“Here, sir.” Giles passed him the brass hand telescope.
Pressing it to his eye, Thorne scanned the suspect area. Through the smoke, a line of figures emerged, marching with the perfect rhythm of machines that never tired. Their metal frames, white and silver, caught the sun like mirrors, flashing cold light through the haze. They moved like a wall that had learned to walk. Not a charge. Not a march. An approach as inevitable as the tide.
“What in the six hells!” Definitely not his citizens—noteven human.
Gunfire faded. For a heartbeat, the battlefield froze. The warring armies stopped to stare. Thorne watched in shock as the units raised weapons, firing streams of light at both Verdancian and Republican alike. Steaming holes punched through bodies. Tanks and cannons exploded. Buildings erupted into flames. The column advanced with the steady certainty of something that had never learned to fear death.
“General Roundtree,” Miles cried into his radio. “Do you see that?” His pulse thundered, and he couldn’t catch his breath. The armored car beside his—the same hardy model—glowed red from the heat of the beam before flipping on its side with an eruption of sparks.
“Yes, and I’m as shocked as you. Forget about the Verdancians. Fire at those.”
The war between nations ended in a heartbeat. The war against the machines had begun.
Miles barked orders to his officers. Sergeant Sander turned right at the next corner, aiming toward the new threat. The machine gunner in the back, shielded by a steel gun-guard, opened fire on the mechanical soldiers. A fresh wave of panic hit Miles as he watched the bullets bounce off.
Noticing renewed gunfire, he glanced out his passenger side window. General Calder had ordered his troops to join in defending against the machines. Miles’ vehicle jolted as a tire blew. Rounds sparked and skipped from the robots’ armor like pebbles thrown at a cliff. They did not flinch. They did not fall. They simply kept coming like a walking sheet of steel.
A flash of light and the world tumbled. Miles seized the grip handle and held on, the sound of scraping metal ringing in his ears.
Lark vaulted the broken barricade like a deer clearing a fallen log. The team stormed into the fight from the rear.
“Go for the legs!” Wes yelled. “Let’s take these suckers down!”
Diego’s bullets did nothing to them. Lark drew her machete and charged in behind the back row. She fell into a slide like a runner stealing home and swung at the knee joint with all her might. The robot toppled forward with a crash, its severed legs still twitching in the dust.
“That’s it!” Wes shouted. “Those hydraulic cables are protected behind the armor, but there’s a weakness at the back of the knees—probably under the armpits as well.”
Harlan dropped to one knee, aimed for the sensitive joint, and fired. The machine stumbled. He hit the other knee, bringing it down. The unit tried to rise again, clawing at the pavement like a beetle turned on its back.
As if receiving a new order, both disabled robots twisted their torsos and aimed at the VERT team. Lark rolled behind a half-demolished wall, feeling the heat from the beam that missed her. The others took cover as well.
“Diego,” Luke called. “C-4 and blast caps.”
Diego crouched behind a century-old oak and dug through his pack. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”
“I should do it,” Lark said, glancing across at her comrades. “I love ya, bro, but you’ve got the agility of a tortoise.”
“We’ll both give it a shot,” Luke said. Diego smirked at Lark and handed her two blocks and caps.
“Have you ever handled this?” he asked. “It isn’t kids’ clay.”
“Just show me.”
Diego ran through the basics with Lark and Luke in a thirty-second speed lesson. The two nimblest team members exchanged nods and raced from behind cover. The machines’ attention had returned to their primary targets, and they didn’t notice the two approach. Lark plunged the small blasting caps into balls of plastic explosive, rolled between two units, slapped the sticky C-4 into the backs of their knees, pushed the arming buttons, and raced away in a zigzagpattern. They pivoted in unison, their blank faces angled eerily toward her. Then their legs blew off, sending them crashing to the ground.
Luke tried something different, slapping his C-4 onto their necks. Sure enough, the heads blew off; however, they continued marching and firing their weapons. Lark grinned as she watched them blast two of their own, four, six, before their fellow robots shot back, silencing the decapitated units.
“That works too,” Luke called with a laugh.
“Get their laser guns,” Wes said.
Running in a crouch, Skye and Harlan raced past the downed units, snatching up the weapons. Stray bullets meant for the robots skittered across the paving and bounced off buildings. Lark started, her pulse pounding, when Skye hollered, “Ow!” and almost dropped the laser rifles. Twirling behind a solid wall, she stopped, breathing heavy, and lowered the weapons to the ground. Lark dashed to her.
“Are you hit?” She grabbed Skye’s arm, examining it.
“Just grazed.” Blood soaked through her shirt sleeve, but, otherwise, Skye seemed fine.
“Look!” Luke pointed toward Highcrest Hall. A column of mechanical soldiers filed their way up the winding incline toward Lord Calder’s castle. Republican and Verdancian forces alike fired at them without slowing their unyielding march.