"Sir, the shield is up!" A young over-eager collie dog reported. Her battle armor said that her name is Bassie and judging from the 8 bumps in her under armor, Anji realizes that the collie-looking private is actually female.

"Good!" growled Commander Burgo. "Whether the enemy bombards us or not makes no difference, the shield will go down after five minutes! So get ready, you mongrels! This is it!"

He was met by a loud 3 bark acceptance from the K28 sailors all around him. The wide clearing is about 400 meters, and they have to charge that to reach the blast walls.

Anji look around her and in a line formation dug around the command center, just over 50 K28 survivors waited for the signal that will either help them escape the trap set up for them or be finally be annihilated. She could see the anxiety and fear mixed in their faces but also the grim determination not to shame themselves in the eyes of their fellow sailors, their ancestors and most importantly, to their gods.

Heh, their gods.

A young Beagle-like soldier 2 soldiers to her left kept muttering for all to hear, "I deliver my body and soul to thy human name, and may thee bless me in return, amen. I deliver..."

"Your gods don't deserve your devotion," She muttered. Then curiously, she wasn't afraid anymore. A sense of calm and acceptance washed over her and she was filled with a sense tranquility. "this is not a bad day to die."

Her eyes glued on the 4 distinguished black armor in the bunch of four-legged warriors. The blackguards due to prior arrangements will lead their own sections of k28 soldiers to hit the blast walls in four distinct places.

four minutes passed and Commander Burgo looks at Codex 4 who is behind him and Anji.

Moments ago, Anji told him to carry the lady towards the field since commander Burgo mentioned that the lady is suffering from osteoporosis. The codex stared at her in disbelief, which is really hard to do since the codex is wearing a black glass for a face. "She is irrelevant. My only priority is you!" He said in a hissing whisper.

"And she is important to me," Anji said stubbornly. If you don't carry her then I will attempt to do so, and that will put me in so much danger..."

"Fine! but the moment I sense that you are in danger I will throw her aside to get to you."

Anji almost smiled imagining it.

Now Codex saw Burgo's look and he signaled his own men (Curly), The blackguard tapped his wrist for a few seconds and then a massive explosion blew up in the eastern fenced area.

Minutes before, 2 blackguards brought the last engine battery in that area, under the cover of smoke and stealth, then rigged it to explode by remote. The explosion was part of a decoy designed to lure the Eratix into a false position. But both the Codex and Commander Burgo knew that it won't be enough.

Thirty seconds after the explosion, the shockwave hit them and filled their position with dust and debris. "There goes my good hair day." Anji moaned.

Then something caught her eyes. An object in the sky glittering in the moonlight. She raised her eyebrows as parachutes were deployed and the objected descended in a much more controlled landing. Even then, when the object who Anji recognized as another escape pod, hit the ground, a loud clang can be heard and one side of the pod was flattened. Everyone stared for a second when the door hissed open, and a huge butt wiggled itself out of it. eventually, the butt and the body that comes with it pops out and an adorable giant puppy came out. Bewildered, the k28 prince looked around his surroundings and then he started whining loudly.

It was the whining that made Anji moved.

Without any real conscious thought about it, Anji vaulted the dugout in one fluid motion and passed through the blue humming shield that surrounded them. The shield is connected to a powerful computer with the attached program to stop anything that is registered in their DNA bank. The DNA bank has access to almost all the species of the known galaxy, except for one. Species 01.

4 blackguards smashed themselves into the shield as they watched in horror as the woman they are protecting suddenly run out. Anji can hear the anguished cry of her guards behind her but she didn't look back nor hesitated. All her attention and focus is to help prince Bentong who now that he finds himself in an unfamiliar environment felt unsure and helpless.

Her enhanced brain through her nanites assumed that the prince's pod was floating in space for several hours now. Either the prince did something with the controls or the pod finally activated its emergency protocol since the oxygen in the pod should be in the dangerous level now is unimportant at the moment, since the problem is the fact that the prince literally drops in the middle of a battlefield.

Anji noticed an MPG launcher on the ground, still held by the dead decaying hands of a former Eratix revolutionary, and she scooped it down and get it. But then she slowed down and it was her turn to gape.

The Eratix were stirring on the other side of the blast wall, probably from the explosion on the eastern fences, and something big was activated in the field. Anji was familiar with the thing because she'd seen anime before and that thing was a mainstay in any sci-fi flick or books. She was looking at a twelve feet high Mech. Its massive two mechanical legs is bent forward, holding a pod-like canopy that is big enough to hold a single pilot. One arm has a 3 prong finger while the other one has a built in minigun. The damn thing reminded Anji of the robot rival of robocop. It was sleek, angular and deadly-looking.

