by Ed Naha
At the top of the stairs, ED 209 surveyed the situation. He paused at the first step. His feet were about three times the size of one of the stairs designed for puny humans. He took a hesitant step. His heel alighted on the first stair. He extended a second foot. Again, he balanced his heel on a stair. Cautiously, he took a third step. His own weight caused his remaining earthbound foot to slip off the thin stair.
ED 209 beeped helplessly as he tumbled end over end down to the next landing. The force of his momentum sent him smashing through the guard rail and down the next flight of stairs and the next. Landing, finally, on his back, he found himself staring at the lights above. He lay motionless. A high-tech turtle caught on its back. He began flailing his legs and remaining arm in vain, trying to flip himself over. Missing an arm, however, ED 209’s body was lopsided and the sheer weight of his torso made the move impossible. Frustrated, he began firing every weapon in his armory.
Walls and light fixtures began tumbling down around him.
Down below, Robo continued his dizzying downward spiral. His legs ached. He could barely urge his arms to grasp the handrail. His vision was fuzzy. Each stair he took sent a shard of pain swimming up his tendons.
Far above him, he could hear ED 209 blasting helplessly away.
Robo stumbled toward the exit door of the fire stairs. Trying to remember the layout of the building, he deduced that this door would lead him to the parking garage next door and safety. He was right.
And he was wrong.
Stumbling through the door, he was bathed in the unblinking white glare of ten massive spotlights. Robo squinted into the blinding glow, shielding his eyes with a tattered hand. Before him, a line of TurboCruisers stood bumper to bumper. Lieutenant Hedgecock and his SWAT team, as well as a half dozen officers from the Old Detroit precinct, were hunkered down behind the cars, guns drawn.
Robo stared into the crowd, confused. He heard weapons being cocked in the distance.
Lieutenant Hedgecock addressed his men using a bullhorn. “Prepare to fire.”
Behind the line, Officers Starkweather and Ramirez exchanged startled glances.
“Hey, wait a minute. What is this shit,” Starkweather asked.
Hedgecock shrugged. “We have our orders.”
“Yeah, well who gave those orders?”
“Mr. Jones . . .”
“Fuck Jones and fuck OCP!” Starkweather yelled, pointing at Robo. “He’s a cop, for Christ’s sake! A fucking good cop!”
“We have orders to destroy it,” Hedgecock growled.
Starkweather stood, slid his gun in his holster, and turned his back on the SWAT team. “Perch and rotate, slimemold,” he muttered.
One by one, the cops of the Old Detroit precinct holstered their guns and walked away. Hedgecock was not perturbed. “Fire at will!” he screamed.
Robo managed to urge his legs forward as the SWAT team opened up. The bullets slammed into his chest. The wind was knocked out of his frail shell. He found himself twirling through the air and slamming into a wall. He angled his body and rolled behind a concrete column as bullets hissed through the air around him.
Robo was breathing heavy. He knew that the SWAT team had the firepower of a small army. HK 91s. Uzis. The works. Each man was a professional soldier. They shot to kill.
“Aim for his head!” he heard Hedgecock bellow. “It’s the only way to stop him.”
Robo shrugged. Sumbitch.
He made a half-blind dash for the next column, some fifteen feet away. Bullets slammed into his helmet, badly denting the metal. He clenched his fists and raised them around the exposed area of his face. Another volley slammed into his side, knocking him down to the ground. He began crawling madly toward the next column, bullets chewing into his armor.
Shells whined all around him. The ground erupted into tiny geysers of macadam and metal. He was a dead man. He chuckled to himself. Well, a dead not-quite-man. He was beginning to get the hang of dark humor. He made a mental note of that as he skittered behind the next column.
Slowly, painfully, he pushed himself up on his feet behind the cover of the column. The gunfire trickled to a halt. He glanced to his left. Twenty feet away was a low concrete wall. On the other side, some ten feet below, was the street. If he could make the wall, he could, conceivably, have a chance.
Robo took a deep breath. The silence around him made a very loud reply. The SWAT team was waiting for his next move. He wasn’t going to disappoint them.
