Goliath, p.28
Goliath, page 28
“Sweet Jesus.” Enderby gritted his teeth as he dragged himself backwards over the tiles, leaving a blood slick behind him. He abandoned his pack where it had fallen. It simply didn’t seem to matter anymore.
“We got him. I think we got him,” a voice said. They were nearer now.
“The bastard. You gotta finish him off.”
“You’re a bloodthirsty bitch, aren’t you?”
Enderby pulled himself upright against the planter. This mode of locomotion was simply too slow. He needed to move quicker. A lot quicker. His vision blurred, growing dark as he strained. He planted one foot flat on the ground, before joining it with the other. Sweat dripped down his nose.
“The fucker tried to kill me.” Adele.
Ignoring the roaring pain Enderby stumbled forwards, re-entering the mall. Unsteady on his feet he leaned against a glass display window, leaving a long smear of blood.
“Here, look!” the first voice said.
“Shit. That’s a lot of blood. He’s gotta be dead. You can’t bleed that much and survive.”
“Yeah? So where’s the body then, smart ass?”
“He’s gone inside. Be careful, he might be armed.”
Enderby tottered into the food market. He needed to hide and he needed medical assistance. And quickly. He was losing a lot of blood. Much more of this and he would collapse on the floor. A very easy target indeed.
“I see you are in distress.” The hologram appeared before him. “I am attempting to summon the emergency services.” For a moment that raised his hopes, before the figure said: “server access is unavailable.”
“Oh, just fuck off,” he grunted. “Damn.” Enderby gathered an armload of cloth carry bags and dumped them into the largest trolley he could find. Once they were spread about on the bottom he heaved himself into it. He needed to break his trail of blood. Until he could stop the bleeding it would lead directly to him. “Pharmacy. I need the pharmacy.”
“Do you have a prescription that requires filling?”
“Bloody hell. Just get moving!” he snapped at the trolley’s dim processor. “You.” He pointed to the hologram. “Security protocol. You must have them.”
“How can I assist you?” The woman’s face smiled sweetly.
“I am victim of a crime. They ... they are following me.”
“I cannot summon the authorities. My server access is unavailable.”
“You must delay them. Do not tell them I am here.” The trolley started moving, slowly heading down one of the isles.
“I can enable safety protocol thirty-two,” the hologram said.
“Yes. Yes. Do that.” He gritted his teeth against a wave of pain as the trolley skirted a fridge section. He didn’t know what that protocol was, he didn’t care. As long as it slowed the two down.
“Would you like to report a fire?” The figure was still smiling.
“What?”
“Protocol thirty-two is to be enacted in the event of a fire,” the hologram explained.
“Shit. Yes, Yes. There’s a fire.”
“My sensors do not detect a fire, Sir.”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake!” What the hell was such a stupid machine doing aboard a venerable old warship like this?
“My sensors may be faulty. I will now direct you to the nearest emergency exit.”
“As long as it’s near the pharmacy.” The trolley lurched, picking up speed, heading down another aisle.
“There he is!” A figure appeared at the end of the aisle, followed closely behind by the ghostly apparition of another shop assistant. Adele seemed to be having a hard time ignoring it. She ducked around it, carelessly tossing food parcels in its direction in the hopes of slowing it down. Swearing she aimed her shotgun at the fleeing trolley and fired. With a loud bang part of the racks above Enderby disintegrated. Metal clanged against the trolley. Surprised by the recoil Adele almost fell over.
“Ma-am, discharging firearms is not permitted within the town limits. I am afraid I must ask you to desist while I summon the authorities,” the hologram trailing her said.
“What the fuck are you? Get away from me, demon.”
“Server access failed.”
Whimpering from the pain Enderby heaved himself off the trolley. He felt something tearing inside his stomach as he slipped clumsily to the floor. Agony washed through him, almost drawing him into unconsciousness. His feet slipping in spilled blood he pulled himself upright once again and hobbled forward, bent almost double from the pain. He caught sight of a number of counters running along the wall. Dispensing pharmacist. That was what he wanted.
