Rat Trap (15 page)

The armored ball carrying Rat flowed toward the chaos.

“This is it,” the chief said. “The clench.”

Jeff tensed, gripping Rat's note hard in his hand. C-10 was moving Rat back into danger. He watched the insect-like sniffers chewing away at Nanny and felt … something, a mix of sad and sorry and disappointed. He'd thought Nanny would put up a better fight. Not that he
wanted
it too, but still …

C-10 was just a couple of feet away when Nanny suddenly started to spin. A gripper flailed out, whacking C-10 and sending it into the wall like a z-ball. It hit an orange octagon and went spiraling off. White jets of gas sprouted all over it as it tried to recover from the blow.

That had to hurt! Jeff hoped Rat had a good grip inside there.

Nanny spun faster and faster. They heard the roar of gas from its thruster jets. Faster and faster. The green eye flashed around and around until it became a blur of light, like a green halo. Sniffers started losing their grip. Faster still, and the whole mass clinging to Nanny shattered and flew apart, flung with tremendous force outward toward the rebound panels. The sniffers careened off the panels, hopelessly out of control. They smashed together, and a few laser blasts eliminated the ones that had escaped destruction by impact.

Jeff stared in open-mouthed shock. Nanny wasn't defeated at all! Nanny was free. It had used the same centrifugal force that the space station used. And it had used Rat's trick, too.

C-10 was all alone.

Nanny swooped and slammed into C-10. Grippers flailed. Bit by bit, Nanny began to tear the ball apart.

Jeff had to look away, and when he did, he discovered that Dr. Vivexian was gone. His designer booties, with the fancy double helix emblem up the sides, were stuck fast to the carpet—empty!

So much noise! Sounds slammed Rat's sensitive ears like hammer blows: thruster blasts, the crash and rattle of flailing grippers, the
zizzzzzz
of the laser, the explosions, and the steady
chew-chew-chew
of the sniffers gnawing away at Nanny.

Rat wanted to cover her ears but couldn't. All four paws clung fiercely to eyestalks and sniffer tubes to keep her from being thrown around inside C-10 as it maneuvered in a violent dance with Nanny, readying for the clench.

A tremendous blow struck C-10, then a rebound that sent the world spinning. All around Rat, thrusters gasped. C-10 was having trouble recovering stability. Rat just hung on and ducked the scrambler that whizzed around loose inside the ball.

Rat wished she could see what was going on! She could hear the whine and roar of Nanny's thrusters. Now a shrill whistle of air. Something was spinning very fast. A clatter of metal raked over C-10, sending shudders through the ball.

Suddenly a window the size of a dinner plate opened right next to Rat. For a second, Rat saw Nanny, its body bristling with grippers and the green eye flashing in battle mode. Where were all C-10's other sniffers?

Nanny slammed against C-10. Grippers flailed at the armor, smashing and plucking. The armor wouldn't last long. They had to shut Nanny down now!

C-10 rolled against Nanny, shifting the window over the grid of pinholes next to the rogue port. Sniffers chewed a grip into Nanny's body, meshing the robots together. Rat pulled the magnetic grapple from its pocket and wrapped the loop around her forepaw. She slapped the grapple next to the rogue-port lock. Nanny jerked as its sensors noted the touch. It realized what Rat was up to. A new series of flails and flips threatened to twist her wrist right off! Her body flopped like a ribbon tied to an air vent, banging hard against the inner walls of the ball.

Rat tightened her grip. With her other forepaw, she grabbed the pinprobe from the spyvest. But Nanny wasn't just frantically thrashing around. It was a sensible robot kind of panic that made it extremely difficult for Rat to get the pinprobe into the tiny hole. She couldn't keep her free paw steady enough to hit the right ones. She shifted the probe into her mouth, then seized a sniffer tube in her forepaw. With one paw in the grapple loop and one holding a sniffer, she was able to hold her body steady. Now she let her head flow with the shifting forces, zeroing in and then …
jab
. There! The first code. Three to go.

A gripper smashed through C-10's damaged armor. It snagged Rat's tail in its pincer-like claw. The pain nearly made Rat let go. The gripper yanked, stretching her flat and hauling her away from the grid. She couldn't finish the code!

In desperation, she shoved the probe back into its pocket, then shifted her grip on the magnetic grapple to her hind leg. The contortion strained her tendons to the breaking point. She curled back on herself and with one powerful snap of her teeth, she bit clean through the flesh and bone of her tail.

