Shared Experience (Part 3)

SHARED EXPERIENCE

Part 3 of 3

Christopher Stasheff

Titan came out only a hundred yards from the ring of ships. From this point forth, he would almost doubtlessly be seen. He didn't light his jet, but he shot forward at full engine acceleration, guns poised and ready, his Hellbore already tracking his chosen ship.

At fifty yards, he opened fire, but he did not stop.

The harpy ship did not realize what was happening at first. By the time its sensors screamed the alarm, a patch of armor was already glowing red. Even then, it did not move—no doubt its inhabitants were trying to discover where the beam was coming from.

A hundred harpies shot toward him with shrill cries—into communicators, no doubt. They sheered off, but his side guns began to mow them ruthlessly, even as the alien ship finally began to revolve.

Too slowly.

At last, two other ships shot to its rescue, sliding between Titan and his quarry, leveling their fire at him—but he was now so close that their shots went wide, and the only way to interpose themselves between him and his target, was to get so close that his Hellbore tore through the ship's skin in a matter of minutes. The harpy ship shot away, but too late—Titan tracked it, and its bottom exploded out even as it fled. Titan didn't stay to look—he swung back to the other "rescuer," even though it was already retreating, angling away, trying to take up a position from which its guns could actually strike at him. But the jockeying interfered with its evasive action, and it forgot to rotate; Titan's beam centered on its vulnerable spot even as it rained fire on him. The ablative tiles shed the plasma even as the ship, finally realizing its predicament, began to revolve—and of course, its beam could not hold steady on Titan.

But his could.

His could, and the harpy ship had waited too long to rotate. It blew, and rained shrapnel on the huge machine—but Titan turned back to his first victim even as its cannon leveled at him, ignoring nine of the harpy ships that came crowding around—he could afford to ignore them; there were too many to come close enough to do damage. Instead, he took careful aim into the egg's own guns, and fired.

The egg blew up, and Titan took off running across the valley floor. He lit his jet and shot forward, jouncing and bouncing—bouncing too hard; he realized he could easily go over at this speed. He cut the jet—he had gained enough distance anyway—and realized, with surprise, that the enemy ships were milling about behind him in a search pattern.

Of course! They had been following the light and heat of his jet, and with it gone, they were slow to resort to their electromagnetic detectors to find him. Realizing that, he shot away from his previous path, swinging wide around the valley to come at the nine survivors from a new angle.

A hill rose before him—good! It would be first a firing platform, then a shield. He ground up its slope—almost directly beneath a harpy egg. He leveled his gun…

And a cloud of harpies descended shrieking upon him.

He fired anyway, his beam burning through a dozen harpies on its way to score the ship. His side guns leveled more of them, and his computer busily traced each separate burning body. The ship lingered, unable to resist the temptation to stamp out this presumptuous bug—and the presumptuous bug shifted tactics, slamming a shell up to follow its own bright beam, a shell that exploded against weakened armor, that blew through the lower part of the hull, and the ship tumbled out of the sky.

Titan reversed engines and shot down the hill. Still the harpies clung to him, shrieking and crying into their communicators, so that their ships would not lose the monster this time. Titan burned them apart and blew them out of the air, but a dozen more came for each he slew.

The eight remaining harpy ships shot toward him, lightning smashing down…

Into the shielding earth of the slope.

But Titan was away from the hill already, running down and into the river. The darkness hid his exit, and the water hid the traces of his heat. The harpy ships did not even realize he had gone; indeed, when he surfaced half a kilometer downstream, the great eggs were gathered around the hill, busily pulverizing it with plasma-bolts.

* * *

They had been hiking for half an hour before the harpy patrol found them.

The saurians pounced, shrieking what were no doubt obscenities in Harpy. Larry dropped to one knee, bringing up his bazooka. "Hit the dirt!"

But Dawn was already kneeling, taking aim at the left hand side of the line and squeezing the trigger—very awkwardly, but very effectively. The gun stuttered, and Dawn was amazed at the lightness of the recoil—but then, they would have had to have perfect recoil-less weapons, if they were going to fire them from the wing.

Recoil-less and light, but very effective. The harpies seemed to stumble in mid-air, then pitched forward, falling in series as Dawn's gun traversed the line, falling down to earth with horrible screams, revealing…

A knot of larger harpies in the middle of the flock.

Larry's bazooka roared, and the knot exploded.