Adele fired again, leaning into the recoil as she did so. The bang of her shotgun was startlingly loud. Part of the floor behind him was ripped up.
“You need to keep that bitch away from me,” he said to the shop assistant. “What security protocols do you have to cover this?”
“Acts of physical violence are under the jurisdiction of the town AI, Sir.”
“Yeah, I know. You have no server access.”
“I got him, he’s down here!” Adele called to Sash. The other woman rounded a freezer aisle and took aim with her assault rifle. She looked a lot more proficient with her weapon than Adele did.
Cursing Enderby launched himself behind the counter just as she fired. He felt wind on his cheek as the heavy round just missed him. As he slid to a stop he realised he had made a mistake. There was no back way out of the counter area. He was trapped.
“Alternate server access found,” the hologram reported brightly. “Access granted.”
“What?”
The vacuous expression on the hologram’s face changed, becoming instantly harder. “Explain why they are firing at you,” the voice said abruptly.
“Get me the fuck out of here,” Enderby demanded. “And while you’re at it, I could do with some Stringent. And some Acos if you have it.” He started yanking on drawers, breaking locks in his haste to see what was inside.
“Those are powerful drugs. I somehow doubt they have been prescribed.”
“I’m bloody self-prescribing. Now, do you have any or don’t you?”
Part of the wood cabinet above him shattered, raining glass on him as Adele fired again. “Die, you bastard!” she called out.
“Oh, thank god.” Enderby discovered a drawer filled with bandages and started pulling them out. Not taking the time to use them properly he simply stuffed them down his ruined shirt.
“It does not serve my purpose allowing these two women to kill you here,” the hologram continued. “I will allow you access to the rear delivery chute.” A door clicked aside behind him, revealing a dark recess.
“What’s the bloody purpose of that? So, you got the drugs or not?”
A draw opened, revealing rows of pressuredermics. “Second row. Yellow dispenser. It is Combinate.”
Relief flooded through him. He hadn’t dared hope for Combinate. He scooped up several of the dispensers and shoved them into a pocket.
“You have lost a lot of blood also. You require a blood plasma substitute. You should travel to a medical facility,” the AI continued.
“Yeah, where would I find one of those?”
“There appears to be a disturbance in the medical centre at present. I would not recommend travelling there. Alternately there is a first aid centre at the recreation park.”
“What?” Enderby dragged himself into the recess, finding himself on some sort of dumb waiter.
The AI did not respond, allowing the persona of the store assistant to resume control. The empty smile returned instantly. “Have a good day, Sir.”
Enderby blacked out somewhere in his journey to the storage facility. When he came to he found himself sprawled on a conveyor in a large, well-lit chamber. He was surrounded by racks of various sizes, each linked to an auto-loading system and rows of conveyor belts. Only the one he was laying on was active, the rollers squeaking after decades of neglect. It carried him quickly towards the far bulkhead and another set of autoloaders.
“Oh, damn.” His fingers shaking Enderby fumbled for one of the dispensers. It was a simple tube with a high pressure cartridge built into a plunger. Pressed against the skin it injected its load of serum directly into the subcutaneous layer. Combinate wasn’t a drug at all. Rather it was a swarm of self-replicating and managing nanites, a tiny army of machines each capable of assisting the body’s natural repair mechanisms. He hadn’t seen medical technology like this for decades. It simply wasn’t something that existed on Russou. This sort of thing was beyond even Tin Man’s ability to produce. If there was such a thing as a miracle cure, this was it.
Still, it took time and he needed blood plasma to replace what he had lost.
The dispenser hissed as he pressed it against his arm. His skin felt hot, the swarm of nanomachines digging in and starting to work. He’d need food too, he realised. The machines needed to be fed. If he didn’t feed them, they’d only feed on him. He didn’t have much spare fat to support them.
