Scattered Suns - Kevin J. Anderson [136]
Chapter 65—CESCA PERONI
The swarms of lockstepping Klikiss robots thundered across Jonah 12 for the better part of a day, pulverizing frozen gases into an obscuring fog. Far from where the damaged grazer sat stranded at the top of the ridge, line after line of the black machines flowed past. Cesca couldn’t tell where they were going.
“Maybe they’ve got ships or equipment sealed in a different storage area,” Purcell suggested. “After all, the robots themselves were buried.” Feeling the cold through his environment suit, he hugged his arms to his chest.
Cesca looked at his pale face, saw his faint wisp of exhalation in the chilly compartment. Their life-support batteries were fading. “Maybe it’s worse than that. What if they’re homing in on the transmissions from our base domes?” He had no answer for that.
Stranded here, unable to do anything about the robots, she had far too much time to think about Jhy Okiah, the destruction of Rendezvous, and the scattered clans. Now more than ever the outlaw families needed someone to bring them together, someone who would be more of a leader than a mere spokesperson. If the clans didn’t get their act together, the Big Goose might succeed in breaking the spine of the confederation of Roamer families.
That was the philosophical big picture, but right now Cesca wasn’t sure how she would survive another day. She had already seen two men die and a horde of alien robots unleashed. She feared the marching insectile ranks might be a greater threat even than the Eddies.
Stuck here, however, she couldn’t do anything for anybody: not for the Roamer clans, not for the small mining settlement, not even for herself. She had to get back to the main base!
As if on cue, a signal came over the comm system. “Hey, Purcell? Speaker Peroni? We’re coming to rescue you, two of us in one of the grazers. Sorry it took so long. Hey, we can’t detect your locator beacon.”
Purcell checked the control panel. “The robots must have torn it off when they attacked.”
“Good thing, or they probably would have come after us,” Cesca said.
With gloved hands Purcell worked the comm controls. “I’m sending you the coordinates manually. We’re on high ground, but I don’t want to turn on our bright spotlights. I’d rather not draw the attention of those robot hordes.”
“Oh, there you are! Closer than we thought,” the rescue grazer transmitted. “Up ahead we can see—by the Guiding Star! There must be thousands of robots. What did you guys do?”
Cesca leaned over the voice pickup. “Give them a wide berth. Avoid any contact.”
Purcell’s voice cracked as he added, “They attacked us, and killed Danvier and Jack.”
Soon Cesca spotted the bright forward lights of a lone grazer trundling toward them. The regimented Klikiss robots had fanned out across the terrain; now, seeing the approach of the low-riding vehicle, the machines became agitated. Hundreds of them veered toward it like a group of maddened insects.
“That doesn’t look good,” Purcell said.
“Get out of there!” Cesca shouted into the voice pickup. “Turn around and return to base at full speed. Forget about us for now. Don’t let them—”
Across the horizon, another line of the Klikiss robots appeared, having circled to the rear. The alien machines pressed in toward the rescue grazer like a giant pincer closing. The vehicle’s driver moved back and forth, scribing a zigzag path. “So many! And I doubt they just want to shake hands.”
“Full speed. You can outrun them,” Cesca said. “We did.”
In the distance she saw the beetlelike robots converging from all directions. They did not seem hurried, just murderously confident as they tightened an ever-constricting noose. The grazer swerved, searching for an opening. “They’ve got us trapped. What do you think they have in mind?”
“Get out of there!” Cesca yelled again.
The grazer accelerated toward the nearest robot, gathering speed until it slammed into two of the black machines that refused to move out of the way. The grazer shuddered, and both Klikiss robots went sprawling aside in the low gravity. But, advancing relentlessly,