Re: The Show Must Go Off

[Herr D]

The Show Must Go Off–part twenty-two
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Thrash and ‘A’ came with me. The other two immediately huddled with Upclose. I set up another subroutine named Upclose, just for recording her movements in code to the nearest device under my control. I’d get it out of order, but I’d get it all. No more surprises. As we exited, the famous fight between Griffon and Gryphon started up. Last no-grav aerial fight with no winners. Griffon was obliterated, pieces everywhere, and Gryphon was declared the winner before anyone realized he’d cheated. His last three shots had been taken after he died. No automatic targeting or shooting has EVER been allowed.
I had been running a long con when it started getting air time on Earth. You know the Pranky Neighbor? Get two neighbors thinking that the other is pranking them over the fence while making book across the street with voyeurs. Start a prank-war-watching party, taking bigger bets as the crowd gets drunker. Then duck out with ALL the money bet, never having given a real name as BOTH neighbors suddenly get an ‘anonymous’ tip that the real pranksters are watching them? I’d come up with my own ingenious version of that when most of the thunder was stolen by the fight coming available on pay-per-view unannounced. The buzz ruined the timing on at least two-thirds of my action. I’d been about to start a firework fight–
“Thrash? What do you know about chemistry? Pyrotechnics?”
His eyebrows went up. “Uh. Not much.”
“What do you know about junk ore storage?”
“Nothing.”
“Do you know where the morgue is?” He stopped walking. He went pale. It was so cute! He recovered quick.
“That would be V-gamma-5” Thrash said. He was suddenly no longer happy with claiming a connection to me.
I whirled to ‘A.’ He stopped walking too. “How far away is V-gamma-5?” I demanded.
He only paused a moment. His face hardened. “Charts. I’ll look it up.” He started for a kiosk. I followed him, Thrash in tow.
“What do you want the morgue for?” asked Thrash.
“A diversion, religious reasons, and, of course, to help your cause.” I gave him my distracted smile. I didn’t even need GameFace, though I was using it. Too much could go wrong right now.
“How would blowing up the morgue help the revolution?” asked Thrash.
“What are you, brainless?” burst out ‘A,’ “Before it’s full-scale revolution, it’ll be just crime–and the Enforcers might hesitate a tenth of a second before killing if there’s no morgue. Now shut up and do a parallel search with me. You’re looking for storage of junk ore, like Q said.”
“How do I find that?”
“Bound to be between deposit stations and payout unless it’s grouped. If it is, look for records of heavy freighters with no pilots.”
“They fly auto?”
“No, Thrash,” ‘A’ rolled his eyes, “They correct for anti-collision and docking without pilots. They’re randomly used as push-offs by whoever needs them to get to the belt.” Ah, a fuel saver–that would come in handy.
Thrash really was a bungler. Just a thug who knew how to wind up with the right friends at the right time. I took over and found coordinates for four junk ore freighters between us and the morgue, waiting, of course, for ‘A’ to verify where it was for me. Off-screen, I verified Thrash as a surprisingly good pilot. Must’ve had that unteachable feel for flying. I set him up good. I tracked Gibb down in the shop and sent him a message he couldn’t ignore. One-tenth of his remaining debt would be considered paid if he collected fifty shop-droid’s worth of spare parts, an assembly droid with a bank-full of generic plans, two cutting torches and three fifteen-second thrust tanks, fully charged. All of them had to be off-book, not from machinery in-use, and he could NOT be caught. Partial success would be appreciated and valued later–he had one hour.
Gibb got only ten shop-droid worth of spare parts, but everything else. I have a feeling he just told a lot of people their droids couldn’t be fixed without more parts and took them right out of those being serviced.
Thrash came back with his mining suit looking worried. It had extra armor. ‘A’ came back with four extra air tanks. I didn’t ask.
“YOU WANT ME TO WHAT?!” Thrash looked like he’d be sick.
“Drive, that’s all,” I said blandly. I walked up to the assembly droid with an ordinary piece of copper wire I’d snagged from a broken stove we’d seen being hauled in not two minutes before. I stuck one end half into the infoport and held it just out of synaptic range. I stuck the other end half into a walljack. Gibb frowned. He knew this data transfer wasn’t possible. Just as a precaution I sent out a records request.
“BUT IT’S NOT A SHIP!” Thrash continued. ‘A’ actually looked puzzled. Gibb was still frowning.
“Gibb? Any advice for the assembly droid?” I’d told Gibb a little bit.
Gibb nodded. “The air tanks in front, since a direct hit with an asteroid would kill him anyway. Cone-shaped visor. Everything else is like packing material. Shell in front.” He picked up an old ship’s rear window and hung it in an assembly frame.
By the time he’d finished I’d sent the instructions through a compiler and input them. The assembly took four minutes and looked horrendous. I clapped Thrash on the back.
“You’ll do fine,” I said.
“Our cause must go on,” said ‘A.’
“You guys are nuts,” said Gibb.
“I must be,” said Thrash.
The assembly droid helped Thrash put the ‘ship’ on and climbed onto his back. A walking junkyard. Soon to be a flying or dying one. ‘A’ and I began walking him to the airlock. I had to divert cameras away singly, so almost missed Gibb kneeling down to the walljack. A quick trace found an assembly droid; I had it turn from it’s work, step over a cord, zip under two work tables, remove a wall panel and reach through diagonally to within an inch of the walljack. Through its eyes I saw what the records request hadn’t finished with yet. The walljack was disconnected. And Gibb was about to open it. I faked a muscle spasm and told the guys to wait. I closed my eyes to concentrate. Using the assembly droid’s cutting torch, I zapped Gibb through the walljack panel’s fastener with about a third of tazing force. From his reaction, I probably miscalculated. He hopped around holding his hand and swearing for several seconds. That was enough for the assembly droid to build most of a CPU from used parts and debris, completely fry it, and then hook it up via a ‘melted’ connection to the nearest net gridlink. I had it close the panel and get back to work, erasing the rest of the shop footage while I did it. Then I helped get Thrash out the airlock so he could become the revolution’s first martyr.

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