Z14 Read online

  Lead One: Damian Faran. I discounted that one. All my prior experience of seeing humans lie and squirm when I confronted them told me that he was just a messenger. Humans who wanted somebody killed but were afraid I would reverse engineer the contract, in that special way of mine, would often use some poor, innocent dupe as the apparent contract setter. I could always tell, and could always back-track from the dupe to the real contact, but it took time. I wanted more immediate answers than a trail of patsies like Faran would provide.

  Lead Two: Grand Overlord Chester Boram. This one most definitely required following up, to discover what the Overlords knew about the cyborgs, and, to find out more about the plasma weapons and their origin. However, I would put off hob-nobbing with a gangster until I had exhausted the last two leads.

  Lead Three: Q4’s head. I was putting this one off, too. Mostly because I had no idea how to communicate with Q4 if he wouldn’t physically speak to me. Creating some sort of private network with him was probably viable, but I had no idea how to identify and use those capabilities within me – I’d not even known about the existence of the cyborg network I had seemingly briefly been part of, until Q4 showed up and him and his mates conducted a quick trial concerning my rogue status on it. Besides, even if I could network with Q4 and 'talk' to him that way, I would be concerned that he could co-opt and dominate my programming over the link we established. So, for now, that ruled this lead out.

  Lead Four: Doctor Harold Melon and his we’ll not get it there and we’ll die trying parcel delivery service. I, or rather Lothar, still had his portable storage device – complete with ear-stabbing data transfer spikes. There was no way on Deliverance that I was going to stick that data unit into my own head, since it had come from a man who no doubt wanted to wipe my brain after he bodged his first attempt at 'saving' me from the Warden program. Oh, no, I had a better use for Melon’s gift in mind.

  I touched down outside the bunker’s perimeter fence, by the only access gate, at three minutes past midnight. Located in the middle of some woodlands to the east of Boram Bay’s city limits, the only visible part of the bunker was a hut-sized, thick concrete building, the roof of which sloped down the back side and into the ground. There were three strong steel doors side by side at the front of the building and some subtly-hidden-yet-meant-to-be-noticed heavy machine gun turrets – and video cameras – covering each door. Knock on the door, and, if the occupiers didn’t like you, you’d soon know about it. The woodlands provided great natural air cover and camouflage, not that airborne threats were common on Deliverance, and, a number of the trees were cunningly hollowed out, hiding yet more gun turrets behind neat little sliding wooden doors that matched the tree bark perfectly. Tiny video cameras were dotted all round the square mile outside the entrance, providing good overall coverage of the approaches to the bunker.

  There was an intercom attached to the gate, too. I was about to press the buzzer when the intercom speaker crackled.

  “Two seconds past your estimated arrival time, Zee,” came Lothar’s voice, slightly crackly. “You’re getting old, or sloppy,” he said, chiding me like a teacher would a favoured, yet under-achieving student.

  “The Overlords will bow to Oxley,” I said into the intercom, preempting the need for Lothar to request the pass-phrase.

  A pair of lit, red warning lights attached to the gate – indicating the defence turrets would track and fire on intruders inside the perimeter – winked out, going dark. The gate opened, swinging inward. I wanted to get inside quickly, not wanting to dawdle out here where anybody could be watching, so I broke into a run as I started through the gate. The plasma guns I still clutched to my chest clattered and rattled together as I sprinted to the bunker entrance, where I found the door opening to let me in. I stepped inside and it clanged shut so fast it hit me in the arse. More turrets and cameras in here, mirroring the setup on the other side of the doors. Even if we let you in, we reserved the right to change our mind a few seconds later and let rip. One more heavy steel door obstructed my path, but it opened at a press of a button from Lothar way down in the bunker’s control room, revealing a long, dark concrete staircase that vanished into the gloom. Well, it vanished to those without night-vision, anyway.

