The Passenger Ch. 03

I shrugged.

"Well, make me a better offer then. One that would make it worth my while to get you out of here."

The tech nodded so vigorously his head almost fell off. I knelt down, one knee beside him, one on his chest.

"Alright. Talk to me. But one loud noise and I'll make all your problems go away right here, right now. Do we understand each other?"

The tech nodded. I pulled the gag down so he could speak.

"I can get you out of here," he rasped, his voice hoarse and ragged. "I know how to get you through security."

My look was skeptical.

"Really. How?"

He coughed, then continued, "I have a car. We go out the back. Disable the alarms. I'll tell security that you're a pair of droids for field testing. I've taken droids out before."

Anne knelt down beside him.

"What's your name?" she said.

"Pete. Pete Wilson."

I nodded slowly and deliberately, as if he'd just confirmed something I'd suspected for a while.

"Okay, Pete. I'm going to untie you. But a word to the wise."

I gave him a cold, grim smile, one of the expressions I'd had tried out on me, a few trips back, by a broker who was forced to trust me but didn't like it at all.

"If you try to screw us, I'm personally going to make sure that Brax gets his hands on you. Do I make myself clear?"

The tech just nodded.

"Good," I said. "Anne, help me roll him over."

She did, and we untied the knots that held his hands and legs together. It took some effort because I'd made them rather tight to begin with, and his squirming had only made it worse. But after a few moments he sat there, rubbing his hands, then he winced when the blood flow was restored and the pins and needles did their thing. I gave him a minute or so until he was ready to roll. Then I helped him back up on his feet.

"Right, Pete," I said. "Time to go. We're right behind you."

I tried to make that last bit sound menacing. I'm not sure if I managed, but it didn't matter. Right now he was so nervous that I could have gotten away with just about anything. He knew his only hope escape the tender mercies that Brax was sure to inflict on him was to disappear along with us. If Brax found us gone and Pete still here, things would not end well for him.

"This way," he said softly.

We followed him to the corner of the lab where a heavy door was set into the wall, an electrokey lock next to it. The door looked like it had originally been built to secure a vault but had ended up here instead.

"Do you need your key?" I asked, reaching into my pocket.

Pete shook his head.

"That would register on the security system. I must bypass it."

He walked over to the edge of the door, got down on his knees and pried open a small panel that was set into the wall just above the floor. He pulled out several wires, disconnected two, joined three others. There was a sound of heavy hydraulic rams retracting and the door began to open, slowly and ponderously. It was much thicker than I had expected. It continued to move until the gap was wide enough for us to squeeze through. Then he disconnected one of the wires and the door stopped moving.

"Now that's a big door," I muttered softly to myself.

Myself was not impressed.

"And you're a big dork," he said. "This is not the time for classic movie references."

Pete stuck his head through the gap, looked left and right, then motioned to us to follow him. Behind the door was a long corridor with a high ceiling. The floor and ceiling were polished and very white. We went left and walked down the corridor to the end, where it turned a corner. There we came to a small door.

Pete looked around, his eyes searching the wall.

"Up there," Anne said.

She pointed at a thin, barely visible conduit high up the wall where it met the ceiling.

"Lift me up, Harvey. I'm lighter than he is."

I cupped my hands so she could use them as a step, and a few moments later I was standing with my back against the wall, Anne sitting on my shoulders, facing the wall.

"Don't get any ideas," she said.

I couldn't help smiling.

"Me? I wouldn't dream of it."

I handed her the pocket tool set I'd taken from Pete earlier. I heard her pop the cover off the cabling conduit.

"Strip the insulation from the blue and yellow wire, cross them, then cut the red one," Pete said.

"Okay."

She worked for a few moments, then lowered the tool set. There came a soft click from the door.

"Done," she said.

As I helped her down, Pete carefully tried the knob. He listened for a moment, then he slowly opened the door. Bright daylight streamed into the corridor.

"Alright," he said softly. "My car is parked to the left."

I put my "Don't mess with me" look back on again.

"This had better go smoothly," I said.

He nodded.

"It will."

