Derelic stretches triumphantly from his victory and starts to take a few steps away from his robotic opponent when suddenly the C.T.D. grabs him from behind. This unexpected event takes Derelic completely by surprise and he finds himself being flung through the air and crashing hard on the ground. The battle drone strides toward his fallen opponent. Still reeling from shock, Derelic has no idea what hit him, and the realization that the drone attacked without command or provocation is still processing.

Czerell takes action and swiftly kicks the C.T.D. in it’s “throat” area, which immediately halts it’s attack. Another point registers on the automaton’s score board.

“What the hell was that all about?” asks a bewildered Cale.

Derelic steadily gets up and rubs his temples “I’ve seen alotta shit in my day, but a training drone that attacks with proper command, that’s a first”.

Czerell slowly approaches the robot and inspects it’s featureless visage with suspicion “There is something very wrong with this Thetron”.

“Must have been some kind of glitch.” says Cale.

“Glitch or not, we can’t have this damn thing running around attacking us with no warning” Czerell says narrowing his eyes.

Cale smiles “I wouldn’t worry about it to much Leutenii, I’m sure it was just a minor malfunction in the programming synapses. Too many cobwebs I guess”.

Suddenly an inexplicable rumble is felt throughout the ship. With each passing second the tremors intensify, until they literally knock the three to the floor.

“What the hell is going on!” Czerell shouts.

After a few moments the rumbling subsides and the trio cautiously rise, preparing for another tremor.

“Valen, what in all hell is going up there?” asks Czerell.

Valen’s panicked voice comes over the ships communications “Czerell, Derelic, Cale…get up here now”!

“What did you do now old man” Czerell says in a low mumble.

At that the three dart up to the cockpit at Valen’s urgent command. When they reach the cockpit they stop dead in their tracks, when they meet the astounding sight that greets them outside the windows of the ship. An enormous asteroid field looms as an ominous and lethal sea of jagged rocks just outside their orbit. The sight is one of beauty but also one of extraordinary danger. From the view of space the gargantuan asteroids dwarf the tiny cargo ship as it precariously teeters on the very rim of this monstrous carousel.

Valen stares out into the field, his face drenched in sweat, his eyes full of labor. The other three run up beside him and join in staring out into the endless ocean of rock.

“Well what the hell are you just standing here…use evasive thrusters to steer us away from here!” shouts Czerell.

“Godammit, what do you think I’ve been trying to do all this time! The field’s gravity is to strong…it’s slowly pulling us in! I’ve barley managed to neutralize the gravitational sway and keep us in a dead lock with the field. The thrusters are on full reverse and sucking up all the ships power.” says Valen

Cale shakes his head “The ship’s power isn’t gonna hold us in a dead lock forever, we have to find a catalyst with enough output of force to blast us away”.

“I’ve managed to dodge a few small ones straying away from the field, but this old rig doesn’t have that much flexibility when its comes to that” says Valen.

“Well no shit, what the hell did you expect, this damn ship isn’t exactly the model of maneuverability!” shouts Czerell.

Valen angrily slams the console in front of him “Look don’t start your bullshit Czerell, where the fuck where you when I was up here saving our asses”?

“Organizing a bake sale, where the hell do you think I was…” says Czerell.

“Alright enough, now we aren’t going to solve anything by arguing. We’ve got Reapers on our asses, a ship that’s low on power and an asteroid field that is threatening to crush us at any moment…let’s try and focus.” says Derelic.

Valen starts to chuckle slightly “Well look at this way, it can’t gat any worse”.

Czerell bites down on his lower lip an looks at Valen with a glance of extreme annoyance “You’ve never heard of karma have you”.

Cale sensing another outburst between the two formerly high ranking Reaper officers “What I suggest we do is each of us taking half cycle shifts in the cockpit, in case we have to dodge something…while the rest of us try and figure out what to do”.

“I’ll take first watch, the rest of you get some rest. The ship’s power grids indicate about eighty percent total saturation…so we’ve got enough power to last us at least a few solar days. Cale you can relieve me at about 0300 Beta hours.” says Cale.

Cale looked out one of the portholes of the ship as he finished hooking up the C.T.D. to the vessel’s main data control systems. He flashed back to earlier when the robot seemingly attacked without warning. The points scored by Derelic and Czerell still registered on its digital screen. Cale had been working around complex electronics all his life and had never felt ill at ease with any machine he came across. But there was something not quite right with this robot, something he couldn’t explain. Intellectually he knew it was just an ordinary training drone, but his gut told him there was something different about this one…something very wrong indeed. As he continued to work on attaching it to the ship’s data systems the point screen unexpectedly went back to zero. Cale stared at the machine more and looked down to one of it’s hands. He noticed tiny movements in the finger tips.

The young Reaper closed his eyes “It’s only your imagination, get a hold of yourself Cale, it’s only an ordinary Thetron”.

Cale suddenly felt a hand grab his shoulder and he gasped slightly and turned around to see who it was.

Czerell jumped back slightly “Whoa take it easy soldier, kinda jumpy aren’t we”?

Cale breathed a sigh of relief “No not really, I just thought…never mind”.

“What are you doing, you’ve been up a long time…you should get some rest.” said Czerell.

“Cale rubs his eyes slightly “Yea, I will…I’m just hooking the Thetron to the ship’s data control systems. I figure since a C.T.D.’s brain is essentially a computer…it might help us to arrive at a solution to our ‘ahem’ little problem. There that should do it”.

“Yea right, go get some rest huh, we can talk more about it when we can all think with a somewhat clear head.” says Czerell.

Cale steadily walks off and yawns.

Czerell steadily stares at the robot, it seems eerie, almost as if the drone knows it’s being watched.

“Rusty broke down pile of shit.” Czerell says as he walks off.

As soon as Czerell is out of sight, the Thetron very slowly makes a fist with it’s right hand…a minus one point registers on it’s point screen.