Authors: Gun Brooke
“And take better care of Ayahliss.”
“I will.” Armeo realized now that Ayahliss had paid the highest price for their adventure. “I will.”
“Good.” Ayahliss blinked the last tears away and hugged Armeo before she dug her fingertips into his ribs and tickled him until he screamed for mercy.
The searing sound was strangely familiar. Kellen let go of Rae enough to get on her knees inside their tent. “Rae. Wake up.” She pulled on her coveralls and grabbed her sidearm. “We're under attack.”
Rae was already sitting up, reaching for her weapon. She had slept in her coveralls and now shoved her feet into her boots. Kellen did the same and then carefully opened the tent flap. The air was heavy with morning mist, and multicolored beams crisscrossed the clearing.
Kellen could hear loud voices inside the other tents, but what drew her attention was Ensign Noor's still body in the center of the circle of tents. “One down,” she reported to Rae.
“Who the hell is firing on us? And from where?”
“They've surrounded us, whoever they are.” Kellen tucked her weapon into one of her back holsters and glanced at her scanner. “I don't detect anything on sensors. This doesn't make sense. I'll check on Ensign Noor.”
“Damn it. I'll try and reach Oches's tent where the communication device is.”
Kellen crawled outside, her body flat to the ground as she hurried over to Noor. At first she feared the worst, but when she pressed two fingers to Noor's neck, she found a strong and steady pulse. She signaled to Rae, who'd made it halfway to Oches's tent by now.
“Commander O'Dal,” someone called from Kellen's left. Emeron D'Artansis was advancing toward her. “This isn't the mercenaries. We've been attacked once before by spy bots, and I'm certain whoever's sent them has launched more to try and finish the job.”
“You've been attacked before in this forest and never bothered to let us know?” Kellen glared at Emeron.
“I made the mistake of thinking they wouldn't venture this far. Someone trying to destroy Dwyn's investigation has probably programmed them. Also, last time we were able to pick them up on sensors. This stealth mode is new.”
“They're after Ms. Izontro and taking us out one by one in the process.” Kellen motioned toward Noor. “We need to drag her out of the line of fire.”
“Is sheâ?”
“She's alive. So far.” She helped Emeron pull Noor over to one of the tents, where the two marines hauled her inside. The two men then joined her and Emeron as they crawled just within the perimeter of the circle of tents.
“The tent's protective mesh-alloy should deflect this type of fire,” she murmured, “but we can't be certain.”
“Their blue rays can cut through almost anything. I've seen it,” Emeron said. “Let's hope you're right, though.”
“Yes.” She also hoped that Rae had reached Oches's tent and the communication center. The bots were impossible to see when they weren't firing, and she guessed that once they did and revealed their position, they immediately moved to another location and began blasting again. Blue, yellow, and green beams pierced the morning air, and together with the mist rising from the damp undergrowth, they blinded her as she tried to pinpoint their origin.
“Here.” Emeron tossed her a scanner, which Kellen gratefully accepted. She worked it in a circle around her. “We're definitely surrounded. I read sixteen bots, and they're constantly shifting positions.”
“So they actually outnumber us.” Emeron reached into the back of her jacket and pulled out a second sidearm. “Not very good odds, but I've seen worse.”
“Me too.” Kellen recognized some of her own steely resolve in the way Emeron allowed an emotional visor to slide into place. “And I have a way to deal with them all at once.”
Emeron eyed her with doubt. “Really?”
“Yes. I have to get to Commander Grey's tent. This may damage some of our gear, but I can't see any other way out.”
“All right. Come on.” Emeron proved again to be a woman of action and few words as she started to run, stopping only to duck when bots hovered closer and scorched the ground around them.
Kellen felt a searing pain in her left calf, but clenched her teeth to stop her moan. Aware that the bots probably had both heat and motion sensors, she kept going. If she stayed near the warm ground her body signature wouldn't be as easy to detect. Kellen didn't think she was bleeding, since the beam from the bot had probably cauterized the wound. Some grass straws were laser-knife sharp as they whipped at her face. She hadn't had time to pull on her gloves, which she regretted now, as perspiration made her lose her grip on her weapon.
“Emeron. Are you all right?”
“Dwyn. Stay down and take cover inside the tent.” Emeron suddenly sounded frantic, not the impersonal soldier at all.
“I can't. Some of the beams are getting through it. My bedroll is destroyed.”
“Are you hurt?” Emeron began to crawl faster, getting up on hands and knees. Kellen pulled her down next to her.
“Don't. You'll reveal your position.”
“I'm all right,” Dwyn said, and now they could see her, huddled by the entrance to her tent. Though tousled and her face smudged with dirt, she looked unharmed.
“Kellen, what the hell are these things?” Owena joined them, pressed to the ground too.
“Spy bots. We need to emit a pulse.” She wasted no words.
“They just pierced through the tent and took out our communication center. I hope yours is intact,” Owena said, looking at Emeron.
“Me too,” Emeron replied through clenched teeth.
“That isn't good.” She pointed up. “At least sixteen bots are circling the camp.”
“Fourteen. I just took out two.”
“Good.” In fact it was incredible that Owena had managed to get a lock on the elusive devices. “We should get back to your tent. We need to inform Rae about the communication center.”
“What'll this pulse do?” Emeron asked as they crawled back.
“It'll destroy any unprotected electronic equipment and weaponry within a two-hundred-meter radius,” Owena explained. “Even gear that's been outfitted to withstand regular electromagnetic pulse. Our weapons have shields against this, and of course there's a remote risk that the bots have similar defense. However, this is newly developed, so I doubt it.”
“Our gear doesn't have that protection either.”
