by Mel Odom
Escape. U R B N set up. Call Beckman.
I buried the e-message in errata, splintering it so that I believed it to be unrecoverable by any but the most dedicated datahound and cryptologist. Any data packet sniffer used to ferret the communication out would first have to know of its existence.
I wasn’t telling. I did not think the captain would either. However, I did not know how I was to escape.
I reached back into the Net and pulled down maps of the immediate vicinity and tried to pick a probable location to make my attempt to contact Beckman. Actually escaping was going to be immensely difficult. In addition to the shock collar, there was also the GPS locator within my chassis.
The command further complicated the conflict within my programming. I had been given orders by a person in authority to escape from my present predicament.
Ahead of me, Madison stopped suddenly and spoke softly into a comm-link in his ear. I piggybacked his communication.
“Drake 3GI2RC is accessing the Net and fouling our systems with data overload. Watch him.”
A male voice beeped into my on-board PAD. “Detective Drake 3GI2RC, surrender your Net access. Shut down your present activity.”
I stopped—almost immediately. But I had time to ping the personal comm-link that Rachel had given me.
She pinged back almost a nanosecond later, hiding her response—fittingly enough—in a public service announcement on behalf of the NAPD regarding first-time tourists to the Moon. The commercial ran continuously over the Net.
I deciphered Rachel’s response at once. I got you.
I didn’t have to erase that message. As soon as I downloaded it, the communication fragmented. A quick peek at NAPD computers let me know that the message hadn’t been intercepted.
I logged out of the Net immediately. Madison looked at me for a moment and exchanged a brief transmission through his comm-link. “No. Everything looks fine. Maybe the unit was just jonesing for the Net. Or maybe it was damaged. It’s just standing there looking at me.”
People passed around us on their way to the tube station 327 meters ahead. Madison and Pearson and I drew several irritated looks and a multitude of curses. When people got too close to us, Madison and Pearson flashed their e-badges and waved them off. This drew further commentary and more ire.
“No, no. Me and Pearson got this. It’s wearing a shock collar. If it tries anything, I’ll light it up till it’s a heap of smoking wreckage. I’ve never liked these things. You ask me, I should just shock it into meltdown now and the tech department can sift through the ashes for whatever went wrong.”
A sharp feeling of wrongness resonated within me. I had seen instances of bioroids locking up mentally and physically when their operating systems became gridlocked due to conflicting priorities. I had never been this close to the line before.
Madison resumed leading and I followed two steps behind him. My undressed state caused mild concern. As used to bioroids as the general populace was, my synthskin face and hands looked out of place against the rest of my body. Like I had been dismembered. I did not turn my head to look at anyone. With my 360-degree vision, I didn’t have to.
I stood at the tube station with my guards. They flashed their e-IDs and commandeered a car to ourselves in the middle of a twenty-three car train. Many of those waiting at the station would have to continue waiting. The situation wasn’t a popular one.
“Stay in the middle of the car where we can keep an eye on you.” Madison pointed toward the center of the car.
I took the ordered position and stood facing back toward the doors as they hissed closed after Pearson fanned them with his PAD. The two NAPD officers took positions at either end of the car and held their stunsticks in their hands as they stood guard over the connecting car doors.
The digital display counted down from two minutes, then a pleasant voice announced departure. “This tube train will be leaving the station in fifteen seconds. Please keep your head and extremities inside the car at all times. Have a pleasant trip.”
I stared at the tube-lev overlay on the windows. The various tube routes stood out in pale green. The train we’d boarded stood out as a glowing yellow dot on the map.
The train left the station without a sound and soared quickly over the mag-lev rails that provided power and direction. The NAPD station I was being moved to was only fourteen klicks away. I assumed I was being transported to a holding cell there to put pressure on Haas-Bioroid. Some of the files I’d downloaded while briefly on the Net snooping through my case file had shown that the district attorney had filed for several injunctions against Haas-Bioroid. I guessed that they were going to move me around and try to stay one step ahead of the corporation. Shelly and I had done the same with high-powered suspects and defense attorneys over the years.
The train halted at the first stop. Madison overrode the controls for the car and kept the doors to our car shut. On the other side of the transplas windows, travelers departed or boarded. Several vid advertisements played over the stone walls, soliciting traffic for sushi restaurants, Eliza’s Toybox, tech outlets, and G-mod suppliers.
A minute later, we were underway again. That was how it went for six more stops.
Then someone dropped onto the roof of our tube car at the seventh stop.
I recognized the thump at once. In microgravity, the noise wasn’t pronounced. It didn’t sound like the weight of a person. But I was able to determine the Earth-normal weight of the person who had landed on the tube car in a nanosecond. I estimated the weight at 59.6 kilos.
Pearson looked at Madison. “Did you hear something?” He looked up at the tube car ceiling. “Sounded like something dropped on us.”
Madison looked up and appeared to be listening intently as the tube train smoothly accelerated. Evidently he couldn’t hear anything over the quiet hum of the mag-lev turbines propelling us through the tube. He lifted his PAD. “Access the tube seccams.”