Slowly, Dawn lowered her weapon, staring at the rain of ash. She had seen it hundreds of times before, on the visual monitor in their bunker—but never with her naked eyes, or so nearby.

"The poor wretches," Larry whispered.

"They had it coming." Dawn shoved pity behind her and pushed herself to her feet. "Or would you rather have let them do it to you?"

"No," Larry said slowly, "all things considered, if it had to be us or them, I'd rather it was them."

"How kind of you," Dawn said witheringly, "and you may be sure they felt the same way. Come on—we've got miles to cover."

Larry went along, wondering what had happened to the more gentle emotions in her.

Of course, he knew what had happened to them in himself. There are fatalities in every war, and nobility and generosity are high on the list. In his case, he was sure they had just gone underground for the duration—and he hoped it wasn't any worse than that, for Dawn. After all, she herself had been safe so far—not captured or wounded, or mistreated…

So far.

He resolved to do what he could to make sure she wouldn't be.

He had just come to that conclusion when a horrendous shrieking and cawing split the air. His hand snapped up, and he saw what had to be a hundred harpies descending on them. Their bias held, even though it had been the undoing of so many of them, so often— they would rather use their talons than their guns.

Wrong choice. He dropped to one knee, leveled the rocket launcher, and loosed a flaming round into their midst. A huge flash lit the immediate sky, and scraps of bone and leather rained down—but the shrieking went on; there were just too many of them.

As the glare died, Dawn's machine gun went to work. The harpies fell in a neat line, then fell again as she traversed backward. Larry's bazooka roared, and the flash lit the sky again. The rain was continuous now.

Finally, the harpies realized they had to use their weapons. Mechanical chattering ripped the night from a dozen guns.

"Get down!" Larry caught Dawn to him and hugged her hard as he dropped down, then rolled over on top of her, waiting for the terrible pain, hoping it would be short-lived, hoping their bullets couldn't penetrate through his body into hers…

A huge roar filled the night, a roar with a thousand echoes, and suddenly the chattering was quiet, and the only sound was the distant booming where the harpies fought the fort.

Larry decided he was still alive, and risked a peek

"Let me up, you fool!" Dawn snapped.

But Larry was frozen staring up—and up, and up, at the huge battle machine that towered over him, as tall as a building, a very large building, as high as the sky…

"What is it? I can't see anything but your collarbone!"

"It's a Bolo," Larry whispered, unbelieving.

Dawn struggled out from under him enough to see, and stare. "It is a Bolo! But how…"

The huge machine began to move. It rumbled straight toward them.

"No, wait!" Larry cried, waving frantically. "We're good guys, we're on your side…"

But the Bolo's noise drowned out his voice, and all he could think as the huge treads passed to either side of him and the vast underside became the sky, was that the world had gone crazy, because this very machine had just saved them from a horde of harpies, and here it was running them over…

But the machine stopped, and its bottom was six feet overhead. The huge treads were a dozen meters or more to either side.

"How… what…?" Dawn wasn't sure which one of them had said it.

Then a huge trapdoor slid open, and light spilled down from above them. "Get in, little allies," a rich amplified voice said. "You need shelter."

"You were never more right in your life!" Larry scrambled to his feet and made a stirrup again. "It's the cavalry, Dawn! Up and in!"

She didn't stay to argue, just stepped into the stirrup and caught the edge of the trap as he lifted. She vaulted in—no straining or struggling here, where all was clear and clean—and spun about to reach down for Larry. He had already leaped high, though, and caught the edge of the door; she only had to help pull him aboard when his knee came over the edge.

The trap slid shut and the huge machine rumbled into motion with the two of them inside, safe in a warm, carpeted room, with the sounds of cannon fire dimmed by heavy armor. For a little while, the war was shut out; for a little while, they were safe inside again.

Dawn rolled over and hid her face in his shoulder. Her whole body began to tremble.

Amazed, Larry brought his arms up around her. "Hey, no fair," he whispered. "I was about to get the shakes."

"Too late," she sniffled. "My turn."

"Well, okay." He patted her back. "Get it out of your system. Then you can hold me while 1 fall apart."

She did.

* * *

Titan crept up quietly, sneaking close.

A dozen harpies burst on him out of the darkness, screaming in dreadful rage and loosing rockets, and bolts from energy rifles.

