Chapter Twenty-Three: The Decoy

Nurse Porter had worked the admissions department at the Terramount Hospital for two and a half years and in all that time nothing had prepared her for the last twenty-four hours. It began with the appearance of a loose robot carrying two barely conscious men like sacks of grain through her lobby, which then, upon reaching her desk, unceremoniously deposited its burden thereupon. The carrier then began a motor-mouthed spiel about their basic needs:

“Please pay close attention, ma’am, as I do not have time to repeat this. This man on your left is an unnamed security guard who has suffered extreme injuries to both hands as well as a severe blow to the head. Here,” the thing continued, producing a severed, blackened hand from a side compartment, “is one of his hands…”

“What…wait…hold on…who is…?” Nurse Porter blurted, eying the appendage.

“I apologize, ma’am, but I must continue. The man on your right is a criminal called Siggy who has been party to theft and attempted destruction of private property during the last hour. He has experienced a severe mental shock and is possibly in need of both medical and psychological help. Do you understand?” The operational light on the robot’s chest was blinking an agitated ostinato to its speech as Nurse Porter nodded in the affirmative. The bionic went on:

“The person responsible for these injuries has fled and will presumably try to escape from the city sometime soon. It is a female, Asiatic in appearance, with light gray hair, black clothing, approximately early 70’s, 110 pounds, armed and extremely dangerous. And now, ma’am, I must ask for a favor; I need to use your computer to locate someone. I have been separated from my owner and am afraid he is in mortal danger. I am prepared to commandeer your computer by force should you not wish to cooperate, but would much prefer to be given your permission. If you please…?”

Nurse Porter was already on a com channel summoning personnel to attend to the wounded men as she nervously nodded and motioned for the bionic to circle her desk and help itself. It attacked the keyboard of her computer with the individuated claw digits of its left hand, seemingly faster than the keys could relay the data. Several screen displays flashed by its vision sensors before it swiveled its head at the nurse.

“Thank you very much!” the thing told her, after which it sped around the desk and rolled off toward the exit, just as the orderlies appeared to deal with the patients.

That had happened about fifteen hours ago. But even before that, she recalled, the day had been somewhat unique. A number of admissions had involved bystanders from the vicinity of the Planetary Exchange building who’d come in with mostly minor injuries from the explosion that had taken place there. Then several security people had been checked in with second and third degree burns after a stolen government shuttle had blown up inside the Dome. It had been a busy day, but the robot’s arrival had been the harbinger of insanity for Nurse Porter.

There had been the news reports on the HV about the blasts, then the departure lockdown, then a scare about explosions outside the Dome, then more reports about big, monster-sized robots gobbling people up. Things only got worse as night came on. Emergency medical teams were called to the warehouse section to respond to an actual battle zone that had flared to life, followed by militia mobilizations, followed by dozens of casualties, more robots on the prowl, more injuries…and all this during Nurse Porter’s only double shift in the last six months!

Fortunately a couple of medical teams had been brought in from the nearest city, Floraville, along with its militia contingent, and the tide of new admissions had ebbed. Every off-duty nurse, doctor, orderly, volunteer and administrator had already been called in, and Nurse Porter was running on black coffee well into her third shift in a row.

She had just returned to admissions duty after assisting in the emergency center for the last four hours, when a familiar metallic form wheeled in the front door. The same robot—at least it appeared to be—this time carrying a single unconscious male in its piston-like arms, rolled through the lobby on its cushioned bearings toward her desk. This time Nurse Porter had the presence of mind to meet the bionic with a computerized wheelchair before the patient could be heaped on top of her paperwork.

“Long time no see,” she quipped as the robot seated the man on the chair, which automatically began bioscanning the patient and adjusting to his weight and state of consciousness. “I hope you have time to stick around, because the authorities are loaded with questions about the first two patients you brought in, and so am I. Where did you find this one, by the way?”

“I apologize for being so abrupt during my previous visit, ma’am,” the robot answered. “And I must also beg your forbearance on this occasion. This man’s name is Brian Chavez, a.k.a. “Chillio” Chavez, a resident of Terramount. I found him in what appears to be a catatonic state, as you now see him. I didn’t have the facilities to…”

“Wait just a minute, Mr. Robot!” Nurse Porter had had enough. “This hospital isn’t a drop-off center! I need some information on the people you choose to deposit here. What is your owner’s name? Are you with the police, or the militia, or what? Where did you find these people and under what circumstances? Who do you…”

“Thank you once again!” the robot said cheerfully as it pivoted and tore off toward the exit. Nurse Porter grabbed a sheaf of papers and waved them as she called after it.

“Blast you, come back here! Who the devil is going to sign… I’ll have you melted down if you don’t—”

But the maddening contraption was already out the door.

