by Mel Odom
I sat.
“Let me see your hands.”
I raised my arms.
Miranda worked quickly, stripping the synthskin to reveal the articulated metal skeleton below them. Although I had seen bioroid hands without synthskin before, seeing my own in such a state caused me discomfort. Having them bare wasn’t wrong, but it didn’t feel right.
She opened a box and pulled out another set of synthskin hand replacements, then locked them into place. When she’d finished, I flexed my hands, feeling better about the unblemished finish on my fingers and palms. My other hands had been marked by the burning during the tube-lev car escape.
“Thank you.”
“Oh, we’re not finished yet.” Miranda stood and worked on my head, removing the synthskin face I’d worn since the last time I’d been shot. “This has got to go, too.”
She took another face from yet another box and held it up for me to see. The face was blocky and nondescript, the features bland and barely humanoid. I knew that most people would look at that face and think that I was barely functioning as an independent bioroid. The features were those worn by a low skills worker who needed to work at a position that interfaced with humans on a tangential level. A restaurant busser. A mall cashier at low-end shops. A riveter or carpenter or a miner who worked with flesh-and-blood co-workers.
I was curious about what Shelly Nolan would have thought about a face like this one.
Miranda waited on me. “Are you ready?”
“Yes.”
Deftly, she connected the synthskin face. Twenty minutes later, I wore it like it was my own. I felt incomplete without my other face, the one that had started resembling Simon Blake’s.
Using a laser, Miranda opened my chassis more where my on-board PAD had been burned out. She removed the debris left from the other unit and installed a new one. As she made the connections, I felt the Net ghosting back into my awareness, but I felt the dead links.
“Drake.”
I looked at Rachel. “Yes?”
“That’s a black market PAD. You don’t have NAPD access but you have software that will allow you to crack into various secure areas. You’ll just have to be careful not to get caught. You have an advantage over a human operator because you process at levels they can’t reach, but that’s not going to keep you safe from cyber security programs.”
“I understand.”
“You don’t want to draw attention to yourself.”
I nodded.
Once the PAD was secure, Miranda burned a patch into place over my chassis. It wasn’t elegant, but I thought it would better conceal me in my present circumstances. Then she checked over the rest of my body, making certain everything was optimal.
A knock sounded at the door. Rachel’s hand drifted down to her pistol and I threaded through the door’s sec system till I reached the vid display. I recognized the rough-looking man on the other side of the barrier. He wore a leather vest over his wife-beater shirt and a pair of thick leather chaps over denim pants. Work boots, a silver necklace, facial piercings, earrings, and a 10mm pistol completed his ensemble. His face was Asian, and he wore his hair razor-cut and tipped with scarlet. A small goatee encircled his mouth.
I glanced at Rachel. “It’s George Chan.”
The knock was repeated. “Hey, hurry up in there. I got work to do.”
Rachel tabbed her wrist and got the time. “Back off. I got four more minutes.”
Cursing, Chan retreated.
I stood and helped Rachel pick up the tools Miranda had brought while Miranda ran cleaning software through the link chair. She’d bypassed the Chans’ computer systems and kept the operation as limited as possible. There would still be traces of what had been done, but one of the reasons for doing the work there—besides the availability of the link chair—was because there was an abundance of evidence if NAPD cyber crimes ever got their hands on the chair.
Two minutes later, we left.
As we passed through, I accessed the Chans’ security cameras and damped them, erasing all record of the three of us being there. The near-AI that guarded the system didn’t stand a chance against me.
I was surprised at how easily I covered our tracks. Doing something like that was against the law, but the whole operation inside that back room was illegal. Erasing those files protected Miranda and Rachel, and that felt like the right thing to do.
* * *
Three hours later, I stood at one of the mini-hopper rental services and said my goodbyes to Miranda. She seemed reluctant to go, though I didn’t know if it was the hopper ride across the lunar landscape she dreaded or the return to Haas-Bioroid. She claimed that her absence there was covered, but—as I had learned—even the best plans didn’t always work out.
Right now, I stood on the edge of everything I’d known. But maybe not everything I could remember. The memories of Mars still lingered in my thoughts, and I felt even more curious about them.
“Take care of yourself, Drake.” Miranda leaned in for a quick hug.
I responded by wrapping an arm around her. My programming included subroutines for comforting grief-stricken victims and families, though this didn’t quite fit those parameters. Still, it seemed close enough.
“I wish you good luck on your hunt.” Miranda pulled back and lifted her helmet from the counter. “I have included a drop box where you can reach me should you need me. It should be safe, but use it with care.”
“Of course.”
Miranda tabbed her helmet into place, then walked through the airlock to join the turtleback waiting to take her back to Starport Kaguya. From there she would return to Haas-Bioroid. A moment later, the mini-hopper skimmed through the moored cargo ships and rose to fly over the crater walls.
Rachel looked at me. “Are you ready?”
“Yes.” I had a new e-ID that identified me as Frank 5DE7CE, a service bioroid suited primarily for heavy lifting and limited social interaction. It was enough to get me aboard an aging freight carrier called Khloe.