The bolts scarred his carapace, of course, but did no other damage. Titan's guns rattled, his projectors enveloped him in fire. When it died, only ashes remained. Titan did a quick scan of the area and was amazed to find it empty. Had he slain the last of the aliens?

His computer began to tally the dead it had seen and heard reported, but the great ships had seen the commotion and heard the alarm that their progeny had given their lives to raise. They swung away from the hill and out toward Titan, no doubt cursing this temerarious mite that had the audacity to survive.

The mite turned and ran; if he had been human, he would have cursed the luck that had spoiled his sneak attack. In darkness and over unfamiliar territory, he didn't dare light his jet; instead he ran, scanning on infrared, at full velocity.

The ships were slow to gain acceleration, but they were gaining indeed.

Titan fled, searching for some sort of cover, something to make a diversion, searching his database for any nearby human installations that might still be inhabited, and therefore must be avoided.

He found instead a building that was probably empty of life, but nonetheless something very much to be sought.

* * *

When Dawn and Larry had readjusted to temporary safety, they investigated their surroundings. They were in the crew compartment that was still built into every Bolo, even though it was rarely used—in fact, to the right of the control console glowed a large green rectangle with the word "auto" on it. Below it was a red rectangle marked "Manual Override," but it was dark, and behind a pane of glass. A small hammer hung next to it, with the notation, "In case of emergency, break glass."

"Does this qualify as an emergency?" Larry asked.

"Only for us," Dawn answered. "The Bolo seems to know what he's doing."

"You are aboard Mark XXVIII Bolo Titan," the rich voice informed them. "Please strap yourselves in securely."

Dawn stared blankly. "What?"

Larry caught an arm around her and pulled her toward the large, padded chairs. "Come on! The ride's going to get rough!"

That was an understatement. They jumped for the chairs and strapped themselves in, just before the floor started to bounce and heave beneath them.

"What is this—the roller coaster?" Larry called.

"No, just a very fast ride." Dawn nodded at the screen. "Look."

Larry did. There was an array of screens before him. The largest was central, showing a view of what lay ahead of Titan. At the moment, the scene was very dark, but Larry could make out some landmarks that had become familiar in the past couple of weeks, though only seen on his viewscreens. Now, though, they were moving—past him, and rapidly.

"What's he running from?"

"Look behind," Dawn said in a stranded tone, pointing at another screen. It was right above, but smaller, and showed the rear view.

Larry caught his breath. "What is that—the whole Harpy navy?"

"What is left of it, I believe," Titan answered. "Do not be afraid if they fire upon us. I am very heavily shielded. The heat may become oppressive, but my cooling system is excellent, and you will not be in danger."

Larry just stared, but Dawn remembered her manners. "Thank you, Titan. That's very reassuring."

Suddenly the view whirled; just looking at it gave Larry motion sickness—but he could feel the movement, too, as Titan slewed about. His stomach had barely adjusted to it when the forward acceleration began again.

"He's going back toward the ships!" Larry yelled, terrified.

"Let's hope he knows what he's doing," Dawn called back, her teeth gritted.

Then the screens filled with fire, and Larry clenched the arms of the chair for all he was worth, thinking crazily that Titan seemed to feel it necessary to prove how good his air conditioning was. But the screens cleared again, and they were racing over the night landscape once more.

"He bluffed them!" Dawn cried. "He went right through their fire and came out the other side!"

"Neat," Larry said, numb. "Let's hope he doesn't have to try it a second time."

Dawn shrugged. "Won't matter. Harpies learn slow."

Larry had noticed that, himself. He recognized the behavior from arrogant teenagers he'd known in high school. They were so sure of their own superiority that they couldn't believe anyone outside their own group could know anything worth their learning—so they didn't. "Cultural superiority complex," he quipped.

"Is that what they call it?" Dawn asked.

Larry stared, surprised, then shrugged. "Don't know. Just an idea."

"Oh," Dawn said, with scorn. "Got any facts?"

The Bolo ground to a halt so suddenly as to slam them into their belts; then the room spun about them. Well, no, actually—they were spinning with it. But it was so fast and so sudden that it seemed to be the other way around.

Larry stared at the viewscreen to kill the sensation of movement and the nausea it was raising, but all he could see were legs of lightning, not very far away, with great dark eggs on top.

There was a lance of light skewering one of those eggs, and it seemed to be coming from a little way above the viewscreen.

