by Allen Steele
—Hey, what’s taking you so long? We ain’t got all day … c’mon!
“Is this ladder the means by which you want me to climb on?” Grag asked.
Another laugh, this time unkind. “Man, you are stupid. Yes, that’s the way we want you to climb up here. Now get a move on.”
Curt grasped the ladder rungs and began blindly making his way up the tractor’s side. Grag was obviously stalling for time, giving him a chance to climb aboard. He tried to pick up the pace as much as he could, but finding the rungs was harder than he’d expected, and he’d climbed only a couple of feet when a vibration against his hands told him that the robot was scaling the ladder just behind him. He hoped that the driver wouldn’t get impatient and start the vehicle again before they reached the top.
He’d left eight or nine rungs beneath him when the vertical surface suddenly turned horizontal and he found what he took to be a small rail just a few inches high. On hands and knees, Curt clambered over the railing and felt his way along a flat surface interspaced with tie-down rings.
You are on the roof. Move one foot to your right and lie flat on your stomach. This way, you will not be seen from either the cab or the ground if your field generator fails.
Curt did as he was told, and a moment later he felt Grag heavily sit down beside him. “You all right back there?” the driver asked. “Okay, here we go.”
Without waiting for a response, the tractor-trailer rig began moving again. Although it had twelve oversize tires on independent suspension, Curt felt the massive vehicle bounce every time it rolled across a rock or micrometeor pit. He found a couple of tie-down rings and clung to them, hoping that the driver didn’t take his time. The readout on his faceplate told him that he had a little less than three minutes left until he became visible again … and this was only an estimate.
About a minute later, the truck came to a halt.
We have reached the checkpoint. A sentry is approaching the vehicle.
“You’re behind schedule.” A new voice, undoubtedly the guard’s. “We saw you stop down the road … what’s going on?”
“Picked up a hitchhiker. Some robot misplaced by the park. We found it and told it we’d find a way for it to get home.”
“Really?” A pause. “Hey, dummy … how’d you get all the way out here?”
The sentry is looking up here, but he is not climbing the ladder.
“I was told to get lost,” Grag replied. “I did my best to follow my instructions.”
More laughter, and Curt found himself becoming embarrassed for Grag. Simon had told him that his mother had always been impressed by the extraordinary feat of consciousness the robot had somehow achieved, an unexpected emergence of sentience unusual for a robot with a low-level artificial intelligence. She’d expanded upon this, adjusting Grag’s programming parameters to further allow it to make decisions and choices of its own. Even so, if Grag was truly developing an emotional life as well as an intellectual one, it was an unprecedented leap forward in the evolution of machine intelligence. So while Grag wasn’t quite as intelligent as a human, it deserved respect all the same. Pretending to be an idiot was beneath its dignity.
“Yeah, all right … take it in,” the guard said. “Go.”
The truck began moving again, and Curt let out his breath in relief.
We have entered the ramp leading to the underground vehicle entrance. The truck will shortly enter the airlock decontamination chamber.
Curt said nothing, but continued to watch the heads-up display. He had less than a minute left when the truck came to a halt. A dull vibration from below and behind him told him that the entrance’s airtight double doors had closed. An instant later, he felt something like enormous wings beating against his back; those would be electromagnetic scrubbers removing moondust from the truck and everything on it.
The scrubbers had just finished their cycle when the darkness suddenly went away. He was visible again.
IV
Otho waited until he saw the truck disappear within the crater, then he rose from where he crouched behind the boulder and began making his way back down the hill, his boots sliding against the loose gray regolith. Returning to the Comet, he climbed up the rope ladder to the airlock, pausing to pull it up behind him before shutting the outer hatch.
He cycled through the airlock, but didn’t remove his suit in the ready-room. He took off his helmet and gloves and stowed them in the suit locker, then climbed up the ladder to the flight deck.
Simon was there, hovering above the pilot’s chair. He didn’t say anything when Otho came in, but instead moved aside to let the android have a seat. Otho sat down heavily, slumping forward to rest his elbows on his knees and gaze down at the floor.
