Somehow, though, I didn’t think the guns pointed my way were filled with knockout paste. I could almost smell the acid inside, gluey wads of it, that would cling to your skin like tar and eat straight down to the bone.
With simultaneous coughs, the pistols fired.
Standing out in the open up a flight of stairs, two stories above the floor, nothing behind me but a copper-solid wall of pipes and wires… I had nowhere to run. Yes I ducked, and I pulled down Chappalar too, though I knew it wouldn’t help — the whole point of a jelly gun is its splash, its knack for spattering you with droplets even if you dodge from ground zero. In a second I’d be sprayed with burning slush…
…except that Chappalar snapped up his gliders like a membranous shield.
I don’t know how he knew the attack was coming — he had his back to the shooters. Maybe he was just trying to catch his balance after I pulled at him… but his sails spread wide, flat to the incoming wads, and the shots broke against him with a sharp double-splat.
The air blossomed with acid’s bitter reek. Chappalar screamed.
He toppled forward, collapsing onto me — his moaning body so light, the weight was like a flimsy coat stand holding a single burning cloak. Twin splash patterns of acid speckled his back and gliders… and each droplet was starting to smoke, a thousand stringy white streamers smelling of cruel vinegar. I had to get him to safety; and do it fast, in the two seconds the jelly guns took to build up pressure before they could spew another round.
First things first: an instant Mayday over my link-seed and piss on being a nelly about data tumors. Protection Central, I bellowed mentally, defense squad, ambulance, killers! The world-soul was bright enough to fill in the details… like where I was calling from. It could triangulate on my link-seed signals. Meanwhile, I grabbed Chappalar under the armpits, hiked up his arms, and rolled us both straight over the stairs’ guardrail.
We didn’t fall. We didn’t glide. Imagine a wobbly blend of both, me dangling under Chappalar as if he were a crippled parafoil. He was halfway unconscious, but still managed to keep his arms and legs stiff enough for a semicontrolled descent — vectoring down at a steep angle till my feet jarred against the floor. Two staggering steps to catch my balance, then I was running for the exit.
Good points about my situation: Chappalar wasn’t heavy to carry, and I had a head start on the shooters, still back at the stairs.
Bad points: my grip on Chappalar was cramp-awkward — just fingertips under his armpits. My fingers were stopped against the solid web of his gliders, so I couldn’t wrap my arms round his body… lucky for my arms, considering the sticky blobs of acid sizzling their way into his back. (The smell of vinegar smoke. The shuddery whimpers of my friend.)
Another bad point of my position: the shooters had begun to run after me. Arms pumping. Feet pounding the floor like hammers. Only world-class sprinters ever galloped that flat out… certainly not me as I juggled an injured Oolom. The jelly guns must have repressurized by now, and I was easily within range; but the two racing after me must have wanted a point-blank shot, maybe flush in the face to scour away my eyes. That queasy thought spurred me on. I sped through the door to the locker room and slammed it behind me with an adrenaline-fueled kick. Didn’t help.
My pursuers hit the closed door like twin battering rams. The door didn’t just fly open, it snapped off its hinges and hurtled across the room, smashing against a locker, then bouncing off to cuff me a good one in the shoulder. I reeled and lost my grip on Chappalar. Trying to do a dozen things at once — keep my balance, avoid dropping my friend, prevent him from crashing to the floor or against the lockers — I made a hash of damned near everything.
Down I went, the door flipping over on top of me. It was only luck I didn’t fall on Chappalar. He landed beside me in the narrow aisle between lockers, the two of us jammed side by side with the broken door heavy across one of my legs.
Pity the door only covered up to my knee; I could have used some protection for my face.
The shooters stopped at my feet. Their guns lowered and took aim. Two triggers fired simultaneously.
And here’s what I saw: a ghostly tube of light, green and gold and purple and blue, suddenly glimmered into existence before me. The two acid balls flew into that tube… and the tube funneled them up, around, in a smooth arc that led from the pistol mouths, circling over the shooters’ heads, back behind them, and out onto my attackers’ shoulder blades. Acid jelly flew through that misty channel, around the loop; then smack, the two wads slapped into the shooters’ backs, splattering against nearby lockers but missing Chappalar and me.
As fast as it’d materialized, the phantom tube, all its peacock colors, vanished like steam. No evidence it had ever existed… except I was still alive, and the acid balls meant for me had got redirected at the shooters instead.
Their clothes billowed with smoke where the acid struck… as if the gray overalls were catching fire, braised by a flamethrower. The woman spun round, clutching at her back with one hand, but making no sound — no squeal of pain/surprise/outrage. A heartbeat later, I saw why: through clouds of vinegar smoke, metal glittered under her burning clothes.
Steel shoulder blades. Hydraulic muscles. A spine of articulated alloy.
"Christ!" I yelled. Don’t ask me why. Being stalked by assassins was one thing, but it just seemed worse that they were robots.
The woman — the android that looked female — had a case of the writhes, making futile grabs at her back. I snapped out my unblocked foot and caught her with a solid cross-kick in the ankle. Something crunched like celery: not her metal shin, but whatever lay beneath, wires or delicate flexors. She tottered back, off-balance, and grabbed at her male companion. He showed no reaction to getting shot, even though smoke poured off his back in thick white plumes; the splash must have missed everything vital. It was only when his accomplice clutched at him that he shifted his attention away from me. Her grip pulled him sideways with her as she tried not to fall… so I took advantage of the moment to scuttle back on my butt, out from under the door and around the end of the lockers, dragging Chappalar with me.
Three seconds later, I was on my feet again, Chappalar slung like a rug over my shoulder. Another three seconds and I rammed the exit door’s crash bar with my hip.
Donkeys, orts and leaners stared at us curiously as we lurched out into the petting zoo. Thank Mary and all her saints, the animals were the only things in sight — no parents pushing strollers, no schoolchildren parading along on a field trip to the park. I dashed to a nearby leaner and threw myself behind it; its pudgy body wrapped in armadillo hide was the best protection I could find on short notice. With luck, it would shield us from the robots long enough for me to help my friend.
I heaved Chappalar off my shoulder and flopped him down in the snow. Steam gushed up as his back touched the damp surface — the acid gobs must have been blistering hot from the chemical reaction of corroding his skin. I spread out his arms, snow-angel style, tamping down every damaged area of his gliders to give them solid cool contact with the ice below. Soothing, I hoped. It took a strong stomach to look over his injuries: his wing membranes had finger-sized holes eaten clean through them, like plant leaves bitten to rags by beetles.
The edges of the holes were still expanding. I could see them grow as the acid ate outward.
Desperately, I scooped up a handful of snow and smeared it over the upper surface of the membrane, hoping to dilute the corrosive chemicals. Whether it worked or not I don’t know — my attention got pulled away as the leaner suddenly slumped its weight against my back.