Robot Blues

by Margaret Weis; Don Perrin

In Xris’s view, a lot of things weren’t adding up. He tried an experimental question, waited to see the reaction.

  “Seems to me that the Navy’s making a hell of a sacrifice just to take out one Corasian agent. If this robot’s all you say it is.”

  Xris wasn’t watching Tess. He had his eyes on Quong.

  The Doc lifted his hand and rubbed the side of his nose.

  I was right, Xris thought. Something smells. And it isn’t Raoul’s perfume.

  Quong suddenly began to cough. He coughed until he was red in the face. Harry reached around, gave him a sound slap on the back.

  The doctor glared at him. “What are you trying to do?” he demanded, in between hacks. “Dislocate my spine?” Choking, he turned to Tess. “Excuse me, ma’am.” lie jumped to his feet, headed for a drinking fountain at the far end of the theater.

  “Why don’t you build a fake robot?” Harry asked. “Pull the old switcheroo.”

  “We considered trying to replicate the robot,” Tess answered, “but it’s just not possible. Some of the materials metal alloys, for example—used in that ‘bot can’t be re-created today. Harsch is intelligent. One look would tell him he’d been double-crossed. As for the robot, NI intends to retrieve all the information stored inside the ‘bot first, before you take it to Harsch. The information is what’s most important. Not the robot itself. I have with me all the equipment necessary to download ...”

  She continued talking, but Xris had stopped listening—to her, at least. Quong’s voice was in Xris’s ear, coming over the commlink that was part of the cyborg’s inner workings.

  “She is not telling us the truth, my friend. The robot would be worthless to the Corasians and my guess is that she knows it. Even if the ‘bot is in working condition, it would not be able to perform its function of laying space Lanes. Professor Lasairion equipped all his ‘bots with fail-safe devices. Before the robot could go ahead and lay a space Lane, the professor sent the robot a confirmation signal. If it did not receive confirmation, it would not lay the Lane.”

  “Uh-huh,” Xris said aloud, as if talking to Tess. “Thanks. That clears a lot up.”

  He could hear the sound of Quong noisily gulping water. The doctor, his coughing fit eased, returned to the stage.

  So, reasoned Xris. This whole scheme is a bait to trap Harsch. The Navy makes a big commotion over this ‘bot, stirs up the political hornets, attracts Harsch’s attention. He figures there’s something to this, sends in his agent, who confirms that this robot must be highly valuable because the Navy is making such a fuss over it—top-level security, all that. When, in fact, the blasted ‘bot couldn’t lay a Lane if its life depended on it.

  “As for killing Harsch,” Tess was saying, “don’t waste your pity on him. He intends to sell a Lane-laying robot to the Corasians. Can you imagine what that would mean? It has always been difficult for the Corasians to mass their forces due to the lack of space Lanes within their own galaxy. They would now have the capability to lay Lanes wherever they wanted. They could send immense armadas to attack us.

  “Once here, the Corasians could continue to build their own Lanes, travel unimpeded to any portion of the galaxy. They could also disrupt our Lanes, making it difficult, if not impossible, for the Navy to come to the defense of planets under attack. The death and devastation would be incalculable.”

  Tess was pale and serious and earnest. And it was all a lie. You’re good, sister, Xris told her silently. You’re real good. I wonder what else you’re not telling us.

  “I know there are rotten people in this galaxy,” Harry Luck was saying, “but I can’t imagine how anyone could be twisted enough to work for the Corasians.”

  “Money has a lot to do with it,” Tess said. “But it’s more than that with Harsch. Or so we think. He could make a fortune—hell, he cold make a hundred fortunes—by selling the robot to any number of people in our own galaxy. Our people believe that he has some sort of weird fascination with the Corasians.”

  “Probably sexual,” Raoul commented.

  “Sex?” Harry guffawed. “The Corasians are big blobs of molten lava—”

  “Not technically.” Quong, having returned from the drinking fountain, interrupted. “The Corasians are actually a protoplasmic mass that is about ninety percent pure energy with just enough fleshy matter to ensure that they can interact with the material world.”

  “So they’re not lava,” Harry carried on, undeterred. “They’re fiery, flesh-eating blobs of goo that haul themselves around in plastic cases. I don’t see anything so very sexy about all that.”

