Azura's spaceport was not at all like the spaceports near Tyler and Kadary, it contained one fundamental difference that Rune and Wren immediately saw as they stepped through the airlock and into the facility.

It was a place of silenced industry, of bits and pieces of machinery lying unkempt all over the place, of toxic spillage upon the floor and mammoth production devices locked down in what seemed like a millennia of sleep. Rune looked about in intrigue, as it reminded him of the machine center back on Dezoris, only deader and quieter. The spaceport was huge, about the size of a giant warehouse, but this must just be the anteroom before they got to the place where the space shuttles were stored. He hoped that they'd still be able to find it amidst all the jumble.

Standing behind Rune Wren surveyed the scene as well, and so did all the party members back on Zelan, thankfully quiet now. After the brief skirmish with the golems they were willing to leave the explorers alone. Wren felt a very weak sensation of disgust as he stepped inside the spaceport, similar to what Rune might have felt if he had stepped inside an abattoir. There were fragments of broken androids everywhere, and they weren't just dismantled peacefully, they had all been hacked to pieces by what looked like blade cuts. It was as if a battle had been fought here once, a long time ago.

But it seemed like the majority of the battle had been fought on the outskirts of the spaceport, as the scene of carnage progressively appeared to clean itself up as the explorers wandered a little ways into the center of the facility. Rune wasn't an expert on tactics but the concentration of broken androids seemed to suggest that they had been defending the station, trying to keep something dangerous outside and being overrun. There was a possibility that it could have been the two golems, but that only made a tiny amount of sense. Golems couldn't be commanded without a master, and that master must have had a hell of a lot of magic inside them.

"It feels like we're standing on the very edge of another mystery, don't you think?" Rune asked Wren as he knelt, inspecting a dried patch of fluid on the floor. It wasn't oil or cooling liquid, or whatever, it was coagulated blood. Palman blood. It was so old that it was barely even there anymore, but Rune touched it with a hand and closed his eyes, focussing and concentrating, trying to see. He could feel it, trailing up his fingers like the touch of a ghostly feather, a speck of the essence that he had sensed within the two golems. This was split esper blood, he was sure of it.

Wren wasn't really listening to Rune, he was analyzing the atmosphere instead. The fact that the inside of Azura even seemed to have an atmosphere at all was very interesting to him, and it kept his attention away from the mechanical corpses all around him. "Analysis of atmosphere complete. The air within the Azura spaceport is suitable for palman consumption. Rune, I advise that you deactivate your oxygen supply and make use of the resources all around you." It would give his friend a lot more time and breathing space once they were on the Alisa Three and back again. It always helped to be safe.

The esper rose from where he was kneeling and looked down at his hand, his fingertips still tingling from where he had touched that blood. He heard Wren's words and glanced up at his comrade, smiling in relief. "So you're saying I don't have to wear this fish-bowl anymore? Thank the Light for that." Rune reached up and removed his plexiglas helmet from his head, doing that before he reached down on his wrist and switched off his oxygen supply. He took a deep breath from his nose and mouth, glad to be breathing free unrestricted air once more.

"Augh!" Rune recoiled as if he had been punched in the stomach, stepping back while he held his nose and his mouth. His eyes watered a bit too. "Why didn't you warn me about the smell?" The esper moaned wretchedly, scolding Wren. The air was breathable, but god, Rune definitely preferred the bottled variety. The overpowering fumes of petroleum hung through the air almost like a physical presence, thickening it, while there was also a deeply burnt smell, an acidic scent that put the stench of petroleum on a pedestal and worshipped it like a god. Rune swore that he could actually feel some of his brain cells beginning to die.

"Just put up with it. It is imperative that we find the correct entranceway to the spaceport." Wren said blandly and then stepped around a felled balduel machine, its green paneling bubbled and melted by what Rune could have guessed was a nafoi spell. It was very strange that Wren didn't seem to have any interest in the obvious battlefield they were standing in the middle of. The curiosity was eating Rune up inside, just as the acidic fumes were designing a headache within his skull.

As Wren seemed to be taking an easterly direction to finding the spaceport area Rune decided to branch off and explore the area to the west. It seemed pretty clear over there and there weren't as many bodies, so he hoped that the fumes would be lessened as well. He was mistaken, but that was no matter. Rune checked to see if his radio was still working. Even if Wren went out of sight he'd be able to converse with him that way. "What do you think happened here?" He asked, speaking with some level of hushed reverence for the damage done all around them.