We slipped out the door in single file, stepping into the uncomfortably bright, bluish glare of Ursa's early afternoon sun. I looked around, blinking against the sudden brightness. We were standing on a walkway that hugged the wall of the building we had just exited. A vast expanse of light gray polycrete stretched before us. The wall behind us was a smooth, bright white, and the blue tinge of the light gave everything a cold, almost clinical atmosphere.

"This way," Pete said.

We turned left and followed the walkway to the corner of the wall where a number of ground cars was parked. I hoped he didn't drive some flashy sports model, but my fears proved groundless. The one he walked up to was a drab brown, utilitarian model, not new but still good; the perfect nondescript vehicle.

"I'll need my key and my card," he said.

I handed him the electrokey and the ID card. He stuck the card on his lapel, then he swiped the electrokey through the car's detection zone. With a soft click the doors unlocked. We got in, Pete in the front, Anne and myself in the back. The gyros whined softly as they spun up, then the car rose gently on its repulsor field.

"Remember, you're droids," he said.

"So what do we do?" Anne asked. "I don't know how to pretend to be a droid."

I think I managed to keep a straight face. I could not see Pete's face.

"Just sit still, don't say anything, and don't turn your head," he said. "Not too stiff. Don't try to look like a statue. Relax. There, that's it."

He turned the car and slowly moved it forward across the polycrete lot, following the lines painted on it at irregular intervals. After a minute or so we came to a high, heavy fence lined with sensors and rows of evil looking canisters; probably part of some sort of anti-personnel system which I suspected might be lethal. It had that kind of look to it.

The gate was tall, heavy, and closed. A pair of blocky guard houses flanked it on either side. Two heavily built security types stepped out, taking up positions on both sides of the car. The one at the driver's side held out his hand. Pete handed him his ID badge. The guard inserted it into his datapad, peered at the display.

"And these?" he asked, glancing at Anne and myself.

I sat still, looked straight ahead of me, tried to appear relaxed. From the corner of my eye I saw Anne do the same.

"These are not the droids you are looking for," I said to myself. "Move along."

Myself wasn't impressed.

"Very funny," he said. "You really need to stop watching these ancient entertainment vids, you know? People give you funny looks as it is. Dorky references to antique vidshows are the last thing you need in your life."

I kept quiet. Myself can be a little stodgy sometimes, and it's usually best to just ignore him.

"Droids for field testing," Pete said curtly. "Yes, I know, I'm supposed to have the paperwork, but it's a rush job for Brax and I'm way behind schedule. He'll rip my head off if I don't get this done by yesterday. He's screaming bloody murder as it is. You know what he's like when he gets his nuts in a knot."

The guard nodded and somehow managed to look sympathetic without changing the expression on his face.

"Yeah," he muttered. "Don't we all?

He returned Pete's badge, then signaled to his colleague on the other side of the car.

"Alright," he said. "Just make sure you file the exit forms for the droids as soon as you can. And don't forget you owe me one."

Pete nodded.

"Thanks. I will. See you later."

He slowly drove out the gate, turned left, and let the car slowly pick up speed. The road was wide and empty before us, and had a strange, almost surreal quality about it. The polycrete was bright and clean and was either very new, or the road had rarely been used. Ursan architecture tends to favor wide streets with clean and straight lines and lots of smooth polycrete that is either light gray or white, but this road had an almost surreal quality to it. It looked almost like one of those artist's impressions that architects use to present their plans, rather than like an actual, physical road.

After a minute or so the Vergence complex had disappeared out of sight. I relaxed, but only a little. We weren't out of the woods yet. Not by a long shot.

* * *

Like most modern, industrialized planets, Ursa has several large space ports. The one we had landed at, or rather close to, was one of the largest. The city we now found ourselves in was named Kawar-Hesh, which means something like "beautiful jewel". Unfortunately, like so many jewels, this one also had a few flaws. The neighborhood we had ditched the car in was one of them.

We had left Pete locked in the trunk of his car, parked in a three-hour-maximum zone close to the airport. I felt fairly confident that he would be discovered as soon as the parking time limit expired. Or the car might be stolen even before that time; it was that sort of area. From here on he would be on his own, but my money was on him keeping a low profile, or even high-tailing it off Ursa altogether. Brax didn't seem like the forgiving type. Either way, I wasn't too concerned about Pete. He'd been working for Brax, knowing full well what he was doing, and I wasn't going to waste much sympathy on him.