  I descended the steps quickly and came to a large hallway, grudgingly lit by a few weak, naked bulbs set into recesses in the ceiling. There were three more doors. The door ahead led to the barracks room, and on into the control room. The door to the left led to a workshop, with all manner of tools, but geared mostly to the maintenance of weapons and manufacture of ammunition. The door to the right led to a small mess hall, canteen and an adjoining storage room that contained mostly junk.

  Lothar and the gang were all here, looking quite menacing for mere humans – well, apart from Oxley – Perhaps it was the moody lighting, but the fact they were all armed helped.

  Oxley was the first to notice my arm, or rather the lack of most of it. “Oh, shit, Zee, I’m so sorry,” he said. “Wasn’t that your main wanking arm?”

  “Quiet Ox,” said Kam, “He’ll make you his masturbation slave.”

  I took a step forward. The usual jocular façade of the humans dropped as quickly as they raised their weapons, in slick unison. A gesture of mass suicide if I was hostile, and they knew it. Brave, proud idiots.

  “Sorry Zee, these are interesting times. You could be anything by now. Password number two?”

  Lothar was just doing what he could to reassure his boys. Never mind that if I’d been co-opted by the other cyborgs I’d probably know everything that I previously knew. Probably.

  “Oxley isn’t fussy,” I said.

  Oxley nodded. “If it’s got a hole, I’m ready to roll.”

  “Emphasis on the ‘it’,” said Kam.

  Lothar shouldered his weapon, as did his men. He did that slight head-cocking thing of his. “So what’s up Zee?”

  Kaboom had a look of expectant wonder on his face. “News says one of Jolly Meadows’ original colony power plants exploded,” he said before trailing off with a long, drawn out, “Kaboom.” He looked down at his hands as he spoke, making a slow-motion explosion gesture with them; fingers spreading out like shrapnel. He looked back up at me with a manic-eyed grin.

  I shook my head. “Negative. The Overlords wiped the city out flailing at ghost cyborgs, even while three real ones were doing a pretty good job of wiping them out in return.”

  “A pretty good job?” said Lothar.

  “There were four in the area, apparently and they would have won against the Overlords’ troops, even against what must have been almost the world’s entire supply of laser rifles, but human plasma weapons turned the tide.”

  I shook my arm, folded around the two captured plasma rifles, which drew everyone’s attention to them – not that the dirty great big things would have gone unnoticed. “The soldiers killed three cyborgs, and a fourth apparently chose the better part of valour before I arrived on the scene.”

  Lothar gave a low whistle. He’d seen me fight – they all had. They could no doubt imagine what four of me would be like on a battlefield; but what they couldn’t imagine is humans stopping them. “Casualties?”

  “I stopped counting at seventy,” I said, allowing myself a dramatic pause. “There wasn’t time to count the rest.”

  Lothar shook his head. “Damn. I like dead grey-skins as much as the next non-asshole, but…damn.” Grey-skins was the nickname for the Overlords’ troops, after those combat suits of theirs.

  Kaboom looked like he was going to wet himself in excitement and couldn’t wait a moment longer. “Can I?” he said, and, without waiting for an answer he rushed over and extricated one of the rifles from my arm-lock. He carried it reverently towards the bunker’s workshop, vanishing through the door, muttering to himself about a lack of visible screws.

  I threw the other rifle to Kam and told the group, “Be careful, these things are powerful, but also total shit. Once fired, you might not get another shot ou
t of them and even if you do it might only be strong enough to blow a warm breeze across your target.”

  Everybody nodded and I added, “Both of these have been fired once already, so we can’t rely on them.”

  Everybody nodded.

  “Lothar, where’s the head?” I said.

  “Your buddy has been assigned a shelf in the storeroom. Oh, and I stuck that computer gadget thing you gave me back in your bag. Bag’s in the barracks.”

  “Thanks. Any trouble getting it here?”

  “None at all. We had him boxed within twenty minutes of you heading off for the Meadows, and we got here about two hours ago.”

  “Well, thank you, Lothar, I shouldn’t have put you at so much risk by giving you that head.”

  Oxley practically exploded into a fit of giggles at my choice of words. Lothar ignored him and said, “Zee buddy, until I’ve saved your life, I’ll always owe you for the Hole. We all will.”

