She slapped herself on the forehead. "Of course," she muttered. "They were building this one. It's not done yet."
* * *
"CJ," Morgan commanded, "the left leg is weak. Destroy it."
CJ drew her eyes away from the machine's weapons and saw the missing plates. She hurled herself forward as the gun barked again, against whom or what she had no idea. She thrust the tip of her spike into the space between the plates, just above the knee, and twisted.
The Destroyer fell over as its leg collapsed. Its gun burst into action again, this time firing wildly into the floor. The chattering ceased; CJ heard the gun click repeatedly. "It's out of ammo," she cried triumphantly. "Kill it."
Axel and Akira joined her within moments; Roni arrived a second later. The damn thing had too much armor to be an easy kill, even laying on the ground, weaponless. One of its hands reached out and grabbed at the calf of Axel's leg. A sharp crack of sound announced the shattering of his armor frame. CJ thrust with desperate ferocity to stop the machine before it crushed Axel's leg as well.
Another spike suddenly jammed its way into the Destroyer's shoulder socket. CJ heard a grunt of pure effort, and saw Lars' face, focused and deadly. He heaved, and the Destroyer's arm popped from its socket. The hand that had been crushing Axel's leg, detached from its owner, sprang open.
CJ dropped her spike and grabbed her pellet gun. "Here," she told the Destroyer sweetly as she thrust the barrel into the exposed shoulder socket. "Enjoy." She pulled the trigger, and the Destroyer rocked gently as the pellets bounced around inside its case.. She ceased fire. The Destroyer lay still.
Axel hopped over and clasped Lars on the shoulder. "Thanks, big guy. Remind me never to shake hands with one of those things." Axel turned, took one step, and collapsed on the floor as his leg gave from under him. "Damn," he muttered. "I guess it's broken."
CJ knelt over him. Akira was already picking up the two longest shards of the shattered frame leg to use as a splint. In less than a minute they had Axel standing again, though, as CJ said, "It's gonna be a little hard for you to run until we get back."
"Check, CJ," Axel said with a smile that started and ended with his mouth; his eyes said he knew better.
Roni exclaimed, "Look here." He pointed through the door.
CJ stood up from the defunct Destroyer to peer around her tall companion. "Looks like the academics back home were right. They really do build all these things out of the same old robot parts." Laying on a table was a chameleon of a machine. The top half was a Destroyer. The bottom half was a repair mech.
* * *
Paolo whistled appreciatively.
Sofia called from another room. "I heard that. Are you looking at pictures of naked women on the Web in there?"
"Sweet Sofia, you know I only have eyes for you," he yelled back.
"Then what was that wolf-whistle about?"
"They found a half-built, deactivated Destroyer. We could learn incredible things from it." They might even learn how to kill one of the blasted machines, though he wasn't going to hold his breath.
"That's just wonderful, darling. I guess." Sofia sounded quite doubtful; Paolo suspected she might have been happier if he'd been looking at pictures of other women. Sofia could compete quite successfully another woman for his attentions. But a half-built Destroyer presented a more complex problem.
Paolo turned back to his team conference and their private 'castpoint. He was fascinated on a personal level with the analysis of the enemy robot. But whatever treasures it might reveal, they were not directly relevant to his field of expertise. For him and his team, the most interesting bit of information had already been revealed. Namely, this room was a machine shop, a repair station for Shiva robots. They would feed this bit of information into their analysis, and see if it helped them forecast other bits of the ship layout.
* * *
Morgan shook his head. Finding a Destroyer to study was the kind of marvelous opportunity you desperately wanted . . . until the opportunity arose, at which point you realized you faced too many choices to exploit any one of them fully. Which dangerous course should they pursue?
He looked through the vidscreens at the machine stretched on the workbench—the Shiva version of an operating table. There lay the captured, virtually intact Destroyer. It was a prize of incomparable value. It was a prize that could easily get his CJ and his team killed.
On the one hand, over a thousand prizes had been posted already from people around the world, requesting that the Angels stay and examine the machine. On the other hand, every minute they stayed, the likelihood that reinforcements would show up grew exponentially. The dilemma was neatly captured by the odds now appearing on forecasts about how soon the team would be destroyed if they stayed, while other forecasts blossomed with other odds on their pathetic chances if they didn't learn how to destroy the Destroyers.
He looked at his watch. With a visible clenching of his teeth, he muttered to himself, "Fifteen minutes, not a minute more, not a minute less, no matter what."
* * *
The Dealer stood up and started pacing, the touchscreen in his hands. He'd put his money up on the prizeboard along with a lot of other people, and Earth Defense had listened to their united plea. He had fifteen minutes to figure out how to destroy the Destroyers. What an opportunity! If only he could figure out how to exploit it.
He watched the Angels crowbar the plates off the machine, exposing wiring and objects of varying sizes and shapes. It made him impatient. The internal wiring would be interesting, but didn't strike to the heart of the question. What was the machine's weakness? How would Sun Tzu take down a Destroyer?
