“Then you wouldn’t have much occasion to see me, would you?” She looked back at Whispr, her tone thoroughly professional. “Eric, don’t forget to take a double antiseptic shower tonight. I’m afraid some of those local cultures might have gotten on your skin.”
The science Meld spoke up uncertainly. “Cultures?”
“Yes.” She smiled pleasantly. “We’re working with some derivatives of local hederotoxin and the stuff can be hard to handle. You have to wash carefully when you’re finished working with the syringes because …”
“See you around some time, Red—maybe.” Clearly alarmed, the Natural stepped quickly out of her path. He and his friend resumed walking in the other direction—a bit faster than before, she thought.
“You’re learning,” a pleased Whispr told her softly. They continued on. A pair of women in mechanics’ outfits waved as they turned up another corridor. Ingrid smiled pleasantly and waved back.
“I’ve had a good teacher,” she told him.
The seemingly interminable subterranean passage continued to stretch out before them. With no end in sight she hoped as much as felt that they were still heading north. Occasionally a man, woman, or Meld would wave or smile in their direction. While Whispr continued to ignore all such acknowledgments of their presence, Ingrid’s confidence grew each time she returned a casual greeting.
Maybe we can pull this off, she began to think. Given such crowded and busy surroundings it was starting to seem possible that anyone who managed to penetrate this deep into the complex might pass unchallenged. As they had surmised earlier, external security was so tight at Nerens that it might readily be assumed anyone present truly belonged there.
She had become so relaxed that by the time they paused at another far less crowded pedestrian intersection she failed to react to the curious stare of the young woman who was walking in their direction. At first she thought the woman, who could not have been out of her mid-twenties, was a Natural. Only when the tech came closer did Ingrid notice that each individual strand of the woman’s shoulder-length black hair was in fact a prehensile manip. The technician had been melded so that when operating over a work bench, in addition to her hands she would also have the use of hundreds of long, thin tentacles controllable by thought training alone. By themselves feeble, when braided together the Medusa melds would allow the woman to manipulate fine scientific apparatus with the utmost precision.
“Excuse me, miss, but where are you going? You’re a long way from the clinic.”
As Ingrid hesitated, taken aback for the first time since she and her companion had exited the lift on this level, Whispr unobtrusively began to sidle to the woman’s left. If he could get behind her and get his hands around her neck before she divined his intent …
“Research.” Ingrid responded to the query with becoming swiftness. “We’re on our way to do some restricted research.”
Strands of her hair writhing like nematodes in Perrier, the younger woman frowned and gestured in the direction of Ingrid’s left breast. For a wild moment the doctor feared the tech had undergone some kind of bizarre X-ray meld that enabled her to locate the concealed capsule and the storage thread it held.
“I don’t see a clearance tag. Where’s your security glowp?”
Glowp … glow pin. Ingrid’s right hand reflexively reached toward her chest. Challenged thus a couple of months earlier she would have dissolved in panic. Time and experience had instructed as well as hardened her.
“Damn. Must’ve left it in my room.”
This wasn’t enough to satisfy her youthful interrogator. “Anyone cleared for Research is supposed to keep their security glowp fastened to their work apparel at all times … doctor.”
Queen to knight four, Ingrid thought. What she said was, “I just had this cleaned. Can’t you tell it’s just back from the Laundry?”
The young tech leaned forward slightly, studying. There was no denying the freshness of the older woman’s apparel. Still …
Before she could pursue the matter further Ingrid added, “I don’t need it because I’m not going inside Research. There’s a junior worker who’s recovering from a recent bout of non-acid dyspepsia and since I’m headed that way anyhow I told him I’d stop by and see how the medication I prescribed for him is working. He’s supposed to meet me outside Security. But you’re right,” she concluded apologetically. “I should have switched my glowp over to my new outfit before getting dressed this morning.”