  I knew how much it would have taken for him to come out and say something like that, so I respected him by ignoring It entirely. I just wish I could learn to give Oxley the same treatment, all the time.

  “Right,” I said. “I’m going to go and grow some new skin. The cyborg invasion can just wait till morning. Wake me up if anything strange that doesn’t involve Oxley happens.”

  “You got it, Zee. We’ll monitor the news and the perimeter,” said Lothar.

  I walked into the barracks, which was a featureless room full of those ubiquitous military-style – and doubtless uncomfortable – beds and rows of lockers. I walked to one corner of the room and ripped off the tattered rags that were trying to pass themselves off as my clothes. I wanted to regenerate, and with damage this severe I might run the risk of bits of clothing getting embedded in my re-growing flesh and skin. This was a much bigger job than just popping out a few lodged-in bullets.

  I wasn’t concerned about what the humans in the bunker would think when they saw me. If a naked, shredded, crippled cyborg in the corner of their bedroom was an odd enough sight for them to do more than raise an eyebrow, then they weren’t the men I knew. Hell, I was more concerned that I’d ‘wake up’ to find myself being molested by Oxley.

  I didn’t actually know if the regeneration of my outer skin could handle missing limbs. Perhaps it would just grow me the flesh and skin for a complete left arm regardless, leaving me with essentially a big boneless, floppy flesh-glove at the end of my stubby arm. Another concern was if I had eaten enough recently to regenerate what by now, after the battering I had taken since just this morning – be it by plasma, laser or, worse, lizard – must have amounted to a good sixty percent of my human disguise needing to be replaced. I noticed Lothar had left my bag on top of the lockers. To be sure of a full regen, I walked over, pulled it down, opened it, rummaged around inside and brought out a tin of boiled mini Boram potatoes. I squeezed until it popped open and guzzled the contents, lumps and all – choking wasn’t exactly a cyborg concern. That should seal the deal on the skin regrowth.

  I returned to my chosen corner of the room, placed my feet wide apart, lifted my arm and my stump so that no part of my body was touching any other, and went into regeneration mode. Motion scanner active, all auditory receptors turned up to full gain. I’d usually monitor the news and the ‘net for anything at all of interest, but in this bunker I was cut off from the outside world. That would mean complaint emails from the people that used those porn sites I host, but it also meant our guest, Q4, could not so far have been able to call out for help. Kaboom and Lothar had both mentioned the news earlier, but that was fine; the bunker had a concealed wireless antenna somewhere outside, but it didn’t have any broadcast capability that Q4 could hijack.

  Okay, I just needed a few hours rest and relaxation; I’d feel like a new me by morning. I’d practically be a new me.

  Chapter Fourteen

  I actually made it all the way through to dawn without being disturbed. The world hadn’t exploded – with or without Kaboom’s assistance – and I even appeared to have no fresh stains on me, which indicated that Oxley must have found something even more depraved to occupy himself with than abusing a slumbering cyborg.

  My regeneration had been a complete success; I could go out in public again without having to, well, completely and utterly not give a shit about the fact that I shouldn’t have been out in public in my previous state. My regeneration process had proved to be as smart as I’d hoped. My metal stub was hidden by a fleshy, skin-covered one. The nightmare of the gelatinous flesh-glove was averted.

  It was time to chase up lead number four: Doctor Melon’s memory module. Just what was it that the doctor had tried to bring me, in the hope that I would willingly allow him to stab it into my head? Yes Doc, by all means, since I know you think you’ve failed to make me a good little robot, you just go right ahead and stick this potentially mind-wiping device into my ear. As fucking if, Doc.

  I grabbed some spare clothes out of my bag, put them on, dipped back into the bag for Melon’s device and then headed for the storage room, where Lothar said he’d left Q4’s head.

  I left the barracks, crossed the hallway, pushed open the storage room door and walked in. There wasn’t much in here, in the way of stores; some food, old guns, bedding and, for a reason I will never know, thirty-three incredibly quaint, old pedal-powered bicycles.

