by Chris Turner
Perhaps he would enjoy himself in Paranith. Goss had given him some throwaway money. He could lose himself in a few gambling games and the pleasure of a few women. Casinos and night life would be a welcome release from his predicament.
With a grim smile, Yul rejected the plan. The sooner he concluded this dull task, the better.
He would have thought Mathias could have provided at least a shuttle to take him down to the planet’s surface. Once again, Yul thought of bucking Mathias. No—an inner intuition told him it was the wrong move. Implants or no, one day his enforcers would catch up with him. It would take only a single slip. First things first: when he finished this job, his number one priority would be to excise the wretched nano-implants, no matter what the pain or cost.
Mathias’s words at the debrief echoed hollowly in Yul’s head. “Remember, try to run and we will fry you, Vrean, and deal with the consequences later. Anywhere you go, near a radio tower or some light drive system, we will track you. Unless you wish to steer clear of every civilization completely?” It was an option, but not a pleasant one. He could always take refuge on some uncharted planet.
Yul bit his lip with moody unease. It was not an option that he was willing to take at this time.
Aboard the transfer shuttle that slowly edged away from the space station, he watched the blue-grey world of Namith materialize in a wash of bright colour. The surface blossomed in a surreal rush—an underpopulated world, one of the more recent human colonies, terraformed partly by the financing of a few ultra-rich investors. Tall oxygen convection pumps, noisy behemoths, installed at strategic places on the surface, comprised the main workhorses, running 24-7 to pump oxygen into the atmosphere. Similarly, flora transplanted from Earth and like worlds made it possible for whole towns and cities, assembled from bottom to top, to bloom overnight. Three mining companies had lent engineering input and raw materials from what he had gleaned; lumber and coal had been transferred at mega costs, all absorbed by investors. An ideal place for a man such as Hresh to set up shop, Yul suspected, if Mathias was to be believed. Namith was approaching a fully terraformed world providing low costs for avid business entrepreneurs.
Yul considered hiring a surface car to take him to the designated warehouse, but he discarded the idea. He wanted to leave no obvious trail. Instead he decided to hunker down in the city at Parson’s Pub, waiting for dusk to arrive. His boots gripped the oily streets slick with rain. The air, warm, scented and humid, soothed his lungs, being richer in oxygen than what he was used to. Low buildings peered down at him. The pedestrians, moving shiftily, were mostly a multi-racial mix of itinerant workers. Near the bar, a lone keyboardist played a modern hypno beat, entertaining the regular mix of barflies whom Yul expected in such a lowbrow spaceport town. It seemed the space station Pegasus had more action than the city planetside. Yul didn’t mind. The chronograph on the wall showed mid-evening. Time to go. He quaffed his ale, took the air tram from the city terminal to the farthest line east, preparing to walk the remaining five miles to the warehouse that blinked clearly on his GPS.
* * *
Aboard his private N-Juen, Mathias sped to the world Rdelnar for a deal-closer with ambassador Chagin of the Upper Colonies, member of the World Planetary Society. The merger between Cyscox Machine Exports and Cybernetics Corp. would increase his profits by 30%, also facilitate the flow of wholesale machine parts and AI systems needed for his new line of bots, to his own labs. How he relished this deal! Of course, he had ruthlessly squeezed the Rdelnarian bureaucrats to smooth the way for a speedy resoluation of all legalities and paperwork crucial to pulling off such a coup. Threats to Chagin’s family and a veiled hint to courier his kidnapped daughter’s finger to him had been the final convincer. He disliked resorting to such tactics, but they proved unavoidable to prevent an exorbitant personal payout and a serious loss of business to widespread, competitive markets. Business was business. How else had he survived thus far?
Kaymis, his financial advisor, sauntered into the ship’s briefing room with an officious air. “The Rdelnarian representatives are ready to sign, sir, offering a not insignificant token of their good faith. An extra thousand Rangenkro-cloned circuits and as many robot-lens eyes. Chagin personally gift-wrapped these extra containers for you.”
