Damn! I could see it on the scope now, spidery lines on the tacmap, lazily approaching us. This was the weapon that had decimated Gamma on Andrion 3. But there was something else as well, coming at us from above!
"Gamma Seven, Beta Four, Five, you all in position?"
"Seven ready!"
"Four ready!"
"Five all set!"
One wanted to go after the O, but something was whirling overhead, a strange buzzing noise that turned my flesh cold.
"Genetic energy weapon, low-mass, twenty-one separate strands approaching," Sweety announced. "Recommend auto stunstars and v-max to disperse these energy masses."
My blood ran cold. This was something new, too. I stepped out from behind the flaming wreckage and brought my E up to my shoulder, switching to v-max.
"V-max, gang! Five, Gamma Seven, stunstars!" I could see them now, sparkling aerial strands of biotic death, falling gently down from the sky, slowly snapping and whirling in the breeze, floating towards us, living death, coiling and uncoiling like snakes, tails snapping, programmed to wrap around the appropriate genetic material and merge with it. We were the appropriate genetic material. I knew it could penetrate our A-suits and the result was an awful, hideous death. I fired at the nearest strand, auto v-max. It was taking hits from Merlin and Warhound to my right. It writhed blindly in the air, whirling wildly. The v-max appeared to be working—the strand was being blown apart, a shower of sparkling fragments.
Four stunstars burst over our heads almost simultaneously, a tremendous ragged quadruple boom, scattering the strands all over the sky. I fell to my knees.
It felt as if I had been hit by a speeding aircar.
"The spheres! Get the spheres, then do the O!"
"Who's the casualty?" Priestess asked.
"Look out! The snakes!" A glittering sheet of raw flame swept over my head.
"Use flame on the snakes! They burn like gas!" Dragon shouted. Streams of fire shot up from his position, and the genetic snakes burst into flames.
Thank God for Dragon!
"Energy spheres approaching! Six spheres! Recommend immediate counterfire!"
Lasers snapped past me, missing by mils. The spheres approached. Closer and closer. I struggled to my feet.
"Counter those spheres—now!" Snow Leopard was still on top of it. We'd have to put off our hit on the O until we dealt with the spheres. A shriek of raw terror, right in my ears.
"Use flame! Burn it!" One of the strands had touched down, and had somebody in its grasp. Things were happening so fast I could not even look at the sit.
"Sphere approaching, Thinker!" Scut!
"Spheres!" Snow Leopard commanded. "Biodee, canisters, chainlink, plasma, now!" It was coming right at me, glowing like a comet. I switched over to biodee and fired, shaking with terror.
Chapter 11:
Advice for the Dead
The sphere came right at me, glowing like a sun, drawn by my own genetics, and I knew nothing at all could stop it from merging with the nearest mass of human flesh and consuming it utterly, burning fiercely from outside until all life was gone. This was what had happened to Gamma on Andrion 3. This was a high-tech, self-guided energy weapon, unlike the snakes, and neither v-max nor stunstars nor flame were going to turn aside this relentless, mindless sphere from its murderous mission.
I was almost frozen with terror, but I fired biodee right into the glowing mass just before it hit me and it exploded right in my face, a brilliant white-hot glare and a crackling bang, lighting up the battlefield for one stark instant.
"Biodee works!" I croaked, staggering in relief. I blessed the warped genius who had come up with the device, and all the nameless toilers in the Legion death factory who had integrated it into our E's. It eats people, fine, we feed it people. Genetic bullets, biotic life and death, human genes to set off the spheres, and superflash moeboid reproduction of the genetic material, driving the sphere to consume to its own destruction.
"Biodee!" Snow Leopard commanded, "Biodee!" Another white flash behind me. A nightmare landscape of twisted, skeletal black buildings was wreathed in dark smoke, fires burning all around us, nuclear clouds glowing overhead, our psybloc flickering in the sky, a lovely, multicolored rain slowly floating down through the dark.
"Snake approaching, Thinker!" Above me, twitching in the air, seeking me out.
"I want canisters on the O—now!" Snow Leopard commanded. It was time to tackle the O. I fired flame up to the snake and it writhed, the fire running all along its airy body, burning brightly.
"Help us!" It was the Systie soldier. A sphere, darting at him. A blood-curdling scream.
"Fire biodee!" The sphere exploded, another white-hot crack.
"Canisters!" We were closing in on the O—he was dancing on my tacmap—right up ahead! The building just to my right exploded, showering me with debris. Laser snapped and popped past me from the O's position. Boudicca and Valkyrie passed me like shadows, heading for the O. What were they doing up here?
"Seven! Plasma! Now!" Snow Leopard ordered in a cold dead voice. Terrific ripping explosions and a blinding tracery of glowing streaks—several troopers opened up on canister. I raised my E and trotted forward to meet the O. I switched to canister and fired on auto. The recoil almost knocked me down and the flash dazzled my eyes. A glimpse of an A-suit to my right; I recognized the weapon, a biobloc fieldfaxer. It was Merlin, moving up, all set to cook his O. But we had to get through the mags first. The canisters were designed to do that. They fired cenite slivers, hundreds of miniature darts of cold death, crafted to slide between the madly whirling molecules of the O's mag shields, and tear open a hole for us to explode.
Another scream, a flash of lasers, a sharp explosion behind us as a tacstar cloud rose to the sky, a sparkling trail rocketing up. Warhound gave us one last psybloc, and the earth shook again to Psycho's chainlink, spitting autofire, then rattling to a stop.
"Get it off! Get it off!"
"More canisters! Autofire!" Sassin ran past me and his massive Manlink spit plasma, glowing pulses of pure energy, straight to the O. Canister! I fired canister, finger holding the trigger down, the E dancing in my grasp.
We walked forward to the O. Snow Leopard and Psycho and Coolhand appeared to my left, firing nonstop.
A black wall loomed between us and the O. It exploded, disintegrating into fragments, and the O spit death at us, a sudden firestorm of laser and tacstars.
Explosions erupted all around me, and suddenly I was on the ground, my head spinning wildly, my helmet glowing red, tacstar skies burning into my eyes, and Sweety calmly relaying data into my ears.
"…left arm no longer functional. Get up, Thinker! Fire canister! The O approaches!" I struggled to my feet. The left side of my A-suit was smoking. I felt nothing but I could not move my left arm. I did not want to look—I aimed my E with my right arm and fired canister.
"Death, Gamma!" Boudicca hurled herself at the O. Sassin fired again, plasma flashing, again and again and again, right into the O. Full auto canister fire deafened me as a deadly hail of cenite darts filled the air. Psycho opened up again with the chainlink and for the first time, I heard the shrill grating whine of Merlin's biobloc fieldfaxer. An airburst flashed just over my head and hot metal hissed down all around me.
The O appeared, looming before us out of the smoke, tall dark body parts shimmering in a pulsating violet haze; is that armor? It fired, a flash, exploding just to my left, my faceplate going dark.
"I'm hit, Two. Take command." Snow Leopard, detached, a message from Dreamland.
"One is down," Two reported calmly. "Fire all weapons—canister, chainlink, plasma, biobloc."