Like the two ends of a broken rubber band, the gripper sprang free and Rat unfolded. The shock went beyond pain. Blood spurted from her tail and formed into tiny spheres that floated around her. No time to worry about that! The gripper might break through again. Snatching the probe back into her mouth, she squirmed her body into position.

The pounding and laser pulses and jerking increased as Nanny redoubled its efforts, but now Rat had a technique. Bracing herself, she jabbed quickly: code two, code three, code four. With a sharp
snick
, a two-inch square door slid open, exposing the rogue port. The hardlink shot out of C-10 like an arrow and connected. The inside of the ball flashed with green light as Nanny's head spun. Its voice spilled out, “Nanny, nanny, nann-nan-na-na-n-naaa-naaa …”

Ppphphpht
. The green eye went dark. The thrusters gave a last gasp. The gripper arms twitched once more, then froze. Deep inside Nanny, the throbbing vibration of power faded, then went out altogether.

At last, Nanny was gone.

C-10's sniffers stopped chewing. A hush settled in the Zero-G room. The only sound was the patter of sniffer parts and the
bump, bump, bump
of the scrambler drifting around inside C-10. Rat blinked, then loosed her grip on the grapple. She pushed away from the dead hulk.

The little spheres of blood floating around her reminded Rat of just how close she and C-10 had come to losing the battle. She ripped a strip of cloth from the spyvest. Gripping the inside of C-10 with a hind paw, she flicked her tail up against her chest. Poor tail! It used to reach to her nose. With tooth and paw, she tied the cloth tight near the bloody stump.

“Excellent, C-10. Now bring her to me.”

Rat's hind leg exploded her toward the window, but too late. Sniffers shifted, closing the opening, trapping Rat inside.

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY
-S
IX

H
IJACKED
!

It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out where Dr. Vivexian was headed, so Jeff took an elevator that stopped one section beyond the Zero-G room. He hoped to double back and surprise Dr. Vivexian. If he had guessed wrong, it wouldn't matter. He would be where he needed to be, ready to help Rat any way he could.
If
he could.

The elevator door opened onto silence. Good sign? Bad sign? Jeff bit his lip and launched into the corridor. He wall-crawled, pulling himself along pipes. A sound like rain hitting a tin roof gradually grew louder as he approached the bend leading directly to the Zero-G room.

Dr. Vivexian floated in the door, his back to Jeff and his feet firmly planted in the footholds. Good sign. He wouldn't do that if the battle still raged. He was settling a gauntlet on his right arm. The gloved part gleamed metallic. Jeff drifted to the ceiling, then carefully, quietly, shimmied closer, squinting: Yes, the glove was biomechanical, each finger pistoned with hydraulics. Dr. Vivexian would need something like that to match Rat's incredible strength and for protection from her teeth and razor toes.

Rat must be here. She must be alive. But Dr. Vivexian was going to break the truce!

“Excellent, C-10. Now bring her to me.”

Oh, no! How could Jeff save Rat if she was still inside C-10? His only chance would be during the moment of transfer. He wall-crawled closer. He needed to see the robot. Get the angle. Be ready to dive between them.

At last, he saw past Dr. Vivexian. A haze of smoke and drifting sniffer parts filled the Zero-G room. Nanny wandered like a dark star, the eye dead, stubs of grippers bristling from the body, once sleek, now streaked with gouges. In the middle of the room, the tidy beach ball of C-10 moved steadily closer to Dr. Vivexian.

Careful not to make a sound, Jeff placed his feet on a pipe, gripped it on either side with his hands, then pulled himself into a compact crouch, tensed for launch.

C-10 shuddered as if heaved by an earthquake. It squawked, “Malfunction! Malfunction!”

The scrambler! All right, Rat! Jeff swallowed a shout of triumph.

The solid surface cracked apart. Rat shot through a gap. She tumbled a moment, head darting in quick motions, searching, Jeff knew, for the blue panel and escape. She reached for the jetpak control.

Dr. Vivexian spoke one word: “Pavlov.”

The effect on Rat was instant. All animation left her body, as if a puppet master suddenly dropped the strings. Momentum carried her to the far side of the room. She bumped against a panel and bounced back toward the door, lifeless as a rubber ball.

