Of Fire and Night - Kevin J. Anderson [80]
"The nearest exit's over here." Paxton led the way. Ahead, they could see the hangar doors.
"Like whistling through a graveyard at midnight," a silver beret said.
"Nothing to fear now," Swendsen said. "It worked exactly as planned."
Sergeant Paxton clicked his shoulder transmitter again. "We're at door 1701/7. Be ready to let us out."
"Acknowledged, Sergeant."
One of the Soldier compies twitched.
Swendsen paused. "Did you see that?"
Yamane frowned, troubled by this unexpected technical problem. "They shouldn't be able to bypass so quickly. I wonder if they've installed adaptive security programming in their new constructions."
Eye sensors glowed. Two mechanical arms shifted. A polymer-reinforced torso straightened. Bullet-shaped heads swiveled.
"Oh, crap!" said Paxton. "Run!"
Swendsen and Yamane bolted. The surviving silver berets charged toward the door, but the Soldier compies revived too swiftly. Swendsen tripped on a compy that was just starting to move. He caught at a nearby robot to regain his balance, only to be grabbed by it. Terrified, he wrenched away, ripping a bloody gouge in his shoulder.
With the ammunition left in their weapons, the silver berets blasted away, yelling at the top of their lungs. Hundreds and then thousands of compies marched toward them, blocking the way out. They closed in from all sides.
Swendsen could see the exit, but it was much, much too far away.
47
RLINDA KETT
Rattling and tugging, nematodes chewed through the metal floor of the lift. From its sluggish movement and frequent lurches, Rlinda imagined at least fifty of the heavy worms must be clinging down there. How swiftly they had slithered up the shaft walls and clambered along protrusions, driven by Karla Tamblyn's furious control.
Rlinda struggled to fasten the chest guard of her environment suit while BeBob fit her remaining glove in place. With a thud followed by loud skittering, the nematodes buckled the insulated floor plates, and a flash of serrated diamond teeth bit through a crack in the metal. Rlinda stomped her heel down as hard as she could, and the worm-thing disappeared. After only a brief pause, the nematodes flung themselves back with renewed vigor, squirming and sliding with a sound like wet leather. The ascending elevator slowed with a jerk, grinding in its track.
"Would it really hurt to let two lousy people escape?" BeBob groaned. "We didn't even belong here in the first place."
Rlinda was already sweating in her half-assembled suit. After seeing the nematodes make short work of the fallen Roamers down there, she knew the thick fabric would offer little protection. Those sharp teeth sent a shudder down Rlinda's spine, but she had no intention of letting either herself or her favorite ex-husband be turned into worm food.
All business, moving as swiftly as she could, Rlinda turned BeBob around, checked his suit diagnostics and his air supply, and pronounced him fully green. "Now you check me out." She backed closer to BeBob.
With a mechanical sigh of surrender, the lift finally ground to a complete stop, and it was still far from the top.
"That's not good," BeBob said.
"You're the master of minimizing." She tried to calm her breathing, but the skittering, thumping sounds of the worms grew louder from below, making her sweat even more. She was embarrassingly close to panic. "Hurry up!"
Nematodes ripped through another floor segment, and Rlinda had to jerk her feet away from the jagged mouths. BeBob checked her diagnostics, squinted at the readouts, then ran his gloved hands over her padded garment. "Enough foreplay, BeBob! Is my suit intact or not? We have to blow out of this chamber."
"Want me to take shortcuts? You'll be the first one to complain if your suit pops open in the vacuum."
"My suit won't help if those worms chew a hole in it, either."
He adjusted something, then made a satisfied sound. "There, you're good to go as soon as we put our helmets on."
She