“I understand.” To Ingrid’s and Whispr’s immense relief, the tech smiled. “I’d forget the obvious regularly if I didn’t make notes every night. This place is really conducive to daydreaming.” Then she did something so blessedly unexpected that Whispr was hard put to restrain himself. She nodded down the branching corridor. “After you’re done at Research you’d better go back to your quarters and pick up your tag or somebody else is sure to confront you, Dr.…?”
“MacGregor,” Ingrid told her without hesitating.
“Dr. MacGregor. Have a good day.” Leaning to one side she peered around Ingrid. “You too, sir.” Stepping past both of them she continued briskly on her way.
When speaking of Research, the tech had gestured toward the branching corridor. Inadvertently and unintentionally the guesswork had been removed from Ingrid and Whispr’s search. Moving with renewed energy they headed off in the indicated direction. Ingrid tried to hunch over slightly, wrinkling her physician’s coat so that the location of the nonexistent security tag would be less prominent. Because of her recent body maniping this proved difficult to do, but she tried nonetheless.
“So we know where we’re going.” Striding along beside her Whispr kept his voice down. “That still doesn’t get us inside.”
An increasingly confident Ingrid smiled sweetly at him. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. One bluff at a time.”
“Yeah. You did good back there. Real good. Ever think of working for a living by fronting for a riffler?”
“Like you, maybe?”
He raised both hands in mock alarm. “Hey, no chance! You’re too good for me.” In more ways than one, he thought dejectedly.
Pressure-relieving badinage was set aside and they lapsed into silence as they approached a doorway. It looked exactly like any number of similar portals they had passed on the long walk from the service lift. That is, Whispr mused appraisingly, if one disregarded the subtle gray surface sheen that indicated the barrier was made of military-grade composite and the three reinforced eight-centimeter-thick bolt-hinges that fastened it to the interior wall. Not your average door.
In addition there was a live human guard sitting behind a desk placed off to one side of the passageway. Dressed in the uniform of Nerens Security he wore a holstered sidearm and a look of boredom that bordered on the bucolic. At present he was staring at a box screen. The absence of a projection visible to anyone but himself suggested that he was enjoying entertainment of a private nature. Probably pornography, Ingrid decided as she and Whispr approached the threshold. Good: his thoughts would be elsewhere.
Her companion tapped her on the shoulder and she looked back the way they had come. Conversing animatedly among themselves, three men clad in nearly identical tech garb were coming up fast behind them. Like the guard, two were Naturals. The third sported a reddish beard and a full lab meld right down to his fingers, half of which had been replaced with advanced techrap. From the fabric above the hearts of all three flashed a softly pulsing glowp. Nodding imperceptibly at Whispr, she slowed her pace and feigned conversation.
“Well I think you’ve got it all wrong!” the youngest of the three technicians was insisting loudly. “Interleaved suspension is not the best way to manage a volatile blend!”
“Uh-huh.” Objecting vociferously the Meld wiggled the fingers of his right hand. Expensive biobond instrumentation gleamed in the light from the illuminating strips painted on surrounding walls and ceiling. “And what would you do? Manipulate them manually?”
“Depends on the composition.” Ingrid accompanied her unsolicited advice by smiling dazzlingly and inhaling deeply. Six pairs of unmelded eyes immediately shifted in her direction as she allowed herself to be swallowed up and surrounded like a female humpback suffering the courtship of a trio of smothering suitors. Had the techs had tails they would have wagged. None of them paid the slightest attention to Whispr as he fell in quietly behind the trio that had become a quartet.
“Really?” opined the third tech. “What would you suggest, Miss … uh, doctor …?”
As she improvised cheerfully while managing to say nothing, the Natural in the lead leaned forward so that a scanner set flush in the wall beside the door could read his retina pattern. Simultaneously, a second and completely different scanner located below it read the information on the tech’s glowp. From within the wall a soft buzz was followed by a loud click. Only when the door opened inward and the technician stepped through was Ingrid able to appreciate its thickness and solidity. Flanked by the other Natural and the Meld and still talking, she positioned herself carefully between them. Meanwhile Whispr, striving not to be too obvious about it, moved up as close behind her as he dared. Absently, the Meld put his own eye up to the retinal scanner and his glowp close to the lower reader. Hidden motors continued to hum softly and the vaultlike door stayed open. Beyond, another corridor loomed invitingly. Ingrid took a step forward.