"It seems that a small platoon of highly trained soldiers breached the entranceway and laid waste to the occupants of this facility. The defenders resisted for a short amount of time but they were hastily overpowered." Rune heard a sizeable crash as something hard and metallic hit the floor. Wren might have been doing some salvaging, or maybe he needed to clear away some bits and pieces to progress further.

Having his helmet off was a blessing and a half to the Lutz, but it was also kind of annoying to carry around under one arm. "What makes you say that?" Rune questioned as he finally came to a doorway, but it was smashed in and ruined, leading into a small storage room that looked like a closet.

The radio crackled a little as Wren replied. It hadn't been doing that as badly as before. Rune hoped that the damn thing wasn't breaking down on him. "Because the occupants of this facility did not have adequate time to create reinforcements." Wren announced from his side of the area, dwarfed by and looking up at a robot production machine. Half-made premature robots were left lying derelict on the warped conveyor belt and piles of the destroyed devices were heaped at the end. No reinforcements, no salvation. Wren didn't care. This was not what he had been sent here for.

Rune's headache, which had started as a painful sting at his right temple had crept all the way across the front of his brow. They had been searching for roughly fifteen minutes now and they had yet to find the doorway they were looking for. The esper had found a box with a telepipe inside it, but it was more than useless to him now. "I think espers might have attacked this spaceport. It explains how they overpowered these machines and why they left golems outside to keep people away from this place. I don't know why espers would attack a spaceport, but hey, the pieces kind of fit together. What do you reckon?"

He got only silence from his friend. Rune continued to hug the walls in his search to find something, anything that would lead them further into their quest. Some stairs would be nice. A large doorway would be even better. He kept up his talking in order to keep the radio online and to dispel the irrational fear that he was all alone on this satellite. "By the way, you never told me where you got that Waizz Star from. You must have done something pretty damn spectacular during the Collapse Wars in order to earn one."

More silence. It was unnerving. Rune started to wonder if maybe his radio might have broken down when Wren at last replied to him, coldly. "I did not earn it. Have you any success on your side of the spaceport? Should I come and search for myself?" Rune didn't take kindly to people who doubted his ability to get things done right. He scowled, growing quiet himself.

Both of them had actually done a rather thorough search of the area. It was through no fault of their own that they were beginning to feel disheartened. Rune and Wren met again at the very back of the facility, empty-handed. Wherever the path to the space shuttles were they certainly couldn't find it. Hanging around an ancient battlefield with half the bodies still present didn't help their spirits much either. It kind of bugged Rune that while all the android and robot causalities had been left as they were, any esper causalities, and he was certain there would have been some, were gone. All that Rune had found was a couple of patches of esper blood.

If they couldn't continue then they would just have to go back the way they came. That was absolutely out of the question for Wren. He would not give up until his mission was complete. However, Rune was beginning to look a little impatient and perplexed, and not at all well. They must have overlooked something previously. All they could do was go back to the beginning of the spaceport and start over again.

They were standing in front of another large machine. It wasn't as big as some of the robot production devices they had walked past, but there was something overly sinister about it. For one it had been splashed with dried esper blood in a startling arc, now dried into a drab one-colour rainbow. Another thing was that Rune could have sworn he had seen a machine similar to this one before, but the design was just so slightly different that he couldn't quite remember where. As Rune turned to the machine while Wren calculated the possibility that they might have missed something, the Reverent Fifth noticed one last thing, the most important thing.

"There's somebody alive in there." He said seriously as he pressed a gauntleted hand against the surface of the device. Rune had originally thought that Azura was a dead world and no living thing had been left alive above and below its surface, but he had been wrong. The machine had been covering up the life signature that he now felt, as well as preserving it through the ages. Yes, Rune was beginning to get a very slow grasp on the mystery. At the back of the spaceport Azura lay hidden an impressive cryochamber, and within it lurked the aura of a sleeping esper.

"Are you certain?" Wren asked his friend, but Rune seemed to have spaced out a little as he leant his forehead against the surface of the cryochamber, trying to see with his mind and not with his eyes. He hoped that the fumes weren't getting to him and messing with his head, making him sense things that weren't there. But Rune was fairly certain of this sensation, pretty much so.

