The group moved through the hall, past the stairs, and toward the stairs.
Cooper had split his attention between glancing around the area from the back of the team and operating the tablet. He grabbed the drones at the loading area and forced them to walk away and escape the control range of the hack. It worked, and he freed quartet of burly men ran off in confusion when they made it to within a few blocks of the convention center and mall. He grabbed the app’s limit of six people at a time and forced people away from the mall’s exits out into the city streets to escape. He had freed two such groups when the team slowed down.
“They know we’re here,” Langley said.
A line of six personal security guards lined the front of the nearest stairwell. They were frozen, but stood side-by-side to form a wall out of their bodies. They hadn’t been in the area and in that formation when any of the team members crossed through the convention lobby.
“Not good,” Murphy said as he looked to the next-nearest fancy stairwell to point out another group of six bodyguards.
“It’s worse than we thought,” Langley said as she pointed to three other stairwells which each had a group of six bodyguards trotting down the steps and pushing people aside.
The eighteen guards, were already large-framed men and women, but were bulked up by the armor they wore under their fine suits. All of them wore computerized sunglasses like Cooper or had cybernetic visor replacements for their eyes, all of which gave them focused expressions. Their movements, however, were clunky like people being controlled through a hack.
“Each tablet can control six people at a time, so this means three other hackers,” Cooper said. He glanced down at his tablet to find the screen flashed between the display he used and a pixellated mess of black and yellow blocks. “Perhaps four others, since someone’s overriding my device.”
“At least we know they’re upstairs if they’re trying to prevent our upward movement.” Langley’s antennas flicked. “I’m reading a weak signal, heavily encrypted and masked with fake background signals, from the fifth floor. They probably won’t all be in the same location.”
One group of guards slowed in their movement and formed into a line midway down their stairwell.
“Take cover!” Cooper drew his large pistol and crouched behind an information kiosk on the lobby floor.
Murphy scrambled to lead Faye behind a stairwell rail and shielded her with his body as he drew his government-loaned revolver.
Langley stood her ground in front of the six nearest guards.
The four large men and two large women rattled in place for a split second, then all looked at the android. They moved in unison as they slowly drew compact submachine guns from holsters within their suits.
“Ladies and gentlemen, you’re lucky the team’s pet monster is out recovering from wounds, and that I’m her substitute.” Langley stomped up to the bodyguard drones and charged her palm coils. “You’d all have ventilated skulls by now. But I value the gift of your lives.” She shocked the guards with short bursts before they took aim.
The six people fell to the floor in a pile at Langley’s feet and dropped their weapons.
“Murphy, you might want to consider a free weapon upgrade,” Langley waved at the scattered submachine guns. She glanced down and shrugged. “Never mind, they have encoder grips. Only the designated user can fire them.”
The next-nearest group of guards drew their weapons and fired bursts at the android. Every round hit their mark and the small rounds pinged as they slammed into Langley’s faceplate and breastplate. Only minor dents formed in the thick metal surfaces.
“Tiny SMG bullets? Sorry to tell you, but I’m not ticklish.” Langley sprinted to the group and shocked all of them. “Different model of weapon, but encoded,” she said as she surveyed the weapons dropped by the people at her feet.
A large caliber roar echoed through the lobby as Langley’s right antenna flicked downward and a piece of the fountain shattered behind her.
Langley attempted to move her antenna, but it was damaged from the impact. She spun to face a group of bodyguards who all aimed oversized pistols at her.
“Oh, Auto-Winnies, that should leave a mark.” Langley ducked to dodge another round and took a hit to her shoulder before she leaped to confront the guards and shock them all. She checked the pauldron and spotted a half-inch-wide pair of entry and exit holes.
“Boss, I can distract them,” Langley said. “Otherwise we’ll have to wade through every person in this convention center.”
“Good work, Reserve Deputy Langley.” Cooper motioned to Murphy. “Let’s get up to the fifth floor and find our suspects. Langley, only provide a distraction. Don’t harm any innocents and catch up to us as soon as you can.”
“Roger.” Langley’s lithe form allowed her to move around with speed, including graceful backflips between stairwells to shock bodyguards who activated to attack the team. She had to move as fast as she could manage to keep up with eighteen attackers at a time. Most of them were armed with small concealed weapons which had no effect on her plating.
The three humans crouched behind the delicate rails and made their way past frozen people. Cooper took the initiative to punch several of the individuals who were activated as drones and tried to stop them. Murphy continued to shield Faye.
Langley leapt to the top of a stairwell on the fourth floor and yanked a guard away from his attempted aim at Cooper’s head with a large pistol. The momentum of her movement caused her to tackle the man and shatter his jaw on the floor.
The man was still conscious, as evidenced by his attempts to wiggle his way out from under Langley’s pin. His deadpan face was enough proof none of his true self was present to take in the sheer pain his injury should have instilled in him.
“You hear me, hacker?” Langley grabbed the man by his neck and lifted him so his cybernetic visor reflected nothing but her blank face. “I don’t want to kill you. But if you force me to hurt more people, what I end up doing to you won’t be quick and it’ll be anything but painless. I’ve been to the dark furnace, a place of eternal weeping and gnashing of teeth. And I swear I’ll bring you a special preview of that suffering.”
“Already malfunctioning from one good hit to your head?” The bodyguard’s words were robotic, as if he spoke from typed commands. “We will break more than your cute little head fin.”
Langley electrocuted the man and resumed her sprints and leaps to incapacitate the last of the armed bodyguards.
The hackers had to switch to large-framed individuals scattered around the lobby to attempt to stop the group, but Langley moved with angelic precision to stop them with a shock. When the drone activations stopped, Langley knew the hackers would shift their strategy to protect the upper floors. She backflipped onto a stairwell and sped after her team.
***
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