Haywire, page 12
Smiling, Alicia reached out to her son. The armor melted back from his face, and she was thankful that – for the moment at least – he still looked the same. The same blue eyes, the same dimpled cheeks, the same thin lips. In him she saw herself, but she wondered for how long.
“I know. Now get in the back. We have to go. Just make sure you don’t touch her, okay? Stay as far on the other side as you can, and I’ll make sure not to hit any big bumps.”
Shawn laughed silently, then entered the truck bed and pulled the cargo door down after him. When it closed with a loud clank, Alicia flinched. She felt like her nightmare was only beginning.
Chapter Eleven
Alex’s worry increased by the second, and he didn’t like it. He wasn’t a worrier by nature, and the feeling suited him like a jacket two sizes too small. His fingers drummed out a staccato beat on his desktop. The coffee maker to his right beeped loudly, telling the entire building his third pot had completely its brewing cycle, but he didn’t go to it or even look in its direction. He just kept tapping his desk and glancing at the clock on his computer monitor.
“You seem agitated, Alex,” his AI assistant said. “Is something wrong?”
He wasn’t sure how to answer that, which irritated him even more. “I don’t know, Isabel. I… Dammit, why hasn’t Alicia called?”
“Her assistant said–”
A loud grunt pushed past Alex’s lips. “If she’s at the museum working, then she has access to phones, including her own. She can’t be so busy that she couldn’t spare a few seconds to return my call, especially since we’re supposed to meet up for lunch in half an hour. No, something… I don’t know. I’ve got a bad feeling.”
“Perhaps you should pour that pot of coffee down the drain,” Isabel said, the tone of her electronic voice reminding him of his mother – prim and mildly disapproving. “All that caffeine can’t be good for your mood.”
Alex wanted to toss back a flippant remark, but the boulder of worry sitting on his chest ruined his sense of humor. Instead he sighed and said, “You might be right. Do me a favor and call her office. Maybe now’s a better time to–”
“Alex, I’m registering an alarm at the Groesbeck Museum,” Isabel said, cutting him off.
Blood drained from his face as his anxieties suddenly became reality. “Contact Lieutenant Ritchie at the Arcadia Security Police. His–”
“He’s already calling you.”
“Patch him through then.”
A few seconds passed in silence before the sound of rushed breathing and distant alarms filled the office.
“Agent Delgado!” Lieutenant Ritchie said. “I assume you’ve been alerted?”
Alex nodded, though no one was around to see it. “It just came through. What do you know?”
“Nothing yet.” Ritchie’s words were said through heavy breathing, like he was running. “We’re attempting to contact the museum, but so far no one’s answering, and no one’s called us. All we got was the automated alarm system. Our lines are open though. How do you want to handle this, Agent? It’s a federal site, so it’s your call.”
The lieutenant was absolutely correct. “Have all available officers converge on the museum, but don’t engage unless you see an immediate threat. I’m heading out now.”
“Will do, Agent,” Ritchie replied. “If I hear anything more, I’ll let you know.”
“Same here. See you shortly.”
The comm line closed as Alex stood up from his chair.
“I’ve signaled the rail office and have a tram waiting on standby,” Isabel said. “I will continue to try and contact Dr. Campbell and the museum. If anyone answers I’ll patch it through to your comm.”
Alex pressed his thumb on the scanner plate of his office locker, and when it opened he pulled out a black biosuit and helmet collar. Most biosuits were thin and light, but his was designed with fighting bad guys in mind, so the carbon fiber surface was bolstered by an ablative layer of strategically placed titanium plates. The thick metal collar chafed his neck, but considering it contained a helmet that could unfold and surround his head at a moment’s notice to keep him safe in a sudden vacuum, he tried not to complain. His badge was secured in a clear pocket on his chest that allowed everyone to see it, and his gun was holstered at his hip. A comm then went around his ear, and into the pockets of his pants went a scanner and a computer pad.
“Thanks, Isabel. I hate to say I knew something was wrong, but dammit… I’ll keep in touch.”
