The Complete Hammer's Slammers, Vol. 2 полностью

A redlight winked in a sidebar of the main screen,indicating thatDeathdealer's integrity had been breached: the driver's hatch was open.In the panoramic display Albers, horizontally compressed by the hologram, was abandoning the vehicle.

"Better ditch too, Birdie," said the horribly ruined corpse of DJ Bell. "This is when it's happening."

"Booster!" Sparrow screamed to his AI. "Air defense! Sort by size, largest first!"

If it'd been two anti-tank rounds, no sweat. The handful of submunitions in each cargo shell would've been blasted in a few seconds, long before they reached their own lethal range and detonated.

"Hey,there's still time."DJ's facewas changing;but this time his features knitted, healed, instead of splashing slowly outward in a mist of blood and bone and brains. "Not a lot, but there's time. You just gotta leave, Birdie."

A pair of firecracker rounds, that was fine too. Their tiny bomblets wouldn't more than etchDeathdealer's dense iridium armor when they went off. Hard lines for the combat cars, but that was somebody else's problem . . . and anyway, none of the bomblets were going to land within a kilometer of the task force.

The heavy anti-tank submunitions weren't aimed at this side of the river either. If the shell had been of ordinary construction, it would've impacted on a bunker somewhere far distant from the friendly tanks.

But the submunitions had seeker heads. As they spun lazily from the casing that bore them to the target area, sophisticated imaging systems fed data to their on-board computers.

A bunker would've done if no target higher in the computers' priorities offered.

A combat car would've done very well.

But if the imaging system located a tank, then it was with electronic glee that the computer deployed vanes to brake and guide the submunition toward that prime target.

Too little time.

Birdie Sparrow slammed the side of his fist into the buckle to disengage himself from the seat restraints. A fireball lighted the gunnery screen asDeathdealer's reprogrammed tribarrel detonated a larger target than the anti-personnel bomblets to which the law of averages had aimed it.

"Birdie,quick," DJ pleaded. His face was almost whole again.

Sparrow sank back onto his seat as the screen flared again. "No,"he whispered. "No. Not out there."

DJ Bell smiled at his friend and extended a hand. "Welcome home, snake," he said.

There was a white flash.