“As far away from those buggers as possible.”
“Why would they be after you?”
“It can only have something to do with your cyber, but I’m not hanging around to ask them. You don’t mess with enforcers.”
She frowned. “Why must it be because of Sabre?”
“Because enforcers are Myon Two’s police force,” Kole said. “They protect Cybercorp’s secrets, hunt down anti-Myon Two activists, arrest owners who use their cybers for criminal activities, that kind of thing.”
“But we haven’t done anything wrong.”
He swerved into another traffic lane and swooped around a skyscraper. “Not as far as we know, but they wouldn’t be after us without a good reason.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know! You want to stop and ask them?”
Sabre said, “The enforcers are following in two air-cars.”
“Crap!” Kole’s eyes darted. “How the hell did they find us?” He frowned. “Unless… it’s him.”
“Who?” Tassin asked.
Kole jerked his head at Sabre. “It must be him. He’s got a locator beacon. It’s the only explanation. Ask him if it’s been activated.”
She turned to Sabre. “Has your locator beacon been activated?”
“Yes.”
“Shit!” Kole said. “We’ll never shake them. We’ve got to get rid of it.”
“We’re not getting rid of Sabre.”
“No, just the beacon. There’s a cyber repair shop across town. We’ll have to grab a tech and make him remove the beacon. Ask him how far away they are.”
She relayed the question to Sabre again, wondering why Kole did not just ask him.
“One point seven kilometres,” the cyber replied.
“Okay, that gives us a little time. A couple of minutes, tops.”
Tassin gripped her seat as Kole swerved out of the lane of flying traffic and swooped into the clear airspace to the left, accelerating. She swallowed hard as he skimmed past a mirror-sided building with centimetres to spare and weaved between the skyscrapers at breakneck speed. About ten minutes later, he landed on one of the parking areas that jutted from the side of a massive pale grey building with rows of mirror windows. Kole jumped out and sprinted inside, and Tassin followed, Sabre at her heels.
Kole skidded around a corner and dived into a shop with a sign outside that said it was a cyber repair station. Tassin entered a moment later, to find Kole wrestling with a short, chubby blond youth who yelled in alarm. Posters of cybers in various combat poses adorned the pale grey walls, lasers and webbing hung between them, and a glass counter displayed an assortment of other equipment. She recognised several wrist-mounted grenade launcher and laser combos, and a variety of helmets and body armour. She glanced back at Sabre and pointed at the youth, who was presumably a cyber technician.
“Bring him!”
Sabre moved past her and gripped the young man’s arm, and he goggled at the cyber. Kole ran to the door and peered out, then raced back towards the parking area, Tassin in hot pursuit. Sabre dragged the tech after them. As they reached the air-car, two black vehicles swooped down to land beside it, and black-clad men boiled out of them. Sabre drew a laser and snapped off three quick shots, forcing the men to dive for cover. Kole leapt into the car and started it, and Tassin climbed in beside him. Sabre shoved the tech into the back seat as laser bolts flashed past, dangerously close. Two cracked off the side of the car, and Tassin yelped. Kole raised the car and reversed it, and Sabre fired four more shots, then jumped into the back seat beside the tech, firing out of the window at the enforcers, who fired back. Blue bolts seared past the car, and Tassin ducked, her heart hammering. Kole swung the car away, and they swooped between the towering spires, accelerating towards the edge of the city. She turned to the cringing youth beside Sabre.
“Remove his locator beacon, now!”
The tech gaped at her. “What? I… I can’t do that!”
“Why not?”
“I’m not… It’s illegal! And I don’t have any instruments.” He cowered as laser shots flashed past the windows, and Tassin glanced around.
Kole swore and weaved the air-car from side to side. “Those bastards have armed air-cars!”
She turned back to the tech, clinging to the seat as the car swayed and veered. “What do you need?”
“I won’t do it!”
She held out her hand to Sabre. “Give me a laser.” The cyber handed her one, and she aimed it at the tech. “Remove the tracking beacon.”
“Okay! Okay, but I don’t have any –”
“What do you need?”
