by Ed Naha
Leon dove across a conveyor belt filled with bottles of coke and dragged Joe through a fire door to safety. Two lab workers, standing next to each other, were hit by a single slug. They fell, mortally wounded, onto a pile of white powder.
An alarm bell clanged to life. Sal’s henchmen began to scatter. Robo stood his ground. He flipped his vision into Targeting Mode. The printout appeared in his brain, TARGETS: 10, 9, 8 . . . 2 SHOTS REMAINING . . . [RELOAD]. He fired the remaining two bullets, TARGETS 7, 6 . . . NO SHOTS REMAINING.
Robo decided that it was time to enter the factory in earnest. He marched into the maelstrom of sizzling lead and cocaine dust. Sal attempted to run by him. Robo extended a mighty left hand and caught the drug kingpin by the neck. Reaching back like an Olympian athlete, Robo hurled the screaming man, javelin style. Sal sailed, headfirst, into four of his firing henchmen.
Robo calmly ejected the spent clip from his gun and reloaded.
The remaining lab workers hunkered down behind a counter filled with bottles of coke. They opened fire, once more, on Robo.
Robo returned to Combat Mode. 7 SHOTS REMAINING. He calmly picked off two of the lab workers. He then noticed plumes of cocaine exploding around his feet. He directed his gaze upward. Two guards on the catwalk were firing their shotguns at him. Robo stared at the men high above him and tilted his head. Vectors appeared before them in Robo’s vision, suggesting the best possible angles of fire.
Robo fired once, spun around and fired a second time. A guard fell to his death, landing two feet before Robo, a bright red splotch on his chest. The second guard, bleeding from the eye, began to tumble down off the catwalk. His foot, however, slammed into a loose plank, wedging itself tightly. The guard, dying slowly, found himself dangling by one foot high above the factory.
Robo watched him spin. He sensed a movement two feet away. He spun, training his A-9 on the source of the movement: Clarence Boddicker. Boddicker smiled and, remarkably quickly for a human, pulled a grenade out of his flak jacket and yanked out the pin.
Robo kept his gun pointed at Clarence’s midsection. Clarence grinned, feeling he had the upper hand. “Cool it, Tinkertoy, or I turn this room into a meat locker.”
Robo stared at Boddicker. Clarence saw that there was no fear in the officer’s eyes. For a split second, Boddicker felt that he was gazing at the meanest cop that ever lived. He gaped at Robo and, then, at the muzzle of the A-9. Robo clenched his teeth and stepped closer.
Clarence attempted a sneer. “I mean it, man. Back off.”
Robo smiled slightly. In one, smooth action, he swung his free hand up, caught Clarence by the scrotum and lifted him high into the air. Robo’s hand continued its arc before letting go. Clarence soared wildly into the air, letting the hand grenade tumble loose. Boddicker crashed through a painted floor-to-ceiling supermarket window, sending countless shards of glass spinning in space.
Another window blew in when the wild grenade landed and went off outside the rock lab.
Robo twirled his gun, T. J. Lazer-style, and slipped it back into his holster. He marched across what remained of the rock house and crunched through the remains of the fractured window. He found Clarence, bleeding but not badly injured, lying in a garbage heap outside.
Clarence stared at Robo. “Let me save us both a lot of time, Tin Man. Put me in jail and I’ll be out in minutes. I’m in business with the guys at Omni . . . hey!”
Robo, not really wanting a prolonged conversation, lifted Clarence high in the air and aimed him at a window that was still intact. He calmly hurled the babbling killer through a second towering pane of glass.
Clarence tumbled back into the rock house, landing between two tattered bodies that once had been part of Sal’s ad-hoc science squad. Clarence stared at the ceiling. A steady drip, drip, dripping of blood drooled across his forehead. Above him, the dead guard still swung gracefully by one foot.
Robo appeared above Clarence. He leaned over him and whispered, “Clarence Boddicker. You’re under arrest.”
He snapped handcuffs on the man’s bleeding hands. “You have the right to remain silent. You have the right to an attorney.”
Clarence laughed in the big goof’s face. “Listen, chromedome. I know the guy you work for. We’re buddies. I could make life easy for you. Save you the embarrassment.”
Clarence screamed as Robo yanked him off the floor and hoisted him to his feet by his handcuffs. “Anything you say can and will be held against you in a court of law.”
