by Andrew Lane
Rhino’s question had calmed the situation down. Chesterson was smiling, and demonstrating something else to the group.
‘Corporal Higgs,’ he said into the radio, ‘please instruct ARLENE to remain where it is for ten minutes while you return to base, then to retrace its path and find its own way back.’
‘Affirmative,’ Higgs’s voice said. Moments later, Tara heard him relay the orders to the robot.
She wandered outside, and stared across at the trees on the far side of the clearing. The sun was higher in the sky now, and she could feel its heat like a weight pressing down on her. She wondered in what range of temperatures ARLENE could work, but decided not to ask the question. Chesterson had obviously already decided that she was trouble. It was the same with her tutors back at college. Tara had yet to find a way of asking questions that didn’t make it sound like she was being confrontational.
A movement in the trees attracted her attention. It was Corporal Higgs. He exited the treeline and marched rapidly across the clearing. As he got to her, he nodded.
‘Ma’am,’ he said. She smiled at him.
The group inside started asking Higgs questions about ARLENE as soon as he got inside, but Tara stayed where she was. She was waiting for ARLENE to appear.
And she wasn’t disappointed. The robot bag-carrier appeared from the shadows between the trees and started walking across the clearing towards her with its scuttling, insect-like gait. She found herself wondering just how fast it could go. Could it outrun a man?
As it got closer, she walked out to meet it. She stopped about six metres away, directly in the path that it was taking back to the hut.
ARLENE continued walking towards her.
Tara folded her arms and stared at it.
The robot continued moving. If it didn’t stop, it was going to walk right over her.
Or through her.
CHAPTER
nine
Tara stood her ground and waited. The robot got closer and closer, its neck and sensor package looming above her. She felt a flutter of nervousness but she wanted to check something. She wanted to check that it had enough awareness to notice her and avoid her.
ARLENE stopped about two metres away from her. Its sensor package stared down at her, then moved first to one side and then to the other. Tara was the focus of its attention as it tried to work out what she was and what to do about her.
She let out a breath of relief as ARLENE scuttled to one side and then walked past her. At least it hadn’t tried to go over her.
She turned to walk back just as ARLENE reached the hut and as the group of observers, led by Brad Chesterson, emerged. Rhino was talking to Chesterson. She heard him saying, ‘As far as I know, it’s already been accepted. An ARLENE system is going to be boxed up and sent to us for evaluation. Professor Livingstone has already agreed it with your board of directors. What we need from you is all the technical documentation you can provide, and some personal tuition if at all possible.’
Tara watched as ARLENE stopped by the hut. The robot settled down on its mechanical haunches, more like a horse than an insect, making it easy to take the bags and rucksacks off it. The observers clustered around it, making appreciative noises about its design and its ruggedness. Tara was impressed as well, but she could see the dark side as well as the light side. She could see how the robot could be abused.
She walked over to the hut to join Rhino and Brad Chesterson. Maybe she should apologize to the man. She hadn’t intended to irritate him – not much, anyway.
A movement caught her attention, and she looked sideways to where ARLENE was sitting.
The robot’s sensor-package head was swivelling to follow her as she moved. It was watching her.
She stared into the darkness of the hut, in case someone was using the remote-control software to track her as she moved, but both the computers were sitting by themselves, unused. Yet on the plasma screen she could see a close-up image of her head.
She turned back to ARLENE and stared straight at its camera. ARLENE stared back at her for a long moment, and then looked away, almost dismissively.
It was morning, and Gecko was crouching on a rooftop overlooking his flat.
He didn’t like what he was seeing.
Two men were standing in his room. They weren’t the same two men that he had talked to a few days ago, but they had been poured from the same mould: high cheekbones, shaven heads, scars, leather jackets. They were Eastern European gangsters.
It looked as if they had been waiting for him for a while, then got bored and started searching his flat for some clue as to where he had gone. He could see clothes and books scattered around the floor, and the drawers had been pulled out of his bedside cabinet and turned upside down, presumably on the off-chance that he had taped some incriminating evidence underneath. As if he would do anything that stupid. He’d decided a long time ago that if he ever had anything incriminating then he would wrap it in a waterproof wrapper and leave it on a rooftop somewhere, where only he and a handful of others could get to it. Hiding something in his room would just be stupid.
One of the gangsters walked over to the window and looked out. Luckily he didn’t look up.
Gecko sighed. Turning round, he slumped down with his back against the low wall that ran along the edge of the building. Pigeons stuttered back and forth on stubby little legs over by the trapdoor that led down into the top floor of the building, watching him out of the corners of their eyes. He envied the way that they could fly from roof to roof, not having to worry about planning the routes and taking the chance that muscular strength and speed would win out over gravity. On the other hand, most of them had malformed, twisted feet from where cuts had become infected from the dirt and pollution that coated the rooftops and windowsills. Cuts and grazes were a common problem for free-runners, but they all knew that hands and other exposed areas needed to be kept scrupulously clean, and they all carried little bottles of antiseptic spray just for that purpose.
On a whim, he pulled his mobile phone from the secure pocket in which he kept it. There was a message from Tara – they had exchanged mobile phone numbers before she had flown to America. She had left it about half an hour ago.