“Your government sent you on a mission with inferior equipment?” Kellen asked, nonplussed.
“This was never meant to be a high-profile search-and-rescue mission.” Emeron glared at her. “Merely a routine security-detail assignment in a low-tech area.”
“Low tech?” Owena gazed up, her face lit by a green beam piercing the dissipating mist. Soon they would be more visible to the bots' ocular sensors.
“We have to share the protected weapons.” She was determined. “We don't have a choice.”
“I agree.” Rae spoke quietly from Kellen's right.
Kellen quickly explained the situation regarding their communication center.
“Damn it,” Rae said. “But go ahead with the plan, Commander O'Dal.”
Dwyn interrupted. “Have you considered that we won't have any communications?”
“She's right,” Emeron said.
“Damn,” Rae said softly. “Ideas, anyone?”
Kellen cursed inwardly at the bots for hitting their communication center. There had to be a way to keep the Cormanians' comm system safe from the pulse.
“Admiral?” Dwyn said, and crawled to Rae. “When I was on a mission on the Beranta asteroids, they protected their gear from a natural phenomenon that wasn't exactly an electromagnetic pulse, but nonetheless destroyed all their electrical circuits.”
“Really?” Rae said. “You paying attention, Owena?”
“Yes, ma'am.”
Dwyn had opened her mouth to continue when a multicolored beam hit the ground in front of her and Rae, sending up dirt, grass, and sparks. Rae rolled to her left, covering Dwyn with her body. “Get down,” she hissed. “I'll be damned if a gang of tin cans will kill me.”
Kellen fought a sudden urge to giggle at her angry words, but she felt the same way. She hadn't survived situations more dangerous than this to die here, killed by unknown adversaries hiding behind cowardly technology. There was no honor in such an end.
“Go on,” Rae urged Dwyn as she rolled off her.
“Well, it was simple, really. They used a fine metal mesh, not sure which alloy, but they had constructed entire rooms lined with this mesh, even the door system.”
“So, a metal mesh?” Kellen tried to think of what they had that could function as a shield against the pulse.
“Like the one that lines the outside of our bedrolls, Commander?” Emeron slid into the closest tent and returned with a bedroll. “This is a fine metal mesh. Look.”
She examined it, then turned to Dwyn. “What do you think?”
“Yes, that looks like it could work. I don't think we have anything that would do better.”
Rae issued the orders rapidly. “Wrap three of them around the communication center and as many of your unprotected weapons and medical instruments as you can fit in there. In the meantime, get the pulsator ready.”
“Aye, ma'am.” Owena crawled back to her tent.
“I'll sweep the perimeter and make sure Noor and the rest of my unit are all right.” As Emeron turned to leave, her coveralls' leg rode up and Kellen saw a deep, blackened cavity on her calf. “You're injured. Let yourâ¦Dwyn clean your wound and I'll scout the perimeter.”
“Ma'amâ¦Protector, I'm fineâ”
“Get it taken care of. You should know better than any of us what can happen to a wound like that in this humid environment.”
“All right,” Emeron responded, and crawled toward Dwyn. She tore a med-kit package from her pocket and threw it at Dwyn, who deftly caught it and went to work.
Kellen began to worm herself around the line of tents.
“Aw, come on, Emeron. Hold still⦔ was the last thing she heard before she was surrounded by bots firing a multitude of beams at her. Knowing that she had been detected, probably because of the lifting morning mist, she jumped to her feet and ran, doubled over, to the nearest tent. She threw herself inside and nearly floored Ensign Oches.
“I got one of them, ma'am,” he yelled above the loud hissing noise. “There's so many of them this time.”
“I know. We're dealing with it. Get down.” She pulled him back with her as a bot passed only centimeters from the ground, then raised her sidearm and aimed. Firing, she hit the bot and watched it twirl and begin a crazy dance, bouncing on the ground. It flipped over and its small antennas, which resembled undersized wings, twirled like they were searching for the one audacious enough to harm it.
Frowning at how she had nearly thought of the bot as a living entity, Kellen fired at it again, sending it into a new spin. This time it bounced against a small rock, which propelled it in their direction.
“Move!” She pushed at Oches, who scrambled backward, trying to get away from the thing. She moved even faster, throwing herself sideways. She had no idea what would happen if the bot exploded on top of them, but she was sure it wouldn't be pretty.
“Ma'am,” Oches called, his tone high and shrill. “You have to get out of here.”
She stared. The bot had rolled in and wedged itself between Oches and a tree trunk outside the tent. Smoke was billowing from one of the antennas, and, like Oches, she realized that any minute it would explode and kill him in the process.
“I'm not leaving you,” she assured the pale ensign, who was sweating profusely. “Lie very still. Let me scan it.”
“Don't, ma'am,” he implored. “You don't know what will set it off, now that it's injured and unstable.”
She noticed that Oches said “injured” and realized that he, like her only moments ago, looked upon these bots as entities. “I won't do anything to destabilize it. I promise. Lie still.”
“No problem. Be quick, please, ma'am.”
Kellen adjusted the parameters on her scanner to their lowest settings. Running it over the bot at what she hoped was a safe distance, she tried to make sense of the readings. On the one hand, it looked as if their blasts had neutralized the bot, but she was afraid it would explode soon. She was sure that would happen even faster if they tried to roll it off Ensign Oches.
“It's not looking good, ma'am, is it?” Oches tried to smile, but only managed a faint tremor in his lips. “Damn, I never expected to go down like this.”
“Don't you dare give up, Ensign. That's an order.”
“All right.” Oches's tone wasn't convincing. He relaxed against the trunk now and wasn't even looking at the bot.