“What is that?” June whispered.
“A clue,” Walleye said. “Maybe the last one we need to put a fire under our backsides so we do something to save our lives.”
-6-
“No,” June said, horrified. “You can’t. It might kill her.”
Walleye looked up, and something like pity changed his features. “Your friend is already dead, Luscious. This is something else staring out at us. I know that’s hard to hear…” he trailed off.
June’s hands flew to her mouth as she tried to suppress a sob. Oh, Mindy, Mindy, Mindy, this was awful. Had aliens stuck something soul-killing into her brain? It was too hideous to contemplate.
“I’m going to need your help,” Walleye said softly. “You’ll probably have to hold her head down.”
June groaned, shaking her head, keeping her hands in front of her mouth.
“You know I’m right.”
The awful thing about that was he was right.
Her shoulders trembled, but June took her hands from her mouth. She knelt beside Mindy with a sigh.
“It will kill her,” June whispered.
“Maybe it will free her. Maybe she can tell us something to save Makemake.”
June forced herself to put her hands on the back of Mindy’s head. She braced herself.
“Push down with all your weight,” Walleye said.
“I—” June wanted to tell him she couldn’t, but she could. She had to.
Swallowing hard, June pushed down, shoving Mindy’s face against the floor.
Despite the broken nose, Mindy made no complaint.
With a pair of pliers, Walleye clutched a protrusion on the unit in Mindy’s skull.
“Ready?” he asked.
“Do it already,” June said between clenched teeth.
Walleye strained, no doubt clutching the pliers as hard as he could. Then he braced himself and heaved upward.
June struggled to hold the head down. Walleye began to yank instead of just pull. That sickened June, and tears began to spill from her eyes.
At that moment, an ugly plopping sound accompanied Walleye’s arms flying up, yanking a bloody disc-thing from the skull. Awful wires, stiff things, dripped with gore and pieces of Mindy’s brain. Those wires had been shoved into her brain.
June couldn’t contain it anymore. She jerked away, vomiting onto the floor. Horror consumed her as she moaned, hugging herself and vomiting again.
Mindy began to cough and retch. She began to twist in the tangle strands, attempting to hump across the floor. She began to moan.
“Mindy!” Walleye shouted. “We’re your friends. We want to help you. Mindy, speak to us.”
Instead of continuing to cry out in growing hysteria, Mindy asked in a small voice, “Help?”
June looked up, stunned. “Mindy?” she asked.
Walleye rolled Mindy onto her back. It hid the blood dripping from the awful scalp wound.
Mindy had stark white features. Her eyes were glazed and she breathed shallowly.
“June,” she whispered. “Oh, June, June, June, it was awful.” Mindy began to weep.
“Tell us about it,” Walleye said. He was crouched low so he could whisper in Mindy’s ear.
“Am I dying?” Mindy asked in a wheeze.
“Yes,” Walleye said.
“Nooooo….” Mindy said. “I’m too young. I want to live. Help me. Help me. You have to help me.”
“Yes,” Walleye said. “We’ll help you. We want to help you. We have to know what happened. That way we can tell the doctors. We have to tell Evans about this too. We have stop…”
“The robots?” Mindy asked. “You’re going to stop the robots?”
June stared at Walleye in shock. She opened her mouth—
“Wait,” Walleye said. To Mindy, he said, “Robots. That’s exactly what we thought happened.”
Mindy searched his eyes. “It is? You know about them?”
“Somewhat,” Walleye said. “You may have the exact knowledge we need. Tell us quickly before the doctors arrive. That way they can go straight to work to save you.”
“You mean that?”
“One hundred percent,” Walleye said.
June knew he was lying. But the mutant sounded so sincere. Had he known about these robots all along? Why hadn’t he told her then?
“I spotted something on my sensor board,” Mindy whispered. “I radioed the tower about it. Evans’s cousin Thebes took the call and told me to come right over with the specs.
