Robot Blues (29 page)

The doctor glared
at him. “What are you trying to do?” he demanded, in between hacks. “Dislocate
my spine?” Choking, he turned to Tess. “Excuse me, ma’am.” lie jumped to his
feet, headed for a drinking fountain at the far end of the theater.

“Why don’t you
build a fake robot?” Harry asked. “Pull the old switcheroo.”

“We considered
trying to replicate the robot,” Tess answered, “but it’s just not possible.
Some of the materials metal alloys, for example—used in that ‘bot can’t be
re-created today. Harsch is intelligent. One look would tell him he’d been
double-crossed. As for the robot, NI intends to retrieve all the information
stored inside the ‘bot first, before you take it to Harsch. The information is
what’s most important. Not the robot itself. I have with me all the equipment
necessary to download ...”

She continued
talking, but Xris had stopped listening—to her, at least. Quong’s voice was in
Xris’s ear, coming over the commlink that was part of the cyborg’s inner
workings.

“She is not
telling us the truth, my friend. The robot would be worthless to the Corasians
and my guess is that she knows it. Even if the ‘bot is in working condition, it
would not be able to perform its function of laying space Lanes. Professor
Lasairion equipped all his ‘bots with fail-safe devices. Before the robot could
go ahead and lay a space Lane, the professor sent the robot a confirmation
signal. If it did not receive confirmation, it would not lay the Lane.”

“Uh-huh,” Xris
said aloud, as if talking to Tess. “Thanks. That clears a lot up.”

He could hear the
sound of Quong noisily gulping water. The doctor, his coughing fit eased,
returned to the stage.

So, reasoned Xris.
This whole scheme is a bait to trap Harsch. The Navy makes a big commotion over
this ‘bot, stirs up the political hornets, attracts Harsch’s attention. He
figures there’s something to this, sends in his agent, who confirms that this
robot must be highly valuable because the Navy is making such a fuss over
it—top-level security, all that. When, in fact, the blasted ‘bot couldn’t lay a
Lane if its life depended on it.

“As for killing
Harsch,” Tess was saying, “don’t waste your pity on him. He intends to sell a
Lane-laying robot to the Corasians. Can you imagine what that would mean? It
has always been difficult for the Corasians to mass their forces due to the
lack of space Lanes within their own galaxy. They would now have the capability
to lay Lanes wherever they wanted. They could send immense armadas to attack
us.

“Once here, the
Corasians could continue to build their own Lanes, travel unimpeded to any
portion of the galaxy. They could also disrupt our Lanes, making it difficult,
if not impossible, for the Navy to come to the defense of planets under attack.
The death and devastation would be incalculable.”

Tess was pale and
serious and earnest. And it was all a lie. You’re good, sister, Xris told her
silently. You’re real good. I wonder what else you’re not telling us.

“I know there are
rotten people in this galaxy,” Harry Luck was saying, “but I can’t imagine how
anyone could be twisted enough to work for the Corasians.”

“Money has a lot
to do with it,” Tess said. “But it’s more than that with Harsch. Or so we
think. He could make a fortune—hell, he cold make a hundred fortunes—by selling
the robot to any number of people in our own galaxy. Our people believe that he
has some sort of weird fascination with the Corasians.”

“Probably sexual,”
Raoul commented.

“Sex?” Harry
guffawed. “The Corasians are big blobs of molten lava—”

“Not technically.”
Quong, having returned from the drinking fountain, interrupted. “The Corasians
are actually a protoplasmic mass that is about ninety percent pure energy with
just enough fleshy matter to ensure that they can interact with the material
world.”

“So they’re not
lava,” Harry carried on, undeterred. “They’re fiery, flesh-eating blobs of goo
that haul themselves around in plastic cases. I don’t see anything so very sexy
about all that.”

“You have no
imagination,” Raoul stated loftily. His eyes grew dreamy, unfocused. “Think of
being consumed by flames, of tongues of fire licking your loins ... of the
sweet, terrible pain ...”

“That’s sick!”
Harry protested, disgusted.

Raoul gave a
delicate shrug. “As I said, you have no imagination.”

Jamil rubbed his
eyes, flexed his shoulders. “Could we get on with this? All I want to do is go
to bed and sleep for about twenty four hours.” Yawning, he shook his head to
cleat it, then hunched forward on his chair. “It seems to me that this is all
settled. We deliver the robot to Harsch. We get paid. That’s that.”

