It steps clear and meets a shot from Hail, the slug airborne almost before there was anything to hit. The impact shatters cheekplate and eye socket, angled to twist the head around on its mounts. The machine locks its feet to the deck to keep the shot from knocking it flat, but two other rails are already taking aim. A Cluster machine hits the Sigurd thing in the throat, nearly claims its head as Bor hits clean through an over extended hip. The hollow shell tumbles, its weight throwing the vault door wide.

We’re already adjusting, already working our trigger. Two of us Junos riddle a Mirai, heavy hardshot paired with armour-penetrating slugs, a steady beat stripping plates and then hull, then tearing through the mechanisms underneath. The Cluster claims another just behind it, tearing through the hands it puts up to shield itself, then through every part of its chest.

We turn and follow the other Juno into the fray, making the last few metres on thrust, crashing into a NorCol machine before it can bring its weapons level.

We kick a knee backwards on its joint, and the other Juno catches the hollow by its hand and hauls it back into our blade. We split ribs and plating, cut clean through spine and wings.

We’re moving before it falls, airborne for the moment it takes us to come down on another pair of empty eyes. Bor blows both legs out before the hollow shell can take our weight, and we ride it down into the deck, fusing armour and decking and the thing that used to hold its mind.

When we find our feet, we’re eye-level with the barrel of a hollow’s NorCol-branded rail. We duck, but not to dodge the shot. A Cluster machine’s munitions are already streaking through the air behind us, and we clear the way in time to watch them thread the barrel, one railgun breaking another, the slug tumbling through the weapon mount and out through the shoulder beyond.

The hollow Decatur watches us stand, warms its engines to try and pull itself away, but we’re already too close. We drive our blade through its foot, snag its beak on one hand and stretch the shell out, grind our way through its chest with knuckles and hardshot, leave it in pieces behind us.

Six shells on sixteen, and we sink eleven of them so close our muzzle flashes cast their shadows, leave three more maimed and mewling on the floor. Two of them pull away, but not before we’ve clipped their wings. The Cluster guns them down before they get too far.

Bor and Hail come back panting, stepping wide of any wreckage that might still be alive. The Junos stay near the door, watching the corridor for any sign of hollow shells.