“A scalpel and snips,” he squeaked, his eyes darting to the windows where more blue streaks zipped past. A passing skyscraper blossomed with a fiery blaze as one of the shots hit it. Tassin did not want to think about what would happen to the car if it was hit. For the moment, however, the enforcers did not seem to be shooting to kill, but trying to force them to land. She hoped Kole had the courage to deal with this situation.
“Will there be any in his medical kit?” she asked the tech, jerking her chin at Sabre.
“Y-yes, but you’ll have to give me permission to touch him, and take the instruments from his kit.”
She nodded. “Sabre, allow this man to touch you and use your medical kit.”
The air-car lurched and tilted as Kole navigated the forest of skyscrapers, the enforcers still close behind. For the moment, they had stopped firing, perhaps realising that they were endangering the public after the hit on the skyscraper. She wondered how long Kole could keep going or if he would eventually have to stop for any reason. Surely the vehicle used some sort of fuel? For the moment, he was leading the enforcers a merry chase.
The tech dug in Sabre’s medical kit and took out a scalpel and what looked like a miniature pair of scissors. He glanced at Tassin. “He must turn his back to me, so I can reach the locator.”
“Where is it?”
“In the back of his neck, just below his skull.”
“You’d better not be lying, or try to disable him,” she said. “Any funny stuff, and your brains become a red mist, got it?”
He nodded. “Look, it would be better if we weren’t being tossed around in here. This is a delicate operation. The locator is attached to a micro-wire that encircles his spinal cord. It’s a safety feature to prevent unauthorised removal of the tracking beacon. One tug and he dies.”
“If he dies, you end up a smear on the wall, understand?”
“Yeah, I know. I won’t hurt him; I just need a steady environment.”
Tassin glanced over her shoulder. “Kole?”
“Yeah, I heard. I’ll do my best. Tell it to the shits who are chasing us.”
She faced the tech again. “Sabre, turn your back to the tech and allow him access to the back of your neck. What about anaesthetic?” she asked the youth as the cyber obeyed.
He shook his head. “He’s a cyber.”
“He feels pain.”
“I don’t have any anaesthetic. Are you going to stop at a hospital?”
“How much will it hurt?”
“He doesn’t –”
“He feels pain!” She glared at him.
“Okay, okay. It’s just a little cut, it won’t hurt much.”
“All right. Make sure it doesn’t.”
“Right.” The tech faced Sabre and reached up to touch the back the cyber’s neck, just below his hairline. Apparently finding the right spot, he raised the scalpel, his hand shaking a little. The vehicle remained level and steady, and a glance out of the front windscreen showed her that they were flying straight across the city, down a broad avenue between the skyscrapers. The tech pressed the scalpel to Sabre’s skin, and a little blood oozed from its tip, making her wince. The cyber stared impassively ahead. The tech put down the scalpel and dug his fingers into the cut, groping for something. After a few seconds he carefully pulled something towards the surface, then picked up the snips and pressed them in
to the cut. The blades snipped, and he pulled out a tiny, gleaming silver ovoid, about the size of a grain of rice. He held it out to Tassin.
“There it is.”
“That?”
“Yeah.”
She took it and tossed it out of the window. “Great. Patch him up.”
While the tech stuck a plaster over the cut, she glanced out of the front windscreen again, saying to Kole, “Okay, you can lose them now.”
The air-car tilted as he veered between the buildings, rejoining a stream of flying traffic. Tassin clung to her seat and turned back to the tech, who put the scalpel and snips back in Sabre’s medical kit.
“Okay, Sabre, guard him again,” she said.
The cyber turned to face the tech, who looked panicky. “Look, I’ve done what you asked. Are you going to let me go?”
“Sure, as soon as we lose the enforcers.”
He slumped, forcing a feeble smile. “Thanks.”