Like most of the bars that line the outer fringes of space ports, this one was seedy, grimy and thoroughly disreputable. The sign on the cracked plaster next to the door left little to the imagination:

Exotic Entertainment
Rooms by the Hour
Best Girls in Town
Discreet Service
Foreign Credit Accepted

The interior was even worse than the outside: dark, filthy, and bearing the traces of decades of customers and the illicit substances they had indulged in. I'd hate to order a drink here. But then, we hadn't come here for drinks.

The character standing behind the counter was human, pock-marked and unkempt and, in keeping with the general style of the establishment, his breath could have peeled paint. The way he leered at Anne made me wish I had a gun. Then he shifted his gaze to me, giving me a look that was far less impressed.

"I need a room. One hour," I said, glancing at Anne to make sure he got the idea. "No, better make that two."

His ravaged face slowly split into a nasty grin, revealing the brown stumps of what probably never had been a decent set of teeth to begin with.

"You want any extras?" he asked.

He pointed at a pair of girls who sat by the wall. They were young, probably illegally so, but already they looked worn and used up, with too much tiredness under too much make-up. It wasn't the years that made them look old, just the mileage. I pretended to look them over, then shook my head and looked at Anne again. She kept quiet, as I had told her to do.

"No. Just the room."

He shrugged.

"That'll be two hundred."

"Fine," I said, not even blinking at his outrageous price. "And I'll need some change."

I pushed Pete's credit chip across the counter. My new best friend looked at the credit chip without touching it.

"That's a local one," he said.

"Yes, it is," I said. "And I need some change."

I looked at him. He looked at me. Then he slowly nodded.

"The rate is ten to one," he said.

I gave him my "Don't mess with me" look, but it was wasted on him; he didn't even blink.

"Look, pal," he said softly. "I don't care who you bumped off for this thing. I get guys like you in here all the time. You know what happens when you slot a hot chip. So take it or leave it."

Now it was my time to shrug.

"Fine," I said. "But I'm slotting the empty right here."

"Hey," he said. "Do I look like the type who'd stiff you?"

I just looked at him. I did manage to keep a straight face. The look he gave me, on the other hand, spoke volumes.

He took a small rectangular box from under the counter. Possession of an unregistered off-line chip processor alone was enough to land him in jail, so I was fairly certain that the operation would not be traceable. He inserted Pete's credit chip into the unit, checked the display, raised his eyebrows about a thousandth of an inch.

"Just over eighty-one thousand," was all he said.

I had had no idea how much money there was on Pete's chip, and I didn't care all that much; all I'd need was a few hundred credits. If that currency shark kept ninety percent for himself, I'd still have way more than we needed. But to appear too trusting would be to invite trouble.

"Show me," I said.

He held up the unit, let me see the display. Sure enough, the amount was slightly over eighty-one thousand credits.

"Do it," I said.

He took another chip from underneath the counter, inserted it into the unit next to the other one. He keyed in the amount to be transferred, took it out, held it out to me. I didn't touch it.

"Two hundred for the room," I said. "Slot it."

He shrugged, then inserted the chip into the bar's main register. That one would be networked, and slotting a hot chip would draw the kind of attention neither he nor his patrons would want. He keyed the two hundred credits off the balance, handed me back the chip and a cheap magstrip key.

"Room one oh three. Make as much noise as you like. As long as you're gone in two hours and you don't leave a mess."

I put the chip in my pocket and motioned Anne to follow me into the corridor off to the side of the bar. What little light there was revealed peeling plaster, a carpet that was worn through to the bare polycrete at the center, and a row of evenly spaced numbered doors that hadn't seen fresh paint in decades. A high-pitched squeal came from behind one of the doors, followed by a man's raucous laughter.

"If you think I'm going to stay here, you're mad," Anne whispered.

"Relax," I whispered back. "We're not."

