Part 23 (1/2)

”s.h.i.+ny's base must be messing with their weapons. Those rounds should have been able to lock in on us. It's a miracle they missed. Actually, now that I think about it, they might not be firing at us. They must be firing blind, or they would have hit something in particular.”

”See if you can guide me back. I'll try and discourage any pursuit,” Magnus said. He slid the slugthrower off his back and discharged a staccato burst of rounds down the sloped tunnel. The sound stunned Telisa, slamming into her ears painfully. She had realized abstractly that the military slugthrowers were loud, but she hadn't understood just how loud they really were until she experienced it in person. Magnus released a tangler grenade from his suit and set it on the floor. It rolled away, accelerating down the tunnel, seeking prey.

She rolled away from the opening and slightly down the hall so she could regain her feet without becoming a target. Shaking her head in a useless attempt to rid her ears of pain, she regained her concentration and linked with the Iridar. She brought a map of their path up in her mind.

”Up ahead and to the left,” she said.

Magnus put his back against the wall beside her. ”If their scanners are working they'll know exactly where we are. I'll have to stay back periodically. They'll see that and be wary, thinking I'm preparing traps or making a counterattack.”

”I don't think their stuff is working at all,” Telisa said. ”The bullets missed us, remember? I bet they can't see anything and the robots are almost useless.”

Telisa felt fear thrilling through her. She was at once excited and terrified. I wonder if the end of my life is here, she thought.

Magnus nodded. ”We can risk it. Hug the wall. If their rounds are blind, they'll be more likely to pick you as a target of opportunity if you're standing in the middle of the room than if you become part of the wall.”

Magnus's level voice calmed her. She leaned back against the cool wall of the cavern. It made her feel a little safer. She started shuffling in the direction of the s.h.i.+p, sc.r.a.ping along the irregular side of the pa.s.sage.

She laughed a little as she looked at the stunner she gripped in her hand. She hadn't remembered drawing it from her hip. The tiny nonlethal weapon was made to protect people against muggings, not to fight off a.s.sault robots. It occurred to her that it might not even work against any robot, even a household cleaning robot.

”Magnus, does this stunner work against robots?”

Magnus shrugged next to her. ”It can't be good for them. But I doubt it would do anything against a s.p.a.ce force a.s.sault model. But keep it out, there are probably marine teams behind the robots.”

Telisa nodded, but she was still thinking about the robots. Then she remembered that she had brought the double-horseshoe artifact with her to show to s.h.i.+ny.

”Remember the artifact that we fired up? It generates a huge EM spike locally,” she said. ”I bet that would get a robot's attention.”

”Yeah, maybe. Once we're back to the s.h.i.+p, though, we should just leave.”

”No, I have it with me!”

”What? Why isn't it on the s.h.i.+p?”

”I was going to ask s.h.i.+ny about it today.”

Magnus shrugged. ”Couldn't hurt to keep it ready.”

Telisa slipped the artifact out of her pack. She zipped the carrying container back up and slid it over her back. Telisa dropped the plastic holder on the floor and held the device in her hand. She held it by one arm carefully.

”Okay, let's keep going,” Magnus prompted.

”Wait. I hear something.”

A high pitched whine rose and fell. Telisa caught a glimpse of something in the air. She blinked. Whatever it was, she couldn't sense it anymore. It reminded her of a hummingbird.

”Some of those tiny orbs like s.h.i.+ny had,” Magnus said. ”They headed past us.”

”Whata””

A cacophony arose from the tunnel ahead. At first it sounded like a pile of garbage being emptied from a large container. Then the thunder of slugthrowers erupted and drowned the rest out. Magnus pulled Telisa down. They hugged the floor for a moment, listening and cowering. Telisa understood now that these were the sounds of a battle.

The orbs are fighting the Seeker's a.s.sault robots, right?

Must be, Magnus replied on the link. Telisa was glad for the link conversation, since her ears rang so terribly she wondered if she'd ever hear again.

At last the noise slowed then stopped. Telisa lay on the sandy floor, breathing rapidly.

We need to find another route I guess, she said on the link.

No. This is perfect. The orbs have made a hole in the forces ahead of us. We might be able to get through to the s.h.i.+p if we hurry.

I don't know. We don't want to be in the thick of the fight.

”Too late. We are in the fight,” Magnus said aloud. Telisa felt relieved she could hear him despite her ringing ears. ”Those orbs are formidable. They've probably taken the a.s.sault machines out. Keep going straight for the s.h.i.+p.”

They moved through a narrow room with two adjoining pa.s.sages. Magnus stayed close and covered the entrances with his weapon, but he didn't shoot again. Telisa chose the pa.s.sage that she believed would take them closer to the Iridar. Any moment she expected a s.h.i.+ny war machine to appear and attack them. Telisa wondered if such things only shot people, or if they had giant whirling blades to slice victims up like in the horror vids.

They came into another room, filled with something unfamiliar. Broken s.p.a.ce force equipment lay strewn all over the floor. Telisa saw green shapes mixed in amongst the carnage. She realized the green objects were uniformed bodies on the floor. Pieces of human were strewn about, splattered in blood. It didn't look real in the colored light of the cubes. Telisa made a confused noise.

”s.h.i.+ny must've taken them out,” Magnus said. ”It's an a.s.sault controller team. They would have set up right after the robotics came through.”

”Can't the robots be controlled from the Seeker? Or even fight on their own?”

”Yes. But teams like this are deployed for redundancy. They can also add flexibility to the machine's strategy.”

”s.h.i.+ny killed all these men. He didn't seem so violent with us. He never did anythinga””

”We never waved guns in his face and tried to capture him. We never invaded one of his bases. Put one of these on,” Magnus said, indicating a dead man who was still mostly in one piece.

Telisa stared in confusion for a moment. Then she realized he meant the corpse's skinsuit. She walked over to the smallest of the dead a.s.sault controllers, hopping over the wreckage of some equipment. The devastation was so severe that Telisa couldn't tell what any of it had been. She got a closer look at the man. Blood poured from a hole in the suit, right above his heart. She avoided looking at his face. She didn't want to remember what he looked like.

”Lot of good it did him,” Telisa said, but she started to work the opening clasp at the man's neck.

”Just don't take a direct hit,” Magnus said. ”It works pretty well against the nerve scramblers, too. Of course s.h.i.+ny's weapons... will probably still kill us.”

”He must hate us, now.”

Magnus shrugged. ”Maybe. We have more important things to worry about than our popularity.”

Telisa unzipped the dead man's suit. She felt a s.h.i.+ver run down her spine as the head flopped to one side and a stream of fresh blood trickled out of one nostril. She exhaled and shook off a wave of nausea.

”Sorry pal, but you don't need Momma Veer anymore,” she whispered. She wrenched the arms out of the skinsuit and then realized that the boots would have to come off first. While she struggled with the operation, Magnus picked over the bodies, taking a couple of grenades and a few electronic devices.

”Can't they trace us with that stuff?” Telisa asked.

”Yes they can. And they can trace us without it as well, unless our theory about the countermeasures is right. Just hope that they're after s.h.i.+ny a bit more than us. Truth is this may be it. The Seeker is a formidable s.h.i.+p, and its crew is elite.”