gone a few yards when he heard a rhythmic banging coming from an alcove
ahead of him.
In the alcove two light warbots were beating their heads against the wall,
literally. They would step forward, run into the wall, bounce back and
then step forward again. From the looks of the wall they had been doing it
for some time.
“Halt!” Craig ordered and the robots froze in midstep. Quickly he ran
diagnostics and found the robots had a bug screwing up their
obstacle-avoidance routines. Fortunately they were light warbots or they
would have long since walked through the wall.
A couple of quick commands and the warbots were functional again.
“Follow me,” Craig ordered and set off down the corridor with the two
killing machines at his heels.
“Come on, damn you,” Wiz muttered, but the tape cartridge spun on
unheeding. He only wanted one file, but the file was enormous. The tape
backup was designed for reliability over speed; its designers had never
imagined someone would have to transfer information to tape in the middle
of a battle.
“They’re in there,” Snorri reported breathlessly. “I can hear them.”
“At last.” Glandurg thrust his scout out of the way. He turned to the
others. “I will go first. Remember, give me room in battle to wield Blind
Fury.”
His followers nodded. Glandurg motioned the others to follow him and
trotted forward, Blind Fury slapping against his back at every step.
Craig paused outside the door to the computer room. One more thing. He
took a thermonuclear grenade from his belt pouch and pulled the pin. Now
the only thing preventing a multi-megaton explosion was his clawed grip
around the grenade. If anything happened and he loosened his hand,
everyone in the tower would die in a flash of nuclear fire.
Then he kicked down the door.
The side door to the computer room fell in with a crash and Craig and his
robots stormed in. Gilligan was at the main door watching the fight in the
corridor and Wiz and Jerry were at the console waiting for the download to
finish. All of them jerked up at the sight of the three armored
apparitions bearing down on them.
“Kill!” Craig screamed. The robot to his left took one step forward,
caught one foot behind the other and tripped headlong with a metallic
crash. The second robot raised both its arms to sweep its built-in lasers
across the group.
“Drop,” Gilligan yelled and all of them pressed themselves to the floor as
the beams of ruby incandescence swept toward them.
Wiz felt something gently warm across his back, unsquinched his eyes and
looked up. The robot’s head swiveled back and forth as it looked from one
gently glowing arm to another. It nodded twice, executed an about-face and
marched headlong into the wall.
“Oh shit!” Craig screamed. Then he went for Wiz.
He could have used his blasters. He could have used his machine guns. He
could have let go of the thermonuclear grenade. Instead he lumbered
forward with one taloned hand outstretched. He didn’t just want to kill
Zumwalt, he wanted to tear him apart, to trample him beneath the battle
armor’s steel feet until there was nothing left but a thin red smear on
the computer room floor.
Wiz dodged the first swipe of the hand by ducking under the massive arm.
He got a desk between himself and Craig, but Craig picked the desk up one
handed and threw it across the room. There was a terrific crash as the
flying desk hit the window wall and the sheets of glass collapsed.
Mick Gilligan dropped to one knee and emptied his pistol at Craig. He
ejected the empty magazine, slammed another home and kept on firing.
Bullets bounced off Craig’s armor and ricocheted wildly around the
laboratory, knocking up puffs of rock dust when they hit the wall and
leaving neat holes in what was left of the big window.
Craig swiveled and pointed the arm holding the grenade at the pilot. A
beam of roiling green fire lanced out. Mick dove for cover, but the very
edge of the blaster bolt caught his left arm and side. He went down