Nearly all of Family Bishop was evacuated. But among the factory walls and gullied land many bodies lay, too many.
—Killeen!—Shibo ordered.
He heaved himself up on weary legs and plunged across the dry wash. It was a hard run to the next skirmish line and his eyes began to cloud with the exertion. Blue dots danced at the edges. The cool air cut in his throat.
He tumbled over an outcropping of sharp stones and rolled into the dry wash beyond. He fetched up against a pile of mechmess. In the rolling his vision had clicked back to normal human and he lay for a long moment, gasping in total darkness. He switched back to IR. Shibo crouched nearby but she did not even look at him.
—Besen!—she sent.
Killeen got up on his knees, his shocks wheezing as loudly as he did. The gritty soil got into everything and he had to clear his suit collar in order to turn his head and watch Besen angling in from a factory ruin. She came into the dry wash at a dead run and was nearly under its edge when something orange struck her helmet. She seemed to fly forward and hit the ground solidly. She did not move.
—Toby!—Shibo sent as though nothing had happened.
Killeen reached Besen and tapped in the codes at the back of her neck. Her running numbers all read zero.
Toby loped into the gully, moving easily. A microwave bolt hummed harmlessly over his head.
He saw Besen. “What—what—”
“She’s…” Killeen could not make himself say it.
Shibo sent,—Harper!—
Toby knelt beside Besen’s body and lifted her arm. She was face down and when he rolled her over they could see a fine web of cracks in her faceplate. They were electrostatic fractures. Through them they saw her eyes, still open. She gazed at them as if about to ask a question, one Killeen knew he could not answer.
Harper came running into the dry wash, panting. She squatted down and immediately let loose a UV shot back the way she had come.
Shibo sent,—Jocelyn! All in.—
—Hold there,—Jocelyn replied.—Nearly got your rig ready.—
Shibo duck-walked over. Toby said numbly, “She can’t be. She can’t just…”
“Hit her clean,” Killeen said, and instantly regretted his bluntness.
“No. No.” Toby fumbled with her helmet.
“Leave her,” Shibo said.
Toby unlocked the collar ring. He gave it a one-quarter turn and lifted the helmet free. The trailing connectors into Besen’ s neck popped free of their sockets but there was no answering jerk from the body. Her eyes were still open.
Toby touched her face. “Besen, listen. Wake up. Come on. Wake up. Besen—”
“Take it easy. Toby,” Killeen said numbly. People hardly ever came back from a system attack like this.
“She’s just out, that’s all. Just out. We give her a stim, she’ll be okay.” Toby started rubbing Besen’s cheeks.
Shibo said, “Check her indices.”
“Just out, is all.” With fumbling fingers Toby reached around and rotated Besen’s head. He and Killeen had to take off her backpack to get a clear look at her internal monitors. The digital circle at the top of her spine was uniformly blue. Numbers slid through each window, cycling meaninglessly.
Shibo glanced at them and then looked back at the hills where the Cybers were. “Looks bad,” she said.
“No. No.” Toby rubbed her face harder, faster. “She’s overloaded, sure. That’s all though.”
“Could give her a stim,” Killeen said, reaching for his pack. He had to make the gesture even though it was the last bulb he had.
“Chancy, doing it right away,” Shibo said. “Systems need reflex time.”
“I’ll bring her back,” Toby said. “She just needs blood in the head—”
“Here.” Killeen helped Toby screw the stim bulb to Besen’s head.
Toby stared into Besen’s unblinking eyes. “You got wake up.”
A microwave bolt whooshed overhead. Shibo said gently, “We have to try her now.”
Toby licked his lips. His mouth wrenched jaggedly. “If her systems overstim…”
Killeen put his hand on his boy’s shoulder but he could think of nothing to say.
Toby’s hands trembled over the bulb. “How… how can I? If…”
“She’s yours. You must decide.”
Toby’s face was white. He looked at Killeen for a long moment. Then he took the stim bulb and asked, “What—what setting?”
Killeen said, “Better try full. She’s pretty far gone.” He thought Besen was almost certainly dead but the next moment would make that plain enough. He would have to get Toby away fast, though, no matter how much the boy wanted to linger over the body.
