Chapter 340

Palget moved down the tunnel with the the Terran known as Sergeant Purohit, dragging the heavy flexible pipe behind him. Two green mantids and a pair of black mantid scurried along next to him, all four of them were dressed in combat armor and hurrying to keep up with Sergeant Purohit's long strides.

"We'll use the matter reclamation system to pull the debris out, see if the tunnel collapsed because of the sheer weight of our visitor or if there was some part of it that extrudes further out from the hull that was driven into the ground by the crash," the Sergeant was saying.

Palget just nodded, triggering his assent tab with his chin, panting and sweating as he pulled the hose behind him. The Sergeant was carrying a heavy pack with a heavier looking gun-like apparatus.

He kind of understood what the system would do. The beam would tear apart the matter, using opposing charges, pull the vaporized matter up the beam, into the magnetic 'funnel', which would pour the matter into the hose. The hose would then suck it back the massive matter tanks back in the parking garage.

Palget and the two black mantids were to be on overwatch while the big Terran and the two green mantids were running the system.

He had to admit, he had been frightened when a quick check had shown that all of the tunnels leading from the parking garage had collapsed. He had envisioned having to clear the tunnels by hand to get out, but the Terrans had simply approached it from a different angle.

The rubble was up ahead. Huge chunks of ferrocrete, twisted piping and hot wires, chunks of random metal, and gravel.

Palget dropped the hose with a gasp, leaning against the wall. He watched as one of the greenies went up to the cables and tapped them with a bladearm. After a moment it climbed down putting up icons of a thumb pointing down.

"All right, let's get this done. On the clock, guys," the Terran said. He connected the hose to the pack on his back, then hefted the gun-like apparatus. "Here. We. Go."

On the last word he triggered it. It let out a loud whining noise, but Palget could see the beam was rapidly digging into the debris even as the thick gray fog swirled into the funnel. The hose started thumping as the gaseous matter was pulled down the hose.

"Neat, huh?" one of the black mantids said, putting a cigarette in their mandibles.

"Huh?" Palgret said, jerking his attention to the mantid.

The mantid lit his cigarette, which had red bands on it, then exhaled a cloud of smoke. He held up the cigarette. "Anti-radiation. Looks weird, but it gets it into your lungs and straight into your bloodstream to counteract any rad exposure," the Mantid said. He waved a bladearm at the human. "Kind of cool, huh? Just disintegrate the rubble, suck it back to the matter tanks, use it to make guns."

"Weird," Palgret admitted.

The Mantid chuckled. "Yeah, humans are kind of weird."

"I can hear you," the human said, shifting his aim.

One of the green mantids made a sharp motion and the beam cut off. There was silence for a moment as the green mantid slowly moved up and into the hole the beam had made. After a minute he came back, icons flashing above his head too fast for Palgret to understand.

"Battlesteel, huh? Ours, the Lanks, or the clankers?" Sergeant Purohit asked. More icons flashing. "Are you sure?" more flashing. "All right, all right, I believe you, Technical Sergeant. I'm going to get asked the same question."

A few more flashing icons.

"All right, back to clearing it," the human said.

"Hey," Palgret said, motioning at the mantid smoking the cigarette to get his attention.

"Sup?" the Mantid asked.

"Doesn't the Precursor Autonomous War Machines of this class have like fifty foot thick armor?" he asked.

"So?" The Mantid asked.

"Well, it's battlesteel. How are we going to get through it? Or are we going under it?" Palgret asked.

"We go under it, when we exit, we're going to be right in front of its waistline guns. We stay here, we're going to get killed when it takes an orbital shot, if we fight our way into it and blow the strategic thinking array, that's one more clanker out of the fight," the Mantid said.

"But, it's fifty foot thick armor," Palgret said.

The Mantid waved at the human. "So? We've got a half dozen humans. Worse comes to worse, I don't know, they can chew through it or something. Maybe draw a dick on it, that always helps."

"Har dee har har," the human said.

Palgret was quiet while the human kept working, the beam whining and humming and the hose pulsing as it moved the matter away.

