The gun spat and the sentry 70 meters away jerked backward like a puppet on a suing. Grayson swung the weapon toward the other sentry, but it was already too late. Fire from a dozen submachine guns rattled and shrieked through the arctic air. The blast hit a second sentry and a running bandit Tech, whirled them about and hurled them down. Then, black shapes rose from the shadows on either side of Grayson's position and surged toward the open Bay doors.
They were committed.
21
Fifty black shapes tan across the parade field lit by the pole-mounted floods, firing as they went. Their suppressed SMG bursts snapped and hissed, sending those in and around the Repair Bay scrambling for cover or knocking them to the ground where they had been standing.
Grayson stepped across the boundary between the parade ground and the Bay. The familiar cavern, red-lit and murky, yawned above and around him. directly before him was the ten-meter form of the damaged Shadow Hawk.
"Collier!" He yelled, waving. "Senkins and Burke! The door! Demo team... move!"
Three soldiers raced for the door leading to the Castle's central passageways. Five men shouldering heavy satchels pounded past him and up to the raised deck supporting the disabled 'Mech. A burst of fire spat from above, and something whipped through the air beside his head. Before Grayson could react, the shots were answered by the harsh chatter of a subgun close by. A figure pitched off the top landing of the spindly ladder zigzagging up to the Bay Control Booth and fell with a dull splat on the ferrocrete 20 meters below.
Grayson turned to the man who had just fiied. It was Larressen. "Thanks," he said. "Go with the Demo Team, Sergeant. I'll be with the security force."
Larressen nodded and swarmed up a ladder to where the demolition team was making its way toward the torso of the grounded 'Mech. Grayson trotted across the floor to where three privates crouched by the door to the passageway. Steel chocks had been driven into the door guides to keep it open, and a squad-portable, bipod-mounted machine gun sat with its barrel probing across the door sill into the corridor beyond. Burke lay flat, the MG stock at his shoulder. The others covered him with automatic rifles. "Anything?"
"No, sir." Corporal Collier was the security team leader. He gestured down the corridor to the next sealed, airtight door. "Just let them poke the tip of their noses through there and we'll nail 'em!" He paused, fumbled, and added a belated "sir." Collier looked younger than Grayson, but seemed to have the knack of handling men. Grayson patted him on the shoulder, then turned to go.
Rumbling thunder crashed from the repair deck, a groaning, tearing-metal protest, as men scattered and someone screamed. Grayson stopped in his tracks, paralysed by shock and dawning horror. The Shadow Hawk,a sleeping giant under the glint of red lamps, was stirring, trembling, slowily raising itself upright. The black-clad figures of the demo team were leaping from that suddenly shifting torso. Sprawled on the ferrocrete where the huge machine's movement had flung him lay the man who had screamed.
What had been a carefully planned and orchestrated set of missions and movements dissolved now in panicked chaos. One of his men stood on the Bay floor spraying full-auto fire up at the looming monster, while others stood rooted where they stood, mouths open. One threw his gun aside and ran screaming, and then others followed. Too late, for the Bay doors were grinding shut with hollow rumblings.
This can't be happening, Grayson thought, but the half-upright battle machine proved otherwise. A vast metal hand swept out, down, and across to bat the lone soldier armed with the autorifle across the room. The gory shape that slid into the wall no longer resembled anything human.
The Shadow Hawkstood, terrifyingly large in the confined space of the Castle's Repair Bay. Grayson noted with some detached portion of his mind that the 'Mech's over-the-shoulder autocannon had been removed, the backpack that mounted the cannon and life support gear was off, and panels on its chest and legs had been opened, all contributing to its damaged, half-repaired look. But the machine was powered and under control. Grayson watched the head — tiny in comparison to the bulky torso — snap around, its sensors tracking a group of fleeing soldiers. The right arm came up, the medium laser strapped along the forearm flashed once, twice, and the ferrocrete was scorched black by swaths of high-energy destruction that turned runing men into twisting, shrieking torches, or left them in charred and blackened heaps.
Carefully planted explosive charges could have destroyed that 'Mech, but there was no way to plant them while the Shadow Hawkwas moving and in combat mode. The Bay doors were still closing, grinding shut with agonizing slowness. "Burke!" Grayson yelled. "Come on!"
The security team scrambled back from the open door. The 'Mech stooped and turned, possibly seeking the source of a voice shouting orders. Its laser flashed again, and Grayson dove behind a stack of wooden crates. Collier was burned as he ran, his blackened corpse unreeognizeable except for the half-melted wreckage of the machine gun still cradled against the charred, smoldering husk of his body. The beams tracked relentlessly. Senkins, too, vanished in fire and oily smoke, his assault rifle spinning across the floor in clattering bounces.
The Bay doors clanged shut with mournful finality. The 'Mech's left hand descended, crushing a soldier cowering in the shadows under the raised repair deck. The man had forgotten that 'Mechs can see by heat, Grayson thought.
Somewhere, someone was screaming in an agony of burned flesh.
The situation was hopeless. He considered calling his unit leaders to get a clearer picture, but rejected the idea. The enemy would certainly be listening in on tacradio frequencies, and the information would help the bandits more than it would Grayson.
The Shadow Hawkstood scanning the room. Grayson could hear the tiny click of mechanical relays in that squat head, and knew the 'Mech pilot was scanning IR, motion-sensitive and visible light images for signs of his human prey. All around the Bay were stacks of boxes behind which men had taken cover. The 'Mech gave the uncanny impression of a dull-witted metal giant considering how to find the fugitives without burning valuable equipment. Soon it would begin to move the crates one at a time, and anyone it flushed would be burned down or smashed.
Grayson eyed the interlocking tooth pattern of the sealed door behind him. If he could get the door open, the survivors of the attack team might have a chance, could scatter into the darkness down the slope of the mountain. But the only way to open those doors was to throw a switch in the Bay Control booth. His eyes travelled past the now motionless 'Mech to the lighted booth, fifteen meters above the deck.
What he needed was a diversion.
Lying near him was a body with one arm outflung, an almost undamaged hand clenched around the strap of a canvas satchel. Grayson knew that it was one of Larressen's people, someone from the demo team sent to destroy the Shadow Hawk.
The satchel contained explosives — five packets of high-velocity plastique, each weighing two kilos — clipped to magnetic backing, and already primed with a timer-activated detonator. Properly placed over selected circuits and servoactuators, those packets could destroy a 'Mech. There was no way to place them now, but they might provide, the distraction he needed.
Grayson set his teeth, wiped sweat from his face, then lunged into the open. Though he kept his eyes off the metal mountain above him, he could hear the click of relays, could feel the slow turn of the head, the ponderous movement of the right arm as the laser was brought up to bear. He reached across the man's body for the satchel, and tugged it toward him. The corpse's hand remained stubbornly attached, and Grayson found himself in a deadly tug-of-war with the unrecognizable form of one of his own men. Worse, he could feel the laser almost in line.