge first. Gutsy pickup Trombley's SAW get some suppressing fire down this hallway. Iceman your with me. Levoy get back to the ship now and let them know we're on the way back, tell them to get ready to nuke the ship. Everyone gives him your coins, if we don't make it back they can revive us." X yelled taking command of the situation.

"Iceman bangers down the hall. It will disrupt their sensors for a few seconds. As soon as these bangers go off fall back by pairs we aren't equipped to combat Cybar centurions with a man down. Gutsy will go first she has the least armor, followed by Habu, then both myself and Iceman."

"Bangers out!" I yelled as I grabbed two bangers off my rig. And tossed the bangers around the corner. Instantly the streams of white plasma switched moving to shoot one of the bangers out of the air but failing to hit the other as it detonated.

"Go!" Instantly Miiora and Gutsy burst from cover and began a walking retreat to the hatchway behind us.

Trombley's SAW barked its hoarse report sending streams of flechettes down the passage toward the four silhouettes that were making their way down the hall. Sparks illuminated the darkness as the heavy tungsten nails punched through the bulkheads.

"I've never been more grateful that Trombley brings that thing with him everywhere." I said to myself before a series of defining booms sounded throughout the chamber as Miiora slam fired the M99.

Five big fat grenades like rounds meant to take down full-sized lankys blazed down the hallway blaming into the two leftmost silhouettes. The syringe-like rounds slammed home, injected their payloads and exploded tearing two silhouettes to pieces. This, however, is when the situation changed. As the two bots came fully into view they raised their weapons.

Time seemed to slow as I saw that they were aiming their energy rifles at Miiora. I saw the white dust like sabot flowering from the SAWs barrel, the creeping arc of the shotgun like M99s shells being flung from the weapon.

She passed within arms reach in slow motion. And I snatched my arm out wrapping my fingers around the plates of her armor, feeling the thick muscle of Miioras tail yielding to my nanite enhanced grip before yanking back.

Like a rope, the limb coiled went thought and just as the bolts of plasma leaped out of the bots strange weapons. With a yank, I pulled her off her feet and backward into me her weapon hanging uselessly in the air a fraction of a second before twenty or so bolts sailed into it and the air around it.

Miiora hissed and writhed in pain as I hooked her to my rig. Turning I pulled another banger and tossed it down the hallway before firing my N-1 down the hall as the first of the machines came fully into view.

It looked a bit like one of our old warbots, only more sleek, and with more organic looking bits dotted around its frame. Thoughts of ancient warriors flashed through my mind at the sight of the helmets as one of the machines, turned its helmet-like head towards me. Its six circular eyes clicking and whirring as it began to bring its weapon to bear.

Eyes going wide, I turn to wrap Miiora in my arms covering her with my armored bulk as two bolts slam into my armor. Only my legionnaire armor seemed to stand up better to the onslaught, taking the hits that went straight through Trombley's suit. Hearing Miiora scream, I got an Idea and used my implant to mask my vitals from external sensors, and collapsed bonelessly on top of her.

Miiora fumbled at my sidearm managing to pull the release latch for its holster as I heard the hot turn its attention towards her. To my surprise, it didn't shoot her right away instead I heard it clomp closer no doubt the machine didn't wish to waist munitions on a moving target. So as it crept closer I slowly move my hand to my pistol holster gripping the handle as the machine came to a stop beside us.

The intimate missionary style position we were in wasn't lost on me and I idly thought 'You know it wouldn't be so bad if there wasn't a fucking alien robot about to kill us.' You think of the craziest things in situations like this. Having had to clear my head of those thoughts, I used my implant to link my visor to Miioras' visual display. The cybar was behind me and to the right, perfect.

The machine stopped, staring down at us before raising its weapon, leveling it at her head as she froze. I felt her stiffen beneath me, giving me the opportunity I needed, and so with a flick of my thumb, I set my pistol to disintegrate. And with a rising mechanical whine from my pistols charge pack I pulled the weapon from its holster and shot the Cybar machine in the chest from the prone position.

There was a BWOOM noise as the area around us was filled with red light as the football-sized ball of destabilized energy slammed into the machine chest sending it flying backward with a massive scorched hole in its chest.

It wasn't dead yet, so as Miiora began to squirm once more I used my free hand to flip and push myself up into the air, locking my boots to the ceiling and shot the cyber in the head. Ducking low and kicking off I twirled the pistol in my hand as I twisted in the air, landing on a table in a crouch before shooting the second Cybar in the shoulder stunning it and blowing the arm assembly off before X finished it off with a shot from his big slug thrower.

"Nice one kid. I doubt Tyrus Wrechs could have done better." X said approving as he reloaded his revolver. Looking around I noticed that X had already dealt with the final two machines.

Nodding to the old man I got off of the table and helped Miiora to her feet. "Habu, Gutsy, Status?" I asked doing my best to keep the concern out of my voice while giving Miiora a quick once over.

"I am alright." Miiora wheezed shaking her body like a dog and managing the dent in her tale armor where I had grabbed it.

