Chimera (isaac asimov's robot mystery)

by Mark W. Tiedemann

  "They're all the victims?"

  "Yes, Derec."

  "I see. Copy all this to Ariel."

  Derec walked away from the station. He could feel everyone watching him.

  "So, now what?" Masid asked.

  "We have to find them," Derec said.

  "'Them '?"

  "The rest. The cyborgs."

  "So, now you're convinced there's more than one," Harwol said.

  "Something like this…yes, I am. And we have to find them and stop them. "

  "Stop them from what?" Palen asked.

  "Taking our place." Coren, Ariel, and Ambassador Setaris filled separate screens mounted on the wall of Palen's private office. Harwol, Hofton, Masid, and Derec filled chairs around her desk.

  "Pocivil hasn't shut up since he agreed to talk, " Palen said. "So far we've identified twenty-six locations for contraband, illegal transport, and warehousing on the ground, and seven bays here that are regular stops for the black market."

  "Has he said anything about the operations being shut down?" Coren asked.

  "That's why he was heading back to Cassus Thole," Palen replied. "Operations on Earth are finished-so he says, anyway. Frankly, I doubt that."

  "Maybe a temporary hiatus," Ariel said. "They ceased before, after Wenithal's investigation."

  "We're prepared to move on all the sites," Harwol said. "Some of them are Spacer-owned, Ambassador Burgess. We're waiting on you to clear us."

  Ariel frowned. "Derec, the cyborg-I went over the autopsy and excavation reports a little while ago. How many of these do you think there could be?"

  "I have no way of knowing," Derec said. "Seems safe to assume at least two of them-the one we have and the one down there. Blood scans confirm that this one here is not the same one that was in the cargo bin with the baleys. But as for how many there might be…" He shrugged.

  "We will sign off on the raids, Agent Harwol," Setaris said, "under the condition that any cyborgs found, captured, or killed will be turned over to us for study."

  Harwol looked unhappy, but he nodded. "Agreed."

  "And I want my people to have access to the sites after they're secured."

  "I'll see what I can do, Ambassador. "

  "This isn't a good time to play things too close, Agent Harwol," Setaris stressed. "Your people know next to nothing about robots in the first place. You won't know what you 're looking at if these sites contain positronic equipment, you won't know how to deal with any robots on hand, and you certainly won't know what to do with any of it afterward. If you encounter any cyborgs, you'll be even less prepared."

  Harwol cleared his throat. "I understand. How soon can you have people available to accompany our teams?"

  "Ariel?" Setaris asked.

  "Give the word," Ariel said.

  Harwol was surprised. "Do you have that many?"

  "Enough for what we consider the key sites. I'll copy the list to you. You have people on Kopernik who can fill the same roles there."

  "Very well. I want to move on this within the next six hours, Ambassador. The sooner we do, the more of these people we can catch."

  Ariel nodded. "Agreed. Coren and I will be going in with the Petrabor team. Coren has been there before."

  "Mr. Lanra," Harwol said, "you are aware of the possible risks. You aren't an active agent -are you willing to submit to the team leader?"

  "My status is problematic, Agent Harwol," Coren said. "Let's stop talking and move."

  "Very well. All agreed, on my authority. Chief Palen will coordinate the station raids. If we time this well, we can shut it down all at once. "

  Palen gave Harwol a dubious look but said nothing.

  "One more thing," Derec said. "These cyborgs, if there are more, will not succumb to stuns. You '11 have to use lethal force, a lot of it, and that means some humans will probably be killed as well. I suggest…" He hesitated, unsettled by his own thoughts. "I suggest you don't worry about the human casualties. These things, loose, are far more dangerous. "

  Everyone stared at him for a time. He felt acutely uncomfortable.

  Masid spoke then. "Ambassador, what about the Spacer end?"

  "Pardon me?" Setaris asked.

  "Obviously, there's a Spacer connection. Probably Solarian, most likely an embassy official. What will be done about that?"

  "We're already working on that. We will take care of it."

  Masid nodded.