"Oops," the human said, suddenly snapping off the beam.

"Oops? What do you mean, oops?" the Mantid asked.

Palgret saw the Mantids all ready their weapons and grabbed his rifle, pulling it around and putting his fingers on the safety lever.

"Um, apparently a hatch opened and ripped into the ground. I might, and I mean might, have just torn off part of what looks like an nCv cannon," the human said.

"Well don't just stand there looking at it, tear the rest away before it fires it and kills us all," the black mantid that had been mostly silent said.

"We've got out access point, get the local troops up here," the human said, triggering the beam. "Wow, silicon, iridium, palladium, all kinds of good stuff."

The black Mantid activated his helmet, it covering his triangular head quickly. "Get ready," he said.

Palgret took cover behind a large chunk of ferrocrete. One of the green mantids moved next to him, crouching down and unlimbering a tiny rocket launcher. The two black mantids took cover, while the other green one climbed on the human's back.

"There, I just ripped up the chamber. Wow, they use snub-nose barrels, it's barely thirty feet long. There goes the feed mechanism," the human said. He clicked it off. "I think I hit a maintenance space."

The green mantid on his shoulder jumped off, deploying little wings from the back of the armor. It spiralled up into the fog filled hole.

Palgret tensed, feeling this thumbs cramp up slightly.

After a few long minutes the green mantid came gliding back down in a spiral, landing on the human's shoulder.

"All right, 528 tossed a couple dozen mapping drones up through the maintenance access. Let's get a good map of this sucker," the human said.

"Don't you have maps from other ones?" Palgret asked.

--not all same-- the little greenie at his feet transmitted onto his visor. --different factories-missions-designs--

"Oh," Palgret said.

--always asky ask question-- the greenie said. --only dumb query is query not queried--

Palgret nodded slowly. Over the last few days he had come to appreciate just how intelligent the green ones were. They weren't savants, or caste workers with minds full of nothing but their bred-in jobs, but highly intelligent creatures, just focused.

He'd gotten used to intense focus after being around the Terrans for a few days.

"Damn, this one's a big one," the human muttered over the local talk channel. "Looks like the maintenance bots are busy somewhere else. Maybe engine damage? Not detecting stable power in the cabling in the walls either."

"Platoon coming in," Palgret's Platoon Leader, Lieutenant Mu'ucru'u said over the channel. The Lanaktallan sounded stressed.

Palgret held position even after the rest of the platoon came jogging up. They had another human with them, this one followed by a half dozen drones easily big enough for another human to hide inside of.

Palgret's squad leader knelt down next to him. "Anything?" he asked.

Palgret shook his head. "The Terrans ripped right through fifty feet of armor like it wasn't there then sent in mapping drones. Said it's a big one."

"Got a manufacturing bay. Everything's thrown everywhere, looks like it was building assault vehicles. No repairs going on, no power," the human said. "Lots of smashed junk, I'm pretty sure this one crashed."

Palgret could feel the tension in the air and recited the mantras he had been trained in. He doublechecked his gear, including the Terran additions, and waited, still crouched down behind the piece of ferrocrete. Most of the platoon was gathered up in a group, chatting among themselves while the Lieutenant stood next to the Terran, who was still crouched down.

"Get your men into cover," one of the black mantids grated out, unfolding his helmet so he could light another cigarette. "Never know when a clanker is going to jump out at you."

"Excuse me?" Palgret's squad leader asked, standing up and turning around to face the black mantid, who was putting his cigarette lighting device away. "I think..."

Palgret would never be able to explain exactly how he knew, only that he somehow knew what was about to happen next.

He reached out, grabbed the back of his squad leader's equipment belt, and yanked him down.

The HV round missed Palgret's squad leader by fractions of an inch, the ZWEEP-KRAK! and bright yellow line close enough to bubble the top layer of the laminate of the squad leader's helmet.

"CONTACT!" the Terran yelled, turning toward where the wall of the tunnel was collapsing. "MULTIPLE CONTACTS!"

The tunnel erupted in the thunder of gunfire.