  “You have no imagination,” Raoul stated loftily. His eyes grew dreamy, unfocused. “Think of being consumed by flames, of tongues of fire licking your loins ... of the sweet, terrible pain ...”

  “That’s sick!” Harry protested, disgusted.

  Raoul gave a delicate shrug. “As I said, you have no imagination.”

  Jamil rubbed his eyes, flexed his shoulders. “Could we get on with this? All I want to do is go to bed and sleep for about twenty four hours.” Yawning, he shook his head to cleat it, then hunched forward on his chair. “It seems to me that this is all settled. We deliver the robot to Harsch. We get paid. That’s that.”

  “Speaking of payment, since the government now knows about this job, we’ll have to declare it as income,” Tycho said in gloomy tones.

  Xris eyed Tess. “I don’t understand, Captain. Why don’t your own people deal with this? If this robot’s so damn dangerous and so damn valuable, why didn’t you just snatch it?”

  Tess made no answer. She merely smiled.

  “Ah,” Xris said in sudden understanding. “I interrupted something, didn’t I? Of course. You had that raid on the barroom planned in advance. That was the diversion you were planning to use to sneak off base! Until I wandered onto the set. Worked out great for you, didn’t it? You let me go pick up the robot. If I get caught, I take the fall. You bat your innocent eyes, give a little horrified scream—”

  “Cut the self-pity,” Tess snapped. “You were operating on the edge, and you knew it. You were happy enough to use me to get off base. You took off like you had a missile up your ass when that diversion came down. You thought you were so smart! Thought you were in control of the whole situation! If you could have seen your face when you heard Jamil had left the base ...”

  Xris took out a twist, but he didn’t put it in his mouth. He held it in his hand, stared at it, tapped it against the gold case. “Yeah, I guess I must’ve looked pretty funny at that.”

  In the silence, Xris could hear the whir of the machinery that kept him alive. Everyone in the place could hear it. Great acoustics, this theater.

  Tess’s hand touched his shoulder. His good shoulder. “Look, we both know that this is a hell of a way to earn a living. But I think we’d both have to admit we enjoy it.” Her hand slid gently around to his back. “And if it’s any comfort to your poor bruised male ego, those kisses were on my own time. They weren’t government-issue.”

  Xris tried hard to stay angry, but he couldn’t. What she said was absolutely true. She had used him. He had used her. She had lied to him. He had lied to her. And he’d known all along those kisses hadn’t been bought and paid for. He lifted his head, looked up at her, and smiled.

  “So we’ve managed to prove that each of us is a sneaky, conniving liar and a cheat. Sounds like the basis of a great relationship to me. Where do we go from here?”

  “To bed,” Jamil muttered, yawning again. “I meant to sleep,” he added.

  “No imagination,” said Raoul, sighing. Once again he regarded himself sadly in his mirror. “I, for one, am going to have to find someplace to repair the damage.”

  “Me, too,” said Harry. “My plane’s a mess. I’ve got a broken front gear and number two engine is out. Something flew off the tarmac, ripped up the turbines. Don’t the people here know that FOD can ruin an engine?”

  Harry was incapable of being witty. Xris could only assume he wa
s serious—which was even more frightening.

  “Well, Captain, what are our orders?” Xris turned to Tess.

  “Bring the robot to me. I have the equipment needed to download the data. When that’s finished, you fly off.”

  Xris chewed on the twist. “We’re taking a hot robot wired with explosives to a guy who turns people into Corasian lunch meat.” He glanced around at the team. “Everyone got their life insurance paid up?”

  “Harsch won’t figure it out,” Tess said firmly. “He couldn’t possibly. We’ve kept the lid on this, tight. No one else knows about this robot. No one.”

  Xris grunted. “Whatever you say.”

  He had another problem to solve, and that was the disappearance of Darlene Rowan. He hoped twenty-four hours would give him time to establish contact with her, make sure she was all right. He turned to Raoul. “Mind if I come along? Watch you put on your lipstick?”

  Raoul was pleased, flattered. “If you truly think you would enjoy it, Xris Cyborg. So few people realize that it is an art form—”

  The Little One nudged his friend. Raoul’s eyelashes fluttered. “Oh. Yes, well.” He gazed at Xris from beneath lowered lashes. “If you would accompany me to the little boys’ room ...”

