Cold Fusion - Lance Parkin [59]
‘Get the forensics team to scan everywhere the ghosts went.’
‘They have still not finished in the observation room sir’
a pretty young female officer told him. He didn’t recognize her.
‘What are they doing there?’
‘The murder investigation,’ she explained, referring to her simbook. ‘His name was Falconstock, a member of the Scientifica’s technical service grade.’
The Provost-General nodded, unsure how to feel. ‘I knew him. How did he die?’
‘Beheading. It appears to have been an accident, during a struggle. The Freudroid reckons that the killer was so racked with remorse that he leapt through the window.’
Medford found, himself looking at the holographs of the crime scene. ‘The window is two-point-five-four centimetre-thick platestic glass.’
‘The ballistics computer estimates that the suspect weighs three tonnes and is capable of moving in excess of one hundred kilometres an hour.’
‘So we’re looking for a guilt-stricken rocket-powered robot elephant.’
‘The computer trying to build up an identiscan is having difficulty, she admitted.
‘What’s the news from Pryanishnikov Station?’
‘The site is secure. Twelve judicial executions. The MechInf was deactivated, but the first response teams arrived soon after. Some people managed to escape into the woods, but they’ve been recaptured now’
‘Adam?’
‘No sign of him – but we captured a couple of his men.’
‘Good. I authorize the use of the mind probe.’
The female officer made a note of this before continuing: ‘A traitor, Ziyou Wanle, was executed. There were Shlimans and other aliens there.’
‘The place clearly earned its notoriety, Keep hovercopter units in the area. Anyone retuning to the scene will –’
There was a burst of activity in one corner of the room.
‘Sir. Energy discharge in the detention area’
‘Visual.’
Two Adjudicators standing in a cell, one firing a guntlet at the wall.
‘Who are they?’
‘They are not Adjudicators. All our officers are accounted for.’
‘That one is combat trained. Close the cell door.’
The cell door slammed shut.
Adric and Forrester exchanged worried glances.
Forrester grabbed the door with the guntlet, then slipped it from her wrist. The glove was still clasping the door handle. A holographic eyecon flashed up in front of Adric’s face: a bird with an elongated beak, a green head and grey wings. He frowned, trying to decipher it..
‘Down,’ Forrester warned him. Adric turned around, just before he was thrown against the back wall by the force of the blast.
The door had vanished, as had most of the floor and surrounding wall. Forrester grabbed her bag and dropped it down to the next level. She jumped after it. Adric followed. ‘Where are we going?’
‘We try to make our own escape route,’ Forrester called.
‘A job made harder by the fact I’ve just lost my wrist computer.’ Adric dialled up a map from the armour’s tactics menu.
‘Head left!’ he shouted. Forrester did as she was told.
They were in a communal area, empty except for another one of those statues. Doorways led away in every direction.
‘Can you open that door?’ Adric pointed to the one that he meant.
‘Give me a second.’ She produced a keycard from somewhere, slid it into the lock. Adric had time to look at the statue. It was a man called ‘Paul Dirac’. He must have been another human scientist, one from around Tegan’s time judging from his clothing. Forrester had opened the door. Through it, the room was small and virtually empty.
A pentagonal area was marked off in white on the floor, there was a bulky control unit in the centre of the room.
‘A transmat,’ Roz declared, closing and locking the door behind her.
Adric beamed, ‘So we can go anywhere on the planet.’
He moved over to the control panel. All the lights and indicators were deactivated. ‘It’s dead,’ he told her.
‘I don’t know the override codes for the transmat network.’
‘But before, you had a transmat override. Have you still got it?’
‘No, I left it behind at the station.’
‘Of course, the Doctor has it now. Do you know how it worked?’ Adric asked her.
‘Not really.’ She didn’t seem sure