The Medida War Read online

  "Steel. John Steel."

  "What's your opinion?"

  "I have no opinion."

  "So what kind of women do you like, John?"

  "I don't know."

  "You must like something - a good looking robot like you. Humans? Robots? Aliens?" Sheer wasn't giving up.

  "My work keeps me too busy."

  "Trimorphs? Humpies? Cyboons?"

  Sheen started laughing. It was a beautiful musical laugh that Joe would have found entrancing if his heart was not lost elsewhere.

  "Come on, John. We want to know."

  Any minute now, Joe thought irritably, she's going to ask me what my star sign is. He maintained his dignified silence.

  Sheer wasn't put off by it.

  "You're very secretive, John. Okay, then answer this instead. Do you believe we robots have souls?"

  "I have no opinion."

  "You see," said the talk lights. "He keeps his circuits clean. It's robots like those ABC Warriors that have stirred us all up with their notions of liberty, freedom and equality. That's not for the likes of us. It would have been better for us if they'd stayed beyond."

  "What's your line of work, John?" quizzed Sheer, determined to make him talk.

  "Sheer! Don't be so nosy," said Sheen.

  "I'm a liquidator."

  "You close down companies?"

  "Something like that."

  "Oh, stop it, Sheer!" said Sheen. "Can't you see Mr Steel wants to be left alone? Stop bugging him!"

  "I'm going to a party in Marineris, John... Would you like to come along as my guest?"

  Sheen looked annoyed because Sheer was trying to gazump Joe. So much for loyalty between friends. But she said nothing.

  "I don't think so," he said politely but firmly.

  "We could have a lot of fun... Just the three of us..."

  "Sheer!" said Sheen. "What do you think I am?"

  "It's a party," said Sheer. "Don't be so boring."

  Joe could imagine. Robots snorting batteries and mains lining. He found that really boring. And he found the skeletal Ms Sad even more boring.

  "Sorry. I'm not into nekrotekking."

  "What?!"

  "You heard."

  That finally shut her up. It was the only way. Polite didn't work with her kind. But he felt a chill of apprehension after he said it.

  Her skull-like head smiled in response. She prided herself on being too much of a player to show her anger. But he knew he had made an enemy.

  After that, the atmosphere in the compartment grew rather cold and the rest of the journey continued in silence, which suited Joe so he could keep his mind on the job ahead and his heart on Juanita.

  He alighted at the coach station at Marineris City, which still showed signs of the meteorite attack some months earlier. Some buildings were still being rebuilt and interstellar rocks were waiting to be carted away.

  He passed the human super models who were gossiping about the Marineris girls in their wellington boots, yellow plastic smocks and transparent headscarves. "What peasants," they giggled. "The bag lady look must be fashionable here. All they need to finish it off is a shopping trolley."

  Sheen Zano looked longingly after Joe as he walked away. He could feel her eyes on his back, willing him to turn around.

  He never did.

  Although he could have run to Camp Diaz, he didn't want to attract attention. So he hired a taxi to take him to a township a few miles from the camp. From there he would proceed on foot and find a way to get past security, or - if necessary - deal with it.

  NINETEEN

  During Juanita's stay in hospital, a course of anti-demonics quickly healed her demon bite. As she lay in her hospital bed, all she could think of was Joe Pineapples. She was drowned in the memory of his hands.

  Then, she thought she was being transferred to another hospital before she was discharged. Aware of the dangers of demonic possession, she didn't question the doctors and was happy to leave the decisions in their capable hands.

  Instead, she was flown to Camp Diaz.

  The senator insisted on her spending the day there and having dinner with him that night before flying her back to Viking city the next day. "My intentions are entirely honourable, my dear," he insisted with old planet charm.

  She was annoyed at his presumption and aware of his true intentions, but realised this would be a great opportunity for her to tell the senator about the cause of Redpeace and how humans must change their attitude towards the planet if they were to survive.

