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facing what had once been the door. "Less messy."
Nathan Anger sent dust scattering up as he followed in the wake of his
robot partner. "Sunny's eager sometimes." He had his lazgun pointed
at Jake. "Call Bev Kendricks in here, will you?"
"There's no need." She entered from her bedroom, still wearing the
same clothes. "You've violated a whole stewpot of our rights already,
Nathan."
"It won't read that way in our report," the OCO agent assured her.
"Armed resistance," amplified the robot. "It sounds foolish, but you
two tried to shoot it out with us rather than answer a few routine
questions. Sad and a pity." He chuckled.
Bev ignored him and nodded at the agent. "In a few hours, Nathan, just
about all of the people you work for are going to be out of jobs and in
deep trouble. Killing us won't--"
"This isn't merely duty," said Sunny, moving a step nearer to
Jake. "There's a great deal of personal satisfaction involved." Jake
grinned. "Call him off, Nate," he advised. "I'm sorry, Jake, but this
is orders," said Anger. "Orders from who?"
"I suppose it won't hurt to tell you that Frank Dockert authorized
this."
"And Dockert gave the order to you directly?"
"Actually, Cardigan, he told me," said the robot. "I'm equally
important in this--"
"From what I've been hearing, Nate, this got of yours isn't any too
reliable," Jake told the agent. "Any further screwups and it's off to
the junkyard for Sunny."
"That's a damn lie!" The robot's voice rose.
"Are you even sure that Dockert gave any such order, Nate?
Sunny's goofy enough to make up the whole--"
"Shut up, Cardigan," shouted the robot, taking another step toward him.
"Shut your damn mouth!"
Jake shook his head, his grin widening. "Sunny, you're going to have
to learn not to interrupt when your betters are talking."
"Betters!" Making an angry, growling noise, the silvery robot came
charging at Jake.
Jake dropped to the floor, at the same time grabbing up the metal
chair.
He thrust the chair up as the mechanical man dove for him.
The legs of the chair hit the robot in the chest and, using the chair
as a lever, Jake sent him sailing across the room.
Sunny hit a window, hard. The glass cracked and he went flying clean
out of the room and into the smoky afternoon.
Anger started running toward the window.
But before he reached it, there was an enormous explosion from
outside.
Slowing, Anger moved carefully to the jagged gap and stared down.
"Sweet Jesus," he said very quietly, "they had him loaded with
explosives."
"Turned him into a kamikaze," said Jake, "to kill me."
"Yes, but.." but if he'd gone off in this room .... "The agent's gun
hand fell to his side and he suddenly sucked in a rasping breath. "I'd
have been killed too."
Jake said, "That's one hell of a retirement policy you guys have."
GOMZ WAS IN possession of very impressive and completely believable
credentials, which identified him as an ace reporter for CarNet News.
The guardbot at the press entrance to the Chattanooga Town Hall gave
him a cordial bow as he returned the ID packet. "Glad to have you with
us this evening, Mr. Silvera."
"I'm looking forward to a real treat." Smiling, Gomez tucked the
spurious identification materials inside his jacket.
The meeting hall was meant to seat six hundred people. There were over
a hundred media reporters inside the place already, overflowing the
press section.
Karla Maxfield caught Gomez's eye and waved at him.
He returned the wave, pushing his way through the growing crowd of
newspeople until he reached the row of seats where she was. "Buenas
noches," he said, halting in the aisle.
"Take a hike for yourself," suggested Norm, her bodyguard, who was
jammed into the seat next to her.
"Norman, dear, scoot," ordered Karla. "I want Gomez next to me."
"A mistake."
"Be that as it may--vacate."
Giving a snorting, head shaking sigh, the big black man rose. "Don't
try to paw the lady," he warned the detective.
"Tell her not to paw me," responded Gomez. "I'm the one who's
irresistible." He settled into the surrendered seat. "You passed the
word around that something was afoot, I notice,
"Without spilling too many details, I notified a few people that this
would be an interesting evening." She smiled, touching his hand. "Is
everything going as planned?"
"Arlo Harmon of Cyberwacky Services, Ltd." swears that all is going
well." Shoulders slightly hunched, he glanced around the hall.
The sound of shuffling feet and quiet conversations was drifting in
from the rear of the. hall as the doors opened to admit the
audience.
"What do they pay you at Cosmos?"
"About half what I'm truly worth." [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]