As the door closed behind him, his computer display filled with phone lines that were dialed over and over again. Isabel called out into the darkness, and he desperately hoped someone called back.
“You don’t look so good, Cap’n,” Crowe said as he and Gimble walked on either side of Laroux and tried to find their way out of the museum.
Looking over, Gimble had to agree with his crewmate’s assessment. Captain Laroux didn’t look well at all. His face was pale, dried blood caked the back of his head, wound sealant sat on his chest like a fluffy white carnation, and more than once he faltered and had to be helped back to his feet. Gimble didn’t know what exactly had gone on down in that hidden place, but it certainly hadn’t gone according to plan.
“I’m well enough to kill the likes of you two,” Laroux said, rubbing his chest around the sealant. “Now get me out of here.”
His threats would’ve had more menace to them if he didn’t wobble while saying them, but Laroux was still the captain, so Gimble flapped his head up and down in acknowledgment of the order and helped the captain along.
The museum was in chaos. Flashing alarms and ear-splitting sirens had everyone scurrying for the exits. People ran, doors banged, and in the midst of it the three pirates in stolen uniforms didn’t garner more than a few looks.
“Shouldn’t we be taking the delivery rover out of here?” Crowe asked as his bulging eyes cast hither and yon.
Gimble looked around to get his bearings, but it quickly dawned on him that he had no idea where they were. Getting distance between themselves and the Titan had been their primary concern, so all he’d done was run.
“Um,” he said, “I think we… Yes… Um…”
“We’re lost,” Laroux said before fetching up a sigh that rattled in his throat like an engine on a cracked mount. “You imbéciles. Listen, follow the people. They are heading somewhere, and that somewhere most likely has transportation.”
Gimble cocked his head like a dog listening for rodents in the brush until he figured out where the greatest concentration of sound was. Several hallways later they stumbled out of a door and were nearly crushed beneath a stream of people scrambling for the front doors.
“Not so hard now was it?” Laroux asked. “Keep going.”
Merging into the crowd was easier than Gimble thought it would be, but getting through the doors was another matter. He was close to pulling out his gun when they finally squeezed through the opening and were spat out the other side.
“The tram is out of the question,” Laroux said, the pale sheen of his face like sweating wax. “Too many cameras and scanners. Look for any rovers that might be about.”
Gimble looked the crowd over, but it was Crowe who found their marks.
“Oy, they look like easy pickings,” the gangly pirate said as he pointed at a rotund man and woman clinging to each other like grim death as they waddled away from the museum.
“Then let’s go,” Laroux said.
Most of the museum visitors came via the tram that ran from Arcadia, but a few used rovers so that they could traverse the moon freely, either on their own or as part of a tour, so there were half a dozen vehicles parked in front of the museum. Their targets were shuffling quickly toward a rover on the far right side of the lot. Rental agency signs were plastered across it. Together the pirates hustled to catch up.
“Would ya be so kind as to lend us some assistance?” Gimble asked when they were within a few meters of the couple and their rover. He had to raise his voice to be heard over the museum alarms.
The couple, already in a heightened state of alarm, jumped. The eyes they turned on the disguised pirates were round as bone china saucers and just as white.
“What’s that?” the large man replied.
“We are in need of aid,” Crowe said. “Our… colleague… has been hurt, you see, and we were hoping you might help us get him to a hospital.”
The man’s wife, her girth equal to his own, shook her head so hard her chubby cheeks jiggled. “Oh, dear, I don’t think we should–”
Two shots rang out, and Gimble turned to see Laroux holding both his guns in steady grips. He looked pale as starlight, but his aim was unflinching. The sound of falling bodies followed a second later. Behind them no one seemed to have noticed the shots over the ringing alarms and their own anxious running.
“The conversation was growing tiresome,” Laroux said as he leaned against the rover’s rear passenger door. “Let’s go, and quickly.”
