Pet Peeve Part 39

"What Grandad means," Dawn said brightly, "is that if a smart goblin like Goody doesn't get it, and if a battle-hardened barbarian like Hannah doesn't get it, neither will the robots."

"That's important," Eve agreed darkly. "Of course they're only machines, but they have mechanical sense. I have fathomed considerable potential in their program."

"What should we do?" Hannah asked.

"Circulate to the sectors and tell them to fall back as necessary to preserve their formations. To withdraw to the upper slopes of Iron Mountain. The robots will cease engaging them when they reach the base."

The demons closed in about Goody and Hannah and bore them away. "Has Trent lost his statues?" Metria inquired as she pinched his bottom.

"His whats?"

"Sculptures, granites, concretes, stones, rocks, gla.s.s spheres-"

"Marbles?"

"Whatever. Once those robots have access to the iron, they'll be unstoppable."

"That is my thought," Goody agreed glumly. "Yet the princesses seem to agree with him."

"They do have talents."

"Which hardly seem to apply here."

They arrived at the werewolf sector. The wolves and elves were clearly suffering. The animals' sides were lathered, and the elves were almost out of arrows, yet the robots were coming on unabated.

Prince Jeremy spied them. He loped up and changed to naked man-form. "We need support," he gasped. "We are taking losses and the robots seem innumerable."

"The Magician says to withdraw up the slope of Iron Mountain when you have to," Goody said. "Keep your formation."

"But that will give the robots access to the iron at its base."

"Yes. He has a plan."

"That's good to know." He changed back and ran to rejoin his pack.

"I'm glad he had the sense to leave Jenny behind," Hannah said.

They moved on to the centaurs. This time it was Cheery who spied them. She trotted up, but the peeve did not make any comment about her bouncing front. "The demons and humans really helped, but they had to move on to support the naga, and we're low on arrows. We'll have to shut down the supply line soon."

Goody relayed the Magician's message.

Cheery looked relieved. "Chevalier's injured, but he won't quit. A strategic withdrawal, however, might appeal." She trotted away.

It was similar with the naga. The straight humans were helping them, and the demons were carrying robots high into the air and dropping them so that they broke, but it wasn't enough. "Withdraw to Iron Mountain!" Hannah shouted. "In orderly manner."

The zombies had arrived to a.s.sist the dragons, and were gumming up many robots with their rotten parts. But here too the sheer numbers of the machines were slowly overwhelming them.

Vortex's snout appeared in the ground. "Brilliant!" his image said. "What a leader you have in Magician Trent!"

"But we don't even know his plan," Goody protested.

"Oh, but we do! It's in Hannah's mind. I'll relay the news." He tunneled out of sight.

Goody turned to Hannah. "You know?"

"Well, Dara and I discussed it. It seems she overheard Magician Humfrey discussing it. We hope it works!"

"You're all addle brained," the parody remarked.

"What-" Goody started. But then Metria enclosed him, and they were on their way to the ogre sector.

They were doing all right. It resembled a goblin/ogre battle, only it was robot heads rammed through knotholes and orbiting the moon. The tower was singing of glorious deeds of valor and sacrifice. Still, there were too many machines.

"Go to Iron Mountain!" Goody called to Smithereen. "After you bash enough robots." That was about as complicated a statement as the ogres could understand.

"We gain mountain," the ogre agreed as he twisted a robot into a metal pretzel shape.

Then on to the goblins. Goody didn't see Gwenny, but found Gap-tooth of the Golden Horde and relayed the message. "Got it," the chief said, and went to direct his battered troops.

"We've done what we can," Hannah said. "Time to report back."

That reminded him. "What is the plan?"

"That's right, I didn't tell you. Eve a.n.a.lyzed the mountain, and found-"

Then Metria enclosed him, and they were on their way back to Iron Mountain. "You should have let me hear the rest of it," he chided her.

"You'll get to in a moment."

Sure enough, one moment later they were back at the iron peak. "And if it works, every robot on the mountain will be finished," Hannah concluded. The trip had blotted out her intervening clarification.

"Isn't it brightly brilliant?" Dawn asked.

"And darkly imaginative," Eve agreed.

"Fascinating," the parody said sardonically.

Well, maybe he would find out soon enough.

They had a panoramic view of the battle scene. Unfortunately it was contracting, as the six sectors gave way before the onslaught of the robots. They were fighting brave rearguard actions, but there was no stemming the metal tide. The robots were definitely winning.

As the day waned, they reached the base of the mountain. The werewolves were panting, their elves just hanging on. The centaurs hardly had strength to climb the gentle slope, and the harpies were riding their backs, exhausted. The naga made it to an iron gully and lay strewn out in snake form. The dragons found a higher ledge and clung to it, pretty much out of fire, smoke, and steam. Even the ogres looked worn out, their knuckles dragging. Only the goblins, small but ornery, still showed fight; their lines roiled as they sallied to beat back the machines. The robots tried to press between them and Mountain Lake, but they rallied and shoved them back. But finally even the goblins had to seek the refuge of the mountain, following paths to a.s.sorted holes and caves.

The robots reached the base and found the iron. There was a fluting cheer from them as they achieved their objective, while Goody, Hannah, and the battered troops looked down in dismay.

"Is it time?" Magician Trent inquired, as if in doubt.

"Yes, Grandpa, I think it is," Dawn said.

"If the big birds are ready," Eve said.

"I will notify them," Grossclout's voice said. Goody hadn't realized that the demon professor was present, but of course demons were normally invisible unless they chose to become apparent. There was a pop as he departed.

"There," Dawn said, pointing north.

