“What are those?” I pointed up to dark shapes perched on the walls at regular distances. They kind of looked like gargoyles on a cathedral.
“Those are the guardian bots,” Yates said. “Deactivated, thank Dynark.”
“What are they guarding?” I asked.
“This gallery,” Galish replied.
“So we’re essentially in a big storage facility?” I asked.
Galish nodded. “Behind each one of the doors should be a vault.”
“Yeah, that’s how it works,” Yates said. “We found the Tabarroh Crystal in a location just like this. I remember thinking that it felt like we were inside a tower.”
“According to the topographs—partial topographs—there are over five hundred of these galleries per level,” Ana-Zhi said.
“And how many levels?”
“Twenty-one.”
Galish whistled in appreciation. “No wonder nobody has ever found the Kryrk.”
“We actually don’t know if that’s the case,” Yates said. “The vault could be empty.”
“Way to bring the mission down, old man,” Galish said.
Secretly, I checked my Aura for the coordinates of the lifeform in hibernation—my dad. It said he was close, distance-wise, but if these tunnels and galleries really didn’t connect, it would be tough to get to his location from here.
“Everyone on the sled,” Ana-Zhi said. “We’re going up.”
We all piled on, and Galish took us up slowly, so we could check for connecting passages.
“Hold it up!” Ana-Zhi said. “Go down one level and get us to the other side of that pillar. I think I saw an exit.”
She was wrong. Five stories up was another circular depression set into the outer wall. Unfortunately it went in only a half meter.
“Maybe there’s a door?” I asked.
“Or maybe not.” Galish checked his scanner. “The EMR doesn’t show anything beyond it.”
Ana-Zhi said, “Let’s keep looking.”
We got another two stories and then all hell broke loose.
All of a sudden, a half dozen guardian security bots came alive and launched themselves from their perches directly at us.
Immediately Ana-Zhi realized what had happened. We had wandered into the edge of a new zone—one that hadn’t been deactivated.
“Yates, shut it down now! Everyone else, protect Yates!”
Within seconds, the air was filled with a barrage of blaster bolts. I managed to take one of the bots out, but we were in an impossible situation. There were bots skittering along the walls above us and below us and we had zero cover.
While Yates frantically worked the LVX, Galish keyed the sled’s thrusters, shooting us up at an even faster rate. If we could clear the bots on top of us and get to the ceiling, we’d at least have some cover. In the meantime, Ana-Zhi and I kept shooting.
A stray bolt sizzled along the shoulder of Yates’s armored suit, knocking him back and off balance. He toppled over the edge of the sled and would have fallen, if I hadn’t managed to grab ahold of his equipment belt and haul him back on board.
“Thanks, Jannigan.”
“You can thank me by staying down!”
I shot over his head and caught one of the bots right in the chest. It shuddered once and then lost power, which caused it to teeter off its perch and tumble to the ground eight stories below—where it landed in a heap of parts.
The sled nearly hit the ceiling before Galish stabilized us. Ana-Zhi blew away the final bot that was above us, so now we had to deal with the three racing their way up the side of the pillar, shooting as they moved.
We tried to pick them off, but these particular bots were as fast and nimble as spider monkeys on boost juice. They effortless leapt from wall to wall, evading our fire.
“Yates, where are we at?” Ana-Zhi yelled.
“Almost got it.”
“We don’t got time for almost!”
A bolt nearly took off her helmet before exploding over our heads in a cascade of sparks.
I didn’t know what I was thinking, but I knew I had to do something.
“That was just too close for comfort,” I said, then quickly powered up the magtouch unit on my suit and grabbed a cable. “I’ll draw them out!”
Once I saw the green ready indicator on my visor display, I vaulted over the edge of the sled, shooting as I fell.
The bots, attracted by the sudden movement, maneuvered to intercept me.
This was going to be close!
I swung from the cable around the central pillar until my boots connected with the wall. For a few seconds I was secure enough to fire with both my RB and my railgun. I got a lucky hit on one of the attackers which caused it to smash against the far wall in an eruption of bot fragments.
This was insane. Completely insane. But there were only two left.
I felt my boots scrape against the pillar as I slid down. Then the crackle of a bolt cut through the air and a shower of sparks burst off the wall above my head.
Crap! I was a sitting duck.
Out of nowhere Ana-Zhi came through with a volley of shots that took out the remaining security bots.
I holstered my guns and grabbed on to the pillar with my magtouch enhanced gloves. Thankfully it was enough to arrest my movement.
Galish took the sled down and I jumped aboard.
“Well, that was fun,” Ana-Zhi said. “Nice shooting, junior. You must practice a lot.”
“A little bit,” I said, out of breath.
She turned to Yates, eyes blazing in anger. “You! That cannot fucking happen again.”
“These zones are not laid out in nice even blocks,” Yates said sheepishly. “It’s almost impossible to know when we strayed out of it.”
“Waah, waah, waah!” Galish said. “You always have an excuse, don’t you?”
“Can it, Galish!”
“So, are we at a dead end?” I asked.
“I was hoping there would be some sort of vertical access shaft, but I don’t think any of these galleries connect.” Ana-Zhi showed me her datapad, and pointed to an area that was fifty meters away. “We need to get there.”
“There is a hatch,” Galish said. “According to the scanner. Look.”
They conferred for a few moments, then Ana-Zhi told him to take
