The two Noughts met others. One produced a sharp, eager spike throughout her own Nought’s buzzing self. Here was true resonance. Her Nought felt a symphony of urgings heavily laced with the complex musk of sex.
No, she could not yank it from these strange moorings. She would have to devise some better way.
Meanwhile, booming shots and rattling near-misses caromed through the foothills. Quath ran desperately toward the valley floor, where a battle was beginning. One of Beq’qdahl’s gang sighted in on her Nought below. Quath sent a crackling blast into the podder. It tumbled over and began to smoke.
Good. This podder was a stranger to Quath, and she was able to brush away the stigma that came welling up from her subminds. But in the valley was Beq’qdahl, and Quath did not know what she could do there. She felt a hard, sinewy knot of conflict arise in her. She tried to force it down into her subminds but they would not accept the bulked fibers. It churned in her like a bleeding pink cyst. Could she truly kill her own kind in defense of a Nought?
Quath could not unravel the bristly knot. She ran on.
FIFTEEN
As Killeen approached Jocelyn’s small command party he checked his pace. It was a bad idea to display haste or anxiety. That would unsteady others.
Then it occurred to him that he was thinking like a Cap’n. At the beginning of the battle he had relished his freedom; now it seemed a hollow pleasure.
“Reporting,” he said simply as he reached Jocelyn. She crouched behind a broken mech-factory wall, listening intently to her comm. Her face was drawn and smudged with dirt, but her eyes danced with nervous energy. She had ordered him down from Shibo’s position commanding the hill.
Jocelyn gave him a look of harried relief. “Killeen—good.” She seemed to have to dredge her words out of some inner struggle. Breathing heavily, she sat down on an overturned mech carapace. Factory debris littered everywhere. “I… I’m afraid His Supremacy has decided against the breakout.”
Killeen said nothing, just nodded.
Surprised, Jocelyn asked, “You think it’s because we pulled out last time?”
“That guy’s crazy. Pointless, tryin’ figure him out.”
Jocelyn pursed her lips, obviously gathering her resources. A microwave burst hissed past nearby. Killeen saw that Cybers had moved closer in from the hills, cutting off the cover of undulating terrain. Family Bishop had formed a skirmish line along the river. They maneuvered now among the shattered rock that bordered the deep fault line. Twilight cast long blue fingers from each protrusion now. As Family members fell back from the gullies and dry washes their shadows made them even more prominent targets.
He watched a running woman retreat under covering fire from the Family. A UV bolt struck her in the lower back, bathing her in crisp darting fireflies. Dying blue sparks glowed in the gloom. She fell. It was Lanaui, an old friend. Too far away for him to do anything. He strained forward, watching, hoping that the shot had not damaged her major systems. Twangs and booms came as Family hammered away at Cyber targets. Lanaui moved. She rolled over and hobbled to the shelter of a burntout mech transporter. From her gait Killeen could tell her power systems were dead. Now she would have to flee using only normal human strength. A Cyber could run her down easily.
“What”—Jocelyn bit her lip—“can we do?”
He said carefully, “Can’t make the hills, not without cover from the Tribe.”
“I agree.” From her stiffness he saw that she was having trouble yielding enough even to ask advice from him.
“Can’t keep goin’ either.”
“No.”
Microwaves rattled through Killeen’s sensorium. Nearby Family members ducked, but he just leaned against the smashed factory wall. He was afraid that if he sat down his legs would refuse to get up.
“Night comes, we’ll stand out by our body IR.” Killeen felt an idea percolating somewhere and the only way he knew to get it out was to keep talking, let his subconscious send it floating free.
Jocelyn’s eyes kept darting as she surveyed the combat grids in her eyes. She was having trouble keeping up with the situation as parties of Bishops fell back toward the rough, gullied terrain opened by the recent quakes. “Right Think maybe we should send the fastest out? Leave the rest, have ’em provide cover?”
This violated all Family combat doctrine and she knew it. Her eyes fixed on him for an imploring moment.
“They’d just hound us down,” Killeen said curtly. No reason to let her know how much this proposal disgusted him.
“I… I guess we’re stuck here. If we can hold our lines through the night—”
“Never happen. We don’t even know if Cybers sleep. Once they got us pinned, they can call in whatever they want”
“Then… then…”
Since there was no point in making matters worse, he hid his irritation by flicking his sensorium to infrared. It might give him an idea of how Cybers saw their situation. He remembered the time in their Hive, how they automatically interpreted objects as though illumination came from the floor. Yet obviously they had adapted well to the surface.
As night thickened, the ground shone more fully, brighter than the mottled molecular clouds above. This resembled the Hive lighting and probably gave them some further advantage. The cool, splashing streams were darker than the land now. The forested hills were holding their heat well and glowed like soft green carpets. He turned toward the fault line and saw a slight brightening where apparently lava coursed beneath. As if to confirm his guess, the ground trembled slightly, like a beast shaking off a fly. Beyond the fault cleft he could see the black ribbon that was the new river. It frothed as if excited to be cutting a fresh bed through the valley, running dark and swift.
“Wait,” he said. “Wait just a minute.”
He watched the night cautiously. A Cyber had been moving to their left and now it was gone. Was it beyond view, or had it simply tuned to his sensorium so well that he now missed it entirely?
He fired a short microwave pulse toward where he thought it might be and then crawled around the shelf of broken rock that sheltered him. Shibo was already moving back to the next line. Killeen ran heavily along the shelf and then angled in toward a gully. Something sang past him as he sprawled down the slope. Dirt jammed in his shin shocks and he had to stop to work it out. By the time he looked up, Shibo had ordered another fallback.
—New drill! Toby!—Shibo called.
Killeen saw his son’s signifier move back toward the river. The boy was running fast.
—Carmen!—Shibo sent.
The woman broke from cover and dashed. She had to leap over the fallen body of a Bishop man who had been hit only minutes before. The man’s suit gave no life signs so nobody had tried to retrieve his body. They were leaving everything now, even supplies and ammo. This was the rear guard and it had to stay light and quick.
Killeen called to Jocelyn, “We’re comin’ in soon.”
—Give us a li’l bit time,—she answered.
“Damn little left,” he said.
