"NEXT!" he roared defiantly.
SEVEN
“Magnificent! They were magnificent!” Boztwank squealed, beside himself with pleasure. The joyful mushroom flew across the control room to congratulate his Leader. “Oh, I do apologize, Idow. You were absolutely correct. These Dirtlings are wonderful. Wonderful!"
“Yes,” Squee agreed with a toothy lizard smile. “They are very good, indeed."
But the starship's Leader heard neither of them. “A distance weapon,” Idow muttered, faintly echoing himself. He leaned forward in his seat, the chair automatically adjusting itself to the new position. “They have a distance weapon. Gasterphaz, why was I not informed of this?"
“Because I did not know,” the Choron Protector replied honestly. “Metal is metal, and they're covered with it. It's in their mouths, nose, ears, any orifice you care to name. And what is not hidden inside their clothing is holding it together. My sensors indicated no weapon grade energy sources, and so I reported them unarmed.” Gasterphaz's veneer cracked. “Sorry."
Magnanimous as any Leader, Idow brushed the matter aside. “Accepted, my friend. So tell me, what weapons do they have with them?"
Deep in thought, the rocky giant drummed his fingers on his control board, rhythmically denting the metal. “Well,” he started.
“Thin knives, thick knives, folding knives, throwing knives, round throwing knives,” Squee interjected, reading from a list that he had made during the battle. “Chains, short hooks, the projectile weapon, which by the way I want for my collection ... sss ... I believe that is everything they carry."
“One of the edged weapons is not properly a knife,” Boztwank sang, his electronic pot weaving and dipping in a ritual dance of joy. “Better list it as a cleaver."
In the ensuing feeling of good fellowship, Squee made the appropriate notation on his list, instead of ignoring anything the mushroom said as he normally did. Besides, to a collector there was no such thing as useless information.
“And the small Dirtling stole a spike from one of our drones in the first test,” Gasterphaz added, trying to salvage his shattered reputation as a Protector. Though he rarely used them himself, weapons were his specialty.
Bent over the list, Squee clamped his elongated jaw down on his forked tongue in concentration. “Did he use it against the Quatralyan?” the lizard asked excitedly.
The Choron frowned. “No, but he still has the spike on him."
In annoyance, Squee crossed out his last notation. Okay, maybe there was such a thing as useless information.
Watching his own reflection, Idow toyed with the silver microphone of his viewscreen. “Boztwank, is Trell still in the reactor core?"
“Yes, my Leader,” the fungi replied gaily. “Why? What has he done wrong now?"
“Nothing,” the blue being mused. “But get him out of there and have him send in the cleaning robot. I want the arena immaculate for the next test."
Gasterphaz perked up at this. “Suitable for recording and adding to our video library?” asked the Choron shrewdly.
Idow just smiled.
Excellent, thought the Protector. The third test had always been his favorite to watch.
“Then I hereby announce that the bank is closed. All bets must ride.” This announcement astonished nobody as Chorons were notoriously dirt cheap. “And I shall prepare the warobot for immediate use. Half-speed as usual?"
“Let's try full speed this time,” Squee suggested cold-bloodedly, the luminescent controls of his tech station brightening at their master's anticipation. “I think our Dirtlings can handle it."
The ship's Leader had a momentary vision of small furry creatures being dropped into an active food processor and he shivered in pleasure.
In total agreement, Idow nodded regally, the fringe of indigo hair around his face bobbing from the motion. “Let it be done."
Upon hearing this, Boztwank, scooted back to his post. Wow. Full speed. They had never done this before. Eeee! This was going to more fun then watching garbage rot.
* * * *
His laser printer finally at rest, Sir John removed his reading glasses and polished them with the handkerchief that jutted from the breast pocket of his tailored, three-piece, gray suit. The handkerchief was silk, monogrammed with the designer's name, and the color of the fabric perfectly matched Courtney's blue silk shirt. Then he blew his nose on the handkerchief and threw it in the wastepaper basket beside his console. These were merely his work clothes.
“Would you like it straight, or condensed?” the millionaire Scotsman asked the room at large.
