Anton's Odyssey (30 page)

Only three days remained until the deadline that would seal Mike’s fate forever. Allen had to scramble non-stop around the clock to transform our ho-bot into a weapon capable of search and rescue. Allen had no illusions about the inevitable violence that would accompany our operation. He struck a deal. He would take the lead in preparation, but would get to sit out the operation itself and avoid dolling out or witnessing any bloodshed directly.

Allen sent us out to “borrow” two jano-bots from which to scavenge parts. I knew that my mother’s job performance would suffer without the equipment, but compared to leaving Mike behind, her getting some sort of reprimand was the lesser of two evils.

Within a day, Allen got the ho-bot to function back within its standard operating parameters. I told Allen what enhancements the machine would need to make it effective for the rescue mission. Allen mounted cameras behind its eyes, which would allow us to see in complete darkness. He placed a type of halo on its head, microphones that would allow the ho-bot to collect the quietest of sounds from a three hundred and sixty degree arc. He wrote a program that would filter through the sounds, homing in on certain key words like “hostage,” “kid,” “ransom,” and “prisoner.” He wrote code that could relay our voices through the speaker in the robot’s mouth, and he overrode the ho-bots safety programs, governors that normally toned down the power generated by its limbs so it couldn’t harm a client by accident.

Lastly, we came to the part Allen dreaded most. Our ho-bot needed some sort of weapon. Ellen suggested a taser so no one would sustain any permanent injuries, but Allen explained that there was no way he was going to be able to write, trouble shoot, and execute a code in such a short amount of time that would allow the robot to aim a ranged weapon and pull a trigger. Hammond suggested we create a glove one of us could wear with sensors that would allow the robot to mimic our movements.

“That’s a good idea,” Allen said, “but there’s no way I could create the hardware in time.”

We came to the consensus that the ho-bot would need some sort of blade to cut Mike free in the event he was bound. Programming the ho-bot to stab would be almost as difficult as teaching it to aim a weapon. I suggested we configure the ho-bot’s right arm so that the movements of the shoulder, elbow, and wrist could be moved by input from a standard game controller. The code
was easy to write, and after a few hours of practice Cotton could sort of control the flailing of the arm, creating crude slashing movements. As Hammond used a rotary diamond burr to place a razor’s edge on the carbine bayonet, Allen began to look uncomfortable.

“If it makes you feel any better,” I said, “slashing injuries are really effective at stopping someone in their tracks, but they’re seldom fatal.”

“Yeah,” Cotton explained, “that’s how the goons back home can carve somebody up without having to worry about a murder rap.”

Allen took some solace in the fact that we would only be maiming people and not killing anybody. We neglected, however, to tell Allen that, given the filth we saw on the boy from the asteroid and because the goons would have no access to proper medical care, any slashing wounds we inflected were destined to become severely infected, gangrenous even.

With less than a day to spare, we had the ho-bot-hunter-maimer-rescuer up and running. Allen, who had worked non-stop the last few days, crashed face down on the couch in his living room. We decided I would run the operation, Ellen would navigate the movements of the ho-bot, and Cotton would control its right arm because he was the best, by far, at using a game controller. That left Hammond to sneak the ho-bot onto the space station and stand by to trouble shoot, if necessary.

Following Allen’s advice, we dressed Hammond up in one of the orange jump suit
s we stole from Jackass Bob’s living quarters. Because Hammond looked so much like his father, we borrowed the man’s badge after he fell asleep following a double shift repairing the airlock.

We borrowed
a cart from the clean utility and stashed the ho-bot inside, broken down into pieces. We started the operation at a time when Mr. Yongscolder would not be guarding the airlock. Hammond pulled his cap down so the shadow of the bill obscured his facial features. The security attendant hardly glanced at Hammond or his badge and waved him through. As he wheeled the cart up the sloping passageway, Hammond whispered into his microphone, “Okay, I’m in.” The operation had begun.

Cotton and I directed Hammond as best we could to the door through which the smelly kid had lured us. We sent Hammond
around a couple of wrong corners, but eventually we found it. We knew it was the right door from the tool marks gouged on the lock.

Hammond closed the door behind him, unpacked the ho-bot and assembled the pieces. He stashed a transmitter relay in the corner near the door. “You’re up, Ellen,” he said.

Ellen studied the vid screen. “All systems nominal.” She stated confidently.

“What do you want me to do now?” Hammond asked.

“Maintain your position,” I said bossily. “If you hear someone coming up the steps, duck through the door and find a public place.”

“Like the Star Lounge?”

“Yes, that would work.”

Allen had set up the computer to dump visual data from the ho-bot’s camera eyes onto the big vid.

“What are those lines in the lower right corner?” Cotton asked.

I shrugged and looked at Ellen inquisitively. She shrugged too.

“Probably just a bug in the program,” I concluded. “The lines aren’t obscuring our view, so let’s not worry about them just yet. I suppose if it gets problematic, we can wake up Allen, but let’s not do that unless it’s absolutely necessary.”

Allen had otherwise done an excellent job with the ho-bot’s visual system. During my previous journey down the steps, I could hardly make out the walls
in the darkness. Now, on the big vid, we could see every nook and cranny.

Through the bottom door, we were finally in the asteroid. The image on the big vid started breaking down, becoming pixilated and blocky. Allen had told me this would happen because the rock walls would interfere with the ho-bot’s transmitter and receiver.

“Drop a relay,” I ordered.

“How do I do that?” Ellen asked.

“Back slash, D-R-P.”

Ellen typed the command, “\
drp.” We heard a quiet metallic clunk and saw what looked like a small ball bearing roll down the corridor ahead of us. It collided with the wall, coming to a rest.