“Just a moment, please.”
Everyone turned. Having risen from his seat and his screen, the seemingly semisomnolent guard confronted them from behind. Ignoring the three techs, his attention was focused squarely on the only woman in their midst.
“Your name, specialty, and purpose, please, miss?”
“Susan MacGregor, general physician. I’m here to check on a patient.” She flashed another award-winning smile. “He’s not contagious, if that’s what you’re concerned about.” She turned to go through the open doorway.
“Your pardon. I must ask you to wait here a moment.”
“Look,” she began sternly, “I don’t know what’s going on, but I have work to do and you’re holding me up. We can discuss whatever’s troubling you when I’ve seen my patient and I come out.”
The guard did not reply. There was a commotion up the corridor. It was caused by the increasingly loud pounding of heavy feet. Half a dozen armed men and women, including two heavyset weapons melds whose left limbs terminated in large-caliber automatic weapons, were hurrying toward the tantalizingly open doorway. Aghast, at least one of the formerly besotted technicians had moved as far away from Ingrid as the enclosing walls would permit. His companions merely looked stunned.
“I am sorry, miss, but in the absence of clarification I must place you under arrest.” Leaving her, the guard’s glance settled on her companion. “And for security purposes, your assistant as well.”
Ingrid launched into a bitter diatribe professing outrage. “I hope you’re as bored with your job as you seemed to be when you were sitting behind that desk,” she told him angrily, “because when your superiors hear about this you won’t have to worry about being bored there any longer! This embarrassment is not going to go unremarked upon if I have to personally contact company headquarters in Cape Town!” Having slowed to a halt, the armed and armored bodies of the quick-response security team now completely blocked the corridor behind her and Whispr.
If he was rattled by her indignation the guard did not show it. “I would recommend that you do that, miss.” His gaze dropped floor-ward. “While you are at it you might also explain why a company doctor and her assistant have chosen to go on duty pairing freshly cleaned clothes with remarkably dirty high-tech desert boots.…”
13
There were five of the intruders. Maybe, Kruger thought as he studied the sullen, defiant faces, they thought that would be enough to overpower the security at Nerens long enough to steal whatever it was they had come for.
First the trespassing floater and its crew that had been ambushed by magified meerkats. Now this. It was turning out to be an unusually busy month. Someone else might have found the dual intrusion diverting. Not Kruger. He liked things calm, quiet, and boring.
Two women, two men, and one hermaphro. All Melds. Specialists in killing, infiltration, demolition, penetration—and more killing. They had been picked up several kilometers from the installation. Having been informed of their presence a curious Kruger had observed their approach from the multiple vantage points provided by silent, near invisible drones that flew well above the altitudes utilized by more common commercial searchers.
It had been amusing. Watching them advance in fits and starts, covering their methodical approach with weapons drawn and ready to unleash narcotizing darts on any security personnel who might challenge them. Darts would make no noise and draw no attention. Oh, they had come well prepared, they had. The most likely scenario was that they had been air-dropped by a silent superfast floater.
Keeping them under constant surveillance and curious to see how they would proceed, he had pulled back his people and allowed them to enter the complex. There was often something useful to be learned from monitoring the activities of the unwary. Regrettably, in this instance the intruders had proved disappointingly predictable. Tiring of the game, once they were inside he’d had the section of corridor they had infiltrated closed off and filled with a fast-acting soporific gas. There had been no need to introduce anything fancy or expensive. One minute they were skulking along beside one another; the next they were passing out on top of one another.