  Accordingly, she let him show her around the ancient domes of Camp Diaz. While he talked about his exotic collections of Martian fauna and flora, she lectured him on the cause of Redpeace. Neither of them was listening to the other and both were thinking ahead to dinner that night. He - how he would seduce her. She - how she would rebuff him.

  He showed her the stables where he kept his reanimated dinosaurs. "My own personal Cretaceous Park," he smiled. The menagerie included two tyrannosaurs, Sodom and Gomorrah, descendants of Golgotha, one of the first fighting tyrannosaurs of Mars. He was able to control their savagery with cybernetic devices operated from saddle reins.

  Diaz explained how Sodom and Gomorrah were the finest bloodstock. He claimed their lineage went back to the legendary tyrannosaur Satanus, back on Earth. She found the idea of taming such creatures repulsive and dangerous. The smell from the reptiles was also pretty disgusting.

  Even though he was desperate to make a good impression on her, he kept on digging a bigger hole for himself. He talked about the bad old days when rich colonists would use the tyrannosaurs to hunt Martians. But in response to demands from Redpeace and other pressure groups, this barbaric practice had been discontinued. Now they were purely for riding. "It was shocking," he commented. "Absolutely shocking." It was clear from his tone that he actually thought it rather exciting.

  Juanita tried to thought mail Joe. But her messages kept being returned. Diaz explained that a natural phenomenon made the transmission of signals very difficult here.

  He insisted on them making a tour of the grounds. The camp was surrounded by a sand sea on all sides, so they were actually on an island. A swing bridge connected it with the mainland. "In the old days, it used to be called Damnation Island," laughed Diaz.

  On the mainland, Behemek tanks patrolled the perimeter. There were also foot patrols of clone soldiers, or "Dead Eyes." A less appealing scenario for a romantic weekend could not be imagined.

  Dinner that night was hardly an improvement. The senator went to a great deal of effort: candles, music, and wine, a lot of wine. She sensibly avoided drinking as she realised it could be drugged, so she stuck to mineral water. He wore a white dinner jacket, a red cummerbund and elegant black evening trousers and boots. And too much "Arm Arnie" aftershave. She wore a Scargill, from his winter collection; it was the least revealing thing she could find and she had it buttoned up to the neck.

  She knew that sometimes a girl could change a frog into a prince. But in the pond there are also toads, amoebas and other forms of life. Diaz was one of them, from the very bottom of the pond.

  She smiled in all the right places at his tedious jokes and then finally, announced "I am a little tired. I think I should go to bed now."

  "May I join you, my dear?"

  "Pardon?"

  "Would you like some company?" He made it sound like she was about to win the lottery.

  "I don't think so."

  "Are you sure?"

  "Very sure."

  He tried to hold her close. "But I do not take 'no' for an answer."

  "I am flattered by your attention..." She'd forgotten his first name. What was it? Juan? Ramon? Manuel? "Senator. You are a very special man. And there are many girls who must find you irresistible."

  "But it's you I'm interested in."

  "What about that model I saw you with on the Hot Gossip Show?"

  "She had shop girl good looks," he replied dismissively. "But you, my dear, are a re
al aristocrat. Like me, you go back to the Foundation Fathers. It's all about good breeding, you know."

  He made it sound like he was talking about one of his dinosaurs out there in the stables.

  "My dear senator, what can I say...?"

  "Say yes."

  "Good night."

  He blocked her route to the stairs. "I thought we could do this the easy way, Juanita. But, you know, there is another way..."

  "What do you mean?"

  "I always get what I want."

  "Good night," she insisted. He reluctantly let her pass.

  As she climbed the stairs, all his old-planet charm faded away. He called limply after her, "I suppose a blow job is out of the question then?"

  She wisely didn't look back.

  The next morning he acted as if nothing had happened. She was expecting to be flown out and looking forward to being reunited with Joe in Viking City.

  "Later," he dismissed her question. "First there is something I want you to see."