  "All right, then," Palen said, standing. "Let's move."

  Twenty-Eight

  Coren watched the TBI team sort and ready their equipment for the third time. The comm unit bead in his ear fed him updates on the status of all the other teams. He still could not quite believe they expected to pull this off-the final count had been thirty-one sites on the ground, and eight on Kopernik, all targeted to be hit simultaneously. It was ambitious.

  But the clearances had come through from the Aurorans, which, no doubt, would cause a furor within Spacer circles-several sites were Solarian- or Keresian-owned.

  Coren's own pack lay at his feet; he had arrived prepared, and had never been one to check and recheck his equipment in nervous anticipation. He glanced around the edge of the bay, toward the warehouse across the alley-the same one where all this had begun. He distrusted tidy closures like this, but it seemed the most logical place for Tresha to go. She was either here waiting transport, or she was already on Kopernik-in which case, Sipha would grab her.

  At least this time I don't feel like I need a bath…

  Ariel sat nearby, her back to the wall, eyes closed, arms folded over her chest, legs outstretched with ankles crossed. She gave the appearance, at least, of a seasoned field agent practicing patience, waiting for the Go signal. At this point, for all Coren knew, she was-everything he had assumed about her had turned out to be insufficient for any reasonable assessment. Ariel Burgess did not conform to easy descriptions or predictable definitions.

  Like Nyom, he thought, only completely different…

  The TBI team leader approached her, and squatted down to talk. She spoke quietly and intently, instructing the ambassador on what she was expected to do. Ariel nodded and rose smoothly to her feet, then crossed the ancient floor of the bay and sat down. A dozen agents huddled around her for one more question-and-answer session.

  Telemetry chittered in Coren's ear. Suddenly, he heard: "Set. Good to go."

  He looked up and met the team leader's eyes. She nodded. The huddle broke up into scurrying efficiency. In less than a minute, everyone was loaded up and waiting for the word.

  Coren pulled his mask down, hoisted the pack onto his shoulders, and jumped from the edge of the bay. He sprinted across the alley and leapt onto the apron of a mirror-image bay. He pressed against the wall and waited while the TBI team flowed throughout the alley, taking positions to cover him.

  Coren took a five-centimeter-square chit from his thigh pocket and slid it into the reader set in the wall. The bay door rumbled up and he ducked inside.

  Three dockworkers looked up from the workstation around which they stood, shocked by the sudden intrusion. Automatically, their hands went up as TBI agents rushed in, aiming weapons at them.

  "Down!" Coren hissed at the workers. They dropped to the floor obediently. "How many inside? Where?"

  "Um…short staffed," one of the workers said. "Don't, uh…there's a special shipment, private…uh…"

  "Okay," Coren said, tapping the man's head. "Quiet."

  Coren set the pack down on the loading dock. The sounds of the warehouse and the distant port thrummed in the vast open spaces, constant and oddly reassuring. Trucks, dollies, crates, containers, all furnished the area.

  He scooped out a handful of vonoomans and began methodically activating them. Upon release, they scampered into the recesses of the warehouse. He sealed the pack then took out his palm monitor.

  "Give them a few minutes," he said to the team leader. He waved to an agent and pointed to the three workers. Immediately, they were
restrained and moved out of the way. The team leader spoke intently into her comm.

  Coren unfolded the monitor. Within seconds, a map of the interior sketched itself. The little machines showed bright green on the schematic. At no point did they change color to indicate human presence-not until one reached the transfer bays on the far side, where the bins for the shuttles came and went on automated tracks. Then several blue points appeared, huddled just outside one of the bay doors. Coren tapped Ariel's arm and pointed.

  "That's them, then?" she asked.

  "I assume so." Coren refolded the monitor and stood. He looked at the team leader. "Ready?"

  She nodded silently.

  Vehicles rolled into the alley outside.

  Shouldering the pack, Coren started forward. Now he felt anxious. He wanted to get out there and find Tresha and whoever else she had with her.

