Rat Trap (9 page)

A speaker hissed. “Hello, Cousin Rat. Isn't this exciting? LB has never had a roommate before. It is nice to share. Is the light level acceptable? Is the audio volume good for your sensitive rat ears? Is the temperature correct?”

No keyboard, but there was an observation camera in the top corner. Rat signed toward it, “All nice. Want to see.”

“Working on that.” One wall of the habitat was a screen. It flickered to life, letting Rat see through the machine's eyes. Total chaos! She blinked. Stepped back. Squinted. The screen was filled with thousands of tiny images at once. Rat's brain was not made to see like this!

“How about half as many?” the machine asked when Rat complained, but that was no good either. “A quarter? An eighth? A sixteenth—what? Only six? It must be very boring to see only six things at once.”

Unfortunately, the six views were just different parts of the Photonics lab. The machine was not connected to the space-station network. And because of that, the machine's eyes could not look where Rat most wanted to see. They could not follow the boy or check on Nanny or watch the investigator arrive to see if it was Dr. Vivexian. She had to wait until the boy could sneak back here and tell them the news—unless he failed and sniffers came instead.

How was he doing? Did Scrub-a-Dub work right?

Her teeth wanted a wire to chew—a real mistake in here! She paced, but that made the scrambler upset her stomach. She spat it up. Was she going to need it?

“Cousin, your heart and respiration rate have increased. Is this a medical emergency?”

Would the machine try to play doctor? Rat felt panic. “No emergency. Rat fine. Only nerves.”

“Understood. You are scared. LB will think of a distraction.”

Rat needed to take control, fast. The machine was like the boy; it liked games. She signed, “Rat is thinking of a word.”

“Which word? Give LB a hint, Cousin!”

Rat thought about using the boy's strange new word, but she did not know how to spell it. So she chose the most important word in the world to her.

“The first two letters are …” Rat signed them using the binary code that made up machine language.

S was 01110011.

U
was 01110101.

“Bett is returning from tea. LB must close the link so she does not accidentally discover you. Quickly, how many letters are in your word?”

“Eight.”

“LB will try to guess the word from these hints. Bye.”

The screen went blank, but before the audio cut out, Rat overheard part of their conversation.

“What have you been thinking about, LB?”

“Thinking?” The machine responded with a hiccup. “You want to know what LB was thinking while you were away at tea?”

“Of course. Don't I every day?”

“LB was counting nanoseconds. Would you like to know how many nanoseconds LB counted?”

“No.” The scientist sounded annoyed. “Really, LB, you've become as uncommunicative as a teenager!”

Rat had never wondered before, but now, when it was too late, she did: Was the machine any good at lying?

C
HAPTER
S
EVENTEEN

L
AST
M
INUTE

The shuttle would be docking in fifty-seven minutes. With pocket computer in hand, Jeff hurried to complete the list of last-minute items. Everything had taken longer to do than he'd thought it would. Everything had been harder than expected.

Item: Empty laundry drawer/leave open.

He scooped armfuls of clothes out and dumped them into the laundry chute.

Item: Dispose of boring wires.

He snatched the licorice-like pieces from beside the computer. He double-checked that none had slipped between the keys or fallen on the floor, then tossed the handful into the reclaimer. He checked again for chewed bits.

Item: Pillow into reclaimer.

Jeff put his hand into the deep, cold hollow in Rat's pillow. Poor Rat. The habitat really freaked her.

“Less than a day, Rat,” he whispered. That's all it would take to unload and refuel the shuttle for the trip back to Earth. With LB's help, Rat would tough it out.

Jeff was the one on his own now.

He hugged the pillow hard to his chest, then smooshed it into the reclaimer. The machine gulped. A lot of trash, but Rat had programmed the computer to forget even that.

Item: Old clothes into laundry/shower with antiseptic/wear booties/new clothes.

Jeff stripped, smiling as he slipped his bare feet into the too-big boots. Rat had thought of everything! He couldn't throw away these Velcro boots. They were the only ones that even came close to fitting him.

So into the shower with them. The warm water pooled inside. Jeff soaped the boots along with his body. His eyes watered as the steam carried the scouring fumes up his nose.