  He was dressed in military fatigues and explained he was going hunting. He had been joined for the hunt by Seraph Rosesand, whom she recalled meeting before at official functions. He, too, was wearing fatigues. Diaz wore a cap with "Slay with me" on it.

  Seraph had a cap with "Start preying." He smiled enthusiastically at her with his horrible lopsided face. "Looking forward to the fun?"

  "I don't know what you mean," she answered guardedly.

  "We'll show you." He ushered her out of the domes. "I can never resist a hunt, you see? When the senator called me last night, I came down from Viking city specially." He eyed up her shell suit by Chow Chess Choo. "I see you're dressed for the part. Nice and bright. I like that. And with its own coolant system, it will stop you getting all hot and sweaty, if you don't mind my being personal."

  "Actually, I do," answered Juanita. She had a terrible feeling, even before they stepped into the stable yard. There, in the early morning sunshine, the two men mounted up on the waiting tyrannosaurs, Rosesand on Sodom and the senator on Gomorrah.

  Three clones were shepherded towards them by other Dead Eyes. "Now, we'll give you the usual fifteen minute start and if you can stay alive for one hour, you'll be spared. Understood?"

  The clones nodded. They seemed singularly uninterested in what was likely to happen to them.

  The two hunters were offered silver goblets of neuropeptide on a silver platter. "It's 'A.'" explained Rosesand with a knowing wink, meaning it was the restricted version of the drink: neuropeptide-A. "It can get pretty hairy out there on the hunt."

  "Don't you mean 'scaly'?" laughed the senator.

  "Wait a moment," interjected Juanita. "I don't believe I'm hearing any of this. Tell me I'm wrong. You're not intending to hunt those clones?"

  "Well... That's only part of the picture."

  "What do you mean?"

  "Wait a moment and I'll explain. Go on! Run! Go!" the aristocrat called imperiously to the clones.

  They remained motionless, even though the two tyrannosaurs, Sodom and Gomorrah, were now taking an interest in them and slavering in their direction.

  "Run! That's an order!"

  At the word "order", the clones came to life and ran off in different directions.

  "Excellent," said Seraph.

  The senator looked down at a totally shocked Juanita. "Now... where were we? Ah, yes. Here's how it works, my dear. You're going to be part of the hunt, too."

  "Me?!"

  "Quite. And if I catch you, you're mine."

  "Same applies to me," butted in Hoodwink. "To the winner, the spoils of victory. That's if we're able to restrain Sodom and Gomorrah, of course. They're a little frisky at the moment. But once they've dined on a clone or two, we should be able to control them."

  "You have a ten minute start," said Diaz. "So I should get going if I were you."

  Her eyes overwhelmed with anger and fear, and she looked up at the aristocrat. Too late she realised that these emotions were the ones to excite him the most. She was beyond words.

  "I did warn you, Juanita. We could do this the easy way, or the hard way. I always get what I want. And I want you."

  For a moment, she thought about not playing their evil, cruel game. Then Gomorrah lunged at her, his teeth snapping in her face. It was barely held back by Diaz.

  She started running.

  Her clothes were torn to shreds in the undergrowth as she desperately tried to find a hiding place. But the tyrannosaur twins had her scent and she knew there was nowhere to hide. The cooling system seemed to have broken down as well. Chow Chess Choo had never designed his fashionable suits for this.

  She heard the terrible screams of a clone as he was torn apart between Sodom and Gomorrah. Despite their head starts, they didn't make any real attempt to escape. And there was nowhere to escape to. They were surrounded by a vast expanse of treacherous quicksand - the sand seas represented one of the particularly unfortunate side effects of terraforming. She looked across at the land on the far side. It was impossible to swim through such a swamp. There was no way she'd make it unless she could find a boat. She ran desperately along the bank, hoping for such a miracle.

  "Now for the girl," she heard a distant voice.

  "Tally ho!"

  Desperately panting for air, she ran on. Not far behind her she could hear the strange barking sounds of the tyrannosaurs, like nothing else on Mars.

  "Mine!"

  "No! Mine!"

