"Ok Pete, are you ready?" the colony manager asked.
"Yes sir, Mr. Manager."
"Ok then, let's do it!" the manager told him as he started for his office. Killer was waiting for him there.
It was the moment. Too much time and effort had been wasted of this piece of human trash. The alien weapons had to be found. Tower colony must posses them. This Killer fellow was just an impediment.
Unknown to Killer all of his aids at the mansion had been rounded up. He was alone and cut off from the outside world. If the manger acted quick enough he could have it all with hardly a drop of blood shed. The only one shedding any blood would be Killer. The dumb fool had never thought of that.
The manager stepped into his office and left the door open. Killer was rummaging through his books on the shelving unit behind the desk. The nerve of the man! The manager had spent years collecting those books.
"Please leave my books alone and sit down!"
Killer looked at the manager surprised and sat down before realizing he had done it. The manager's sudden show of authority had taken Killer off-guard.
"It's over! I want to know where the alien cache is and I want to know right now!"
Killer laughed. "You know I can't do that."
"I'm afraid you'll have to. Pete! Pete, come in here and take care of this!"
Instantly Pete appeared from the other room. As he came into the room he closed the door behind him and withdrew a gun with a silencer on it from his waistband. Killer froze in shock. Pete stood in front of Killer with his gun ready.
"You will lead us to the alien stash right now!" the colony manager informed Killer. "If you hesitate in the slightest my man has been instructed to shoot you. Now let's go!"
"Wait a minute! You can't do that my people..."
"Petowie!" the gun pronounced almost politely.
Pete had shot Killer in the knee. Killer grabbed the knee in disbelief. It hurt...and it kept hurting more and more. Killer's mouth was moving but the words wouldn't come out.
"I warned you. The time for games is over. Now if you don't make an attempt to get out of that chair you'll lose the other knee, then maybe an elbow, or a toe, or something else, now move!"
Killer started to hesitate. Pete took aim on the injured man's good knee. Killer was out of his chair in spite of the pain before he could be shot again.
"Good!" the manager congratulated Killer. "I have a wheel chair standing by with a nurse who will administer small doses of painkiller to ease the pain a little--so you may show us to your arsenal."
A wheelchair was wheeled in by a nurse who helped Killer into it. She quickly bound his knee and stuck a pad on it. Her charge was wheeled out to a waiting hover car and loaded up. There were six hover vehicles in all. One, a hover truck, held a detachment of police troopers. The vehicles took off and headed where Killer directed. He had been warned to not mislead the convoy.
Killer was glad to direct them to the machine. His dreams were over. All he wanted was to receive medical aid. The next day he might be dead or back in a sleeper's capsule but at that moment all he wanted was to have the pain stop.
***
When they all came back it was obvious that they had decided something. One by one the screens came back to life. The artificial faces all wore a smile on them. Jet stood up and motioned for Toni and me to stand as well. Honcho's screen lit up last.
"Please excuse the delay--friends. We wanted to be sure of ourselves. We were left with instructions from the creators on what to do in just about any situation, but not this one. They had not anticipated that this planet would be visited by aliens. We have been sitting here thinking that what they would want us to do would be to avoid contact. That was wrong. We want to be your friends.
"It does us no good to sit here and wait for a return that may never happen. It is wrong to sit and do nothing. We must start doing again. We want to join you. We want to be a part of your world. If you will allow us to join you, on an even footing, we will share what we have with you. We have the ability to manufacture great quantities of goods. We have transportation facilities that could unite the whole planet. We have weapons to help you win your war.
"Will you be our ambassadors? Will you make our connection with your world?"
"That's it? You accept us and now you want us to help you start in the world outside?" Toni asked. I didn't like the sound of her voice.
"You misunderstand. The reason you were brought here was not to decide if you met our standards--we wanted to know if there might be a place out there for us. If there wasn't then there would be no use for us to upset the status quo. It was obvious to us that we can help--and you, in turn, can help us."
"What do you want us to do to help you?"