‘Hi,’ her voice said. ‘We’ve just landed at Heathrow. Had a great trip. Rhino’s a good guy – I think you’ll like him. He’s a bit like you, I guess – small and muscular.’ There was a pause while Tara realized the implications of what she had said. ‘Not that I’ve been looking at you. Or him. Not in that way.’ She was getting more and more flustered now, and Gecko started grinning. ‘Anyway,’ she said, trying to regain her composure, ‘we’re getting a taxi back to Calum’s place once we’ve got our baggage sorted out. Apparently Calum wants us all to get together for a final briefing. So I guess I’ll see you there.’
Gecko slid his mobile phone back into his pocket and fastened the flap across it. He stood up and stretched, preparing himself for the run across the rooftops back to Calum’s apartment. He turned round to take a last look down into his flat – and felt a shiver go down his spine.
The two gangsters were gone.
Had they given up for the day, or . . . ?
The trapdoor in the centre of the roof burst upward. One of the shaven-headed men erupted from the space like a jack-in-the-box.
Calum suppressed a frustrated sigh. He didn’t seem to be getting through to Professor Livingstone.
‘I don’t think you understand,’ he said as patiently as he could. ‘The intention isn’t to go in with nets and cattle prods and anaesthetic darts. This isn’t like King Kong, where we bring the last survivor of an unknown race of creatures back to civilization and exhibit it in a carnival for entertainment. If we get even a scrap of hair I’ll be happy. Anything that we can get a DNA sample from.’
‘You’re missing the big picture,’ Gillian said, shaking her head. ‘If the Almasti exist, and that’s a big if, then bringing one back would be –’ she paused, searching for the right wo
rd – ‘a phenomenon. Newspapers from here to China and back would put two photographs on their front page and their home page – one of the Almast and one of the person who captured it. This might be the missing link between apes and humans – a living example of where we have descended from. We’re talking worldwide exposure!’
‘I’m not missing the big picture,’ Calum said testily. ‘I’m ignoring it. I don’t like the big picture. I don’t want to be on the front page or the home page of anything. I just want to bring back enough viable genetic material so that the Almasti’s entire genome can be sequenced. After that, I would rather they were left in peace.’
‘You’re being naive, Calum.’
‘Maybe I am,’ he said. He glanced at the professor. She had a frustrated scowl on her face. ‘Look, I understand where you’re coming from. You’re a businesswoman, and you have been for as long as I’ve known you. If your photograph is on every front page and home page, then the business opportunities flood in, don’t they? Everyone will know who you are.’
‘You think I’m treating this as an advertising opportunity?’ she asked with quiet intensity.
‘I think you’re treating it as a number of things, including an advertising opportunity, but you’re forgetting – this is my expedition. I’m the one setting it up and financing it. Whatever comes out of it gets used in the ways that I decide.’
Gillian just shook her head. ‘You’re very like your father, you know?’
‘Thank you,’ he said, feeling the sad tug of memories.
‘I didn’t mean it as a compliment. He was an idealist, and so are you. He could never see the complexity of problems, or the implications of the various answers. To him, and to your mother, the world was a very simple place, but it isn’t, Calum. It really isn’t.’
‘My world is that simple, and my world exists for about as far as I can reach. Which, in this instance, is all the way to Georgia.’
She put her hands up defensively. ‘OK. All right. Just promise me that you’ll think about what I’ve said.’
He recognized her words as a typical negotiating ploy to get out of a dead-end situation, and he responded in a like manner. ‘Yes, I promise I’ll think about it,’ he said with as much conviction as he could force into his voice.
‘Right,’ Professor Livingstone said, clapping her hands together, ‘on to the next point – someone in your party needs to be armed.’
Calum felt his skin crawl at the very thought of weapons. He didn’t like violence. He didn’t even like thinking about the possibility of violence.
Gillian noticed his reluctance. She raised a hand to forestall his response. ‘Don’t worry – I’m thinking of something less lethal than it sounds.’ She reached down to a case that she’d brought in with her, and which was resting by her feet. ‘This is a new thing that’s been developed by one of the laboratories I do consulting work for. They’ve given me one of the first off the production line.’ She put the case on the counter and flipped the catches. Calum watched edgily as she opened it and took out something that looked like a lot of black metal tubes strapped together, with a shoulder stock at one end, a handle and trigger in the middle and a wide barrel at the other end.
‘What the hell is that?’ he asked. ‘Some kind of multi-barrelled shotgun? If the Almasti are alive, then I want them to stay that way.’
‘It’s a non-lethal weapon.’ She patted the middle of the gun where all the tubes seemed to be part of a rotating mechanism. ‘It’s a rapid-fire taser shotgun. There’s no gunpowder inside – it works on compressed air. The munitions it fires are mainly lithium-ion batteries, with two sharp prongs at the far end. When they hit something, the prongs touch the skin and complete a circuit, and the battery delivers a charge of several thousand volts. It’s not enough to kill anyone or anything – except maybe a mouse – but it’ll knock a man or a wolf or a bear out for quite a while. It’s yours for as long as you need it. It’s certified flight safe, as long as it’s in the cargo hold with the appropriate documentation – which is already in the case.’
