The Peace War by Vernor Vinge

A
bobble and one rifle in the hands of an incompetent marksman?
    The gunfire came to a ragged stop. "Now, Jeremy!" Naismith said. The larger boy
jumped into the open and swung his weapon wildly across the ravine. He fired the whole
clip. The rifle stuttered in an irregular way, as though on the verge of jamming. Its
muzzle flash lit the ravine. The enemy was invisible, except for one fellow vaguely seen
against the light-colored rock at the side of the cleft. That one had bad luck: He was
almost lifted off his feet by the impact of bullet on chest, and slammed back against the
rock.
    Cries of pain rose from all along the ravine. How had Jeremy done it? Even one hit was
fantastic luck. And Jeremy Kaladze was the fellow who in daylight could miss the broad
side of a barn.
    Jeremy slammed down beside him. "Did I g-get them all?" There was an edge of horror
in his voice. But he slipped another clip into his sawed-off weapon.
    There was no return fire. But wait. The bandit lying by the outcrop — he was up and
running! The hit should have left him dead or crawling. Through the bushes below, he
could hear the others picking themselves up and running for the far end of the ravine.
One by one, they appeared in silhouette, still running.
    Jeremy rose to his knees, but Naismith pulled him down.
    "You're right, son. There's something strange with them. Let's not press our luck."
    They lay for a long time in the ringing silence, till at last the animal sounds resumed
and the starlight seemed bright. There was no sign of humans inside of five hundred
meters.
    Projections?
Jeremy wondered aloud. Zombies? Wili thought silently to himself. But
they could be neither. They had been hit; they had gone down. Then they had gotten up
and run in a panic — and that was unlike the zombies of Ndelante legend. Naismith had no
speculations he was willing to share.
    It was raining again by the time their rescuers arrived.
    Only 9 o'clock on an April morning and already the air was a hot, humid 30 degrees.
Thunderheads hung high on the arch of the Dome. It would rain in the afternoon. Wili
Wachendon and Jeremy Sergeivich Kaladze walked down the wide, graveled road that
led from the main farmhouse toward outbuildings by the Dome. They made a strange
sight: One boy near two meters tall, white and lanky; the other short, thin, and black,
apparently subadolescent. But Wili was beginning to realize that there were similarities,
too. It turned out they were the same age — fifteen. And the other boy was sharp, though
not in the same class as Wili. He had never tried to intimidate with his size. If anything,
he seemed slightly in awe of Wili (if that were possible in one as rambunctious and
outspoken as Jeremy Sergeivich).
    "The Colonel says," Jeremy and the others never called Old Kaladze "grandfather,"
though there seemed to be no fear in their attitude, and a lot of affection, "the Colonel
says the farm is being watched, has been since the three of us got here."
    "Oh? The bandits?"
    "Don't know. We can't afford the equipment Dr. Naismith can buy — those micro-cameras and such.
But we have a telescope and twenty-four-hour camera on top of the barn.
The processor attached to it detected several flashes from the trees," he swept his
hand toward the ridgeline where the rain forest came down almost to the farm's banana
plants, "that are probably reflections from old-style optics."
    Wili shivered in the warm sunlight. There were lots of people here compared to
Naismith's mansion in the wilderness, but it was not a properly fortified site: There were
no walls, watchtowers, observation balloons. There were many very young children, and
most of the adults were over fifty. That was a typical age distribution, but one unsuitable
for defense. Wili wondered what secret resources the Kaladzes might have.
    So what are you going to do?"
    "Nothing much. There can't be too many of 'em; they're awful shy. We'd go out after
them if we had more people. As it is, we've got