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It is discouraging – but you are fairly certain that if you are able to get the pocket door closed on more of the drone, you should be able to induce the damned thing into seizing up, which with any luck should allow you to get your hands on it. As the drone retreats away from the door back to the center of the hallway, you scrabble around for your spear, before remembering that it is still tied to your suit. Concerned about prematurely provoking the drone, you keep the spear close to the ground. But as you contemplate on whether or not you should risk creeping forward or not, it occurs to you that you might have better luck if you used brief window of opportunity that you get from feeding the drone the lines in Primitive to get the spear into position, and then try to get the drone to slam into the tip, instead of the other way around. At the very least, it has to be worth a shot, right?
"Start of Line. Range of address, four cubits. Target of address, drone. Purpose of address, locomotion full stop and power down. Time of address, effective immediately and effective immediately. End of Line."
As soon as the drone stops shuffling, you squat down, and angle the spear up, so that it is pointing towards the ‘fleshy’ part of the bottom of the bale. You are just eyeballing it through the darkening tint of your auto-visor and the stark light of the drone’s lamp, but you think that you got the spear tip just outside of the doorway. Recalling the wrapper that you threw, you make small, circular movements with the tip, hoping to bait the drone into an attack. Moments later, the drone snaps back into action and hurtles itself onto the point, adjusting its position incrementally as it accelerates. You stay stock still as the distance closes – waiting for the drone to hit the tip. And as soon as you feel the drone on the other end of the spear, you throw all of the force that you can muster into one monstrous thrust, again using the boosters on your suit to ram yourself forward while your boots remain magnetically anchored to the ground.
The result is beautiful. Short of somehow knocking the drone out, you don’t imagine that it could have gone better. You feel – and see! – the razor wire parting, the bale giving way. Moving quickly, you press the spear to the right and then further up, with all of your might, hoping to get it securely stuck in there. As you do, you feel something give way, and you notice that one of the legs is now out of alignment. While all of this is happening, the drone is getting more and more desperate. Instead of slowing down and stopping, it is getting more and more violent, no doubt trying to destroy the interloper in its body.
You hold yourself steady for a moment, partially to catch your breath and organize your thoughts, and partially to make sure that the drone is not going to be able to pull itself off of the spear.
