"That thing won"t scratch a Kay-Dee," Tovel gasped.
"We must"ve damaged it," said Roba. "Or else why ain"t it firing no more?"
The robot now used Roba"s rifle as a club. Ben dived to the floor as the weapon whooshed over his head and smashed into the wall. Tovel and Roba were using the distraction to try and scramble out of the Kill-Droid"s way, falling over each other in the enclosed, suffocating s.p.a.ce, choking on smoke and dust. When the thing advanced on them, Ben found himself directly in its way.
Desperately he wormed through the robot"s tangle of sinewy legs. His skin felt scorched by the fierce heat radiating from the machine"s gleaming body. He cried out as something hooked on his ankle and the flesh started to tear. But with his arms at full stretch, he felt the cold, solid bulk of Tovel"s rifle. Grabbing it, he jammed its barrel up what he hoped was the part of the Kill-Droid where the sun don"t shine.
This time when he fired, the results were a lot more spectacular.
Like a firework going off in a jam jar, the monster"s head exploded. A fog of red smoke escaped the shattered gla.s.s.
Sparks shot out of the blackening neck. The twisting limbs stiffened and then buckled beneath the weight of the great chrome coffin above. Ben tried to work his way clear of the bulk as it teetered and rocked alarmingly above him, but something was still hooked in his left ankle, anchoring the thing to him.
"Don"t let it fall on me, for G.o.d"s sake!" Ben gasped. "I"ll be flattened!"
In the sputtering light of the sparks, Ben saw his own terrified reflection staring him out from the robot"s gleaming back. His distorted features grew closer, clearer, as the dead weight of the thing finally fell to crush him.
Inches from his face its fall was halted.
"Get yourself free quickly," Ben heard Tovel gasp. "This thing weighs a tonne."
Ben felt for the hook in his ankle and yanked it out.
Raising himself on his elbows, biting his tongue to stop himself whimpering with the pain, he worked his way backwards a few feet along the tunnel.
"All right, I"m clear!" he yelled, but his cry was drowned out by the clang and clatter of the Kill-Droid as it smashed heavily into the ground, inches from his feet.
Ben breathed a long, long sigh of relief. "Thanks, fellas."
"Thanks yourself," Tovel replied, and Roba nodded. Despite the pain in his ankle, Ben felt a giddying rush of triumph.
He"d sorted the War Machine"s big brother, and earned his place in the barracks. Having the friendship of this pair should make his stay here, and that of Polly and the Doctor, a little easier.
Roba studied the Kill-Droid"s inert body. "This thing"s loaded with different weapons, but the charges are all still full. Not a shot fired. Why didn"t it use them?"
"It probably heard me telling you the whole roof would come crashing down," Ben called, gingerly feeling round his injured ankle. It didn"t feel too bad now. It just itched like h.e.l.l.
"You reckon this thing cares about a tonne of rubble on its head?"
Tovel clearly didn"t think so. No, it must be the one me and Shade met before. We must"ve hit it."
"Whatever," Roba announced, raising his wrist to his mouth. "Looks like we"ve got a h.e.l.l of a trophy to take back to Haunt."
III.
"Good work, Roba. Out." Haunt smiled in triumph as she swung round to address Polly, the Doctor and Shade. "Roba reports a Kay-Dee down."
"No static blocking communications this time," the Doctor observed quietly.
"Is Ben all right?" Polly asked.
Haunt nodded. "The droid attacked them in the tunnel." She paused, "It must"ve killed Lindey first."
Polly saw the Doctor shake his head at this. "We don"t know that for sure," he said.
"You said yourself, these tunnels are connected." Haunt stared him down. "Can you give me an alternative explanation?"
"Very well, if the droids did indeed kill Denni and Lindey,"
the Doctor said quickly, "then that mystery is solved. Will you now accept it is essential we learn our destination with all possible speed, and attempt to find a way of signalling for help from outside?"
Haunt seemed to consider his plea. "Shel, take the old man and the girl back to the control room," she said at last. "I"ll contact the others. We"ll search on for the bodies of Lindey and Denni and meet you back there."
Shel looked pale, his face covered in a sheen of sweat.
"Marshal."
They left Haunt in the vast chamber, alone with Shade, both as silent and still as one of the statues balanced on top of the pillars.
"If it wasn"t the droid that murdered Denni and Lindey,"
Polly said nervously, "then what did?"
"Or who?" the Doctor muttered darkly.
Polly decided not to pursue her line of questioning. She was scared enough as it was. She shivered as Shel led them down the same tunnel that she had taken with Shade.
"I do wish you could"ve seen the blue place, Doctor," she sighed. "I"m sure you would"ve understood it."
"Maybe so," the Doctor agreed loftily. "Young man," he added turning to Shel. "Would you be so kind as to attempt to contact someone on your communicator, hmm?"
Shel looked at him curiously but contacted Haunt. Her voice crackled through in response, partially obscured by the rhythmic shushing of the static.
"A test only," Shel reported. "Out."
"The power source you mentioned, Doctor," said Polly. "Does that mean it"s growing fainter?"
"Perhaps. But without a good deal of excavation, there is no way of retracing your footsteps to discover the truth. We should continue to the main control room." He sighed heavily, impatiently shrugged off his frock coat. His long white hair was clinging to his damp forehead. "We must see what is happening back there."
Polly nodded, and followed after the silent Shel.
Her arms itched. The fleas, she thought. They must bite.
She ruminated gloomily on the red lumps that would soon cover her as they trekked back to the control room.
They"d got as far as the bullring when the itching was replaced by a p.r.i.c.kling sensation at the sound of flashbulbs charging.