‘No,’ he said forcefully, pushing it back. ‘No, no, no, no, no. You’re trying to drag this expedition in a direction in which it will not go – not for as long as I have a say. No weapons, no exploitation, no advertising opportunities, nothing! Is that clear?’
She shook her head sadly. ‘It’s clear, but it’s shortsighted and it’s wrong. Look, I’ll leave the taser shotgun here. Think about it.’
Another negotiating tactic. ‘OK, I’ll think about it,’ he said softly. ‘But the answer will still be “no”.’
‘Family quarrel?’ a voice asked from the doorway. ‘Should I back away and leave you to it?’
‘Come in, Natalie,’ Gillian said, waving a hand, ‘and discover the reason why you never had a brother.’
‘Eeuw!’ Natalie exclaimed as she pushed the door open and entered the apartment. ‘I don’t even want to think about it.’
Calum watched as she walked across to the table. Realizing that he was watching, and realizing that Natalie had noticed that he was watching, he looked away. And felt himself flush with embarrassment.
The thug looked around the rooftop, caught sight of Gecko and started moving towards him. He obviously wasn’t a free-runner – he was too bulky – but he moved like a freight train, big and unstoppable.
The second gangster emerged from the trapdoor more carefully, but then he was carrying a gun.
Gecko knew immediately that they had seen him from the window, pretended not to and had set out to ambush him unawares. He wasn’t sure if they were out to catch him and make their boss’s offer more forcefully, or whether they had been sent to punish him for not saying yes by breaking his arms and legs, but frankly he wasn’t going to hang around to find out.
His best route off the roof was straight ahead, but that would mean going through the two gangsters. That was out of the question. There was only one alternative.
Gecko jumped up on to the waist-high rim that bordered the roof area and started to run. Within less than a second, he was sprinting at full speed. The far edge of the building seemed to rush towards him. He was pretty sure he knew what lay beyond it, but it had been a long while since he had done that particular jump and he was a little fuzzy about the details. He seemed to remember that it was a tricky one, with a high element of risk. Not the kind of run he would normally choose. The problem was, he had no time for a calm, considered reconnaissance.
He reached the end of the small wall and jumped blindly into space, arms extended for balance, legs bent slightly to absorb the impact of landing – assuming he didn’t plummet all the way to the ground.
He quickly evaluated the situation as he fell. It wasn’t good. The roof ahead of him was further than was comfortable – or even achievable without having the wind at his back. Worse, it was a pitched roof, built as a triangle. It would have been bad enough if he’d been falling towards one of the pitched sides, but he was end-on to the building. If he didn’t land exactly on the peak where the two sides met, then he would hit either the left or the right side. Unable to get a purchase on the slope, his feet would slip and he would fall, rolling down the roof until he hit the guttering and fell off.
Just to make it worse, the end of the roof peak had a decoration on it, a little curlicue that probably looked really quaint from the street but which at his level looked more like a major obstacle to landing. He had to hope that his momentum carried him over the decoration and on to the ten-centimetre-wide peak.
This was not looking like a successful jump.
All of these thoughts flashed through his mind in the time it took him to cover about five metres horizontally and drop two metres vertically. The roof of the building he was aiming for rushed towards him, growing larger and larger in his field of vision. He wasn’t going to make it! He was dropping too fast! He was heading straight for the triangular wall between the sloping roofs!
The little plaster curlicue seemed to rise past h
is eyes as he dropped. Desperately he reached out for it, hands scrabbling for a grip. His fingers closed over it just as he slammed into the wall. The impact drove the breath from his body and sent a pulse of pain through every bone and every muscle he had. Instead of dropping like a stone he just hung there, hands clamped on a fragile plaster decoration that had endured God knows how many years of rain, snow and baking sun.
He brought his legs up and braced himself against the wall. A quick glance over his shoulder showed him that the two thugs hadn’t yet made it to their side of the chasm. That was a relief – they were probably in a mood to use that gun by now.
He heaved himself up with his arms, while at the same time trying to walk up the wall with his feet.
His arms were burning as they took his entire weight. He could feel them trembling with the stress he was putting on them. His fingers felt as if their joints were coming apart, the skin and tissue stretching like elastic.
He hauled as hard as he could, edging his feet higher, small step after small step. He couldn’t let it all end here.
The plaster decoration was level with his eyes. He lunged upward and wrapped his right arm round it. That gave him enough purchase to pull himself inelegantly up, scrabbling with his feet to maintain the momentum. Within moments he was folded over the roof: legs hanging on one side, torso and arms and head on the other.
He felt like he was going to be sick.
Glancing over at where he had come from, he saw the two thugs staring at him. One of them raised his gun. The other slapped it down with a curse. Maybe they didn’t want to draw attention to themselves. They were both looking hard at the roof that Gecko was folded across, trying to work out if there was a way across there for them, or maybe trying to work out where to go next to intercept him.
He wanted to stay there and catch his breath, but he didn’t have the luxury of time. He climbed to his feet and painfully started to walk along the ridge where the two slanted roofs met, balancing like a circus wire-walker.
