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PART TWELVE(12)
~~~~~~~~~~
One Dash One leaned from the HoCra's pilot controls, his left hand
hitting the 'standby idle' no the rpm control panel, and his right reaching for
the inboard comm. mike. He saw that Two Dash Two was holding the link open, so
he simply spoke into it.
"This is ODO; go on the PT," he
informed the lookout man.
Seconds later, he was waving franticly to get Three Dash One's attention,
and Penny flashed an acknowledgement that she was coming to see what was up.
Two Dash Two was still speaking as he dived for the munitions keep and
yanked it open.
*\"...dark, a grass and that entuned eelza,"/* ODO heard as
Penny jumped through the HoCra's hatch, which he had popped for her.
*\"I'll close-link and act. the homer,
when you're ready to fire."/*
"TiDO, did you hear the full order?" the pilot demanded of
Penny expectantly, as he extracted the Shatta launcher from its niche in the
upper section of the keep's shock-padding.
Her eyes narrowing at the sight of the specialized launcher, she didn't
have any trouble guessing what she was supposed to do.
"A grass, the eelza, and how many dark?" she responded, moving
to kneel before the keep as he stood from it and set the launcher on the
padding of the bench across from it.
"Two," he said shortly, as he set the collapsible launcher into
working order. "I hope you have a minute, TDT," he added in a loud
voice, sounding almost pleading.
He heard Penny behind him, picking through the B(attle) E(ngagement)
poke`mon kept as 'live' ammunition in the keep. He silently cursed the fact
that they were so cryptically marked ~ 'security precaution' the procedural
memorandum had called it, he remembered vividly. It made finding just what you
wanted, exactly when you wanted it, a real pain in the waatuesii.
"We're feeling generous, over here; you can have a full sixty-one
seconds, if you absolutely need them," came Two Dash Two's tightly
humorous reply.
"Crizzianne Meganium! They don't ask much, do they!?!" One Dash
One muttered tensely. He was watching the 'good to go' indicator lights on the
launcher, praying that the number two wouldn't short out and trip the
auto-reset.
'Gotta get that fixed tomorrow,' he
thought nervously.
"What's the sign for entuned, again?" Penny asked him urgently,
wishing she was sure so she didn't feel she needed to double-check.
"Triple wave lines!" he snapped. "Don't you realize there
is only the one electric type with that symbol?"
"I thought so," she replied meekly, "but water is the two wave
lines, and there are three other 'ele(ctric)`(wa)ter' combos."
She heard him breath relievedly, "About cauterizing time!" and
assumed the launcher's systems had come fully on-line.
She scooped up the four Shatta Balls and turned to have One Dash One
snatch them away one at a time, and drop them into the launcher's self-load chute.
"Commendations and apologies later, TiDO," he told Penny,
sounding the latter. "I have to go and loose these four fractions of hell
on the front-lines."
He hoisted the launcher and made for the open hatch, shouting to Two Dash
Two, "Activate in ten seconds, pal. TiDO will fritz ya twice when I'm
about to ship your air-mail."
He passed through the hatch, stepped down into the ruins, quickly located
a large and level enough piece of stone several feet away from the HoCra, and
set the launcher squarely onto it.
A flick of a switch, and he had activated the HomingTone program
sequencing. He studied the solid band running across the LCD screen, which told
him the search mode was standing by and 'unbiased' ~ That is, it was on its
default setting, and would lock onto the closest broadcasting frequency source
outside its close-in range.
Knowing it would be okay if he overshot the line approaching TDT, he programmed
it for five yards beyond the targeting source, and engaged the 'search' mode.
The search pattern came up empty for a scant two seconds, and then he saw
a source waveband register on the LCD screen.
He smiled grimly as the solid band switched to the same frequency, and
the two lines moved towards each other.
One Dash One turned triumphantly to Penny, who was standing expectantly
in the hatchway, watching his dim outline through the rain, and he informed her
forcefully, "We have lock!"
He heard the heavy duty mechanical servos whirr faintly beside him, and
added, "And the trajectory is homing in ~ Frizzle TDT!"
She disappeared, and he heard the beeping of the homing system's
progressive tone, become one, long, droning buzz.
"We have T for Tone and Trajectory!" he whooped, loud enough
for Penny to hear him in the cockpit of the HoCra.
'Who says I'm tone-deaf?' he thought smugly, as he reached for the
firing switch. 'I can hear this sweet tone just dandy.'
He pressed the 'magic button' and added silently, 'Waaay incoming,
Front-lines-fellas! Down you ATTA Boys!'
[:^:][:^:][:^:][:^:][:^:][:^:][:^:][:^:][:^:][:^:][:^:][:^:][:^:][:^:][:^:][:^:]
When One Dash One told him to activate in ten seconds, Two Dash Two
ordered Everett, "Move left, draw a cautious bead, and fire when I
do." He considered the ShoRi's sighting scope, and added before
Too tense to dream of taking offense, his own 'no credit' policy running
through his anxious mind,
Two Dash Two widened that gap by moving himself, to the right a couple of
yards, and lying prone between two stones that were as long as he was, and that
formed an open-ended trough.
He didn't have time to inch, so he shimmied forward with haste, thinking
disjointedly, '...enough bleeding stones...could have built...dozen
pillboxes.'
He paused just before he could see over the rubble to the party on the
other side, and switched on the homing beacon inboard the comm. unit.
Keeping his ears open for the 'heads up' signal he had been told to
expect, he levered himself forward with the toes of his Rubbimel, and brought
the length of the ShoRi to bear on the first light closest to his end of the
line.
His right eye went to the scope, and he got his first glimpse of the
actual figure behind one of the advancing flashes ~ It was an ATTA Guardsman as
he had been fearing.
His scope didn't linger there. He moved it to the next figure and saw a
much different person, dressed in a heavy, tanned leather, Dust and Rain coat.
The next two were dressed differently, but not any more like Guardsmen
than the second was. And the fifth on the opposite end was another ATTA-G.
Two Dash Two was thrilled, having not seen anyone else. There was a flash
for every target, and apparently no one behind the blind-line. Four P-teamers
would be close to overkill for only two ATTA-Gs, but that just meant they could
pull out more speedily when the call came to do so.
He was bead-drawn on his Guard and studying the man's equipment, when he
got the two beeps from the comm. unit he was expecting.
'He looks pretty comfortable, holding that Mangeez
A(djustable)C(aliber)-Thirteen' TDT observed silently, with a wicked grin.
'Let's see if I can't wake him up for the battle opener.'
He aligned his scope's crosshairs on something hanging from the Guardsman's
gear belt, and prayed it wasn't too heavily live, as he pulled the trigger...
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