“Would we like what, straight or condensed?” Dr. Wu asked, strips of computer paper littering the floor at her feet.
The Chinese physicist had tied her console in with the computers at Cal Tech in an effort to discover how to crack the alien's force shield. As her printer reeled off another failed equation, she ripped the sheet free, made a note of something interesting in the formula on her clipboard, then crumpled the paper into a ball and threw it in the general direction of her wastepaper basket. So far, the score was; wastepaper basket: zero, floor: thirty-seven.
“World reaction to the events we have just witnessed,” Sir John politely explained.
“Condensed please, Jonathan. No lectures today,” Prof. Rajavur said, laying aside his earphones and giving Dr. Malavade the go ahead signal.
Enabling a never before used section of his console, the Indian linguist started diligently tapping complex commands into a computer keyboard.
Sir John cleared his throat. “Ahem. Hurrah for the good guys."
With an expression similar to a man who has discovered a live eel in his underwear, Rajavur spun about in his chair. “I beg your pardon?"
“Well, you wanted it condensed."
“Elucidate,” the professor ordered in ill humor.
“It's the street gang,” Sir John explained looking embarrassed. “The majority of the world is cheering for them. The Bloody Deckers are heroes."
“Heroes?” General Bronson stormed, slamming down the receiver of his hush phone so hard that the instrument rang, even though it was not equipped with a bell. “They're loonies!"
“Heroic loonies,” Sir John corrected. “So nobody cares."
“Well, Bill Paterson cares,” Bronson countered.
Sir John raised a questioning eyebrow. “And he is?"
“The police captain for Manhattan Central. He just issued arrest warrants on each gang member for carrying a concealed weapon. Apparently, the man has been trying to nail the Deckers for the past seven years. Captain Paterson is reported to have turned a cartwheel when Hammer pulled that gun in front of two billion witnesses."
“Indeed. Well, I wish him luck in serving it."
Bronson gave a half smile. “Yeah, me too."
* * * *
Taking their time, the Deckers went about the messy task of placing their dead friends side by side, and removing their leather jackets to covering their mutilated bodies. Afterwards, Chisel scurried about the test chamber recovering most of his knives. But that was okay. He still had that blade he'd stolen from the little robot. A secret weapon, yeah. Cool. Crowbar offered his spare chain to Drill, it was accepted and together the two men were working the kinks from the metal lengths, getting ready for the next attack.
Taking full advantage of the lull, Hammer dug fresh bullets from his pocket, loaded the clip and slid it into the butt of the automatic pistol where it locked into place with a satisfying click. Eight more rounds and the Colt would be useless. He had to make every shot count, even though one of the bullets was already spoken for.
The ganglord had talked briefly to Crowbar, telling the stupid sonofabitch that if he ever disobeyed orders again, Hammer would blow the man's freaking head off. Torch was dead because of him, and the only reason Crowbar was still sucking in air was that the gang needed every stud they had to get out of this mess alive. But a single mistake and the bastard would be wearing grass for a hat.<
br />
The hissing noise of the arena's weird door opening, made the Deckers glance up from their weapons, and though they had faced death a thousand times before, today the street gang almost wet their denims. This next test was going to be a grade A, bottled and bonded, four star mother.
Stepping away from the closing wall was a giant humanoid robot. The machine man stood twenty feet tall at least, with a shiny body made of smooth green armor. In its right hand, the awesome robot held a big metal bar, or maybe a club. But the weapon was huge, whatever it was. The thing looked like a telephone pole veined with energy cables, and there was a worn, pitted nozzle at the lower end. Nobody had to tell them that this was plainly a weapon of power.
Without any preamble, the deadly machine began to walk straight towards them.
“DECKERS!” Hammer yelled, and the gang rallied to the cry. Bravely, they charged their newest opponent, ready to fight to the death, because Deckers don't surrender.
Pausing in curiosity, the cleaning robot peered down at the beings running towards it and wondered what was the problem. The test chamber was a mess, but no more so than usual.