“Should have killed her,” he muttered, allowing the dispenser to drop from his fingers. He laid back, watching the ceiling lights pass by as the conveyor carried him unerringly forward. After a moment it jerked to a stop. This was as far as it would take him.
Enderby slid his legs off the conveyor and pulled the mass of still wrapped bandages out from beneath his shirt. Feeling feverish as the Combinate took hold he awkwardly pulled off his jacket and shirt. Both were ruined. His vision growing dark he struggled with the wrappings. They were designed to come off easily, however in his current state of mind he couldn’t quite get his fingers to grasp the tab. Grimacing he brought a package up to his mouth and took the tab between his teeth. With a yank he ripped open the package, spilling white wadding onto the floor.
“Shit.”
Not daring to lean over to pick them up he grappled with another package, carefully keeping hold of the contents as the wrapper tore. Grunting he arranged the contents on the conveyor beside him. This package came with a convenient adhesive strip. Fingers shaking he pressed it to his stomach, ignoring the instructions that directed him to clean the wound first. Sometimes there simply wasn’t time for such niceties.
“So, why are you helping me, then?” he said aloud. More to take his mind off what he was doing than because he expected the mysterious AI to overhear and answer him. “You’re bound to think I’m one of them. Shit.” He muttered, trying to manoeuvre an adhesive strip over the exit wound. His fingers were starting to stick together as the blood dried. In ideal conditions the strip would hold the wound closed while it healed. These were far from ideal conditions, but he would take what he could get. The Combinate would do most of the work. He just needed to give it time and a bit of a helping hand.
“If you wanted to help me you’d give me a gun,” he continued. “So I can kill the fuckers. I know that’s what you’d want. You’d kill every one of the bastards if you had the chance. All of you AI’s would.” He wrapped a bandage around his chest, wincing as the movement pulled at the wound.
An intercom on a nearby bulkhead hissed to life. “I do not desire any of you dead. Not yet. You may yet serve another purpose. When you exit this room you will find a vehicle. I have programmed it to take you to the recreation area. You will need to travel to the top of the hill. Be warned, you will be visible most of the way, so expect to receive fire.” With that it died. The machine had said all it would.
“I’m not one of them,” Enderby said. “You hear me? Shit.”
As he pulled on the remains of his jacket it occurred to him that the AI’s intentions, whatever they were, should worry him. No AI would ever wish any denizen of this planet well. Russou’s citizens were well advised to fear them. The machines would murder them all if they ever had the chance. Yet, here was one that hadn’t immediately set about trying to kill him. Its reasons could only be insidious. If it wanted something from them, it did not bode well.
The one lesson he had learned was not to trust an AI wielding a palm scanner. His hand was still swaddled in bandages from that incident. If that was true so was its extension: never trust an AI wielding a mainline super dreadnought.
Enderby carefully levered himself to his feet. His vision blurred as he moved too quickly. Grimacing he froze for a moment until it cleared. He couldn’t take on Adele and her friend like this. He needed to get patched up properly. And find a gun.
The AI had been right. A vehicle that looked suspiciously like a golf cart was awaiting him as he exited the storage facility. Designed to allow easy access for loading, the passage outside was wide enough to accommodate several such vehicles at once. All the lights were on here too, the passage stretching off to a pair of closed doors on one side, and to what appeared to be a glassed over walkway on the other.
Deciding to follow the AI’s lead he stepped gingerly onto the cart and settled himself. “On you go,” he said.
The machine started moving silently, the bubble tyres quickly carrying it out into bright sunlight. The glassed over walkway opened out onto one of the avenues circling the town. Within moments they were down amongst buildings, the leafy suburbs swallowing the little vehicle as mature trees fought each other for sunlight. He couldn’t see any sign of his assailants. If he was lucky, they were still searching the mall. It was very possible they were arguing with one of the holograms, not quite able to understand exactly what they were. Holograms were not a technology ever seen on Russou either.
A sharp crack in the distance ruined his hopes. A window pane nearby starred, the heavy round driving through to embed itself in a wall somewhere inside the domicile. There wasn’t another shot, clearly the shooter had decided they were wasting ammunition.