“Grag reports they’ve reached the decontamination facility,” Simon said at last. “Curt has become visible, but no one has spotted him … at least not yet.”
Otho nodded but didn’t reply. A moment passed, then he raised his eyes to fix Simon with an angry, unblinking stare.
“You know as well as I do,” he said slowly, “that this is more about your revenge than his. And I swear to you, if he doesn’t come back from this, I will rip your drone apart and leave you blind, deaf, and speechless for the rest of your life.”
The Brain said nothing, but his eyestalks twitched.
V
Curt knew the fantome field had failed the instant his vision cleared and he found himself able to see the roof of the truck. He squinted against the abrupt glare from the ceiling panels, but he’d barely closed his eyes when the truck suddenly began moving forward. Through narrowed eyelids, he saw the vehicle airlock’s massive inner doors slide open. The decontamination procedure was finished, and now the vehicle was entering the garage.
Lying facedown on the roof rack, Curt remained motionless. He hoped there were no security cameras, or if there were, they weren’t positioned so that they could make out the tops of the vehicles entering the garage. He felt the truck roll across a long stretch of mooncrete floor until it finally swung to the right and came to a halt.
They had arrived. Now came the tricky part: not getting caught.
“Grag,” he said, speaking softly even though his voice was muffled by his helmet, “climb down before the drivers get out. Hurry.”
The robot stood up from where it had been sitting beside him and moved across the roof platform toward the ladder. Turning his head within his helmet, Curt watched as Grag went to the ladder and, grasping its top rungs, began climbing down. Its head had just disappeared from sight when he heard the cab hatches opening and slamming shut, followed a moment later by voices just audible through his helmet:
“Hey! Who told you to get down from there?”
“We have arrived,” Grag replied. “I thought it was appropriate to disembark.”
“You thought it was … oh, geez! Who taught you how to talk like that?”
“Aw, let it go, man. Some of these guys speak better than we do, even if they’re dumb as rocks.”
“Yeah, I guess. Okay, dummy, follow us. We’ll take you up to the office and see if we can find a serial number on you.”
“If you don’t mind, I prefer to wait here until my owners come for me.”
“What? No, wait … stop! Don’t go over—”
“Assuming standby mode until registered owners issue new orders.”
“No! Don’t stop! Walk forward! Hey, are you listening? Walk … forward. Don’t … stop…”
“Oh, that’s just excellent. Now it’s stuck here!”
A disgusted sigh and a muttered curse, followed by the dull clang of something soft, like a boot sole striking metal. “Stupid ’bot. Okay, might as well leave it. Damn thing’s too big to move, so at least it’s not going anywhere on its own. We’ll just have to tell someone in the security office what we’ve found and let them handle it.”
“Yeah … okay by me. C’mon, I’ll buy you a drink.”
Curt heard footsteps walking away from t
he truck. The faint squeal of an elevator door sliding open, then closing again. Then silence.
The garage is empty. There is no one in sight.
“Thanks. Any cameras?”
None that I can see.
Curt slowly sat up, his limbs stiff and sore from the rough ride. The truck had been pulled into a parking bay beside a loading dock to await the arrival of workmen who’d come later to open its trailer. Looking over the side, he saw Grag standing beside a ceiling support column, arms at its sides. The robot seemed inert and nonfunctional, but then its head abruptly turned on its thick neck and its luminous red eyes peered up at him.
“Nicely played,” Curt said as he stood up. “You can go vocal now.”
“Thank you,” Grag replied, just loud enough to be heard through Curt’s helmet. “Sometimes it’s an advantage to have one’s intelligence underestimated.”
“Never by me, old friend.” Curt scrambled down the ladder, and then paused to remove his helmet and look around. As Grag said, the garage was vacant. A few other vehicles were parked nearby, including a three-wheel flivver with IPF markings. A quick glance within its open dome confirmed that it had two seats: perfect for a getaway.
Curt walked over to the flivver. Grag unfroze and started to follow him, but Curt pointed back to where the robot had been standing. “No, stay where you are. You’re in the perfect place. Don’t let anyone move you, but be ready to grab that flivver and make a run for it.”
