The Great Destroyer by Jack Thorlin Page A

but small enough that it could be wielded quickly.
     
    Of course, Takagawa would not arm her child for war with a metal spear.  The shaft was made of carbon nanotubes, the strongest material humans had ever created.  The spear’s warhead was made of synthetic diamond. 
     
    Jackson had supplied the name: Ascalon, the spear that St. Simon had used to slay the dragon.
     
    In testing, Charlie II had stabbed Ascalon through a half-foot of concrete.  He would now wield the blade against the Ushah.
     
    Initiate subroutine draw_ascalon.exe.
     
    Faster than any human could, Charlie II withdrew Ascalon from the thin scabbard hidden beneath the decorative clothing he wore.
     
    Target distance = 1.85 meters.
     
    1.85 meters < Effective combat radius
     
    Initiate zero_g_movement.exe.
     
    Initiate kick.exe.
     
    The short Ushah still had his left arm extended and pointed at the Equality Minister’s falling body when Charlie II kicked off a bulkhead and flew toward the Ushah in a zero-g lunge.
     
    The Ushah was slow to react, perhaps because he had immediately looked at Drew Murphy next, who was screaming out of the way off to the Ushah’s right.  By the time the Ushah realized Charlie II had sprang at him, it was too late to do more than reflexively flinch.
     
    Initiate subroutine combat_stab.exe.
     
    Charlie II cocked his hydraulically powered arm back and then rammed Ascalon into the Ushah’s chest.  The Ushah let out a high-pitched scream as the diamond blade tore through the skin of the Ushah spacesuit, an inch of some exotic metal that sent a small current back through the blade, a soft rubber-like undershirt, the skin of the Ushah itself, six inches of Ushah flesh and bone, two inches of Ushah heart, and then the same materials in reverse order on its way out the other side.
     
    Initiate ascalon_withdraw.exe.
     
    Initiate enemy_damage_assessment.exe.
     
    Charlie II yanked Ascalon free, his optical sensor and image processing software noting a gout of light-red blood. 
     
    The stab to the chest had been highly successful, the robot’s learning algorithms concluded.  The anatomical assessment sent to him by Dr. Takagawa forty minutes earlier had proven accurate—if evolution had driven the Ushah into a similar shape as humans, it stood to reason their basic organs wouldn’t be dramatically different.
     
    Initiate threat_scan.exe.
     
    The Ushah linguist recoiled in evident horror as the mechanical servant came alive and killed his companion.  The taller Ushah, however, reflexively pressed a button on his suit to call up his weapons, the same blade and firearm combination the shorter Ushah had wielded.
     
    Enemy 2 = Threat.
     
    Charlie II had observed the shorter Ushah’s use of the firearm moments earlier.  His programmers had given him the power of inference, of deduction.  He knew the taller Ushah had drawn weapons, and knew what would stop him. 
     
    Target distance = 1.3 meters.
     
    1.3 meters < Effective combat radius
     
    Initiate zero_g_movement.exe.
     
    Initiate kick.exe.
     
    Charlie II sprang forward again. 
     
    Initiate combat_stab.exe.
     
    This time, the Ushah saw him coming and reacted, bringing up his own blade to deflect Ascalon.  The Ushah’s weapon deflected Ascalon so that it struck nothing but air.
     
    Initiate combat_punch.exe.
     
    Here, Yazov’s tactics once again proved their worth.  Charlie II had two arms, after all, and only one was needed to wield Ascalon.  With his left hand, Charlie II punched through the Ushah’s face plate.  The panel deformed and collapsed around the robot’s fist.  Charlie II withdrew his hand, taking the remainder of the faceplate with him. 
     
    The Ushah’s face was reptilian, a darker shade of green than his lime green spacesuit.  His skin was scaly and creased by lines.  He appeared to have no hair.
     
    The Ushah let out a shout and began deeply inhaling in the shuttle’s air.  He breathed like a human at high altitude, on