Reunification (31 page)

Arms and legs are fully functional, though
left knee squeaks slightly. Quickly fix with tiny droplets of oil
from finger, but make note to bring knee to the attention of one of
the certified technicians back in HQ after I return to Xeeo. My
quick fix will do for now.

Optics are not obscured. Zoom in
feature—which allows me to see two dwarves arguing in a building on
the other side of town—works, as did zoom out feature, which
returns my vision to its original size.

Alert! Audio receptors pick up sounds of
feet in leather boots coming up behind me. I whirl around, aiming
my PRB, only to see that it is my temporary ally in Dela, Sir Alart
Garson of the Knights of Se-Dela.

Sir Alart is a tall human specimen, male,
wearing typical metalligick armor that all members of the Knights
wear. It covers his body from head to toe, with knobs along the
shoulders, arms, and chest to allow its user to activate the skyras
energy stored in it. Carries a sword by his side, a silver-white
one, which I recognize as the best kind of weapon to use to kill a
vampire. Quite appropriate, because records indicate that Kona
typically works with vampires and vampires cannot be killed via
most normal means.

Unlike most Delanian humans, Sir Alart's
left eye is mechanical, a generic type of mechanical eyeball that
is popular among those who lost their eyeballs in an accident. Its
pupil extends and retracts as he draws closer to me, as if he is
trying to decide what the best length to have it at.

“
You ready for this?”
Sir Alart asks. I sense tenseness in his tone.

I nod. “Of course. I have nothing to fear.
I have you and the other Knights to aid me should the target prove
difficult to catch.”

“
And you're also a
robot,” Sir Alart points out. “Which means you can't feel fear at
all, right?”

Again, I nod. “That is correct, Sir Alart.
All emotions are foreign to me, though I've found I don't need them
in order to be an effective law enforcer.”

Sir Alart shudders, as if I had just said
something disturbing, though my reference files for human social
interaction do not indicate I misspoke. “I just can't imagine it.
Ruthlessly enforcing the law, without any sort of mercy or kindness
behind your actions. Makes me glad we Knights are mostly
organic.”

Despite my lack of emotion, I begin to
question just how useful an ally Sir Alart is. Most Delanians are
so afraid of robots like myself that they do not talk even this
much to me; even so, Sir Alart does not appear to like me that
much. He seems to view our alliance the same way that the street
cleaners of Xeeon view their job: an unpleasant task that needs to
be completed quickly.

Were I a human, I might be offended by
that; however, I am not a human. It doesn't matter to me if Alart
considers me his best friend or not. What matters is that we are
both law enforcers who, with luck and skill, about to put an
infamous criminal who has terrorized both of our worlds for decades
behind bars.

Nonetheless, I ask, “Are the rest of the
Knights in position, in accordance with the plan?”

“
Every last one of
them,” Alart confirms. He gestures with his hands at the area
surrounding the buildings. “They'll strike like cobras as soon as
they see the signal.”

“
Excellent,” I say.
“They have the communicators I gave them?”

Alart grimaces. He pulls a tiny, handheld
radio from his armor and waves it in front of me. “Yes. And they
all know how to use these infernal contraptions, too, so you don't
have to worry about anyone messing up.”

“
Good,” I say, “though I
notice you sound less than enthusiastic about these
devices.”

Alart puts his away as he says, “Because
they're unnatural. The way we Knights usually in contact in
situations like this, we either have a portal monkey to deliver
handwritten notes to each other or develop a series of bird calls
we can use to signal our positions to each other without giving our
position away to the enemy or some other signal that only we would
recognize.”

“
Both methods sound
inefficient to me,” I remark. “But it does not matter. I see that
we are both armed and ready to go, so why don't we head down and
find out what kind of party Kona is throwing?”

I wait for Alart's response, but the
Knight simply stares at me as if my head had popped off its
sprockets and rolled at his feet.

“
Was that … a joke?”
says Alart in disbelief. “From you?”