“Understood.” Grag obediently returned to his previous position. “Where are you going?”
“Up there.” Walking behind the parked vehicle, Curt put down his helmet and began to climb out of his vacuum suit. “Topside, I mean. Observe radio silence with me, but get in touch with Simon and Otho if something goes wrong. When I’m done, I’ll make my way back to this place. You’re going to stay here and be ready to leave in a hurry.”
“Understood. Good luck.”
“Thanks.” Curt folded the vacuum suit as small as he could and hid it along with his helmet, lifepack, gloves, and boots behind the flivver. The utility belt with his holstered gun went around his waist, but he left the fantome generator behind. He’d need the remaining reserve charge in his belt batteries for the plasmar; besides, becoming invisible again wouldn’t help him very much if he couldn’t see where he was going and wouldn’t have Grag to guide him.
An elevator stood nearby, probably the same one he’d heard the two drivers board. It might take him straight to the crater floor, but it might also take him somewhere where he’d likely be spotted. Curt looked around again. There were probably service tunnels he could use that would accomplish the same thing …
Yes, on the wall over there: a white arrow within a red border, EXIT stenciled beneath it. Approaching the sign, Curt saw that it pointed down a short passageway to an airtight door. The door wasn’t locked; behind it was a narrow corridor stretching away into the distance, its ceiling lined with insulated conduits. Curt quietly shut the door and started jogging down the corridor.
Most of Armstrong’s infrastructure lay beneath the crater floor, a labyrinth of electrical and data networks, water tanks, sewage reclamation systems, and emergency radiation shelters, all connected by service corridors for servants and maintenance personnel. Fortunately, maps had been helpfully posted at major junctions, so Curt never became completely lost. Nonetheless, he got turned around a couple of times before he found what he was searching for, a lunasteel stairwell leading up to the surface.
He was only halfway to the first landing, though, when he heard a loud bang of a door slamming open somewhere above, followed an instant later by the sound of something running downstairs. Not the footfalls of a human, though, but rather the softer and more rapid steps of a small, four-legged creature.
Looking up through the metalwork of the stairs, he barely caught a glimpse of an animal frantically running down toward him. A small dog, its legs taking the steps three or four risers at a time, more of a controlled plummet than a run. It had almost reached the landing above him when the door crashed open again.
“Down there! After him!”
Curt turned to jump back down the stairs. He landed with bent knees as quietly as he could and ducked into the shadowed stairwell beneath the metal risers. Planting his back against the wall, he pulled the gun from its holster; a flick of his thumb adjusted the plasmar to its lowest setting. The dog and the two men pursuing it were nearly on top of him. He held his breath and waited.
Through the gridwork risers above his head, Curt watched the dog sail the rest of the way down the stairs. Off-white with tan markings and wide brown eyes, it was, Curt saw, a moonpup: a Jack Russell–beagle mix, specifically bred to live on the Moon. The dog landed on the mooncrete floor and tore off down the corridor. In one-sixth lunar gravity, the moonpup’s escape was more of a series of bouncing leaps than a sprint. Tongue lolling from its mouth, it bounded down the way Curt had just come; it either didn’t notice the human hiding beneath the stairs or didn’t care.
Seconds later, two men came down the stairs after the dog, a terran and an aphrodite. Both wore the uniforms of IPF officers, and neither looked particularly amused.
“That way!” the terran shouted as they reached the bottom of the stairs. “There goes the little bastard!”
“I swear, when we catch him, he’s going right out the airlock!” his partner snarled. Then both disappeared down the corridor.
Curt let out his breath, but didn’t holster his gun again. Probably a household pet fleeing from some canine misdemeanor. For a moment, he’d been tempted to stun the two men chasing the dog. He couldn’t afford to do so, but he wished the moonpup the best of luck and hoped its pursuers weren’t serious about throwing it out an airlock.