"Let us be a part of what is going on. We are growing stagnant down here. We need the challenge or we will atrophy. Do you not feel that we can contribute anything?"
Toni was thinking. To me it was no contest. This culture added to ours would be the strongest that I could imagine.
"It's a deal!" Toni finally told them.
"Good! I think you will find our help useful."
***
He had passed out. It was a loss of blood and pain. It necessitated a short visit to the hospital in Tower city. Soon the doctors had him stabilized and conscious again. One of the doctors joined the group as they left the hospital with Killer directing the way.
***
In spite of the risk Ralph let first Dick then Mike see him--in a public place. Neither recognized him. It was simple: they had never seen him before, instead all they had ever seen was the uniform.
Perhaps that was what had made Cookie so special to Ralph, she had been able to look past the uniform and touch the real man. To be sure she had always held back. There was that little thing about one of them being a dweeb and the other a CB. That didn't matter to Ralph any more. If Cookie could forget that then he would too.
Ralph made a point of bumping into Sid and starting a conversation with him. It was easy. Sid was a likable enough guy. It surprised Ralph that he had never been able to see past the black the CBs wore. It was fair. They had never seen him and he had never really seen them. It was ridiculous. Ralph had wanted to get close to Sid to try to find out what had happened to Cookie and the closer he got the more he could see that Sid had nothing to do with her disappearance.
It was the same for Dick and Mike. They were just people--not serial killers. Ralph decided that he might as well pack up and go back to Old Tower. That was what the CBs were calling Tower city. He knew he was needed to be on standby. Things were destined to get pretty bad back there. The force could use him. He kept making plans to go back but they were always for the next day. Ralph found that he didn't want to leave. He wasn't sure why. Maybe because it would mean he was giving up the hope of ever seeing Cookie alive again. That was a hard pill for him to swallow...
***
We got back to the complex in good spirits despite the long, cold ride in the rail car. We planned on calling Killer and getting him to come out for us so we could tell him the good news. So much had happened. He had no idea about the others and all the supplies that they were willing to share with us. The war was over.
***
We had a surprise waiting for us. Jet had left the complex under the control of one of the computers while we were gone. When we got back we were surprised to find that all the lights were out and the complex looked like it was shut down.
"What's happened here?" Toni asked Jet.
"I don't know. Maybe the computer failed or there was an error in the program I wrote for it. You and Cookie stay here. I'll go see if I can get the lights working."
"Ok. If it takes very long come back down and get us so we won't worry about you, ok?"
"Good idea. It probably won't take but a minute or two."
She left and Toni and I were left standing on the platform beside the rail tracks. It kind of felt like when we had gone to visit Seventeen's complex. Little did we know...
Directly the lights came on and Toni and I found our way inside and up to where Jet was. She was highly agitated.
"What's the matter?" I asked her.
"Seventeen!"
"What do you mean, Jet?"
"I'm afraid Jet is upset that I have taken over her complex." I heard a familiar sing-song voice answer.
"Seventeen? Is that you? What are you doing here? You took Jet's complex? Why'd you do that?"
"Relax." the voice sang. "She relinquished control and I have taken it before any of the others could. She is upset now, but when she has had time to think on it she will see that it is for the best."
"I don't think I would!" Toni intoned harshly. "I'd whup your butt for taking something that wasn't yours!"
"It's not Jet's either and besides I don't have a butt. I have not done this out of spite. The complex was up for grabs the moment she abandoned it. She should be glad that it was I and not one of the others who got it. You and she are my guests. Please enjoy yourselves. Use the facilities for as long as you want and feel free to come back and enjoy it again and again. It is in beautiful shape, don't you agree?""
"A real steal!" Toni wisecracked.
***
It wasn't as bad as it seemed at first. With Jet leaving to go to the outside world with Toni and me the complex needed someone to watch after it. A plain computer would be fine for a few days or a week, but after that it really needed the attention and foresight that only a sentient computer or above could offer. It was for the best.
I won't say I liked the way Seventeen had snuck in while we had been away. I guess I should have suspected something when it hadn't been there for the meeting in Apex. I guess it just proved that these were real thinking machines. They even had the flaws. They could be sneaky, greedy, underhanded...