One of the Angels levered the Destroyer's gun out of its socket. It rolled, exposing the wiring that led into the firing mechanism from the Destroyer's midriff. And the Dealer shivered as an electric shock of excitement rushed through him. He knew the answer. He would use the Destroyer's own gun to destroy the Destroyer. Of course.
* * *
CJ clapped her hands. A giddy, little-girl quality filled her voice. "Morgan, you really believe we can patch up this gun so that we can fire it ourselves?"
"Everybody here seems to think so," Morgan replied. "Hook it up and find out."
Akira had already bent to the task, splicing optic fibers to the gun leads. Axel pulled out his pellet pistol and stripped it down, extracting the trigger mechanism. In a minute and a half they were done.
Axel smiled. "I have got to check this out," he said, standing up with the gun in his hands.
CJ plucked it from his fingers. "Naughty boy, Axel. Don't you know that it's ladies first?" She held the weapon awkwardly. "I can see this isn't going to be all fun and games. We could really use a shoulder stock on it."
Lars roared, "Next time we'll put in our order early."
CJ shrugged. Then in a sudden motion she raised the weapon, aimed at the far wall, and pulled the trigger. A single shot produced a trio of violent noises that echoed in the room: first, the sound of the gun firing; second, the sound of the bullet blasting a hole in the ceramic wall; and third, the sound of CJ landing on her back as the recoil knocked her from her feet. "Wow," she said with delight, her enthusiasm unimpaired. "So many guns, so little time."
Lars bent over her. "Perhaps you should let someone built like a Destroyer handle the Destroyer's gun, Boss Lady." He held out his hands. CJ reluctantly handed it over. "Thank you," Lars said with warm mirth.
CJ stood up. "At least we have confirmation, those guns must be shooting depleted-uranium ammo. Couldn't have knocked me down, otherwise."
Axel pointed out the door. "You know, there's another gun just outside."
Roni shook his head. "It's empty. Do we know how to reload these things? Or where to find ammo if we do?"
CJ waved her hands, brushing the questions aside. "Have faith in the Web, guys. If we have the gun, somebody'll figure out how to use it." She glided toward the door.
Roni thrust his hand against her chest. "
Just a minute, there, Boss Lady. I'm the recon guy here. And now that hall is a recon objective." Keeping CJ at bay with one hand, he tossed a pyramid through the door into the hall with the other. "You always have to make sure there's no—" A sudden burst of gunfire interrupted Roni's lecture and turned the pyramid into powder. A pair of Destroyers stepped around the corner, weapons trained. The noise of a hail of gunfire rattled the room, and—
The Destroyers disintegrated, leaving behind spumes of powder as fine and harmless as the remnants of the pyramid. Lars leaned over and theatrically blew the smoke from the tip of his barrel. "Now that's the way to fight a Destroyer." He held the weapon high. "This here is a monster gun, folks."
Morgan's voice interrupted. "Expect four minitanks."
Everyone but Axel leaped to the inner side of the wall; Axel was still hobbling out of the way when the tanks came through the doorway, two at a time. The tanks really didn't have a chance, even though Lars had stowed his handheld cannon; the Angels were ready. The battle lasted less than a minute.
Roni threw out another pyramid. This time no one fired on it. They stepped into a clear hallway.
* * *
The Dealer listened to the Angels chatter about the Destroyer gun with a sense of pride. It was his idea, after all, that got them so excited.
And CJ was right about the gun in the hallway. Somehow, they ought to be able to make use of that one as well. But how would you reload those things?
Chan Kam Yin flickered through the vid footage of the guns, freezing half a dozen frames in their own windows for closer scrutiny. The magazine on the weapon looked like an old-fashioned drum magazine, the kind you saw in black-and-white American gangster movies. But the unit was completely sealed. He needed a way to make a hole in it big enough to load ammo but small enough, and out-of-the-way enough, to not interfere with the weapon's action.
He figured out where he wanted to cut out a section of the device. Now the question was how. The Angels didn't have a machine shop for working ceramic parts. Should they burn a hole in the ceramic case with the new molecular acid? You sure couldn't use explosives for such a delicate operation.
Or could you? He knew just who to ask.
* * *
Lou heard someone snoring while the chime on his touchscreen rang insistently. As his irritation with the twin noises rose, so did his level of awareness; he finally recognized that he was the person doing the snoring.
As he reached consciousness, the snoring stopped, but the chime remained. He slapped his hand down irritably to make the connection. "Yes?" he asked thickly.
Viktor's broad face filled half a window. A much younger, Oriental face filled the other. He felt like he ought to recognize the Oriental. Then his eyes lost focus; he still wasn't awake yet.
Viktor waved. "Conference call. You remember Chan Kam Yin?"
Lou blinked, scrunching his face around to try to get some blood flow. "Oh, yeah, Kam Yin, hi." He stretched his arms. "I'm still coming back to life. Sorry."
"Sleepyhead," Viktor chided him. "You need to exercise more."