Crowbar and Drill reached the green giant first. They arced around the machine's legs, whipping the robot with their chains as they passed. The thin plastic armor cracked in a spiderweb pattern under the violent blows and bits sprinkled to the floor, exposing an inner framework of struts and circuitry. The gang took heart from this and bellowed their name again even louder.
Dispassionate as a doorknob, the machine scanned the damage. The waterproof casing of its legs wasn't intact anymore. With a robotic sigh, the janitor laid aside its electronic mop and bent over to retrieve the broken pieces of itself.
In an overhand throw, Chisel released his pride and joy, a two and a half pound, stainless steel, Bowie knife. The Texas toothpick whizzed through the air and smashed into the robot's chest, lodging firmly between a circuit cube and a power cable. As a short circuit surged through its entire body, the machine flashed into overload, its control relays systematically burning out. Blind and deaf, the dizzy robot noisily crashed to its knees and sent an urgent plea for help to Those-Who-Command.
* * * *
“They're doing what?” throated Idow, rising from his chair.
“Attacking the cleaning robot...” Squee said, his voice fading away as his shipmates scrambled to their tech-stations. Oh, nobody ever listened to him.
Magenta with anger, Leader Idow slapped the switch activating the microphone on his control board. “Hey, you waste heads! Cut that out!"
In the test chamber the translation came as:
* * * *
“STOP, FOOLISH ONES."
As always, the Deckers paid no attention to what somebody in authority told them to do. Crowbar grabbed the robot's staff and dragged the pole away, almost straining a gut in the process. Fighting to retain its balance, the mechanical reached out a hand to steady itself. Hammer easily dodged the clumsy attack, and aimed the barrel of his .45 automatic pistol right between the sightless eyes of the rapidly disintegrating janitor.
“CEASE THESE ACTIONS. THAT IS ONLY THE CLEANING ROBOT."
“Bullshit!” Hammer roared rebelliously, pulling the trigger.
With a jolt, the mechanical's head kicked back. In vain, the machine tried to stabilize its internal systems as two more steel-jacketed rounds were pumped into the sparking remains of its face. The ganglord was gambling here, for even the street punk knew that the brain could be anywhere in a robot; the chest, legs, arms, anywhere at all.
However it had been deemed that in a cleaning robot it was judged most prudent to keep the machine's delicate brain as far away as possible from the caustic reagents and potentially destructive chemicals that it handled on a daily basis. So the brain was located in the head. For protection.
As dead as it could possibly be, the robot stiffly pancaked onto its face, the lovely green armor peeling away from its overheating nuclear stomach like the leaves of a murdered artichoke. Fat crackling sparks crawled over the broken machine, smoke poured from its joints, and a leg fell off.
Then in crude humor, Chisel unzipped his pants and contemptuously relieved himself on the fallen Goliath.
* * * *
Utterly flabbergasted, the aliens couldn't believe what they had just seen. This was almost beyond their comprehension. Exactly how primitive were these guys?
“By the Prime Builder's Waste Products,” Idow gulped, slumping backwards into his formfitting chair.
* * * *
“Holy crap,” General Bronson gulped, slumping backwards into his padded swivel chair.
A prude at heart, Prof. Rajavur took umbrage at the mild profanity. “Really, Wayne, your language!"
“Is most appropriate,” Dr. Wu interrupted. The scientist was utterly flabbergasted. This was almost beyond her comprehension. “Holy crap, indeed."
* * * *
Chisel's base spectacle gave forth unexpected results. The smoke from the robot thickened, the sparks got fatter, and a vicious humming started. Justifiably frightened, the gang quickly retreated to safety.
“Hey, chief,” Drill whispered, crouching low, with the rest of the gang following his lead. “You know what? I think that thing is going to..."
It did. The entire starship shook as the tortured works of the broken robot whoofed into a fireball. Tendrils of smoke and shrapnel filled the air. As the force of the detonation knocked the Deckers prone, the gang gripped the floor like Moslems in Mecca. Every warning light in the starship winked on, klaxons sounded, bells clanged, powerlines snapped and the viewscreens in the control room went black.
