“Right.” A standard itinerary popped up into Adam’s virtual vision. “Damn, we’re going to have to be quick. They normally leave for Stakeout Canyon at noon. That gives the crews time to position the hypergliders in the evening and get clear while it’s still light.”
“We’ll manage it.”
Adam’s e-butler had pulled out several sections from the introduction now. He skimmed through them until he found the files on skill memory. The implant was done in a room off the side of the office. He opened the door and found what looked like the kind of waiting area you’d get in a modestly successful legal firm. The exception was the five comfortable leather couches arranged along the back wall, each with its own sophisticated array. A dark mold was starting to spread out of the edges of the slightly damp leather; the first living organism they’d seen since they arrived on the wet desert. He checked the power reserves on the arrays.
“I’ve found the skill memory implanters,” he told the others as he came back into the hangar.
Five of the hypergliders had been opened. Wilson was sitting in the cockpit of one, his hands resting on the console i-spots. Below and behind him the wing buds flexed as if something inside them wanted to be birthed.
“Well done,” Wilson said.
“Not quite. There’s a slight problem. The humidity back there is even worse than in here. It’s screwed up some of the array connections. I’m really only happy with one of the systems. You’ll have to go one at a time. I’ll settle Oscar in first.”
“Okay,” Wilson said.
Oscar’s stony expression was unreadable.
“How’s it going out here?” Adam asked.
“We’re running through the preflight checklists,” Oscar told Adam quietly. “So far all five seem operational.”
Anna walked past, hauling a thick superconductor cable that she plugged into a socket on the second hyperglider. “They’re going to need charging before we take them out. The secondary power supply is okay, but they can’t fly on that. We need the main cells charged; the electromuscle and plyplastic have a lot of work to do.”
“I think the town generator was in the first building we came past,” Adam said. “Oh, and we need to leave soonest. The drive to Stakeout Canyon from here normally takes a good six hours. Then we have to plant the tether anchors.”
Wilson stood up in the cockpit. “Let’s get on with it, then.”
“We need tether cables for the hypergliders as well,” Anna said. “They must be around here somewhere.”
“You two sort that out,” Adam said. “I’ll get Oscar up to speed on the joys of hypergliding.”
“There’s plenty to go around,” Anna said. She was grinning as she gestured around the hangar. “Fancy joining us?”
“Not at my age and weight, thank you.”
Wilson clambered down out of the cockpit. He zipped up the front of his fleece. “Keep an eye on the checklists for me, please.”
“Will do,” Adam promised.
Oscar looked along the row of couches in the rear room. One of them had its array activated; green LEDs were shining on the front of the unit. He gave a snort of disgust. “Water damage my ass!”
“We still need them to get the hyperglider ready for you.”
“This is wrong. The odds are completely against me getting up there intact.”
“So tell me which one of them is the Starflyer agent?”
“Oh, fuck.”
“Exactly. Lie back on the couch.”
Oscar did as he was told. He rested his wrists on the i-spots. “Interfaced,” he said.
Adam’s virtual vision confirmed the connection. He told his e-butler to initiate the program. Plyplastic cushioning flowed over Oscar’s wrists.
“The induction prep phase will last about a minute,” he said, reading from the menu. “Implantation is eight minutes.”
“And integrity review is another minute,” Oscar said. “Yes, thank you. I went through this enough times when I was with the CST exploratory division. The junk we needed to know for that…”
“Relax please,” Adam said dryly. He moved his virtual hands across the icons, initiating the induction preparation phase.
Oscar’s eyes were already closed. Now his face began a series of minute twitches to accompany the REM.
Adam went back into the hangar. Two of the hypergliders were still running through their checklists. No problems had been red-flagged.
He was peering into the cockpit of one when he heard a sound behind him. Lifted his head to see who it was. “Oh, couldn’t you—”
The slim harmonic blade was rammed into the base of his skull, angled perfectly to slice up into his brain.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The quantumbuster would not load into its launch tube. There was nothing Ozzie or the SIsubroutine could do to make the fat missile slide out of its magazine rack into the tube. Not one goddamn thing. He’d tried every trick he could think of. Forcing power into the electromuscle handling arms. That just made them spasm and flash up burnout overload warnings in his virtual vision. Getting the SIsubroutine to review the code for the whole magazine management program. Its analysis proved that the software was effective. Running diagnostic after diagnostic on the physical mechanism. The scrutiny showed every component was fully functional.
It still didn’t work.
Ozzie let out a furious snarl. There was a dark pressure inside his head that was growing with each passing hour. He’d never known frustration like it. To have got to this point only to be blocked by some kind of glitch was the kind of irony that only a truly badass god would practice.
There is a logical reason why this machine does not work; therefore I will find the fault.
When he looked around his virtual vision at the appallingly complex architecture of the launch mechanism all he could think to do was beat his virtual fists against it. His inability to concentrate wasn’t helped by lack of food. Two days now. He hadn’t slept much during that time, either.
There was an unexpected yet familiar rustling sound in the cabin that drew Ozzie’s attention back through the virtual structure. On the right-hand couch Mark was floating a couple of centimeters above the cushioning with his back toward Ozzie. The rustling came again.
“Yo, Mark what’s…Hey. Wait a goddamn minute! Is that CHOCOLATE?”
Mark rotated lazily, his cheeks bulging as he munched away contentedly. One hand held the torn and crumpled wrappings of a Cadbury’s milk chocolate bar. He peeled the purple foil away from the last four squares and popped them defiantly into his mouth.
“You bastard!” an outraged Ozzie yelled. “I’m like fucking starving here and you’ve had a secret supply of food all along.”
“Lunch box,” Mark mumbled through his clogged mouth. “Mine.”
“We’re in this together! Son of a bitch, where’s your humanity? The only thing I’ve had in the last two days is water. And we both know where that comes from.”
Mark finished the chocolate with a big swallow. “Oh, I’m sorry. Did you forget to steal sandwiches from the kindergarten before you kidnapped me on a hijacked starship?”
“This is my ship! I paid for half of it.”
“Fine, so just open the TD channel and explain that to Nigel Sheldon.”
Ozzie wanted to thump the arrays in front of him. “What the fuck were you in an earlier life, a lawyer?”
“You’ve killed me!” Mark bellowed back. “What in that twisted-up piece of wreckage you call a brain made you think I’d be grateful? Please, I’m interested. Do tell.”
“If you’d actually close your mouth and listen to me then maybe your low-achiever IQ could just get a handle on what I’m telling you.”
“At least I’ve got an IQ larger than my shoe size.”