“Speaking of
payment, since the government now knows about this job, we’ll have to declare
it as income,” Tycho said in gloomy tones.

Xris eyed Tess. “I
don’t understand, Captain. Why don’t your own people deal with this? If this
robot’s so damn dangerous and so damn valuable, why didn’t
you
just
snatch it?”

Tess made no
answer. She merely smiled.

“Ah,” Xris said in
sudden understanding. “I interrupted something, didn’t I? Of course. You had
that raid on the barroom planned in advance. That was the diversion
you
were planning to use to sneak off base! Until I wandered onto the set. Worked
out great for you, didn’t it? You let me go pick up the robot. If I get caught,
I take the fall. You bat your innocent eyes, give a little horrified scream—”

“Cut the
self-pity,” Tess snapped. “You were operating on the edge, and you knew it. You
were happy enough to use
me
to get off base. You took off like you had a
missile up your ass when that diversion came down. You thought you were so
smart! Thought you were in control of the whole situation! If you could have
seen your face when you heard Jamil had left the base ...”

Xris took out a
twist, but he didn’t put it in his mouth. He held it in his hand, stared at it,
tapped it against the gold case. “Yeah, I guess I must’ve looked pretty funny
at that.”

In the silence, Xris
could hear the whir of the machinery that kept him alive. Everyone in the place
could hear it. Great acoustics, this theater.

Tess’s hand
touched his shoulder. His good shoulder. “Look, we both know that this is a
hell of a way to earn a living. But I think we’d both have to admit we enjoy
it.” Her hand slid gently around to his back. “And if it’s any comfort to your
poor bruised male ego, those kisses were on my own time. They weren’t
government-issue.”

Xris tried hard to
stay angry, but he couldn’t. What she said was absolutely true. She had used
him. He had used her. She had lied to him. He had lied to her. And he’d known
all along those kisses hadn’t been bought and paid for. He lifted his head,
looked up at her, and smiled.

“So we’ve managed
to prove that each of us is a sneaky, conniving liar and a cheat. Sounds like
the basis of a great relationship to me. Where do we go from here?”

“To bed,” Jamil
muttered, yawning again. “I meant to sleep,” he added.

“No imagination,”
said Raoul, sighing. Once again he regarded himself sadly in his mirror. “I,
for one, am going to have to find someplace to repair the damage.”

“Me, too,” said
Harry. “My plane’s a mess. I’ve got a broken front gear and number two engine
is out. Something flew off the tarmac, ripped up the turbines. Don’t the people
here know that FOD can ruin an engine?”

Harry was
incapable of being witty. Xris could only assume he was serious—which was even
more frightening.

“Well, Captain,
what are our orders?” Xris turned to Tess.

“Bring the robot
to me. I have the equipment needed to download the data. When that’s finished,
you fly off.”

Xris chewed on the
twist. “We’re taking a hot robot wired with explosives to a guy who turns
people into Corasian lunch meat.” He glanced around at the team. “Everyone got
their life insurance paid up?”

“Harsch won’t
figure it out,” Tess said firmly. “He couldn’t possibly. We’ve kept the lid on
this, tight. No one else knows about this robot. No one.”

Xris grunted. “Whatever
you say.”

He had another
problem to solve, and that was the disappearance of Darlene Rowan. He hoped
twenty-four hours would give him time to establish contact with her, make sure
she was all right. He turned to Raoul. “Mind if I come along? Watch you put on
your lipstick?”

Raoul was pleased,
flattered. “If you truly think you would enjoy it, Xris Cyborg. So few people
realize that it is an art form—”

The Little One
nudged his friend. Raoul’s eyelashes fluttered. “Oh. Yes, well.” He gazed at
Xris from beneath lowered lashes. “If you would accompany me to the little boys’
room ...”

Tess suddenly put
her hand to her ear. She listened a moment, said “Excuse me, gentlemen,” and
walked to the back part of the stage.

“Implanted
commlink,” said Harry knowingly.

“Gee, you’re a
scientific wonder today,” Xris remarked caustically.

He was watching
Tess. He didn’t like the way her shoulders slumped, the way she slowly lowered
her hand from the commlink implanted beneath her skin behind her ear, the way
she stood a moment, as if trying to sort out what to do next.

