Defalcon flexed his half-healed left arm cautiously, and suppressed a wince as his abused muscles complained loudly. He adjusted the blades slung across his back, and picked his jacket up.
Something moved in his peripheral vision. He froze, casting his glance around the hospital room. Nothing shifted in the shadowed corners. The room was as it should be. Yet that flicker of movement had been real. Defalcon reached back, brushing the palm of his hand across the hilt of one sword, loosening the other in its sheath. He dropped his hand to his blaster rifle, curling his fingers around the reassuring weight of the handgrip.
Flicker.
He looked up.
"There is just no way!"
The spider-bot glared at him malevolently from its upside-down position on the ceiling. It chittered softly, seeming more alive than machine. Its movements were fast and jerky as it skittered across the ceiling towards him. Defalcon's eyes widened and he jerked his blaster rifle from its holster. The spider-bot sprang at him as he fired twice; neither shot seemed to do any damage despite connecting. Discarding the blaster, Defalcon went for his swords and threw himself backwards, the memory of what those steel talons could do still vivid.
Missing its target, the robot landed on the floor and leapt at him again. Nightfire sheared away two claw-tipped jointed legs; the thing screamed and bled black ichor. A moment later it fell lifelessly to the polished white floor as Defalcon decapitated it.
Dazir burst into the room, Dare a split second behind him. They had just enough time to see the mangled robot on the floor before three more scuttled into the room by way of the ceiling. Their sinister eyes were fixed on Defalcon.
Defalcon heard Dazir's breath hiss in as the first robot sprang at them directly from the ceiling. The second charged down the far wall and came at them across the floor. The third clung to the doorframe, blocking any retreat. Defalcon had the time to realize that these three were larger than the first, perhaps the length of his torso, before the leader hit them.
Defalcon brought Nightwind around in a long, sweeping arc that caught the robot at the height of its leap, shearing through it in a shower of sparks. The halves fell twitching to the floor, exposed wires sparking, tubes spraying black oily ichor in a violent arc across the room.
Dare had pounced on the second as it charged them. The creatures were susceptible to sharp steel as they were not to bullets or blasterfire; Dare's sharp dagger severed three of the robot's left legs. Unbalanced, the thing began going in circles. A second blow from Dare drove the dagger hilt-deep in its head, causing the robot to collapse. The silvery-blue rabbit coolly yanked his ichor-stained blade out and beheaded the robot.
At about the time that Dare's victim was going in circles, the third robot shifted in preparation to strike. Dazir recognized the movement as a prelude to attack, and tackled the unprepared robot first, knocking it from its perch on the doorframe. Clinging to its back with both feet and one hand, he began methodically slashing the tubes exposed at the neck and leg joints, spattering the walls and floor with ichor. The robot bucked wildly against Dazir's hold, weakening visibly. It collapsed finally, and Dazir released his grip, retreating as it thrashed around on the floor. Jointed legs scrabbled fruitlessly as it sought for a foothold on the smooth, waxed floor. Defalcon put it out of its misery with a blow from Nightwind.
The three looked at each other nervously. Dare broke the silence.
"Those - those were -"
"Yeah," Defalcon agreed. "They are."
"Were," Dazir correctedf. "They were." He pointed over to where the robots had fallen. "They're not anymore."
Black liquid liberally splashed the floor, walls, ceiling, and rabbits. But the machines themselves had completely vanished. The ichor was the only trace that they had even existed.
"Well I don't know about you," Defalcon said after a second, "but I am totally freaked out."
Dare nodded. Dazir started to say something, but froze as a soft chittering sound reached them.
"That's it," Dare said, "let's go."
There was no argument.