Galactic Battle (6 page)

“That was just the elevator, you guys,” Tarope said, sounding like he wanted to believe it.

All too soon, the doors hissed open.

After the tight, cramped elevator, the huge open tunnels of the Belly were a surprise.

It's almost like a cathedral,
John thought.

Huge, steely pillars rose into unseen heights, and shafts of dim light broke the gloom. But it was all too easy to imagine sinister figures lurking high in the shadows, waiting to pounce.

Up above, a tiny hovering shape ducked quickly out of sight. In a flash of silver it was gone.

A bat? Don't be stupid, Riley. This is a spaceship, not Dracula's castle!
John tried to reassure himself.

“What is this place?” Dyfi said.

“Storage, mostly,” said Monix. “This is where the droids live, out of sight of the rest of the ship.”

“I'm not scared of a few old robots,” muttered Tarope. But then something made the loud sound of a rattling chain, and he gave a sudden little croak of fear.

“Defendroids aren't robots like you're used to,” Monix said. “They're dangerous. Like guard beasts.”

“Right,” John said, feeling like he had to call things to order. “Ton-3 said to go this way.”

“Are you sure?” Kritta said nervously. “This way doesn't look very welcoming.”

John referred to the team sheet again, and the hologram of Ton-3 flashed up before them. “That is correct. But take care, Galactic Battle team,” she said mysteriously before disappearing again.

Right on cue, a low mechanical growl came from the shadows. There was the sound of metal scraping against metal.

Kritta grabbed hold of John's arm and clung to him tightly. “I really don't want to be here.”

Kaal reached out for Kritta's other arm. “It's okay, Kritta,” he said. “This pair of Robot Warrior champions won't let anything hurt you.”

“Come on, everyone,” John insisted. “Let's not get too worked up over this, okay?” But in spite of his words, his own heart was beating fast as he led them through the dark tunnels. If the robots were as scary as they sounded, he wasn't sure he wanted to meet them face-to-face.

As the group turned a corner, John glimpsed a skeletal robot form looming through the shadows. A sinister red light pulsed from its gleaming metal skull.

It turned to face the group and began to run toward them in a lurching stride . . .

Dyfi squeaked and hid behind John's leg.

“It's okay!” John said. “It's only Master Tronic, here to meet us already. See?”

“Oh,” Dyfi said, poking her head out. “Sorry, sir. You scared me!”

“Think nothing of it,” Master Tronic said. “I'm used to the students not recognizing me at first.”

John understood what Master Tronic meant. The technology teacher changed his body to match whatever he was teaching. Right now, he was a lean robot with four tool-tipped arms, which was perfect for teaching electronic maintenance and repair. The only thing that never changed was the red light beam from his head.

“So, Galactic Battle team,” said Master Tronic, “are you ready to meet the Defendroids? There are six of them, which is why this team is limited to six students.”

He gestured behind him to a large reinforced window, behind which several huge shadowy shapes paced back and forth in near darkness. They looked twice as tall as Master Tronic. Mechanical roars and snarls came from within. The door beside the window looked like it could withstand a nuclear missile strike.

John and the others looked at each other nervously.

“Well, don't all charge forward at once,” Master Tronic said, his voice heavy with synthetic sarcasm. “Come on, team. You need to get a good look at them while they're in full aggression mode. I don't want you to forget what you're dealing with.”

I guess this is where the leader has to set the example,
John thought.
Nobody wants to be the first one. Even Monix looks worried. But if I don't go, nobody else ever will.

John stepped forward, walking slowly until he was right in front of the window. Kritta followed behind, then all the others. The Defendroids inside were still hard to see in the dark, but John saw an enormous metal claw brush by the window, and his heart thumped painfully in his chest.

“That's better,” said Master Tronic. “And now . . .” He flipped open a control panel next to the window and pressed a switch. Instantly, light flooded the room inside.

Everyone gasped, including John.

The six Defendroids were roughly human-shaped, but they each had two arms: one ending in a spiked, lumpy sphere and the other in a long curved blade. Their faces looked like they were full of brute anger, with big jutting chins and tiny little red eyes.

“Technically, they're called DF-221 to DF-226,” said Master Tronic, “but I have my own names for them. Basher, Lasher, Slicer, Dicer, Crusher, and Steel Storm.”

“Cute names!” John said sarcastically.

The Defendroids stomped back and forth, swiveling their heads to the left and right — and sometimes, frighteningly, all the way around to face in the other direction. When they did that, their arms and legs rotated in their sockets to match the direction of their head, and the robot stomped off back the way it had come, without having to turn around.

From time to time, the robots would roar and bash the ground or the walls, sending a tremor through the floor. It was as if they had to attack or they would go crazy from imprisonment.

“As you can see,” Master Tronic said, “they are heavily armed. One wrecking-ball arm, one blade arm with extendable circular saw. They can stamp with the force of a pile driver, electrify their limbs, and even extend the wrecking ball on a chain to ensnare their opponents.”

“I'm not sure if that's the scariest thing I've ever seen, or the coolest,” Tarope said.

“Why are these things called Defendroids, anyway?” Kritta asked. “The way they're acting, shouldn't they be Attackdroids or something like that?”

“These beauties are part of the school's defense system,” Master Tronic explained proudly. “Right now they're in full aggression mode. We keep them that way when they're in storage, because if the school was ever attacked, they'd need to be sent in to fight the intruders right away.”

“We can't fight them, even with LaserPros!” Monix complained. “They'll crush us to a pulp!”