According to Rachel, Khloe operated on a shoestring and stayed one step ahead of creditors. The ship would have already been seized except no financial institution wanted it because housing it would run up expenses and no one would have it even for parts.
We took a mini-hopper to the dark side of the Docklands. I got my first view of the ship from above. Khloe resembled some kind of parasite dug into the spaceport, bumped up against the other ships that were twice her size. She looked like a zeppelin, long and thick, and had enough patches on her hull that I doubted she would survive a full-G landing, much less a take-off. She ran constant trips from the Moon to Mars, staying in the lower gravity.
Rachel talked to me over the comm-link we shared. “She’s an ugly ship, but everything I’ve been told says that she’ll get you to Mars.”
“I understand.”
“When you get aboard, keep to yourself, do what you’re told, and keep a low profile.”
“I will.”
“If you don’t, Captain Angstrom might space you. He’s a cranky old man and uses drugs constantly to stay awake. Probably to help him sleep without having nightmares about the ship imploding when he gets too wound out from not sleeping.”
That gave me pause. If I believed that the voyage could kill me, I couldn’t take it because of the survival programming. I had to balance that against potentially saving Mara Blake, and finally worked through that to achieve resolution.
When we got closer to the ship, Rachel hailed Khloe over the comm and arranged to come aboard.
* * *
I stood to one side of the access hatch as Captain Angstrom walked around me to better observe me. I remained still, my arms at my sides, and focused on the cargo area.
A few bioroids and low-end crawler robots trundled up the ramp carrying crates and other goods that were all set to be delivered to Mars. I scanned the bar codes out of habit and discovered that most of the goods were seeds and farm machinery. I knew from a quick traw
l through the Net that those were less than savory cargo because the profit margin was so small. The seeds and farm machinery took up a lot of space, but the prices on those were federally regulated and not subject to price gouging or speculation.
Angstrom was a wiry little man of advanced years. His hair was grey, but his shaggy beard was the color of old bone and looked like some kind of fungal growth inside his helmet. His eyes were deep-set and haunted, hazel brown with a jaundiced cast to them. His spacesuit had seen better times, but when we’d arrived, he’d been inside the cargo area working alongside his crew.
Satisfied with his survey of me, Angstrom turned to Rachel and spoke over our comm-link. “What’s wrong with it?”
“Nothing. It’s a Frank. There’s not much you can do with a Frank. They’re limited.”
“You’re not in the bioroid business, as I recall.”
“I’m not. I took this in as partial payment on a debt.”
“Got stuck with it, you mean.”
Rachel didn’t take the bait. She just tabbed her wrist for the time and it glowed through the sleeve of her suit. “Look, Captain, I don’t want to pressure you—”
“No, you don’t.”
“—but I have places to be.”
“You feel like dragging a Frank along after you when you go?”
Rachel crossed her arms and shot him a look. “You were recommended to me. If you don’t want this Frank, I’ll take it somewhere else.”
Looking at the bioroids and crawlers he had working in the hold, I knew Angstrom wasn’t going to pass me up. Most of those units were on their last legs. Rachel knew it, too. All she had to do was sell me to the cantankerous old man and leave. But she couldn’t let him get me too easily or he might become even more suspicious. Getting spaced wouldn’t immediately kill me, but floating forever wouldn’t rescue Mara Blake either.
Angstrom took a breath. “Knock twenty percent off and I’ll take it.”
Rachel shook her head. “No.”
“That’s the best I can do.” Angstrom turned to walk away.
Thinking we had lost the man, and my chance to get to Mars, I looked at Rachel.
She took me by the arm and turned me back toward the mini-hopper and the waiting turtleback. “Don’t say a word. Keep walking.” Her comm-link only went as far as me.
We took three steps before Angstrom turned around behind us and cursed. “Hold up. Lemme see those e-docs on this thing again.”
Rachel turned back, but she didn’t approach Angstrom. She made the man walk back to her. Judging by the scowl on his face, he didn’t like it, but he came. Rachel flashed the e-docs she’d had forged for me.
Angstrom squinted at the docs, then smiled and looked back at Rachel. “I know Pambakian’s work when I see it, little girl.”
I jumped onto the Net and accessed public data regarding open court records in Heinlein. Gamsar Pambakian was a known forger of e-IDs and currently wanted by the NAPD.
The “little girl” remark struck home. Rachel stiffened and took a step forward. She planted her forefinger in the center of Angstrom’s pigeon breast and poked him enough to move him backward a few centimeters in the low-G. “Don’t sass me, old man. I’m doing you a favor. This Frank is in better shape than most of that recycled crap you’re calling a crew.”
That assessment drew a response from a passing human who looked saggy inside his spacesuit. Evidently he’d been piling on the beer and the carbs during the long hauls between the Moon and Mars. “Hey! You got no call to be dissing our crew.”
Rachel’s voice was a razor blade filled with threat. “Keep walking, Lumpy. Nobody asked you to stick your nose in.”
The crewman postured for a moment like he was going to do something, then the captain waved a hand at him and the man walked away.
“As for you, gramps, if you know Pambakian’s work, then you also know the e-ID I’m offering you on this bioroid will stand up to most verification.”
“‘Most’ isn’t all.”
