Neal Asher - The Departure

‘Lay down your weapons,’ he broadcast to those trapped soldiers, through personal fones and spacesuit com systems.

Through a thousand cams, he watched security-force personnel still firing on the robots poised to fall upon them. Some had already destroyed readerguns that had turned on them, that had been blocking their retreat. Hundreds of messages slid into the network, seeking instructions from the commander, or from Smith and his immediate subordinates, but so far no replies seemed to be forthcoming.

‘This section of the station is no longer under Smith’s control,’ he informed them, his lips merely miming the words, but the com system turning them into something stronger than he himself could physically manage. ‘I am now in control of all local computer systems, robots and readerguns, so you will drop your weapons immediately and either leave the area extending between Arcoplex One and the Arboretum, and including Tech Central, or return to your quarters to await instructions.’ With that, he made the robots in the area jerk forward menacingly like war dogs pulling at their leashes, and set readerguns in motion momentarily, but did not allow them to fire.

A fit of coughing racked him suddenly, more blood emerging, his breath becoming noticeably shorter. Saul rested for a moment whilst watching the security forces scattered about the area. Listening to the exchange of orders, he finally managed to locate the military commander of all these troops. It was a guy called Langstrom, so he opened up com with him.

‘Political Director Smith has abandoned you,’ he explained. ‘I now have absolute control of this section. The only choice you now have is whether you obey me and live, or disobey and die.’

Momentarily transferring his attention to Tech Central, he saw Braddock herding all but three of the staff outside and sending them on their way. Hannah meanwhile held the remaining three at gunpoint, so perhaps it was Braddock’s idea to keep a limited number of hostages. But they needed to be people Smith actually cared about, and Saul doubted that such people existed. He next explored Tech Central’s schematic, in his mind, quickly finding what he required, then connected to a simple cleaner robot nearby and sent it over to Hannah’s location. Finally he summoned one of the least damaged construction robots remaining just outside the tubeway.

‘Who is this?’ Langstrom responded, with seemingly admirable calm.

About twenty troops had retreated into another tubeway, where they had eliminated the nearest readergun. They were obviously on the point of heading for the next gun along, just as Saul started making his announcements. Langstrom was a wiry black man clad in the same style of vacuum combat suit as his soldiers, except with a silver diagonal bar across the front, and he now stood near an uncompleted section of tubeway, gazing out into the web of girders running between the latticework walls. Within view were soldiers who until then had been fighting desperately against robots that Saul controlled.

‘My name is Alan Saul, but that of course means nothing to you.’

‘Precisely,’ Langstrom replied.

Just a mental nudge caused all the robots within view to once again advance slightly. Firing broke out again, until Langstrom issued orders into his helmet mike.

‘If he really controls all the readerguns and robots, like he says he does,’ observed a huge bulky man standing just behind Langstrom, ‘we don’t stand much chance of getting out of here.’

‘And if he’s lying, and we surrender our weapons,’ said Langstrom, ‘you know damned well what Smith will do with us.’

‘Have you recently received any word from Smith?’ Saul interjected.

Langstrom shook his head involuntarily, then said, ‘No word, as yet.’

There was nothing to stop Smith from communicating with his troops isolated here, but it seemed he considered them even more dispensable than the robots he had withdrawn from the fighting earlier. Saul also wondered if Smith was now receiving medical treatment, just like he himself would need very soon.

‘He wasn’t lying about these readerguns here,’ said the bulky man, eyeing two corpses sprawled at the edge of the tubeway. ‘And he’s not lying about the robots either.’

Langstrom nodded. ‘What guarantees are you offering?’

‘You know I need to offer you none,’ Saul replied.

The man again tried for some response from Smith, but got nothing. He then cursed and tossed down his machine pistol.

‘Smart move,’ Saul remarked.

‘You’re watching?’ Langstrom asked.

‘As I told you, I have control in a limited area, but my control there is absolute.’

‘You’ll let my men come in?’ Gesturing up at the nearest cam, Langstrom pointed out the robots that hovered menacingly.

‘So long as they don’t try anything stupid, Langstrom,’ Saul agreed.

Langstrom nodded briefly and waved his men back. Speaking over com, he called them all in, and soon they began retreating.

‘What is it you want?’ was his parting question.

Right then, Saul wanted more than anything to not be leaking so much blood inside his suit.

‘Not your concern right now,’ he replied.

As the commander moved off, Saul opened com with Tech Central. ‘Hannah,’ he began.

Braddock was now back inside, too, where he had ordered the three remaining captives to call up views of the surrounding area on their screens. Both he and she looked up simultaneously.

‘A cleanbot has arrived just outside, and I want you to follow it.’

‘Where to?’

‘There’s a surgical area located one floor below you.’

‘I see,’ she said, suddenly looking worried.

Just then the construction robot arrived, dropping through the hole in the tubeway roof, and advanced towards him. He could only see it through the cams, as he programmed in its next location, retracing Smith’s escape route along the tubeway, before giving it very careful instructions about how to pick Saul up. Even so, the world greyed for a moment as its claws closed around him, but it seemed that unconsciousness remained out of his reach.

Hannah felt overcome by a sudden atavistic fear at the sight of the construction robot crouching in the corridor with bloodstains on its cowling. When she saw Saul slumped in front of it with his back propped against the wall, she assumed it must have attacked him. Then she noticed the Caduceus symbol on the door he was resting beside, and logic triumphed. She stepped over the cleanbot that had guided her here, and rushed over to kneel before him.

‘Smith . . . got away,’ Saul managed.

Those were definitely not the words she wanted to hear. She stared at the blood plating the outside of his spacesuit, dried out and turned oak-brown by vacuum. ‘Where are you wounded?’

‘Side.’ He gestured with one blood-smeared glove.

Hannah peered at the mess of suit sealant that had boiled out of there. ‘Can you move?’ A weak shake of the head. ‘I’m going to need Braddock,’ she decided.

After a pause Saul replied, ‘He’s coming now.’

Braddock arrived in double-quick time, armed and looking for a fight, but as soon as he saw Saul, his face turned white. Was that because without Saul their chances of survival became precisely nil?

‘The prisoners?’ Hannah enquired.

‘I locked them in the toilet,’ Braddock told her.

‘Okay, help me.’

They carried Saul as carefully as possible through the door and into a surgery prep room.

‘Get his suit off,’ Hannah instructed, as she herself frantically began checking the cold stores and equipment cupboards ranged along one wall. It was good that the level of gravity lay as close to zero as made no difference, otherwise Braddock’s task would have been much more difficult. By the time she had found trauma dressings and a pair of scissors, Braddock had removed the spacesuit to expose the blood-soaked undersuit. Whilst he held Saul in place Hannah cut away the undersuit, and soon located the wound. She then affixed a trauma dressing, which quickly formed itself over the wound while infusing it with coagulants. After that they loaded Saul on to a special gurney which closed pads securely over his arms, legs and forehead, before rolling him through the clean lock leading into the operating theatre.