"Help!" Prince Bentong screamed and it pushed Anji into action.

She ran passed the prince and as the mech approaches, she made a sliding stop. She pops the lense cover of the MPG, sighted the mech in its crosshair, waited for the dead tone to ring in her ears then when she had a good lock, she pulled the trigger.

A heavy trail of smoke escaped the MPG and the rocket went wide for a second as it looped upward, then it corrected itself and angled down towards the right side of the mech before it blew up.

A wall of super-heated plasma nd radiation smashed towards Anji and she flew off her feet and landed on her backside.

When the smoke cleared, the right arm of the mech that is holding the minigun was mangled, and there was also an obvious damage to its legs as it started doing penguin walk towards Anji.

"Anji!" screamed the prince.

"Stay down!" She screamed back, then sneered at the incoming mech. She planted her feet wide like solid tree trunks, then pulled out the Vibro blade given to her by Codex 4 and brandished it towards the giant Mech.

She was like a valkyrie protecting an injured comrade behind her. "Come on, motherfucker!" She shouted towards the incoming Mech. "Let's see what you got!"

Anji knew she was dead, probably so will prince Bentong, but she promised herself that the mech will get a few dents in its armor before it kills her. A black shadow passed right by her.

The next thing she knew was that Codex 4 was leaping in the air before smashing his size 20 foot into the mech's canopy. As it buried itself inside, this gave the codex a sort of leverage as he hangs parallel to the ground. Then he bent over and started punching the cockpit with his only hand. Boom! Boom! Boom! Crack! Anji watched in amazement as the Codex arm buried itself from the wildly swinging mech. He pulled his arm out then grabbed the massive Gauss gun behind him and then poured kinetic blast inside the cockpit again and again. Who ever was piloting the damn Mech was nothing more than goo inside. Eventually, the Mech died down and the Codex lifted himself out easily.

Then Anji remembered the prince and as she turned she felt like she was hit by a runaway horse when the huge puppy tackled her. "Anji! take goodness you arrived! I was so scared and then I was falling and I -heeek!" The prince bleeted when the Codex lifted the pup off her and stared at Anji.

"Are you alright?"

"Yes, I'm fine I-"

"Don't ever do that again!"

And just like that, her worries were replaced by her sudden anger. Why is this lumbering hunk of metal always makes me feel like a 13-year-old child? "I will do whatever I want! Just try and stop me!"

Codex lunged at her and Anji thought the blackguard finally snapped. But he twirled her around and multiple needle rounds hit the back of his armor to no effect. He turned, his body still protecting Anji, before firing back at the incoming Eratix. Anji saw one group of the rebels setting up a plasma heavy gun on top of one blast wall, then withering fire behind him opened up at the enemy position.

When Anji turned back, almost 50 K28 sailors were galloping hard towards her position, firing their needle guns everywhere. It was almost majestic as the galloping doggies charge with barking battle cry. The rumbling of their giant paws can be felt on the ground. I need to help them, she thought.

The three other blackguards surrounded her and even the codex was astonished. "What are you doing here? You have your assigned-"

The Codex stopped because the blackguard started talking in their AI language of bleeps and sounds. Anji is annoyed that she cannot follow their conversation but since time is at the utmost, she couldn't blame the other blackguard (Moe?) since they can say more and transfer more information through their AI language of 1s and 0s.

Despite all the needles fired at them, Anji gawked as Codex 4 simply stood up and stared at the night sky. "Good," He said. "About time they arrived."

And just like that, the entire surrounding area for miles on end was blasted to dust from red beams coming from the heavens. Even the K28 sailors lost the momentum of their own charge as liquid silver metals drop from the sky like rain and surrounded them. Each of the silver liquid silently decelerated as they neared the ground then completely stop and hovered about two feet from the ground. Then the liquid metal open up and inside emerged a new blackguard.

Within moments, the cleared field is surrounded by blackguards. About two hundred of them deployed in and around Anji in a multiple rings of protection. Two teams of blackguards brought a triangular device that is pulsating with energy and when it was deployed, a powerful synchronize multi-shield started emanating in a mile wide and completely covering Anji, the prince and Alpha Codex 4.

The golden shield is clear enough however to show the air armada of almost 40 Kavak transport ships zooming from the south and dropping even larger mech droids. They were black, solid and mean looking titans who then started patrolling the horizon.

Codex 4 turned to her, and he can see the slumping of his shoulder and his arm started shaking. "Command Alpha, you are safe now."

"Safe?" Anji said stupidly.

"Yes, for your army has arrived."