A second later, the external seccam views cycled through the vid projected from Madison’s PAD. The first scans showed the tube train rocketing down the dark length of the tube. The forward scans showed the bright pool of light far ahead that was the next stop. The rear scans revealed the fading light of the last stop.
Then the seccams in the middle of the train tracked movement on top of the car we rode in.
“Night vision imaging.” Madison’s voice grew tighter.
A moment later, a lithe form in a tight black, featureless uniform appeared in the center of the cam view. A tight-fitting mask erased all of the person’s face, disguising it under a gauss effect camo halo that bent light frequencies. The form wasn’t invisible, but it was hard to identify as anything other than bipedal. The shape was hunkered down, presenting a low profile in the tunnel to avoid being plucked off by the wind rush. I picked up the signature of heavy electromagnetic readings and knew that e-mag footwear and gloves were in use. Cleaning personnel used them on buildings to wash windows. They generated an electromagnetic field that allowed them to bond with most surfaces. The exterior of the tube car would be easy.
“Dispatch, this is Madison.” He sounded cool and unhurried, but I detected the rising tension in his voice. “We have a situation. Patch into the tube-lev seccams.” He held his stunstick and stared at the center of the tube car ceiling where the figure crouched.
“Acknowledged, Detective Madison. Dispatch is pulling up seccam feeds now.”
On the PAD vid, the masked person lifted one hand. In the next instant, a blue-white spike of laser light bit into the darkness and flicked sparks from the overhead tube roof. Then the laser plunged through the tube car roof and jutted into being just above my head.
Chapter Forty-One
I watched the laser with keen interest, thinking at first it might have been mining equipment. Then I realized it was too lightweight for that. This was an exotic piece, something that might be used by special forces troops.
I thought momentarily of John Rath and how the ini
tial case I’d gotten involved in after the abduction of Mara Blake had centered around a Mars military team. The military angle kept returning to my investigation. I prepared myself to fight if necessary.
Sparks dropped down onto my head and shoulders in a cascade. None of them were hot enough to do any serious damage to me. A rough oval dropped out of the tube car ceiling, leaving a glowing ring of metal. As it clanged against the floor, falling slowly in lunar gravity, the black-clad figure dropped to one knee on the ground in front of me and lifted a pistol.
I almost kicked the weapon from the figure’s hand, obeying the drive within me to prevent a human from coming to harm. Then I realized that the weapon was a fast-acting tranquilizer pistol. The gun spat three times and microcharges exploded beneath Madison’s face. The rounds were low-velocity, designed to penetrate the skin and invade the bloodstream. Slumping backward, already unconscious, Madison tumbled slowly to the floor.
Behind me, still in my 360-degree vision, Pearson called for help over his PAD and advanced with his stunstick lifted and ready to attack. The black-clad figure pivoted too quickly and lost contact with the car floor, spinning out of control for an instant. Despite the miscued move, the invader recovered and fired again while in rotation.
The initial microcharges splatted against the back wall and tiny beads of fluid ran down the surface. Then the figure bent its knees, absorbing the impact of its feet against the transplas window. Security lights inside the car activated, bathing the area in bright illumination.
The black-clad figure blocked the stunstick with its empty hand, then pressed the tranquilizer pistol into Pearson’s neck and pulled the trigger. The drugs took effect and left the NAPD officer a bundle of floating flesh and bones that bounced from the floor twice before settling.
Moving quickly, the invader holstered the tranquilizer pistol, then pulled out a monofilament knife. Flicking the blade out to its twelve centimeter length, the invader sliced through my cuffs.
“Let’s go.” The voice came through a muffler that made the words come out stiff and mechanical, like gears grinding.
I hesitated, not certain how to take my newfound freedom. “Where?”
The figure pointed to the hole in the car roof. “Move. Now. As soon as the train comes to a stop, we’ve got to be gone.”
On the side of the car, I saw the map that showed we were closing in on the next station. Security would already be waiting there. More security would be working its way through the train as well.
Staying there would mean returning to NAPD custody. I’d been framed and the odds were against me. I was supposed to remain intact. I was not supposed to bring advertising problems to Haas-Bioroid.
But Mara Blake was still out there, hopefully alive.
I sprang up gingerly and gripped the heated edge of the burn hole. My synthskin cooked and sizzled. I shut down the warning feedback. I didn’t feel pain, and the feedback was there only to let me know I was facing damage. Burned hands would debilitate me.
I pulled myself up and braced my right elbow on the edge to get the leverage I needed to haul myself out of the car as the train came to a halt. Several waiting tube passengers saw us and pointed. We weren’t making a quiet getaway. I got to my feet. I turned to help my rescuer, but discovered the invader had already leaped up and caught hold of the edge with reinforced gloves that were evidently heat-resistant.
At both ends of the train, two cars ahead and four cars behind, transit authority police hauled themselves on top of the cars. They came at us at once. Security klaxons screamed and the echoes ripped down the length of the tunnel.
“Please stand clear of the train. Please stand clear of the train. Transit authorities are currently dealing with safety issues. Regular transport will begin momentarily.”
