“Missiles armed,” Jessica said, her hands poised above the fire control panel.
“Too late,” Kate replied, grabbing her Ingram and arming the blaster. “At this range the blast would chill the people, and they got kids.”
“So what do we do?” Jake asked, staring out the front window. “Light our flamethrower? Use the grens?”
“Wait for it,” Kate ordered, standing behind the man, her hands on a ceiling stanchion. “Wait for it…now! Charge!”
The huge machine rolled forward, its headlights flaring and the air horns sounding like the clarion call of doomsday. The terrified people darted away from the vehicle as it continued onward until reaching the bugs. Suddenly, the cameras showed the fat insects everywhere, and a skittering noise came from the sides and roof.
“Zap ’em,” Kate shouted. “Quarter power!”
“Quarter? But that’s not enough to… Right!” the man said in understanding, and dialed down the voltage to barely enough to stun a human and flipped the switch. The monitors went crazy, scrambling and strobbing as the raw current pulsed through the armored hull. From every direction there came high pitched keens, and a score of the insects splashed into the water stunned or dead.
As the monitors cleared, Kate saw the people still moving, the low voltage dissipated through the yards of water not enough to slow them. But those bugs in direct contact with the metal hull were fried. Not all, but enough.
“Hit ’em again!” Kate commanded, watching the screens. The surviving bugs were concentrating on the killer thing in their midst, the splashing meat momentarily forgotten.
“Again!” she ordered, watching the reserve power gauges drop quickly. “Again!”
“Almost there…” Roberto announced from the periscope. “Just another sec. Okay, they’re on dry sand!”
The Trader bared her teeth in a feral grin. “About goddamn time. Now give me full power! Everything we got!”
The lights and monitors went out as the nuke batteries put every volt through the defense grid welded onto the outer hull. Keening screams sounded in every direction, and several of the insects on the Plexiglas windshield burst into flames, blue sparks crawling over their dripping wet bodies. The crackling continued for several minutes, the water around the war wag starting to steam until the reserve banks were exhausted.
As Jake released the switch, the engines started once more and everything came back online. Then a monitor winked out as a fuse blew, a curl of smoke rising from under the control board. The bald man rushed to fix the matter, while the others took stock of their own equipment, flipping switches and checking meters.
“No damage, Chief,” Jake reported, spinning in his chair.
“That we know of,” Roberto muttered, trying to see the muddy ground below the wag. But the angle was wrong. Then suddenly an alarm sounded and a red light flashed on the damage board.
“Nuking hell, we got a fire in the kitchen,” Jessica reported, working the controls. A monitor came to life and showed swirling smoke, laced with fiery orange. “There must have been some arcing through the shutters.”
“You, you and you, go handle it,” Kate commanded, pointing to the gunners. “Foam only, no water, until you’re sure it was an arc and not a live short circuit.”
Grabbing preDark pressurized cans from wall mounts, the men rushed down the corridor and out of sight.
“Kill that alarm,” Kate said, and the wag went quiet. Going to the transponder, she took a hand mike from a rack and pressed the transmit switch. “Gordon, you copy?”
“We’re here, Chief,” he replied over the ceiling speakers. “There’s smoke coming out your ass, port side.”
“We got a team on it already,” Kate replied succinctly. “What about the bugs?”
There was a crackle of static. “I think you got them all. Can’t see any movement on this side.”
Which didn’t mean shit, since the muties were notoriously hard to ace. Even the ones lying under the water might still be alive, just unconscious for a while. They could have found a chink in the armor and were burrowing into the wag as she tried to decide what to do. Seconds counted now.
“We’re going to have to do a hard recce,” the Trader said, taking the Stetson off the wall and patting it into place. “Gordon, get ready to burn us in case of trouble.”