Robo glared at the killer. He squinted his eyes, locking into Record Mode. Clarence stared wide-eyed at the Titan. “Come on, man. I’m trying to do you a favor. I work for Dick Jones. The big poobah at OCP? You can call him. I have his card. Wise up, trashcan. Jones is the number two guy at OmniCon.”
Robo seemed to look through the man. Over Clarence’s face appeared the computer graphic: VOICE/STRESS ANALYSIS: 93% TRUTH PROBABILITY.
Robo remained silent as he dragged Boddicker out of the lab and toward the awaiting TurboCruiser. His brain was working overtime. None of this was making sense . . . yet.
Clarence was yelling, all traces of composure gone, as Robo tossed him into the Cruiser. “Don’t you get it, asshole? OmniCon runs the cops. You’re a cop.”
Robo sat behind the wheel. “Yeah. I’m a cop. A good cop.”
He gunned the gas and sent the TurboCruiser hurtling forward. “Damn,” Clarence muttered. “You just opened one fucking el grande can of worms, my metal man.”
Robo nodded. That was possible. But if he had, he’d find a way to slam that lid shut again.
[ 21 ]
Sergeant Reed sat at his desk and glared at Starkweather and Ramirez. “You’re out of your minds.”
Lewis sat on a desk behind the two protesting cops and watched it go down. Tempers were hot. Nerves were on edge. Things weren’t too peachy in the Old Detroit station house.
“I don’t like it any more than you do, sarge,” Starkweather said. “But listen . . .”
Reed slammed his hand on his desk. “You listen to me, asshole. You’re talking about shutting down a major metropolitan police force. Without cops, this city will tear itself apart!”
Ramirez spoke. His voice was calm, even, and firm. “I’m the shop steward, sarge. I gotta tell you. The union thinks you should know that there was a strike vote last night . . .”
Reed looked up. The room was now filled with cops, filing in slowly from the locker room. Reed stared at the face of one man. The cop looked down at his shoes. The sergeant slowly gazed at all the faces of the police officers. None of them returned his look.
“We’re getting creamed out there, sarge,” Starkweather said. “It’s like a shooting gallery. Since OmniCon took over, we’re like sitting ducks. Layoffs. Bad communications. MediVacs showing up a half hour late. We’re dead meat as soon as we leave the station.”
Reed stared at his knuckles. He couldn’t argue with Starkweather about that. The mortality rate was up in the force and the morale was down. It was open season out there for cops. OmniCon didn’t seem to be backing them up at all.
The room was silent for a prolonged second. The silence was shattered by the sound of the front door bursting open. RoboCop marched into the room, dragging battered Boddicker behind. Robo slammed Boddicker against Reed’s desk. Clarence snarled silently.
Robo nodded up at Reed. “Book him. He’s a cop killer.”
Robo turned and marched out of the precinct. Lewis ran to the door and saw Robo pull away in the TurboCruiser. She shook her head, bewildered, and turned her attention to the bleeding man before Reed’s desk. The cops in the room regarded Boddicker with a mixture of awe and anger. Clarence glared at them. “What the fuck are you looking at? Just give me my phone call, all right? I want out of this dump.”
In the TurboCruiser, Robo headed out of Old Detroit and guided the car into the modern section of town. Over the swirling streets before him, he superimposed his Playback Mode. He saw Clarence’s triumphant face
over and over again as he declared: “I work for Dick Jones. The big poobah at OCP? You can call him. I have his card. Wise up, trashcan. Jones is the number two guy at OmniCon.”
With Clarence’s voice echoing in his brain, the thug’s face appearing on a never-ending memory loop before his eyes, Robo pressed down on the accelerator. Hard.
In the OCP Tower, Jones paced nervously around his desk, talking rapidly into his phone. “Yes. Yes. Yes,” he snapped. “I understand. I know our deal, but you let me down. In a big way. I want you to remember that. You owe me.”
He slammed the phone down and sank into his thronelike chair behind his desk. Absentmindedly, he began drumming his well-manicured fingers on the desk top. “Shit,” he muttered. “This is turning into Frankenstein theater.”
He slid open the top desk drawer and pulled out a small CompuMap. He activated the map and watched a tiny red blip move closer to the tower.