It felt surreal to be standing on the outside of a cryochamber and trying to look in. For so long throughout Rune's incarnations it had always been the other way around. He stepped back, then crept around the machine searching for other clues, hypothesizing as he went along. "This must be what the robots in this spaceport were protecting so ferociously when the espers attacked. Maybe the robots had kidnapped an esper leader somehow and they were trying to get him back, or maybe the bots took this place as their base and they were trying to reclaim it…"

"You make it sound as though you believe all machines are capable of is sinister planning and ill will toward palmans." Wren observed blandly as he took a good look at the exterior control panel of the cryochamber, rather simply designed but still quite old. He didn't really care what Rune thought but perhaps even Wren still had a shred of racial dignity left in him somewhere.

"Oh, sorry. I didn't meant for it to sound that way. Oof!" Rune apologized gladly but gasped a second afterward as one foot of his slid down and got stuck within a strange and uneven patch of flooring. His head came forward and he hit the surface of the machine with his brow, feeling the nasty sting. If he had been wearing his helmet at the time he probably would have broken it, and that would have been a huge life-threatening problem to contend with. "Fucking Noah…" He groaned angrily, taking the name of his first incarnation in vain.

Rune looked down to see what had caused him to lose his balance in the first place. He pulled his foot out of the small triangular hole in the floor with a little ankle manipulation and saw that the hole was intentionally made. It wasn't just a depression in the floor, it was part of a descending staircase leading to a level below the one they were on. Somebody had planted this enormous cryochamber on top of the path to the space shuttles in order to keep people out! "Wren, come look at this!" Rune called and moments later the android was right beside him, seeing what Rune now saw.

It was a rather ingenious concealment now that Rune thought about it. They weren't going to be picking up and looking under every enormous pile of bolts that they came across, and it was only through Rune's esper senses and moment of clumsiness that they had found the way ahead. Wren was studying the cryochamber silently, judging whether he had the ability to budge it or not. "I do not think I possess the adequate strength to move this device." He concluded without even giving it a try.

Perhaps he was right. The cryochamber looked like it weighed several tons at the least. Rune could picture a small group of robed espers, some wounded, animating the two golems ripped from the blue stones outside and ordering them to place this cryochamber over the exit like a lead-lined casket. Wren was strong, but not that strong. "Come on, lets at least give it a shot. I'll help too, what do we have to lose?" The Lutz pressed, offering himself up as a plough mule if he needed to.

Wren gave in and did as he was told, bracing his legs at the correct position and taking hold of the side of the machine in order to maximize the effectiveness of his force. Rune did the same thing beside him, but it was laughable to think that the blue-haired physically weak palman would be able to make a difference. If Rune wanted to think that he was, then that was fine, but mathematically speaking they would not have any success.

The esper and the android pushed and pushed for several strenuous, difficult minutes, but they were not able to shift the cryochamber even an inch. It was like the blasted thing had been glued to the floor. Rune leant against the machine for a moment to get his energy back, then Wren spoke, having an idea himself that might make things a little easier. "We should awaken the person lying dormant within the cryogenic chamber. They maybe be able to help with the moving of this obstacle, and if not then their absence would lessen the weight within the obstacle in the first place."

It made sense to Rune but it wasn't exactly the right thing to do either. He knew that he'd hate it if somebody woke him up from a deep sleep only to make him shove heavy roadblocks around. "We don't know the reason why that guy or girl is frozen in there. What if we're not supposed to wake them up? What if we wake them up and can't get them back to sleep again? We'd have a problem with an extra person in our party and only one space suit to go around."

They were all good reasons Rune had, but mostly he felt a little threatened by the thought of a new person in their party, and an esper to boot. He was comfortable with the group of friends that he had and they had saved the worlds together, had become something of a family. But Rune guessed that it was stupid not to have change, to resist change, as that was their entire world right now. The esper gave in without Wren having to say another word. He just hoped that they weren't making a big mistake. "Well, we're not getting anywhere as we are. Let's crack this sucker open."

For once Rune actually had a better grasp and understanding of how to operate a cryochamber than Wren did. He could have broken it open all by himself, but instead he elected to stay around the corner of the device and think of another way to move the huge thing. He didn't want to see the frozen esper jump out of the machine like a jack-in-the-box, it would bring back too many nasty memories of being frozen himself. This was Wren's idea, he could assist in the thawing-out process in his place.

