The boy hesitated, then followed him. “I’ve been taking lessons for two weeks now…” he began, “… and you say I’ve been learning fast…”
“You have.” Hosato wondered what this conversation was leading to.
“You meant it, didn’t you. You weren’t just saying that?”
“Seriously, James, you’re one of the best students I…” He broke off his comments as a thought occurred to him. “You haven’t gotten into a duel, have you?”
Hosato was suddenly towering over the boy.
“What. No. Nothing like that.”
“Good.” Hosato sighed, sinking back into his chair. “What is it, then?”
“I… I was wondering. Do I show enough promise for you to take me with you… as sort of an apprentice?”
Hosato was surprised by the sudden wave of affection he felt for the boy.
“James,” he said, shaking his head slowly, “being a duelist is a lousy way to earn a living. That’s why I’m trying to give it up. You wouldn’t—”
“I’m not talking about being a duelist or a fencing master.”
The sharpness in James’s tone brought Hosato’s head up with a snap. Their eyes met.
“That isn’t what you’re doing here, Hayama.” The boy’s voice was as steady as his gaze. “You know it, and I know it, so let’s not kid each other. Okay?”
Hosato’s protest died in his throat before that gaze. Instead, he studied the boy coolly for several moments.
“All right, James,” he said at last. “What is it exactly that you think I’m doing?”
“I… I don’t know,” the boy admitted, his certainty faltering at last. “Theft maybe industrial espionage maybe you’re just hiding from the authorities. Whatever it is, you’re no fencing coach.”
“Really?” Hosato forced a mocking smile.
“Oh, you can coach fencing, all right, but that’s not all you can do. Maybe you can fool my father, or Sasha, or even the computers, but remember, I’m the one you kicked your first day here. I have that as proof that you and Suzi there are more than you pretend to be.”
“If you’re so sure of yourself, James, why haven’t you reported your suspicions to someone?”
James made a face. “First of all, they’d probably just laugh it off as some kid whining about losing a fight. But more important, because I’m hoping you’ll take me with you when you finally leave this rock-pile.”
Hosato shook his head. “I don’t understand you, James. You want to take off with someone you don’t know, someone you think is a criminal. What kind of future is that. What are you expecting?”
“What kind of future do I have here?” the boy countered. “Whatever or whoever you are, you’re living outside the structure outside the accepted rules. That’s what I want, but I can’t do it by myself. I don’t have the money or the knowledge to try it on my own, and when you’re playing for keeps, you can’t afford to learn by trial and error. I need a teacher or a protector and so far, you’re the best candidate I’ve found.”
“What’s so bad about life here?” Hosato pressed. “Your father—”
“My father!” The boy sneered. “My father can’t comprehend that anyone might not want to work for the corporations, the same corporations that have shelved him. They’ve decided he’s too volatile and outspoken to be promoted, but too talented to let go. So they’ve set him up as a big man in a little slot, given him a staff to order around and a product family so stable even an idiot couldn’t mess it up, and then they forget him.”
“Maybe your father doesn’t see it that way.”
“Sure he does. He’s a lot of things, but he isn’t stupid. He knows he’s been shelved, but instead of walking out and trying it on his own, he’s fighting it. Security robots. A revolutionary new product. Did you know he’s been ordered to drop the project. And he’s still spending fourteen hours a day working on it. For what. So he can get slapped down again when he finally makes his proposal?”
“Why is everyone against the project?”
“They say it can’t be done. Robots can’t handle Security, and it’s a waste of company time pursuing it.”
“Surely he has something that makes him believe it’s possible.”
“All I know is he keeps saying…”
James suddenly broke off his oration in mid-sentence. His eyes searched Hosato’s with a new intensity.
“Is that it?” he asked.
“Is what what?”
“The security robots. Is that what you’re doing here. Is that why you’re pumping me for information?”