“Where did that fall from?” Ellen inquired.

“Don’t ask.” Said Cotton. He had assisted Allen in constructing the relay delivery system, and he knew Ellen would not approve of its location.

Cotton pointed at the lines in the lower right hand corner. “See that,” he said excitedly, “how these two lines get longer as we walk down the corridor.”

Ellen and I nodded.

“This is just like a video game,” Cotton squeaked, “Allen must have written a program using visual input to draw us a map. That’s really brilliant!”

“That is good,” Ellen agreed. “With a map, we are much less likely to get lost.”

The corridor sloped downward. Giant rats scurried out from cracks in the walls and gave the ho-bot a sniff. Nothing edible, the rats went back about their business.

“How far do you think we’ve walked?” I asked.

“Just shy of a kilometer.”
Ellen said, pointing to the number “845m” on the small vid.

Around the corner, the ho-bot entered a giant chamber carved out of the asteroid. The occupants had lit the place dimly with fires in disposal barrels. The light from the flames cast an eerie glow. Grubby bodies lined the walls. Some were huddled together. Others sat alone, muttering incoherently to themselves. A few jerked violently in the throes of a fene high. Most seemed to just stare vacantly, not even noticing the ho-hot was there at all, lost in the stupor of fene-withdrawal. It was much worse than the grungiest alleyway back home.

“There must be hundreds of people!” Ellen said. “What are they doing here?”

“Most probably left unhappy ships,” Hammond voice sounded through the speakers on the big vid. Though he couldn’t see the mission unfold, he had been following our conversation intently. “Some probably got fired for poor job performance. Dad said the severance package you get when you’re terminated for cause is pretty lousy. It will only buy you a few weeks rent for a room aboard the station, and when you run out of funds, they evict you, and you have no where to go. Most probably end up down here.”

“That’s terrible!” Ellen said, “I had no idea they could do that.”

“Well, they never do it to officers, just starmen. Officers, they keep onboard until they return home. If you’re an officer and you’re bad at your duties, they just reduce your responsibilities and slash your pay. ”

“That’s totally unfair,” Ellen said.

“Really?”
Hammond said curiously, “I thought both your parents were officers.”

“They are, but that doesn’t stop the system from being unfair.”

“Yeah, but I figured a person in your position —”

“Guys,” I interrupted, “can we stick to the mission.”

“Yeah, sorry,” the two said in unison.

A few seconds later
, a faint glimmer caught my eye. “What was that?” I said. “Turn back and to the left.”

On the floor lay the synthetic carcass of another ho-bot, the artificial flesh had been melted and burnt in parts, and the torso was split open where somebody had pried out the more valuable components.

“That’s practically the same model as ours.” Cotton said, insightfully.

The large room narrowed into the mouth of another corridor. A few paces further, Ellen dropped another relay because the image on the big vid was breaking up again. She was learning fast. Arou
nd a corner and the ho-bot was in another giant atrium, just like the one we had left.

“What should I do now?” Ellen asked, not knowing exactly how we should start our search. I wasn’t
really sure myself.

“Just walk each of these two big rooms in a figure eight. Maybe Allen’s audio program will point us in the right direction.”

The ho-bot circled and paced. Audio waves oscillated in the upper left hand corner of the smaller vid screen; underneath appeared the word “kid” in yellow, followed by the number “152.”

“What’s that mean?” Ellen asked.

Fortunately, Allen had taken the time to explain to me how his surveillance system worked, forcing me to repeat parts of the lecture back to him to make sure key the main concepts had sunk into my skull.

“That means at 152 degrees, which is to the back and right, somebody said the word ‘kid.’ The word lies within the parameters of our search algorithm,” I explained, “but because it’s yellow, there’s only a low probability that it’s relevant to a kidnapping and will lead us to the right place. It’s probably yellow because the word ‘kid’ was used alone without any other key words.”

“What colors do we want?”

“Orange, orange-red, or red,” I said.

“Hey look, the line just changed!” Ellen said, excited.

Underneath the sound oscillations were the words “kid” again, but this time yellow-orange in color and accompanied by the word, “money.”

“So what does that mean?” Ellen asked.

“Well someone said the word ‘kid’ again, and somehow the word ‘kid’ is associated with some amount of money.” I explained. “Yellow-orange means that there’s still a very low probability the words are connected to our mission. Probably the amount of money mentioned was too small to be a ransom.”

“What should I do?” Ellen asked.

“Let’s go check it out.” I commanded. “Turn and face 152 degrees.”

“Okay, now what?”

“Just walk in a straight line I guess.”

After thirty meters, we encountered a heap on the floor. Ellen directed the ho-bot’s head to check it out. Sure enough, the heap was a kid who had been worked over badly. He was moaning, and his face badly bruised.

“That poor boy,” Ellen cried, “should we help him?”

“No,” I said. “Keep going. There’s nothing we can do for him.”

Ellen sent a sour look in my direction
. I ignored her silent protest though. With no ship to receive him, I knew that if we pulled him up into the station, he’d eventually find his way back down into the asteroid.

Another forty meters and we found ourselves within arm
’s reach of a gang of three grubby bearded men, their eyes bleary and their clothes little more than rags. Upon seeing the ho-bot, the nearest one hid a bundle of C-notes in his coat. They had probably just rolled the kid who lay in a heap nearby. The man to the right stepped forward and in some strange accent said, “Hello there! What have we here?”

“I think they recognize us as a ho-bot.” Ellen said. Her eyes widened in shock, “Crap! Can they hear me?”

I pointed to the microphone Allen had attached to the keyboard. “See that button! They won’t be able to hear you unless you push it in and the diode turns green.” The diode in question was red.