RoboCop was approaching. Jones shook his head and sighed. It was going to be one of those nights.
“You want to play supercop?” Jones mused. “Okay. We’ll play. But by my rules.”
Outside the Tower, the TurboCruiser fishtailed to a halt. Robo stepped out of the car, slammed the door, and marched toward the front entrance. He entered the two large glass doors, pushed his way past a gaggle of tired executives, and strode toward the elevator.
He stood stiffly at the elevator bay. He pushed the button. After a minute, the glass elevator descended, filled with startled clerks and secretaries. They skittered nervously around the charred Titan as he stepped into the elevator. He slammed his finger onto the square button for the 112th floor, nearly sending it through the elevator wall.
The lift rumbled to a stop on the 112th level. Robo exited angrily and walked down an empty corridor. He paused before a door marked DICK JONES, SENIOR PRESIDENT—SECURITY CONCEPTS DIVISION. Without hesitating, he swung the door open wide.
The reception area was empty and dark. Light shone from under an adjacent door marked PRIVATE.
Robo opened the door and entered the room.
A lone desk lamp illuminated the room. Dick Jones was sitting behind his desk, staring out at the lights of the city far below. A drink was in his hand.
“Come in, Officer.” He smiled. “You know, I don’t usually see anyone without an appointment. But in your case, I’ll make an exception.”
Robo marched forward, his hand hovering near the handcuffs looped on his belt. “You’re under arrest,” he announced in a monotone.
“Oh,” Jones said, feigning surprise. “What’s the charge?”
“Aiding and abetting a known felon.”
“Dear me,” Jones exclaimed. “Sounds like I’m in a lot of trouble. Well, golly. You’d better just haul me in.”
Robo reached down for the handcuffs. Panic took hold of his brain. Something was wrong. He wasn’t functioning. He pushed his hand toward the cuffs. It wouldn’t budge. His entire arm had gone dead, locked in place.
Robo shook his head. He heard Jones laughing softly. Robo blinked. The Prime Directives appeared suspended before his eyes. DIRECTIVE ONE: SERVE THE PUBLIC TRUST. DIRECTIVE TWO: UPHOLD THE LAW. DIRECTIVE THREE: PROTECT THE INNOCENT. DIRECTIVE FOUR: [CLASSIFIED].
Directive four began to flash in his mind. A series of wild grids and access codes zipped across his field of vision. DIRECTIVE THREE: OCP PRODUCT ID #943054-SC.
More access codes flashed by his mind’s eye. Soon, the fourth directive was revealed.
DIRECTIVE FOUR: AN OCP PRODUCT SHALL NOT ACT AGAINST OCP’S BEST INTERESTS—AN OCP PRODUCT SHALL NOT ACT AGAINST ANY SENIOR OCP OFFICIAL—AN OCP PRODUCT SHALL NOT ACT AGAINST OCP’S BEST INTERESTS—
Robo felt his knees buckle. His senses were swimming. His arms went limp. He struggled to maintain his balance. It was useless. He was slowly being drained of all his power.
“Why, what’s the matter, Officer?” Jones asked sweetly.
Robo remained on his feet, watching the room spin around him.
Jones took a sip of his drink. “I’ll tell you what’s the matter, son. It’s a little insurance policy called Directive Four. My little contribution to your psychological profile. Any attempt to arrest a senior officer of OCP results in a shutdown. Awwww.”
Directive Four continued to bore itself into Robo’s brain as, system by system, he began to shut down. An avalanche of warning lights swam by his eyes. Data whizzed through his fading memory, wild and out of control. Robo slowly drifted down onto his knees. He was losing his sight. There was a video breakdown in his lenses. The room was crackling with horizontal and vertical lines. Jones moved from behind his desk and stared down at the quivering android.
“What did you think, twerp? Did you think you were an ordinary policeman? Just one of the guys? You’re our product. We own your ass, batteries included. We can’t very well have our products turning against us, can we?”
Summoning up every ounce of willpower he had left in his shell, Robo groped for his gun, resembling a drunken soldier on leave. He pulled it clear from its holster. Then, he lost the use of his fingers. He dropped it.
Jones was amused. “Ahhh. There’s still a little fight left in you. Hmmm. Maybe it’s about time you met a very good friend of mine.”