Nurse Porter held the stack of papers over her desk and let them drop in disgust. She rubbed her temples with both hands and regarded the unconscious Chillio Chavez.

“Might as well try to get information out of you.”

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Ansel Gunther sat on the edge of one of the observation lounge seats facing the one occupied by Tara Bechtel. He had insisted that he and Tara be permitted to speak privately before returning to his official responsibilities with the ambassador’s staff. It irked him that “Saint Thomas” was being such a gentleman in regard to Gunther’s dereliction of duty the past week. But it hardly surprised him. True to form, Ackberg was treating him as if he had no real worries about his “boy wonder.” Perversely, the graciousness with which the elderly man treated him made him feel less important, more of a non-entity than ever.

Soon, however, the ambassador and his entire diplomatic corps—in fact all of Generaton—would be offering him the respect that was his due. It was a disappointment, of course, that Claudio had seen fit to vanish like he did. Presumably something in Gunther’s behavior or his conversation with the robot had tipped it off as to his real purpose. But Claudio’s non-availability wasn’t an overwhelming problem. Whatever its reasons for leaving, Gunther knew enough to play his hand without the bionic’s testimony to back him up. As soon as the missing professors were located, he could begin making his move.

“Ansel, the last time we sat here talking,” Tara said, taking his hand, “we said some things about the ambassador…that were…”

“I’ve told you before the man is very persuasive. He excels at winning people over. I see that you’ve come under his spell.” Gunther’s eyes looked away toward where Ackberg sat with Lee Tsiang and the Shaws on the far side of the lounge.

“The things we said then,” Tara steered the discussion back, “I was afraid that you read some meaning into them—that you heard me saying I expected more…more from you. I thought about what we talked about; what you might have deduced from what I’d said.” Her hand went gently to his cheek and turned his head to face her.

Gunther blinked and looked at her. “So what were you saying?”

“Only that you are so talented. So insightful. That the ambassador is fortunate to have your help. He… He really does care about you, Ansel. I know he does; I’ve seen his face—his eyes—when he talked about you while you were missing.”

“Oh, I’m certain he became very choked up when his ‘pet’ ran away. People become very attached to their pets, Tara, Dear.”

“Could it be you only say that because you’re harboring some bitterness, Ansel? Think about it: has Ambassador Ackberg ever really done anything harmful or insensitive to you? Has he really ever claimed credit for your ideas?”

“It’s worse than that, Tara. Far worse. The man’s totally unaware of all I’ve done for him—and for Generaton—over the years. The contacts I’ve made, the steps I’ve taken to make our planet stand out. And now, with this mindless confederation deal that is about to happen, he and the governor are about to throw it all away.”

“You oppose the confederation plan?” Tara sounded incredulous.

“Only because it will waste so much that’s already been accomplished. To share Generaton’s prosperity with the whole sector, that will mean absorbing the other planets’ liabilities, don’t you see? It will mean slowing everything down, both for Generaton and for us.” Gunther shook and tightened his grip on Tara’s tiny hand to emphasize his words.

She looked down on their fingers as they intertwined, unsure of what to say. A future together with this young genius is what she had always wanted. The time they’d spent together had filled her with a sense of longing, acceptance, importance—giving her an opportunity to bask in the reflection of the greatness she saw in him. Only, now it seemed they were at cross-purposes.

“What was so vital about staying behind on Earth?” She’d finally decided to change the subject—give herself time to sort things out. “You said you had found out information about the Skinners, Ansel; is it anything that would give us a clue as to where they might be—where they might have been taken?”

Gunther’s face became impassive as he looked away. Was that why Claudio had disappeared—did it have some way of tracking its owner? “No,” he said. “It’s nothing like that, Tara. Be patient, my love; I’ll share everything with you when the time is right.” He looked back into her eyes. “For now, you’ll just have to trust me.”

For several moments, the couple just held hands and gazed at the starfield displays that surrounded the lounge. Then, realizing that the others were waiting for them to finish, both of them rose unanimously though reluctantly and moved toward the group of diplomats. Tara felt the weight of Ansel’s secret gnaw at her stomach and the thought flashed through her mind that she was holding hands with a stranger.

“Well!” Thomas Ackberg sighed with a smile as they approached. “I trust that your conversation straightened out whatever required attention, you two.” He and the rest of his entourage were on their feet, friendly faces all around. Obviously, the ambassador had urged them all to show Gunther the same grace and willingness to forget the past. As Ackberg and Tara exchanged looks, she felt a pang of guilt, fearing that her lover was still planning some kind of move that this kindly old man would disapprove of. She only hoped that …

Her datapad chimed and she grabbed it and spoke into the transmitter. It was Lt. Jerrold’s voice that sounded in her audio implants. “A message has just come through for you, Ma’am, from Cole Skinner. It was recorded about forty-five minutes ago.”