Wren went to the control panel and issued a systems interrupt, ordering immediate cessation of treatment to the patient. A rectangular hatch in the side of the cryochamber opened quietly and a long sheet of thick metal extended from the bottom of the opening, like the surface of an operating table. Then wisps of frozen air wafted through the opening like little curls of smoke. They were pretty to look at. The cryochamber asked one last time whether Wren was absolutely sure that he wanted to continue with the operation, as if the machine knew something that Wren did not.

A part of Wren also told him that what he was doing was an extremely bad idea. It was the same part of the android that had sensed the call just as Rune and Myau had, but the rational part of him had denied its existence. That was why he didn't listen to it now, was why he stepped over the boundary and doomed thousands of people to a horrible fate. It was why Wren had just signed his own death warrant away.

He turned off the power and the sleeping ghost within the machine was revealed to the world.

It wasn't an esper. Rune had been wrong about that. The cryochamber ejected the body onto the metal platform and Wren suddenly found himself looking into a mirror, one that reflected the past. Lying on the table was a Wren-type far older than he had ever seen before, primitive but not badly made, comatose and preserved in cryogenic perfection. It was as tall and as broad as Wren was, but instead of jet black hair its colour was a fiery red. He had seen more modernized versions of this machine on Kuran.

The Silent Wren. The Siren.

The android stood there, watching quietly as the effects of cryostasis began to wear off the other machine. This Siren was a thousand years old at the very least and a hand-made model by the looks of it, not something that had fallen off Mother Brain's production line. It jerked itself awake and sat up groggily, yet there was something of a restrained militaristic snap even in the way that it woke itself up. The Siren opened its eyes, light cloudy grey as predicted, and looked over at the first person it had seen in just under ten centuries. "Identify yourself." It said in a voice that was identical to Wren's own.

Wren replied just as dully to the question that had been directed at him, lowering the gun that he had risen in pre-emptive self defense. It was common for androids to become irrational and attack allied units after being inactive for such a long time. He had only been taking precautions. "I am Wren-type Forren one thousand and eighty three of the control satellite Zelan. I mean you no harm. I ask for your identity also." He said, relaxing his guard. Wren was glad that their guest had turned out to be an android, he felt that he could handle them much better than an esper, especially when espers and androids seemed to have fought here previously.

The Siren twisted its body a little and sat on the very edge of the metal platform, eerily similar to the dead android back on Zelan that had been the keeper of the Waizz Star. "I am Wren-type Siren, no number, of the order of Sa Ruik and servant to Lord Orakio, slayer of Layan scum. I mean you no harm either, Forren of Zelan. Who is your master? Are you a follower of Orakio as I am?" Siren asked in a blank, dead voice, like somebody deeply devoted to their own beliefs. He certainly had a very impressive resume. Wren had no idea what he was talking about.

Around the corner Rune was listening to their conversation through his radio, adjusting his helmet back on his head. He didn't care that he had to use up a bit more of his oxygen supply than he was supposed to, he simply couldn't take the awful smell of the Azura spaceport any longer. Over the radio it sort of sounded like Wren was holding a conversation with himself, that was how similar they sounded to one another. The magician was more confused than ever, that was why he didn't come out of hiding and greet this new acquaintance. It talked and sounded like an android, but its aura was that of an esper. What the hell?

"I do not know of this Orakio that you speak of, but I serve the Algo star system as its sole caretaker. I have no master. Siren, what are you doing on this satellite and what is the nature of this battlefield all around us?" Wren pressed softly, a mere identification turning into something of an interrogation. Siren did not look perturbed by the questions at all, and Wren also wanted to ask why this android did not have a number. Nearly all androids had a number, and this Siren preferred to talk like people from the feudal societies of old.

The red-haired machine smiled smugly, gripping the edges of the platform with his hands. He saw nothing wrong with telling this Forren-type the truth. "I was banished here for crimes against the filthy Layan people, may they burn in everlasting hell. When my master Orakio was lost to the darkness I continued his mission as his humble substitute. Agents of Kay Eshyr and Le Cille banished me to this distant moon but my convictions and ideals still remain strong. I will have my vengeance against them now that I am alive again. The spilt blood of Sa Ruik cries out for it." Siren smiled cruelly, showing teeth. "Thank you for awakening me, servant of Algo. How may I repay this service?"

