The goobots did what I’d intended them to do—hit and explode into goo that covered her suit, and most important, the symbols that glowed on the armored plates, all of them.
I’d switched off direct visuals the moment I saw the glow, viewing her with a composite of sonics and thermal. She was a bit fuzzy, but goobots, much like hand grenades, didn’t demand precision.
Still hovering, Gordon stared at Vaughn, breathing without saying anything as if he were having trouble composing himself—or maybe he didn’t know what to say.
When he did talk, he barked out, “Don’t move,” as if we hadn’t gotten that message the first time.
Then he added, “I’ve called in my team,” which was interesting because I hadn’t seen him talking into a mic or typing anything. Continue reading Roll the Dice: Part 4→
Sean gave me a digital thumbs up on my message as I pulled the door shut behind us. The door locked behind me as HQ’s computer noted the zones of defenses going up behind us as we left.
The tunnel had once been used to dump either sewage or industrial wastewater into Grand Lake—maybe both. We walked across the faded brick, the tunnel’s height forcing me to lower my head.
Looking back toward Amy and me and then forward to Cassie and Jaclyn, Vaughn said, “Our best shot is to walk out looking confident.” Continue reading Roll The Dice: Part 3→
As the Rocket suit’s systems registered and passed their tests, I thought about the black and blue marks on my body. The Rocket suit’s medical technology was more about immediate first aid than internal diagnosis.
The Xiniti implant on the other hand was all about being internal. It had detected and healed my sword wound. Even if it had wanted to fill me full of cybernetics, it seemed to have just closed the wounds, internal and external.Continue reading Roll the Dice: Part 1→
“Uh… Yeah. I can see how you’d feel that way and, honestly, you’re right,” I stood up, feeling the beginning of a headache and some pain as I stood, the spots where I hurt corresponding to where the creature bit me.
Unlike almost everyone else, I’d been too busy to throw on my costume, making me tempted to pull up my shirt or pull down my pants to check for physical marks.
This wasn’t the moment for checking. I could do that before I put on the Rocket suit, but I did want to know. Continue reading Isolation: Part 12→
Jaclyn stepped forward, “I don’t want to be ‘that guy,’ but weren’t we going to try to see what we could do to slow things down and give the Nine’s puppets some space so they could be flexible? That was the plan last night.”
“I know. You’re right. We were going to do that,” Haley said, “And that’s not the only thing we need to think about. Lim called this morning… If we go in and people die, the public could end up on Major Justice’s side just because they don’t expect us to kill people.” Continue reading Isolation: Part 9→
I could see how Major Justice or the Nine might have come up with the idea though. Having people barrage you with requests that you surrender, some of them people you know… Well, it didn’t feel good.
Knowing that it had to be a ploy took a bit of the edge off, but I wondered if they’d done this before and to whom.
Then another thought hit me, “If you all are getting deluged with texts like I am right now, forward them all to Hal.” Continue reading Isolation: Part 7→
Kals talked with Julie in a low voice, using words that were a mixture of English and Ascendancy. The Ascendancy was straight jargon transliterated or translated into English. Even the Xiniti implants couldn’t translate it very well, turning most of the words into sound waveforms—which I could maybe figure out her strategy given time, but not in the moment. I still needed more context.
The words themselves still didn’t make it clearer. An example? Kals said, “I’ll need you to do eight high mind squirts in a row in the low mind zug pattern I taught you earlier.”