* * * *
Suddenly, the FCT found itself staring at the outside of the alien ship and the team cursed in six different languages.
* * * *
As the force of the detonation dissipated, the rattled street gang got slowly to their feet.
“Everybody okay?” Hammer asked, straightening his leather jacket and checking for damage. Nyah, the coat was fine.
With a grunt, the dapper Drill tucked his sweaty T-shirt back into his worn denims. “Yeah. Sure. I just love getting dumped on my ass by exploding robots."
“Me too!” Chisel cried in simple-minded delight. “Let's do it again!"
In a friendly manner, Hammer gave the boy a smack on the head. “Joking. He was only joking, pinhead."
The boy smiled in embarrassment. “Oh."
“I'm okay too,” Crowbar said, hawking and spitting into the distance.
Drill loftily sniffed at him. “Like, who cares if you got a hole in you or not, dude?"
The ganglord started to tell the two of them to stuff a sock in it, when an odd thought occurred to him. A hole in him. The gag had worked in an old spy film he'd seen once. Maybe. Just maybe.
“Follow me!” Hammer cried, sprinting for the blast area with the gang close to his heels.
“What's up, chief?” Drill asked, effortlessly keeping abreast of his commander.
“Cross your fingers,” Hammer muttered.
The panting Chisel did. Both hands.
Thick hot, acrid smoke lay thick in the area, and the Deckers had to tread carefully so as not to trip on any of the fused machine parts or chunks of green armor that littered the blackened floor. The place looked like a tuna melt left too long in the oven, and the smell, whew, worse then a wino's kiss.
After a quick glance about, Hammer grimaced. Damn, guess his idea had been for shit. Vexed, he kicked at a half-melted lump of robot, and the startled youth saw the hundredweight piece of metal disappear from view, shortly followed by a loud clang. Wary of their footing, the Deckers advanced closer to the spot and, sure enough, there was a gaping hole in the floor. Through it they saw a corridor on the ship level below them. The street gang needed no further prompting. Heedless of the hot, jagged metal that ringed their escape route, the Bloody Deckers scrambled down the hole and raced out of sight.
* * * *
Replacing the blown fuses
in his control board, Squee activated the video cameras in the arena and hissed in horror when he saw the bi-level view inside the devastated test chamber.
“Gone!” he raucously informed the control room. “The primitives are gone!"
“Mrmph,” Leader Idow said unintelligibly, absorbed in the task of recalibrating his navigational equipment.
Gasterphaz had lifted the lid of his tech station, and was working on the internal circuitry, bent over at the waist in an angle impossible for any species not possessing an endo and exoskeleton as did his. “A pity,” the Choron rumbled. “But that blast could have damaged even me."
Frantically, the lizard danced about. “No-no! Not dead, gone. Escaped, gone!"
With amazing speed, Gasterphaz freed himself from the maze of wiring. “The primitives are loose?"
Aghast, Idow dropped an electro-wrench. "Loose aboard my ship?” he throated, using both of his mouths.
“Alive?” Boztwank screamed, his fronds quivering in fear.
Squee dumbly nodded yes and the mushroom fained to swoon. This was terrible. He couldn't believe it! So the fungi pinked himself, and he still couldn't believe it.
Moving in astonishing speed, Gasterphaz slammed shut the lid of his tech station, switched on the anti-intruder systems and prepared for personal combat.
Coming out of his reverie, Squee located Trell, alerted the Technician to the situation and ordered him to go hide.
Muttering curses, Boztwank keyed the starship's reactor to 20/20, sealed the ship and set his squirter on emergency sequence.
But strangely, Leader Idow reclined in his chair and rubbed a pale blue hand across a pale blue cheek. Well, well, he cynically thought to himself. It appears that there was going to be a third test held today. Only this one, he and his crew had to pass.
EIGHT
Slow and cautiously, a human head eased its way around the corner of a white passageway, and daringly looked this way and that. Nothing was in sight but another white passageway with blank white walls. It was exactly like every other corridor in this goofy ship. The gang could have been going around in circles. Although they had been trying very hard not to do that.
Illegal Aliens Page 7
