Read Online Going Under by Justina Robson - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Justina Robson
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It was armoured. But most of all, supported by a girdle and two of its powerful arms, it was holding a very large and sophisticated gun. She could not determine what kind of gun.
As it moved it watched her and she got the impression it was smugly biding its time from its protective cover whilst she was simply standing there in the sky. She was winning on points, but points didn't count in the end.
"Killing is wrong," Lila said, almost on reflex, though as she said it she considered herself to be asserting a basic humanity that was inviolable. There was an absurdity to saying it at that moment which seemed to demand a laugh, but she couldn't muster one. She was too busy studying the gun.
"Who says?" The imp dug his claws into her ear with familiar pain.
She saw a variety of rounds inside the clip and the typical twinbarrel design of demon guns: one for sport and one for serious. "Everyone." She tried to figure out which it was going to choosealthough technically she could not be penalised for murder, even if the instigator of the duel only set out with maiming weapons.
"Oh that's convincing," Thingamajig hoicked up a wad of phlegm and spat down into the lagoon. "Everyone. Of course. Everyone. Fneh. He's not alone I bet. Look at him prancing around there like some fey princess."
"I see them." She had picked up the two others working with the obvious demon just as the imp mentioned it, having thought of the same thing herself. One was high above her in the cloud deck, the other was on the rooftops at the water's edge. As ordinary Lila she would have missed them, but her Al was in permanent Battle Mode here and it had no problems locating the telltale movements of those showing too much interest in her position. It had started out with twenty-one candidates, but settled on just the two after a few picoseconds of hard thinking. To Lila it was no more than her own intu ition talking. Without hesitation she shot straight up as fast as her jets would carry her.
An instant later the air shimmered where she had been and there was a loud bang.
"Matter Vaporisator," the imp said with relish. "Disguised as a common Letemhavit Repeater. Mmn, impressive. These guys have money behind them. That Zoomenon technology doesn't come cheap."
Lila, who had heard of MVs but not seen them, was suitably silent. Humans didn't know how MVs worked, only that they instantly reduced their target to its consituent atoms. There was a theory about information removal ... but the design didn't interest her nearly as much as the sure knowledge that whatever it hit didn't survive.
"They need three for the triangulation point," Thingamajig informed her happily. "But the power source has to be with the one on the ground, the others will just have some crystals or shit. See, I went to this exhibition once in the Engineering District ..."
Lila focused on the space above her. Icy air tore at her and vapour turned to water on her face, streaming down toward her temples and chin. Her skin burned and tingled but her inhuman eyes were able to stare without pain. She raised her right arm, felt the gun system assemble itself and the shot depart without having a single thought, go through her head. There was only the wind, the vector, the target, and the intent. Cold brilliant.
A few hundred metres above her the round detonated-shatterstar-and she darted sideways in the soft white mist as the shining fragments of coalescing and deteriorating elements burned in their characteristic sunburst yellow, white, and blue. They glimmered like witch lights and then winked out, their moment of astonishing destructive power spent. A second later two dark and indistinct lumps fled past her heading downwards. There was a trail of dark smoke and the stink of burning flesh.
"Barbecue," muttered the imp happily.
As he spoke a thin, almost invisible tendril of green leapt out through her arm.
Lila felt Tath's grab snag on something aetheric and, to her, intangible. Like a
As it moved it watched her and she got the impression it was smugly biding its time from its protective cover whilst she was simply standing there in the sky. She was winning on points, but points didn't count in the end.
"Killing is wrong," Lila said, almost on reflex, though as she said it she considered herself to be asserting a basic humanity that was inviolable. There was an absurdity to saying it at that moment which seemed to demand a laugh, but she couldn't muster one. She was too busy studying the gun.
"Who says?" The imp dug his claws into her ear with familiar pain.
She saw a variety of rounds inside the clip and the typical twinbarrel design of demon guns: one for sport and one for serious. "Everyone." She tried to figure out which it was going to choosealthough technically she could not be penalised for murder, even if the instigator of the duel only set out with maiming weapons.
"Oh that's convincing," Thingamajig hoicked up a wad of phlegm and spat down into the lagoon. "Everyone. Of course. Everyone. Fneh. He's not alone I bet. Look at him prancing around there like some fey princess."
"I see them." She had picked up the two others working with the obvious demon just as the imp mentioned it, having thought of the same thing herself. One was high above her in the cloud deck, the other was on the rooftops at the water's edge. As ordinary Lila she would have missed them, but her Al was in permanent Battle Mode here and it had no problems locating the telltale movements of those showing too much interest in her position. It had started out with twenty-one candidates, but settled on just the two after a few picoseconds of hard thinking. To Lila it was no more than her own intu ition talking. Without hesitation she shot straight up as fast as her jets would carry her.
An instant later the air shimmered where she had been and there was a loud bang.
"Matter Vaporisator," the imp said with relish. "Disguised as a common Letemhavit Repeater. Mmn, impressive. These guys have money behind them. That Zoomenon technology doesn't come cheap."
Lila, who had heard of MVs but not seen them, was suitably silent. Humans didn't know how MVs worked, only that they instantly reduced their target to its consituent atoms. There was a theory about information removal ... but the design didn't interest her nearly as much as the sure knowledge that whatever it hit didn't survive.
"They need three for the triangulation point," Thingamajig informed her happily. "But the power source has to be with the one on the ground, the others will just have some crystals or shit. See, I went to this exhibition once in the Engineering District ..."
Lila focused on the space above her. Icy air tore at her and vapour turned to water on her face, streaming down toward her temples and chin. Her skin burned and tingled but her inhuman eyes were able to stare without pain. She raised her right arm, felt the gun system assemble itself and the shot depart without having a single thought, go through her head. There was only the wind, the vector, the target, and the intent. Cold brilliant.
A few hundred metres above her the round detonated-shatterstar-and she darted sideways in the soft white mist as the shining fragments of coalescing and deteriorating elements burned in their characteristic sunburst yellow, white, and blue. They glimmered like witch lights and then winked out, their moment of astonishing destructive power spent. A second later two dark and indistinct lumps fled past her heading downwards. There was a trail of dark smoke and the stink of burning flesh.
"Barbecue," muttered the imp happily.
As he spoke a thin, almost invisible tendril of green leapt out through her arm.
Lila felt Tath's grab snag on something aetheric and, to her, intangible. Like a
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