  Tess suddenly put her hand to her ear. She listened a moment, said “Excuse me, gentlemen,” and walked to the back part of the stage.

  “Implanted commlink,” said Harry knowingly.

  “Gee, you’re a scientific wonder today,” Xris remarked caustically.

  He was watching Tess. He didn’t like the way her shoulders slumped, the way she slowly lowered her hand from the commlink implanted beneath her skin behind her ear, the way she stood a moment, as if trying to sort out what to do next.

  “Something’s gone wrong,” said Jamil in an undertone.

  “Surprise, surprise. Look, next time you hear me say ‘This is the easiest job on record,’ just shoot me, will you?” Xris returned. “Point-blank. Through the heart. Get it over with.”

  Tess began to walk. She was headed off the stage, moving rapidly.

  The entire team was on their feet.

  Xris was the first to catch up with her. He grabbed her elbow. “What gives, Captain? Where are you off to in such a hurry? We’re on the same side, remember?”

  Tess shook him off, glared up at him. She was clearly furious. “Mag Force 7. And there’s only six of you. What a chump I am. Let go of me.”

  Xris didn’t. “What are you talking about?”

  “Your number seven just showed up.”

  Xris silenced the others—particularly Raoul—with a flashing glance.

  “And,” Tess continued, “he’s raising one hell of a row. He’s blabbing his head off about the robot!”

  Chapter 23

  And trust me not at all or all in all.

  Alfred, Lord Tennyson, Idylls of the King, “Merlin and Vivien”

  “Here goes my nap.” Jamil groaned.

  Tess fixed them all with a grim stare. Her hand rested on her holster. “You want to tell me what you’re up to?”

  “I don’t know who this guy is. He’s not one of ours. Maybe,” Xris said, “he’s one of yours. Maybe this is something you’ve cooked up for us?”

  Tess flushed in anger. She started to retort, caught herself, swallowed her words. After a moment, she was calm again. “I suppose this is inevitable. We neither of us can trust the other.”

  She looked narrowly at Xris, at the rest of the team. “You’re saying that this man isn’t one of your team?”

  “Yes, that’s what I’m saying. Is he one of yours?”

  “No, of course not! But then who? . . . How? . . .” Tess sighed, put her hand to her forehead. “I don’t believe this.”

  “Maybe it’s Harsch?” Jamil suggested. “Or one of his agents? Maybe he got suspicious, decided to check things out himself.”

  “That was the first thing I considered,” Tess said, “but NI doesn’t think so. He calls himself Jeffrey Grant. He flew to Pandor in a rent-a-plane. He requested clearance to land. When that was refused, he said he had to see someone about the ‘old robot.’ The Admiralty’s been monitoring all air traffic on this planet. They stepped in at that point, ordered that Grant be allowed to land. He was immediately taken into custody. He hasn’t been permitted to leave his plane. He’s being held incommunicado at the airfield.”

  “Harsch wouldn’t be likely to broadcast the fact that he knows something about the robot,” Jamil pointed out.

  Tess was silent, thinking. She glanced at Xris. “You’ve seen Harsch. Could you say for certain whether or not this might be him?”

  “I might not be able to,” Xris said. “I saw Sakuta, remember? He may or may not have been Harsch. But the Little One could. He could also tell if this guy is Harsch or is working for Harsch.”

  “And I’m supposed to rely on what he says? Oh, very well. You and the hat come with me.”

  “Sure,” Xris answered. He rubbed the right side of his nose. “But what about the robot? I don’t think anyone will bother it, not with all those biohazard warnings decorating the crate’s exterior. But you never know—”

  “Tycho and I could go collect the robot,” Quong offered, picking up on the cue. “Our friend is also decorated with biohazard warnings—so to speak.” He indicated Tycho’s biochemical warfare patches.

  “And it would be consistent with my story that I suspected something was wrong with the crate,” Xris said.

  Tess was regarding him with renewed suspicion. “You know, I might almost think you had this planned.”

  “Yeah, I’m a genius,” Xris returned, shrugging. “I’m such a genius I get taken in by a Corasian agent posing as a museum curator and an NI agent posing as a human.”

