Looters Of Tharn

Chapter 16

Anyara grabbed Blade's arm.

«Now we see how well we have learned.» Her voice was steady but her face was grim and set. She brushed her hair back from her eyes, then turned and dashed toward the rest of the expedition.

The people who had been in the lake were already scrambling out of the water. Some did not even bother to dress, snatching up only their boots and weapons and dashing naked toward their horses. Those who had been guarding the horses were already mounting up. Some of them were already driving the baggage animals with the metal in the packs out across the plain. Several more of the scouts rode in, all shouting the same thing as the first woman.

Blade and Anyara scrambled up the bank, tearing skins and clothes on the thornier bushes. Blade could see no smiles or any signs of fear on any of the faces, only intense concentration.

By the time Blade and Anyara saddled up, the scouts had reported two more Looter machines. That made a total of six war machines. To Anyara and the others within earshot, Blade called out, «Good. The more we find, the more damage we can do at one blow.»

Privately he was less confident. Six machines at once might mean that someone among the Looters was expecting trouble. The machines might have been reprogrammed to coordinate their actions better or take more notice of what was happening around them. The purple ray should be harmless. But against the subsonics the only defense was not letting the fear they inspired overwhelm you. Against the tentacles the only defense was not letting them grab you. Blade had done his best with the training of the people's fighters. All he could do now was to hope that his best had been good enough, and fill in as many gaps as he could.

Blade spurred his horse to a trot and headed out toward the scouting line. Anyara followed him.

The scouting line was pulling back, following their orders. Blade could now see the six Looter machines out on the plain. They were coming along slowly, about as fast as a galloping horse. They were spread out in a single line a hundred yards or so apart.

Blade drew his signal baton out of its sling on his saddle. It was a telescoping wooden pole with a great bushy tuft of yellow-dyed feathers on top. He shook it out to its full eight feet and raised it high. Then he waved it to his right, drew it sharply downward, and swung it from side to side.

That signal meant, «Everybody move over to the right, spread out, then stop.»

Trying to catch the machines on the run would soon exhaust the horses. Let the machines come to them, then strike!

If the machines noticed Blade's signals, there was no sign of it. But the riders of the people did. The scouts pulled their horses around in wide circles and headed in the direction Blade indicated. The rest fell in behind and on either side of him and Anyara. Blade slowed to a trot to spare the horses and the formation eddied and swirled as the other riders did the same.

In minutes they reached the position Blade indicated. He reined in his horse and hurled the baton downward. The butt, tipped with sharpened teksin, sank into the hard earth and the feathers bobbed wildly. On either side Blade saw the others rein in, spreading out to form a line stretching two hundred yards from end to end, parallel to the path of the Looter machines.

The machines paid no more attention to the horsemen than if they had been so many tufts of down blowing in the breeze. All six advanced as steadily as if they had been running on rails. The nearest one passed down the front of the horsemen less than a hundred yards away.

Blade felt forty-nine sets of eyes flicking from the machine to him and back again. He could almost smell the desire to plunge forward in a mad charge against the enemy. But he shook his head and jerked his thumb down toward the ground. He heard murmurs of disappointment and even Anyara's face fell. But Mazda had made his decision, and the fighters of the people would obey.

The machines glided away toward the lake, still in their unbroken line. They reached the nearer shore of the lake, then their line split apart in the middle. Three machines moved around each side of the lake, shifting into a single line as they did so.

Blade reached out of the saddle, jerked the baton free of the ground, and waved it three times toward the lake. It was time to move out on the trail.

The machines reached the foot of the hill where Miros stood about the time the riders reached the nearer edge of the lake. Blade ordered a halt and watched the machines. Each trio was shifting into a triangle less than a hundred yards on a side. They were also slowing down. A moment later their legs sprang out and all six of them settled down on the ground.

