Anger Management

by Lawrence M Schoen

  Coop started to leave but Lilly stopped him. “If this works, I owe you.”

  He turned back and smiled, genuinely this time. He wasn't trying to convince her of anything now. “Lilly, my debts to the universe run pretty deep. You don’t owe me anything compared to what I owe back. Good luck, honey. I hope you and your siblings all make something of the chance.”

  Coop strode out of the bar. He had work to do and for the first time he could remember, it wasn’t an act.

  It felt pretty damn good.

  Chapter 14

  Al reversed his earlier route with alacrity, slapping repeatedly at the subway call button of his doubly secret entrance and leaping into the car the moment it arrived and opened its doors. The crime boss's subway would take as long as it would take and nothing he could do would change that.

  He was certain Doos would reach the Presidential suite of the Palais Titan well ahead of him. And whatever trick or skill set that Cooper had used to destroy one of the Box's avatars earlier, it probably wouldn't suffice to handle two of them. Moreover, the question was moot: Cooper wasn't at the hotel. According to his plan he should even now be distributing confounding DNA throughout the spaceport. It was a clever idea, but already doomed to failure. Once in possession of Potato and Dr. Acorns, Doos would be free to ignore any false positives. It might be curious, but as a race, the Box focused on efficiency and pragmatism. With the prize already won, Doos would not succumb to distractions.

  His comm trilled and he spent a few minutes responding to Cooper who had already lined up the decoys. For a moment he considered telling the human not to bother, that Doos had surely already abducted Dr. Acorns. But… if he truly believed there was no hope, why was he rushing back to the hotel? He finished with Cooper's question and disconnected, impatient to arrive.

  As he neared his destination he overrode the door control and had it open before the car had come to a stop. He hurried to the hidden door and beyond it along the route that took him to the entrance to the maintenance closet in the hotel's sub-basement. The handful of employees he passed on his way to the staff elevator again all wisely melted out of his way. He fumed as he chose the hotel's top floor and used a code to lock out anyone else who might have called the elevator at an intervening floor.

  Why did I put them on the top floor?

  He was running the instant the elevator opened, running down the hall, running through the still-damaged door of the suite, running until his eye caught the trail of bloody footprints along the floor that showed that someone, a human with smallish feet, had left under her own power, striding with a determined but otherwise normal gait. Or more exactly, not the gait of a struggling victim or the slow trudge of a defeated captive. Someone had escaped the pair of Box!

  Al frowned. Part of his success as a crime lord on Titan owed to his natural ability to notice and recall extraneous details. In this case, he found himself recalling the size of Dr. Acorns's shoes and comparing them to the bloody footprints. It was hardly definitive, but the prints looked too small to belong to the virologist. Which meant that whoever it was that had walked out was irrelevant.

  The rest of the room looked no different than he'd last seen it, complete with the remains of the Doos extension that Cooper had disabled. The bloody trail looked to originate in one of the adjacent bedrooms and he entered cautiously in case, despite all odds, one or both of the Box was still there.

  Well, they were and they weren't. The destroyed remains of two Doos extensions occupied the bedroom, but judging by the holes that had been blasted through one body and the melted lump of the other, there was no way either had survived. To be sure, Doos still existed, but it had lost another two bodies. Seventeen remained. Honestly, Al didn't understand why the Box had allocated twenty extensions to its mission when one would normally have been more than sufficient, or two, just to have back-up. And yet, that was proving not to be the case. Both Cooper and Dr. Acorns had been more than a match for the same Box that had wiped out most of Al's race and seized his planet.

  Except… if she'd defeated the pair of Box that had come for her — as was clearly the case — where was Dr. Acorns?

  He approached the remains of the less damaged Doos, allowing his fingers to touch mangled and melted weapon-limbs and trace the stumps of otherwise undamaged arms. He acknowledged a fact that he'd noticed before but hadn't properly processed: Doos's weapons were modular. Its limbs could be configured in a myriad ways with whatever armament it desired for a given task. Adding new limbs would have been easy. And removing them likewise as effortless, which explained the stumps.

