“Me cago en la hora que yo nací,” Regina said, glaring at the bots. “Can someone get those things back in their capsules?”
“Sue,” Eva said over private comms. “Override the Ball Buddies, now!”
Moments later, the robotic Attuned moved as if awakening from cryostasis. And because they’d been instructed to behave as wild animals, and they were currently all clustered together regardless of species, they simultaneously went batshit fucking loco.
Regina shouted, “We’ve got to catch them all!” as the now-aggressive or rapidly fleeing Pod Pals began attacking each other, or racing toward the platform’s edge after the escaping xana, or trying to climb the cliff or fly away into the starlit sky. Some of her agents responded, while others continued their pursuit of Damaal and her accomplices.
Josh, meanwhile, was towed into the waiting BOFA ship, fists banging futilely against the impenetrable bubble he was encased in. Eva’s stomach was full of rocks soaked in kerosene and set on fire. After all this effort—coming back to Garilia, dealing with Damaal and the resistance and her own mother—the mission was a failure. There was no chance she could make it across a platform swarming with dangerous robots and armed BOFA agents, bust into a government vessel, and rescue Josh without endangering him, her crew, herself, and probably Regina. She’d done some risky things before, but this was just asking to be restrained and dragged off to prison, which was where Josh would likely end up now, given what he’d done.
For someone who had just escaped from The Fridge’s confinement, it seemed a cruel thing to lock him up again. Waste of a brilliant mind. Then again, given what he’d done to his own family and almost done to the whole universe, maybe it was for the best.
Whatever boosts Nara had in her boots let her take a mighty leap that put her on the roof hanging over the platform, and from there she jumped again and clung to a rocky outcropping, more than far enough away to avoid getting nabbed by an isosphere. She gave a quick salute—to Eva or Jei or someone else, it wasn’t clear—and proceeded to climb in boot-augmented bursts. Eva had no idea how the merc planned to get back to civilization, much less off the planet, but Nara had been in worse situations before and managed.
Besides, Eva had to worry about getting her own people out.
“Sue, bring down a few of the big flying ones,” Eva said. “Enough to carry us out of here.”
“What about Josh?” Sue asked.
“I’m sorry,” Eva said. “There’s no time. We get out of here now, or we end up on that ship with him.”
She raced over to Pink’s side, examining her friend’s restraints while muttering a string of curses under her breath. A random Pod Pal ran up, and Eva kicked at it to shoo it away.
“We can get these things off later,” Pink said. “First, we need to get gone.”
“We will stay,” Sapri said, surprising Eva. He emanated a strange amount of calm given the chaos around them.
“What?” Eva asked. “Why?”
“We will cooperate with the administrator,” he replied. “Given the circumstances, this seems more likely to yield a positive change than our other efforts to undermine the current regime. And even if we are apprehended, the resistance will continue without us.” The other rebels murmured agreement, except Jei, who scowled as was his custom.
“I don’t want to be stuck here dealing with BOFA,” Jei said. “I need to get back to Dr. Lucien and see what he wants to do.”
“If we don’t get out before the quarantine, we’ll all be stuck,” Eva said, glancing at her mother. Regina was still shouting orders, ignoring the resistance since they weren’t doing anything objectionable at the moment. She was ensconced in her own isosphere as protection from the rampaging animal bots now, which gave Eva a small measure of relief.
With a great gust of wind from its enormous wings, a white Pod Pal landed behind the rebels, raising its crested head to the sky and loosing an ear-splitting cry. It looked like a cross between a flying todyk and a bird, and was easily five meters long, with talons big enough to carry off any one of them. Eva went for her pistol, then realized it was reaching out a claw and waiting rather than attacking.
“I think our ride is here,” Eva said.
“Yes, I’m controlling that one,” Sue said, popping up behind her. “Technical specs say it should be able to carry three of us.”
Her crew was sorted, then. She turned to Jei. “What about you?” Eva asked. “Can your dog get you back to where you were staying?”
“I believe so,” he replied. “But as you said, I will have no way to leave the planet after that.”
“What, you don’t want to keep running errands for the resistance?” Eva asked.
Jei glanced back at the rebels, clearly torn. “I support their cause, yes, but to be trapped for an uncertain amount of time due to a planetary quarantine . . .”
Eva grinned. “I can give you a ride, if you don’t mind being trapped with us for a few cycles until we reach a Gate.” Assuming we can even make it to La Sirena Negra before the quarantine shuts down the spaceport, she thought.
“I . . . thank you, I will consider that,” Jei replied, his expression unreadable. He bowed to the resistance members, who all touched their tails to their foreheads.
“Walk in the Light,” Sapri said. Without further ado, the xana approached Regina, stationary inside her protective bubble.
Agents continued running across the platform, chasing down Pod Pals and trapping them, either in their capsules or in isospheres. Some even wrestled the robots to the ground or hit them with stun batons, which appeared to have little effect. The bots fought back with their arsenal of upgrades, shooting flames from their mouths or producing intense jets of water, or even releasing clouds of what Eva assumed was poison like she’d been hit with by the Attuned in Rilia. It was complete pandemonium, and she didn’t envy the BOFA people their job of capturing all the critters.
Eva climbed onto the Pod Pal’s back, marveling again at the sophistication of the technology. It definitely felt like she was on an animal and not a glorified toaster. Pink and Sue each wrapped themselves around one of its clawed feet, clinging tightly, and Jei hopped onto his dog-bot hoverboard next to them.
Across the platform, Regina was still barking orders as if she were dealing with wayward children instead of federal agents. She paused and turned to regard Eva and the others on their massive mount, her mouth fixing itself in a firm line. Then, with a deliberateness that had to be intentional, she turned away again and continued what she was doing as if she hadn’t seen them at all.
Eva let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. All they could do now was get back to their ship and hope they could leave before the lockdown started. She opened her mouth to ask Sue to order the robot to leave, then stopped.
“Where the hell is Mala?” she asked.
“Miau,” a tiny, smug voice answered from her lap. Mala looked up at her with wide hazel eyes, their pupils entirely dilated in the darkness.
“How did you—never mind,” Eva said. “Get in my fucking backpack before I feed you to this bird.”
For once, Mala didn’t argue.