Wren helped Siren off the table and steadied him on his feet, the ancient android still wired to a dangerous-looking gun that Wren could not successfully identify. He would have preferred it if Siren was unarmed, just in case. He was still smiling that self-assured smile of his when Wren answered. "Presently my companion Rune and I are seeking to board and reconfigure the auto pilot of the Alisa Three. We have been halted here due to your cryostasis chamber blocking the exit. If you could assist us in shifting this obstacle we would be very obliged."

"I wasn't expecting such a modest request. Of course I will help you. It is likely that Kay Eshyr set this obstacle in the first place. Layans make it their business to be as difficult as possible." Siren explained with confidence. Wren didn't know who or what Layans were, but this old android must have been very vindictive of them for a reason. They were fortunate that Siren was willing to help.

Rune stepped out from around the corner of the large cryochamber after fixing up his helmet and oxygen supply, seeing the other wren-type for the first time. To him they were virtually identical in size and shape, but one looked more sinister than the other. One seemed darker in spirit than the other, and Rune did not feel very safe. Despite his internal feelings Rune smiled cheerfully as the two wrens walked towards him and waved a hand in greeting. "Well, three pairs of hands are better than two. Hi, my name is Rune and-"

Before Rune could even finish his sentence there was a series of clicks and hisses and Siren already had his handheld cannon at the ready. He wasn't smiling anymore and looked as any Wren did at the beginning of a fight. The very moment that the red-haired machine saw Rune the Lutz was in terrible danger. He was so surprised that he didn't even raise his hands. He hadn't been expecting this. "Filthy Layan…" Siren said coldly, checking his aim. "Filthy Layan…"

"What?" Rune said, confused and more than a little nervous at having a gun trained at him, especially one as big as the one Siren was carrying. "I'm not a Layan. I'm an esper. I don't even know what a Layan is!"

Wren got the gist of the situation pretty quickly and drew his own gun on the wren-type standing beside him, taking a couple of steps back to place some distance between them. He didn't know how powerful Siren's weapon was but he was quite certain that his photon eraser would be stronger. Why would he suddenly classify Rune as an enemy? It didn't make sense. "Drop your weapon. I have you in my sights. You will not harm Rune. He has no affiliation with the people who banished you here."

"Even after a thousand years Layans still swarm over these worlds like cockroaches. I will not have it. You will die, spawn of darkness!" Siren announced, taking aim and firing at Rune's chest. The esper would not have been able to dodge the shot even if he had seen it coming, but Wren kept his word and lashed out at Rune's attacker, grabbing Siren and forcing him off balance just as he depressed the trigger.

The shot flew high and missed Rune by several feet. He watched the two androids collide into the side of the cryochamber and then to the floor, Wren pinning Siren down for several moments before he managed to twist in his grip and throw Wren off with a rough shove, reaching for his weapon again. Wren planted his hand down over the weapon before Siren could lift and use it however, though it was still wired into his arm. The two androids were wrestling very heatedly but they weren't actively trying to hurt each other, Siren was only trying to get to Rune and Wren was trying to keep that from happening if possible. He may have been acting coldly to Rune recently, but he was glad that Wren was willing to do that.

But Rune didn't have many options left himself. He couldn't fight properly as he was and there was nowhere left for him to run, except back the way he had came and into the remaining golem they had left outside. He watched as Wren disarmed Siren by snatching at his gun and ripping the connection wires out of the ports in his body, tossing the empty weapon a couple of meters away. "Enough!" Wren shouted as he pulled Siren to his feet and kept him in an efficient stranglehold, forcing him still. "Rune does not pose a threat to you! Stop this at once!"

"I see how it is…" Siren replied softly, craftily, looking as if he was coming to a profound conclusion. "The Layan scum has even managed to delude poor misguided Orakian servants into their ranks. There is no end to my pity for you, Forren. Now I must remove your allied status and classify you as an enemy target as well." Immediately after he finished speaking Siren tapped into a store of strength that Wren had yet to experience and pulled himself out of the dark-haired machine's grasp, drawing back and striking him in the chin so hard with his fist that Wren went crashing to the ground.