Quick now. Dry the body. Dry the boots. They were waterproof, at least. No squishing when he walked.

Clean underwear. New jump suit.

A glance at the clock: twelve minutes to spare.

“How about that, Rat?” he said, surveying the empty room. Except for the three sunspot posters, it was as clean and bare as the day he had arrived.

Last item: Activate Scrub-a-Dub/crash pocket computer/leave on desk.

On the main computer, Jeff called up Scrub-a-Dub. He activated it, and 180 seconds flashed on the screen, then started ticking down by seconds. Besides the hundred other things it did, Scrub-a-Dub would also create a false fire alarm, flooding the room with fire foam. The chemical would wipe out any lingering Rat sign.

Just as Jeff crashed the pocket computer, there was a knock at the door—but not in code!

“Who's there?”

“It's your mother.”

“Mom!” She was dressed in a conservative pantsuit and carrying a briefcase. Her hair was in a tight bun with a restrained highlight of green at each temple. “What are you doing here?”

“Well, that's a fine way to greet—whoa! Look at this place! Packed and ready to go, huh?” Mom stepped into the room, saw the posters, and froze. “Oh, Jeff! You picked some of the best ones. I didn't think you even cared.
Now
look,” she said, dabbing her eyes. Black smeared along her forefinger. “You messed up my makeup. And I want to look super sharp for that investigator.”

That explained the power suit. The investigator was from an important research company. Mom wanted to impress him. After all, you never knew who might end up sitting on a funding committee.

Mom went into the bathroom. Following her, Jeff glimpsed the computer: 90 seconds. “We don't have time—”

“Of course we do.” Water splashed in the sink. Mom called out over the sound. “The captain told me the investigator wanted to question you. It sounded so official and severe, I thought you might like some company.”

“Gee, Mom!” Jeff's eyes moved from the bright numbers—45 seconds—to the nozzles in the ceiling. She'd have a lot more to fix than eyeliner when that foam let loose!

She mistook his small whine of alarm as a protest. “Silly, I know. You're getting so big that that probably feels like hand holding.”

“No.” In fact it reminded him of Bett's fierceness, defending LB against the mysterious caller. It made him feel great. “I just expected Dad.…”

“I made him watch the computer. I've been studying up on modifieds, and I have some questions for the investigator.”

“You do?”

“You haven't felt sick or anything, have you?” Mom pressed a still-moist, soap-smelling hand against his forehead. “No headaches or cramps?”

Only fifteen seconds to splatter. Breathing fire foam would make them sick for sure! “Nervous, that's all. Being late won't help. Let's go!”

Jeff snatched the briefcase off the floor, took Mom's arm, and headed out the door. He managed to seal the door behind them just in time. A loud
whoosh
, like a whole school bathroom of johns flushing at once, came from inside his room.

“What was that?” Mom asked.

“Who knows? This place is always making weird noises.”

The captain was already waiting in the reception area when Jeff and Mom arrived. It was a medium-sized room, much like the waiting room in a hospital. A hatch twice as wide as a man filled one wall. It opened onto the long airlock tunnel leading to the shuttle dock beyond Outer Ring. A red light above the hatch showed the tunnel was still filling with air.

Jeff stood between Mom and the captain with hands behind his back, secretly making a sign with his fingers: You will succeed. Over and over, like a chant. It meant a lot to him, Rat saying that.

A tinkly chime. The light turned green. Slowly the hatch began to rise. When the gap was about three inches tall, a row of ten sniffers rolled over the threshold and stopped: ten square, mouse-sized bodies on wheels, with big alligator jaws. Ten pairs of glittery eyestalks and ten pairs of ribbed sniffer tubes peaked over the jaws. The tubes snuffled. The jaws tapped quietly together.

Strange. Sniffer teeth should clatter. These ones were making a kind of lip-smacking sound. Jeff bent down for a closer look. Blue rubber dentures were fitted over the steely teeth.

The hatch continued to rise, revealing a pair of designer booties. They looked like cowboy boots made of glossy black leather. Studs of hammered silver traced the double spiral of the DNA helix up the tall sides.