“I asked him why I couldn’t wire it. He told me this was urgent. So I went.” Mindy searched Walleye’s eyes. If his weird appearance bothered her, it didn’t stop her words. They began to tumble out of her.
“Thebes must have had a unit already. He met me and led me into a room. The robot was waiting there. It had four articulated legs like a giant spider, and a bulbous body. I think I shrieked. The robot moved fast, throwing me down on a bed. It injected me with a drug. I heard buzzing and felt pressure against my skull. That was the last time I was in charge of myself. The unit took over and gave me commands.
“I couldn’t resist. Oh, how I wanted to. It used pain and sometimes just bypassed my desires. I could understand everything going on around me, but I couldn’t do anything to stop it. The only drawback that I could see from the robot’s perspective is that I understand some of the larger plan. Some of their thoughts seeped into my brain.”
“What does it want?” Walleye asked.
“Makemake.”
“Why?”
“I’m not sure,” Mindy said. “I think to construct something.”
“Is there anyone else like you?”
“A handful so far,” Mindy said. “More on the way. The robots are going to take over. I have the feeling they’re going to turn everyone into an automaton like I was. I saw a room with thousands of control units. I think they want to turn us all into worker drones.”
June held back a sob as she listened.
“Are they robots or are they aliens?” Walleye asked.
Mindy thought about it. Her eyes sought out Walleye. “They’re both,” she whispered. “They’re robot aliens.”
Walleye frowned severely. He didn’t seem to know what to ask next.
“You’re never going to escape,” Mindy said.
“Why not?” asked Walleye, sounding suspicious.
“They know about you. They could see through my eyes. They have to know you pulled out the control unit. They’re still trying to remain hidden. Go-hour is fast approaching.”
“How long?” Walleyed snapped.
“Twenty-four hours,” Mindy whispered. “No longer than that.”
“They’re going to capture everyone?”
“Yes.”
“Is there an alien spaceship in orbit?”
“Pods,” Mindy said. “Three big pods are coming. One is bringing the factory supplies. The rest are robot soldiers. They’re going to transform the Kuiper Belt first and construct whatever is needed. After that—Listen. This is super important. I think they’re going to wipe us out, all of us, not just us in the Kuiper Belt.”
“Genocide?” June whispered.
Mindy’s face scrunched up. “Do me a favor,” she said in a tight voice. “It’s starting to really hurt. Kill me. I don’t want to be a drone again. Kill me, and then kill yourselves. Believe me, you don’t want to be a drone. It’s the most awful thing in the universe.”
Mindy started to say more. As she did, someone came through the front door.
June jumped to her feet.
Walleye palmed the stitch-gun off the floor.
An official in a port uniform stepped up. He had a gun in his hand.
Walleye shot him first, sending a dozen stitches into the man’s face. As the official fell, the mutant ran forward, hissing a dozen more shots. Something heavy thudded into the hallway.
June began shaking and trembling, hugging herself.
Walleye reappeared. He had the lo
ok of death on him. Without asking June or Mindy, he shot Mindy, killing her.
June moaned in dread. This was a nightmare.
Walleye the Freak reached his free hand toward her with its stubby fingers extended. He grabbed one of June’s hands with surprising strength, jerked her and forced her to stumble after him.
June passed the dead man in the hall. He lay on his face. She could see the control unit in the back of the skull. Mindy had been right. There were more of them.
“It’s starting,” Walleye told her. “We’re going to have to move faster than these robot aliens. Lucky for you, Luscious, I have the perfect plan.”
-7-
June squeezed her eyes closed as the rocket lifted from Makemake Port, the thrusting Gs pushing her against the blast-seat.
Somewhere along the line, her heart must have hardened. The old June Zen would have wept. She would have begged Walleye to go to the cryo storage-chamber and take her grandfather’s unit. She couldn’t very well leave Maximus Zen behind like this.
