Reality Dysfunction - Expansion

Over on the far side she watched three men emerging from the craters, scrambling sluggishly for solid ground. They helped each other along, wriggling on their bellies when the slippery loam proved impossible to stand on.

Je

The men reached level ground sixty metres away from the ESA team, and stood up. Two were recognizable colonist types: dungarees, thick cotton work shirts, and woolly beards. The third was dressed in some kind of antique khaki uniform: baggy trousers, calves bound up by strips of yellowish cloth; a brown leather belt round his waist sporting a polished pistol holster; a hemispherical metal hat with a five-centimetre rim.

They couldn’t possibly have survived, Je

The two groups stared at each other for over half a minute.

Je

They started to circle round the edge of the barrage zone. The three men watched them silently.

“Do you want all three?” Will asked.

“No, just one. The soldier must be equipped with the most powerful systems if he can create that kind of chameleon effect. I’d like him if we can manage it.”

“I thought chameleon suits were supposed to blend in,” Dean muttered.

“I’m not even sure we’re seeing men,” Will added. “Maybe the xenocs are disguising themselves. Remember the paddle-steamer.”

Je

“Did you see that?” she asked. They had covered about a third of the distance round the barrage zone.

“I saw it,” Will said brusquely. “It’s a xenoc. Why else would it want to hide its shape?”

The distortion in the datavise band began to increase. Je

“Stop!” she commanded, her voice booming out of the communication block’s external speaker. “The three of you are under arrest. Put your hands on your head, and don’t move.”

All three men turned fractionally, focusing on her. Her neural nanonics began to report malfunctions in half of her suit’s electronics.

“Screw it! We must break them up, even three of them are too powerful. Will, one round EE, five metres in front of them.”

“That’s too close,” Dean said tensely as Will brought the gaussgun to bear. “You’ll kill them.”

“They survived the first barrage,” Je

Je

“One metre,” she snapped. “Fire.”

The explosion sent them spi

“Keep firing, keep them apart,” Je

Explosions bloomed around the three men. Will was using the gaussgun the way riot police employed a water ca

Je

Her neural nanonics triggered a single shot. She actually saw the induction pulse. A complete impossibility, her mind insisted. But a slender violet line materialized in the air ahead of her. It struck the farmer’s ankle and splashed apart, sending luminous tendrils clawing up his leg. He yelled wildly, and tumbled headlong.

“Dean, subdue him,” she ordered. “I want him in one piece. Will and I will fend off the other two.” Her carbine’s targeting circle slithered round on the soldier as she stopped ru

Je

The gaussgun was roaring three metres away. Will was standing his ground, feet apart to brace himself, swivelling from the hip to send EE rounds chasing after each of the men.

Je

Dean Folan dropped his gaussgun and backpack, which allowed him to cover the last thirty metres in two and a half seconds. In that time he fired his TIP carbine twice. The beams tore into glaring purple streamers which knocked the farmer down into the soft loam. With his opponent out for the count, Dean took the last five metres in a flying tackle, landing straight on top of him. The weight of his own body and the suit and his equipment should have been enough to finish it. But the man started to rise straight away. Dean gave a surprised yelp as he was lifted right off the ground, and went for a stranglehold, only to find a hand clamping round each wrist pulling his arms apart. He fell onto his back as the farmer regained his feet. A booted foot kicked him in the side of his ribs. His suit hardened, and he was thrown onto his belly by the force of the blow. The farmer must be a construct made entirely out of boosted muscle! His neural nanonics combat routine programs went into primary mode. He swung the TIP carbine round, and another vicious kick actually cracked the casing. But he lashed out with his free arm, knocking the farmer’s other leg out from under him. The farmer went down heavily on his backside.

Somewhere in the distance the gaussgun was thumping out a stream of EE projectiles.