Goody strained to see. On the horizon were several dots. These expanded rapidly, becoming birds. The birds seemed to grow larger as they approached, and larger yet. Finally they were huge: they were rocs.

The rocs carried some sort of lines strung out between them. At first they looked like spider strands, then like string, and finally like cables. They were heavy; a roc could carry a Mundane elephant, but the cable was making them struggle. It looped around in a complete circle, a number of strands, with rocs supporting it all around. It seemed to be metal wire wrapped in cloth. Goody had no idea what the point of it was.

The big birds flew right over Iron Mountain, carrying the giant ring of wrapped wires. Then all together, they let it go. The cable dropped down to circle the base of the mountain close to where the robots were. The robots looked at it, but saw no purpose in it, any more than Goody did. Why drop wrapped metal wire on a metal mountain?

Then demons materialized, detaching individual strands and connecting them to large plants growing in sheltered gullies. "Those look like electric plants," Goody said.

"Oh, yes," Eve breathed. Like her sister, she breathed very well. "The perfect mating of animate and inanimate."

And they were the sorceresses of animate and inanimate things, at least in knowledge. They surely knew what they were doing.

But meanwhile more and more robots were reaching the mountain, cl.u.s.tering there, delighted with the presence of all that iron. Soon they would be setting up a factory to make more of themselves.

Suddenly it happened. The robots fell to the iron ground with audible clanks and lay there unmoving.

"What a lazy bunch!" the peeve said.

"What are they doing?" Goody asked, surprised.

"They're dead, if machines can be dead." Eve said. "The battle is over."

"I don't understand."

"But I explained it to you," Hannah said. "The coils, the electric power plants, the coiling current-it's the magic of magnetism."

"The magic of what?"

"Allure, glamor, charisma," Metria said. "Appeal, potency, seduction-"

"No, this is electric attraction," Eve said. "Specifically, iron. We have made Iron Mountain magnetic. The iron bodies of the robots are helplessly attracted to it, and that's their doom, because when their heads come up against all that power it blows their programs. They are done for."

"But why didn't it do the same to us?"

"It doesn't affect living organisms," Dawn said. "Or even all metal. Just iron."

"Which I appreciate," Hannah said. "My armor is aluminum. I'd hate to have it pulled off by a magnet."

So, just like that, they had won the battle and beaten the robots. Who had not thought of magnetism any more than Goody had.

"Tomorrow we'll start picking up the pieces," Magician Trent said, satisfied.

Chapter 16: Lost Things.

It was too crowded on the mountain to go anywhere or do anything other than stay put and rest. The harpy supply line resumed, bringing box suppers for all, and facilities for washing and refuse were set up in mountain crevices. The invisible river that sprang from the side of the mountain provided plenty of translucent water.

They settled down for sleep where they were. Dawn and Eve argued over which of them would get to be a pillow for Goody to sleep on, until Hannah settled it by doing that job herself. Her metal armor wasn't very soft, but he knew better than to complain; he definitely did not trust the teasing mischief of the princesses.

In the morning Goody, Hannah, and the princesses were drafted to relay Magician Trent's parting message to the troops. "You have all done well in this significant battle. You held the robots back long enough for us to craft the magnet that destroyed them. You can all be proud. But take this warning back to your people: we have won the battle, not the war. It was not possible to destroy all the robots, and those that remain will surely resume construction of more of their kind. Next time they will profit from experience, and organize with leadership instead of pushing blindly toward Iron Mountain. They will insulate themselves from damage by magnetism. They will seek not merely to pa.s.s by the opposition, but to destroy it. So do not rest easy; we must remain vigilant, and prevent the robots from ever becoming numerous enough to defeat us."

That was a sobering statement. The threat had been abated, not ended. They relayed it to the several contingents as they organized to go home.

Only then did Goody feel free to seek Gwenny, who he knew was busy organizing her goblins for the return. They went to the Goblin Mountain section and asked for her.

A goblin subchief was surprised. "We thought she was with you and Magician Trent. She's not with us, dunce."

It felt as if a cold hand gripped Goody's innards. What had happened to Gwenny?

They questioned the other subchiefs, trying to ascertain who had seen Chiefess Gwenny last. It turned out that she had been rousing the troops everywhere, doing a fine job (for a female), going constantly back and forth. She had been there as they started the retreat up the mountain. And not since. She had simply disappeared, and no one had seen her go.

"I hate to say this," Hannah said. "But many goblins were slain in the melee. She-"

"Croaked?" the peeve asked.

"No!" he cried.

"May have been abducted by the robots," she concluded. "To be a hostage for their safe escape. If some of them suspected that Iron Mountain was a trap."

He stared at her. "They did catch us and hold us prisoner before," he said. "They do know about that sort of thing."

"Yes. And as Magician Trent said, they can profit from experience. So they might take her away, knowing her value to us, and maybe use her to bargain for a better deal."

Goody didn't like the notion, but it seemed better than the alternative, which was unthinkable. He had to believe that she was alive and well. "But then how can we find her?"

"We can look around the area. They can't have gotten far."

But a quick search revealed nothing. It seemed Gwenny Goblin was nowhere in the area, dead or alive.

By the time Goody gave up the search, the a.s.sorted contingents had departed, leaving the robots littering the scene, especially on Iron Mountain. Magician Trent and the princesses were gone, together with the demon and human contingents, including Dara and Metria. There was no one left but Goody and Hannah.

"I don't know what to do," he said. "I can't rest until I know where she is."

"Give it up, joker," the parody said. "She ditched you, one way or another."

Goody stiffened. His hands twitched.

"Maybe I should carry the bird for now," Hannah said.