The Radioactive Redhead with The Peach-Blonde Bomber
Page 1
The Radioactive Redhead
Copyright © 2005 by John Zakour and Lawrence Ganem
The Peach Blonde Bomber
Copyright © 2013 by John Zakour and Lawrence Ganem
Original published in 2013 as an audiobook by GraphicAudio.
All rights reserved.
Published as an ebook in 2018 by Jabberwocky Literary Agency, Inc.
Cover artwork by Moritat
Cover design by Nikki Lazos
ISBN 978-1-625670-50-2
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
For my wife and son and all the people who bought the first two books.
—John Zakour
For William Goldman, Friz Freleng and Bruce Springsteen.
—Lawrence Ganem
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
The Radioactive Redhead
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
The Peach-Blonde Bomber
Acknowledgments
Also by the Authors
The Radioactive Redhead
Prologue
In the early 1700s, after spending close to fifty years studying ancient biblical texts, the father of modern physics, Sir Isaac Newton, predicted that the world would end in the year 2060.
He never mentioned anything about a redhead.
If he had, I might have been a little more careful.
1
Some men are born dangerous.
Some men become dangerous.
Some men have danger thrust upon them.
And whenever danger decides to do a little thrusting, I always seem to be on the blunt, receiving end of it.
“The good news,” HARV said as we entered the main room of the floating restaurant, “is that the shite in this production appears to be particularly skilled. The bad news, of course, is that he’s also an android assassin.”
“He’s a what?”
The Kabuki actor’s prop sword suddenly flared a fiery red and he leaped at me from the raised stage overhead. His red-and-white makeup glared under the hot lights and a manic look of bloodlust danced across his cold, slightly crossed eyes. The dinner-theater patrons around me broke into applause so loud that it nearly drowned out the samisen and lute music blaring in the background.
“What a pity,” HARV sighed. “This promised to be a fine production of Chushingura.”
“Try to focus on the big picture here, HARV.”
I grabbed the actor’s sword arm as he swung the energy blade at my head. Sure enough, his wrist was hard and unyielding, definitely the tempered polymer shell of a droid. And definitely more trouble than I was expecting. I slid sideways and rolled onto the floor, putting the droid’s own momentum into a judo throw as I pivoted. The heat of the blade singed my face as it flashed past and the droid tumbled over me, falling flat onto a large table of six nearby. His blade burned through the table like a fat man through a cream pie when he landed and the whole thing gave way beneath him. He fell to the floor amid a cascade of tempura and spilled sake.
My name is Zachary Nixon Johnson. I am the last private eye on Earth. And right now, I am seriously regretting my choice of career.
It is the year 2060. And let me say at the outset that this is not the way I usually spend my weekend nights. You may not believe it, but I’m a bit of a homebody at heart. Dinner theater is not my scene. Kabuki dinner theater, despite being all the rage at the nano, is really not my scene. And Kabuki dinner theater in a trendy, free-floating restaurant, three hundred meters above downtown Oakland … well, you see where I’m going with this, right?
“It’s an interesting strategy,” HARV whispered inside my head as I quickly climbed to my feet. “It’s illegal, as you know, to create an android with realistic skin tones. Creating a droid with a skin tone that emulates traditional Kabuki makeup, however, is completely legal. Granted, the places to use such an assassin without drawing undue attention are somewhat limited.”
“Yeah, leave it to us to find the loophole.”
I’d come to the Oakland Kabuki Palace Theater and Dinette to meet a client—a potential client actually. I don’t usually do blind dates when it comes to business but things had been a little slow of late so when the cold call came in last night asking for a no-strings-attached meet and greet, I figured that it wouldn’t hurt to hear the offer.
I was wrong. Especially about the wouldn’t hurt part.
The droid popped back onto his feet and brandished his energy sword with a dramatic twirl that utterly delighted the dinner theater patrons around us, even as they ducked for cover. They were still under the impression that this was part of the show and they were ready for more in-your-face Kabuki dinner theater action. I on the other hand, was not in the mood for audience participation.
I flicked my wrist and cupped my hand in just the right way to activate the tiny motion sensor of the hidden holster that I wear on my forearm. The holster responded by smoothly popping my gun (a Colt 46, version 3.2A, I think—I can’t keep track) into my hand and the gun throbbed to life when it hit my palm, in recognition of my distinctive heat/DNA signature. The entire action takes a lot less time to do than it does to describe, but the beauty’s in the details.
The droid growled and leaped high in the air toward me, sword flashing in a fiery wide arc.