  Someone took this Box's weapons.

  Al turned from the dead avatar, noting the hole in the wall leading into the bathroom. He poked his head in there, regarded the additional damage, and upon exiting noted the shattered mirror and blood on the farther wall. It was only then that he saw a small huddled form in a corner of the room. Warily, he stepped closer. Human. Female. Black hair. Clothing seemingly oversized. He recognized Dr. Acorn's lab coat, but the human was not Dr. Acorns, though a pile of the virologist's hair surrounded her head. Whoever she was, she was breathing. Al gingerly picked up the unconscious body and carried her back through the foyer and into a bedroom that Dr. Acorns had presumably been using as her lab. He laid her down on the examination table. Lightly tapping her face did not rouse her.

  He actually had a fair amount of experience with unconscious humans — an occupational necessity in his line of work — he had not come prepared with any of the more effective albeit invasive methods of inducing wakefulness, even assuming there were no other injuries.

  In that moment, Al recalled Cooper's second traveling companion, a teenage girl who had arrived on a stretcher and, as far as he knew, been comatose. Was this that girl? It made a certain sense, but then why was she wearing Dr. Acorns's clothing?

  That was the least of the mysteries he had to solve, far behind whose bloody footprints had left the suite, and most importantly what had become of Dr. Acorns and Potato?

  One thing at a time.

  Al stepped back into the foyer and picked up the phone, calling for the hotel operator.

  “This is Alhiz’khlo’tam. Yes, you heard me correctly. I am calling from the Presidential suite. I believe one of the room's residents has been attacked. Send the hotel's physician here immediately. Do it now.”

  There was nothing more he could do here. He had to leave, but couldn't until the doctor arrived. Frowning, with the phone still in his hand, he accessed an outside line and tapped in a quick sequence of digits. The line picked up after a single ring.

  “Doug? Yes, it's me. I need you to come to the Palais Titan. The Presidential suite. Bring a van. When you arrive recruit a handful of staff to aid you. This is a salvage operation. Three extensively damaged Box avatars. Remove them to warehouse #3 and begin a full autopsy and dis-assemblage of each. Alert me when you're through. There will likely be medical personnel here. Ignore them and discourage them from distracting you and your team. Yes, come now.”

  Al hung up the phone and returned to the other bedroom to stand by the unconscious girl. She appeared to be sleeping peacefully, had likely slept through the arrival of the pair of Doos avatars, slept through their destruction.

  Where were Dr. Acorns and Potato? Seventeen Box remained on Titan's spaceport determined to abduct them. Was Cooper's plan in play? Would it be effective? Two humans had done what a planet full of Clusterans had not, confronted and defeated Doos. It was inconceivable. It had happened. He gazed down at the girl as he tried to reconcile the impossible and waited for the hotel doctor to arrive.

  Chapter 15

  Back in the main corridors of the spaceport, Coop opened the pillow case of human and alien hair. He took a small pinch of Potato's blue and green fur and another of Jess's flame-red hair, dropping bits of them here and there as he walked. He continued this practice at every intersection and even tossed some into a passing robotic-wagon as he followed Dyrk’s directions
through the throngs of people.

  “This should drive the Box totally crazy. I like that. A lot.”

  «That’s the idea. But this is just the start. We need to up our game and I know just the place. Hang a left at the next intersection,» Dyrk instructed.

  Coop complied and found himself in a narrow alley between buildings.

  “Where are we going?”

  «Down. Through that door on the left.»

  “Got it.” Coop entered the door and descended the metal staircase he found inside. He went down at least three stories before the stairs ended and he was able to exit into another corridor. This one was tall. The walls rose to take up easily half the space he’d just covered when he came down the stairs. The chamber was packed from floor to ceiling with the ducts and pipes and other metal-work required to move air and water through the spaceport at industrial levels.

