“Of course not,” the elder snapped, as though this was all self-evident. “A machine is nothing without the one piloting it. Our guardians were those pilots!”
And then Hunter understood as well. “And it was their ships at the feet of these mechs, wasn’t it?”
The man nodded, his anger now fading to a smolder as it became clear that we finally understood what had occurred. “But you’ve destroyed them and killed two of our great machines. It’s not enough that you fought our guardians while the raiders set fire to three houses. Now they’ll have nothing to fight with when the raiders return next! You’ve killed us all!”
I turned to Hunter beside me, then glanced at Jha still seated in the MGT. I had led the mission astray. I had sorely misread the situation and had doomed this poor settlement w