"He's attacking!" Larry yelped. "The fool machine's actually trying to take on that clutch of eggs!"

"This unit is programmed to destroy as many enemies as possible, whenever possible," the Bolo informed him.

"But not when it's suicidal!"

"I will not die, nor will you."

"I just wish he could be sure of that," Dawn whispered.

Titan must have overheard her, but he did not reply.

Fire sheeted down the screen.

"Think it's getting hot in here?" Larry said nervously.

"Just in your mind," Dawn retorted. "Come from looking at that screen." But Larry noticed she didn't glance at the temperature gauge.

There was a sudden blinding flash that washed the screen in pure white.

"He's blind!" Larry shouted.

"No he's not," Dawn grated, "just us."

Then their insides roiled as the tank swung about again and shot into motion. The acceleration pressed them back into the cushions, and Larry kept telling himself the chairs were built sturdily enough so that they wouldn't break, no matter what the acceleration was.

The screen cleared, and he saw they were racing through the countryside; dimly perceived shapes were whipping by them. The glare from the distant battle showed them a scene of ruin and carnage all about.

The Bolo stopped, whirled, and the lance of fire stabbed out from above the screen again. Larry pried himself away from the side of his chair. "I sure hope he's not picking on any more ships!"

"Why not?" Dawn said bitterly. "At least we've lived a few minutes longer than we would have if he hadn't rescued us."

Suddenly, the screen was filled with leathery bodies—then with fire. The rain of ashes began. Then the blinding flash washed the screen again, and the room spun about them once more.

"I'm beginning to feel like a martini in a shaker," Dawn groaned.

"Better than feeling like an egg in the frying pan we left," Larry said, hoping it was a comfort.

"This egg is feeling pretty broken, thank you! How did I get into this centrifuge?"

"Through the floor," Larry answered.

"Down, quickly!" Titan told them.

They didn't wait for explanations; they just scrambled out of their belts and down from the chairs, but Dawn protested as she moved. "This can't be all that safe!"

"We will be passing only a kilometer from the fort," Titan told her. "I must drop you very soon, for I do not think I can stand against these ships indefinitely. You will have a short but hazardous walk to the fort, but I believe you should be able to deal with any problems you encounter."

Larry hesitated just as he was about to throw himself to the floor, then spun and grabbed two blast rifles from the rack on the wall. Titan lurched, and Larry more fell than jumped to the carpet.

"Do not lie on the trapdoor," Titan warned them.

"Don't worry," Dawn assured him. "We're not."

Suddenly, the tank jarred to a halt, and Larry's stomach went hollow, afraid that the Bolo had run into some opponent it couldn't knock aside. His imagination quailed at the thought of what that enemy might look like—but Titan was saying, "Down, now, and lie low—I will lead the enemy away from you! Good luck, small allies!"

The trap door's latch clunked, and it dropped open.

"Thanks, Titan!" Dawn called, and dropped through the hatch.

"Good luck to you!" Larry called, and followed her.

They threw themselves flat on the ground, and Dawn shrieked, "Hold me!"

At that point in time, there was nothing Larry wanted to do more. He couldn't fight, he couldn't run, and the feel of another human body would be awfully comforting. He wrapped her in his arms and lay huddled around her as the huge machine ground away from them, leaving them naked to the night. Minutes later, thunder swelled and lightning stabbed down not two meters from them—but it didn't hit them, only left a stink of ozone as the alien ships passed by. Harpies scurried in their wake, but didn't notice the humans who were trying to disappear into the ground—their attention was all on Titan.

Then they were gone, but Larry just stayed put, wrapped around Dawn with arms and legs both. Finally, her voice came muffled: "I think we'd better get going."

"Do we have to?" Larry asked plaintively. "It's so nice and cozy here."

They lay alone and uncovered in the middle of a plain of death, but Dawn said, "I know what you mean. If we don't make it to the fort before the ships finish with Titan, though, there won't be anything left of us to be cozy."

"But if I let go, I'll never get to hold you like this again."

Dawn lay very still in his arms for a moment, then said, "We're in the middle of a war, you know. We could be dead any minute."

"All the more reason to hold on while I can."

"Look," she said, exasperated, "if we make it to the fort, I promise you can hold me again. Will you let me up now?"

