Amersy's upper torso was protruding from the wrecked jeep. He was trying to crawl out, but the chassis had his legs pinned. Lewis gripped the side of the jeep, braced himself and lifted. The jeep creaked as it rose half a meter. Amersy wriggled free.
"Thanks," Amersy said.
"What the hell hit us?"
"I think it was some kind of e-bomb. It blew every circuit in the jeep. Even my Skin's electronics suffered."
"Shit. Where the hell did KillBoy get an e-bomb from?"
"God knows." Amersy looked back at the first jeep. "Sarge?"
"I'm here."
"You need help?"
"Don't think so. How are your guys?"
Amersy saw blood spreading out from underneath the back of the jeep. "Jesus! Karl? Karl, can you hear me?" He checked Karl's telemetry grid, which was almost blank. The Skin suit still had some functions, and there was a heartbeat. But that was about all he could tell.
Both of them dropped to their knees and peered into the gap. Karl's Skin had been split open by ragged twists of metal that had peeled back from the bodywork. Several of them were still impaling him.
Amersy used his speaker. "Hang on, Karl, we'll have you out of there right away."
"We'll have to turn it right over," Lewis said.
"Shouldn't be a problem." They took hold of the jeep. "Ready?" Amersy said. "Okay, lift." The jeep began to emit labored metallic screeches as they slowly tipped it up. One of Lewis's hands slipped, and the vehicle sagged back a few centimeters.
"Hell," Lewis grunted as he found another hold. "The tank's split, this thing is dripping in hihydrogen."
"Great."
They had almost got it on its side when Amersy's sensors detected the little projectile. An intense blue-white spark hit the jeep. The hihydrogen ignited immediately, enveloping the entire vehicle. Amersy and Lewis let go, sending it crashing back down.
"Down!" Amersy ordered. He was already flinging himself flat.
The fuel tank exploded.
Lawrence was unconscious for an unknown time. When the pain pulled him back he guessed it couldn't have been long. Dust was still swirling round the wreck. Amersy called him, and he said he was okay, though he was lying. The end of the steering column was still jutting into his side. The Skin's medical program was scrolling up information: the damaged tissue, chipped pelvic girdle, the suppressants it was pumping into his blood. He placed both hands flat on the dashboard and pushed. His body moved back, sliding off the steering column.
Even with the drugs, Lawrence wailed at the pain as it withdrew. Then his Skin muscles were realigning themselves, sealing up the wound. The suit's internal layer discharged antiseptic, anesthetic and clotting agents into the tear. The whole area turned blissfully cold.
He turned around to see what had happened to Hal. "Oh, sweet Fate." The kid was sitting against his safety straps, head hung forward. All of his medical modules had been burned out by the e-bomb. Lawrence's Skin AS couldn't get a response from any of them. Small patches of blood were staining the kid's shirt where the jolt of their impact had dislodged modules.
"Sergeant?" Odel limped out of the house. There was something wrong with the shape of one leg. "Are you okay?"
"Sure." He levered himself out of the driver's seat. "You?"
"Not a problem."
"Good, let's get Hal out."
"Where's Dennis?"
Lawrence looked around. There was a Skin suit lying in the middle of the street, badly mangled. The second jeep must have hit it full on. "Shit!" Dennis's telemetry grid was flatlined.
Don't grieve for the newly dead—they never thank you. Secure the platoon. Lawrence could hear Ntoko growling it out.
He released Hal's safety straps and lifted the kid out of the rear seat. "Bring the medical kit," he told Odel.
An explosion rocked the street. Lawrence saw a fireball burst out of the second jeep as the wreckage levitated off the ground.
"Amersy, get to cover. We've been ambushed. Seek and destroy."
"Roger that."
The two Skins lying flat on the ground beside the blazing jeep scrambled to their feet and sprinted for the nearby houses.
Lawrence wrapped one arm around Hal, lifting him gingerly, then reached down into the passenger seat for the smart missile rack. He stepped into the house through the demolished wall.
The room inside was empty. He kicked the door open and went through into a dark hallway. There were six identical doors and a stairway. He hurried down to the far end and kicked the last door open. It was another empty room. Tiny cracks of light leaked around the boarded-up window. He eased Hal down in a comer.
Odel put the medical kit down and snapped the top open. "Have we got anything that'll help?"
"I don't know." Lawrence picked out a diagnostic probe and switched it on. He was relieved when the small display pane lit up. The em pulse hadn't damaged electronics that were off at the time of the attack. Data began to flow into his AS.
There was the sound of a carbine firing in the distance. "Odel, go help them."
"You bet."
"Hey, be careful out there. These bastards look like they know what they're doing."
"So do I."
Amersy ran along an alleyway leading off the main street. There wasn't a lot of cover. The prefab houses were spaced a regulation twenty meters apart. The grid of streets almost allowed him to see from one side of town to the other. It also gave the ambushers the same field of vision. And he didn't know where they were.
Lewis had ducked away at the second house, heading off down a side street. Amersy raced on for a little while, then took a turning. He called up the Dixon map file, inertial guidance plotting his position. The Skin AS gave him a rough estimate of where the little projectile had come from. His link with Lewis gave him the other man's location, plotting that on the map as well.
"Lewis, we need to pincer them. You getting this tactical data?"
"It's online, Corp."
"Keep going straight on for a hundred and twenty meters. I'll be three streets to your left. They should be between us."
"Roger."
Lewis jogged along the route Amersy's AS had provided. His carbine slid out of its arm recess. When he got to the intersection he stopped and peered around the corner. There was a flash of motion two houses down. His AS replayed the image. It was a woman in her mid-twenties, dressed in jeans and a yellow T-shirt. She was carrying some kind of pearl-white cylinder in her left hand. The AS couldn't match it to any weapon in its catalogue file.