“Play it back, Lieutenant.” Tara tapped a contact to put the playback on a speaker for all to hear. Everyone leaned in to listen.

“This is Cole Skinner speaking. Vice-mayor Bechtel, this message is for you and Thomas Ackberg. By the time you hear it, my wife and I will have left Polkbridge. For the past five or six hours we’ve been held at an undisclosed location here on the Station. But we’ve been able to arrange a release and obtain passage to Generaton. Rest assured we are all right and will be in touch with Ambassador Ackberg when he returns to Terramount. We hope he will join us there soon. Thomas, we are also hoping to make contact with my Uncle Urbec while we are there. Sorry for the brevity of this message but we were convinced that it was best for us to leave immediately and without needless fanfare. Please relay our thanks to everyone who has been concerned with our safety and trying to locate us. End of message.”

Everybody began to chatter and express their relief at once, so that Tara had a hard time cutting through the noise to return to Jerrold. “How was this received and by whom, Lieutenant? Were you able to trace it?”

“There was a handwritten note, Ma’am, delivered by a teenage boy to Security Center 12. The boy told the OIC that an older gentleman handed him the message and paid him some money to drop it off at the nearest security office. The note instructed the receiver to access a voice mail account and gave the frequency code. We’ve been able to trace the message to the com station where it was recorded, near the North Bay service lifts. I have a team checking on outbound ships to see if the Skinners were aboard one.”

“Excellent,” Tara replied. We’re on our way to the North End now. Keep me apprised, Lieutenant.” She switched off the device and motioned for the others to join her as she began trotting across the lounge toward the hover-shuttle that had brought them there after they’d all rendezvoused with Gunther at the Mayor’s office. With his long, purposeful strides, Ackberg kept pace with her while the others hurried to catch up.

“No mention of who it was that held them all these hours or where they were—that’s rather curious, isn’t it?” the ambassador wondered aloud.

“You know the two of them far better than I do, Ambassador,” Tara said, stashing her datapad in the bag slung over her shoulder. “Maybe there was a good reason for omitting those facts, maybe not; the message sounded as if they were in a big hurry.”

“It also was clear that Cole wished me to follow him to Generaton,” Ackberg added, “although I hate to leave when the mystery of their kidnapping still hasn’t been solved.” He twisted his head toward his fellow diplomats as he entered the shuttle. “What do you all think? Should we stay together—return as a group?”

Lee Tsiang spoke up. “I’m going wherever you are, Thomas. With people getting abducted like this, I refuse to let you venture anywhere alone. Besides, things on our planet look fairly serious and my brother probably could use our support right now.” Frankford and Valerie Shaw were nodding in agreement.

“What about you, Ansel?” Ackberg asked the young attaché. There was no trace of reluctance or sarcasm in his voice. Gunther blinked into the old, bleary, forgiving eyes and almost regretted the worry he’d caused this grandfatherly gentleman. Almost.

“Let’s make it unanimous, Ambassador,” he said with a sheepish smile.

The hover-shuttle’s repulsers revved to life and the group’s driver sped them toward the North Bays. Tara eyed Ansel timidly, replaying their conversation in her mind. His eyes were watching the passing station-scape, and she wondered if he was purposely avoiding her gaze. She wondered what it was he knew about the Skinners.

-----------------------

Bru and Pearl waited on the stoop of Bogie Grayson’s condo for Papa to come and let them in. They’d been waiting for several minutes and Bru began to wonder if the old-timer had suffered some kind of relapse following his abduction, drugging and rescue experiences of the previous couple of days.

Two militia were standing guard in front of the house: one of them, a stocky gent named Paco, cradling his blast-rifle next to the air-jeep Branchwater had finally agreed to assign them; the second one, Faunea, covering the street with a lanky-legged, nervous pacing motion that made Bru edgy and distracted. He decided to quit watching her and check out the front windows for signs of movement inside. He could make out nothing positive through the transluscent curtains.

“Try the com channel again,” suggested Pearl Lasham. “Maybe he fell asleep while we were getting here.” Bru tapped the resend button and heard the soft chiming in his implants.

“You’d think he’d be waiting and eager to…”

But just then the door lock clicked. Bru wanted to reach out and try the handle again, but he didn’t. He waited some more. Pearl looked at him questioningly. He held up a hand toward her. Something felt wrong.

He waved a hand beckoningly toward Paco at the ‘jeep. The soldier nodded with a frown and hurried over and whispered, “Trouble?”

“I dunno. Just have your gun handy, that’s all.” Paco raised it to the ready and crouched a little as Bru knocked lightly. “Papa? Are you there, fella?”

