Metal pumping and flexing, pistoning and scraping, stretching and bending across the earth, metal tearing into the ground, thudding deep into the soil, metal rising up into the air in a swarm . . . The swipe of blades, the crash of cannon-balls, the spung and ricochet of bullets, the whirling of saw-edged discs, flares of wire, rains of chaff, explosions of shrapnel, swarf springing up all around . . . Through it all danced the energy of electricity, jumping in blue sparks, crackling down arms and legs, earthing itself on blades, shorting out between electromuscles, singing in the mind . . . The noise of explosions, crackling orange and yellow flames, burning phosphorus, the clash of metal, the squeal of drills slipping across plate, the scrape of knives, the thud of lead on iron . . . The atmosphere was squeezed and sucked this way and that by explosions, smoke and iron filings pushed through panelling in great gasps that sent the gyros shuddering, eyesight and hearing baffled by the flash and crash and roar .