  He was beginning to accept that Nyom had died coincidentally, the result of a power struggle between forces that in all likelihood had not even been aware of her existence. Accept it, yes, but he would never be at peace with it. All that remained for him now was to find those responsible. After that…

  He would never be able to work for Rega again, even if Looms were willing to have him.

  I wonder if Ariel's offer is real…

  At the rear of the bay, they ascended a short staircase. The door at the top let them into an office area. The squad seemed to fill it.

  Coren was unconcerned about tripping warehouse security monitors-he doubted any of the normal internal systems were on right now-but his targets might have placed alarms at various points. He opened his pack again and took out another mass of tiny machines. He keyed them and let them out in the corridor beyond the office. Scavengers, they would hunt down and eradicate any telltale devices they found.

  He sat down before a comm and waited, watching his monitor. When all the lights showed green, he nodded to the team leader.

  Swiftly and efficiently, the agents poured from the room and disappeared into the warehouse, each member with a preassigned location. One of them remained behind.

  The bead gave him new updates, reports from the various locations. Ariel listened to the same data, nodding silently to herself.

  Coren inserted a decrypter into the console before him and initiated the invasive routines. Within seconds, the data stored in the warehouse systems was isolated from the DELETE protocols that would have erased everything upon a single command-a command, Coren noted, which had not yet been given. Secured, he opened a comm channel and began sending all this information to another site.

  "Done," he announced. "Let's go."

  The trap was closing as Coren and Ariel hurried through the administrative areas of the warehouse. With Palen coordinating on Kopernik and Agent Harwol coordinating on the ground, the global sweep was underway. Warehouses, shipping firms, and ships were being seized. Executives were being picked up for questioning.

  Alda Mikels was about to be arrested again.

  He entered the same office area he had been in five days ago, overlooking the gridlike expanse of the warehouse proper. So familiar and so strange-things rarely formed neat closures or elegant symmetries in his profession. There was a mirror-like quality to this, though, that gave him a sense of validation, confirming his choices and assuring him that his purpose was necessary and sufficient. Perhaps this feeling was wrong, an illusion, but he could use it. He moved unhesitantly.

  Halfway across the grid they heard the first blaster shots. Then shouting. Coren recognized the stentorian timbre of TBI commands. Arrests were underway.

  He crossed the apron to one of the open doors leading out to the transport grid. Agents stood above eight people who lay face down on the floor, hands clasped behind their heads. Nearby sprawled three corpses, smoke still coiling listlessly from their wounds.

  Coren went from prisoner to prisoner, then to the bodies. No Tresha.

  The maze of cargo bins beyond was motionless, the power cut. Huge cubes scattered across the vast field hovered on their self-contained antigravity cushions.

  In his ear, Coren continued to hear reports of successful raids, arrests, a few casualties.

  But no cyborgs.

  He pulled out his optam and scanned the field of inert blocks. No movement. He strode onto the grid.

  "Coren-"

  Ariel came after him, the TBI agent trailing behind. "Where," she asked, "are you going?"

  "They're here," Coren said. "They have to be." He turned away and continued walking.

  "There are agents at the other end," Ariel called.

  "I know!"

  The TBI were very good at these sorts of things-they rarely botched a raid-but Coren wanted the confrontation. Things were going too well-the sites were being taken efficiently, arrests made quickly, few fatalities-but he wanted more of a mess, an excuse to get angry and desperate and violent.

  He moved quickly, though cautiously, among the eerily-still cargo bins. The air smelled of ozone, and he felt a faint, dry tingle over his skin. The maze stretched a good two kilometers to where the port machinery sorted out the containers, those arriving and those departing going to separate chutes to the correct shuttles.

  He stopped. He could not see the warehouse end now through the forest of cubes.

  "Gamelin!" he called, voice echoing. "Did you know who she was? The baley runner you killed?" He listened to the answering silence. "Nyom Looms! Do you remember that name?"

  He continued walking. "She was your sister, Gamelin! Did you know you had family?"