Both of the men were quite large and muscular. The bands that bound their arms behind their backs and their legs and ankles together were fastened to the wall. This kept prisoners upright. It was by no means inhumane. If they wished they could relax by leaning against the smooth bare surface behind them. Otherwise their range of motion was circumscribed. One of the power loaders that worked the oceanfront diamond shelves might be capable of breaking such security bands. Mere flesh, blood, and bone, no matter how extensively maniped, could not.
The interrogation room was quite large, with a six-meter-high ceiling and four walls devoid of windows or decoration. Large floating digits marked the day and time. At one end there was a single door and a couple of chairs. Multiple vit pickups embedded in walls, ceiling, and floor recorded every millimeter of the chamber in very high resolution tridee.
Members of Kruger’s capable staff had methodically checked the captives for everything from concealed weapons to incendiary clothing to intestinal explosives until they were certain there was nothing left on their various persons capable of shooting, stabbing, cutting, poisoning, or exploding. What was left to answer his queries were four people of different shape and identical demeanor.
The hermaphro had bit down on a suicide capsule before Kruger’s people could get to him.
“Hello. My name is Het Kruger. I am the chief of security at this SAEC installation. You made an illegal entry into this facility and were caught. As you surely know, all travel into the Sperrgebeit is forbidden except to those who have been preauthorized by the relevant company department or Sanpark. None of you carry such authorization.” Smiling pleasantly, he held up his communicator. Its screen was blank and its projector remained dark. “If you were carrying such authorization, you would have knocked. Who, please, is second in command of your infiltrating group?”
“You’ll find out eventually anyway, I suppose.” A slender Tibetan woman whose maniped gunhands had been unloaded nodded toward the massive, heavily maniped Dayak occupying the far end of the lineup. “Sulok is in charge if anything happens to me.”
Kruger nodded and worked his communicator. From the ceiling a narrow openmouthed cylinder emerged. Emitting a soft pop, it disgorged an opaque yellow bubble the size of a watermelon. As the prisoners looked on, the bubble drifted slowly downward before angling to its right. Though the maniped Dayak fought and struggled with his bonds, he was secured to the wall behind him as effectively as
if he had been nailed to it.
Touching the side of his head the bubble hesitated, as if verifying its location. Then, despite the shouted protests of Sulok’s comrades and his own violent cursing, it englobed his skull. For a brief moment his furious features, slightly distorted, were visible through the engulfing yellow haze. Then the bubble ignited. This was followed by a great deal more screaming.
By the time the flames had burned themselves out there was nothing left of the man’s head. Seared carbon-black, the top of his spine stuck up and out from between his shoulders, smoking like an extinguished match. The fire had burned partway down into the chest cavity. Exhaust systems hummed as the interrogation room’s automated climate control worked hard to remove drifting ashes, soot—and the smell.
Kruger stood and waited patiently for the survivors to exhaust their rage. Their insults and threats and unpleasant descriptions of his ancestry affected him like a cold shower: bracing and cleansing. When they had finally run down he approached the diminutive Tibetan woman who had identified herself as their leader and halted a couple of meters away. Though the bindings securing her to the wall were unbreakable by any known organic force irrespective of meld, Kruger always prepared for the unexpected.
“You suckling yak bastard!” Evidently she was not quite finished. He raised one hand to his communicator. She stiffened and went quiet.
“Better,” he told her. With a slight nod he indicated the stillsmoking corpse hanging limp in its bonds at the far end of the lineup. “A necessary demonstration. To show that I have little patience with intruders. If you are curious, it involves a blend of aerogel and napalm. For the recalcitrant, it can be substituted for a meal. Acutely indigestible.” Holding the communicator up to his mouth he noted the fear the movement engendered in their expressions. Purely from a professional standpoint, he enjoyed the reaction.
“They’re ready, I think.”
Two figures entered the room: a man and a woman. The reaction of the three remaining prisoners to the appearance of the new arrivals was as varied as it was confused. Het Kruger was a type known to them: physically imposing, tough, lethal, completely self-controlled, and dedicated to his work. But this pair … the prisoners did not know what to make of them. They could console themselves with the knowledge that neither would anyone else.