“Big bang, tight,” I said, gripping my gun.
The gun’s OLED screen flashed to signal recognition of my voice command and I pulled the trigger even as I dove to the floor.
My energy blast hit the droid squarely in the chest, punching a hole through its innards and shorting out its central power unit. Sparks flew from within and the samurai robe began to smolder as the body fell backward to the ground. Again the crowd broke into applause as they rose from beneath their tables.
“A Kabuki assassin droid,” I said, getting to my feet. “I think that’s a first.”
“Indeed,” HARV replied. “But don’t cherish the uniqueness of the experience too long.”
“Why not?”
“Because in a nano, it won’t be so unique.”
“What?”
I heard excited shrieks from the audience behind me and turned just in time to see two more Kabuki actors charge me from two of the narrow runways. Each held a samurai sword that flamed to life as he ran.
“You gotta be kidding me.”
“Come now,” HARV said, “you didn’t really think there was going to be only one Kabuki assassin droid, did you? Especially considering the production they’re doing.”
The restaurant was a huge, high-ceilinged, circular room with doorways at each of the four compass points and a raised stage at the center for theater in the round productions. At the north point was the main entrance whose great doors opened to the red carpet hoverport (and two dozen tiny valet ‘bots programmed for parking and “bringing ‘round” the patrons’ hovercrafts). At the east end was the emergency exit, a rapid-fire teleportation gate with a preset destination of the street below. West was the restrooms, which I am told were very swanky. And south was the kitchen.
A catwalk ran the full circumference of the dining room and four smaller catwalks stretched outward from the stage. Three went directly into the audience. One went to a set of large double doors on the western wall near the restrooms, no doubt leading to the dressing rooms for the actors, including the two droids currently intent on turning me into diced detective sashimi.
I hopped onto a table and pulled myself up to the catwalk to meet the charging samurai actors.
“What the DOS is going on here?”
HARV’s hologram shimmered to life beside me, projected from the holographic image producer built into the computer interface I wear on my wrist. It’s low tech, I know. HARV much prefers using the projector that’s attached directly to my eye. He feels he gets better definition. But there are only a handful of people in the world who know about my mental link with HARV so we keep things on the down-low when we’re in public and use the standard-tech gear.
I feel obligated to mention here that HARV, aside from being one of the world’s most advanced thinking machines, is a work in progress. He began life as a supercomputer with a preprogrammed personality subroutine that mimicked a proper English butler, a sort of Wodehousian Hal-9000.
Then my good friend (and super-genius inventor) Dr. Randy Poole had the great idea of downloading him directly into my brain via a subcortical interfacing nano-connection (scanc for short). It was a radically experimental, incredibly painful procedure that was done very cavalierly a couple of years ago. Since then HARV has been, for lack of a better word, evolving. He has changed his appearance. He has changed his personality. He has become more human. A true thinking machine. It has been absolutely amazing to see.
Unless of course, you happen to have him attached to your brain.
Then it’s annoying beyond belief.
I’m all for progress and evolution but just think for a nano how you’d feel if your toaster suddenly decided to convert to Judaism (and it was inside your body).
All that said though, when HARV is in business mode, he’s the best sidekick in the world. So I guess I shouldn’t complain.
“Well, let me think,” HARV said, adjusting the cuffs of his holographically starched shirt. “An anonymous potential client calls. Refuses to give his name or the details of what he needs and arranges to meet us at a Kabuki dinner theater presentation, where, by coincidence, we are attacked by Kabuki assassins immediately upon our arrival.”
“I get it, HARV.”
“Did I or did I not say that blind meetings and anonymous clients are a bad combination?”
“Yeah, well if it was up to you, we’d never leave the office.”
“I gotta tell you, Zach, right now, the office is looking pretty damn good.”
“You can gloat later, provided we survive,” I said. “Right now we have to get the bystanders to safety. I’ll keep the samurai occupied. You handle crowd control.”
HARV nodded.
“I’m on it.”
He lifted his holographic form onto center stage and turned his visage to the crowd.
“Ladies and gentlemen, please do not panic. We are experiencing some intensely dangerous technical difficulties. We would be most grateful if you would all immediately proceed to the emergency exits in a quick and orderly fashion while Mr. Zachary Nixon Johnson battles the deadly dinner theater Kabuki android assassins.”
None of the restaurant patrons made the slightest move toward the exits. They did, however, increase the volume of their cheers.
I meanwhile was up on the catwalk facing down two charging samurai.
“I suppose discussing this like reasonable beings is out of the question?” I asked as they approached.