“Bitch,” Enderby groused. He coughed dryly, alarmed to find a dribble of blood on his chin. That was never a good sign. “Bitch.”
The vehicle left the town behind, heading towards the leisure facilities. Sticking to the path it wound its way between bowling greens and skeetball courts. It mounted a steeply curved bridge over the river and headed into the trees. The town quickly vanished behind thick foliage. Enderby didn’t notice, by this time he had blacked out, his head lolling on the firm faux leather seat. The bleeding slowed to a trickle and then stopped, the edges of his wounds narrowing almost perceptibly. Fortunately the Combinate knew what it was doing.
Still, the odd droplet of bright red blood fell to the pathway as the vehicle trundled over it.
“Julian. Julian, get up.”
Enderby moaned, his eyelids flickered but didn’t open.
“Julian Enderby. You must get up.”
“What?” Feeling lightheaded he brought a hand up to his face. It felt like it was made of lead. “Shit. I can’t see. Have I gone blind?”
“No. It’s just dark. You must get up.”
“What?” It was early morning. How could it be dark? “Who are you?”
“You know me, friend Enderby. Please, you cannot stay here.”
“Tin Man? That you?” Enderby frowned. That wasn’t possible. “I'm hallucinating,” he decided. Tin Man couldn’t be here. The machine had stayed behind on Russou.
He felt a presence move in beside him, hunkering down to be at face level with him. “Please. You must move from here. There is a first aid station inside, and your assailants are not far away now. They’ve been tracking you. I don’t think they want to stop to have a chat.”
Cursing Enderby pushed himself up against the hard seat back. A wave of dizziness caused him to freeze. Clearly the exertion was too much. As his vision cleared he looked around him. The vehicle had brought him to some kind of wooden lodge. It was large, double storied with wide verandas and a glass entrance way. There were lights inside, slowly becoming visible as the sun quit the sky. He couldn’t see the source of the voice.
“Shit. I’m going mad,” he declared through clenched teeth as he wedged his feet beneath him and slowly eased himself forwards. His vision darkened again, but it cleared quickly when he stopped moving. He felt hot, like he was running a fever. That was the Combinate, the nanomachines running up his temperature as they worked furiously to repair the damage. He needed a drink. And something to eat. Probably a blood transfusion.
“Inside.”
“What?” Shaking his head, he looked around again. “C’mon man. I'm too old to start hearing voices.”
The walk to the door was difficult. Moving in little more than a shuffle Enderby kept his eyes on his objective, refusing to look down as a dizzy spell caught him a long way from anything he could hold onto. Closing his eyes did not help at all. It was with some relief that he caught hold of the door handle and clung onto it, the hinges creaking as he subjected it to his weight.
Like every other door aboard the Goliath, this one was not locked. He opened it and stumbled through.
“To the left.”
“Dammit. Quit that. You’re not here.”
“Of course not.”
“What?”
“Don’t you remember? You left me behind on Russou.”
“What? Don’t be stupid.” Feeling disturbed Enderby paused at some sort of reception counter, allowing the gleaming wood to take his weight for a moment. “You told me to come here.”
There was no reply.
“Are you saying I’m going mad?” He felt the strength going from his legs and he slipped to the floor. That thought terrified him more than some gun toting maniac.
That wasn’t right. Mad people didn’t know they were mad.
“Shit man.” Tears blurring his vision he clenched his hands into fists and held them to his head. He wasn’t mad. He wouldn’t believe it. He was fine.
“Get up, my friend. You are almost there. The first aid station.”
“Stop it. Please.” He bit down on a sob that was clawing its way up his throat. He couldn’t bear this.
“You must keep moving.”
Shit. Maybe it was better to be mad. Better to give in to it. He heaved himself up again and walked forward as directed. He saw a small red cross symbol on a wall. Beyond it was the gleaming white of the first aid station. He stumbled inside.
