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With the drone stilled, you punt yourself out of the room as fast as you can - no longer having to worry about squeezing through, as one of the struts has become your spear! Your thrust is aimed at the thick 'fleshy' portion of the bale, right above the drone's eye. With all of this movement, it occurs to you that the drone might take it self out of stand by to defend itself, but to your relief, the ragged tip of your improvised prod manages to close the distance and drive into the bale. Unfortunately, the razor wire of the bale is either less yielding or thicker than you originally assumed - the thrust skips off, and the jolt is almost enough to make you lose your tenuous grip on the spear.
Worse, that same jolt was enough to snap the drone back into action. The bale scythes with almost a desperate intensity. The legs are a flurry of movement. And in a single terrifying moment, you realize that with the drone positioned in the middle of the hallway, your thrust has brought you well outside of the protection offered by the stripped down room. Trying not to panic, you switch on your forward facing boosters to augment your existing backward momentum from your failed attack, making a blind dash back into the room. As you are unable to see where you are going, your helmet ends up passing within a hands breadth of the top if the passage you have cut into the hallway. At the moment though, you are much more worried about the drone, which is barreling right after you, legs all akimbo and its eye furiously blazing away, bathing the entire scene in the harshest white light imaginable, kicking up debris and worm remains as it accelerates towards you with all of its might.
But while the strut might now be in your hands, the metal paneling that was attached to it remains in place. Already compromised by your cutting, the panels buckle inward when the drone rams itself into them. There is a bizarre surreality, watching an impact so quick and violent that is also completely silent. Detritus is spewed into the room, and as you fight to get yourself back under control, you wonder if the drone is going to manage to break its way through.
And it seems that the drone is wondering the same thing you are. The shaking of the bale slows and then stops, then the few legs that made it into the room scrabble around a bit as the legs without presumably seek firmer purchase. Finding it, the drone pulls itself back from the breach - though it does not retreat back into the center of hallway this time, no - instead it remains just outside, the outer layer of the bale just a few fingers breadth away from the wall, as it shudders turn to softer gyrations - though when a half loose strand or razor wire gets caught, the shaking returns to full strength, until it manages to pull it free. With the immediate danger passed, your fear turns to annoyance. Pinning this thing is going to be a lot trickier than you originally thought.