In response, both samurai pulled a handful of shurikens from the folds of their robes and hurled them at me as they charged. I spun and dove to the floor of the catwalk but not before taking three or four hits to the shoulder and back. Luckily, the body armor I wear under my clothes absorbed the impact (and stopped the razor sharp spikes before they pierced my skin).
“Yep. Should have seen that coming.”
I rolled over onto my stomach and fired off a couple of rounds that took out the nearest samurai. The crowd cheered again, louder this time, as I rolled and smoothly popped into a crouch position, gun steady in hand and leveled directly at the remaining samurai as he charged. I had to admit I was starting to feel in the groove.
And that, of course, was when I got hit over the head by a samisen and kneecapped hard by a lute. The first rule of Kabuki theater: never turn your back on the musicians (which is probably the first rule of any kind of theater).
HARV meanwhile was still center stage, trying very hard to get the dinner crowd to take his warnings seriously.
“I really mean it here, people,” he shouted. “This is not a drill. The Kabuki actors and entertainers you see around you are, in actuality, soulless androids designed expressly for merciless killing. You do not want to be eating dinner around these entertainers. Now please, evacuate this building immediately!”
Alas, the crowd only cheered louder.
I ducked under the swing of the samisen player’s next swipe, took him down to the ground with a leg sweep, then blew his head off with a point blank blast to the face. The crowd cheered, partly from the smoothness of my fighting moves, but mostly I think because the samisen music had gotten on their nerves as well.
“This is the last time I go to a Kabuki show.”
“Noh play,” HARV replied, popping back beside me.
“Okay, then, a play.”
“Noh play.”
“That’s what I said,” I sneered. “A play.”
“Noh play.”
“HARV!”
“That’s the traditional name for this type of production, Zach. A Noh play.”
“You mean like a do over?”
“You really are a philistine, aren’t you?” HARV said. “Watch your back.”
I turned and managed to dodge the swing of a sai-wielding actress droid as she attacked. I stumbled backward as she came at me again, with both sai at once. I popped my gun back into its holster and caught both droid hands at the wrists and tried very hard to keep the razor sharp blades from my chest. The droid brought itself closer to me and pushed back with considerable strength. Then I noticed the subtle, yet distinctive male features of its face.
“Wait, I thought this was a woman.”
“It’s a droid.”
“I know, but I thought it was a droid posing as a woman.”
“It’s an arrogato,” HARV replied.
“A what?”
“Women aren’t allowed to participate in traditional Kabuki theater so all female parts are played by men posing as women. They’re
called arrogato.”
“Like English theater during the Elizabethan period.”
“Very good.”
“Hey, this isn’t the first time I’ve fought thespians, you know.”
“Sadly.”
I rolled backward onto the floor, planted my foot on the droid’s chest as I did so, and tossed her over me. She flew off the catwalk like a silk kerchief on a spring breeze, her floral pastel kimono arcing through the air. It was absolutely lovely, save for the fact that she was headed straight toward the table of a party of four (a double date, I think), all of whom were now running for their lives. She landed awkwardly on the table, hands beneath her, and impaled herself on her own blades. There was a deathly silent nano as everyone in the room stared at her crumpled body, sparks from her ruined circuitry spitting from the blade-sized exit wounds in her silk covered back.
Then there were more cheers from the crowd.
“Bravo!”
“Encore!”
“Who knew Kabuki theater was so accessible?”
“HARV, why is the audience still here?”
“Because they’re morons,” HARV said, shrugging his holographic shoulders. “They think that this is all part of the show and I can’t convince them otherwise.”
“Well, if they don’t understand the truth,” I yelled, as I dodged a new attack from the lute player “tell them a lie.”
“What kind of lie?”
“Use your imagination.”
“I’m not programmed for imag …” HARV’s holographically created eyes flashed with the spark of inspiration that was eerily human. “Never mind. I’ll handle it. By the way, watch out for the ichi and kani ro.”
I managed to say, “The what?” just as HARV’s hologram disappeared and two more obi-clad droids with swords leaped at me from the catwalk. I ducked under the sword swipe of one and blasted the other in the chest while HARV made a return to center stage.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” he announced dramatically, “the Oakland Kabuki Palace Theater and Dinette thanks you for coming to tonight’s special presentation featuring the dinner theater debut of Zachary Nixon Johnson.”
Wild applause.
“This isn’t helping, HARV.”
“Tonight’s performance was sponsored by your good friends at World Tax Association, funding the boondoggles of today with your savings of the future.”