The Complete Hammer's Slammers, Vol. 2

Her tribarrel scissored bolts across those of Stolley's weapon, turning fist-sized chunks of the leading truck into meter-diameter flashes colored by material that vaporized and burned: rubber/metal/wood across the truck; cloth/flesh/munitions as the muzzles lifted into the bed.

Metals burned with a gorgeous intensity of color, white and red and green.

The target exploded into a lake of fire that screamed. Willens keptWarmonger

as high on her fans as he could as the combat car entered the roadcut at a barely controlled slide and cranked hard right to followDeathdealerup the bridge approach.

The filters of Ranson's helmet snapped into place as flameswhuffed

out like crinolines encircling the combat car. For a moment, everything was orange and hot; thenWarmongerwas through.

Junebug Ranson was back in the physical world in which her troops were fighting.

The Adako Beach community was a few hovels on this east side of the Padma River.There were twenty or thirty more dwellings,still unpretentious,beyond the gravel strand across the stream. The bridge itself was a solid concrete structure with a sandbagged blockhouse on the far end and a movement-control kiosk in the center of the span.

The blockhouse and kiosk had been added in reaction to the worsening security situation. WhenDeathdealer's main gun punched the center of the blockhouse twice, the low building blew apart with an enthusiasm which the ammunition going off within did little more than color. Swatches of fiberglass fabric from the sandbags burned red as they drifted in the updraft.

A bus was waiting on the other side to cross the bridge. It lurched off the road and heeled slowly over onto its side, its headlights still burning. The truck behind it didn't move, but both cab doors flew open and figures scuttled out.

A man without pants ran from one of the huts near the bridge approach and began firing an automatic rifle atDeathdealer. Sparrow ignored—or was unaware of—the fleabites, but Stolley triggered a burst in the Consie's direction.

The hovel disintegrated into burning debris under the touch of the cyan bolts. The Consie dropped flat and continued firing, sheltered by the rocky irregularity of the ground. Another set of muzzle flashes sparkled yellow from closer to the streambed. A bullet rang onWarmonger's hull.