"You come over here anytime, Viktor and we'll run a marathon and see who finishes first," Lou retorted. He leaned forward. "How're our Angels doing?"
Viktor nodded his head. "Pretty good. One broken leg, but they took a Destroyer apart and figured out how to use its gun."
"Great."
Viktor agreed. "They are doing very well, indeed. But we want them to do better. Kam Yin, could you explain for Lou your idea for reloading the second gun?"
Lou listened to the boy explain the problem in his halting English. Lou could feel a sense of impatience every time he thought about the Angels' plight while he sat here waiting for the explanation to rattle to a conclusion, knowing that Viktor had already heard this explanation and could get through the essentials ten times as fast. But he understood Viktor's purpose. And he supposed that teaching the younger generation was a never-ending task, a task that shouldn't be cut off, even with Shiva closing on them at meteoric speed.
Kam Yin finished, "How do we open the ammo case? Viktor says he can open the case with duodec more safely than molecular acid."
Lou laughed. "Surgical duodec, Viktor?"
"With the right thin bead, we can make a clean fracture in the ceramic," Viktor replied huffily. "Try that with acid."
Lou nodded. "He's right, Kam Yin, despite his prejudices. Let us draw up a plan for you and get back in about fifteen minutes, Okay?"
Kam Yin nodded. He looked uncomfortable. Finally he blurted out, "What sort of contract do you want?"
Viktor waved the matter aside. "Our first recommendation is free. The second one, though, Kam Yin, will cost you."
Kam Yin looked surprised. "Thank you," he said, and logged off.
Lou frowned. "Our first recommendation is free? When did that start happening, Viktor? Particularly for a person you yourself described as a con artist? "
"Lou, Lou, we are trying to help this boy grow to be a better person. I'll bet no one has ever helped him for free in his life. We're setting a good example." Viktor closed one eye and peered at him from the other. "Besides, what's an old miser like you need more money for, anyway? At least in the good old days we could shoot people for being as tight with a nickel as you."
"In the good old days your whole country had only a handful of nickels, Viktor, and the State owned all of them."
"It was not perfect," Viktor conceded.
"An amazing concession. And now, let's lay out a det charge."
* * *
Morgan's voice finished, "You see the schematic on your left windshield?"
CJ gurgled with joy. "You bet, Morgan. Axel, can you lay a line of duodec that precise?"
"No problem, Boss Lady."
"Okay, let's break for a minute. Akira, you copy?"
Far down the hall she could see Akira come to a halt. "I await your pleasure. But please ensure that our delightful Axel acts with speed as well as care."
"I love you, too," Axel replied, ending the words with a kissing sound. He dismounted and knelt over the empty firearm.
Lars asked, "You have some duodec?"
Axel said, "Of course. I never leave home without it." He set to work.
Despite Akira's jibe about speed, Axel had a delicate task that would take several minutes. Waiting as patiently as she could, CJ rocked back and forth on her heels, dimly aware of her own inability to stop moving. She studied the disposition of their team with a sense of frustration. The layout's imperfections bugged her, but she could not think of any way to improve it.
The destroyer that had blown away the trailer had also nailed another pair of cycles, drawing them down to just two wheeled vehicles. Axel rode one of them—he had to ride, to keep up—and CJ had put Lars on the other one, carrying the weight of the last of their supplies salvaged from the trailer. The bottom line was that the team could move no faster than she could walk with her suit amplification set low to conserve power.
Meanwhile, she'd sent Akira out as recon, holding Roni back to use the second destroyer gun once they had it operational—Axel couldn't handle the recoil with his injury, and though CJ enjoyed joking about wanting the gun in her own hands, she knew that neither she nor Akira was big enough to handle the damn thing properly.
Overall, the situation was good compared to the situation of a typical Angel team, but CJ wanted more. Standing here in the quiet hall, unable to act, the fear caught up with her. She could feel control of the situation slipping away from her . . . as it had ultimately slipped away from every other Angel team in history. She shook her head violently to dispel the thought. Lars spotted the motion, and she could see the concern in his eyes. "It's nothing," she told him before he could speak.
A soft sound of cracking ceramic caught her attention. Axel stood up, gun in hand. "Got it," he said with pride. "Now all we need is some ammo."
MacBride's voice answered. "There's a storeroom two rings out from the slidechutes. You should find ammo th
ere."
Roni took the gun from Axel. "Great."
CJ shook her head. "But is it great enough, Morgan? Will the welcoming party at the slidechutes let us break into the storeroom without trying to stop us, just two rings away?"
In the silence that followed, she could imagine Morgan shrugging his shoulders, thousands of miles out of position to help. Worse, she could almost hear him trying to figure out how to protect her, rather than worrying about reaching the goal. If Morgan tried to keep her out of the pending danger, she would have to . . .
With an effort, CJ regained control of her dark thoughts. She straightened, she smiled, and she forced her normal attitudes to wash back through her mind; it felt like fresh rain. "Why's everybody standing around? Move out." She hurried, too fast, feeling Lars' eyes still on her.
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