"Doctor!" she yelled. "That sound..."
"Down!" yelled the Doctor, flinging himself to the rocky floor.
Polly copied him, her cushioned suit protecting her from the gravelly floor. She felt a heat like sunlamps on the back of her neck.
All she could see was a crimson wash filtering into her vision, and the rising whirr of something huge and heavy approaching.
"D-Droid." Shel reached for his gun.
Polly stared in horror as this "droid", a chugging red colossus as big as a department store lift, stole into the rocky ring on angle-poised legs and swivelled its heavy gla.s.sy head from side to side in search of what it could crush first.
Chapter Seven.
The Burden
I.
Shel levelled his rifle and fired blast after white-hot blast at the robot. The droid hunched on its many legs like a spider that knows itself discovered, then lashed out a steel tentacle that swiped the gun from Shel"s grip. A splatter of blood from his arm slopped onto the floor, but Polly heard no sound of a cry.
The Doctor was back on his feet. He flapped his heavy frock coat at the creature like a matador waving his cloak before an enraged bull.
"Run, Polly," the Doctor insisted. He looked at her pointedly, sheltering behind his coat. Did he think that if he couldn"t see the robot it couldn"t see him? "As fast as you can."
Polly rose to her feet and prepared to run for the jagged hole in the ring that led to the pa.s.sageway stretching back to the control room. As she did so, a metal fist punched the Doctor through his coat. Silently he doubled up and collapsed.
The robot sidled up to his p.r.o.ne body. Two flexible probes that ended in gleaming surgical blades emerged from its silvery trunk and hovered over the Doctor, as if about to carve a roast.
Then a grating noise somewhere between an alarm clock and an egg timer burst out into the shadowy bullring. Polly saw the woman called Frog come charging into the rocky arena, screaming. She fired blast after blast from a rifle she clutched in just one hand.
The robot spun round to face her, leaving the Doctor unguarded. Polly swiftly ran over to him, as he lay winded on the floor. She gripped his hand; it was cold, clammy, heavily veined. And as he rose she saw his face. Lined, parchment-thin skin. Eyes like dark beads rolling in his head as he recovered his wits. For a moment she wanted to recoil from him as something almost alien, but he held his hand out to her, a pathetic gesture for help, and she took it. His grip on her arm was feeble as he held on to her, gasping for breath, an ordinary old man again.
Frog had been joined by Creben and Joiks, each firing their guns at the droid, trapping it in a circle of fire, blasting at it again and again until its devil-red haze faded, its movements became weak and clumsy. Unable to resist the hail of fire, its legs splayed and it crashed heavily to the ground.
The Doctor seemed to draw strength from the mechanical creature as it flailed helplessly on the floor. His breathing became more regular, and he smiled at Polly with something approaching pride, as if every breath he drew demonstrated superiority over his fallen foe. He scratched at the back of his neck, reminding Polly she was still itching all over too. Just her luck if the fleas were poisonous.
Shel stared down dispa.s.sionately at both the silent machine and at the puncture wound in his arm.
Joiks shot a pointed glance at the Doctor. "I think he could use you."
"I am not a doctor of medicine." The Doctor shook his head wearily. "However, his combat suit will compress the flesh around the wound, will it not? To stem the blood flow?"
Creben nodded. "And this should help. Medikit." He pulled a slim metal box from a pouch on his harness and stepped forward to examine the wound. Shel recoiled, began nursing the injury as if he"d only just become aware of it.
It doesn"t hurt," Shel informed them.
Looking a little awkward now Shel had rejected his help, Creben discarded the first aid box and turned instead to the droid. "Is it dead?"
"Looks like it," Frog gurgled. She prodded the thing with her foot. "I ain"t seen one that size before." She gave a filthy chuckle. Polly shuddered.
"That was the second droid," Shel muttered. "T... Tovel destroyed the first in the tunnels back there."
Frog slapped her palm against Joiks"s in a victorious gesture, her bulging eyes shining with delight. "Two down, Game Over," she said with a gappy smile. She scooped up Creben"s first aid tin and rummaged inside. "Celebration time. Got anything recreational in here, Creben?"
"Frog, stop." Shel shook his head slowly. "The droid had already k... killed Lindey."
"Lindey too?" Her voice buzzed out just as loudly, but everything else about her seemed fragile and quiet for a second.
Joiks stared at Shel. "You saw this?"
"No."
"Got a body?"
"Her body has not been found."
"She was grabbed, wasn"t she?" Joiks started pacing up and down. "It just took her, whatever it was. Took her away, just like Denni. No body." He kicked the droid savagely. "No d.a.m.ned body."
Creben pointed to one of the robot"s barbed flexible arms, lying uncoiled now like a steel snake. "If it snagged Lindey and Denni with one of these at full stretch, it could simply have retracted the limb. They"d have been dragged away at quite a speed."
"But where would it have hidden the bodies?" asked Polly.
"And why?"
Creben tapped a nozzle protruding from the cracked gla.s.s facade covering the droid"s metal midriff. "Disintegrator. Nice and clean."
"You seen something like this thing before, Creben?" Joiks asked suspiciously. "Thought this droid was meant to be some kind of new secret design."
Creben shrugged. "I"ve come up against disintegrators before. Just never on a droid."
"Let me see." The Doctor stooped and delved into a split in the gla.s.s to remove a tiny circuit. Once he had finished scrutinising it, he straightened and faced Creben. "A neat explanation, young man, yes, very neat," he said, still a little breathlessly. "But I"m afraid you are incorrect."