Curt continued climbing the stairs, and this time reached the top landing without further interruption. He found an ordinary swinging door, one easily opened by a fleeing dog, and on the other side … darkness and silence, broken only by a soft chirping sound. Curt paused beside the half-open door and listened carefully for a few seconds, then eased himself into the night beyond.
Armstrong Crater had been transformed into an immense terrarium, an enclosed and self-sustaining biosphere replicating life on Earth. Specifically, a plantation in the Deep South of Old America, circa the mid-nineteenth century. Darkness lay deep upon groves of magnolia, sycamore, and weeping willow, while crickets and bullfrogs chorused amid shallow ponds fed by meandering creeks. Gravel footpaths led among manicured lawns and well-tended gardens; the air was warm and fragrant with honeysuckle and roses.
Pausing to take all this in, Curt wondered at the effort and expense it must have cost to build this place. Victor Corvo was rich even before he’d murdered Roger and Elaine Newton; since then, his wealth must have exploded. A new career in politics had given him the ability to create an oasis amid the lunar desolation, but this was a paradise as corrupt as the past it emulated. Corvo had wanted to create a slave race; he didn’t get his wish, but he could always dream …
The stairwell emerged from an underground service entrance disguised to look like a woodshed. Creeping around its side, Curt saw the stately plantation house at the crater center. Its architect had designed it to resemble the mansions of old Alabama. Two stories tall, with a columned portico above the front door and open porches along the sides, its whitewashed walls were ghostly luminescent in the earthlight reflected through the dome aperture high above. Lights gleamed within the ground-floor windows, and above a piped-in recording of a tender Italian guitar—Morricone’s “Il Tramonto”—he heard voices: two men standing on a porch, engaged in quiet conversation.
They were little more than silhouettes, but he had little doubt who they were. One of them, at least.
The house was only about sixty feet away. He could reach it in seconds if he ran. Curt resisted the temptation to do so, though, and instead studied the mansion from behind the woodshed. He expected to spot bodyguards—IPF officers, perhaps—patrol
ling the lawn; to his surprise, there were none. Maybe the IPF considered the defense cordon outside the crater to be adequate, but it was still peculiar to find no one protecting President Carthew inside the crater …
Unless they’d been distracted by something. And then he remembered the moonpup, and the two men who’d run past him in pursuit of it.
Had this been staged to lure away the bodyguards? And if so, then why?
Curt turned his gaze away from the mansion, and carefully peered into the darkened grounds surrounding the mansion. He searched for movement, or a shadow that shouldn’t be there …
And he found it.
VI
“I’m so sorry about this, Mr. President,” Victor Corvo said. “I didn’t think he would—”
“It’s all right, Senator.” James Carthew chuckled, albeit ruefully, as he grimaced at the sour-smelling urine stain spreading across the front of his shirt. “Quite all right. Puppies can be rambunctious even under the best circumstances … and that one was more active than most, wasn’t he?”
“He was, indeed,” Corvo said, and privately reflected that there was more truth in this than President Carthew would ever know.
At least in the few minutes he had left to live.
For the past eight weeks, ever since the nameless moonpup was weaned from its mother, it had been trained for just this moment: to panic the instant it was placed in the arms of anyone resembling the president of the Solar Coalition, the person to whom he was ostensibly being given as a gift. The face mask worn by his trainer, along with pinches, slaps, and rewards for proper responses, had rehearsed the little mutt for its small but significant role, and it had reacted just the way it was supposed to, by peeing on the president, knocking the drink from his hand and nipping him for good measure, then leaping from his arms and running off the porch and away from the house.
Corvo had yelled for the two IPF officers who’d accompanied him and the president out onto the porch to catch the dog, and they’d obediently taken off in pursuit. But the moonpup had been trained to head straight for the nearby entrance to the crater’s subservice levels, the door of which had been conveniently left unlocked and slightly ajar. The security officers had chased the dog downstairs, and once one of Corvo’s servants had picked up the fallen mint julep glass and gone back into the house to replace it with a fresh drink and, against Carthew’s wishes to do so himself, fetch a clean shirt, the two men were alone—if only for a few precious minutes—on the porch.
