As the Planetary Union's massive fleet and Kaylon's mechanical warships entered each other's optimal firing ranges, someone opened fire. No one knew which side had shot first, but a fierce battle erupted in a region of the solar system not too far from Earth.
And yet...
As the fighting went on, everyone aboard the Orville and the Planetary Union's hastily assembled fleet discovered, to their horror, that compared with the Union's sleek, streamlined ships, the mechanical warships from Kaylon seemed faster, more maneuverable, better shielded, and far more powerful?
It often took several Planetary Union ships chasing and firing on a single mechanical warship just to wear down its shields and destroy it. In contrast, a Kaylon warship could easily overload a Union ship's shields with just a few rapid shots—even the shields of a super-sized cruiser were no exception?
Even more terrifying, the mechanical warships appeared to have no crew at all. The ships themselves seemed to be robots, and they could transform while attacking. They could also use brute force to ram and instantly destroy any human destroyer or cruiser foolish enough to get close?
In just a few minutes of fighting, the Union's fleet of more than a hundred ships of various sizes had already lost at least a dozen to the enemy. Even Commander Halsey's flagship had been damaged and forced to withdraw, while their total number of victories amounted to a pitiful three or five. The casualty ratio had reached an astonishing dozen to a handful?
As the melee continued and the Union fleet lost its flagship, leaving the remaining ships to fight on their own, the enemy kept widening that gap.
More and more ships identical in appearance to the Orville were being pierced or destroyed by the mechanical warships. Wreckage, escape pods, assorted