He sprinted toward the wall. The garage erupted into a solid sheet of sound. The world around him was alive with molten lead. Robo neared the wall. A slug flattened itself against the armor on his back. He found himself tumbling forward. He couldn’t lose his balance or he’d slam, head-first, into the wall. His legs were pumping furiously. He arched his back, extended his arms, and kicked forward.
He sailed up and over the wall, clearing it by less than two inches. He found himself tumbling down an offramp and into the alleyway behind the Tower. Above him, he could hear the SWAT members hurry for their Cruisers. He didn’t have much time. Turbine engines were whining to life inside the garage. Soon the streets would be crawling with prowling Cruisers, speeding after him like hungry jackals.
Robo stumbled down the deserted alleyway. So far, so good. He froze. At the far end of the alley was a TurboCruiser, its lights flashing. Robo turned and fled in the opposite direction. The Cruiser slowly followed him.
Robo cursed himself for letting it end like this. He shouldn’t have underestimated Jones. Who the hell did he think he was anyway? Robo shrugged. He’d been trying to figure that one out for weeks.
A sudden pain in his left leg caused him to falter. He stumbled sideways into a row of garbage cans, floundering in the trash like a drowning man in a sea of crap. The Cruiser’s lights were upon him now. The car’s siren slammed into his eardrums, causing him to wince. He staggered to his feet. Screw them. If they were determined to take him out, he was determined to fight them.
He stood and faced the headlights. He raised his once-mighty steel hands and formed two colossal fists. He braced himself in a classic prize-fighter stance.
A small cop leaped out of the car and stood before him, hands upraised.
“Murphy,” the cop whispered. “It’s okay. It’s me. Lewis.”
Robo dropped his arms to his sides. He began to totter. Lewis ran up to his side.
“Lean on me,” she said.
Robo extended a battered arm. Lewis wrapped it around her shoulder and led him to the passenger’s side of the Cruiser. She gently eased him into it, closing the door carefully behind him. She got behind the wheel and gazed at the fragmented features of RoboCop.
“You are one sorry-looking son-of-a-bitch,” she said.
“You should see the other guy.” He half-smiled.
She eased the car out of the alleyway and headed toward the safety of the countless tenements of Old Detroit. “Welcome back, partner.” Lewis grinned.
Robo slumped in the front seat of the Cruiser. He didn’t know exactly why, but he felt as if he belonged there.
[ 22 ]
Dick Jones guzzled a cup of coffee and waved one of his three secretaries away from the shambles that once was his office. The place looked a lot worse in the daylight. He figured it would take a work crew at least twenty-four hours to replace the doors, the sections of walls, and the corner of the 112th floor that went into low orbit the night before.
He sighed and sat down behind his desk, flicking on a Watchman TV on his desk. Perky Jess Perkins and dapper Casey Wong were just beginning their early-morning drone.
“Good morning.” Casey smiled, his teeth nearly reaching his earlobes. “I’m Casey Wong with Jess Perkins and these are today’s top stories. It was revealed today by doctors at the Texas Clone Institute that Hollywood immortal Sylvester Stallone died yesterday during an unsuccessful brain transplant. A longtime supporter of bio-engineering, Stallone was ninety-seven. His last film, Rambo 38: Old Blood, w
ill be released posthumously next month.”
Jones squinted at the tiny screen. Footage of policemen walking in front of a precinct house with picket signs materialized. Jones nearly gagged on the coffee. Jess picked up the patter. “Police Union representatives and OmniCon continued negotiations today in hopes of averting a citywide strike by police scheduled to begin tonight at midnight. We go now live to Justin Ballard-Watkins.”
A somber kid with a loud blazer stood in front of a precinct house. “Picket lines have already formed around some police stations in the city,” he intoned, “to stress the rank and file’s seriousness about the strike. Cops are on duty today, but will they be on duty tomorrow? That’s the question we put to people in the crime-plagued Lexington area.”
A store owner was pictured boarding up his appliance shop. “They’re public servants,” he groused. “They have job security. They’re not supposed to strike.”
