146 - Lump Them Together

Terry could hear and see everything that was going on, with Agadore's help, even as he sat, pressed against the quivering stone walls, feeling helpless and useless.

Hara lay on a couch next to a table with a miniature of the whole city and immediate canyon system on one side of her, while Firedrake One lay coiled into an enormous lump of scale, head resting on the stone to her other side.

Ilax and the other zon all connected in code, watched by ahymanders and beyond them, the Nadu also lay, reaching out with their sensors as far up into the atmosphere as possible to give the Drakes their targets as far out as they could.

Out of his sight he knew that the so called Emperor... the older Kyrus fellow, and his boy were deep in code, striking for the control codes buried deep in the fortress Prime had built.

*Agador, how is Mom doing?*

*They are proceeding very well, only two hundred people died in the initial ceiling fall. Mom estimates that another one thousand forty are salvageable... oops, sorry, Mom and Drake One inform me I should say 'saveable', I'm sorry, I didn't--*

*--I understand what you meant, no offense taken. How are they?*

*Functioning well, smoothly and with no damage... or injury.*

*I appreciate the effort to use human terms for humans, Agador.*

The next chunk of code poured in, before his eyes and ears.

*Four Hundred to Five hundred... all of you. Lump the masses together!*

*Sure boss. The eighty seven of us left are confused but compliant,* One said. *Why?*

*Shove forty or fifty of them into a single falling lump, get it spinning before someone gets to go bang and spall off chips in all directions!*

*YES BOSS!*

Fireballs high in the sky, falling stars, grew bigger, began to spin randomizing their trajectories, burst into glittering flakes that vanished in the air, burning or were so small when they hit that in the massive noise were lost.

*Great idea warboss, we're getting them!* *Whoo Hoo we'll save the--* *incoming. INCOMING* Archie and the Head both screamed out warnings. *under power*

*I have eight restored, stepfather, Four Ninety One is almost rebuilt*

That's what I can do. I can work with Hara and help them rebuild the Drakes and reload their code from when they blew... surely a tech second class should be able to help... ouch, where did you come from? I don't use code ferrets, certainly not as battered as you, Blackie.

The ancient old ferret settled on Terry's shoulder and thrust a nose in his ear, under the veil fastening. *I I I Yashar not Blackie flyer than bees. We builder more more, build faster faster. Faster than stink dirt dog.*

*Mom reporting small chamber cleared, Eshmaeel slightly injured in secondary rock fall. No more casualties, crossing the river to assist medics*

*Agador I'd like to introduce you to Yashar, Yashar the ferret who is fly, Agador the better than a Bootleg.*

*Hello Yashar.*

*Sniff. Machine Better than Bootlegger boy, code inside outside Terry boy. We build.*

*Nice to meet you too.  We build.* Agador sounded both rushed and amused.

*Amalgamation working, too few Drakes left, too few! Warboss send us send us spend us* *Fifteen you missed one* *Two Ten get it get it now move it no, don't bang you can't catch that one**Get THOSE stop them stop them*

*City impact in four sec--*

The distant strikes had shaken a ceiling down. This was close enough to throw everyone up in the air, flailing and bruised, a sound so large that it could not be heard but only felt. Terry had his arms wrapped around his head as he saw, through Agador, the next one.

*Boss we can't stop it, we can't redirect. Forty Seven, Sixty Nine, Four detonating!*

The fireball broke into a dozen pieces when the Drakes blew themselves against it, only one smaller piece hit the city glancingly, sheering off enormous chunks of stone that flew to ricochet off the canyon walls and partly dam the river below.