Hell’s gearbox, Djan Seriy thought when she saw it, but did not choose to share the image with the others.
The flickering blue-grey light — sporadic, sharp, intense — came from two almost perfectly opposed bearings, partially obscured by intervening machinery in both directions.
“That’s battle light,” Hippinse said.
“Agree,” Anaplian said. “Any ship signals?”
There was a pause. “Yes, got it, but… Confused. Broken up. Must be the other side, getting reflections,” Hippinse said, sounding first relieved then worried.
“Our direction?” Anaplian asked.
“Follow me,” Hippinse said, heading off.
“Xuss; ahead, please,” Anaplian said.
“Already there,” the drone said.
The suits tipped them so that they raced across the ghostly landscape far below with their feet leading, though the view could be switched easily enough to make it look as though one was flying head-first. Holse asked about this. “Not streamlining,” the suit replied. “We are in vacuum, so not required. This orientation presents smaller target profile in direction of travel and prioritises human head for damage limitation.”
“Ah-ha. Oh, yes; also, what holds the world up?” Holse asked. “There’s no Towers.”
“The large machines present within this space retain the structural integrity of the ceiling above.”
“I see,” Holse said. “Righty-ho.”
“Steer clear of the open Tower base,” Anaplian told them, leading them away from a great disc of darkness above. Petals of material nearly a kilometre long hung down from the edges of the gap, looking so symmetrical that at first they didn’t realise they were the result of something breaking through from above. “The ship?” Anaplian asked.
“Looks like it,” Hippinse said. He sounded puzzled, and worried again. “Supposed to leave a drone or something here.”
They flew on for another minute until Turminder Xuss said, “Trouble up ahead.”
“What is it?” Anaplian asked.
“Somebody’s fighting; high-frequency CREWs, particle beams and what looks like AM by the backsplash. From the signatures, we’re outgunned. Pull to here,” the drone told them, and their visors indicated a line across the long summit of one of the kilometres-high vanes at the top edge of one of the gigantic spheres. Light flashed immediately beyond, bright enough to trip the visors’ sight-saving function. They drifted to a stop metres beneath the ridge line of the vane, each a kilometre or so apart from the other.
“Seeing this?” the drone asked, and imposed a view on their visors of a great dark gulf of space beyond, between more of the level-filling spheres and side-tipped concave torus shapes, lit by glaring bursts of light.
The view became shallowly triangulated, offered from three different points of view, then four and five as the four smaller drones all added their perspective to that of Xuss. Three different sources of pinpoint light and sudden, harsh detonations lay between sixty-five and ninety klicks distant. Much closer, only ten kilometres from them and four down, a single object was trading fire with the three faraway sources. The co-ordinated views suggested something only a few metres across was darting in and out behind the cover of great serrated blades on a vast cogwheel beneath, firing and being fired at by its three distant adversaries.
“Those three read as ours,” Hippinse said urgently. “They’re having to fall back.”
“Can we surprise that thing just underneath?” Anaplian asked.
“Looks like it.”
“Ping one of the distants, make sure we have this right,” Anaplian said. “Xuss?”
“Done,” the drone replied. “They’re the LP’s; three remaining of four combat drones it left behind under the forced open Tower. They’re damaged, retreating.”
“The fourth?”
“Dead,” Hippinse said. “Slag in the trench between us and the hostile.”
“Tell them to keep doing exactly what they’re doing. Xuss; those five and a half AM missiles? Prep all but two.”
“Armed.”
“Tell two of the extra knives to widen out now and drop — not power — on my mark, second-wave suicide-ready.”
“Prepped, moving,” the drone said.
“Everybody else, spread further out over the next eight seconds then pop over the top and empty everything. Start moving now. Ferbin, Holse, remember; work with the suit and let it move you if it needs to.”
“Of course.”
“Will do, ma’am.”
Eight seconds.
“Now, now, now!” Anaplian called. The suits bounced them up over the long curved summit of the great ridge of blade. Light flared above them. Suddenly looking down into the chasm beneath, the exhausts of the drone’s AM-powered missiles were soot-dark spots on their visors as the suits blanked out their extreme flaring. The visors blinked red circles round their target and all four of their weapons fired. Ferbin’s kinetic rifle leapt and hammered in his hand, throwing him up and back with every pulse, the rounds tiny bright trails left in the eye. He started to twist as the recoil tried to turn him round and make him somersault all at once, the suit doing its best to compensate and keep the gun pointed at their target.
Light everywhere. Something thudded into his lower right leg; there was a burst of pain as if he’d twisted his knee, but it faded almost instantly.
The target washed out in multiple, visor-tripping bursts of light which threw shadows like barbs and thorns all over the ceiling kilometres above.
“Cease fire!” Anaplian yelled. “Calling off the drop-knives.”
“They’re stopped,” Xuss said. “Here’s their view.”
Something glowing white was falling and tumbling away amongst the curved blades, unleashing yellow sparks and leaving orange debris falling slower behind. All firing had stopped. The fiery, falling object was providing the only light there was.
“That it?” Anaplian asked.
“Pretty sure,” Xuss said. “Move on, keep checking?”
“And scan that hostile debris. Let’s go. Hippinse?”
“Took a kinetic frag,” the avatoid wheezed. “Close to getting mushed, okay. Repairing. Moving.”
“Okay,” Djan Seriy said as they all moved out across the dark trench. Far below, the molten debris was still falling. “Ferbin?” Anaplian said gently. “I’m sorry about your leg.”
“What?” He looked down. His right leg was missing from the knee down.
He stared. General Yilim, he thought. He felt his mouth go dry and heard something roar in his ears.
“You’ll be all right,” his sister’s voice said quietly, soothingly in his ears. “Suit’s sealed it and pumped you with painkill and anti-shock and it was cauterised by the hit. You will be fine, brother; my word on it. Once we’re back out we’ll grow a new one. Easiest thing in the world. Okay?”
Ferbin felt remarkably all right now. Almost happy. Mouth okay, no roaring any more. Certainly there was no pain from the wound, in fact no sensation down there at all. “Yes,” he told his sister.
“You sure, sir?” Holse said.
“Yes,” he said. “I’m all right. I feel very good.” He had to keep looking at it to be sure it had really happened, and then felt down, just to confirm. Sure enough; no leg below the knee. And he felt fine! Extraordinary.