The android was not knocked out, but it took several crucial moments for him to recover and in that time Siren was headed for Rune. The esper took several steps away from the approaching menace, his face as dark as the night sky. Rune was starting to get pissed off. He was the fifth incarnation of Lutz, some bucket of bolts that had come out of the freezer didn't scare him at all! "Damn it, how dare you hurt my friend! I'm gonna make you eat fire!" He cried, raising his hand in preparation to cast a spell. The correct magic word was already forming on his tongue, something fiery…

"Rune!" Wren yelled and that was enough to force the magician to remember what he had forgotten. If he cast magic in his space suit he ran the risk of setting himself on fire. But it was too late now, Rune had already started the spell.

He jerked his hand away at the very moment he cried out "Flaeli!" like a rising bubble in his throat. It totally ruined his aim but by a sheer miracle the spell ignited an inch or three away from his fingertips. Rune could feel the heat of the spell but a cold fear gripped the pit of his stomach, only unclenching when he took control and hurled the esper spell in Siren's general direction. Great Light, that had been close, but in the seconds after the spell was cast Rune decided that it had been worth it.

Even though the spell missed it still seemed to be worth it. Siren leapt away from the deadly volley of fire like one trained to avoid bomb blasts with ease and landed in a crouch, just as Wren was getting back onto his feet. The enemy android appeared slightly shaken, but in such a way that seemed to suggest he was enjoying himself. That arrogant smirk was back, and Rune knew that only he was supposed to wear it. That devil. "You are a Layan." Siren said with civil admiration as he stood again. "I was not one hundred percent certain until now. I will fight you on your own terms, Layan."

Rune felt the wrongness impression spike in his head as Siren raised a hand in the same way that Rune had just done, using the very same gesture. The spike, that sixth sensation he felt when he had pressed his brow against that cryochamber came back to him again, like a tide. In training, in the esper mansion that hand and gesture had been raised to him and…

"Flaeli!"

Sometimes Rune didn't believe in taking chances. He let his body and his instincts do the deciding for him while his mind was gawking and trying to understand what was going on. Rune made himself scarce and dove behind some trashed machinery just as a second flaeli spell was ignited and sent hurtling right at him, exploding and mightily scorching the ground where he had once stood. It was not as powerful as Rune's spells, but it was an esper spell and it had come straight from the hands of Siren.

It didn't make any sense. Rune didn't understand it as he hid behind the mound of twisted metal and panted, his strength and stamina drained by the weight of his space suit. He was sweating heavily, strands of light blue hair loose from his ponytail pasted to the side of his neck. He heard Wren say through the luxury of his radio; "On your knees." Then there was a brief scuffle, the friendly wren-type probably trying to hold Siren back again. Everything had gone pear-shaped so suddenly, Rune's head was throbbing something fierce, and things had stopped making sense.

An android with magic? It was impossible.

They had reached the end of their tether. This mission thing just wasn't going to work. Screw the Alisa Three and screw Azura, Rune had had enough. He came out from hiding and saw that Wren had been able to clout Siren over the head with the butt of his photon eraser, sending the red-haired android to one knee on the floor. Wren looked like he hadn't really wanted to do it, but he had been forced to anyway. "We have to get out of here." The esper said gravely, a little weak in the knees at having that flaeli spell thrown at him. "Let's retreat."

Wren could see the merit in Rune's suggestion. He had been dedicated to sending the Alisa Three back on course out of the Algo system but he needed to draw the line somewhere. Continuing as they were with Rune in his deteriorating condition and this other wren-type antagonizing them significantly increased their chances of mission failure. It would be foolish to risk the life of the Lutz over something they could attempt again at a later date. "I agree with you, but we must first relegate this Siren to his cryogenic sleep. I will incapacitate him and together we will place him back into the machine."

It was rude for Rune and Wren to talk over Siren's head like that while he was still very much awake and listening to them. The blow to the back of his head had really hurt and disoriented him for a bit, paired with the lingering disorientating effects of his cryogenic sleep. Siren had only really been working at forty percent capacity so far and he was still coming to terms with the idea that he was alive again. He wasn't going to let that filthy Layan scum and traitorous Layan sympathizer put him back into the cold freezer yet again.

