Metal Swarm - Kevin J. Anderson [152]
Roberto Clarin paused as he and three colonists struggled to shore up the town's defences. ‘Shizz, how the hell can they want to fight again? Half the bugs have been wiped out.'
‘That's exactly why,' Margaret said. ‘Now, more than ever, the breedex needs to reproduce and replenish its numbers. And for that, it needs you.‘
With a surge of adrenaline, Davlin clapped his hands and shouted for everyone to take their positions - this was not a drill. The already shaken people let out sighs of despair mixed with determination. =,
Maria Chan Tylar and the colonists she'd been training jumped to gather and recharge their scavenged weapons - hand-held projectile launchers, broad-beam twitchers, and two shoulder-fired jazer rifles - and scrambled up makeshift ladders to the top of the barricade. Because of his years of experience as an excellent marksman, Davlin took one of the jazers for himself. Every charge from the weapon's energy pack, every round of ammunition in the other guns, had to be used wisely, and would likely still not be sufficient.
Clarin said to him in a low voice, ‘You think it makes any difference that so many of the bugs are dead? Do we have a chance now?'
‘We always had a chance. It was never a really good one.' He looked at the Roamer leader. ‘It's still not very good. But every bug the robots killed is one less that we have to shoot.'
Spotters on the wall shouted an alarm. Insect workers had spent a full day amidst the smoke and carnage below dragging away warrior bodies and the shrapnel of destroyed black robots and Soldier compies. Climbing a makeshift ladder to reach the top of the wall, Davlin stood beside Margaret.
‘I saw that the robots killed one of the domates. Will that help us?'
‘Not much. The breedex has seven of them left.'
He was startled to see tears trickling down her cheeks. ‘Shouldn't you get to shelter, or are you going to die with the rest of us?'
‘They won't touch me. The breedex has marked me in its mind.' She clenched her fists. ‘I'm stuck in the middle of this bloody hurricane. I wish DD were here, but I'm glad he got away with all those others.'
‘I wish I'd gotten a lot more people out in time,' Davlin answered. He squared his shoulders. ‘I saved as many as I could.' Even so, he wasn't sure how many of the escapees would survive without food, tools, or weapons at the sandstone bluffs. He could fight only one battle at a time.
Davlin noted that the Klikiss workers had cleared a path across the battleground. He watched more warriors and a group of the massive domates emerge from the dark openings of the towers. Forming a kind of procession through their city, the battered Klikiss began marching toward the compound.
Maria lined up her gunners along the top of the wall, while others took high positions on rooftops inside the town. They all held weapons and seemed anxious to fire. ‘Not yet,' she said. ‘Our biggest advantage is surprise.'
Puffing and red-faced, Clarin climbed up to Davlin's post. ‘We'll hold them off as long as we can. Maybe if we kill enough now, they'll back off.'
‘They won't back off,' Margaret said, her tone weary and matter-of-fact.
Clarin sighed. ‘I didn't think they would.'
Maria Chan narrowed her eyes and hefted her weapon. ‘I intend to leave a big pile of dead bugs all around me, one way or another.'
The domates, with tall head crests and jaws like industrial grinding tools, strode on multiple legs across the packed dirt toward the stockade wall. Davlin tensed, drawing imaginary lines in his mind. Just a few more steps. He had already activated the network.
‘Remember, the striped ones are the real targets, second only to the breedex,' he shouted. ‘Get rid of all seven of them, and we deal a powerful blow to the whole subhive.'
As the first domate stepped onto the path in front of the stockade wall, its chitinous foot tromped on the first of Davlin's buried landmines. The explosion blasted upward like an orange geyser, hurling dust and gravel twenty feet into the air. Smashed and mangled, the dead domate crashed to the ground