Page 63 of Clive Cussler Desolation Code (The NUMA Files #21)

The Overseer and his men waited outside the maintenance shed as the missile-armed drones approached from the north. It had been a while since he’d witnessed a strike like this up close. He found himself looking forward to the obliteration.

His grin faded as the drones began to waver. It vanished completely as they went off course, turning west and then diving into the side of a hill at full speed. Even the surviving drone with the M4 carbine, which had been holding station above the windmills, began to go off-kilter. It moved one way and then the other like a drunken man trying to stay on a sidewalk after a late-night binge. Suddenly it turned toward the nearest wind generator and drove itself directly into the path of the swirling blades. A single strike from the twenty-ton blade smashed it into fragments, rendering any hope of an air attack moot.

“Worthless damned machines,” the Overseer grunted. He grabbed the radio. “Vaughn,” he called out, “have the men storm the maintenance shed. They can take it by sheer numbers.”

He waited but heard no reply. “Vaughn?”

Looking over at the unarmed group he saw that they were just standing there. Not moving forward or back. Not taking cover or even holding their weapons up. They just seemed…stuck.

“Vaughn,” he called out again, fiddling with the radio’s controls. “What’s your damned computer up to?”

With no sign of a reply, the Overseer gave up on the radio and turned to his men. “We’ll have to do this ourselves. Take aim! Fi—”

He’d only just given the order to fire when the garage door flew off its hinges, blasted into the air by a charging front-end loader that came out with its yellow-painted blade raised like a shield.

The impact stunned the Overseer and his men, but only for a second. “Fire!” he shouted.

The men opened fire on the charging construction vehicle. Most of them aiming right at the partially lifted blade. Their bullets punched holes in the metal shield, but had little effect on the other side. The machine continued toward them like an unstoppable tank.

“Get around it,” the Overseer shouted.

His men fanned out, half of them on either side. Only to be hit with a furious counterattack. Arrows pierced two men, a spear impaled a third, while a stick of the explosives landed near enough to three others that they were sent flying through the air, head over heels. They crashed to the ground and didn’t get up, their bodies broken by the shock waves.

The Overseer realized his mistake, but it was too late. The savages were still in the barn. The only person on the big machine was Zavala, who was riding atop the loader like a chariot racer.

He leveled his rifle for a kill shot, but Zavala tossed something long and cylindrical his way. The Overseer dove for it, the simple and instant calculation honed over a long period of fighting. He could run maybe fifty feet in the time a grenade would go off, but he could throw it three times as far and dive behind something for protection before it went off.

Grasping the object, he pulled it up and arched his body, ready to launch the device. Only now did he realize it was too small and light to be a stick of explosives. He looked at it instinctively. It was nothing more than a telegraphing aluminum stick with a small metal hand at the top. A dime-store back scratcher.

He tossed it away angrily and spun toward Zavala, retching in pain as an arrow pierced his bicep.

The pain was remarkable. Far worse than a bullet wound. He dropped the rifle in agony and took off running. A stone from one of the slings hit him in the back. Another arrow missed to the left. The attacks spurred his retreat, and he sprinted toward the tree line like a man possessed.