“In the infirmary,” Bloat said. “With a glucose feed.”
“Then I need you to make another gap in the causeway,” Modular Man said. “Ahead of Snotman and Detroit Steel.”
The Outcast glared down at the sleeping Croyd. He sighed. Then he tapped the end of his staff on the stone-flagged floor. The glow from the amethyst was very faint, but he could feel it happen. “Done,” he said. “Concentrating your attack on Detroit Steel was a good move, by the way. You wounded him, did you know? The right leg and arm of the suit aren’t working very well for him, and he’s bleeding inside the suit. He’s wondering whether they should retreat. Maybe a little more damage”
“He’s not the problem,” Modular Man said. “Snotman is. We’ve got to work out a way to beat him without violence, without directing any energy at him.”
“Hey, give His Largeness a break,” the penguin said, skating around Modular Man’s ankles. “He’s a little buried in his work right now.”
Modular Man seemed to consider that. “That’ll do,” he said. “I’ll need plastic explosives, a manual, and detonators. And you’ll need to evacuate the main gatehouse, because you’re going to lose it.”
The Turtle lurched sideways. Mistral’s wind howled around the shell like a gale out of hell. He heard Danny say, “Oh, shit!” Her rifle went sailing end over end past his cameras as the wind ripped it out of her hands. She grabbed the shell with both hands. “Help!” she screamed. “The netting…”
Tom could hear it ripping loose.
He tilted the shell to shield Danny against the fury of the wind. Mistral was floating serenely above him, smiling like the queen of the hop. Tom tried to summon his teke, a cannonball, a fist, anything to knock the wind witch senseless, but it was impossible to concentrate. The gale was pushing him back and down; he had to shove back hard just to stay in the same place. Sweat trickled down his forehead.
Then the sound of an elephant’s angry trumpeting cut through the roar of the wind. He saw the charge on his overhead screen as Elephant Girl came flapping up at Mistral.
Three tons of flying elephant does tend to get your attention. Mistral turned her attention on Radha, and suddenly the winds were gone. With nothing to push against, the Turtle bolted upward like a shot from a cannon. Danny shrieked as more of the safety net tore free.
Mistral grew larger on his screens. He reached out with a telekinetic hand, wrapped phantom fingers tight around her. I got her now, Tom thought. Elephant Girl was closing too.
Mistral made a short, sharp gesture at Radha.
The hurricane smashed into the elephant full force. Three tons of solid gray flesh, and the winds slammed her aside like a Ping-Pong ball. Corporal Danny was swept off Radha’s back. She flew past, her shout lost in the storm. Tom reached for her with his teke, Mistral forgotten. Then the elephant crashed into the shell, and Tom lost it.
The shell went end over end, a Frisbee in a hurricane. The safety harness dug into Tom’s chest. Everything inside the cabin that wasn’t tied down was flying through the air. Something bounced off the top of his head. Tom blinked, dazed. They were falling, plummeting like a iron parachute, still tumbling.
All he could think was, I’m going to die. The fog swallowed them again, his screens all going to gray. He was too dizzy to care. Every muscle in his body went tight with fear as he imagined the water coming up to smash them. Then he heard Danny screaming.
Somehow Tom made himself close his eyes, take a deep breath, and push. The shell jerked to a sudden stop, hung wobbling in the air. The world around them was an ocean of yellow-gray. There was no ground, no sky. “Danny,” he whispered breathlessly.
“Still here,” she said. He found her then, clinging tight to the safety netting. Two corners had torn away.
“Your sister…” he said, remembering.
“…okay … chute’s open…” Her voice was ragged. Tom glimpsed motion in the fog overhead. His fingers tightened on the armrests as he tried to ready himself for Mistral, for more demons, for whatever the fuck was coming at him.
Elephant Girl came gliding out of the mists, searching. She blew a short note on her trunk when she saw them. Tom thought it sounded relieved. Radha was in bad shape. Her wounds wept blood. One eye had swollen shut, and the right side of her head was a massive bruise. Tom didn’t know how she’d managed to stay conscious, but it was a damn good thing she had.
“RADHA,” he said through his speakers. “I’M GOING TO MOVE DANNY OVER TO YOU. HEAD FOR THE JOKERTOWN CLINIC.”
“What about you?” Danny said.
“I’VE GOT A SCORE TO SETTLE WITH MISTRAL,” Tom said.
“She’ll kill you,” Danny said. Radha trumpeted agreement.
“I CAN TAKE HER,” Tom insisted. “SOMEBODY’S GOT TO DO IT.”
“No,” Danny said. “We did our job. Leave it be for now.”
Tom frowned. “What do you mean, we did our job?”
Danny hesitated a moment. “They never expected us to win, Turtle. We were only a diversion. And it worked. The covert team is inside the Rox, undetected.”
“The covert team?” He was confused. Then, when he realized what she was saying, the anger took over. “Son of a fucking bitch!” he swore.
“Turtle, please. My shoulder hurts. Take me back. I don’t want Mistral to kill you.” She patted the top of his shell. “You don’t have any extra bodies either. I bet.”
Tom’s head was throbbing. He felt inutterably weary, betrayed, heartsick. All of a sudden, he found he just didn’t care anymore. “YOU WIN,” he told them. “WE GO BACK.”
The shell slid through the fog, toward the northeast and safety. The elephant flapped wearily beside him. No one spoke, all the way back.
A quick flyover showed that Snotman and Detroit Steel were still stopped at the second gap. Snotman had propped the armored man against the bridge rail, and the giant was kicking him over and over again.
Still charging him up. At least it was taking longer.
Jokers were still evacuating the main gate. The android flew through it, absorbing the details of its architecture.
All the energy of the explosions would have to be directed outward. Fortunately there were plenty of sandbags lying around that had been used to help shore up the fortifications, and the android had memorized the explosive manual on the first read-through. Modular Man set charges against the main structural members of the gatehouse, then piled sandbags around them to absorb any energy directed inward.
Snotman and Detroit Steel appeared before he was quite finished, coming down the roadway to the crossroads where the four bridges to the Rox came together. Detroit Steel was being carried on the ace’s back, and the giant punched Snotman over and over with his working arm, feeding him energy. The two hesitated on the far side of the drawbridge, Snotman obviously hoping someone would start shooting at him. No one did.
What’s keeping him going? Modular Man wondered. Any sensible person would have quit by now, alone in enemy territory with no support and a wounded man. Was Snotman’s hatred that strong? Or was he thinking at all?
Maybe he just thought he was invincible.
Modular Man thought he might just have to concede that point.
Detroit Steel punched again and again. Modular Man strung wires.
Snotman held out a hand, pointed. A burst of energy blew away one of the two chains holding up the drawbridge.
Good, Modular Man thought. Keep using that energy.
Another shot hit the other chain, but the hard steel held. More punches and a third shot were required before the drawbridge boomed down.