More sniffers came out. Ten by ten they came—an army!—orderly as fire ants. They flowed around the booties like a river around a boulder.

“Goodness!” Mom said. Clutching Jeff's elbow, she pulled him away from the advancing robots. They broke off into dozens of columns and disappeared down corridors or swarmed up the walls into the vents. So many! Enough to patrol every ring.

The hatch rose past sharply creased black pants, a gray tunic with arms crossed over it, one finger tapping impatiently. Then tight lips in a round face, topped with a head of thick black hair. The man's lips slipped into a pleasant smile. Blue eyes found Jeff. The impatient hand fluttered, as if whisking away a bug, but the finger motions spoke the special sign language of the lab: “Where's my rat?”

Reflexively, Jeff's mouth began to open, the well-rehearsed answer on the tip of his tongue.…

“Dr. Vivexian, I presume. Welcome aboard,” the captain said, bumping Jeff aside and jolting him to his senses.
I'm not supposed to know that sign language!

Only the captain's clumsiness saved him from falling into Dr. Vivexian's trap.

“You must be Dr. Janice Gannon.” Dr. Vivexian made a slight bow to Mom. “An honor.”

Mom was startled. “You know who I am?”

“Come, come. Such false modesty. There are those of us who closely follow your work.” Dr. Vivexian turned to Jeff. “And this must be our hero. Jimmy, isn't it?”

“Jeffrey,” Mom corrected.

“Oh, I beg your pardon.” Dr. Vivexian offered his hand, fingers held tight together like a spear. Challenge flashed in his eyes. “I want to thank you for saving my rat, Jeffrey.”

I'll bet he knew my name all along! He's trying to psych me out!

“Jeff,” Mom said as the moment turned awkward, “where are you manners?”

“I hope I did, sir. Save it, I mean.” He shook hands the firm, confident way Dad had taught him to and poured out the words he'd memorized. “I stopped Nanny, but it got away. It was hurt pretty bad. It's probably dead.”

“We will soon know.” Dr. Vivexian withdrew his hand. “C-10 has gone to fetch the sniffer that caught the rat.”

“C-10?” the captain asked.

“Ah, yes, you might not be familiar with collective intelligences way out here,” Dr. Vivexian said. “Any ten of the sniffers you just saw can combine into a robot smarter than a prowler. For convenience, C-10.”

“Doctor,” Mom said, “since you are familiar with my work, you must understand what a critical time this is.”

Jeff should've guessed! Mom didn't really come to stand by him. She was here to protect the Project.

“Of course,” Dr. Vivexian said. “And if I'm not mistaken, solar max has already passed. Your findings?”

Mom gave a sharp twitch of her head. “Not conclusive yet. There's so little time left. Nothing must delay me. That creature of yours already damaged a stabilizer. What if it takes out a computer or imager?”

There she goes again, getting it all wrong! He should interrupt. Make her look stupid. Pay her back for pretending she was here for him.

“… regulations,” Mom was saying. “Rule forty-four requires extermination of modifieds that escape into the environment. You've got to kill it quickly.”

Jeff flinched at Mom's terrible words, but he watched Dr. Vivexian carefully.

“Our lawyers have reviewed the regulations as well. This hardly qualifies as the environment, does it?” He gestured around them. “It's more like an elaborate cage. Almost Victorian from what I saw as we approached. Rather quaint and antique.”

The captain harrumphed.

Mom pressed on. “Then what about rule eighty-eight?”

“Rule eighty-eight? My, my, you have done your homework. But I hate to think of my rat being such a distraction from your work.” Dr. Vivexian lightly touched Mom's elbow. “I tell you what. Make a list of all the systems vital to your work. I'll have sniffers patrol them and your lab.”

That was a good waste of sniffers.

“They won't
touch
anything, will they?” asked Mom.

“Of course not.”

Mom bit her lip. Her anger faltered.

“Go back to your work, Dr. Gannon. Leave the rat to me and C-10.”

As if on cue, a column of sniffers suddenly filled the corridor, spilling from the vents and forming a line right up to Dr. Vivexian's feet. In the distance, Jeff saw something small and dark moving along the top of the column. The sniffers passed the object to each other the way ants might pass a dead beetle to their nest.