“Morn!” Pol yelled, hurled himself to his feet and fired.
Morn crumpled, the look of startlement still on his face. And startlement was on Raen’s face too, horror as she averted the gun. Pol sank to one knee, swore, and Jim seized at him, but Pol stood without his help, braced, fired a flurry of shots into the armored invaders, who stood as if paralysed.
Raen did the same, and majat swept past the lines of her men, who hurled accurate fire into the opposing tide, majat meeting body to body, waves that collided and broke upon each other, with shrilling and booming. Heads rolled. Bodies thrashed in convulsions. More of the wall collapsed, and again they were flanked. Jim turned fire in that direction, and saw to his horror the majat sweeping down on them.
Pol’s accurate fire cut into them, shots pelting one after the other, precisely timed.
A body slid in from their rear: Merry, putting shots where they counted; and Raen next, whose fire was, like Pol’s, accurate. The shrilling died away; majat rushed from their rear, narrowly missing them in their blinding rush, and they dropped, tucked for protection.
But Pol did not go on firing. He laid his head against the rock, staring blankly before him. Raen touched him, bent, pressed a gentle touch of her lips to his brow.
“That’s once,” Pol said faintly, and the face lost its life; a shudder went through his limbs, and ceased.
Raen averted her face, looked instead at the wave of majat that was breaking, flooding back toward the walls.
And with a curse she sprang up and ran; Merry followed, and other azi. Jim slipped his hand from Pol’s shoulder and snatched at his rifle to follow, past the cover of the rocks.
A dark body hurtled into him, spurs ripping. He sprawled, went under, body upon body rushing over him, until pain stopped.
x
Agony . . . Mother existed in it, in each powerful drive of Her legs that drove Her vast weight another half-length. Drones moved, themselves unaccustomed to such exertions, their breathing harsh pipings. Workers danced back and forth, offering nourishment from their jaws, the depleted fluids of their own bodies, feeding Her and the Drones.
Their colours grew strange, the blue mottled light and dark, with here and there a blackness. The sight disturbed Her, and She moaned as She thrust Her way along, following the new tunnel, the making of the Workers.
Mother, the Workers sang, Mother, Mother.
And She led them.
I have made the way, the Warrior-mind reported, one of its units touching at Her. Enemies are retreating. Need of Workers now to move the stones.
Well done, She said, tasting of life fluids and of victory.
Warrior scurried away, staggering in its exhaustion and its haste. Follow this-unit, Warrior gave taste to Workers. Follow, follow me.
xi
“Sera?”
Raen caught herself, caught her breath between the wall and Merry’s solid body. An azi-light swung from her wrist. She blinked clear the subway, the vacant tracks coursed by majat. One of the men offered her a flask. She drank a mouthful; it went the round among them, forlorn humans huddled at the side of the arching tunnel. They panted for breath, lost in the strange sounds, the rush of chitined bodies, of spurred feet. One of them, hurt, slumped in a knot against the wall. Raen reached and touched him, obtained a lifting of the head, an attempt to focus. Another gave him a drink.
They were twelve, only twelve, out of all of them. She swallowed heavily and rested her hand on Merry’s shoulder, breathing in slower and slower gasps.
“City central’s up there,” she said. “Blues have A branch. The reds are probably in E, that goes to the port. Greens . . . I don’t know. Golds . . . likely C, due south. They’ll mass in central, under ITAK headquarters”
“Three hives against them,” Merry said faintly. “Sera, the blues can’t do it.”
She slid her hand down, pressed his arm. “I don’t think so either, but there’s no stopping them. We’ve kept them alive this long. Merry, take the men, go back. Go back from here. I’ll not throw the rest of you away.”