Tassin turned to face the front again, hanging onto her seat as Kole swooped and swerved through the towering glass spires, crossing lanes of traffic in what she assumed was a highly illegal manner. If the enforcers had only been after her before, she did not doubt that the local authorities would be after him now, too, for traffic violations. Her heart warmed to the brash hacker. Why were the enforcers after her, though? She frowned, pondering. Buying Sabre should not have raised any red flags, unless Manutim had still been his owner, and returned to find that his employee had sold Sabre to her. He would most probably have informed the enforcers, perhaps told them that she intended to try to free the cyber, or something. She had not parted from him on good terms. He had undoubtedly done it out of revenge, even if he did not believe she could free Sabre. He had not been certain that the cyber had been free when he had returned to collect him on Omega Five. Perhaps the techs on Myon Two had discovered Sabre’s freedom, though, when they had examined him. Only Sabre could tell her that, and she longed to talk to him.
Kole said, “I think I’ve lost them. Ask him.”
Tassin glanced back at the empty sky behind them. “Looks like it. Sabre, where are the enforcers now?”
“Out of scanner range.”
“Let’s get rid of this guy,” she said to Kole.
“Good idea.”
He swooped towards a shorter building with a landing pad on its roof and stopped the air-car.
Tassin turned to the tech. “Out.”
The youth climbed out with alacrity, and Kole guided the car back into the sky, circling around the city.
“Now what?” Tassin asked.
“Well, we can’t stay on Ferrinon. The enforcers will have staked out my apartment and they’ll track me as soon as I spend any money. That means we can’t stay at a hotel, buy food, fuel, hell, anything. We have to get off this planet.”
“Buy passage on a ship?”
He snorted. “If we did that, they’d track it, too. Luckily there’s no need. I have my own, and she’s fully fuelled.”
“You own a spaceship?”
“Yup. She’s an armed explorer. Her name’s Striker.” He smiled.
“Wow. I guess you fleeced a lot of corporations, huh?”
“I told you I was the best hacker in the galaxy.”
“Where will we go?” she asked.
“Friend of mine. Thanks to you and your cyber, I’m deep in the poo with Cybercorp, since they tracked the pair of you to my apartment. I need to access the Net to create a new alias and transfer my money to new bank accounts so they can’t catch me when I use it, or worse, confiscate it. Trevare’s a pal, and he’s got all the equipment I need. He lives on an abandoned mining moon.”
“I’m sorry I’ve caused so much trouble for you, and I really appreciate your help, Kole. It means a lot to me.”
He shot her a faint smile. “Hey, I’m not the sort who dumps a girl in the shit when the going gets tough. I’ll hack my way out of this just like I always do. No biggie. What I’d really like to know is; why are the enforcers after you?”
She explained her theory about Manutim, and added, “That means there must be a way to free Sabre again.”
“Right. Well that’s good news. That makes sense, too, because as far as I know, only someone with the right code can activate a cyber’s tracking beacon. It stands to reason that his previous owner would still have the code and gave it to the enforcers. We could have changed it, but we’d have had to take Sabre to a repair station to have it done, and they keep records, so in fact the only way to give them the slip was to remove the beacon. Lucky we found a cowardly tech who believed you when you said you’d shoot him if he didn’t do it, or if he hurt Sabre. He was supposed to give the beacon that tug, I reckon, and kill Sabre, so he’s going to be in a world of trouble now. Okay then, next stop, spaceport.”
Half an hour later, Kole landed the air-car on a vast concrete apron and parked it amongst a host of others. The trio climbed out, and Kole led the way along a row of parked spaceships, most of them shuttles and leisure yachts, along with a few transports and tourist barges. Tassin gazed at them in wonder, marvelling at the amazing machines that could fly through the void. The majority were shiny and looked fairly new, but a few were battered and pitted with thousands of tiny scars. Kole strode ahead, and gestured to a sleek silver ship with a needle nose and stubby wings, four big hollow tubes housed in its tail that she assumed were engines.
“There she is.”