If the robots won, would they unfreeze grandfather and shove a control unit into his brain? Would they make all the cryoarchs work as drones until they died? It would be a rude awakening. Instead of a hoped-for scientific heaven, they would enter a technological hell.
June couldn’t understand why she didn’t weep for Grandfather Zen. She didn’t understand how she could keep following Walleye. The little assassin had lived up to his title over the last hour. He’d murdered seven people so far, and that didn’t include Mindy and the two intruders. So, he’d killed ten people in a little over an hour. How could he stand himself?
June managed to look over at him. The little mutant grinned like a devil. Then she realized that was the G-forces pulling at his face.
The heavy lifter rose from Makemake. This was a Clan Evans lifter, meant to carry tons of cargo into orbit. Walleye had slain everyone questioning their right to commandeer the lifter.
Walleye had explained to her on the run. “The robots are going to win, Luscious. Don’t ask how I know. It’s my gut instinct. Maybe we could save more on Makemake, but that would mean taking awful risks. The problem now is that we don’t know who to trust. The infiltrators could be controlling anyone. Therefore, I’m trusting no one but you, Luscious. Does that make sense?”
She could only stare at the mutant. A life as a loner seemed to have prepared Walleye for this moment. Was she lucky or damned to have hitched along for the ride?
The fierce thrust lessened as they escaped Makemake’s limited gravity. Walleye had debated fleeing the dwarf planet and the robot invasion in the heavy lifter. He’d decided the robots would just send a missile after them. They had to slip away unnoticed.
“I’m gambling,” the mutant had told her. “I’m rolling the dice, Luscious, figuring these aliens are arrogant as sin.”
The lifter’s comm crackled. A controller wanted to know what the hell the pilot figured he was doing. All lifters were grounded for the next ten hours. Why had he broken the restriction?
“We’re not answering,” Walleye said. “I doubt the aliens will get too anxious about us yet. We’ll turn toward the project soon enough.” He meant the main orbital construction project, the giant warship. “The aliens have to have infiltrated it already. Since the lifter is heading there, the aliens will no doubt figure we’ll fall right into their laps.”
“You’re mad,” June said matter-of-factly. She said it even though her facial muscles felt too tight.
“No,” Walleye said. “I have a different kind of demon riding my back. You know what that demon is, Luscious?”
June didn’t answer.
“Demon I-Know-Too-Much,” he said.
“You knew this was going to happen?”
Walleye gave her a lopsided grin. “I can see deeper than others. Most people don’t even see what’s going on around them, never mind fitting the pieces together and making a reasonable assumption.”
“You’ve lost me,” June said.
“That’s the story of my life, Luscious. Trust me; this is our only chance. No…I guess we could do this some other way. This just seemed to be our best chance of getting away with our lives.”
The comm squawked again, the controller threatening them with the orbital guns if they didn’t answer.
Walleye stabbed a button. The thrusters quit. The Gs stopped on the instant. Weightlessness took over.
Walleye sat at the piloting board. His stubby fingers moved quickly. June wondered what he was doing. Finally, he took a square object out of his pocket. He fit it over the on/off switch and tapped the thing’s screen. A number appeared: 20:00.
As June watched, the number changed to 19:59 and then to 19:58 and then 19:57…
“Time to go,” Walleye said. He unbuckled and shoved off the chair, leaving the timer over the on/off switch.
June shook her head. “Go where? You’re not making sense.”
“You know something, Luscious? You should keep your pretty mouth shut and listen more. You’re stressing out. That’s not going to help any. We have a narrow margin to get out of this in one piece. But you have to do exactly what I say. Are you ready?”
In that moment, June realized the mutant was right. He’d done the impossible. He’d figured out there was an alien infiltration-attack on Makemake. Big Bob hadn’t done that, nor had Luxor Evans. A little freak who lived under the catapult system had done it. If she wanted to live her own life to a ripe old age, she had to change her thinking about the mutant-man.