“Something’s gone
wrong,” said Jamil in an undertone.

“Surprise,
surprise. Look, next time you hear me say ‘This is the easiest job on record,’
just shoot me, will you?” Xris returned. “Point-blank. Through the heart. Get
it over with.”

Tess began to walk.
She was headed off the stage, moving rapidly.

The entire team
was on their feet.

Xris was the first
to catch up with her. He grabbed her elbow. “What gives, Captain? Where are you
off to in such a hurry? We’re on the same side, remember?”

Tess shook him
off, glared up at him. She was clearly furious. “Mag Force 7. And there’s only
six
of you. What a chump I am. Let go of me.”

Xris didn’t. “What
are you talking about?”

“Your number seven
just showed up.”

Xris silenced the
others—particularly Raoul—with a flashing glance.

“And,” Tess
continued, “he’s raising one hell of a row. He’s blabbing his head off about
the robot!”

And trust me not
at all or all in all.

Alfred, Lord Tennyson,
Idylls of the King,
“Merlin and
Vivien”

“Here goes my nap.”
Jamil groaned.

Tess fixed them
all with a grim stare. Her hand rested on her holster. “You want to tell me
what you’re up to?”

“I don’t know who
this guy is. He’s not one of ours. Maybe,” Xris said, “he’s one of
yours.
Maybe this is something
you’ve
cooked up for us?”

Tess flushed in
anger. She started to retort, caught herself, swallowed her words. After a
moment, she was calm again. “I suppose this is inevitable. We neither of us can
trust the other.”

She looked
narrowly at Xris, at the rest of the team. “You’re saying that this man isn’t
one of your team?”

“Yes, that’s what
I’m saying. Is he one of yours?”

“No, of course
not! But then who? . . . How? . . .” Tess sighed, put her hand to her forehead.
“I don’t believe this.”

“Maybe it’s
Harsch?” Jamil suggested. “Or one of his agents? Maybe he got suspicious,
decided to check things out himself.”

“That was the
first thing I considered,” Tess said, “but NI doesn’t think so. He calls
himself Jeffrey Grant. He flew to Pandor in a rent-a-plane. He requested clearance
to land. When that was refused, he said he had to see someone about the ‘old
robot.’ The Admiralty’s been monitoring all air traffic on this planet. They
stepped in at that point, ordered that Grant be allowed to land. He was
immediately taken into custody. He hasn’t been permitted to leave his plane. He’s
being held incommunicado at the airfield.”

“Harsch wouldn’t
be likely to broadcast the fact that he knows something about the robot,” Jamil
pointed out.

Tess was silent,
thinking. She glanced at Xris. “You’ve seen Harsch. Could you say for certain
whether or not this might be him?”

“I might not be
able to,” Xris said. “I saw Sakuta, remember? He may or may not have been
Harsch. But the Little One could. He could also tell if this guy is Harsch or
is working for Harsch.”

“And I’m supposed
to rely on what he says? Oh, very well. You and the hat come with me.”

“Sure,” Xris
answered. He rubbed the right side of his nose. “But what about the robot? I
don’t
think
anyone will bother it, not with all those biohazard warnings
decorating the crate’s exterior. But you never know—”

“Tycho and I could
go collect the robot,” Quong offered, picking up on the cue. “Our friend is
also decorated with biohazard warnings—so to speak.” He indicated Tycho’s
biochemical warfare patches.

“And it would be
consistent with my story that I suspected something was wrong with the crate,”
Xris said.

Tess was regarding
him with renewed suspicion. “You know, I might almost think you had this
planned.”

“Yeah, I’m a
genius,” Xris returned, shrugging. “I’m such a genius I get taken in by a
Corasian agent posing as a museum curator and an NI agent posing as a human.”

Tess contemplated
him a moment longer, then smiled a half smile. “The number-one rule for someone
in my business is don’t get personally involved—”

“—because you may
have to shoot the involvee,” Xris finished. “Yeah, I know. You’ve got a job to
do. And so do we. Why not let us do it? Quong and Tycho collect the robot. You
can send an armed escort with them if you want. Harry, you go make certain the
Claymore’s in shape to fly us out— What’s the matter, Harry?” Xris interrupted
himself. “You
do
remember where you left the bomber, don’t you?”