  «There are three main air-control facilities. They detoxify the air and distribute it to the entire spaceport. This was the nearest access point to our location and it's also the closest to the Box at the departure terminal. Stop here. I need to take over.»

  Coop sighed. “Okay.”

  Dyrk cracked his neck and stretched his arms after he assumed control of Coop’s body. Then looked around before looking up.

  «Just what I was looking for,» he said in satisfaction.

  Dyrk climbed, jumped, and swung his way up the industrial jungle-gym like a ninja doing parkour in his sleep.

  Within seconds he achieved a perch atop the ductwork summit next to a large vent set into the concrete wall. It only took a moment and a few twists before he had the vent’s cover removed and propped against the wall.

  Dyrk crawled inside and pulled the cover back in place.

  Well, that was easy.

  «That wasn’t the hard part. This is just a branch that will take us to the central facility. That place is pretty heavily guarded according to the data I read. But I think we can avoid most of the guards by coming in like this.»

  You think?

  «It isn’t like I have much experience with these things. In the movies, the hero always makes it through, or meets up with a plot complication to raise the stakes and make his inevitable victory even more satisfying. But I don't have a script of what's going to happen here,»

  I wish you’d stop reminding me of that after you take control of my body.

  Dyrk chuckled again and started to crawl along the pitch black confines of the duct.

  I can't see a thing. Can you tell where we're going?

  Dyrk had taken out the comm device that Al had given them and aimed the glow of its tiny screen forward. «Huh. I thought this would provide more illumination. But no problem, I have a rough idea of where we need to be. We'll be fine.»

  A moment later he banged head first into a metal wall.

  Miss a turn?

  Dyrk sighed, «Hold on, Ben, this may hurt.»

  Hurt? More than giving me a concussion? What are you doing?

  And suddenly Dyrk was gone, leaving Coop in control of his body, on hands and knees in the dark duct.

  “Dyrk?

  «It's easier for me to make adjustments to your body if I'm not running it.»

  “Adjustments? What kind of… Arrghhhh!”

  Coop clutched at his eyes. There had been a brief and intense sensation deep inside them, not quite a burning, more like what he imagined it would feel like if bees had somehow gotten inside his eye sockets and were attempting to sting their way back out. Then it was gone and only the memory of it lingered. He lowered his hand and found he could see. Not well, but now the light from the comm unit gave an adequate view of the ductwork all around, revealing that Dyrk hadn't reached a dead end, only a T-intersection. They had to turn left or right.

  “What did you do?”

  «Cat eyes.»

  “What?!

  «Well, not actual cat eyes, but the same idea. The part of your eyes that does the seeing, the retina, has two kinds of cells, right? Rods and cones. Cones see color, rods are better at detecting light. Human eyes have about four times as many rods as cones. But Cats have twenty-five times as many rods as cones. That's why they're so good at seeing in the dark, but not so much when it comes to color discrimination.»

  “But what did you do?

  «I converted a bunch of your cones to rods. Don't worry, I'll switch them back as soon as we get where we're going. Now, let's swap again.»

  Muttering about unsolicited mutations, Coop relaxed and mentally stepped back. A moment later, Dyrk had them crawling down the left-hand length of the duct.

  After several yards the wind inside picked up and the ambient noise increased dramatically.

  «We’re getting close.»

  Dyrk crawled a few more yards. He found himself at another intersection. To his right the duct widened before ending at a massive fan that was forcing air past him with consistent, solid force. To his left the duct continued on into darkness, but only a few feet ahead he saw a trapdoor in the floor. He turned left and stopped to more closely examine a gate leading down and out of the duct. Inset into the face of it was a handle. It appeared to be unlocked.

  It was also right where the schematics said it would be.

  Dyrk gently turned the handle and pulled slowly against it.

  A crack appeared and light entered the dim confines of the air-tunnel. He leaned down and pressed his eye against the opening.

  He couldn’t see much.

