Scout Quan gritted his teeth,figuratively speaking, as he fought to break the link and securecontrol almost simultaneously. He damned near plowed dirt with hisquad despite every effort to establish control swiftly, however. Atthat, he couldn’t say his efforts were particularly sterling. Hedid manage to remain upright. He’d never tried to control an avatarlike it or even close, though, and there was no time for‘practice’. They arrived and landed in the middle of a battle—or atthe end of one—and he had to gain control and fight ordie.
‘They’, the drones,recognized the invasion almost instantaneously.
It was almost as if the traitor hadbeen warned—had known to expect them—was prepared to protect themaster.
Shaking that thought for the moment,Scout Quan struggled to keep pace with the assassin he had beenassigned to.
Assassin Kau seemed to have no troubletaking control and initiating a counter attack against thetraitor’s drones immediately.
Uttering a challenging bellow when hehad control, Scout Quan surged toward one of the drones that hefinally realized was systematically checking the fallen andfinishing them off if it transpired they were stillbreathing.
Assassin Kau had already taken outthree in the time it took him to gain control of his avatar andwobble drunkenly toward his first target.
Embarrassing and damnedannoying!
But he thought he acquitted himselfwell enough after those first few challenging moments.
By the time the two of them had takendown all of the drones in the immediate vicinity, he discovered hisavatar was heaving breaths gustily.
That sent an instant shaft of fearthrough him.
He was going to be in deep shit if helost the host he’d claimed—especially since they’d destroyed all ofthe others close enough to reach.
“These are partbiological,” Assassin Kau responded to his anxieties as if he’dspoken aloud, which, of course, he had no need to.
He had been chosen by Assassin Kauhimself—because they were kindred souls and could mindlink.
“What is it doing?” ScoutQuan asked uneasily.
“Gasping. It has beenexerted. It needs more atmosphere in its lungs to pump life fluidsthrough its system.”
Scout Quan was still all at sea, buthe nodded as if he’d understood and looked around.
They were standing in the middle of abattlefield where a gruesome, desperate battle had been fought.There were bits and pieces of biological materials and mechanicalstrewn everywhere and a mixture of fluids, as well.
It was difficult to tell which piecesbelonged to the natives and which to the traitor’s invadinghorde—except, of course, for the mechanical pieces. “They have notyielded to him,” he said with a mixture of surprise and a touch ofadmiration.
Assassin Kau pulled a grim expressionand lifted his head to scan the perimeter of the field. “No. Andfrom the look of it, they have been waging war for sometime.”
Scout Quan followed the direction ofhis gaze and saw ruins of a civilization that surrounded the fieldthat only beings of the physical like those laying in the fieldmight build. A quick search of the onboard data revealed more thanhe was currently in any state to dwell upon, but he singled out thedata that he was interested in. “Dwellings for the beings lyinghere.”
Assassin Kau almost seemed to shrug.“We knew this world was likely taken before the traitor arrived.Biological entities are far more common than not—than those who arelike us.”
That brought Quan’s attention back totheir immediate surroundings and he discovered he could hear …something, some sound that seemed indicative ofdistress.
“They are not all dead.This is what the drones were about when we arrived—insuring thatthey were.”
Quan nodded dismissively, considering.“It might be easier to track our quarry if we had a native to guideus—or supply us with useful information.”
Kau lifted his hands in a sweepinggesture. “This quad has very little information stored. But I havemy doubts that any of these would be useful.”
Quan spied one that had lifted itshead to stare at them. He pointed. “That one.”
* * * *
Ultima thought she was hallucinatingwhen she saw—whatever it was that she saw. Two of the cyborgsstanding on the rise almost seemed to have been struck by beams oflight that nearly rocked them clean off their feet. Their kneesbuckled. One even landed on his knees.
Lasers?