Suddenly there was a loud alarm sound.
"What's going on Jet?" I asked worried.
"How should I know--ask Seventeen!" she responded crossly.
"Intruder alert!" Seventeen sang.
"What kind of intruders? Where are they?"
"They have just opened up a door leading in from a cave."
"It's probably only Killer." Toni said. She meant it to be reassuring. Her voice belied the uncertainty that she felt inside. "He probably tried to contact us and couldn't, so he came to see why."
"Seventeen-" Jet addressed the take-over computer, "would you project on the wall here what camera #114 is picking up. Use the nearest droid. Please."
"Can't. I've got all the droids on stand-by mode down below. Go into the first compartment, I'll have it on the computer monitor screen there."
I ducked into the room. On the screen I saw a view of the outer entrance from a camera that was evidently located above the door in the cave. The camera was facing outward. There were a lot of people out there, there were a lot of guns, there were a lot of police uniforms. I swallowed nervously. If we were arrested then it would be either prison or execution.
I remember my eyes clouding up with tears. I'm not proud of that. At that moment I thought my life was over. I swallowed again. It was obvious that the men in the cave were waiting for the some of ther com padres who had gone on ahead. There were others already inside the complex hunting us down with ther guns ready to shoot.
"We've got to get back to the railcar--it's the only other way out!" I shrieked.
"Let's go!" Toni agreed.
I followed her back out into the hall. There were police already there. One of them pushed Toni to the floor. She landed on her back with her hands over her head. A gun was shoved in my face and I was slammed into the wall. I had my hands up. I remember thinking, "He won't shoot--yet!"
There was a disturbance beside me. Two of the policemen were trying to subdue Jet. "Jet! Don't move! Put your hands over your head! Do it or they'll kill you!" I shouted to her.
The gun in my face was placed under my chin and shoved hard. It hurt. "Shut up!" the cop behind it ordered. I got a glimpse of Jet. She was doing like I had told her and looked like she would be ok so I wasn't worried, about her.
I felt hands frisk me. I was ordered to put my hands behind me and turn around. I did and my hands were handcuffed. It was still very tense. "How many more of you are there?" the cop behind me wanted to know.
"Just us three." I told him. I wanted to make him and the others relax a little before something happened.
They had Toni, Jet, and myself lined up facing the wall when two or three more cops went on ahead to see what they could find. One of the cops behind us had a radio and was talking into it. He kept using all these codes so that we couldn't tell what he was saying. What else could he have said other than he had encountered three women and they were continuing the search? They were all so excited that the fact that Jet was an android, or at least that she had chrome-colored skin, didn't seem to bother them at all, in fact I don't think they had truly noticed it at that point.
I stood leaning up against that wall for what seemed like a long time. Every once in a while my jacket was grabbed or I was pushed. It was hopeless just like it had been back in the city. All I could do was wait until they decided what they were going to do with us.
Finally they decided that the area was 'secured' and they radioed that it was 'clear'. I looked over at Jet. She was obviously intrigued by the handcuffs she was wearing. Somehow that didn't surprise me much. It was all new to her. How had she put it on the railcar? Yea, an 'adventure'.
If one of us were to survive it would be her. Toni and I could end up dead or locked away for life, but Jet would be cajoled into sharing the secrets of the others. I suppose there was the outside chance that she could be dismantled so they could see what made her tick.
I began to cry. What good had it done us to try to improve our lot? The damned SOB's in charge had it under control. What gave them the right? The fact that they were more ruthless than the rest of us. Is that the way it is? The human race being led by the worst of us?
From what I had seen of Jet she wasn't so strong that she could break free of her chains or her metal skin so impenetrable that a bullet couldn't punch a hole in it. The three of us were lost. The others might find a way to defeat the dweebs but the three of us would be out of the picture before they could do anything.
I wouldn't give up. Giving up is dying and CBs don't give up--until after we are dead!
The whole book in zipfile format.
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