Providentially cushioned by the restraint mesh, Gaggii escaped a similar concussion. The impact cracked the rear window, allowing the prisoner to kick out the rest of the glass. There was just enough clearance for him to crawl through to the bed of the pickup.
A dazed, groggy Moody tried to aim his pistol in that direction but he was having a hard time just hanging onto the suddenly heavy weapon. His head and vision cleared fast, but by that time Gaggii had vanished into the woods.
“He’s getting away!” Ooljee yelled unnecessarily.
“I can see that!” Moody forced open the damaged door and started to climb out, quickly withdrew his legs as the yellow vastness struck at them. Glistening yard-long fangs sent dirt and rock chips flying.
As his partner tried to get a bead on the violently twisting shape, Ooljee struggled with the truck, alternating curses with prayers. One of them must have worked, because the engine hummed to life. Slamming into reverse, the pickup bounced away from the tree, then rolled awkwardly forward once more.
The snakeshape struck at the front windshield, spidering safety glass tough enough to turn bullets and darts but not fangs the size of pickaxes. Moody threw up his arms to protect his face, but the glass held. It would not withstand a second such assault.
Ooljee swung around, did something to the wheel, and yelled at his partner, “Jump!”
Moody eyed the hard, rough ground outside. They weren’t going very fast, but still. . .
No time to argue. He popped his own door, tried to will into existence a depression filled to the brim with a hundred years worth of pine needles and leaves, and jumped.
Any local accumulations of vegetable matter had already been spoken for. They lined fox dens and squirrel nests, not the ground beneath the careening pickup. He hit hard, pain splintering his right shoulder. It felt like some crazyboy had taken a good whack at him with an iron bar. He rolled over a few times before coming to rest.
Struggling to hands and knees, he watched as the driv-erless pickup, headlights gleaming, rumbled away into the night with its brilliantly glowing yellow and red nemesis twisting and coiling above it. The snake thing struck repeatedly at the truck’s cab, attacking effortlessly, a mad manic mass of pulsating serpentine energy.
Let it expend itself against the unfortunate vehicle, he thought. Save your shots in case it comes looking for you.
“You okay?” An anxious, exhausted query.
Grimacing, Moody rose while clutching his injured shoulder, his useless gun dangling from his right hand. He’d hung onto it when he’d jumped from the truck, and he was damned fortunate not to have blown his guts out when he’d hit the ground.
His eyes tried to penetrate the blackness between the trees. “Any sign of our boy?” he muttered, ignoring his partner’s concern. Somewhere behind them the truck was rattling down a slope, still pursued by the malevolent yellow snake-shape.
Ooljee shook his head tiredly. “This is his backyard, not ours. He knows it, we do not.”
“Bet he ran back to his place.”
“If so, he will not stay there. And I do not think we should go after him. I do not think that a second reception would be either as indifferent or polite as the first.”
Moody grunted agreement as he stared into the woods. His shoulder throbbed and he was mad—at himself more than their former prisoner. They should’ve stripped him bare-ass and slapped sealant tape over his mouth, though his chanting probably had far less to do with generating the snakeshape than did the cleverly disguised transmitter on his wrist. For all they knew, the tiny device was capable of running every molly in his house.
Ooljee was right: it would be stupid to try and take Gaggii again tonight. Having conjured up one lethal tactile program, he could probably conjure another, and they no longer had the hard shell of the pickup cab to protect them. They would need backup after all, enough to handle Gaggii no matter what he called up.
Their police spinners, built to military-level specifications, were undamaged. If they could just get to a phone, any kind of phone, they could fill the woods around Gaggii’s house with riot squads. It meant a long walk back to the road, and at this time of night, probably an additional hike all the way to the main highway.
Meanwhile Gaggii would be busy at his place—doing what? Barricading himself in, emplacing defenses, or preparing to flee? Or maybe he was so sure his fanged tactile had taken care of the two intruders that he would relax? Moody knew better. Someone as smart as Gaggii wouldn’t take that chance. Arrogant he was, but not stupid.
No, he wouldn’t be accommodating enough to linger in the vicinity. He’d run. If they could get to a phone in time they might be able to throw a cordon around the county, if not the state.
“That is how Kettrick and his housekeeper were slain,” Ooljee was saying.
“Yeah. With a smaller version. Forensics wouldn’t have figured it out in a million years.” Moody didn’t have the faintest idea which way they were going. Much simpler just to follow his friend.
They descended into a shallow arroyo, jumped a foot-wide creek, clambered up the far side and immediately dropped into defensive crouches.
Smoke drifted capriciously through the trees, but there was no sign of the monstrous glowing serpent-shape. Either the program had run down or Gaggii had called it off. They advanced warily on the pickup.
Moody yanked open the door and started to reach inside. He stopped as soon as he saw that they would not be able to use the truck phone to call for assistance, because it was no longer there. Nor was the front half of the truck. In its place was a cooling lump of metal and composite about four feet high. The pickup’s bed was still intact, but the cab and engine compartment had melted like a chunk of pork fat in a pot of greens.
Moody tried to imagine the snake-thing clamping tight to the truck and expiring in a burst of incredible energy. It must have been quick; a single violent spark lighting up the night, completely overloading the electric engine’s surge suppressors. In addition to the body itself, the intense heat had melted all four tires.
Gaggii had called it up to rescue him, but he hadn’t had time to program it selectively, Ooljee was thinking.
“He directed it to attack the truck, but not us. So when we jumped out it ignored us. That is what I prayed would happen.”
“What if you’d been wrong?”
Ooljee shrugged. “Then we would have had to rely on your shooting. I thought flight the better option.”
“Too bad it didn’t start a fire.” Moody glanced at the surrounding trees and brush. “Might’ve brought a ranger out to check on it. I don’t think what’s left of the truck is putting out enough smoke to be noticed from a distance.”
“Doesn’t matter. We must get back to the main road.”
“He’s used the web to kill twice, and he tried to kill us with it.” Moody spoke as they strode through the trees. “He’s learning how to handle the infernal thing.”
“He still needs a mechanical interface to access it,” Ooljee pointed out. “The bracelet was only a link to whatever setup he has constructed in his house. Take that away from him and he is harmless.” He considered aloud. “He must have used it to make contact with his home molly via a cableless modem at Kettrick’s house. I wonder what he intends to do with it besides defend himself?”
“You heard him.” Moody felt like he was carrying a fifty-pound pack on his back. In a sense he was, except that he had the location reversed. “He’s the ant who’s figured out how to use the garbage. Or if this web was set up with a purpose in mind, he’s trying to figure out what that is.”
“No one will believe what happened to us here.” Ooljee squinted into the night, changed direction. “We will have to say he had a gun, or that the truck sprung a wheel. II we go into a station and say we lost our prisoner because he was rescued by Klish-do-nuhti’ i they will lock us up instead of Gaggii.”