I nod and smile. “Yes. It was funny,
wasn't it?”

“
It was …” Alart seems
to struggle with finding the appropriate words to criticize my
humor. “Why did you tell a joke? I thought bots like you didn't
have a sense of humor.”

“
We normally don't,” I
explain. “But the Xeeon City Government has been making a concerted
effort to 'humanize' us J bots, because they are starting to think
that our normal robotic selves are frightening to the
citizenry.”

“
Uh, okay,” says Alart.
“But—”

“
To achieve this goal, I
have been downloading many electronic books on humor so I can
become the funniest robot in all of the two worlds,” I continue,
because I feel it is important for him to understand completely
what I am doing to achieve this goal. “I have downloaded books by
such famous Xeeonite comedians as 'Mad-Hammer' Hagan and 'Master of
Comedy' Killan. I have learned the secrets of humor from their
books; in fact, Hagan's book is titled
Secrets of
Humor
, appropriately
enough.
”

Sir Alart shakes his head in exasperation.
“I've never heard of either of those two comedians, but whatever.
Let's just do our job. You can joke later, after we've busted Kona
and her cronies.”

“
An excellent
suggestion, Sir Alart,” I say. I tap the side of my head. “But may
I suggest that you take your attitude and sell it to the Attitude
Store on Sixth street? Because I hear you can make good money doing
that.”

Sir Alart glares at me. “What did I say
about joking?”

“
That joke was from
Hagan's
Secrets of Humor
,” I explain,
because I can see that Sir Alart clearly did not 'get' the joke, as
most comedians say. “Chapter three, under the section 'Jokes You
Can Tell Assholes Who Can't Take a Joke.'”

“
I liked you better when
I thought you were just another stiff robot,” said Sir Alart. He
rests his sword on his shoulder, turns, and walks to the entrance
leading from the roof of this building into the
interior.

I follow quickly, but do not make any more
jokes. This is partly because this is not the situation to be
joking around in, but also because I now wonder if I 'botched' the
joke, as the books say. Perhaps I need more practice, which the
books say you should do if you want to become a great comedian. I
have no aspirations to become a comedian—I much prefer law
enforcement—but I resolve to tell better jokes nonetheless.

Sir Alart opens the door and peeks inside,
even though I could just as easily have told him that there is no
one in there thanks to my sensors failing to pick up any signs of
life. Still, he pulls his head out and says to me, “It's safe,”
before disappearing within.

The door almost closes itself behind him,
but I catch it with one hand and enter. We stand in a dark, narrow
room, with holes in the walls, ceiling, and floor from years of
neglect. My optics catch a tiny spider of undetermined species
crawl into a hole on the floor, but I do not allow myself to be
distracted by that, because Sir Alart and I are in the enemy
territory now, which means that we have to be on high alert at all
times to avoid being taken by surprise.

The ceiling is low enough that Sir Alart
must crouch to avoid scraping the top of his helmet against it. I
do not need to, but I do so anyway in order to avoid giving our
enemies less of a visible target. Though I doubt that our enemies
could harm me much; aside from Kona, the rest of her minions do not
seem to have any skyras rings of their own, which means they likely
rely on old-fashioned weapons like swords and cudgels and knives,
weapons that pose a tiny threat to robots like myself.

We soon emerge onto one of the two
catwalks extending across the ceiling of the warehouse. We do so
very slowly, because both of us are heavy, Sir Alart due to his
armor, I due to being constructed entirely out of metal. We manage
to make very little noise as we walk across it, but I am prepared
to fight the moment someone notices us.

Though our keeping silent isn't entirely
necessary, because below us come the loud—almost too
loud—conversations of Kona and her minions even before we see them.
Her minions are mostly dwarves, which is why my audio receptors
pick up such loud and hostile tones, as my records say that dwarves
generally speak in gruffer tones than most Delanian species.

