26
<Power is down to two-point-one percent.>
“I guess it’s time.”
He signaled a halt, then knelt, Pashu pointed forward. Tomiko made her way to the front.
“What do you got?”
“I need to change my battery. Down to two percent.”
“OK, I’ll tell the master guns. Radić, take point.”
Rev waited until the private moved past him, then gratefully took a seat on a fallen tree trunk. He rotated his left shoulder. The strain of carrying Pashu’s weight was beginning to wear on him. Not that her seventy-plus kilos were overly heavy, but she perched on the end of his shoulder, not nicely centered. And the harness under his skin felt like it was bunching up, which was impossible, of course. But it sure felt that way.
He rested the edge of the cannon’s muzzled on the trunk beside him for a few moments, relieving the stress.
Come on Reverent. Stop being a baby.
Truth was, he was still depressed about the fight at Bluebonnet Meadow. Losing so many Marines, including two of his friends, was bad enough, but to kill just one Centaur was grating at him. The master guns had reminded him that their mission had been to let them get away, and Rev realized it, but it still made him angry. A couple more kills, particularly the courser, would have been better.
And if he were being honest with himself, his overall depression was probably why he was beginning to resent Pashu. Without her, he knew many more Marines would have been killed by the killer-drones before they could get away.
Hopefully, they’d have a better mission when they linked up with the Second Team. Something where they were allowed to actually kill the enemy of humankind.
What a concept!
But they weren’t going to get to the link-up with him sitting on his butt feeling sorry for himself. He pulled his assault pack off his back and took out one of his two spare batteries. This wasn’t a standard-issue powerpack. Bright white with “Sieben” emblazoned across it, the battery wasn’t tactical. But it supposedly was matched to the IBHU, giving it more precise power that resulted in a better beam.
Rev has his suspicions that any battery could do, but that Sieben had purposely designed the IBHU so that only this battery would work, thereby ensuring themselves of many downstream sales.
He reached back to remove the old battery, but try as he might, he couldn’t quite get it. He’d never replaced the battery before, letting Daryll or one of the other techs handle that.
“Well, crap. One more thing to report. This has got to be fixed.”
He called out for Tomiko.
“What now?” she asked.
“I need your help. I can’t replace my battery.”
“You’re kidding me.”
“Nope.”
“Un-fucking-believable. They think you’re always gonna be with the techs? Idiots. Here let me see.”
She stepped behind Rev and asked, “I see the slot. Just press the release?”
“Turn counterclockwise, then press.”
He could feel her at his back, then heard, “OK, I got it out. Hand me that one.”
He held it over his shoulder, and she took it. He could feel her press against him, then heard a click.
“OK, it’s in.”
Rev frowned. His indicator hadn’t lit up.
“No, it’s not in right. Try again.”
“I got it right,” Tomiko grumbled, but she removed it, then snapped it in again. “There.”
Still nothing.
“Punch, run a power check.”
<Zero. No power.>
He raised Pashu, then lowered her. She worked better with the external energy, but in an emergency, she could take power for movement or to fire her missiles from his body for a limited time. He hoped that the motion might jiggle some bad connection.
“I still have nothing,” he said. “Try again to make sure it’s seated right, OK?”
Tomiko jumped up on the log, leaned over his shoulder, and said, “Look, Rev. There’s only one way it can go in, and it snapped in fine. I closed the lid and locked it. I put it in right.”
“But I still don’t have power. Can you try one more time?”
She rolled her eyes but jumped back down. He could feel her remove it, then put it back in.
Pashu remained dead.
“Nothing. Can you give that battery to me?”
Tomiko grumbled under her breath, too low for even Rev’s augmented hearing to pick up, but she took it out and handed it to him. He examined it, not really knowing what he was looking for. But nothing stood out. It should work.
“I’m going to give you my last one. Let’s hope it works, or I’m going to be pretty useless.”
He passed it back to Tomiko, and once again, he could feel as she snapped it in. A moment later, the cover was latched and turned.
Immediately, Pashu came to life.
<Power at ninety-nine-point-seven.>
“OK, OK, that did it, thank the Mother,” Rev said with relief.
“I told you I did it right. Freaking Sieben, giving you a shit battery. Kinda sucks.”
“Yeah, sucks big-time.”
She jumped off the log. “Well, hopefully, that one will last until we hit one of the supply caches. And for this one?” she said, waving the faulty one before flipping it over her shoulder and into the undergrowth. “I’d be asking Sieben for a refund.”