"Oh, I guess so," Larry sighed. He uncurled, and Dawn sprang to her feet. He was a little slower getting up, but when he did, he said, "Here," and handed her a rifle.

She stared at it. "Where did you get these? They're even built for people!"

"Off Titan's emergency arms rack," Larry said. "This is what they're for. Come on, the fort's that way."

They could tell, because the sky was still bright with the cannon shots from the fort—but they were shooting at a fleeing enemy.

"What happened to all the ships that were shooting at the fort?" Dawn wondered.

"They've gone after Titan," Larry said. "We're not the only ones he was leading them away from."

"But why? Why would they need to go after a lone Bolo when they've got a fort they have to destroy?"

"Pride." Larry shrugged. "They can't stand to see a Bolo blow up a few of them and get away with it. Besides, the fort will still be there when they're done with the Bolo, but it might not work the other way around."

"No, it wouldn't, would it?" Dawn said softly. "The Bolo would run and hide. But they can be sure it would come back."

Larry nodded. "Come back again, and again, and again—until they were all dead. No, on second thought, if I were commanding those enemy ships, I'd probably go after Titan, too."

"I hope he survives," Dawn said softly.

"So do I," Larry said, "but even if he doesn't, he wasn't alive in the first place. All he really cares about is finishing the job he was set to do."

"But he can't! There are too many of them!"

"He doesn't know that," Larry said softly. "Maybe he can't, but we can."

"What? Finish the job for him? There can't be even two thousand humans left on this planet!"

"If he takes enough of them with him, we just might do for the rest." Larry held out his hand. "Come on. Let's get to the fort. We've got a job to do—and you've got a promise to keep."

"I might ask for a promise from you before I keep mine," she warned him.

"And I just might be willing to give it. Let's go get safe so we can find out, okay?"

And they set off across the wasted landscape, hand in hand, but very vigilant.

* * *

Titan swerved, running with a purpose now—but not too apparent a purpose. He took evasive action, zigging and zagging with the most randomized pattern he had, switching between two other patterns constantly for good measure—but it took far more time than a straight-line course, and the ships were gaining.

They were almost upon him when the low concrete mound rose before him. All to the better—he alone could not blast through that bunker in anything resembling time enough, let alone melt through the shielding beneath. He lurched up onto the structure and halted dead center, cannon rotating and elevating to target the nearest ship. He knew what he must do, knew the probability of survival was so low as to be negligible—but he had to do it anyway; it was the only chance. He poured fire into the harpy ship, and it began to dodge through evasive maneuvers, rotating and hitting the proper rate instantly—so the saurians could learn, after all! Slowly, handicapped by their own assumption of superiority, but they learned.

Two other ships instantly broke off to bob and weave about the target ship, becoming a three-body system, each absorbing some of Titan's fire so that none would be destroyed. It was useless; Titan left off and swerved to take aim at another.

But they had taken aim at him, too. Three huge harpy ships crouched over him, pouring down lightning. He shot back, but they were moving just enough so that his bolts missed their tubes.

He could feel his tiles cracking.

The heat shivered the concrete beneath him.

Finally, one shell slammed into a harpy tube, and the cannon blew up, taking the ship with it—but another swung into its place.

More lightning poured down on Titan, but he held grimly to his purpose, slamming his own bolts back upward, aiming for a cannon-mouth, but they danced and swerved erratically…

With a roar, the concrete gave way. The alloy steel beneath it, already hot, glowed red. The heat beat up at Titan in waves; he could feel his own belly-plates melting…

But the alloy was melting, too. Suddenly, it went, and Titan sank down into a mire of molten steel—down and down, still firing up at the enemy until the lake of liquid metal closed over his cannon, melting his gun barrels, melting his Hellbore, too, and his treads, and his shielding…

But the liquid steel poured down into the complex below, the installation it had protected, and melted shielding there, too—lead shielding, which boiled in seconds, and the graphite rods beneath—the graphite rods that had made a chain reaction manageable, that had controlled the furious continuing explosion of pure plutonium in the ancient nuclear fission reactor, built by the planet's first colonists but still operating, still fueled…

Still lethal.

Before Titan's shielding was quite gone, before memory banks could melt, before his silicon chips had begun to turn to slag, the reactor core beneath his melted down. It blew, and it blew high and wide—high enough to reach the ships that had torched it, wide enough to atomize them all—and as he died, Titan knew that he had kept his promises.

THE END