Hosato heaved a great sigh and stood up. “James, I think this has gone far enough. I don’t know what problems there are between you and your father, and I don’t want to know. What I do know is that it’s highly improbable you’ll convince me to be an accomplice if you want to run away from here.”
“But—”
Hosato halted the interruption with an upraised hand.
“I’ve listened to you, now it’s my turn. Yes. You’re right. I know karate. I usually don’t admit it because I’m sick of everybody assuming anyone with yellow skin is a karate expert. I used it on you that first day for the same reason Suzi gimmicked the tapes. I needed the job. I was hungry, and the only other way I could get money was killing people, and I’m sick of it.”
He fixed James with a hard stare.
“Now, if you want to report that to Sasha and get me tossed out of a job, go ahead. I don’t want it bad enough to put up with being called a thief and a liar.”
He started for the door, with Suzi floating at his heels. At the last moment, another thought occurred to him.
“Remember this conversation, James. Remember what I have to do, what I have to put up with just to eat. Then think long and hard before you make any serious moves toward an independent life.”
“But what if one of the units breaks down?”
Hosato interjected the question casually as he ordered another round of drinks through the keyboard mounted on the table. At this time of day the bar was empty and they could talk uninterrupted.
“Not much chance of that.” His companion grimaced. “And even if it did, nothing much would happen.”
There was a soft warning gong, and the square in the center of the table sank slowly from sight. A few moments later, it sighed back into position, the empty glasses gone and fresh drinks standing in their place.
“Nothing much?” Hosato prompted. “With no one monitoring the manufacturing area, I should think it would have major problems, if not a permanent work stoppage.”
The little bearded maintenance man shook his head slightly, but not enough to interrupt his drinking.
“That’s what I’m telling you, Hayama,” he said, putting down his glass at last. “The new system’s modularized with parallel units and flow monitors. If anything goes wrong, anything at all, the damn machines pull the entire unit and slap another one in place. Down time would only be about fifteen minutes thirty at the max.”
Hosato shook his head, setting his glass down without drinking.
“I don’t know, Rick. It still sounds to me like you could get yourself in a lot of trouble. You’ve got a Mexican standoff between Maintenance and Security over who’s responsible for watching the manufacturing area. If anything goes wrong, someone’s going to get blamed, and from where I sit, that’ll be Maintenance.”
“Don’t worry about it,” his friend insisted. “Nothing major can go wrong, not the way it’s set up now. At best, a mechanical failure would be a nuisance. We’re just hoping there’ll be enough nuisances to prove our point.”
“How can you be that sure. I mean, surely there’s some point of vulnerability that could send things into a tailspin.”
“Let me tell you, Hayama. I’ve been working here for twelve years. I’ve seen almost everything imaginable go wrong at one time or another—the plumbing, the machines, the life-support systems everything. But I haven’t seen anything yet break d
own that couldn’t be fixed or replaced in minimal time, and that was before the modular system. I remember one time—”
A high beeping interrupted his oration. With a sigh he thumbed a button on the side of his belt pager and stood up.
“No rest for the wicked, I guess,” he grumbled, tossing down the last of his drink. Then he reached forward and punched the keyboard with practiced ease. “I’ll get this tab. Have one more on me, okay. I’ve got to run.”
Hosato smiled and waved as the maintenance man departed. As soon as he was out of sight, however, the smile dropped from his face like a mask.
The table bonged again as his fresh drink rose into view, but he didn’t even look at it. Instead, he stared intently at the far wall as he tried to organize his thoughts.
Well, Suzi, he thought, there’s good news and bad news. The good news is that no one’s watching the manufacturing areas. The bad news is that, according to the maintenance crew, the production lines can’t be gimmicked.
That was their opinion. Hosato would have to be convinced. There was a big difference between coin- cidental machine failure and deliberate sabotage.
