Adam Christopher - The Age Atomic

Rad paused, his eyes scanning the other machine. The robot’s head was turned away from him, and at the base of the neck he could see brown hair bunched under the edge of the metal.

Rad yanked the rod from Kane’s machine and it snapped shut again, cutting the light out. Rad felt the room spin a little but got to the other machine. The one holding Special Agent Jennifer Jones.

He carefully rolled her head so she was looking at the ceiling. What he’d thought was a robot head was actually a mask or helmet, hinged at the top, held together with simple pins. This close, he could see Jennifer’s eyes through the holes in the mask. She sighed, and Rad could see her teeth through the slot mouth.

“OK, OK…” said Rad, his hands moving over the mask, locating the pins holding the mask in place. There were four, and they came out easily. After dropping them to the floor, he lifted Jennifer’s head carefully and pulled at the front of the mask. It swung up, and the back panel loosened; within moments it was free. Rad tossed it to the floor, and then swore.

There was another mask, smaller, covering Jennifer’s face from hairline to chin. Rad ran his fingers around the edge, which stopped just short of her ears, trying to find a strap, but there was nothing. The mask was brilliant gold, shining, the front an elegant Art Deco sculpt of a woman’s face, with delicate eyebrows and full lips.

Rad pulled at the edge, but the mask didn’t shift. He pulled again, harder this time, but the mask was firmly attached. Rad merely lifted her entire head, making her to moan in discomfort. Jennifer was alive, at least. He could worry about the golden mask later.

Kane coughed. “The Corsair isn’t a robot… it’s a man. I saw his eyes.”

Rad nodded, processing the new information. “OK, OK… so the King is a robot and his robot is a man. Great. Let’s work out the why and the how and the who later. We’ve gotta get out of here, but it looks like I’m the only one up and moving.”

Rad swore and shook his head. It was time to think of something big and great that was going to work. There was something he was forgetting, he was sure of it.

“The King said I can’t leave the machine,” said Kane.

“The King said a lot of things.”

“Some of which were true.”

“Yeah,” said Rad, still holding Jennifer’s head. “But some of which was a little less so. Like the fact he was a robot, for a start. So who knows what else he’s been saying?”

“What reason would he have to lie about me? Why would he want to keep me here?”

“Ah, yeah, about that.”

Kane raised up his head. “About what?”

“Well,” said Rad, “seems the King wants to keep you around as his own personal power generator.”

Kane shook his head. “What?”

Rad shrugged. “Long story. You’ve got the Fissure inside you. Neat, right?”

“I… what?”

“Look,” said Rad, “we’re on the clock here. So let’s save it and work on this marvelous escape plan.”

“I’m glad you have one,” said Kane, resting his head back on the pillow.

“Ah, yeah, and it’s marvelous, believe me.”

There was a bang from somewhere beyond the green door. The blind King had climbed the stairs, then.

Rad looked around the workshop. They had to leave, and it wasn’t like he could wheel the two machines out. But the Corsair was absent, and the outer door was, as Rad had hoped, still open.

Jennifer coughed. Rad felt her pulse, under the edge of the mask. It felt fine, strong, and she was breathing normally and her eyes looked clear and were blinking as usual through the eyeholes.

“Rad?”

“We meet again, Special Agent. How do you feel? Can you move around inside this thing?”

Jennifer grunted with effort, and her head slid on her pillow as she struggled with something.

“I’m strapped down. I don’t think I’m hurt. At least I can’t feel any pain, and I can move my arms and legs.”

“OK,” said Rad, retrieving the metal rod from the floor. “Let’s just hope they didn’t have a chance to get started on you properly.” He felt along the seam of the machine, and began to work the rod into the gap.

Kane watched them from his table.

“What do you mean, get started?”

Rad huffed as he worked at the lid of Jennifer’s machine.

“It’s what we thought. The King isn’t turning robots back into people. He’s turning people into robots. This place is full of robot parts — new parts, not ones he’s taken from the refugees. He’s creating his own little machine army, and he’s using power from the Fissure to do it.”

“The power that’s inside me.”

Rad paused. His back was to Kane, and he was glad that Kane couldn’t see the expression on his face. “Seems so. But first things first.”

The rod slid home, and Jennifer jerked as Rad opened a two-inch crack between the machine’s lid and the base. No light flooded out, so Rad adjusted his grip and heaved. There was a loud crack, like he’d broken a catch, and then another, and then the rod moved easily, Rad levering the lid up.

Jennifer was held down to her slab with thick leather straps across her chest, her legs, each arm and ankle. Rad made short work of the buckles, and Jennifer only needed a little help to sit up. She stood, and Rad helped her step over the high lip of the machine and onto the floor. She looked down at herself and straightened her coat.

She seemed fine, just dandy, but Rad flinched when she looked up at him through the metal mask. She noticed, and laughed, her voice echoing behind the metal.

“It’s strange, it doesn’t feel like there’s anything there.” Her fingers ran over the mask, tracing the seams, feeling the contours. “It has no weight. It’s like it’s a part of me.”

Rad nodded. “Then it won’t slow you down. But Kane is the problem right now. We can’t get him out of the machine, but we can’t carry him out in it either.”

Rad clicked his fingers. Of course… he turned to Kane.

“When you landed, what happened to the suit?”

Kane coughed. “Landed?”

“Landed, crashed, fell on your ass, whatever,” said Rad. “When the great reporter fell from the sky, were you still dressed as the Skyguard?”

“Ah, yeah, I guess.”

“So what happened to the suit?”

Kane frowned. Then he looked around the workshop from his horizontal position.

“It must be here somewhere. I don’t remember.”

“Maybe the suit is part of this all?” said Jennifer. “Maybe they reverse-engineered it for the technology, used it to help build the robots?”

Rad nodded. “Maybe,” he said, picking up his coat, hat, and scarf off the third, empty machine. He began putting them on and then paused, one arm in his coat. “You’re one of Carson’s Special Agents, right?”

Jennifer nodded, but Rad noticed a pause before she did so.

“OK,” he said, “I’m going to ask about your significant pauses and whatever it is you’re not telling me later, but listen, if you worked for Carson, that means you know at least a little about the Fissure.”

“Yes, of course.”

Rad shrugged his coat on properly. He began pacing the workshop, casting his eyes over the shelves, tables, cabinets and stacks of equipment. There were enough robot parts in the room to build a dozen walking machines, but he couldn’t see what he was looking for.

“The Skyguard’s suit is really a machine, like a robot,” he said. “Last time I saw it, it was doing a pretty good job of channeling or absorbing the energy of the Fissure itself.” Rad turned to Kane. “That was the whole point of the plan, right?”

Kane nodded. “The Science Pirate made some changes to the suit so it could absorb ambient energy. The plan was to drain energy from the Fissure, and then feed it back by overloading the suit’s batteries.”