“Right, Captain.” Gimble swallowed a lump in his throat as he rolled the old man over and took the rover’s keycard from his limp hand. Shooting at pirate hunters was one thing, but killing two gray-hairs just to hurry things along didn’t sit well with him. He’d made peace with his criminal nature long ago, but there were some lines he didn’t like to cross, and slaughtering innocent elderly people was one of them. A bitter flavor coated the back of his throat as he slipped the keycard in the driver’s side door slot and opened it. Everyone opened their doors and got in seconds later.
“So then we’re to get you back to the Dieu Le Veut, Captain?” Crowe asked. “And then back to Puerto de la Sombra?”
Laroux groaned as he settled on the rear seat and leaned back. “Oui, but the hunt is still on. They might have slipped our grasp, but that doesn’t mean they’ve slipped their leash. I’ll have them yet.”
Gimble had no idea what Laroux was talking about, but he was humbled by the captain’s tenacity and was reminded all over again why he had taken command of the Crimson Kings after Captain Voorhees’s death. Laroux was as smart as he was vicious, and Gimble didn’t envy anyone who got caught in his crosshairs.
Shawn hadn’t known he’d passed out until he woke up in the enclosed bed of the delivery rover as it bounced over icy rocks. Every millimeter of his body throbbed in dull pain, and his brain felt like an animal trudging through mud. When he reached to rub his eyes he was shocked to see his hand encased in a dark metal gauntlet, but a gauntlet that felt like an extension of his own skin. In a rapid series of flashes everything came back to him: breakfast, the pirates, the Titan, the journey down to the hidden lab, the canister, the gunshot, and the pain. The pain most of all. His shoulders shuddered as it echoed through him.
He took a deep breath and closed his eyes to calm himself. When he reopened them he looked at his other hand. It was clad in the same dark hued metal. When he surveyed the rest of his body he found that the armor extended up his arms and down his legs in overlapping plate-like segments that mimicked his musculature. When he moved they shifted against each other, but it wasn’t unpleasant or awkward. Not in the slightest. Beneath the pain he felt strong and powerful.
“It really happened,” he said in a croaked whisper.
The rover shuddered to a stop. Glancing to his right he saw his mother looking back at him through a portal set in the wall between the bed and the driving cab. “Shawn, you’re awake! Oh thank God. You had me so worried!”
He wanted to laugh, but the absurdity of what was happening stopped him. Instead he pushed against the bed so that he could sit up. His hand dented the steel floor. “I’m fine, Mom. This is all just… a bit much.”
Artemis, who sat on the other side of the truck bed, had covered her armor in a bulky spacesuit that made her look like she was wrapped in marshmallows. Though it was decades out of fashion, it was probably the only thing large enough to cover her bulk and hide what she was. He could still see the shadow of her infection in his enhanced vision, but it was diminished, the threat lessened by the spacesuit’s immensity.
“You’re gonna be pretty sore and tired for awhile,” the Titan said. “The nanites are still integrating themselves into your body. Once they’re done you’ll have energy and stamina you never knew was possible, but until then rest as much as you can.”
“I… I will. Where are we going?”
His mother turned back and reengaged the rover’s engine. “We’re heading to the spaceport, and from there we’re going to Mars.”
A heavy thud struck Shawn’s heart at the thought of going home. “Mars?”
Artemis held up the data tablet his mother had taken from her office. On it blueprints flashed by in a steady stream of grids and schematics. “I compared the data I have on all of Groesbeck’s known facilities against what your mom has, and only one of them had differences – the one we just came from. That means the rest have been fully searched and cataloged already. Nothing there for us. But, according to chatter she recently heard on the scholarly grapevine, a secret lab of his was uncovered on Mars a short time ago, and the person overseeing the site is a former colleague of hers. Even better, it’s in the nethers of Bellona.”
“The nethers?” Shawn said, taken aback. “That’s crazy. Why would Groesbeck set up shop in that hell hole?”