A bearded nouveau-hippie newspaper vendor smiled at the camera. “The cops are workers like everyone else in society. They’re getting a raw deal from management. You know, cops have rights, too.”
Jones flicked off the TV. That’s all he needed. His life wasn’t going down the toilet fast enough. Great way to start a morning. He stared at the coffee. “Marsha! There’s no sugar in this crap!”
Marsha, a pert young woman with a bulldog jaw, marched into his office with a sugar dispenser. She banged it on his desk and glared at him. “There’s a moron outside to see you,” she snapped. “And if he tries pawing at me one more time, I’ll remove his teeth with my shoe.”
She spun and left the office. Jones sagged visibly. What else could go wrong? He barked into his intercom, “Send the mor . . . gentleman in.”
Clarence Boddicker, wearing shades and a festive Hawaiian shirt, sauntered into the office. He glanced at the ruptured room around him. “Been doing some redecorating?”
Clarence tossed a vial of coke on Jones’s desk. “Want a toot?”
“It’s a little early, isn’t it, Boddicker?”
Clarence smiled, sticking a small shovelful of cocaine up his nose. “It’s never too early to feel good.”
Jones frowned. “Clarence, you’re a fuck-up.”
Clarence wiped the coke off his nose. “Hey, let’s not start flinging mud . . .”
Jones shrugged. “I’ve always known that about you but, in spite of that, I depended on you. I figured, Hey. The guy has ambition. He has intelligence. Give him the chance and he’ll perform.”
“I do the best I can.”
“Not good enough, Clarence. The police officer who arrested you? The one you spilled your guts to? You’re going to have to kill him.”
Clarence wasn’t concerned. “Hey, pal. I’ve come through for you whenever you needed a favor. All I ever asked in return was a guarantee of no jail for me and my men. He was taking me to jail . . .”
Jones narrowed his eyes, resembling Mr. Punch more than ever. “He’s a cyborg, you idiot: part human, part state-of-the-art technology. He recorded every word you said. His memory is admissible evidence in a court of law. You involved me. You may have damaged me.”
“I guess ‘oops’ isn’t going to cut it?” Clarence asked, flashing a lopsided grin.
“This isn’t funny, Clarence. I’m in deep shit thanks to you.”
“Hey, you wanted dead cops all over Old Detroit so you could sell your robot monster. I did the job. Now, there’s a man-machine roaming the streets and you want me to deal with it? No way. I’m out of here, partner.”
Jones took a more persuasive tack. “Hold on, Clarence. I didn’t say it wouldn’t be worth your while. Delta City begins construction in two months. Two million workers will be there, living in trailers. A lot of them will become city residents. A whole new wave of customers for drugs, gambling, prostitution. Delta City will be virgin territory for the man who knows how to open it up to new markets. One man could control it all, Clarence. You could control it . . . if you eradicate the one obstacle standing in your, our, way. RoboCop.”
“If I say yes, I’ll need all my men.”
“Emil DeLorean was bailed out of jail this morning.”
Clarence smiled. Jones tossed him the CompuMap card from his desk top. Clarence caught it and stared at the map. A red dot was glowing from a rundown section of town.
“Well,” Clarence said. “I guess we’re going to be friends after all, Dick. Have you got access to military weaponry?”
Jones nodded. “Of course. We are the military.”
Clarence picked up the card and stuffed it in his shirt pocket. “Give me a few hours to get a plan going. By tomorrow morning, your man-machine will be ready for the scrap heap.”
“That’s the way I like to hear you talk, Clarence.” Jones beamed.
“I figured,” Clarence said, turning to leave. “By the way,” he called. “If I were you, I’d fire that ice queen outside. She’s a real bitch. Doesn’t know how to treat guests.”
Jones nodded. “Consider it done.”
Jones watched Clarence disappear from the office. He leaned back in his chair. “Asshole.”
[ 23 ]
Lewis guided the TurboCruiser through a maze of crumbling buildings and shattered dreams. The industrial complex had once been the pride of Detroit, one of its largest and most profitable auto manufacturing plants. Now, it was nothing more than the home of countless rats and roaches.