“Just what I want to hear, Kaymis. The Rdelnarians are wise to humour me.”
Kaymis’s hands peaked under his chin. “There’s another matter you should know about. The Zikri have been busy. My sources indicate that they’ve been launching intelligence probes on you.”
Mathias grew thoughtful, his eyes flicking over the lemon wax gleam on the polished mahogany of the bar in his private space yacht. “I’ll broach that matter when the threat becomes real. I’ve had many threats in my day. I still blame Goss for that loose end. Idiot.”
“Well, the problem does not go away by blaming Goss.”
Mathias twitched his nose in anger, an indication that the topic was closed. Already his mind was fast-forwarding to the next problem. How to requisition torso parts as cheaply as possible and undercut the opposition. Parts, including Rangenkro, must come in under the 100 million credit mark or heads would roll. Luckily his insider Aragius had seen to the blackmail of certain key figures who managed the slave labour on the world Haigon out on the fringe of Vega. That included child-labour assembly-line workers who put together the basic shins and forearms and mechanical joints, all components he used in his synthetics.
Mathias smiled. “Bring the extra supplies aboard, Kaymis. Alert Goss regarding the usual security protocols. The shipment will be put to good use swiftly—it must reach my labs by tomorrow. We have room for it here.” Mathias chewed his lip. It would take several days for his ships to get out here and transport the main shipments back to Phallanor to his main labs. Work must be underway asap.
Kaymis nodded and left Mathias’s private chamber.
* * *
Well-cloaked in his stealth Orb, thousands of kilometres away from Mathias’s yacht, subcommander Krin intercepted Mathias’s private transmissions and with a console-mounted device translated the alien words into something he could understand.
He turned to Bral, his assistant who had been with him since the Orb fiasco. “Be sure to give ‘ambassador’ Chagin a warm welcome. Let’s prepare a little surprise for our skurg Mathias.”
Bral emitted a sardonic chitter. “Overseer Vngbrug requests to be part of the ops.”
Krin twitched, unnerved at mention of Vngbrug’s name. “On second thought, I will go down personally to be part of this mission.” A devious plan was already forming in Krin’s mind.
Vngbrug arrived at that moment, overhearing plans of the operation. His upper motilator reached out to call in the new development.
Krin stayed the overseer’s tentacle. “We can handle this with our own resources.”
“I think not,” growled Vngbrug, twisting free from Krin’s grip. “We call in backup. I demand it.”
A moment of deadly silence passed between the two. Krin’s tentacles writhed. “Your call, overseer.”
So did Krin contain his rage. The gurkuk was hovering on the border of becoming a serious nuisance, one that would have to be curtailed sooner rather than later.
* * *
For Yul, the roads quickly became dirt tracks through drab unwooded countryside. Weeds abounded in the makeshift, shallow ditches, crudely trenched. Dark and derelict buildings loomed behind steel fences on large, mostly deserted lots. A noisy, battered vehicle clattered closer and Yul quickly hopped the ditch and crouched in the weedy shadows. A flatbed truck carrying cylindrical objects, coils wrapped in clear plastic and rolls of packaged cables passed, spewing noxious fumes. An old hybrid vehicle. No other traffic came. The area was unnaturally quiet.
Namith’s moonless sky was dark but for a scattering of stars. Yul could see the lights of a fenced service yard ahead—should be Hresh’s, if the coordinate readings were accurate. Assorted vehicles were parked there: transp
ort trucks and low-backed pickups, the halogen glow of lamps reflecting off their sleek, gunmetal sides. Some were badly dented and others had odd-sized wheels, the rubber cracked on their edges. A front? He observed other buildings behind the main octagonal one with flat roofs. Large ones—he could not tell how far back they went in the murk. Possibly some underground operations going on there.
Yul checked his gear: his ion blaster AV9, his long bowie knife, circle-vision collar and mini camera, also a small pistol for good measure—more a trank gun with two settings, stun and full sting. It could prove fatal if it struck vitals. His weapon of choice was the ionblaster, minted 4035, loaded and locked.
