Nico prepared another round as Max's System Functions frantically worked on predicting the outcome of another round going at a Cutter.
"Are we ready for the one-two punch?" Nico asked happily as Max's full-force Orbital Lance showed ready.
"Let's do this. You fire, and I will pick the predicted location as soon as it vanishes." He agreed.
"Split it into two charges the first time. Better odds of hitting the ship when it comes back." Nico suggested.
That likely wouldn't destroy a Cutter, but it would put the fear of whatever gods the Arisen worshipped into the commander of the vessel.
Nico fired her Mass Driver, but the glorious plan to determine the disappearance pattern was foiled at the last moment when the ship forcefully ejected a War Walker into the path of the projectile.
The energy shield destabilized the Warp bubble around the projectile, and the War Walker joined the combined impact, thrown back against the shields of its ship by immense force.
The shields held, but barely, and Max could see explosions all over the ship as the power relays were overloaded, and then the Cutter went completely dark and began to drift into space.
"Looks like we overloaded their main power source, or Warp Drive, whatever they're using to drive those things." Nico laughed as the disabled ship began to drift.
Max was about to eliminate the ship completely, but the sudden appearance of what looked like the entire contents of the Cube changed his target priorities, and he turned the pair of Lance Strikes at the assembled army with a dispersed pattern for maximum effect.
The strikes never made their target. The shields around the Cube flashed and flickered, showing Max that they had anticipated his response and chosen to protect their warriors from his first strike.
"I think they're learning to fight against us." Nico mused as the Mass Driver charged.
"I didn't expect them to sacrifice their shielding to protect the War Walkers, though. Extending them that far makes them weak." Max agreed.
The War Walkers were already racing toward them from both sides, and the ships wouldn't be able to protect them from the next strikes, but Nico and Max would only get one more before they were outnumbered ten thousand to one.
"Give me a lift. Just a Warp speed hop into melee with the War Walkers from the Cube since the patrol is still bearing down on the ones behind us." Nico demanded.
Her thoughts said that she was done playing cat and mouse with the ships, and once they were in melee, there was very little chance of the enemy using heavy weapons, as every shot that missed would likely hit an allied unit.
It was the same anywhere. Projectile and high-powered energy weapons had no place in a confused melee unless you were greatly outnumbered. The damage to your own troops from friendly fire would be too great.
Max grabbed Shattered Pride and brought it deep into the enemy ranks, then released Nico back-to-back with him and fired outward with the Disruptors set on maximum dispersion.
Hundreds of War Walkers died in an instant, torn apart by the energy beam, and the two Mecha charged forward with their defensive Lasers constantly glowing as they targeted everything that they could see.
[Commanders, if you can hold for thirty seconds, the Station Defence Fleet will be at your position to reinforce you.] The Station Dispatcher informed them in a desperate tone.
Nico was the first to reply in her characteristically happy combat voice. [Fear not, young dispatcher. Thirty seconds is no challenge for us. Just make sure they get here safely while I collect arts and crafts materials.]
Max was certain that the dispatcher thought it was a strange human joke that didn't translate properly into Koleska, but Nico had an actual project in mind. The War Walkers were basically skeletons, made up of an alloy that shouldn't exist in reality, but if she could capture some before they had a chance to vanish and put them in the flat space she had equipped on her Mecha, she could make herself an Arisen themed trophy room.
There was no guarantee that they wouldn't disappear from the flat space, but since it was already a separate space, there was a good chance that they wouldn't be able to rescue the pilfered body parts from her.
Not only would that allow her to make her trophy room, but she could also study them properly if she wasn't in combat with them.
The gleam of gold and blue as Cleansing Light ducked and dodged, avoiding being shot while it fought, was a stark contrast against the dull gray of the War Walkers in this group, but the blue energy of his lasers made them glow in a way that reminded Max of a bad horror film, where anatomically incorrect skeletons gleamed with magical energy as they attacked.
The sight made Max laugh, and once he had seen it, the bad animatronic skeletons could not be unseen. Their only saving grace was that their torsos were solid. If they were skeletal like the bony limbs, Max likely wouldn't be able to stop himself from laughing as he fought.
Familiar Ion Cannon signatures flashed all around him as the reinforcements with the new weaponry arrived at the battle, so Max pushed onto the offence again, trying to separate the War Walkers into clusters that the Koleska could focus on and eliminate in smaller groups.
The new Ion Cannons were doing a wonderful job of cutting through the War Walkers' shielding, and the Arisen force was falling faster than they could charge at the new arrivals.
The battle wasn't completely one-sided, though. The Koleska defenders were falling at a steady pace to the War Walkers' return fire. They were doing their best to utilize the evasive techniques that they had learned in the training program, but they didn't have the practical experience to combine them and improvise.
So, while they dodged some shots, which was an improvement, more than enough shots were still landing to thin their ranks while both sides scrambled to bring more forces to the most affected sectors.
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