Unfortunately, that also meant he was going to have to scout it himself. He had hoped that wouldn’t be necessary. That’s why he had sought out the talkative little mechanic, sprawled in his favorite bar. The right words would have saved him a lot of trouble. “If the Z units go, we’re all out of work. If you look sideways at the W runners, they stop dead… I keep telling them there’s no backup for the four-wheels, but no one listens” Any phrase like that would have given him a target. Instead, he was going to have to do his own dirty work.
Well, he hadn’t really expected the answer to fall into his lap. He had hoped, but he hadn’t really counted on it. That’s why he was wearing his Ninja suit.
He stood up and reached for his employee card, then remembered Handel had already paid for the drinks. Rick was a nice guy. It was a shame he was going to have to put him out of work, along with the rest of Mc. Crae Enterprises.
Hosato paused for a moment after emerging from the bar’s dimness to let his eyes adjust to the light. One of Sasha’s guards was walking past and swept him with an impersonal gaze. Hosato smiled and nodded a greeting, which was ignored.
He wasn’t worried about detection, yet. At the moment, his Ninja suit looked like an ordinary turtleneck jumpsuit with wide turnback cuffs. This was no accident. Part of invisibility was being able to blend with the general populace before and after the job, and the suit was designed to enable him to do precisely that.
Setting his legs for a purposeful stride, he left the mall and living quarters and headed into the tunnels leading to the other buildings of the complex. There were occasional security guards about, but none paid him particular attention.
The boldness of a daytime scouting mission had its advantages. If seen, he would be assumed to be going about normal business. At night, the only ones moving about would be him and the guards, which would immediately arouse suspicions.
As he navigated the tunnels, he debated trying for one of the buildings housing a product family other than Turner’s. It would be better if he practiced his trade in another area to avoid throwing immediate suspicion on himself as a member of Turner’s staff. As quickly as the thought occurred to him, he rejected it. Before he could make his penetration, he first had to traverse the corridors. If he were seen in a building other than where the guards were used to seeing him, the balloon would go up and he’d have a great deal of difficulty explaining his presence. No, it would have to be Turner’s building.
That decision made, he turned up the flight of stairs leading to his chosen target. When he reached the second landing, instead of continuing up to the office levels, he paused in front of a small metal door in the wall marked “Maintenance Access.”
He shot a quick glance up and down the stairs, but for the moment he was alone. Actually, even if he were observed at this point, he was relatively safe. This was a scouting mission only, and as such he had no incriminating equipment or explosives on his person that would betray his true intent if seen or searched.
Working quickly, but with careful precision, he pulled out the winding stem of his wristwatch and swept it over the door and frame. The second hand, now still, showed no new movement.
Apparently the door was what it seemed, a plain metal door with no lock. There were no indications of electric currents to betray a hidden alarm system.
Hosato stared at the door for a moment. The big question was, what was on the other side of the door. A guard. A camera. It was ludicrous to believe an outfit as security-conscious as Mc. Crae would leave this vital passage vulnerable. Well, there was only one way to find out. Fixing an expression of mild curiosity on his face, he opened the door and looked inside.
A low, dimly lit corridor stretched away before him for some thirty feet before terminating in an abrupt right turn. Curious.
He stretched his arm in and swept the floor, walls, and ceiling immediately inside the door with his wrist-watch. Nothing.
Gritting his teeth, he stepped inside and let the door shut behind him. Nothing happened.
He waited impatiently for his eyes to adjust to the gloom. It was here somewhere. He could feel it instinctively. Somewhere nearby was an alarm waiting to be triggered. The question was, could he find and identify it before it alerted the guards to his presence?
Cautiously he edged forward. He studied the walls, ceiling, and floor for telltale openings or holes, while at the same time he swept the same surfaces with his wristwatch. It was here somewhere.
Ten feet down the corridor, he found it. Unconsciously he nodded to himself with professional admiration and satisfaction. Very neat.