  There was a concrete floor some twenty feet below him and more metal pipes cut across his vision, obscuring what little his peek could show him.

  «Wish us luck.»

  What? Why? Wait!

  «Shh, I got this, Ben.»

  He opened the hatch all the way. After waiting a moment to see if anyone noticed, he lowered his head through it and looked around.

  Nobody screamed or shot at him. Dyrk viewed it as a good sign.

  The part of the room he could see had three things. First, it had a lot of big pipes. Second, it had a far wall, partially blocked from view, that sounded like it had a great big fan operating in it. And finally, it had a bored looking security guard who sat at a desk several feet away from Dyrk’s preferred landing zone.

  «Well, this will be interesting,» he whispered, tucking the pillowcase inside his shirt

  You’re going to jump down there and attack that guy, aren’t you?

  «No. I’m going to drop, not jump.»

  When did you become a grammar Nazi?

  Dyrk didn’t bother to respond. He was in the zone. And just like that, he lowered himself out of the trapdoor, extended his body to the full extent of his reach, and dropped.

  His feet hit the cement floor and Dyrk rolled to his right to absorb the impact, bounding to his feet like a cat, knees bent. He straightened to his full height and placed his hands on his hips in what he believed was a suitably dramatic fashion.

  Sadly, the security guard didn’t seem impressed. Surprised, but not impressed.

  What are you doing? Don’t stand there posing. Karate chop him already!

  Dyrk was a little surprised by Coop’s lack of appreciation for his dramatic entrance. But the guard had recovered and reached for a stun baton that sat atop the desk.

  That was a problem.

  «Fine, Coop. We’ll do it your way.»

  Dyrk made a blade of his right hand and lashed out with a blow to the man’s neck.

  The guard stumbled and fell face first onto the desk. But he hadn’t been knocked out. Bravely, he planted his hands and pushed against the desk to rise.

  «Not today, buddy. Go to sleep.»

  Dyrk reached down and grabbed the man’s neck. He applied the appropriate pressure to the proper nerve and counted to five. That was how long it took for the guard’s body go limp and slump across his desk.

  Dyrk wiped his hands off on his trousers and turned to survey the facility.

  He was greeted by the shocked expressions of a trio of newly ar
rived security guards.

  They had just walked in with cups of coffee grasped in their hands, and now gaped at the sight of Dyrk and their unconscious coworker.

  Three cups of coffee hit the floor.

  The guards drew their stun batons and charged as one.

  The confines of the room made it difficult to maneuver. The facility’s floor was crowded with pipes and vents running every which way. But Dyrk's ultimate goal was the fan on the far side of the room, so he chose the obvious route.

  Dyrk went up.

  He jumped into the air and grabbed onto a pipe. With one hand he pulled himself up off the floor. Then he curled his legs and used his coiled energy to launch himself higher. He was just able to grab a support beam with his finger-tips.

  A stun baton smacked the wall right where his feet had been a moment before.

  The sound of the electrical shock could be heard amidst the drowning din of the machinery.

  Whoa! That guy’s baton is a lot stronger than the other ones we’ve seen.

  «Coop, remember when I said I wanted to experience everything?»

  Do not get electrocuted.

  «I’ll do my best.»

  With that, Dyrk planted his feet against the wall and launched himself into the air again.

  En route, he flipped over and executed a perfect twist before landing behind one of the amazed guards.

  Dyrk grabbed the man’s arm – the one holding the stun baton – at the wrist. He yanked and twisted with savage force. The man yelped and the baton clattered to the floor. The action hero lashed out with a swift kick to the man’s shin to distract him, then reversed his hold and flipped the guard over with a single, fluid movement. He placed his hand on the back of his opponent’s head and pressed down. At the same time, Dyrk drove his leg up.

  Knee met nose.

  A crunching sound ensued and Dyrk dropped his opponent to the floor. The guard did not even try to get up. But the fight was far from over.

  A second guard rushed at Dyrk from his right. The man had his baton extended with the nasty end leading the way.