His mother half turned and spoke over her shoulder. “Because he needed access to supplies and transportation, but he couldn’t be too close to them either. The nethers would have given him that, along with anonymity. He could have easily setup a lab down there without any authority noticing, coming and going with impunity. If Groesbeck was going to hide Titan research anywhere, that would be the perfect place, and I think I can use my friendship with Sheldon to gain access to it.”
Shawn was impressed. He’d never thought of his mother as the detective type. Probably one of the many changes her federal agent boyfriend had helped foster in her. He opened his mouth to say as much, but suddenly his vision swam with floating numbers and letters, information he didn’t need or want. He shook his head violently, and after a couple of seconds most of it disappeared. Fighting down a wave of nausea, he leaned back and said, “Alright, sounds like a plan.”
“In order to get to Mars, though,” his mother continued, “we can’t take regular passenger spacecraft. Neither of you would make it past the first security checkpoint, and even if you could we don’t have any kind of legal travel documents on us, so instead we’re going to the commercial port on the west side of Arcadia to see about taking a freighter out.”
A laugh rumbled in Shawn’s unsettled stomach. He pressed a hand against his forehead and gritted his teeth through a fresh wave of queasiness. “We’re gonna ride hobo, huh?”
“We don’t have a choice. The only way we can get off Callisto is if we hitch a ride with a cargo hauler who needs money more than he needs proper documentation.”
“And which of us is going to negotiate this joy ride?” he asked, his insides finally settling a bit. “I don’t know about you two, but the closest I’ve come is begging a friend for a lift.”
His mother laughed and nodded. “I’ll be handling that. I wasn’t always a mother and museum director, you know, and your father wasn’t always a doctor. We were both young and broke once, and when college kids need to be somewhere on the cheap they take the rides they can get. I’m not proud of it, but I’ve hitched a ride or two in my time. I’ll get us to Mars.”
Shawn smiled at the idea of his parents hitchhiking around the solar system. It was an image that didn’t jibe at all with the people he’d grown up knowing, especially his mother. He smiled even more as the ever-present pain coursing through his chest and head diminished further.
Hoping he was beginning to recover, Shawn looked down at his body. Even though metal covered him from the neck down, he felt like he was naked. He wiggled his fingers, and they moved with enough ease that he didn’t doubt he could still play his guitar if he wanted to. As he looked at his right hand he remembered the talon that had sprung from Artemis’s finger, and the thought had barely formed in his mind before the metal along his fingers liquefied and reshaped itself into pointed claws in less than a heartbeat.
“Whoa!” he said, his heart pounding. The connection between himself and his nanites was instinctive, beneath conscious thought, each tiny piece of intelligent metal as much a part of him as his own skin. It was an amazing feeling of empowerment.
Artemis nodded from the far side of the truck bed. “That’s good. You’re already starting to gain some control. The younger recruits always did have an easier time of it. A lot of your systems are autonomic, meaning that if you go somewhere that has toxins in the air, or the temperature is too high or low, your nanites will react to protect you from it. Over time, though, you’ll learn to control it and manipulate it with ease. If we were able to touch I could download some of my training and experience directly to you, making things much easier, but . . .”
Horror and amazement rolled through his mind in alternating waves. “Yeah, let’s not do that. But... you’ll help me?”
The Titan didn’t respond at first, but eventually she nodded. “As much as I can. Your nanites also come with a basic amount of combat and weapons training, which over the next few hours will integrate into your brain without you even knowing it. It’s like instinct for digital minds.”
Shawn was thankful. He felt strong, so strong, yet he worried that he was a bull let loose in a china shop. Just a day ago he’d considered Titans little more than storybook characters, but now... now he was one. Suddenly the elation left him, and in its place was the cold spray of reality. He was a Titan. But, what else was he now? Was he still a high school student? A lead guitarist? A boyfriend? His life had been saved in the bowels of the museum, but had it really? Did he still have a life? Could he ever be again who he’d once been? Had he lost his old life forever? A shiver started at the base of his spine and raced up to his shoulders, and his body trembled as the full implications of what had happened hit him.
