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He strained round in the saddle, upping his retinal implants’ resolution to their extreme. All he could see was the long thin black trunks and their verdant cone island bases, outlines wavering in the heat and unstable magnification factor.
A movement.
The TIP carbine was discharging before he even thought about it, blue target graphics sliding across his vision field like neon cell doors as he dropped the barrel in a single smooth arc. A red circle intersected the central grid square and his neural nanonics triggered a five-hundred-shot fan pattern.
The section of jungle in the central blue square sparkled with orange motes as the induction pulses stabbed against the wood and foliage. It lasted for two seconds.
“Down!” Will datavised. “Hostiles four o’clock.”
He was already slithering off the horse, feet landing solidly on the broad triangular creeper leaves. Dean and Je
“What was it?” Je
“Two of them, I think.” Will quickly replayed the memory. It was like a dense black shadow dashing out from behind one of the trees, then it split into two. That was when he fired, and the image jolted. But the black shapes refused to clarify, no matter how many discrimination programs he ran. Definitely too big for sayce, though. And they were moving towards him, using the shaggy treebases for cover.
He felt a glow of admiration, they were good.
“What now?” he datavised. Nobody responded. “What now?” he asked loudly.
“Reco
There was a silent orange flash above her. The top third of the tree ten metres to her left began to topple over, hinging on a section of trunk that was mostly charred splinters. Just as it reached the horizontal, the rich green plumes at the top caught on fire. They spluttered briefly, belching out a ring of blue-grey smoke, then the fire really caught. Two ve
The horses reared up, whi
Je
Dean’s sensors had also detected the maser beam. He fired a fifty-shot barrage back along the line.
The fallen tree’s tip fizzled out. All that was left was a tapering core of wood and a heap of ash. Blackened ground creepers smouldered in a wide circle around it.
“What the hell did that?” Dean asked.
“No data,” Je
Globules of vivid white fire raced up the trunks of several nearby trees like some bizarre astral liquid. Bark shrivelled and peeled off in long strips behind them, the naked wood below roaring like a blast furnace as it caught alight. The flames redoubled in vehemence. Je
Je
“Save the equipment,” she shouted. “We can’t hang on to the horses in this.”
Will heard the order as his horse began bucking, its hind legs kicking imaginary foes. He drove his fist into its head, catching it between the eyes, and it froze for a second in stu
Balls of orange flame were hurtling through the air above him, spitting greasy black liquids: ve
Dean and Je
More trees were falling as the flame consumed the wood at a fantastic rate. For one nasty moment they were completely pe
Je
By now a ring of ground a hundred metres in diameter was burning, leaving just a small patch at the centre untouched. The three of them grouped together at the middle as the last two trees went down. Now there was only the ground creepers burning, sending up forked yellow flames and heavy blue smoke.
Je
She gripped the TIP carbine tighter. “As soon as the flames die down I want a sweep-scorch pattern laid down out to four hundred metres. Fight fire with fire. They’ve shown us what they can do, now it’s our turn.”
“All right,” Will muttered happily.
Rummaging round in her packs for one of the spherical heavy duty power cells she was carrying, she plugged its coiled cable into the butt of her carbine. The other two were doing the same thing.
“Ready?” she asked. The flames were only a couple of metres high now, the air above them swarmed with ash flakes, blotting out the sun. “Go.”
They stood, shoulders together, forming a triangle. The TIP carbines blazed, sending out two hundred and fifty invisible deadly shots every second. Targeting processors coordinated the sweep parameters, overlapping their fields of fire. Neural nanonics ordered their muscles to move in precise increments, controlling the direction of the energy blitz.
A ripple of destruction roared out across the already cremated land, then started to chew its way into the vegetation beyond. Dazzling orange stars scintillated on tree trunks and creepers, desiccating then igniting the wood and tangled cords of vine. The initial ripple became a fully-fledged hurricane firestorm, exacerbated by the relentless push of the carbines.
“Burn, you mothers,” Will yelled jubilantly. “Burn!” The entire jungle was on fire around them, an avalanche of flames racing outward. One again the ve