  Coren stopped and looked to his left. He glimpsed a tall shape, dull gray, slightly crouched, standing outlined against one of the bins.

  Coren raised his blaster.

  Suddenly, the shape came toward him faster than Coren had ever seen anyone move. If it were not moving directly at him, Coren doubted he would have been able to discern a single detail.

  But the moment seemed infinite in what he could see:

  A face, pockmarked as if by horrible disease. Wide-set unblinking eyes. A hairless skull. Wide shoulders. A runner's build. A dead-alive intensity, unchanging, mutated into an expression of profound resentment.

  Coren wanted more than anything to run.

  He fired, too late. The charge slammed into the cyborg's torso, but momentum carried it into Coren. He felt as if his entire body had been slapped all at once. He flew back, into one of the cargo bins, and dropped onto his buttocks painfully.

  Coren rolled and slowly rose to his feet.

  When he turned again, the cyborg stood less than a meter away. He suppressed the impulse to try to shoot it-he doubted he could raise his weapon fast enough.

  "Gamelin?" Coren said.

  "Pleased to make your acquaintance, human," it said, its voice a rasp like dried paper scraps and crushed bone. "We don't know each other, do we, gato?"

  "Maybe, in a way. Is that your only name?"

  "Only need one."

  "How about Jerem?"

  It cocked its head quizzically. "You have a name?"

  "Coren Lanra."

  "That's two names. Never figured that. What, humans got to have more than one of everything? How come you never give anything else more than one name?"

  "You know better than that. Look at your homeworld. It's got four names: Nova Levis, and Cassus Thole."

  "Don't forget the star now. Tau Secordis. Six names. But other living things? One name."

  "Are you a living thing?"

  Gamelin shook its head. "Not really. But I don't mind. It's not so bad being dead. You should try it." He took a step forward. "What was that you said about a sister?"

  "You killed her."

  "Not possible, gato. I don't even have parents."

  "You did."

  Gamelin looked puzzled. "How'd I kill her?"

  "Broke her neck when she wouldn't breathe your poisoned air."

  Gamelin's eyes blinked, very slowly. Coren could not read its expression. The cyborg's eyes narrowed brie
fly.

  "Not acceptable," it said.

  "Coren!" Ariel's voice called.

  Gamelin looked around. Coren gripped his weapon and brought it up.

  The cyborg moved fast, laterally. Coren fired. The bolt struck a cargo bin, punching a hole in it. Something within it had been under pressure and now shot out of the wound, sending the entire container careening off its track into another one. Within seconds, they dominoed off and into each other, and Coren watched, stunned, at the sudden pile-up.

  The grid's AI tried to compensate. Bins that had been immobile now began precipitously changing tracks and rearranging to avoid the collisions. Enormous piles of metal rammed each other. Bins bounced around like toys. The drumming of colliding bins filled the vast chamber. Somewhere the violent hiss of escaping gas cut through the thunder-the bin he had punctured.

  What was I thinking about this being too neat and efficient…? Coren wondered.

  Through the din, four harsh blaster shots, like air tearing, focussed his attention.

  "Ariel!"

  He looked around for her-just as Gamelin grabbed him.

  Coren felt a bolt of terror pulse through him as he was lifted off his feet by one arm. The hand that gripped him compressed muscle and bone on his forearm, impossibly strong, and he understood how Jeta and Damik and the Brethe dealer and others unnamed had died. The blaster fell from his hand.

  Now, was all he thought as he looked into Gamelin's face. Ariel ran. Cargo bins careened in her wake, seeming to chase her. When the inert cubes had begun to move to compensate for the sudden threat to property, restarted by a watchful but uncreative AI, she expected to be crushed between them.

  She glanced back. One bin bounced randomly among the others, a thick spray of gas squirting powerfully from a hole in its side. She considered shooting it again, but that might only make it worse. She kept running.

  Finally, near the warehouse end of the transport maze, the banging ended and the shifting bins stopped shifting. Ariel looked back into the altered landscape and thought, Even if very little is damaged, getting all this straightened out is going to take some doing…