Blade could hardly keep from cheering out loud as he saw the way the machines had arranged themselves. The two triangles stood, one on each end of the hill and the city, a good mile or more apart. Each was well-placed to scan its surroundings in all directions, but not to support the other one. They were too far apart. Two machines of each triangle were also fairly close to the bushes around the lake. The people's final attack could go in on foot, under cover. There would be no need to take horses within range of the subsonics.

Blade signaled for the team leaders to gather around him and then dismounted. Each fighter unslung his pack of combat gear from his saddle, then drifted over to join the circle assembling around Blade. With the point of his teksin sword Blade drew his plan on a bare patch of ground. When he had finished giving his orders, he straightened up and looked soberly at the even soberer faces around him. «This is our moment, our moment to stand up to the Looters and prove that the people can defend themselves against all enemies. The eyes of all the people are on us, not just the living but all those who have died that the people might live to this moment.

«We shall not let them down.»

Blade shrugged his shoulders to settle his pack into a more comfortable position on his back, raised his baton, and led the way toward the shore of the lake.

The bushes were thick and thorny. The fighters creeping through them made enough noise to be heard a mile away by anyone not totally deaf. Fortunately the machines seemed to be just exactly that.

As they slipped within range of the subsonics, Blade noticed apprehensive or grim looks spreading across the faces of the fighters. Was their new knowledge, the loss of the fear of the unknown, going to be enough of a defense? For a minute or two Blade couldn't help wondering. Then slowly the faces straightened and the eighteen men and women moved on steadily.

The fighters in Blade's teams were scratched and sweating by the time they settled under cover. Then came a hot, nerve-wracking wait in the grass and under the shrubbery. They had to allow Anyara's teams plenty of time to get into their positions on the other side of the lake. Both attacks had to go in as nearly as possible at the same moment.

So they waited, impatiently whittling at twigs with their teksin knives, slapping at the insects that whined maddeningly around eyes and into ears, wiping off the sweat that trickled down foreheads and necks. The sun moved higher until it burned down almost straight out of a cloudless sky, baking the earth and filling the day with a sleepy warmth.

Hot, sweaty, insect-ridden minutes followed each other, one by one, until Blade knew that at least half an hour must have gone by. Had something happened to the other teams? Had they been ambushed and destroyed, silently and swiftly. They might have- A woman lying next to Blade grabbed his arm and pointed off to the right. Blade's eyes followed the woman's pointing finger. Through a gap between two branches Blade saw an orange handkerchief waving on the other side of the lake. It was the signal «ready and waiting» from Anyara's teams.

Blade took a deep breath. He reached into his pack and took out a bag of teksin wedges and a hammer with a teksin head and a wooden shaft. He tied these to his belt. He saw flickers of movement in the bushes all along the line of fighters, as each one of them got out his particular equipment and hung it on his belt.

Then Blade reached into his pack once more, and pulled out a teksin whistle with a gilded leather thong. He looped the thong about his sunburnt neck, put the whistle between his lips, took another deep breath-and blew with all the power in his lungs.

Bushes exploded with cracklings and crashings as Blade and eighteen others leaped to their feet and plunged out into the open. Some of them were obviously dizzy from heat and strain and the subsonics. They lurched and staggered as they ran. But they stayed on their feet and kept going.

Blade swung to the right as he ran, moving up to join the team that was heading for the right-hand machine. It grew larger and larger as they ran, squatting there in all its metallic ugliness. The turret was turning slowly, but the machine showed no sign that it noticed the approaching people.

Then the turret stopped dead and began to swivel slowly back toward Blade. It had registered that the world outside was sprouting something strange, possibly unnatural, possibly even dangerous.

Run, run, run! Blade almost shouted the words out loud. Get to the machine before it starts moving or shooting. Thirty yards, twenty, ten. Breath rasped in his throat, his chest was tight and painful with strain and tension. Five yards, four, three- A young man, even more agile than Blade, sprang into the air like an Olympic broad-jumper, leaping for the machine's rear platform. He landed on his feet, nearly going forward on hands and knees. Metal clanged and boomed under him. He turned forward, grabbing for the bag and the hammer at his belt. Blade leaped up onto the platform beside him.