Slowly the door swung inward. Papa Poole stood in the diffuse, dawn light of the orbiting Fusion Sats, blinking and squinting, clothed only in his disheveled underwear, running his bony fingers through thick gray hair. He was obviously shaky on his feet, and Pearl’s mothering instincts began propelling her forward. Bru, however, laid a hand quickly and gently on her shoulder, holding her back. “Wait one second.”

Pearl stepped back again with a scowl of annoyance. “Are you crazy? Wait for what? Look at him, Bru, the man needs help.”

“He doesn’t look right.”

“I know he doesn’t. Let me…”

“In a minute. I’m just being careful, just making sure.” Bru was looking for signs that Papa was coherent—that he knew who was at the door. He waited for the old man’s vision to adapt and focus on them. It was taking too long. Something was wrong.

“Papa,” he called gently but firmly, “it’s Bru. It’s Captain Copetski. Do you know me? Can you come out here to me?”

“Bru…” Papa’s voice was nearly inaudible, like it was borne on the wind from a distance. “Bru…Have to tell you…”

“What is it, Papa?” Bru felt his spine tingling as the man before him began to tremble as if being shaken by the strings of a puppeteer.

“Tell you…” The barkeeper’s eyes began to fill with tears. “Tell Maggie… Tell her I love…her.”

Bru heard a muttered curse somewhere inside the condo. He felt a sickening kind of panic as he leapt at Pearl and the militiaman, knocking both of them off the stoop onto the carefully manicured shrubbery.

The blaster bolt erupted from behind the old man, practically vaporizing his midsection and filling the immediate atmosphere with hotly charged particles of charred flesh. Two massive beast-robots emerged from their hiding places at the rear of the building. Somebody smashed an upper-story window and began blazing away with a second pulser as the two militia fighters began returning fire.

Bru held Pearl tightly in his arms as they both tried to find cover under the shrubs. They had no weapons—Bru’s gear had been left in the ‘jeep. Papa was their decoy, he thought grimly. Their bait. And because I didn’t take it, now he’s dead.

He loosened his grip on the mayor and they twisted behind the bushes to try getting a better view of what was happening. Both Faunea and Paco had been able to activate their full-cover shields which gave them a modicum of protection from the fiery onslaught from the upper window and the beast-bots which had already begun using their own onboard pulsers. Paco had immediately fallen back to the ‘jeep, while Faunea, with her quicker, more agile movements, dodged, rolled and sprinted back and forth to avoid the enemy bursts, obviously trying to confuse the attackers and give her partner time to deploy some more heavy-duty weaponry.

Bru’s searing regret about losing his longtime friend in this skirmish was quickly pushed behind him as he recognized a familiar form that emerged from the front door with a bulky, deadly looking blast launcher in its hands. It was Parker. Apparently the assailant taking shots from the window was his partner Jacques. Bru felt a fierce, murderous hatred boil up inside him as Parker’s ugly profile came into view. A bloodlust that demanded vengeance. Apparently, Pearl could interpret his expression because her hand was suddenly on his elbow as they both were crushing themselves back against the walls of the building to keep out of sight.

So it was Parker who had blasted Papa Poole—disposed of him like he was just so much garbage to be incinerated. “You know him?” Pearl whispered in Bru’s ear as the angry SPAID pilot knocked the back of his head against the wall in frustration.

“It’s them,” he replied, though she could not quite make it out under the cracking and thundering of the energy bolts being unleashed around them. “It’s the two kidnappers we followed here.”

Parker was bellowing something into a wrist com-link that Bru had trouble deciphering. Obviously it was an instruction to the other attackers that they should change the concentration of fire to the ‘jeep rather than the soldiers. Parker and Jacques and the two robots shifted their aim at the vehicle and it began to rock and buck with the impact of the fusillade against its armor plating. Without ray shielding, Bru realized, that plating wouldn’t last very long against a barrage from four pulse blasters.

Apparently, Paco was still inside the ‘jeep, arming some formidable piece of equipment Bru didn’t know about. Faunea had planted herself behind a large, decorative boulder out at the curb, using it as cover while she lobbed in pulser rounds and an occasional grenade at one of the robots. Bru found himself hoping she would toss one at Parker there on the stoop, but knew that the soldier was likely trying to avoid harming him and Mayor Lasham if she could.

“Bru, I activated the emergency beacon the commander gave me before we left.” Bru looked at her and blinked his eyes in gratitude. Hopefully, reinforcements would be arriving before they or one of their protectors got blown away.

Whether it was due to their weapons needing recharging or what, there was suddenly a lull in both directions of the battle. And into that strange silence a distant sound of heavy, rolling wheels materialized. Bru poked his head above the top of the shrubs to get a better view up and down the boulevard in front of the condo. What he saw made his heart sink.

A third beast-robot, looking even larger and more menacing than the first two, was rounding the corner, rearing up, and beginning to take aim.

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