Page 192 of Red Scale Daddy
The turrets unfold.
I throw the shock blade at the nearest unit as the first shot burns past my shoulder, close enough to heat the side of my mask. The blade strikes the turret housing and discharges in a violent crackle of electricity, forcing it to seize mid-rotation. The other three swivel toward me.
I run at them.
The corridor erupts with fire.
Shots hammer the walls and floor around me, white-hot lines carving through the plating as I zigzag hard enough to make my ribs scream. One blast clips my upper arm, spinning me halfway around, but I use the turn to slam my shoulder into the wall beneath the second turret. My hand closes around its mounting strut, and I rip downward with everything I have.
The turret tears free in a shower of sparks.
Pally moves.
I see him low and fast in the corner of my eye, sliding beneath the scanner sweep toward the far panel while the remaining turrets track the larger idiot making himself obvious. A shot hits the floor near his boot, and I throw the broken turret housing into the firing path. It explodes under the next blast, spraying fragments across the corridor.
“Anytime,” I growl.
“At the panel,” Pally snaps.
“Lovely place to die?”
“Working.”
A turret locks onto him.
I cross the distance in two strides and put myself between the barrel and Pally. The shot hits my chest plate dead center, knocking the air out of me despite the armor. I slam into the wall beside him and taste blood behind the mask.
Pally’s fingers fly.
The turret fires again.
I catch the barrel with both hands and force it upward as the shot discharges into the ceiling. Heat pours through my gloves. The metal burns, and I snarl through clenched teeth as the turret motor fights me.
“Pally!”
“Done.”
The grid shuts down.
The sudden silence is beautiful.
I release the turret and flex my smoking fingers. “See? Elegant.”
Pally looks at the scorch mark across my chest rig, then at the destroyed corridor. “That was the ugliest thing I have ever seen survive.”
“Thank you.”
“That was not praise.”
“Felt like praise.”
He moves to the panel, pulls a live internal map, and his face changes. “We triggered a perimeter alert.”
“How bad?”
“Fast.”
Sirens start somewhere above us, low at first, then rising through the ship in measured pulses.