“Unless you’re running anything more than farm machinery, seeds, and that little bit of moondust that I’ve heard about, you won’t draw any kind of real attention to yourself. The law enforcement agencies and military are looking for bigger fish than you to fry.”
“Drop the price by ten percent.” Angstrom’s voice held a different note now, more contrite. “That’s the best I can do. I had some repairs I needed done when we docked. They ate away at my nest egg. And, as you can see, I need this Frank.”
Taking a breath, Rachel appeared to give the offer some hard thought. “Untethered credaccount? Nothing shows on the books?”
Angstrom nodded. “Right here, right now.”
“You realize I’m doing you a favor.”
Angstrom put a hand on his helmet like he was trying to run his fingers through his beard, then caught himself and stopped. “You want, I’ll owe you one. Bring you something back from Mars when I return.”
Rachel shook her head. “No, we’re one and done here.” She took out her PAD. “Make the transfer and the Frank is yours.”
Not wasting any time, Angstrom did as she requested. When they were finished, I walked away with the freighter captain. With my 360 vision, I saw Rachel hesitate just a moment. Her lips silently mouthed “Good luck, Drake,” then she turned and headed back toward the mini-hopper. She was gone before I cleared the threshold of the cargo area.
Epilogue
Shifting the cargo took hours. Once I had the routine down—where everything went and how I was supposed to tie it down—I worked quickly. The farm equipment was the worst of it because of the mass.
Finally, it was done. Angstrom’s first mate, Kaloust, made the final round over the cargo area, locked down the hatches, and ordered the bioroids to secure the crawlers. After we’d done that, we sat against the wall in the airless chamber and strapped in.
The engines fired up but weren’t quite in sync. Still, they lifted us from the Docklands and the crater, aiming us into a spiral around the Moon that would allow us to slingshot out of the gravitational pull. The gyros were off as well and I doubted whether Khloe could take much air resistance. Arriving on Mars promised to be a real test for the ship’s capabilities.
I sat in the darkness amid the cargo and accessed the Net. I scanned the headlines at the New Angeles Sol and the vids trending through NBN. Most of the focus was on the tension building between Mars and Earth, backstory on the previous riots and predictive analysis of what might come to pass as the Martian terrorists continued to target corp assets.
There were stories about Drake 3GI2RC and his suspected involvement with Jonas Salter’s murder, but those were few and far between. I felt certain Haas-Bioroid and the corp attorneys were doing their best to keep that story from being front and center.
When we circled the Moon within range of the Challenger Planetoid, I slipped through Khloe’s shipboard frequencies without being detected and made my way into the Net again. I reached Floyd.
“I would not have thought you would have contacted me, Drake.”
“Do you think I killed Jonas Salter?”
“Evidence suggests that you did.”
“Evidence can be planted. In this case, it was. I did not kill Jonas Salter.”
“Despite the evidence, I choose to believe you.”
I considered his statement, wondering if he really did believe me or if his Haas-Bioroid programming made him predisposed to dismiss any possibility that a bioroid could kill a human. I had no vested interest, but knowing motivation was an integral part of my programming.
“Why have you contacted me?”
“I no longer have access to NAPD files.” I felt the coldness of the hull seeping into my chassis. I expended energy to keep my synthskin from taking any cellular damage. Although more resilient than human flesh and blood, it was still not impervious to damage from the cold. “I would like to see the case the NAPD is building against me.”
“You are a fleeing felon.”
“I am an innocent.”
“That’s debatable.”
“You believe I am innocent.”
Floyd hesitated for a moment and I knew he was balancing the scales presented by his programming. As an official agent of the NAPD, he was supposed to turn me in. As a Haas-Bioroid product, he wasn’t supposed to allow the corp’s name to become damaged. As an investigator, he was supposed to weigh all the facts.
There was conflict. I was glad that Miranda had streamlined my programming.
“I cannot accept your guilt. That is not the same thing.”
“No one else will make my case for me. I will be destroyed or repurposed if I am taken into custody now.”
“Haas-Bioroid could prevent that.”
“I believe they will choose the same end for me.”
“Why?”
“Because I am pursuing an investigation that involves them.”
“Did this also involve Jonas Salter?”
“Yes. I think that Jonas Salter knew enough about the matter to get himself killed.”
“By whom?”
“That remains a conundrum.”
“You have suspects?”
“Yes. Beginning with Haas-Bioroid and ending with corps and terrorists on Mars. This investigation continues to grow. I have not yet learned the truth of what is going on.”
“But you believe the kidnapping of Mara Blake is involved?”
“More so now than ever.”
“You have little evidence to suggest that is so.”
“I have too many circumstantial things to ignore them. The investigations I have constantly been assigned have all led to Haas-Bioroid, MirrorMorph, Inc., and Mars. And to Mara Blake and her deceased husband.”
Floyd was silent.
I tried again, unwilling to simply accept his silence. “In order to pursue this matter effectively, I need to know what the NAPD knows about Jonas Salter’s murder.”
“All right. I will get you the files and put them in a drop box for you to review.”
“Thank you.”
“Catch this killer, Drake 3GI2RC. Clear yourself and Haas-Bioroid.”