Flinx Transcendent_ A Pip & Flinx Adventure - Alan Dean Foster [114]
Sitting off to one side on a bench of ersatz marble, a rectangular transparent box held a supine serpentine shape. In a flash Pip spread her wings and, despite Flinx's efforts to restrain her, bolted from his shoulder. The winged form imprisoned inside the perforated, impervious container was alert and active even before she landed atop it. Though they could not make physical contact, mother and offspring proceeded to engage empathetically.
The contemptible folk filling the room would take no more chances with her than they had with Scrap, Flinx realized. It didn't matter. Their number was not important and at least for the moment their armaments were of no interest to him. The only thing that mattered was the solitary figure sitting isolated in the center of the chamber.
Sunlight filtering through a circular pane in the ceiling lit Clarity from above. She looked much as she had sounded over his communit—exhausted and abused. The damage that had been inflicted was visible only in her face—and her eyes. It took them, and her, a long moment to recognize him as he rushed toward her.
“F-Flinx?” She shook her head, blinked, and tried without much success to sound angry. “You shouldn't have come. Now that you're here they'll kill us both.”
“Maybe,” he muttered as he knelt in front of her. “Maybe not.” He wanted to take her in his arms. He could have tried, though in her present state it would have been difficult to get even those rangy limbs around her.
From the neck down she was completely encased in a dirty gray foam that had hardened to a plastic-like consistency. Other than her head and neck, only her hands and feet had been left exposed. He started to reach for the foam casing. Her eyes widened.
“No, don't touch me!” She was trying hard not to cry. “If you try to tear or break or drill through the foam in any way, it will blow up!” She looked toward the watching Order members. “At least, that's what they told me when they were spraying it on.”
A deepening chill washed through Flinx as he straightened and took a step back. Her captors were taking no chances. She was encased in enough material to bring down the entire building: a possibility that apparently did not bother those who had gone to the trouble of fitting her with the untouchable, volatile sheath.
A voice sounded nearby. The Elder had come up behind him.
“Having become all too familiar with your peculiar combative abilities, young man, we of course have taken appropriate steps.” He pointed the cane he was holding at the terrified, immobilized woman seated before them. “She is encased in a latex-based high explosive, which has been intermingled with sensitized nanowiring. Attuned to the microscopic cabling are four button-sized wireless detonators taped to her thighs, any one of which can by itself set off the entirety of the solidified amalgam. If you attempt to penetrate the material to retrieve the triggers, the material will detonate. The detonators themselves have been individually randomly coded and locked, so they cannot be deactivated remotely.”
Flinx digested this. “Then how can she be freed from the foam without setting it off?”
“An optical wormgrip can be slipped through the slight gap between her body and the encasement to safely remove the detonators. They can then easily be switched off.” The Elder smiled thinly. “Sometimes simple mechanical procedures are more expedient than complex electronics.” He indicated their surroundings. “We intentionally do not have a wormgrip anywhere on this property so you cannot take one of us hostage and demand that we bring it forth. We cannot be forced to turn over that which we do not have.” Eyes that had seen much and were the