I prepared myself to resist, but I knew there was little chance of that. These men weren’t dangerous felons. My programming only allowed grappling if human lives were in danger, primarily because even though I would only try to remove a threat, humans were fragile and could easily be injured or possibly die.
I couldn’t fight these men.
My rescuer pointed up at the slightly curved tunnel ceiling. I noted the protective plate that covered the rectangle was larger than a tube car. I knew that this was one of the points where tube cars could be lifted out or inserted into a train through an automated lift system. In the next instant, the protective cover exploded. Rather, the latches holding the cover in place detonated. The cover dropped to the train only a few meters in front of us, then slid away from the contact, landing on the ground. The advancing transit authority guards narrowly avoided getting flattened, but they kept coming.
The black-clad figure stepped toward me and wrapped its arms around me. “Hold on.”
I slid my arms around the figure, and I knew from the build that I could feel pressed against me that my rescuer was female.
“Hold tight.” She dropped a hand down to the airbelt at her waist. Compressed air shot from the airbelt at her back and along her legs, lifting us from the train and into the yawning cavern of the tube car access port.
Two of the transit authority guards powered by airbelts entered the tunnel only meters behind us. A third man was blocked off by the other two. He regrouped and tried again and followed his team mates inside the port.
I watched them close the distance quickly because they weren’t moving as much mass. “We are being followed.” I scanned the tunnel ahead of us. It continued straight up for at least eight hundred meters. When the tube designers had added the cargo port entries to add and subtract cars, they’d used abandoned mine shafts on several occasions rather than going to the expense of drilling new tunnels. Boom arms mounted on the tunnel walls sat inert, awaiting signals to help guide the dropped or raised cars.
“No get away is completely clean. But I’ve got that under control as well.” She reached to her belt and pulled out a grenade.
I accessed the Net and downloaded the blueprints and schematics for the cargo tunnels and makeup air ductwork as the NAPD cyber teams chased my efforts. I had the e-documents and information before they shut those sites down. Accessing the files, I figured out where we were. The cargo tunnel we were in was littered with seccams. My rescuer wasn’t the first person to think of using them as an escape route, or a point of entry for tube-lev robbers.
I did not know what she had planned. There was nowhere we could go that the NAPD could not follow us. Doubtless, I was in more trouble now than I had ever been in before.
She activated the grenade, held onto it for two seconds, then dropped it down the duct. Almost immediately, the grenade exploded and threw out sticky ropes that filled the tunnel. The spinnerbots contained within the grenade bit into the metal sides of the tunnel and latched on.
The tangler grenade was a non-lethal measure designed for riot control and passive defense. The glistening white strands were as thick as a grown man’s wrists once the expansion foam hit the air.
Unable to brake quickly enough with their airbelts because they’d been determined to catch us, the two guards slid into the mass of ropy adhesive. Instantly they came to dead stops, mired in the tangler strands. Even if they had the special chemical that would remove the adhesive qualities, it would take time for the reaction to take place.
Behind them, I saw the third guard jetting back down to a lower air duct. He disappeared a moment later as other guards entered the access port below. The blueprint I had access to showed an area large enough for the men to navigate. Air displacement in the tube tunnels was a necessary evil and had to be compensated for.
I didn’t think my rescuer had noticed everything. “Two of the guards have been stopped. One is doubling back, probably seeking another entry tunnel to intercept us.”
“I know.”
“More guards have taken up pursuit.”
“I know.” Even with the modulated voice, she sounded irritated.
“Drake 3GI2RC.” The call came from the NAP
D over my on-board PAD. “Drake 3GI2RC, report.”
I didn’t reply, and my programming clamored inside me. Not responding to a direct order was difficult.
“Drake 3GI2RC, report.”
I broke the connection, blocking the NAPD from reaching me on any channels. Almost immediately, Haas-Bioroid pulsed a RETURN signal to me, giving me a direct order to return to the nearest corporate arm. That was equally hard to resist, and I couldn’t completely shut that one down. It echoed again and again inside my thoughts. I focused on Mara Blake and the people that I would be saving by finding those missing weapons. That took precedence over commands from the NAPD and Haas-Bioroid.
The woman altered her course, but her calculations were off. We thudded into the top of the tunnel at the end of the run. Cargo equipment, boom arms, and three empty tube cars occupied the large space in front of us. Four tunnels spread out around us, all of them leading from this cavern and the cargo tunnel we’d left behind.
“Can you access the seccams?” She twisted her body, heading into the northern air duct with one hand to support us.
I had to sort through the blocking programs and ninja viruses the NAPD sent to me through the Net. Keeping those away was chipping away at my on-board resources. “Yes, I can.”
“Can you track the transit authority through the ducts?”
I built up an image of the ductwork inside my head. The series of tunnels was like the inside of an anthill. Everything was built at ninety-degree angles, creating a labyrinth of mazes in three-dimensional architecture. The tube-lev transit authority had fielded several units. I counted thirty-seven men and women en route to our position, working to cut us off.
“Yes. There are thirty-seven transit authority officials in the ductwork now.”
She cursed. “They work fast.”
“The Moon’s air supply is an important commodity. Everyone here safeguards it.”