The second hand on his watch jumped, indicating the presence of electrical currents under the 'floor. Probably pressure plates set to trigger an alarm if anyone walked across that portion of the corridor. Short of tearing up the floor, there was no way of deactivating the trap or telling how far down the corridor it extended, so he probably couldn’t jump over it. It was a very effective system, which would catch the average intruder before he detected it, and stop him cold. Fortunately, Hosato didn’t fit into that category.
He scanned the walls with his watch. As he suspected, they were free of alarms.
He sighed inwardly. Well, this was it. Beyond this point he could no longer claim to be lost or curious if caught. There was no way in which someone could casually or accidentally bypass this trap. Penetration beyond this point could only be calculated and deliberate.
Squatting down, he pressed the bottoms of his pants legs against the sides of his boots, taking care to be sure the proper electrical contacts were made. Standing again, he unrolled the turtleneck. It was longer than it appeared, coming up over his head and sealing with the same type of fitting that attached his pants to his boots, leaving him peering out two narrow eye slits in the resulting hood. Finally he folded the wide sleeve cuffs down over his hands and sealed them. As the final connection was made, sealing him in completely, the Ninja suit activated itself. He was ready.
Stepping to the wall, he pressed his palms against it, then one knee. Then he picked up his other leg, and, suspended in midair, pressed the knee against the wall.
He hesitated for a moment, then pulled one hand free and pressed it against the wall a foot farther down the corridor; then he pulled his other hand free and repeated the process.
This feature was one of the minor advantages a Ninja suit gave him—wall-walking. In the palms and knees of the suit were wafer-thin suction units that were activated when pressure was applied. They were not very strong, but powerful enough that if he maintained three-point contact with a surface, they would hold—provided he did not shift his weight too suddenly.
Though he could not see his watch, he had similar units built into the suit, which he used periodically to check the floor as he made his way along the wall. After fifteen feet, he failed to get the warning tingle
from his sensors and knew it was safe to use the floor again.
He was sweating profusely as he eased himself back down to a standing position. The ventilation in a Ninja suit was not good, and wall-walking required considerable exertion. He considered turning off the suit, but decided against it. From this point on, he was committed, and the suit was his best protection against detection.
Trusting his sensors to warn him of any additional alarms, he stepped boldly forward and turned the corner.
There, confronting him, was the unblinking eye of a security camera.
Cursing his carelessness, he lowered his head to hide the eye slits and hurried past the camera.
Very, very neat!
Anyone successfully bypassing the floor trap would be so swollen with self-confidence he would blunder right into the backup system—as he just had.
Invisibility had fringe benefits. Not only was it an invaluable aid for infiltration, it also hid embarrassing mistakes, like the one he had just made. The fact he had escaped detection had nothing to do with his skill and training. This time, the credit belonged to the Ninja suit.
Hosato breathed a silent prayer of thanks for this new addition to a Ninja’s arsenal of weapons and equipment. His ancestors in Japan had worn baggy suits of black, white, and charcoal gray when undertaking a mission. The black or gray would blend with the shadows, and the white would vanish against snow, while the baggy fit would break up the telltale silhouette of the Ninja.
As technology progressed, so had the Ninja’s gear. The current apex of that evolution was suits such as the one Hosato was wearing. While not actually rendering him invisible, it was certainly the ultimate in camouflaging.
The cloth, which appeared at first glance to be a brightly colored velvet, actually was covered with millions of light relays, each paired with a twin on the exact opposite side of the suit. When activated, each relay would pick up whatever light reached it and display it on the opposite side of the suit. That is, whatever was behind him would be displayed on the front of his suit, and whatever was in front of him would be displayed on the back.
The suit was effective to the point that he could pass in front of a lamp without casting a shadow. He could still be detected by the human eye if he moved, but if he remained motionless, a casual gaze would sweep right past him. Fortunately, security cameras were easy to fool. The most someone monitoring a camera would see if he walked past would be a slight rippling of the picture, which would be disregarded as an electronic disturbance in the equipment.
Mirror Friend, Mirror Foe Page 6
