TWENTY-FIVE

 

With an indifference only possible for a computerized automaton, the construction robot brought its spinning saw down on Dourado, but in the instant before contact was made, the blade shifted sideways. With an eruption of dirt, the blade buried itself in the ground, just a few inches to her right.

Before she could move, almost before she realized she was still alive and intact, the manipulator arm reversed, the saw tearing free of the earth. She rolled left, scrambling on all fours to put some more distance between herself and the robot, but she knew it wouldn’t be enough.

The manipulator arm shuddered, and began moving away from her. The saw plunged down again, burying itself deeper into the ground than the first strike. Then, with an ear-splitting shriek, a six-foot long section of the manipulator assembly broke loose from the hydraulic joint. Lazarus, his arms still wrapped around the other end of the disarticulated appendage, leapt from the base of the machine.

The damage seemed to have no real effect on the robot. Its other arms came forward, clamps and manipulator claws opening wide to grasp him, treads moving as it lurched ahead.

Instead of retreating, the big man wrenched the saw blade out of the ground, spun around like an Olympic hammer thrower building up momentum, and then brought the blade down hard on the treads.

The air rang with the impact. The severed appendage twisted out of Lazarus’s grasp and he half-staggered backward, scrambling to avoid being run down. The blow, however, had done what he intended.

The robot’s left track came apart, one end flinging about like a decapitated snake, and then the left side stopped moving. The massive machine spun around, its one remaining track causing it to pirouette, and it slammed into the transmitter building, smashing an enormous hole in the concrete wall.

Dourado, still in full-flight-mode, retreated several more steps before realizing that the battle—man versus machine—was over. What she had failed to do with technology, Lazarus had accomplished with brute force.

She stopped running and leaned over, resting her hands on her knees until her breath returned and the urge to throw up passed. Carter hastened over and embraced her, but the moment of triumph lasted exactly that long.

“Heads up!” Lazarus shouted. “We’ve got incoming!”

Three more of the construction-bots rolled into view and turned toward them. Lazarus bent to retrieve the makeshift axe that he had used to take down the first machine, but Dourado knew the odds of defeating all three were not good.

She looked around for her computer and found it.

Both pieces of it.

Lazarus had spared her from the first swipe of the saw blade, but in so doing, he had diverted the blade down onto the laptop, slicing it in two.

“So much for that idea.”

Lazarus hefted the broken saw-arm and stood his ground. “Get to cover,” he shouted. “I’ll deal with them.”

Carter grabbed Dourado’s arm and pulled her toward the wrecked robot. With her free hand, she pointed to the hole in the building. “In there!”

Of course! Dourado thought. We’ll force Tanaka to shut the robots down.

In the subsequent chaos, she had almost forgotten that the man responsible for it all was hiding on the other side of that wall. Her mind still boggled at the insane reasons he had given for putting the entire planet in danger, but his motivation didn’t matter. All that mattered was stopping him.

Carter climbed up onto the base of the disabled robot and disappeared through the hole. Dourado followed, picking her way through the rubble and dropping down into the dark hole beyond. There were no overhead lights shining, but there was some light from the glow of a computer screen on the other side of the room, right next to the open door. She didn’t see Tanaka, but a prone figure—it had to be Fallon—was stretched out on the floor, partially buried under debris from the collapsed wall. Carter was kneeling beside him, but Dourado hastened to the computer.

Outside, the low rumble of the tracked machines devolved into a tumult of metal crashing and hydraulic systems straining. An ear-splitting shriek filled the tiny room, and a shower of yellow sparks poured in like rain, as one of the robots began cutting through the wall.

Carter grabbed Fallon’s shoulders and pulled him from the rubble, dragging him toward the door, but she stopped there. Dourado could see that another one of the robots had moved into position in front of the exit, blocking their escape.

There was only one way they were going to survive this.

She gritted her teeth against the horrible noise, and tried to keep her attention on the task at hand.

The Space Tomorrow access menu appeared on the screen, and she saw the familiar prompt for username and password. She entered information for the admin account Fallon had shown her.

 

User not recognized.

User name:_________

Password:_________

 

She tried again with one of the backdoor accounts she had set up. The results were the same. She tried another, her last. No good.

“Porra!” she snarled. “I’m locked out.”

Carter bent over Fallon again and started shaking him. “Wake up, damn it!”

Fallon came to, jolting as if startled.

“Password?” Dourado shouted.

Fallon nodded.

“What’s the password?” Carter shouted into his face.

“Password,” he said. “Cap P. ‘At’ symbol. Dollar sign. Dollar sign. Lower case ‘w’. Zero. Lower case ‘r’. Lower case ‘d’. Username is M-dot-Fallon.”

Dourado stared at him, gobsmacked. “Seriously? Your password is ‘password’? Are you an idiot?”

She typed it in.

 

Username: M.Fallon

Password: P@$$w0rd

 

The main intranet menu opened. She navigated through the network, found the robotics subsystem menu, typed in the blanket shutdown code she had used before, and said a prayer.

The tumult ceased.

Lazarus’s face, twisted with concern, appeared in the hole a moment later, but when he saw that they were alive and unhurt, he relaxed. Dourado slumped against the wall, too exhausted to even remain on her feet.

Carter however, wasn’t ready to celebrate the win. She shook Fallon again. “Where’s Tanaka?”

“Ow!” Fallon complained, touching a hand to the back of his head, then looking at his fingertips as if checking for blood. “I’m not even sure where I am.” He glanced around. “Oh. Son of bitch. He sucker punched me.”

“He did a lot more than that.”

Fallon blinked as if he was having trouble bringing the big picture into focus.

“Tanaka was the hacker,” Carter said, speaking as if addressing a child. “He betrayed you.”

“Why?” He struggled to his feet, and then jolted forward, throwing open a panel on the large metal cube that dominated the room. He stuck his head in for a moment then just as quickly emerged and slammed the panel shut.

“It’s gone.”

“Proof of concept,” Carter muttered. “This whole thing was a setup so Tanaka could steal the Roswell fragment. All he needs to do now is find another transmitter.”

Fallon still looked confused and helpless. “But…why?”

“Why else? He wants to destroy the world.”