No Dominion The Walker Papers - By CE Murphy Page 0,118

the ground beneath me to vibrate hard with their running steps, then bounced up and fired again, hoping to catch more than one with the next grenade.

Two golems exploded into pebbles. I bellowed, “Hoo-ah!” and dropped again, waiting for the rest to come closer.

The stone next to me cracked open and a golem dropped its full weight on me.

Air slammed out of me in a sob. My ribs weren’t shattered, but I’d felt them crack. If the golem levered itself up a few inches and dropped on me again, I’d be flattened. I couldn’t afford that, and I didn’t have many other options. Neither did it, though. It growled and snapped at me toothlessly, but I was certain if anything got caught between those flat gums it would be crushed. I exhaled to get the last air out of my gut so I could breathe in again, and when all the air was gone, I squirmed one arm free. The frag rifle was crushed between me and the golem, but even Joanne might think twice about setting off a grenade on her chest. Maybe not—I’d seen her take hits at least that hard and walk away—but it was a rash idea.. And I didn’t have magic to back me up. I wheezed a breath past the pain, fumbled a grenade from the backpack, and swore I would never do anything this stupid again if I lived through doing it once.

Then I pulled the pin and shoved the grenade into the golem’s mouth. I grabbed its lower jaw and jammed it up, closing its mouth on the grenade, and I counted eight seconds in a prayer: “Please, God, let this work. Let it work.”

Stone exploded on top of me. Shards slammed into my belly. Dust penetrated my pores. A thump like being hit by the shockwave of a sound barrier breach drove me a few inches into the ground. My ears started to ring , the noise building until it had a visual of its own, rings spreading through the black behind my eyelids.

On top of that, I heard something else. An irritating vibration, enough to set the teeth that didn’t feel loosened on edge. It made the air shiver, like a barrier set up around my skin.

Like a subwoofer playing a pitch to drive mosquitoes away. Subsonics that humans couldn’t hear. Subsonics that rattled the air, though, and probably the earth.

I’d led the rock golems right to me.

Maybe I wasn’t so smart after all. If I’d done it on purpose it would’ve been clever, and it was still better than hiking all over the eastern Cascades trying to find them, but I was supposed to be the one who relied on thinking ahead. Thinking ahead was supposed to keep me from getting cracked ribs and grenade concussions.

The ringing in my ears faded a little. I had to sit up, even knowing it was going to hurt. It was going to hurt a lot. I did it all at once, rubble falling away in a noisy counterpoint to the pain crashing through my body. I didn’t dare prod my ribs to see how bad they were. I could find out later, after I’d finished destroying rock golems and taking out their demon father. I rolled all the way to my feet, panting through the pain, and didn’t dare stop to take stock of what other damage I’d sustained.

Four golems had been reduced to sand. There were four left, and no obvious signs of more generating. I wondered if eight was a number of significance in ancient Sumer, or if I’d just interrupted their spawning session before it reached the number I knew was significant, which was sixty. I had to hope so, because I didn’t have enough ammo for another forty-two golems.

The four left were spreading out, acting more wary. That was anthropomorphizing: rock did not act wary, even when animated. It didn’t plan, either, but I did, and to my eyes, it looked like they were preparing a more strategic attack. If all four picked up speed and moved in on me at once, I was done for.

At least I could even the odds. There were two grenades left in the launcher. I hefted it to my shoulder, took a breath against the oncoming kickback, and fired.

The grenade flew where it was supposed to, but I dropped. The kickback was centered against my shoulder, but it slammed the whole body at the best of times. Firing it with cracked ribs