Thankful that I hadn't hurt Miiora to badly I turned to the unicorn. Her light armor had been scorched in several places where plasma bolts had slammed into her. And if she had been a normal clop she would have died, but thanks to her freaky healing factor she was still on her feet, or hooves in this case. "I'll live. But this weapon is bucked." She spat tossing Trombleys SAW.

"Double time it!" X suddenly yelled over the squad channel gesturing frantically for us to move down the corridor.

Not having to be told twice Miiora and Gutsy helped each other rush down the passageway. Pausing I stopped, contemplating the idea of taking one of the cybar weapons. Something was telling me to take the weapon, and before I knew it I almost had the weapon in my hand before an armored gauntlet swatted my hands away and pushed me forward. "Move your ass Legi!" I heard X yell snapping me out of some kind of my trance.

Quickly and effortlessly catching up with Habu I fell into step with to cover their six o'clock. "Talk to me X. What's going on?"

"New word from the Defiant. A new ship has just emerged from the gas giant and is on ingress." He said, his voice filled with a mixture of anger, and trepidation.

"Think it has anything to do with the signal?"

"No doubt." He said as we turned a corner watching as Miiora and Gutsy kicked off into this ship's window covered docking tube. At the end of the docking tube, I could see the second fireteam waving us onwards waiting to pull us in.

As I crossed the void between the two ships I felt Shiraui pushing her way into my perception. Using the link I felt her bull her way into the back seat of my mind. 'What the hell are you doing?' I seethed.

'I wanna see. Your vitals are peaking and I wanna know why.' She huffed in that innocently cute voice if hers.

That's when I saw the reason for the commotion. Coming up from the gas giant was one of the largest ships I had ever seen. Its twin dagger snapped hulls were like nothing I had ever seen, my HUD computer putting it at almost half the tonnage the Galactica. Linking my HUD to one of the Defiant's external cameras I zoomed the image in, the ship bristled with what I could only assume were numerous weapon blisters.

"What the fuck is that!?" Big Dog yelled from the other end of the tube giving voice to my question.

Something washed over me as I felt Shirauis agitation. She desperately wanted to get out of her birth and fight the ship with all she was worth. What she had told me before The anger I felt from the flayed was so intense that I began to actually feel my nanites buzzing with a need to do battle. And at the edge of my hearing, I could hear it, the keening.

"A cybar battleship." I heard both X and Shiraui say in unison, one with seething rage and the other in abject terror.

Forcing my suit to inject me with calming drugs I tried to calm Shiraui. I was about to ask how this day could possibly get any worse before every light in the tube and the Defiant starting flashing red as an all too familiar siren started blaring through the one MC.

My heart sank as I watched space start to warp and twist. X and I fired our jets scooping Gutsy and Miiora respectively into our arms and flying down the tube. The others saw us coming and dove for cover as the four of us came to an ungraceful halt at the end.

"Defiant actual their aboard!" I heard Big Dog yell slapping the airlock controls and keying the tubes retraction sequence. Looking to X and nodding in unison, we broke into a sprint for the CIC. As we crossed the decks we passed crewmembers desperately belting civilians into crash couches and securing equipment.

In what seemed like no time we bullied our way through the guards and made our way into the CIC where colonel Tigh was busy barking orders to the bridge crew. His eyes shot to us for a fraction of a second before he pointed to the railing at the perimeter of the bridge.

A sudden shifting caught my attention and I noticed that in my desperate rush to get to the CIC I had neglected to put Miiora down. Her weight negligible to my adrenalin-filled, nanite enhanced strength. She looked at me, her helmet depolarising as I muttered an apology and clipped her into the crash couch before turning my attention back to the colonel.

"I don't care about regulations! Do you see what's out there? If what Shiraui said is true then there's about to be a grudge match and we're going to get caught in the middle of it. Miss Shuri, Flip the ship now, mister Baxter, have tubes two and four loaded and ready to fire on that derelict, and prep for maximum burn."

"Aye, sir!" The bridge crew shouted X and I stepped up to give our reports.

"Sir…" X began only to have the colonel cut him off.

"Save it X. Shiraui filled me in already based off of whatever fucked up link she shares with Iceman. Get buckled in…"

"Sir! The alcubierre tunnel is stabilizing… Obba." The sensor operator's voice caught in his throat as he turned from his station. "Sir… the tunnel something is coming through."

"Get me a visual." Tiegh ordered, prompting one of the screens to display an image of a swirling crimson vortex, a hyperspace tunnel.

The colonel's eyes widened as the image began to warp and bend. Turning to the helm operator he barked out a series of orders. "Give the word. Ventral lateral roll ninety degrees port, Maximum burn At vector, nine, six. delta. Ninety eight. Bravo!"

"Ventral lateral roll ninety degrees port, Maximum burn At vector, nine, six. delta. Ninety eight. Bravo!"

"Execute!" The colonel yelled, as I felt the ship buck to life forcing me to activate my mag boots as the already weak artificial gravity desperately tried to keep up with the ship. Ahead of me I could see the colonel stopping himself into his command couch before keying the one MC. And without a word I crossed the bridge and plopped into the seat next to Miiora.

"Siege warning, Siege warning. Lanky Claw ship exiting hyperspace. All hands combat stations, standby for maximum burn."