Jeff unsprung, but he never made it beyond the threshold. Pistoned fingers hissed, seizing his upper arm in a grip as strong as Nanny's. That grab should've dragged them both into the room, but Dr. Vivexian was well-anchored. He knew how to handle himself in zero-g.

“Oh, no, you don't.” He twisted Jeff around, bringing them face to face. “You have interfered enough.”

“Ow! You're hurting—”

“I'd like to break your neck.” The fingers squeezed Jeff's arm even harder in demonstration, then eased off to a gentler, but solid, grip. Dr. Vivexian smiled. “But that would be ungrateful, hmm? You have saved my rat's life twice. My masterpiece, nearly lost! Can you imagine what I have suffered since she escaped?”

Dr. Vivexian's mouth pinched, and he looked away, into the room, at Rat. Jeff looked, too. She was halfway to them, drifting as slowly as a lavender soap bubble. Something was tied to her tail. A ribbon? On Rat? Then he saw the red stain spreading in the cloth. “She's hurt!”

“I noticed,” Dr. Vivexian said. His gaze flicked toward C-10. It was coming apart at the seams. “I suspect she is lucky to be alive.”

C-10 babbled, “Error … error … emergency shutdown.”

The scrambler couldn't be causing that. C-10 and Rat were too far apart. Clearly, C-10 had not escaped the clench unscathed. But who cared about C-10?

Jeff squirmed, hoping to catch Dr. Vivexian off guard, but the glove held fast. Rat was so close now, Jeff could see into her eyes. He was startled to find something in them—recognition? hope?—whatever, Rat was there! Her body might be hijacked, but she wasn't a mindless zombie. If only he could think of a way to reach through Dr. Vivexian's brainwashing …

Time was running out. In another minute or two, Rat would be close enough for Dr. Vivexian to simply pluck her out of the air. He'd stick her in a cage. She'd never see the sun again.

Sun! Of course!

Jeff shouted, “Sunshine! Rat, remember the sunshine!”

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY
-S
EVEN

N
OT
T
OO
T
IDY

Sunshine!

The boy's voice.

Together, word and voice burned through Rat's mind like an exploding star.

With a fierce squeeze of her forepaw, she reclaimed her freedom. She paused behind the blue panel to check on the boy.

“How dare you!” Dr. Vivexian shook him. The hydraulic fingers hissed with strain. “How dare you know my rat that well!”

Down the corridor, an elevator door whisked open. A voice bellowed, “Vivexian!” Dr. Vivexian looked over his shoulder. The captain soared around the bend, in his element, moving along the pipes like a great ape swinging through the jungle.

Dr. Vivexian glared at the boy then at the blue triangle.

“This is not ended,” he called. “Do your hear me? You are mine. I will get you back again, one way or another.” He tossed the boy aside. Rat saw the boy tumbling. He would be okay. Rescue was on the way.

Rat darted into the air shaft. Discovered right away that the forepaw was hurt more badly than it had felt in the heat of the battle: dislocated, maybe even broken.

A broken paw. A chopped tail. Pretty lucky rat.

She limped along using the three-legged gait. More luck. She expected to have to fight her way to the boy's room. But the air shafts were clogged with dead sniffers. They weren't blasted, and it wasn't the effect of her scrambler. Something had happened to C-10, some delayed damage from the battle. It had spread to every one of its sniffers. Once again the secret places of the space station belonged to Rat alone.

It was the last worry. Nanny gone; C-10 gone; and the power of the voice broken by the boy. Wonderful boy!

She came to the grate above his bed. At first glance, Rat thought she must've taken a wrong turn. Everything was so tidy! But no, her nose insisted, this is the boy's room.

Rat pressed against the grate for a better look. The three sunspot posters proved her nose right. The only hint of a mess was a jump suit draped over a chair and the laundry drawer left open. She pushed at the plastic clips holding the grate closed. Nosing it open, she slid onto the shelf beneath it. She held the heavy mesh with a back foot until her poor hurt tail slipped clear, then guided the grate silently closed.

Look, smell, listen, feel. Just in case.

Nothing.

ITCH!

Rat dove onto the bed. Her paw raked the Velcro seam to peel open the spyvest. She wiggled out of it. Rolled over and over in the bedclothes, kicking, scratching, and nipping until every itch was dead. But now her forepaw ached and her tail throbbed. When the boy came, he could doctor her. He would like that. But no cast this time. Rat knew better now. Her broken leg had probably healed many days before she chewed off the cast.