  The voices were closer now and the ground vibrated from the distant thud of the reptiles' mighty feet on the ground. Throughout the chase she had constantly tried to send out a thought-mail to Joe. But every time some concealed blocking device prevented it. Then, as she ran along the coast, her clothes in tatters, her DA advised her she could transmit. She realised it might only be for a brief second; a mere moment before she would be held prisoner. So she had to seize the time.

  By now Juanita knew that whatever was coming, that whatever happened, she wasn't getting out of this. She knew she was damned. And if you really love someone, then it's best to let them go. There was nothing Joe could do for her. There was no point in making him suffer, too.

  All she could do was tell him goodbye.

  She wanted to tell him so much more. But there was no time. The tyrannosaurs were getting closer. There was just no time. And so she sent one brief, poignant message; it was all she could send in the few seconds available to her.

  "Don't cry for me. Juanita."

  Then Diaz rode her down and threw her to the ground. She stared up into the face of death: there was blood and bits of torn clone uniform hanging from the tyrannosaur's jaws.

  Rosesand and Diaz looked cynically down at the terrified girl from their ferocious mounts. For Diaz, he had simply achieved his objective, as he always did - by fair means or foul, it made very little difference to him. For Hoodwink, this all appealed immensely to the cold reptile within him.

  "I think we'll put her in the cage now," said Diaz.

  "Yes, she looks about ready."

  She would be put in a cage with Martian snakes and spiders for company for a few nights. That ought to do it. If they gave her some mind-altering drug injections as well, they would be able to break her spirit utterly.

  She wasn't the first famous movie star or model politicians craved. Neither was she the first that they would stoop to any depths to have. They had been using trauma-based mind control for a long time.

  The purpose of their hunt was to induce post-traumatic stress disorder. She would not so much forget the horror of it, as disassociate from it. Put it in a remote compartment in the back of her mind. When, after further privations Diaz showed her affection, she would become dependent on him, and would need her torturer to survive. The sense of relief and gratitude that life-threatening experiences are over causes the mind to do strange things.

  It was called love-bombing.

  TWENTY

  In Viking City, Hammerstein was critically aware that they need
ed a seventh ABC Warrior. Particularly now Joe had gone missing. There were ongoing outbreaks of violence against anything Martian that were keeping the Warriors occupied twenty-four hours a day. The G Men, the human police force, were useless when it came to protecting Medusa's creatures. The Warriors were still looking at possible applicants, but had yet to find someone suitable.

  They considered a beautiful and mysterious Russian-designed robot named Nikita. Mek-Quake had met her in a bar and been told by the bar-droid that she was a deadly assassin with an impressive number of kills to her credit. Mongrol and Hammerstein asked around and she checked out. The fact that other robots would hastily change the subject when her name was mentioned spoke volumes. A metal Mata Hari would be a most valuable member of the group and she cautiously expressed an interest in joining the team.

  Nikita insisted on meeting just Hammerstein alone. But she deliberately changed the time and location of their meeting several times. She would send him thought-mails and then withhold her number when he tried to call her back. At the last moment, she'd send him new instructions, giving him the run around all over town. He finally met up with her at Loading Bay Six, Grand Central Crane Station. She wore a wire wool coat and high-heeled steel boots. On her head was what looked like an enormous Brillo pad. Her hands were enclosed in a matching muff. Her face was as intoxicating as two hundred per cent proof vodka. Her voice was as cold and steely grey as the skies over her native steppes. Her body was as firm and rounded as the sugar beets on a collective farm. And when you looked into her eyes, you could see the salt mines, but, for some reason, they seemed okay. She was that good.

  She spoke with her back to him, carefully watching the exits. He noted she had the somewhat unfortunate initials "NKVD" inscribed on the back of her head.

  "What do the initials stand for?"

  "I do not wish to say. People do not like me when they know."

  "How do you feel about the job?"

  Looking very beautiful, Nikita sighed, "I am afraid I am not beautiful enough."

  "But you could be a model."