She’d half expected the towering cyborg to remain fixed in place. That she’d be too weak to cause any upset to his position. But Sebastian promptly lost his balance and stepped aside.
He recovered and spun his torso around to look at her. Though most of his face was in darkness, the light from outside caught at his eyes, and from the malevolent way they glinted, she had the distinct impression he was going to shoot her down where she stood. She was really regretting holstering her pistol.
But then a clanging sound diverted both of their eyes to the entrance. A robotic hand had latched onto the lip. Another appeared, and Horatio clambered into view, with Will hanging on behind him: Will gripped the two straps of the robot’s backpack, and kept his legs firmly wrapped around the sack’s lower portion.
Sebastian knocked her arms aside and jerked his torso around. He beckoned at Horatio. “Quickly!”
Will slid down and followed Horatio into the cave. The pair squeezed by the stones Sebastian had dislodged; when they were past, the cyborg promptly began slamming his tail into the rock ceiling once more. And as usual, Sebastian fired his rifle in between each impact to further weaken the ceiling. Smaller pieces were falling away than earlier. Not a good sign…
“We have to help him.” Rhea aimed past Sebastian and unleashed an energy bolt at the ceiling.
“Calculating optimal firing solution,” Horatio said. He paused. Then: “Target the designated spots.”
Rhea received a share request and accepted. On her HUD, specific areas on the roof became highlighted past Sebastian, indicating where she should fire the pistol. She raised the weapon and engaged.
Will also joined in, targeting a different set of coordinates, judging from the bore holes he created in the ceiling. Horatio also unleashed his forearm weapons.
The combined fire from the pistols and Sebastian’s rifle, along with the impacts from that strong tail, caused the roof to begin yielding like before. Large pieces tumbled down sporadically between strikes, crashing to the cave floor in front of Sebastian, some of them hitting his tail along the way. He was quickly forced to retreat as the sporadic fall of fragments became a cascade.
The whole party stepped back, in fact, and let gravity finish the job. Behind them, Gizmo also maneuvered deeper into the tunnel, and vanished into the dark.
The repeated crack of stone on stone battered her ears, and as the cave filled up with falling rock in front of her, Rhea caught a glimpse of a giant reptilian head. It darted in from the entrance but was lost from view as dust from the collapse filled the tunnel. She heard a roar, barely louder than the cacophonous din produced by the falling stones, but it was promptly cut off.
Darkness shrouded her as the dust consumed her vision, while at the same time the collapse sealed the opening, cutting off all sunlight from the inner portions of the cave. Only her companions remained in the murk, silhouetted in blue on her HUD, courtesy of the positional sharing she had active.
The rampant stone on stone din faded, replaced by only the occasional crack as the fallen rocks settled. Then even those latter sounds ceased, so that she heard only her own nervous breathing, along with the respirations of Will and the other cyborg, and the soft susurrations of Gizmo’s rotors—something only audible at relatively close ranges, though the acoustics of the cramped chamber no doubt enhanced the sound.
“Well then, careful what you wish for…” Will said into the darkness.
If the bioweapons were out there, the collapse muted their sounds quite well.
Oh, they’re out there, she told herself.
As if to prove that point, a loud thud filled the air. She started, nearly leaping in place. The rocks composing the nearby collapse rattled, shifting. No doubt a giant head had struck the blockage from outside.
“Something tells me we should probably move away from the entrance,” Will said. “As in, far away. And now.”
19
Rhea switched to LIDAR, and the tunnel walls, floor and ceiling filled in on her HUD. The surfaces were depicted as white wireframes made up of several smaller polygons. Her companions remained silhouetted in blue, but the rest of their bodies were also composed of polygons now as well, like the cave.
“Do you have LIDAR?” Rhea asked the cyborg.
“Obviously,” Sebastian replied.
Gizmo, also highlighted in blue, darted deeper into the cave.
Another thud filled the air, and the collapse shook beside them.
“Go,” Will said.
Sebastian led the way. Rhea followed, walking abreast with Horatio and Will. They stayed well beyond the range of that deadly tail. All of them, including Sebastian, kept their weapons out and at the ready.
“Oxygen levels are stable so far,” Horatio said. “A good sign that this cave is larger than hoped or connects to the surface again somewhere.”
“I’m banking on the latter,” Will said. “Our luck hasn’t run out yet.”
Rhea continued to hear that persistent thudding as the party advanced; it soon became distant and muted, until it faded entirely.
“You think they’re going to give up at some point?” Rhea asked.
Will shook his polygonal head. “I don’t know. Maybe. Depends on their progress. If they’re halfway through already, then probably not.”
“But they have no way to know that,” Horatio said.
“True,” Will said.
Rhea kept an eye on the overhead representation of the tunnel on her HUD, and watched it fill out as Gizmo mapped the area ahead. But then Gizmo’s dot froze, and the mapping ceased.
“Did we just lose our drone?” she asked. “Or did Gizmo spot something?”
Will didn’t answer.
A moment later the indicator drifted slightly closer to them.
“We still got her,” Will said. “Keep in mind, I have the drone flying at the broadcast limit. So it’s only natural that Giz will flit into and out of range.”
Rhea considered that. “I’m just wondering, but isn’t it better to