“We didn't invite the entire school's parents to Hyperspace High to watch their children go splat,” Master Tronic said. “Pay attention, all of you. Whenever you use the Defendroids to spar with, you have to switch them over to training mode. Like this.”

Master Tronic pressed a sequence of keys on the control panel at the door, and a strange blue pulsing light began to ripple through the cell. The Defendroids stopped their constant stomping and stood still, arms hanging by their sides. Without the roaring and crashing, it was suddenly deathly quiet.

“They'll still fight, of course,” Master Tronic said, “but it's strictly nonlethal. Oh, they'll put on a good show, but the chances of anyone actually getting injured are very slim indeed.”

“Well, that's good to know,” Monix said in an icy tone.

Master Tronic ignored her. “John, the passcode to put the robots in training mode is SOMNOLA, and the code to set them back to full aggression mode is LEXTALIONIS. Don't ever, ever open this door without entering the training code first. Not unless you want to spend the Space Spectacular in the medical wing!”

“Got the message loud and clear, sir,” John said, committing the codes to memory. “Thanks.” Out of the corner of his eye, he saw something zip away in the upper shadows. The flying thing again! Or was he seeing things?

Master Tronic activated another control, and the great door groaned open with a hiss of pistons. “In you go, then. They're set to follow your voice commands.”

Despite everything Master Tronic had said about the Defendroids being safe now, John hesitated. He really didn't want to go in there. But the team needed him. He forced himself to walk in.

“Come on, you guys,” he said to the silent Defendroids. “Follow me. It's time for energy weapon practice.”

“CONFIRMED,” said the nearest Defendroid, in a voice that grated like rusty metal.

Kritta was staring at John with her mouth open. “You just walked right in. Wow. That was so cool.”

“Just one problem,” Kaal said. “Where are we going to practice? We can't go back to force field 1.0. It will be too crowded.”

“We'd be less likely to hit each other if we had a little more room,” said Kritta tactfully.

“I suggest you use the Sonic Sports Hall,” Master Tronic said. “And you'd better head up in the Grav-Lifter beam, too. You'll never get the Defendroids in a service elevator.”

“No kidding. We barely got
us
in a service elevator,” Monix grumbled.

“So what is the Grav-Lifter beam exactly?” John asked the team sheet as they walked on through the Belly hallways, the Defendroids in training mode following close behind.

Ton-3 flashed into being. She had changed outfits again. Now she was wearing a workman's vest and holding a huge wrench. “It's for hauling the big loads between decks! No need for platforms or elevators — just a big, wide-open shaft, with tractor beams to pull you up or down!”

“Uh-oh,” said Tarope. Up ahead lay the edge of what looked like a gaping circular pit, easily sixty-five feet across. “I think this must be it.” A faint reddish light pulsed down the length of the shaft.

John gulped. “Do we just . . . walk over the edge?”

“You got it!” chirped Ton-3.

“I'll go first,” Kaal said boldly, striding in front. His wings twitched, ready to bear him up, if need be. He took a step over the edge and hung there in space, the edges of his body glowing in the beam.

“Okay, everyone,” John said. “All together, on the count of three. One, two . . . three!”

Together, they walked over the edge. Kritta held her hands over her eyes. Suddenly, John felt like he was walking on soft pillows. He looked down, and immediately wished he hadn't. The shaft seemed to drop down to infinity.

“We're moving!” Tarope said.

Sure enough, the whole team, Defendroids and all, was rising steadily upward.

John could see the bright lights of the ship's upper decks shining far above. He kept his eyes fixed on that, refusing to look down again.

When the Galactic Battle team reached the Sonic Sports Hall, John still felt more than a little giddy from his ride on the Grav-Lifter beam. Being hauled up through several decks without even a platform to stand on had been a little nerve-racking, to say the least.

Still, the admiring glances and comments they'd gotten from the other students as they'd departed the Grav-Lifter beam and led the Defendroids through the corridors to the Sonic Space Hall had been worth it. John was feeling almost proud of them now.

He activated the touch screen outside the hall. “Okay, team. We can customize the room for Galactic Battle, and there are loads of options. Random floor tilt, laser turret fire, maze settings, reflectors . . .”

The team looked at him with expressions of horror.

“Or I could just set it to basic,” John added hastily. “Simple, shock-resistant, and soundproof. Yeah. That makes sense. I think we'll go for basic.”

“Good choice,” Kritta whispered as they filed inside.

“This looks great!” said Tarope, running into the center of the hall. “There's tons of room.”

“Okay, everyone!” John called. “Ready to get some serious practice in?”

Everyone except Monix yelled, “Yeah!”

Monix just shrugged, which looked pretty weird on a floating oblong.

“So how does this work?” Kritta asked. “We can't actually damage the Defendroids permanently, can we?”

Ton-3 was quick to answer, now back and wearing her bright yellow team T-shirt and shorts. “When your weapons have their safety on, they won't do any permanent damage. The Defendroids will count how many times you've successfully hit them. Twenty hits and they fall over until the next round. Oh, and bashing them on the head is a critical hit and stuns them. If you can manage it.”

Just like fighting a goblin in the
World of Khaos
video game,
John thought.

“And what do we do when they hit us?” Monix said acidly. “Bleed on them?”

“They won't hit us,” John assured her. “In training mode, they back off when they're hit.”

“That's a relief,” said Dyfi. “Otherwise, we'd all be squished!”

“Okay, team, let's get to work,” John said. “This morning was kind of a mess, but never mind, that's all behind us. We've got real opponents now, so we can really cut loose. Okay. Let's get started. First, everyone spread out and find a space.”