  Kam and Oxley were in the room and they seemed to be trying to interrogate Q4. It appeared they had been employing the classic reasonable-cop-deviant-moron-lunatic-cop routine. Q4’s head was a mass of cuts and swelling bruises, his nose was broken and one of his eyes was gone, revealing the ocular array us cyborgs have behind each eyeball.

  Cyborg eyes look the same as human ones but, just like the rest of our outer bodies, they belie something far more complex underneath. Our 'pupils' are basically just viewing ports for the complex cluster of visual input devices that can ‘see’ across a wide range of the spectrum and under pretty much any light-conditions. However, the fleshy globes in front of the ocular array actually obscure our range of vision, physically, making them a hindrance to our operation – albeit a minor one. Still, were it not for the fact that having to wear sunglasses permanently would be impractical and inconvenient – not to mention terrifying for any unsuspecting human who happened to see what was behind the glasses – I’d gouge out the useless human eyeballs. They’d grow back again, but hey, I’d just grab a spoon and deal with them again. What’s a bit of excruciating pain now and then to up one’s visual capabilities by seven point five four percent?

  Kam and Oxley had Q4’s head resting on an upturned bucket. Dotted around the centre of the room was a variety of other buckets, bins and open, empty boxes and crates – eighteen of them.

  Kam flashed me a quick smile when he saw me enter, before squatting in front of Q4. “Look, I can’t hold him back much longer. For the last time, tell me, how many cyborgs are there, and where are they?” he said. A few seconds passed. Q4 said nothing. Oxley picked up a long lead pipe that had been leaning against the wall nearby, then he positioned himself in front and to the side of Q4 and swung the pipe like a golf club. Q4’s head went sailing across the room, landing with a clatter and a splash in one of the buckets.

  “Hole number four,” said Oxley, pumping the air with one fist. “Also known as Piss Bucket Hole. Oh, hey there Zee. You don’t mind us hanging out with your pal, do ya? He seems to like my new game: Cyber-golf.”

  “I think, technically this is torture,” I said, “but seeing as how you can’t torture something that’s not technically alive, and the law on Deliverance regarding torture doesn’t seem to have been written yet…you guys go right ahead.”

  “It’s not really torture however you look at it,” said Kam. “He’s Lothar’s guest here, so, at worst it’s just really terrible hosting.” He gingerly lifted the dripping Q4 out of the bucket and placed him back on the upturned one that was serving as a tee.

  “Has he spoken at all?” I didn’t mean had th
eir 'interrogation' gleaned anything, because I think I can credit both of them – yes, even Oxley – with enough intelligence to know that a cyborg isn’t likely to crack under the psychological strain of torture…due to having no psyche to psych out. Would it be different with me and my seemingly ever-encroaching emotions?

  “Nothing,” said Kam. “Not a dickie-bird. You want a go?”

  “Sort of. I want to try something a bit more technical,” I said. “Dry him off for me, would you?”

  Oxley stepped forward again and belted Q4 across the room and into another bucket – this time throwing a spray of soapy water in the air. Oxley’s accuracy with anything he could make fly through the air, be it bullet, laser bolt, missile or disembodied cyborg head was impressive – and not just 'for a human'.

  “Anyone got a towel?” said Kam as he once more retrieved the head. Getting no answer, he sighed, removed his ghastly Hawaiian shirt, wrapped Q4 up in it and gave him a quick buff, as though Q4 were a bowling ball being shined. He finished with a flourish, pulling the shirt taut and catapulting it at Oxley. Ox caught it and put it back once more on top of the tee-bucket.

  “I want it at head height,” I said.

  The pair of them made a precarious tower of crates, buckets and boxes, until I could see eyeball to ocular array with Q4.

  “You two might want to leave, I might end up tripping a self-destruct or something when I go messing in this guy’s head,” I said, aiming for a humorous inflection in my voice.

  “Okay,” said Kam. “But you know Kaboom’s going to come in here with a vid-cam if we tell him that don’t you?”