MetaWars: Fight For The Future

Chapter 36

Sam braced herself, half expecting to feel a lethal electric jolt.

Of course, it didn’t come.

The fence buckled with the impact of her vehicle, strands of wire snapping, but it didn’t quite give. The land yacht’s engines strained against the obdurate barrier, wheels spinning in the sand, failing to find traction.

A second land yacht hit the fence, then a third and a fourth, ten more. More wires were severed, pillars torn up from the sand. The fence collapsed. The last of the Millennial guards dived for cover.

The second fence was only a hundred metres behind the first. Sam’s vehicle had lost much of its momentum, but the same wasn’t true of the rest of the fleet. The land yachts hit the second fence, shredded it and surged forward in triumph.

There was nothing between the Guardians and their objective now. Nothing but three miles of desert sands. They were leaving the Millennial guards, stunned, behind them. Just a handful of them had recovered their wits enough to climb to their feet, to fire their weapons after their receding foes.

The other land yachts fell back, allowing Sam’s to retake the lead.

She shouted instructions to her Aboriginal driver. He stepped on the accelerator again. They approached the looming red shape of Ayers Rock, but veered off to follow the line of its broad southern face to its western tip. They had gained two miles on the Millennial guards, and were concealed from them by the rock.

It was time to put the next stage of their plan into operation.

The land yachts came to a halt. Their occupants disembarked. All but one.

Jonah was still meta-tranced in his seat. Sam sent him a pop-up message, then turned to their driver. ‘I need you to stay with him,’ she said. ‘If he hasn’t come back by the time the Millennials get here—’

The older Aborigine nodded. ‘I will protect him,’ he promised.

Sam looked around at the other land yachts. She counted seventeen, all told. They must have lost two more to the Millennials’ rocket launchers as they had rushed the outer fence. It could have been a lot worse.

The Guardians knew what to do. They had parked their vehicles facing Ayers Rock, and had begun to calibrate the catapults on their backs. Sam looked nervously at the catapult attached to her own vehicle.

Her driver produced a laser rangefinder. He sighted through it at the rock, calculating its distance away and height at this point. He clicked his tongue thoughtfully, as he knelt by the catapult and adjusted it according to his readings.

Sam didn’t dare speak, she didn’t want to risk distracting him.

The moment she had been dreading came at last. She pulled on her parachute harness. It wasn’t a full chute, but it would slow her descent a little.

The driver turned to her. ‘It is ready,’ he said.

Sam’s heart was pounding as she stepped up onto the back of the land yacht and lowered herself into the catapult seat. She was tilted backwards, so all she could see was the dark sky, freckled with more stars than she had ever seen before.

There were still more adjustments to make for Sam’s size and weight. As she waited, she heard the first catapults being sprung. Several human shapes soared through the air above her. From this angle, she couldn’t tell if her fellow Guardians had landed safely or not. She heard gunfire from atop Ayers Rock, which suggested that at least some of them had made it.