And whatever else, Ryan had been pretty sure that the Illuminated Ones within the wags wouldn’t relish the idea of being trapped in the outside world with no means of transport for getting back to the redoubt. Soaking up pressure from fire directed at the impervious body, they could sit there quite happily all day until the ammo was exhausted, and then do as they wished with no opposition. But direct fire at their weaker spots, and plant the seed of panic in their mind, and then it may be possible to push them into the action that you wanted.
Taking Ryan’s position at the window as the man departed, Gloria directed the attack on the wags as much as possible on the noise and confusion. Blaster and laser fire rained down on the wags and the road around, kicking up clouds of dust and chippings from the old tarmac patches.
“Hey, give me the grens and the launcher!” the Gate queen yelled. On the far side, her shot was echoed by Tammy, whose task it was to act as opposite number to her queen.
The engines of the two wags had fired up, and could be heard over the blasterfire. Before leaving the camp, Jon and J.B. had primed the old gren launchers that the tribe had in their armory, the legacy of a trade that had taken place during their time in the wood. It was an irony that they had made the deal in the very ville where they were about to test their new toys, but the irony was lost when there was no time to consider such things.
On each side of the road, Tammy and Gloria loaded the gren launchers and primed the grens. Shouldering the heavy weapons, each warrior directed the nose of the launcher downward, and toward a spot in the center of the road and between the front of one wag and the rear of the preceding wag.
Counting to ten and steeling herself for a recoil of whose strength she had no real idea, Gloria fired. On the opposite side of the road, Tammy also let loose with a gren.
The explosion as both grens hit the road and detonated simultaneously was deafening, and drowned out all other sounds. An immense cloud of dirt, tarmac and dust was thrown up as the grens gouged a great trench from the road.
“Motherfucker!” Gloria yelled as the air began to clear and she could see the damage that had been wrought by the grens. It was a cry that mixed surprise and exhilaration as she viewed the sight before her. Where there had once been a road, there was now a large crater that still smoked. It looked several feet deep—certainly too deep for even the four-wheel-drive wags to cope with—and extended across about half the width of the road. The wags had pulled back a few yards as the explosion had hit, and had halted again, unsure of what to do. They were covered in dirt, and some lumps of tarmac had made small dents on the bodywork, but they were otherwise undamaged.
Both Gloria and Tammy reached the same conclusion after surveying the damage they had wrought. It was obvious that the wags wanted to stay close, as they had only withdrawn rather than fleeing, and there was still enough room across the road for either one of the wags to skirt the crater and join its twin.
On each side of the road, the two women loaded up the gren launchers and took aim once more. Both directed their fire at an acuter angle than before, so that it would take out the road directly in front of them, in effect making an impassable trench that ran the width of the road. The only problem in this being the danger that they faced from flying debris as the grens hit. Before each fired, they yelled at the other inhabitants of the room to hit the floor, and then let fly with the grens.
A moment of intense silence followed the detonation as the grens hit close to the windows, the blast followed by a cone of silence that accentuated the rushing of their own blood in their ears. Then the heat and force of the detonation hit, throwing both Tammy and Gloria backward to hit the floor of their respective bars with a force that would have knocked out lesser people. But the Gate women had an innate wiry strength that enabled both to scramble to their feet and view their handiwork.