Jones walked over to his desk and punched four console buttons. The lights in the room came on. A wall panel behind Jones opened. The gargantuan form of ED 209 appeared. The towering fighting machine cocked both of its arms into firing position. Jones patted ED on the knee.
“This is my buddy, ED. He doesn’t like strangers.”
ED lumbered around the desk and headed toward Robo. Jones sat on the edge of his desk. “I had to kill Bob Morton because he made a mistake. You. Now, I think it’s about time I erased the mistake. Ed, baby, say the words I want to hear.”
Jones raised his drink to his lips as ED 209 focused its attention on Robo’s shaking shell. “You are trespassing on private property . . .”
Robo barely heard the words of the lumbering killing machine. ED’s cannon volley hit Robo straight in the chest. The concussion blew Robo back toward the door marked PRIVATE. The door splintered on impact and Robo found himself tumbling, limply, through the reception area.
Robo felt his visor crack. For the first time, he was seeing without the benefit of the computer-enhanced visor. But through only one eye. That was it. He had an eye. A human eye. It was still functioning. He blinked his good eye and watched ED 209 smash through the remainder of the door. Robo struggled to get to his feet. It was no use. ED 209 used one of his cannon arms like a massive club. The blow caught Robo on the side of the head. He flew through the doors leading to the hallway.
He careened into the corridor wall opposite Jones’s office. Things within his body were starting to quiver. He was summoning some old, untapped strength. Goddamn it. If he had a human eye, he had to have some other human attributes. Some human strength. Dredge it up, man, he screamed to his sputtering brain. Make the connections.
Connections to what?
To the past!
But he had no past . . . at least not that he knew of! He concentrated, trying to dredge up specifics. It was impossible. He was done for. No, damn it. There was something in him, a spirit he did not yet recognize, but one that he welcomed.
He devoted all his consciousness into raising it.
ED 209 crashed through the wall and emerged in the hallway. He raised the cannon muzzle, executioner style, and brought it to within inches of Robo’s face. “I am now authorized to use deadly force,” ED 209 commented.
Something inside Robo snapped. He slammed his fist against the extended cannon muzzle as hard as possible the second ED began to fire. ED’s arm swung across his own torso. The muzzle clanged against ED’s other arm as the shell exited. There was the sound of shattered metal and the smell of burnt circuitry as ED 209 blew his own arm off.
ED 209 stood, puzzled, in the corridor. He examined his own smoking stump as Robo struggled to his feet. Crad
ling his injured head with one hand, Robo staggered down the hall.
ED 209, spotting the movement, pivoted casually and, leveling his one remaining cannon arm, fired a heat-seeking miniature smart rocket from the launch tube situated next to his machine-gun attachment.
Robo continued to stagger down the hall. Sensing danger, he glanced over his shoulder and saw the smart rocket scream down the corridor toward him.
Robo darted around a wall, hobbling as fast as his weakened legs would carry him. The rocket screeched around the corner as well, still targeted on its prey. Taking a big chance, Robo hesitated until the rocket was almost upon him and then dove, head-first, on the thickly carpeted hallway. The rocket slammed into a wall, sending a chunk of the 112th floor into low orbit.
Glass, concrete, plaster, and various wads of office furniture tumbled down to the ground, crushing a dozen cars in the parking lot far below.
Robo found himself covered by half a wall. He slowly crawled along the floor. He saw two titanic feet begin to smash through the debris. Robo squinted his human eye. This definitely was not a great place to be.
ED 209 began wading through the debris in search of RoboCop. From out of nowhere leaped the badly damaged RoboCop. He landed on the hunchbacked robot’s hood, his added weight forcing the already top-heavy robot down. ED 209 fired a cannon volley, successfully blowing out a portion of the floor and neatly rearranging half of the office space on the 111th floor.
Robo wheeled backward, dizzily, and plunged headfirst through a doorway marked FIRE STAIRS.
In his office, suspecting the worst, Jones barked orders into his phone. “Just get Lieutenant Hedgecock down here. There’s trouble at the Tower. We have a rogue prototype down here, ripping the place apart.”
Robo staggered down the stairway, his body leaking precious fluids. A shadow blotted out the light above him. He glanced over his shoulder. ED 209 was, once again, on his trail. Robo doubled his efforts to run down the stairs. He couldn’t generate the power. His movements were tentative, feeble.