“I can’t believe that, sir,” Murchison protested. “When I was taken onto that ship there was physical contact with the spider captain who treated me well, considering the situation. It showed intelligence and intense curiosity. Maybe it was a scientist of some kind with its feelings under strict control. I don’t have an empathic faculty like yours, but if it had been feeling hatred and revulsion as well as curiosity I’m sure I would have felt it. My feeling now is that since my escape, we may have done something to make them really hate us.”
Before he could reply, Naydrad curved its body into a flat L so that its narrow head was pointing vertically upwards and said, “Even at the beginning of a battle their pilots like to show off. Look at that.”
At an altitude of about three hundred meters the gliders that had been climbing singly or in small, random groups above the full width of the beach had come together into a wide, circular formation. For a few moments they circled nose-to-tail like the star performers in an aerial display, then they banked inwards in unison, tightening the circle until they were directly above the med-station buildings and the watchers. The captain’s voice returned.
“Nice coordination,” it said approvingly, “but I don’t think they’re showing off. The pilots and passengers are unlimbering their crossbows with the idea, I’d say, of shooting straight down at you. They probably figure that the bolts will have more penetration with the gravity assist of a three-hundred-meter fall. It’s a sensible idea but, not knowing how our shield works, completely wrong. … Now what the hell are they doing?”
One of the gliders had rolled into a near-vertical bank, tightening its circle and descending, sideslipping off height as it came. It was followed quickly by another three and then suddenly all of the aircraft were spiralling down towards them.
“Oh, no!” said the captain, answering its own question. “Because their crossbow bolts were stopped at ground level, they think the shield is a wall surrounding us instead of a protective hemisphere. They’re going to crash into an invisible wall at full .. . Haslam, Dodds, deploy your tractors, wide focus and low power in pressor node. Try not to wreck their gliders, just fend them off before they hit it.”
“Sir,” Haslam protested, “I need a few seconds to focus on every target….”
“And there are too many targets,” Dodds joined in.
“Do what you can—“ the captain had time to say before the first glider crashed into the curving invisible surface of the shield.
It looked as if the aircraft had broken up and collapsed into a loose ball of wreckage in midair without any apparent cause. Both occupants were entangled in the structure as it tumbled along the frictionless surface of the shield towards the ground. The second pilot, guessing that some strange weapon was being used against them, banked sharply in an attempt to climb up and away. But one wing struck the shield, crumpled, and its main spar penetrated the fuselage. The aircraft spun heavily into the frictionless surface and the passenger was thrown free before its pilot and the crippled glider began to slip groundwards at an accelerating rate.
“Haslam, Dodds, grab them,” said the captain sharply. “Ease them down gently. Right, Doctor?”
“You’re reading our minds, friend Fletcher,” said Prilicla; then, “Friend Naydrad, instruct. ..”
The fall of the first glider was checked about five meters from the ground and eased down so gently that it barely disturbed the sand, but the second one was caught two meters up so that its speed and impact were only slightly diminished.
“… Instruct the robots to return all patients to recovery at once,” Prilicla went on. For a moment he stared at the semicircle of waiting spiders that had begun to edge closer while he tried to maintain stable hovering flight in spite of the almost physical impact of their emotional hostility. He made a quick, mental calculation and spoke.
“Friend Fletcher,” he said, “will you please increase the …”
“The diameter of the meteorite shield by, I would estimate, ten metres,” the captain broke in. “Am I still reading your mind, Doctor?”