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Hector struggled to stabilize. No time to think. Three Bandas were coming for him, he knew. Where were they all? He could still sense two but not the third.

He couldn't dwell on it. Had to act. If they were solid enough for him to sense this clearly, they would be more vulnerable to bombardment. He loaded up more cubes in his mind as twin assaults of lasers and exploding javelins pressed him down closer to the ground. He needed to keep track of his altitude on top of everything else.

More processing. More thinking. More concentration.

Ah. There was the third. Circling around to flank him. Not as solid as the other two. Much smokier. Harder to sense that way. Smart. Hector almost hadn't--

Oh shit, there was a fourth on the other side.

He needed distance. Speed. Couldn't let himself get surrounded. Even a few extra seconds would be useful for the Amir-10 to repair itself.

"Sagir!" said Hector.

And the Amir-10 shrunk back down to its usual size. The holes in it were now smaller as well. The regenerating factor was supposed to be faster than the Amir-9 version, and Hector had no doubt that it was, but goddamn if it didn't still feel like a lifetime was transpiring in the middle of this fight.

Hector swerved out of the way of another slew of lasers, one of which he caught with the shield, making it bounce off and hit into the thin canopy of trees below. One of the poor trees took the full force of it and burst apart, setting the others around it aflame as splintered wood splashed up toward Hector.

A thought struck him, and he didn't hesitate. He dove down lower, into the trees. They wouldn't provide much cover, but some was still better than none. And the forest wasn't too dense. Even going as fast as he was, he didn't worry about crashing.

He wanted to press his sensory advantage--assuming he did indeed have one. If trees made it even slightly more difficult for Banda to keep track of him with his aura sense or whatever the fuck he was using, then that would be enough.

Aha, and the Banda clones were lagging behind now. Not losing track of him, necessarily, but definitely a bit slower to follow.

And he was getting another idea now.

Clones, huh?

Hector couldn't match that trick, but maybe he could pull off a bootleg version.