Now. The other Two-Legs was still crouched behind one of Woodcarver's packs. Shreck took the human child in paw and jaw. He and one of Tyrathect hustled the protesting children down the stairs. As they departed, Tyrathect was already embellishing on Steel's story, reporting on the troops it could see from below the crest of the hill. "Blow up the lesser powder dump," Steel hissed at the departing Shreck. That dump was near empty, but its destruction might persuade the spacers where words could not. After they were gone, Steel stood for an instant, silent and shivering. He had never seen disaster so narrowly avoided. Along the ramparts, his archers were showering arrows upon the enemy pack and the Two-Legs. Damn. They were almost out of range. In the castle yard, Shreck detonated the lesser dump. The explosion was a satisfying one, much louder than an artillery hit. One of the inner towers was blown apart. Flying rock showered the yard,
复件 (73) air max2, the smallest pieces reaching all the way to where Steel stood on the ramparts. Ravna's voice was shouting in swift Samnorsk, too fast for Steel to understand. Now all the planning, all the hopes,
复件 (31) air max2, all balanced on a knife edge. He must bet everything: Steel leaned a shoulder close to the comm and said, "Sorry. Things go fast here. Many more Woodcarver come up under smoke. Can you kill all on hillside?" Could the mantises see through smoke? That was part of the gamble. The gunner's voice came back,
复件 (32) air max, "I can try. Watch this." A third voice, thready and narrow even by human standards: "It will be fifty seconds more, Sir Steel. We're having trouble turning." Good. Concentrate on your flying and your killing. Don't look at your victims too carefully. The archers had driven the human back, part way under the cover of smoke. Other packs were rushing out to protect her. By the time the Visitors circled back, there would be lots of targets, the human lost among them. Two of him caught sight of the spacer floating down through the haze. The Visitors would have no clear view of what they were shooting at. Pale light flickered from beneath the craft. A scythe swept across the hillside toward Woodcarver's troops. Pham was bounced around his perch as Blueshell turned the boat back to the target. They weren't moving fast; the airstream couldn't have been more than thirty meters per second. But every second was full of the damnedest jerks and tumbles. At one point Pham's grip on the gun mount was all that kept him indoors. Forty some hours from now the deadliest thing in the universe is going to arrive, and I'm taking potshots at dogs. How to take out the hillside? Steel's whiny voice still echoed in his ears. And Ravna wasn't sure what OOB was seeing beneath all the smoke. We might do better without automation than with this bastard mix. At least his beamer had a manual control. Pham embraced the barrel with one arm while he reached with the other. At wide dispersion the beam was useless against armor, but could burst eyes and set skin and hair afire -- and the beam width would be dozens of meters across at ground level. "Fifteen seconds,
复件 (8) air max, Sir Pham," Blueshell's voice came in his ear. They were low this time. Gaps in the smoke flickered past like stop-action art. Most of the ground was burned-over black,
复件 (7) air max, but there were precipices of ########## rock and even sooty patches of snow trapped in crannies and shadowed pits.... Here and there was a pile of doggy bodies, an occasional gun tube. "There's a crowd of them ahead,
mbt fanaka black, Sir Pham. Running near the castle." Pham leaned down and looked forward. The mob was about four hundred meters ahead.
mbt fanaka black
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