第119页
The drones were getting very good at hunting them.
A pair of Sentinels paused, hovering four meters above the ground. After bombarding the jungle from a hundred meters with energy blasts… and missing, they had finally descended to their level.
Their lateral spars flexed as if they could smell the trap. The spars about each sphere then drifted farther part and both spheres moved within centimeters of each other.
It reminded Kurt of cell division, only in reverse. They were combining.
What the purpose of this "mating" was, Kurt wasn't sure. He was, however, sure he didn't like it.
The now-double Sentinel crept closer.
Team Saber on the left flank detonated fougasse positioned under the drones. Flames shot up and lit the canopy, smoldering shrapnel obliterating the foliage.
A split second later Blue Team on the right flank let loose an SPNKr missile and a hail of MA5B fire. They were in perfect defilade.
The air filed with white-hot tracers and black roiling clouds. Two nearby trees crackled and fell.
Kurt flashed his red status light, and the fire ceased.
Saber had jumped the gun. A half second maybe, but they had definitely shot before the Sentinels were in position.
What had he expected? For all the simulated combats the Gamma Company Spartans had been through, nothing could have prepared them for continuous guerilla action with the Forerunner killing machines.
Kurt squinted. Even with image enhancement and thermals he couldn't make out anything in the air where the Sentinels had been. But he could see the ground… and among the splintered tree trunks, burning leaves, and popping metal, there was neither drone.
He blinked his amber light twice, ordering the teams to fall back. He didn't like this one bit.
A full bank of green status lights winked at him.
Kurt saw motion in the mist: shadows that resolved into six rods arranged in a long hexagonal geometry—two spheres within—pulsing as the energy field enveloping the combined Sentinels shimmered.
They were completely untouched.
Kurt flashed his red three times: the retreat signal.
One sphere glowed and moved back and forth searching. It stopped and fixed upon Kurt.
He jumped.
A flash of light struck. The jungle floor detonated and a three-meter crater fizzled and cracked into glass.
Kurt rolled into a crouch and instinctively returned fire with his MA5K.
This was part of the plan, too: the part where everything went wrong and he had insisted on drawing the enemy's fire while the others slipped away. He knew the terrain: Twin Forks River was three hundred meters to the east. It should be a stroll through the park.
The other sphere shone like burnished gold and his rounds bounced off its energy shield… even as the first sphere reheated, building charge for another shot.
Kurt ran, zigzagging into the foliage.
In this doubled configuration the Sentinels could simultaneously fire and defend with an energy shield. That was big trouble.
It seemed all their engagements with the Sentinels were doing was teaching them how to be more effective in combat.