The Ascendant Stars - Michael Cobley [177]
‘ … Is that it? … Finally! Julia, are you receiving? Please say yes, otherwise we’ll have to go and search for another droid trying to make a crazed run towards the Great Hub.’
‘Harry?’ Something very like happy relief chimed in her thoughts. ‘So Nicodemus fixed you after all.’
‘Just a corrupted file,’ said Harry. ‘I’m almost embarrassed at its non-malevolent nature … ’
At that moment a spindle-framed biped droid entered via an open hatch and crouched down before Julia, folding its rodlike limbs.
‘And this is?’ she said.
‘Nothing to worry about, Julia – it’s a good friend of Reski Emantes.’
‘Hello, Julia, I am known as the Construct,’ said a calm, accentless voice. ‘Or rather I am an augmented partial of the same. Reski and Harry have explained about Corazon Talavera and the missiles, and how she has enslaved your Enhanced friends in order to run her vile operation. I am here to help you gain access to the Great Hub – once inside we’ll have to improvise some way to return you to your physical form. First we have to downport you from that bot to my onboard storage.’ The spindly Construct held out one of its hands and one of its digits slid back to reveal an odd silvery stalk.
‘Can you open your port panel, Julia?’
‘Is Reski Emantes with you?’ she said.
‘A copy of him is piloting the fast scout we arrived in, decoying those Vor ships away for as long as possible,’ Harry said. ‘Unfortunately your activities have attracted the attention of a couple of Vor sentry drones which are closing in on your last detected position, as casted by that transponder you were carrying at one point. So, Julia, time is of the essence – I promise that you can trust the Construct. The downport will be very much like translocating via the tiernet. All very straightforward. What could go wrong?’
‘On past experience,’ Julia said, ‘almost anything. Very well, go ahead.’
A small niche in her flank popped open and the Construct held the silver stalk up next to it. The stalk morphed through a number of connectors before turning into an odd cross-shaped one with two pins. Seconds later the familiar loss of colour and high resolution was followed by the frozen final image that rolled up into nothingness …
And unfurled into Harry’s familiar night-time street corner. Julia was back in her trench-coated femme fatale exter, with a few extra details like black gloves on her hands, the sound of a saxophone playing off in the distance, while the street was a gleaming black from recent rain. When she put her hand in one of her pockets her fingers found the solid heavy shape of a handgun.
‘Julia, over here, quick!’
There was Harry, stepping from the shadows at the corner, beckoning her to follow. Which she did until he stopped before a glass-fronted frame from which the Construct gazed, its shiny brass and amber colouring reduced to monochrome. It was crouching in a recess off a rounded, cable-lined tunnel.
‘Harry, Julia, I have to be concise. Suffice it to say that I gained access to one of the Great Hub’s data towers but not without attracting unwanted attention. This is the situation – Talavera has docked at the main launch bay … ’ There was a quick image of the cylindrical Sacrament at rest within a field-contained docking bay. ‘Her underlings have finished unloading the tanks containing the Enhanced and, of course, your body, and are now starting to bring out the launchers, twenty-five of them, each holding twenty missiles. They are being stacked in neat rows so it seems likely that they will be mounted near the mouth of the bay for ease of launch.’
Julia heard shouts from some distance behind the Construct, who paused