“
Come on, come on,” says
a woman's voice, which I quickly match with the audio file of
Kona's I have downloaded into my memory. It is harsh and impatient,
which is a good description of the witch in general. “You dwarves
are so slow. We need to get this shipment of super speed out
tonight
, and if you idiots don't get all of this packed and
through the Portal soon, we'll miss our deadline and the Founder
will be beyond angry.”

I understand most of what she says—for
example, super speed is a Delanian drug that is popular on both
Xeeo and Dela and is smuggled between worlds by a variety of
criminal gangs. Kona has been known to work alongside the Red Ring
Smugglers to help smuggle the drug between the worlds, though I had
thought she was going to try to keep low after the busting of her
earlier vampire feeding ring. Then again, Xeeonite psychologists
often say that criminals usually return to crime quickly because
they have made a habit of it.

I also understand the reference to the
Portal. Xeeo and Dela are connected by thousands of Portals that
allow individuals from both worlds to travel between them. Most
Portals are overseen by the governments of both worlds; however, it
is common among criminals to have their own illegal Portals that
they use to commit all sorts of crimes. That Kona and her minions
have one—possibly more, as most criminals generally have anywhere
from two to as much as fifty, depending on the size of the criminal
operation in question—surprises me not in the least.

The reference to the Founder, however,
makes no sense to me at all. I do a quick search of the mobile
Database files, but find no reference in Kona's bio of any being
named 'the Founder.' Possibly a hitherto unknown partner-in-crime?
Unknown.

I glance at Sir Alart and whisper,
“Founder?”

But Sir Alart shakes his head. “No idea.
Keep listening.”

I nod as we continue to walk along the
catwalk. As it turns out, there is some light in this place; on the
floor, near a dozen empty old crates, are portable floodlights that
show a sight I had expected to see.

There are at least a dozen dwarves in all,
hauling large crates full of super speed between each other through
a larger-than-normal Portal. The Portal appears to be a custom
design, possibly made by Kona herself, because it does not match
any Portal design I know of; however, it may actually be an older,
discontinued model, because it has a thick layer of dust over it,
as if it has not been cleaned or used in a long time. Bluish-white
energy crackles within it as dwarves enter and exit it in an
orderly manner that prevents the dwarves entering from bumping into
the dwarves leaving. A short wooden ramp allows the dwarves to
climb up to or down from the Portal easily. I see no power source,
though if my readings are correct, I suspect that this Portal has
skyras energy coursing through it.

Standing ten feet from the Portal is
Jornan ah Kona herself. I snap a picture of her face and compare it
to a picture from the mobile Database files. The two look the same:
Pale, almost sickly skin, with blackened, rotted teeth from too
much super speed usage. Her hair is stringy and graying already,
even though her files indicate she is in her late thirties.

I peer over the side of the catwalk to get
a better look at Kona. Though she is not walking, her body shakes
and shivers as she watches her minions move the super speed drugs
through the Portal to wherever they are sending them. Another
common symptom of super speed over-usage is that the user's body
shakes uncontrollably, though I do not take that to mean she is
weak. On the contrary, records indicate that Kona is a master
witch, as she has ten rings on all of her fingers, which is five
more than the typical Delanian witch or wizard has.

Kona has her hands on her hips, tapping
her foot against the floor impatiently. Her men are clearly moving
as fast as they can, but dwarves, due to their height and weight,
cannot move very fast. That is good news for us, because it will be
that much easier for the Knights and I to capture these criminals
once we begin the attack.

“
By Waran-Una's name,
you dwarves have to be the slowest dwarves I've ever had the
displeasure of working with,” Kona snaps. She points sharply at the
Portal. “Go faster, faster, faster, or do you think you can just
take it nice and easy, as if we
don't
have a deadline to
meet? If we don't get all of this super speed delivered on time,
none of us get paid a cent. Do you hear me? Not one
cent.”

None of Kona's dwarves respond, but I
suspect it's less to do with not having anything to say and more
having to do with their fear of her. Mobile Database records
indicate, based on the confessions of her arrested ex-partners,
that she does not take well to minions who talk back to or disagree
with her.