She slowly drove through a three-story-high door and into a dark, hangarlike structure. She maneuvered the car carefully, avoiding the large slabs of wood and metal debris strewn across the sprawling floor. She glanced at the seat behind her. Clanking softly in the car were two cases of baby food marked “spinach” and “strained beef.”
The interior of the plant was as large as three football fields and, even in broad daylight, nearly pitch black. The only sun that entered the place was at the far end of the structure, where half a wall and a section of the ceiling had given way—the result of bad weather and bad planning.
She heard the clanking of steel ahead in the sunlight. She pulled the car to a stop where Robo sat, patiently hammering his right leg with a small sledge. Lewis got out of the car, removing the baby food and a leather satchel.
She gazed at Robo’s leg. He had stripped off some of the armor plating and his calf was now an exposed puzzle of inner workings. Flexible steel “muscles” quivered with each slam of the hammer head. Lewis dropped the satchel next to Robo with a thud. Robo looked up for the first time. His helmet, still badly mangled, looked horrifying. His one human eye blinked at her.
“Maybe I should have dropped you off at an auto body shop,” she said.
“I could have used the tools,” he muttered, slamming on his leg again.
“I wasn’t sure what you needed,” Lewis said, pointing to the satchel. “I just sort of grabbed things.”
Robo opened the satchel. Several sophisticated hand tools were inside. He pulled out a small cordless power ratchet.
“Thanks, this is great,” he said. “I have to get this thing off.”
“What thing?”
“My helmet.” He fit the pit on the power ratchet and shoved it up under the lip of his helmet, close to his temple. The ratchet made the sound of a hundred angry locusts. A two-inch machine bolt screwed out of his head at an angle and clanked to the floor. He took the ratchet and fit it on the other side. The buzzing caused Lewis to flinch. “That ought to do it,” he said.
Lewis gaped at Robo as he began to pry the helmet off.
“What do you look like under there, anyway?” she asked.
“Beats me,” he said. “Maybe you’d better turn your back. You may not like what you’re going to see.”
“You can’t look any worse than you do now.” She laughed half-heartedly.
Robo slowly lifted the helmet up and over his head. He tossed it on the ground with a clank. Lewis nodded her head appreciatively. “You know, Murphy, you’re not half bad looking.”
S
he reached into the glove compartment of the Cruiser and pulled out a small makeup mirror. She handed it to Robo. “You still have blue eyes,” she said. “Sort of.”
He gazed into the mirror. Indeed, his eyes were blue, but they were flecked with tiny red, blue and yellow LEDs which picked up information and fed it to his brain center for analysis.
Robo pulled the mirror back and studied his face. He was forced to grin. His countenance was an elegant blend of flesh and steel, sort of an organic high-tech sculpture which harkened back to either the ancient Greeks or the German Expressionist cinema of the 1920s. It depended on your sense of humor.
Two recessed organic access plates had been installed on his forehead, giving him a distinguished, regal brow. What was left of his hair was short and nubby, ending abruptly in ribbed titanium which spread out from the crown of his skull. He suddenly flashed on Clarence’s last fatal shot in that warehouse a small eternity ago. He touched the back of his skull. A metal plate was firmly bolted in place.
The shock of realization set in. He could no longer escape the truth. He had been the human victim of a murder. And, then, the subject of a high-tech product push. His eyes widened in mute horror. He could not, would not face that. It was impossible.
Lewis watched Robo silently, the sadness welling up within her. She extended a tentative finger toward him and touched the fleshy part of his cheekbone. “It’s really good to see you again, Murphy.”
Robo snapped the compact shut and pushed her hand away. He raised his left hand. It was badly mangled. He lowered it and raised his right instead. “Murphy had a wife and son. What happened to them?”
Lewis stood awkwardly, groping for the words. “After your . . . after the funeral, they moved away.”
“Where did they go?”
“Mrs. Murphy signed on with MoonCorp. I’m not sure if you remember or not. She has a sister living at the Luna Industrial Plex. UniCorp pulled a few strings and had everything arranged within two weeks. She thought you were dead. Aw, Murphy, I’m really sorry.”