Exultant, I go at last to Full Battle Awareness.
I am free . . .
In the Battle Center, Jaime felt a sudden vibration transmitted through the deck and seat. He wasn't sure what, but something was happening.
After Alita had left, he'd found an empty bulkhead storage locker and transferred Captain Fowler's remains there . .. with Shari's help. She still seemed numb, moving as if she were in shock, but she was recovering fast. Shari Barstowe was a tough lady, Jaime decided, and one who would do what she had to do to survive.
Now, he could hear a distinct and distant rumble., almost as if Hector was starting to move. Leaving Shah in one of the observers seats, he rushed to the control panel to try to make sense of what was happening.
"Hector!" he called. "Situation report!"
"Free ..."
Jaime blinked, looking up at the empty display dome. "What?"
'The Enemy mechanisms that were hampering my psychotronic operations have been eliminated," the voice said. "My AI and data storage and retrieval functions are now operating normally." There was the briefest of pauses. "We are under attack, and I am shifting to Combat Mode."
"Give me visual, please."
A vertical bar of vivid green light appeared on the inside of the bubble, momentarily stationary. Then it
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swiftly painted itself around the display dome's interior, leaving in its track a 360б panorama of the hilltop outside.
!"!*! machines were everywhere, swarming across the barren crest of Overlook Hill or drifting in the sky overhead. He saw the flash and stab of 1*1*1 weapons, artificial lightning bolts and high-energy lasers, as the enemy machines attempted to burn down the armored mountain that was Hector.
"My operational readiness is severely impaired," the Bolo's voice continued with unhurried calm. "I sense extensive damage to both primary and secondary circuitry. Sensor capability is currently at thirty-eight percent of optimum. External communications arrays are damaged and operating at fifteen percent of optimum, and attempts to raise other units, command centers, or CDF stations in the past thirty-eight point five seconds have failed. Damage to four right-side foretrack bogies will limit mobility to eighty-nine percent of optimum. Centra-gravity generators are off-line. I estimate a maximum road speed of one hundred ten kilometers per hour.
"My onboard fusion plant is currently operating at only three percent of maximum output and may have physical blocks similar to those established on my main memory functions. Available stores of expendable munitions, except for antipersonnel flechette canisters, are exhausted. All primary and secondary weapons are off-line. Battle screens are off-line.
"My psychotronic systems, however, including all molecular circuitry, paraneuronic assemblies, and AI programming, are fully operational."
"Great," Jaime muttered under his breath. "Maybe we can think them to death."
"That is the essence of efficient combat planning and maneuver," Hector replied. "We must outthink
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the Enemy, for we are severely outnumbered and outmatched in almost every material way."
Jaime hadn't intended for the Bob to hear his crack. He reminded himself that he would have to be careful about what he said out loud. "Can we fight at all?" he asked. "Can you use flechettes against those things?"
"I have two thousand eight hundred forty-six A-P flechette canisters remaining, either loaded or in stores. I have noted that canister rounds are effective against some !*!*! machines." The clucking sounds representing the enemy's proper name startled Jaime. He'd not expected the Bolo to be able to pronounce non-Anglic words. "I will have to carefully manage my remaining stores until I can reload and rearm."