“Let’s do this, Walleye. I’m with you.”
***
They were wearing spacesuits and standing at an open outer hatch. Walleye pointed a suited arm at something she couldn’t see. She nodded her helmet just the same. He clicked a safety line to her suit. The line was already connected to his belt.
Walleye bent his stubby legs and jumped out of the open hatch. She immediately jumped after him.
They drifted high in orbit above Makemake. It was bright down there in one circular location on the ice. Everywhere else on Makemake was dark.
Walleye pointed again. This time he pointed behind them. June turned and saw the heavy lifter start up again, thrusting and accelerating.
Their helmets lacked comms. Their only communication would be through gestures and common sense.
Walleye seemed to know what he was doing. The little man twisted and squirmed in his suit. He pulled the line between them, dragging her closer and closer. Finally, she reached out, grabbing him, trying to cushion their meeting.
The two of them began to tumble. For an instant, she could see Walleye’s face through the visor. He seemed to be concentrating intently.
It took some doing. He squirted hydrogen particles from a thruster on his back, at spaced intervals.
In time, they quit tumbling.
June was impressed. She’d heard before how hard zero-G maneuvering was with a thruster-pack. Where had Walleye picked up such skill?
Walleye squirted more hydrogen particles in a long stream so that they picked up speed. She noticed he used darkened particles. Usually, they would be white, leaving an obvious trail. He must have military grade particles in the pack.
Abruptly, Walleye quit squirting. They glided along up here in high orbit. There had to be haulers and boats around them. Yes! She spotted one. It was ahead of them, almost directly ahead as if Walleye had been aiming for it.
Just then, a violent explosion appeared to their left. It was huge, and it grew. What could have caused—
June sucked in her breath. She bet Walleye had targeted the heavy lifter directly at the project ship. That’s why he’d been fiddling with the controls. Had Walleye succeeded, or had the port authorities fired the guns, destroying the heavy lifter? The vast explosion inclined her to her original conclusion.
June gasped as Walleye rotated the two of them. He started using the thruster-pack again afterward. It finally dawned on her all the things he’d been telling her earlier. She’d on
ly half heard him before because she’d still been in a daze.
They were going to pirate a hauler. They weren’t going to pirate just any hauler, though. Walleye was deliberately heading for the supposed robot hauler from Dannenberg 7.
She remembered him saying, “I wouldn’t doubt that all the robots headed to other ships. You counted eleven before, and there are way more haulers, boats and ships out here. What do you want to bet they left their hauler empty, on the assumption the stupid humans wouldn’t know what was going on?”
June swallowed heavily. She dearly hoped Walleye knew what he was doing.
-8-
They struck the Evans hauler hard enough to knock the wind out of June. She gasped, whimpering at the pain. Then, as she struggled to take a breath, she realized they were floating away from the hauler.
It was a tubby space-vehicle. It had numbers painted on the side and the words: GET BENT. That was typical Evans bravado.
Walleye squeezed his thruster-pack throttle. They quit drifting away and now drifted back toward the hull. It looked beat-up, that was for sure.
Walleye used magnetic clamps to attach both of them to the surface. Neither had magnetized space boots. That had been an oversight on Walleye’s part.
Now Walleye’s helmet moved back and forth as if he were searching for something. He demagnetized, using the thruster-pack so they slid along the hull, traveling a few meters above the hauler.
June started getting worried again. This was taking too long. Just then, Walleye waved an arm and pointed.
June had no idea what he pointed—Hold it. That looked like an open hatch. Is that where the robots had exited the hauler earlier?
Walleye squirted more black hydrogen particles. Bit by bit, they drifted toward the hatch. As gently as a feather, they reached it.
Perfect piloting, June told herself.
Walleye entered the lock and June followed. He looked around and slapped a switch. The outer hatch shut, putting them into momentary gloom. A light began to shine.
The A.I. Gene (The A.I. Series Book 2) Page 7