Kole hurried up to the ship, and Tassin got the impression he would have hugged it if he could. He stroked the smooth hull, and the door beside him whined open, a set of three steps unfolding. He vanished inside, and Tassin followed. The interior was plush, decorated mostly in white, grey and cream, with occasional splashes of deep crimson. She entered a corridor that opened out further down into a lounge with cream seats around a glass-topped table. Grey carpet covered the floor, and shiny metal fittings hinted at odd devices. At the far end of the lounge, a speckled white bar counter fronted a glass cabinet full of bottles. She glanced in the other direction, where Kole hurried towards a small room full of screens and consoles covered with buttons, where two padded black chairs that faced a wide, curved window. As he entered the room, the consoles came alive with little lights, screens flickered on and filled with writing, and subdued lighting came from behind the consoles.
“Hello Striker,” he said.
Tassin wondered who he was speaking to, then jumped as a soft, dulcet female voice crooned, “Hello Kole.”
She glanced around in bewilderment, meeting Sabre’s blank gaze. Entering the bridge as Kole settled into one of the chairs, she enquired, “Who was that?”
“That, my dear, was my ship.”
“It speaks?”
“Yup. It’s like that thing on his forehead. An AI: an artificial intelligence. Of course, it’s not as sophisticated as his, but it’s not a monster, either. It runs the ship.”
“I see.” She slid into the chair beside his, gazing out of the windows.
Kole pushed buttons and tapped keys. “Striker, prepare for take-off. Destination, Drellin Moon.”
“Engines online, preparing for take-off. ETA to Drellin Moon, seven hours. Corridors X436 -32 and U860-50 optimal.”
“Go ahead,” Kole said.
A soft hum came from behind Tassin and rose to a deep throbbing, which she assumed was the engines. “Corridors?”
“Yeah. That’s how we travel between the stars. We use photon corridors.”
“Photons?”
“Ah… particles that stars emit. They form sort of rivers, in deep space, between the stars. Photons travel at the speed of light, obviously, and photon ships use vast sails or wings of electromagnetic power that’s specially polarised to capture photons and push them backwards, which pushes the ship forward. Once it’s going faster than the speed of light, it captures the photons it’s overtaking and pushes them backwards, which makes it go even faster. Technically, the speed of a photon ship is limitless, but, like everythi
ng else, what speeds up must also slow down, and the faster you go the more time you have to spend decelerating, which is done with normal engines. Nothing stops in space if it doesn’t have brakes. If we don’t decelerate, we keep going forever.”
Tassin was fascinated, and watched the ground fall away below as the ship had left the apron and rose into the sky. “So why do you use these photon corridors to go faster and normal engines to slow down? Why not use the normal engines for both, or the photons?”
“Well, changing the polarity of solar wings is impossible, apparently, and normal engines would never get us faster than light, because the energy they produce would be left behind faster than they could produce it, you see? Normal engines, however, have a profound effect when a ship’s travelling faster than light because the energy they produce is sort of compressed, if you will. That’s the best way I can explain it. It’s way more effective, at any rate.”
“Okay.” She did not understand completely but it seemed to make sense. “So who’s this friend of yours?”
“He’s a fellow hacker. We go way back, but he hacked the wrong corporation and got into huge trouble. He had to go into permanent hiding, and he’s been there ever since.”
Tassin glanced at Sabre, who stood in the corridor just outside the room where she sat with Kole, in a guard stance. “Go and sit in the lounge, find food and drink if you require it,” she ordered him, annoyed.
Kole glanced at her. “He really bugs you, doesn’t he?”
“Yes. I remember him as a free man, not a… machine.”
“What will you do if you can’t free him?”
“I’m going to free him.”
He nodded, turning to gaze out of the window. “Sure you will.”
The blue sky outside turned black with startling swiftness, and stars became visible as the ship turned away from the planet’s glow and headed into deep space. Tassin stared at the mesmerising view, entranced. Billions of stars sprinkled the inky void like miniscule diamonds on black velvet, each one a sun, and in some areas what looked like clouds glowed faintly. She pointed them out to Kole.
“What are those?”
“Cosmic dust clouds, or asteroid clouds. You don’t want to get caught in one of those if you value your ship and your life. Luckily, photon corridors never go near them, or vice versa.”
The Cyber Chronicles IV - Cyborg Page 5