I took her hand and led her down the corridor. When we reached the door marked '103', the number barely legible, I walked right past it until we reached the end of the corridor. We turned the corner, and there was the back door I knew would be there. A place like this would have at least one back door. I looked around, saw no wires. This wasn't the sort of place that would have a lot of high-end security, but you never know. I tried the door. It was locked. I stepped back, kicked it with the sole of my shoe, putting my weight behind it. Something snapped and bits of cheap hardware tinkled to the floor. The door popped open.

The alley behind the bar was choked with garbage; the smell was thick enough to slice. We made our way between dumpsters and climbed over heaps of refuse, surprising the occasional rodent. It was a relief to get to the end of the alley.

We walked for about half an hour. Gradually the grubby streets gave way to better ones as we got closer to the space port proper, until we walked once again between the clean, white walls of buildings and on roads that were wide and straight. I noticed that the sunlight no longer appeared so blue and harsh, which meant that by now our eyes had adjusted to it so that it looked normal to us. If and when we'd get back aboard the Slowboat, the lights there would appear dim and reddish to our eyes for a while.

We stopped at a simple but decent looking hotel where I got us a room, paying with the unregistered credit chip. Then I took us into a restaurant across the street, ordered a much-needed pair of drinks for us and watched the hotel entrance through the window, until the shadows lengthened and the light began to fade.

"Alright, Harvey," Anne said. "I've been patient and quiet and I've done whatever you said. Now it's your turn. Will you please tell me, right now, what the hell is going on?"

I nodded. So far there hadn't been much time for explanations, and the quick fabrication I'd given Anne when she was reactivated in Pete's lab would have left her full of questions. Unfortunately, there hadn't been time for me to come up with something better, so some fast mental footwork was in order.

"First of all, how are you feeling?" I asked her. "Pete said you might feel a little confused and vague about the period just before you passed out. Are you alright?"

Once again I realized how much I hated lying to her. But I simply couldn't tell her yet what she was. When should I tell her that? Later? Never? I simply didn't know. All I knew was that she should have a chance to be the person she had become. The problem was, of course, that right now I wasn't really sure who that person was, following Pete's hacking and slashing his way through her memories and identity. I also realized that if I told her the truth, she'd need a lot of time to process all of that and come to grips with it, not to mention some peace and quiet. And right now we simply didn't have any of that.

"I'm feeling fine," she said.

She reached out across the table and took my hand.

"Better, now that we've stopped running," she continued. "Are we safe here?"

"For the moment. As long as we're careful."

I squeezed her hand.

"What's the last thing you remember?" I asked

She frowned.

"Well, I guess Pete was right... Some things are a little jumbled. I remember our flight to Ursa. I remember us, on the ship. Talking. I remember..." She smiled. "I remember you kissing me."

Her smile softened, and the look she gave me was very direct.

"I remember falling in love with you, Harvey."

I took a deep breath, heaved a sigh of relief.

"Good," I said. "That's the most important thing. Because I love you, Anne. I hope you'll always remember that."

"And I love you. I could never forget that."

We sat there for a moment, holding hands, looking into each other's eyes. Then I squeezed her hand again, gently breaking the moment. I let go of her hand, took a sip of my drink.

"What else do you remember?" I asked, glancing out of the window at the entrance of our hotel across the street. All quiet.

"Well, we landed, and then there was that weird little guy..."

"Controller Fech."

"Yeah. And then there was this creep in the business suit who took us inside."

"Brax," I filled in.

"After that it gets a little vague."

I nodded.

"You lost consciousness a few moments later."

It was as close to the truth as I could give her right now.

"That upset me a little, so I shouted at Brax," I continued, "and he shot me with some kind of paralysis nerve gun. I woke up in the lab and I couldn't move a finger, and Pete had you on the table under a sheet and you had your eyes closed and you didn't move at all and..."

I'm not sure what she saw on my face, but she reached out and took my hand, and it must have been the bad light that made my eyes water so badly. Of course she didn't know what had caused most of my emotional turmoil, there in Pete's lab, but she could see how much it bothered me.

"Anyway," I continued after a few moments, "Brax came in, told Pete to stabilize you, and then he said that he had no intention of letting either of us go, because the environmental control units we thought we were moving were really AI units, and you know how illegal those are."