"I—what?" she demanded. "Will we help them or not?"
"Knowing Hammerhand, we probably will," he all but snarled. "But we'll have to contact him before we promise anything. Come on. We need to get to the convoy and give them the good news."
"It doesn't sound like good news," she grumbled but began to move and they headed back the way they'd come to the other Knights Mechanica. "It sounds like you know this mech."
"Less talk, more walk. Let's go!" was all Windchime said as they circled to the other side of the hill and sprinted the rest of the way.
Chapter Twenty-One
She wasn't sure why the news of that particular kind of mech was so alarming to Windchime, whose hybrid was something to be feared by virtually any being that came across it.
It wasn't like she needed to know either. The man had his reasons for wanting to get back to the convoy they were supposed to be scouting for. She had merely been sent to accompany him and likely learn a little something too.
And she had. She'd learned that his was a mech that was better to run away from than fight and that running away was likely the best choice she could make if she had to fight anyone alone. And the fact that someone with a mech that had an owl or bird of prey for a helm and an electrical lance or spear was a matter of some concern to the Knights—or, at least, one Knight in particular.
They reached the convoy after a few hours’ travel and when they were within view, Windchime increased his pace and left her to follow as best she could while he rushed ahead to talk to Hammerhand.
"Do you think he's in a hurry?" Jessica13 asked.
"I would say he is anxious to tell Hammerhand of the news we learned," Mini pointed out.
"He already sent them a copy of the communication we had with the people in need," she said and held her Minato at the same speed as it had gone for the duration of their trip. "Hammerhand would have already decided what he wants the Knights to do. Maybe Windchime simply wants to know what the decision was—is. Or maybe he has something to say. Did he seem a little scared to you?"
"It wasn't only fear, although I suppose there was a hint of it in his voice and reaction," he replied. "It seemed more like alarm. I would say he and Hammerhand have encountered this mech in the past and are not overly enthusiastic about facing it again."
Jessica13 couldn't understand that. Between Windchime, Hammerhand, Tinker, and the dozen and a half or so other Knights among them, they could handle almost any situation. Of course, the possibility of the mech with a spear that could disable other mechs was a concern, but given that Taylor, in particular, could pick one off from about a klick away, it couldn't be that much of a problem.
But Windchime was concerned and she didn't know what to make of it. He didn't appear to be the kind of person who would panic for no reason.
The convoy really was something interesting to watch. A group of the mechs walked and kept their weapons primed and ready in case of attack, but not all the Knights were there.
One or two were in the Beast that was dragged by a couple of larger motors with tracks to pull it across almost any landscape. Tinker had put considerable work into the Beast of Burden, which was almost like his mech away from his actual mech. It was about half the size of a battleship and worked as the supply train for the Knights when they needed to move over longer distances. It could also be converted into a small fortress if they needed to defend themselves from attack.
Jessica13 had never seen any attack come to that. Most of the time, the Knights tended to be the aggressors to drive pirates and the like away from those who might need their help.
It was either that or helping to defend the bunker in need of rebuilding. They had stuck close for as long as the people had needed them before they finally headed out. As nice as it had been of them to maintain some semblance of defense, they had also been a drain on resources. Once the bunker’s occupants had managed to restore their own defense systems, they were ready to rebuild their homes and make everything better for themselves.
Which meant it was time for the Knights Mechanica to move on once more and find others who might need their help and clear the Earth of the evils of the pirates who roamed their world.
It was an odd way to live but given that they were able to live their lives in their own way, it made sense for them to dedicate themselves to helping others in any way they could. She liked that. The desire to make her own choices and live by her own standards was why she had parted ways with her old bunker and started out on this new life of hers. It was more dangerous but also more adventurous.
Jessica13 had been told that her father had done the same and that even the life among the Knights Mechanica had been too constricting for him. He'd left Sanctuary before she could even form much more than a vague memory of him and had left the Knights not long after that. All she really had left was a small exposure on ceramic, a picture of him and her mother. There wasn't much of it to see, and she'd needed to break it into smaller pieces in order to keep at least their faces when making her escape.
She had hung the picture from one of the exposed wires inside her cockpit. It was something she liked to look at from time to time, not really because she missed the
