Up Against It - M. J. Locke [93]
“I’m up.” Geoff chose his target. He did not point; they were dealing with an intelligent enemy, not a lump of ice.
“Twelve o’clock!”
He pulled out his disassembler tube and crossed between the lumbering machine and Kam and Moriarty’s position. It slowed, tracking on him as he approached. He moved around to its side, as Amaya had done. He was crosswind instead of down, and that made it harder. Ian flanked him on the far side of the machine. They reeled out tether and tossed it up over the target machine’s reach—it swiped at the cable and missed. Amaya planted herself where she was. When the angles were right, he shoved off hard toward his target.
He did not get the timing quite right—his trajectory wobbled—but Amaya and Ian stabilized him. Then the machine came up, a field of spears and grapplers. The wind was slowing him down. He made an easy target. Fuck.
The machine hooked the tether he shared with Amaya and yanked him down into reach of its arms. He tucked, swept the disassembler across the arm that had his tether—landed on its casing—touched down and spun, spewing more disassembler. All the arms broke off and tumbled away, one by one. He jumped up again, downwind toward Ian, who gave him a helpful tug. He landed a meter or so away from the machine, and doused it along the side. The wheels began to disintegrate. So did a chunk of rail, which spat sparks.
Geoff checked his disassembler gauge. “I’m out of bug juice.”
Ian checked. “Me, too.”
Amaya did not bother to reply; merely tossed hers aside and pulled out her flares. Geoff followed suit.
Ian yelled, “Fuck! Eight o’clock! Eight o’clock!” and started running, yanking out his own flares. Amaya and Geoff turned—a third machine had slipped by them and was bearing down on Kam and the old man. It was mere meters away, and reaching for Moriarty, who had his back turned. The welding had stopped, and Kam was climbing into the hole they had made.
Moriarty turned at Ian’s yell, and stumbled back out of the machine’s reach just in time. One boot came loose—he flailed, trying to keep out of the attacking robot’s reach.
Ian shouted at Geoff and Amaya, “Launch me!”
The three of them did their shuffling, clumping run, as hard as they could.
“Now!” Ian said, and crouched, as Geoff and Amaya came up on either side of him. They slung him into the air. But this time the machine was ready for an airborne attack. It plucked him easily out of the air, sliced through the tethers securing him to Amaya and Geoff, and pulled his right arm off.
Time slowed down for Geoff. A fountain, a red haze—Ian’s blood—filled the air and streamed out into the Hollow. He heard someone scream. Maybe Amaya, maybe Ian. Maybe him. Moriarty had gotten both feet back onto the hull and was running at the machine, firing his weapon, loosing a stream of curses. If the bullets were having an effect, Geoff couldn’t see it.
“Let’s take it!” Geoff told Amaya, but she looked confused. She shook her head and approached the machine, flares at the ready. “Look…”
What the hell…?
The machine had ceased its attack on the old man. It lowered Ian carefully to its casing and held him there. With another two appendages, it pulled a medical kit from a cabinet in its side.
“What’s it doing?”
“I think … it’s trying to help him,” Amaya said.
“Bullshit! It just ripped his arm off!”
Ian was struggling. The machine kept him pinned down. “Help me!” His voice was weak and desperate.
That was too much for Geoff. He rushed the machine. Moriarty attacked at the same time. The machine plucked the old man’s gun out of his grasp, tossed it to the winds, and shoved Moriarty back into the xaser station bulkhead. By this time, Geoff had scrambled up onto the machine. He tried to grab Ian’s good arm to pull him away, but the machine batted him aside, and he spun