  Tess contemplated him a moment longer, then smiled a half smile. “The number-one rule for someone in my business is don’t get personally involved—”

  “—because you may have to shoot the involvee,” Xris finished. “Yeah, I know. You’ve got a job to do. And so do we. Why not let us do it? Quong and Tycho collect the robot. You can send an armed escort with them if you want. Harry, you go make certain the Claymore’s in shape to fly us out— What’s the matter, Harry?” Xris interrupted himself. “You do remember where you left the bomber, don’t you?”

  “Uh? Oh, yeah, sure, Xris. I remember where I left it. It’s just how I left it—sort of sudden-like. You see, I really wasn’t supposed to have left it at all, only I said I had to go to the can and— For God’s sake, Xris,” Harry expostulated. “I heard you were in trouble!”

  Xris thrust a twist into his mouth. “Still think I planned this?” he asked Tess in an undertone. Aloud he said, “Jamil, go with Harry. See if you can keep him out of the brig. Doc, you and Tycho meet us at the airfield with the ‘bot. I’ll take the Little One with me.”

  Xris turned to the small raincoated figure. “Would you know this time if Harsch was using a telepathic scrambler?”

  The Little One nodded emphatically, smashed his two small fists together.

  “And if the Little One comes along with you, Xris Cyborg, I come along in addition,” Raoul announced. “After I repair my makeup, of course.”

  Tess glanced sidelong at Xris.

  “I’m afraid he’s right. He has to come,” he said, grinning. “They’re a team. We all are.”

  “God help us,” Tess muttered.

  She left to arrange for an armed escort for Tycho and Quong and the robot. (“It’s not that I don’t trust you. Let’s just say that I don’t want anything else to go wrong.”)

  Jamil and Harry left to try to retrieve Harry’s spaceplane. (“I know where I left it. It’s sitting right on the tarmac. Jeez! I wish you guys would forget about that other time....”)

  Once Tess was gone, Raoul drew out a pocket mirror, began redoing his lipstick. Xris bent down, said quietly, “What about Darlene?”

  Raoul answered in the same soft tone, pausing at intervals to examine the tracings
of the lavender-colored pencil around his lips. “It was close, Xris Cyborg. Very close. The Little One discovered the plot and warned me in time.”

  Xris’s stomach clenched. “The Hung?”

  Raoul looked not at Xris but at Xris’s reflection in the mirror. “Yes, my friend. That is what the Little One says. They were Adonian assassins, hired by the Hung. Third-rate, mind you.” Raoul sniffed and concentrated on his work. “No delicacy. No finesse. And they used a poison to which there was an antidote. Still, I suppose that a mob can’t be all that selective—”

  “She’s all right,” Xris repeated urgently.

  “She’s fine. She left on a pleasure cruiser to Moana. She chose that planet because it is near Pandor. I have ... somewhere”—he glanced at his handbag—”exactly where and when we are supposed to meet her. She sent it in code. She said you would know how to decode it.”

  “How the devil did they track her?” Xris demanded angrily. He grabbed hold of Raoul’s arm roughly. “Stop painting your face and listen to me. Damn it! You and the Little One were supposed to be on the watch—”

  “We were, Xris Cyborg,” Raoul interrupted. He regarded Xris with mild reproach and put his arm around the Little One, who shrank into a heap of wrinkled raincoat at Xris’s furious tone. “No one followed her. We kept close watch. We would have known. After all, we are fond of Darlene, too.”

  The Little One darted forward, grabbed hold of Xris’s pants leg, tugged on it fiercely, and pointed a jabbing finger at Raoul. The Little One put his finger to his mouth, pointed at Raoul again, repeated this gesture twice. Raoul had returned to his interrupted beauty regime, was again complacently regarding himself in the mirror.

  Xris suddenly understood the pantomime. “You ingested the poison.”

  Raoul gave a delicate shrug. “My body is able to adapt. Hers might not have been.” He searched through his purse, found the note with the coded message. It was scribbled on the back of a shopping list.

  “I’m sorry.” Xris took the list, tucked it carefully in his pocket. “It’s not your fault. I brought this on her.

  This is my fault. If I’d left her alone, she would have had the whole goddamn Royal Navy protecting her!”