The young man bowed his head to Blade. «I am sorry, Mazda, that I took from you the honor of being first. It was rightly-«

«Never mind honors now, Zeron,» said Blade sharply. «Let's get to work.»

As Blade spoke the turret's turning swung the ray-tube toward them and over them. Clinging to the tube was a young woman. She was pounding wedges into the opening in the turret from which the tube jutted. As the turret's turning carried her out of sight, hammers sounded forward. The two men with the most dangerous assignment were at work, driving heavy plugs into the holes from which the tentacles emerged. If they didn't work fast, they would be the first to die.

Blade took his own advice and pulled a wedge from his pouch. He slid it into the gap between the turret's base and the ring on which it revolved, pushed on it hard, then grabbed the hammer and swung it with both bands. Whang! Whang! Whang! Each blow sent a tingling through Blade's hands and arms and a vibration through the metal under his feet.

Whang! Whang! Whang! Zeron was doing the same thing. The machines might have enormous power stored in them. But how much of that power could they feed to the motors that turned the turrets, extended the tentacles, maneuvered the legs? If that power was not enough to overcome the resistance of a dozen or so teksin wedges swiftly driven into place by fighters of the people, it would be the end for one of the machines' prime weapons.

From underneath the machine came more hammering. Someone was driving wedges into the joints of one of the legs. A machine could not get up and fly away unless all four legs were retracted. Now someone was busily at work making sure that at least one leg on this machine would never retract.

Blade rammed in a second wedge and went to work with the hammer. Then a third. Then a fourth. By the time the fourth wedge was in place he was streaming with sweat. His bare chest and arms were as wet as if he had just climbed out of the lake. But the turret was as thoroughly immobilized as if it had been seated in concrete.

The young woman on the tube sprang lightly to the ground. Blade recognized Chars. As she did so there was a whooosh and flickering orange yellow flame suddenly enveloped the tube. Greasy black smoke streamed up into the sky.

Chara smiled at Blade. «Burns good, doesn't it?» She had wrapped a layer of cloth soaked in teksin oil around the raytube, then set it on fire. The burning cloth raised the temperature inside the tube high enough to ruin the sensitive electronic equipment.

Something went pfffffssssshsssssttttt! — like the biggest of all cats-from underneath the machine. The machine shivered, then sagged down at one corner. The man who had been working on the legs scrambled hastily out from under. His face was black with smoke and his hair and eyebrows a good deal skimpier than they had been before. His teeth flashed white as he grinned.

«It tried to pull up the leg. But I think something went wrong with the little machine for the leg. Am I right, Mazda?»

«It seems like it.»

Blade hung his hammer on his belt and climbed on top of the turret to get a better view. He nearly shouted out loud as he saw a tentacle flashing around the other machine they had attacked. Then he saw that the turret was motionless, the ray-tube a smoking, half-melted mass, and not one but two legs jammed and buckled. One of the tentacles had pushed out its wedge, but that was all. The six members of the attacking team were standing back at a safe distance, watching the deadly tentacle clutch at nothing but empty air.

A hundred yards away stood the third machine of the group, now moving slowly around on its legs in a small circle. The tentacles were still retracted but the turret was swinging quickly back and forth through a half-circle that faced the two captured machines. Occasionally the third machine sounded its siren.

Apparently the machine couldn't make up its programmed mind what was happening and what it should do about it. There was no reason to give the machine the time it needed. Blade motioned his third team forward at a run. As they passed down between the two captured machines, Zeron sprang down to join them. Apparently the young man hadn't had enough fighting for one day!

The third team was halfway to the third machine when it suddenly exploded into action. All four legs snapped up into its belly with a loud clang. At the same moment the machine leaped into the air, wobbling slightly. The turret swung to aim the ray-tube at the approaching people.

Purple flame darted from the rising machine. Blade heard men and women alike screaming in surprise and terror. The memories went too deep-always before the purple ray had brought death wherever it touched. For a moment the seven running figures were lost in the purple glare. Then it faded, and the seven ran on, not missing a step. The screams turned into shouts and cheers.