"You will do no such thing." Siren intoned powerfully as he rose up from the floor. His gun had been ripped from his arms and he was weaponless in that respect, but it did not matter very much. He was armed in a myriad of other different ways instead. There was something almost regal in his voice, almost royal, and it appeared that Rune had finally found his match in arrogance, righteousness and ego. "If Layans still exist upon the worlds then the Great Light must have awoken me to eradicate them! This machine that has kept me in living death…"

Siren threw his arm out in the direction of the machine while still keeping his cool grey eyes directly on Rune, as if he was trying to kill Rune's layan soul with his very hatred itself. A bright flash came from the android's open hand and an incandescent beam flared into life, knifing through part of the cryogenic chamber like a laser. The magician had seen one of those special techniques before, though it was not something he was personally capable of doing. Black smoke rose from the device as Siren lowered his arm slowly, the githu technique cast. "…it is no more." He said at last.

The idea that Siren was actually a real threat was finally starting to get through to Rune. He took two steps back and pointed at the red-haired machine accusingly. "Shit. Spark him Wren, while you can!" He ordered, wishing that he could administer something like a tandle himself without hurting his friend. Siren's strange abilities were interesting to Rune but he'd rather see the android deactivated on the ground than try to study his violent mannerisms some more.

Acting silently, Wren gathered enough energy in his spare hand to create an intentional electricity surplus, intending on forcing it through Siren's body on contact and overload all of his internal systems in one fell swoop. Wren could hold on to the spark for just under ten seconds before containing the electricity became too dangerous and he would have to abort the skill. Small arcs of playful leaping green lightning came off his metal-plated hand as he reached out for Siren, moving to grab his shoulder from behind.

However, Siren was not so stupid as to misunderstand what a spark was and he pulled himself away quickly, adding space between himself and Wren. Before he could claim his balance again he flinched as a small twin laser burnt the outer layer of his armor, hardly damaging it but still leaving a mark. Rune smiled morbidly as he realised he had actually hit something with his gun for once. He couldn't hurt the android but he could at least cause a distraction. He seemed to be Siren's main target anyway. "Over here!" Rune cried as he charged forward and tackled his enemy, throwing all of his weight into the attack.

The esper wasn't a heavy man but the considerable weight of his space suit was enough to knock Siren over. The attack surprised him but only after a second his hands came up to reach for Rune's neck. Rune reared back to add precious space between himself and his enemy and called out; "Wren! Hyper-jammer!" with all the force that he could muster. His friend heard him and shook the excess spark electricity out of his hand, running with plan B, certain panels of his armor folding away to reveal a series of high frequency broadcasting devices.

Perhaps the sound of that ability activating was familiar to Siren. The android went tense and shouted "No!" into Rune's face, furious that his consciousness was being taken away from him again after a thousand years of sleep. The sound of the hyper-jammer was so high pitched that palmans could not hear it at all, but the sound was quite audible to androids, cats, and admittedly to motavians like Gryz. To those that were able to hear it the hyper jammer was like a shrill, unbearable, pealing song.

Within seconds Siren was another immobile body lying on the floor with Rune on top of him. The light and awareness had left his eyes and now he was just staring, blind. Wren came over and helped Rune up, pulling him off the other wren-type. It seemed really quiet around them now according to the esper's radio, and he could see that the smoke from the damaged cryochamber was beginning to lessen. Rune gathered his bearings quickly. "How much time do we have before he wakes up again?" He asked, feeling the need to flee.

"Any amount of time between one and six minutes. I advise that we get out of here as soon as possible. Can you still run?"

Rune smiled steadily. "For a few minutes, I think. Time for a strategic retreat. Let's get out of here."

And run they did, directly back the way they had came. Rune breathed harshly through his radio but after every safe second had passed he was glad they were leaving Siren far behind. Wren was maintaining pace with him easily although he could have run much faster if he wanted to, keeping Rune's back protected from potential attacks. They had totally failed their mission but at least it had been a spectacular failure, as opposed to just a mediocre one. Ancient killer magic-using androids had not been on their list of potential enemies.

Even so, Rune still wished he could have learned why Siren had known the age-old venerated spell of flaeli, along with the more commonly used githu technique. That machine had been a walking mystery, albeit a spiteful one, and the Lutz had wanted to understand why.

Fortunately, or unfortunately for him, he would know soon enough.