He snapped the circle-vision about his neck, an extra set of electronic eyes, allowing Mathias to see what he saw in 360 degree vision. The edges rested on his collarbones, manifesting a light pressure. He pressed the ‘live’ button. A switch on the other side turned off video and allowed him to take stills of whatever was in range. He also checked the key code card Mathias had given him at the last minute. It seemed sound; if it tripped an alarm, things could get ugly. The circle-vision’s cam eyes were sending feeds back to Mathias in real-time so the bastard could see what was going on from all angles, provided the trans-light network was open, operating and active.
He tugged his black cap down over his brow and donned his night-vision glasses. He wore dark padding underneath a Kevlar vest, effective for grazing blasts and minimal force, but no deterrent for serious blasts. Nighttime insects chirped away, of which he took little notice. He scaled the wired fence, his army-issue clothing protecting him from any electric shock.
The patter of claws on tarmac alerted his ears. He turned to the baying of hounds. Crouching, he held his breath, lifted his trank gun as the first of the salivating beasts came charging at him. All fell in writhing heaps, then lay still. He walked over, nudged one with his toe. Its red tongue lolled from a fang-filled maw. They’d be out for 3-6 hours. Not enough time to raise suspicion. He hoped. Plenty of time for him to do his sleuthing and be back out over the fence before anyone detected his presence. Get in, get the footage, get out...
He crept up to the side entrance across the weed-cracked asphalt, casually inserting Mathias’s card in the reader. He’d be on camera, but with his black cap and dark glasses, the security system’s monitor would be hard-pressed to ID him. The door opened slowly inward. Yul slipped inside.
A twitching unease grew in his gut. Of bad things to come. It would be worse, he knew, to oppose Mathias.
He blinked in the half-lift corridor that gave way to a spacious depot. Nothing but old junk here. Sybcore was a company that prided itself in stocking ancient android parts for replacement parts. He smeared his cheeks with charcoal and moved forward on the balls of his feet. There was something distinctly sinister about Hresh’s warehouse. It had an unwholesome, abandoned feel. Eerie parts of ‘mekkies’, droids and bots of ages past, lurked in the gloom. The vacant, unanimated faces of the mekkies on display, or their complete lack of features chilled him. Whereas Mathias’s display at Tower 1 had been well-lit, systematically organized and tagged, Hresh’s depot was a hodgepodge of clutter, of machine parts and broken and dismantled mekkies, most not on display.
In their heyday they were collectively called mechnots. Later he knew them as ‘mekkies’. Would he be rightly classified as a ‘mekkie’? Yul shook his head. Why was he pondering such inane questions?
He crept forward, bridling his impatience.
So far nothing significant stood out. Whether it was lab, front or depot, Yul did not know, nor did he care. He just wanted this contrived indenture over. What did Mathias want him to find here? That wretched Biogron-thing encased in glass? The machine gave him the creeps. He shrugged, continued his reconnaissance.
The echo of booted feet brought him to a halt. A security guard on regular rounds? Yul glimpsed a solitary figure edge out of the shadows, extending a stun gun. Just some night watchman, he reassured himself, half asleep on the job. He could hear him mumbling about his ill luck at drawing the night shift.
Yul ducked into the shadows. Nothing he couldn’t handle. To get discovered this early in his recon wouldn’t pay. Get in, get out, take some video of this little adventure to show around Mathias’s coffee room gang—Goss and his ugly boxer face, the CEO, and the rest of the bloodsuckers.
He turned his attention back to the disorganized scatter. These bots looked very old—all old parts of models no longer in existence. Who would want to buy such trash? Why no new ones? What was this place used for? A conduit to some other hidden research lab?
Another sound caught his attention. He turned, raising his blaster.
A flitting, human-size feline shape moving on all fours skirted the shadows beyond the stacks. Christ, a live mechnobot? Surely not here?
He watched, waited.
Nothing.
If he took it out, security would be alerted.
Warily he advanced to investigate, his blaster clutched in a tight fist. The figure had pulled back into the gloom behind that large stack of robot parts.
