BZRK (BZRK 1)

Vincent took no pleasure in the food, but he came as close to pleasure as he ever did when he stabbed a cutter claw into the nearest nanobot, right into its comm link, and spilled nanowire.

Vincent’s phone pulsed.

Only one person could ring him and always get through.

He pulled his phone out and looked at the text. His concentration wavered, and he very nearly lost two of V2’s legs to a low scythe cut from a nanobot.

Grey & Stone confirmed dead. Sadie injured/OK.

Vincent was not good at experiencing pleasure. Unfortunately he was perfectly able to experience grief, loss, and rage.

He had set aside the first news of the crash. He had stuck it in a compartment. He was on a mission, he had to focus, and from long experience he knew not to trust news reports. Maybe Grey McLure had not been on the plane. Maybe.

This, however, came from Lear. If Lear said it, it was true.

Vincent texted back, missing a couple of letters as he jammed a sharp leg into the vulnerable leg joint of the second nanobot and watched it crumple.

But more nanobots were coming. A new platoon of six.

Tgt LO infst. Engaged. Withdrfing.

If he had two biots in this, he might fight this battle and win. With three he’d be confident. But this was a losing fight.

A follow-up text from Lear: Carthage.

Vincent stared at the word. No, no, no. This was not his thing. This was not what he did.

A beam weapon cut one of his six legs. The cut didn’t go all the way through, but it snapped off. It wouldn’t slow him much, but it would throw off the biot’s equilibrium.

This was not the time to stay and play smack-the-nanobot and maybe lose. It was time for extraction, and as quickly as possible.

Carthage.

Carthage. The Roman Empire’s great enemy. Until the Romans conquered it; murdered or enslaved every man, woman, and child; burned every building to the ground; then sowed the earth with salt so that nothing would ever grow there again.

Carthago delenda est. It had been a slogan in Rome: Carthage must be destroyed.

Vincent wiped his mouth with his napkin.

He pushed back his chair.

V2 turned and ran from the four near and many farther-off nanobots. More were scurrying down the optic nerve. They weren’t a problem: using their four legs, the nanobots were slower than a biot. Only when they had a fairly smooth surface could the nanobots switch to their single wheel and outrun a biot.

Unfortunately the eyeball was perhaps the ultimate smooth surface.

V2 motored its legs at full speed. Back around the eyeball.

Vincent made his way slowly across the room toward Liselotte Osborne.

V2 waited until two of the nanobots were close enough to open fire. Their fléchettes ate a second leg away.

Vincent felt the echo of the pain in his own leg.

V2 sprayed sulfuric acid to the left and right simultaneously. It wouldn’t kill the nanobots, but it would slow them, bog them down in puddles of melting flesh. And even on just four legs and dragging stumps he could maybe outrun the remaining nanobots.

Liselotte Osborne cried out suddenly.

“Oh! Oh!”