As she approached, the machine suddenly reached out and she automatically jerked backward, the scissors snapping closed only a hair away from her throat. Carol had actually felt the passage of the metal on her skin.
Snarling a curse, the woman unlimbered the rapidfire and hosed the preDark device with a stuttering stream of 9 mm rounds. At this range it was impossible to miss and almost every round hit the sec hunter droid but merely bounced off its armored body.
Now the droid charged again, the twin scissors closing with a loud crunch, and she saw that the barrel of her blaster was cut off at the magazine. Nuking hell, it was a guardian of some kind! Firing wildly, the panicked woman could barely control her weapon without the aid of the barrel and she hastily backed away, trying to shout for help, the impulse returning unbidden after so many years of being rendered mute.
Then her weapon jammed, and as the droid reached for her face Carol turned and ran blindly into the street, bouncing off the dead cars and rattling the ancient occupants. Then cutting through a courtyard, she ran through a feeding flock of buzzards, hoping the birds might distract the machine. Screaming in outrage, the carrion eaters erupted into flight, and while the urge to look was strong, Carol dared not risk a glance to see if the trick worked.
Pelting down the street, the woman zigzagged through the rubble and dashed under the crashed lamppost. Unable to hear anything but her own rushed breathing, she scrambled up the rubble, feeling a rush of relief that the cable was still hanging in place waiting for her return.
Rushing for the hook, Carol tripped and landed hard, losing her blaster and a hand went straight onto a cluster of salt crystals, the sharp prisms stabbing through the soft part of her palm like a glass daggers. Writhing in agony, she pulled her hand loose just as the jingling noise came again from behind. It was here!
Blasters started shooting suddenly from above, the rounds hitting everywhere nearby. Safe for the moment, the woman reclaimed her rapidfire and savagely yanked the arming bolt of the boxy 9 mm Ingram SMG, finally freeing the bent casing caught in the ejector port. Firing as she turned, Carol saw only the brief flash of mirror bright steel as the scissors stabbed into her chest.
Searing pain filled her world as she saw her own blood gush onto the machine, then the second scissors reached for her throat. Everything went chaotic as she went flying sideways to land on the ground, then rolled away until eternal blackness swallowed her whole.
Casting away the headless torso, the sec hunter droid swiveled its lenses skyward, easily finding the APC on the ledge. It waited a full minute for an order from the soldiers operating the U.S. Army vehicle, but when nothing was received on the proper channels, it immediately switched to defense mode. Cycling out a pair of secondary arms equipped with pliers, the droid grabbed on to the dangling hook and started to climb steadily arm over arm.
Now from above and below small caliber rounds hit the droid, then a nearby section of the rock face exploded thunderously as a LAV rocket slammed into it. Shrapnel ricocheted off its primary hull in a hundred places, but nothing penetrated.
Then the damage around the smoking blast crater began to spread, the cracks yawning wide in every direction. Large pieces of the rock started to fall away, causing a minor avalanche. Then there came the roar of a diesel engine and the cable began to move as the APC departed the weakened section.
Gripping even harder, the droid continued to climb even as it bounced and slammed off the crumbling face of the cliff. More than once it was sent spinning away, sailing over the city, only to come crashing back against the rock with brutal force. An eye cracked, distorting its external view, and a secondary hydraulic system went off-line from the pounding, but the droid accepted the damage as minimal and continued toward the enemy.
The droid was only a few yards from the top of the cliff, when the APC stopped moving. Redoubling its ascent, the sec hunter clawed its way onto the desert floor and stood just as the 25 mm cannon atop the LAV 25 roared into life. The explosive rounds detonated on its hull in strident fury, smashing both primary and secondary systems. Forced backward from the sheer force of the continuous detonations, the sec hunter tried to get out of the way and it suddenly was falling.