He peered down the space between two rows of crates. Nothing there. He squinted in the gloom. If it had been real, it was gone. He hadn’t time to chase ghosts.
No new development of synthetics, no lab of any kind. Maybe he wasn’t looking in the right place? He had the itchy feeling this was an undermanned facility. A feeling that important events were happening elsewhere. But where?
There was nothing of interest ahead, just some trolleys and carts to transport cargo from the service bay’s double doors, now closed to this junk yard. Likely not the place Mathias wanted him to spy on, but there were several accesses, or tunnels at the back that led elsewhere, he assumed, to the outbuildings that he had glimpsed earlier in the darkness of the service yard.
Yul turned off his video and snapped only a few photos to spite the man. He knew these shots of broken, derelict bots would interest Mathias, keep the heat off him for now. The man seemed to get enough of a hard on over robotic parts as it was. Damn that bastard! He would feed Mathias his balls one of these days.
Shooting photos here was a waste of time.
He entered one of the tunnels, ducking below the grimy windows that overlooked the service yard to avoid being seen by a wandering sentry who might be prowling about.
The tunnel dipped like a ramp and the windows disappeared. He moved on down the dim-lit corridor, halogen lamps glowing every 20 feet, figuring he had descended quite far underground. At the passage’s end appeared another depot three times larger. Something of interest here: bundled canvas cargoes, steel crates, hundreds of stacked wooden boxes. He heard the whirr of front-end loaders and the scuffling and mutterings of men loading cargo aboard what he saw to be a ship.
A ship? It must have been there for some time, for he had seen or heard no ship land in the time it had taken him to get to the warehouse on foot.
The thump of running footfalls came at him from behind. He pressed himself flush to a box, in behind a compact forklift. Shit, trouble.
Just in time. A breathless man came running toward the loading crew, with his weapon raised.
“Security breach! You guys see anything?”
“Nothing.”
The guard frowned, tapping his monitor. “Could be an equipment failure. If you see anything—alert me asap. Keep your eyes open!”
“Yes, sirree, Eugene,” one of the men snorted amusedly. He flicked an exaggerated salute, noting the nameplate.
The security man’s lips twisted sourly. “Let’s make that commitment a little more serious, shall we, ‘Guido’?”
The worker shook his head, smirking, ducking back to his work. “Whatever you say, Eugene.”
His colleagues chuckled, resumed their crude talk and coarse banter which revolved around certain adventures at Dolly’s strip tavern at Paranith.
Yul quietly snapped more photos of crew and cargo. So, there was a ship in active range. Which meant that Mathias�
��s pics would arrive on his desk instantaneously across the light years, as would his circle-vision feed. The device would upload the digital info to Mathias’s computers, streaming along the light-drive highways.
Yul knelt carefully and using his knife, pried up a crate’s lid, slit open a wrapped package lying within. Aha! These were not old bits of junk as in the last section. New robot parts: gleaming limbs, pristine headpieces, faceplates, masks, perfected skulls, helmets, circuitry, modules, power packs. The circuit boards were packed neatly in cellophane, sawdust lining them for protection against jostling or impact. Ion power packs, bulging with Fe-Al boosters—here was enough evidence to pique Mathias’s interest. He turned his circle-vision back on.
Everything looked as it should for a robotics part distributor, but Yul felt in his marrow there was something not on the up-and-up about this place. Why use a junk storage depot as a front? Were such components illegal tech? Where were they taking them?
One last recon for that bastard Mathias: an exploration of the ship, then he’d make himself scarce.
Skirting crates, Yul looked up to see the gunmetal grey ship towering over him. He’d seen ships like this before, bulky, toad-like shapes of huge cargo-hauling capacity, older models which he couldn’t quite name.
Overhead, the ceiling ran up over a hundred feet. He needed to move fast and with caution. One quick run-through the ship and he’d quit this place. Nothing more of significance to see here. Too risky for in-depth reconnaissance. His cover was blown. There were the guard dogs patrolling the yard.