They reached the spot where the machine had been and looked upward to where it hovered some thirty feet above them. If it would just drop a bit lower-

The tentacles! There they were, flicking out of the front of the machine. Blade opened his mouth to shout at the seven to scatter, but they were doing that before he could even take in a deep breath. Against a war machine armed, alert, and out of reach, what else was there to do? There hadn't been any explosives ready for the expedition.

The machine seemed to stoop toward the ground, like a hawk sighting a mouse. Two tentacles flashed through the air. Their tips curled around the waist and legs of a running man. It was Zeron, the same Zeron who had wanted to see more fighting, Zeron who had been too slow or too bold to get beyond the machine's reach:

The tentacles tightened. Zeron screamed, a long, rasping, utterly horrible scream, a raw-throated shrieking rejection of a world that was letting this happen to him and of the pain that seemed to be tearing him apart.

A moment later he was torn apart. One tentacle snapped one way, one the other. With a gruesome craaaak Zeron's body tore apart at the waist in a shower of blood and fragments of bone and internal organs. The two tentacles rose high into the air, as if brandishing their horrid trophies. Then they unclasped and the two halves of Zeron's body fell down to land with small puffs of dust.

That machine was going on the hunt, thought Blade. It was time for all of them to scatter, and fast.

Before he could give any orders, a second war machine swept into sight from behind the towers of Miros. It was a hundred feet off the ground and moving at well over a hundred miles an hour.

This time people did start scattering, as fast as their legs would cover ground and before Blade could even think of giving an order. Blade himself leaped down off the turret and started running. There was absolutely nothing else to do, except run so far and fast that the machines would lose interest. Sooner or later they would. They always did. But how many of the fighters of the expedition would still be alive by that time?

Then Blade stopped almost in mid-stride, to turn and stare. The second machine was not plunging down on the scattering fugitives. Instead it was circling the first one. The first one seemed to be standing still in the air, its tentacles drooping listlessly.

Then the second machine stood on end and leaped for the sky. It dwindled with a rush and roar of air into something small and gleaming in the sky nearly a mile above. Then it plunged down on the first machine. It must have been doing more than three hundred miles an hour when it plummeted out of the sky and smashed into the first machine.

Blade went flat on the ground, hands clasped over his face, not sure that this mechanical lunacy wouldn't be as deadly to his people as the two machines could have been. If the Looters' machines were atomic-powered and these two exploded, there wouldn't be much left of the expedition or the city of Miros.

But there was no explosion. There was only an earsplitting metallic crash like the biggest of all automobile collisions, as a hundred tons of metal slammed violently together. Blue smoke and sparks filled the sky as high-powered electrical equipment died spectacularly. Then there was an earthshaking thud as the two wrecks plummeted to the ground, followed by the pattering of odd bits and pieces raining out of the sky.

Blade waited until the rain had stopped before getting slowly to his feet. He had picked up several small burns from hot bits of metal. Others lay smoldering in the grass. The two war machines lay where they had fallen, mangled and blackened hulks.

He heard someone calling his name and turned to see Anyara running toward him from the direction of the lake.

Her face was covered with sweat-caked dust but her grin spread clear across her face.

«Mazda, it was incredible. We took the two we attacked, then the other one took off. For a moment we thought it was going to attack us, but it went out of sight behind the city. We didn't lose anyone, not anyone at all. I was bringing my people over to join yours when we saw the second machine come out again. I didn't believe for a moment that they would do what they did, I couldn't believe it!» She reached Blade and embraced him wildly.

Blade kissed her, then realized that he was swaying on his feet from the sudden release of tension. His throat was so dry that he had to take a drink from his water bottle before he could speak.

«Yes, I was surprised too. But I think I know what happened. The computers-the thinking machine-that guide the war machines sometimes go-mad-when they don't understand a situation.»

Anyara laughed. «Some thinking machines! They certainly didn't think very well today, did they?»

«No,» said Blade. «At least not today.»