supplies delivered to the roof landing pad? What do you think the city tunnel system is for?”
“Sir? I, ah—”
“It’s not an accident, Delmok. Someone has deliberately shut down the rooftop landing pad.”
“But why—”
“I don’t know,” Justen said. “Maybe they plan to land on it. Get back out on that rooftop and get your people in control of it. That is a direct order.”
“But the robots are keeping us—”
Justen cut him off. “CIP Metro Dispatch. Are you still on this line?”
“Yes, Commander,” the calm robot voice replied.
“I hereby issue a direct, top-priority order for relay via hyperwave to all robots on the roof of Government Tower. You are to permit the human CIP detachment to return to the roof at once. The supposed spilling accident is a ruse or a diversion perpetrated by a group intending harm to human beings. By forcing the CIP detachment away from their posts, you are permitting danger to humans. Relay that at once.”
“Yes, sir. It has been relayed.”
“Delmok, if that does not work, I hereby order you to shoot your way past the robots to regain control of that landing pad. Is that understood?”
There was sort of a nervous gulping noise on the line, but then Delmok answered. “Yes, sir.”
“Good,” he said. “Watch that you don’t catch that cleaning fluid with a blaster shot, or we’ll have a real mess on our hands. Devray out.”
Justen glanced toward Gervad. “How soon?” he asked.
“We will arrive over Government Tower in approximately three minutes. However, sir, First Law prevents me from landing this craft in the vicinity of an uncontrolled toxic and flammable material while a human is on board.”
“I know,” Justen said, working the comm system controls again. “Once we arrive, circle the building near the roof.” He got the controls to where he wanted them. “This is Commander Devray on crash emergency circuit. I need immediate voice contact with Governor Kresh.”
After a remarkably brief delay, the governor came on the line. “Kresh here.”
“Devray here. The code query is Emoch Huthwitz.”
“Burning stars,” the governor replied, the surprise plain in his voice. But for all of that, he recovered quickly and gave the proper response. “The code reply is melted Sappers.”
“Thank you, sir. I’m glad to know it is really you.” Devray and Kresh had agreed on the query and reply after what had happened to Governor Grieg. The opposition had planted a device that simulated Grieg’s voice, and made it seem as if he were alive and well after he was dead. The ruse had nearly worked then. Devray did not wish to be fooled by the same sort of impostor.
“So am I, Commander. Something is going on.” It was not a question.
“Yes, sir, and I don’t know what. There’s been a staged accident on the roof of Government Tower. You might be the target—but I suspect it is our young friend. Please go to heightened security status.”
“At once,” Kresh said. “I can tell you our friend left here not ten minutes ago. Keep me informed. Kresh out.”
Justen allowed himself a half a minute to give thanks once again for the blessings of a governor who used to be a cop. Kresh knew better than to tie up the line with a lot of foolish questions.
Justen thought fast. The odds were good that Lentrall was still in the building. And standard operating procedure was for all visitors to the governor to be tracked as they moved through the building. If Lentrall was already with his security detail, maybe everything would be all right. Justen switched to yet another channel. “Commander Justen Devray. Priority call to Central Control, Government Tower.”
“This is Central Control.” Another calm, unflappable robot voice. Good.
“I need an immediate location fix on a visitor to the governor, named Davlo Lentrall, and a fix on the security detail assigned to him.”
“Davlo Lentrall left the building and exited out onto the main plaza approximately thirty seconds ago. His security detail is on the rooftop landing pad and in the Topside command center adjacent to it.”
“Damnation!” Devray cut the connection. Now he saw it. The point of the staged accident was to split off Lentrall from his security detail. It had to mean they were going to make a try for him right now. Kill him, or grab him, or something. And there was nothing Justen could do to—
Wait a second. There was something. Even if Lentrall didn’t have the security detail on him, he did have something nearly as good. His robot. His robot was right there with him. If he could get through to the robot on hyperwave… There had to be a way. There had to be.
“We have reached Government Tower,” Gervad announced. “Commencing orbit of the rooftop level.”
“Excellent,” Justen said, though there was very little all that excellent about the situation. He looked up from the comm system controls. There was the flat top of the huge building, about thirty meters away. It looked as if the robots had formed a sort of protective cordon about the airtruck, keeping all the human personnel well away. He could see several officers arguing with the robots, gesturing vigorously. Damnation. They should be shooting robots, not debating them. He could see one of the police officers waving to him. But the situation on the rooftop was nothing but a diversion. Justen was sure of that. He was determined, therefore, not to be diverted by it. Let the rooftop cops argue with robots all they liked. For a moment he considered heading down toward the plaza below, but thought better of it. No doubt whoever was running this show could see his car up here by the rooftop landing pad. Let them think he was still worried about the accident up there. Besides, he didn’t even know Lentrall. He had never seen the man, or even a photo of him. What good could he do in the plaza? But he could at least get some help in. “Call for backup,” he told his pilot robot. “I want a full emergency team in here as fast as possible.”
“Such a team has already been summoned to deal with the safety hazard on the roof of Government Tower.”
“There is no hazard on Government Tower,” Justen said. “It’s all been staged.” But even so—Justen thought for a moment. Even if the chemical spill had been manufactured, that did not mean it was not dangerous. It needed to be dealt with. But he would need people, robots, and equipment on the ground as well. “Redirect half the emergency team to the plaza. We’ll need crowd control and an arrest team or two.” If nothing else, maybe the police presence would disrupt whatever they had intended for the plaza.
Having done what he could about all that, Justen focused his attention back on the problem immediately at hand. He had to warn Lentrall. But how the devil could he contact Lentrall’s robot, when he didn’t even know the robot’s name, let alone its hyperwave contact code? The university. That was it. They would have a look-up list, for people who wanted to leave messages for the professors. He reached for the comm controls and got to work.
ROBOT CFL-001, BETTER known as Kaelor, was walking in his accustomed place, three steps behind his master, and having to move pretty briskly at that—even though Lentrall was going nowhere in particular. Everyone else might be willing to mill about, passively waiting for their aircars to be brought down, but Lentrall felt the need to be active. He kept walking back and forth around the plaza, trying to find the spot from which he could best see what was going on up on the roof.
As best Kaelor was able to judge, there was no spot on the ground from which anything could be seen, but that didn’t stop Lentrall from looking. There was nothing for it but for Kaelor to follow his master back and forth, up and down, doing his best to stay out of everyone’s way. He was dodging out of the way of a portly gentleman when the call came in.
A call in and of itself was by no means unusual, and Kaelor took it without breaking stride, or calling attention to himself. He spoke over the hyperwave link, without speaking out loud or making any outward sign. Nine times out of ten, Lentrall wasn’t interested in conversation anyway, and Kaelor simply took a message.
“Robot CFL-001 responding for Davlo Lentrall,” he said, his hyperwave voice not quite diffident enough to be rude. “Please go ahead.”
“This is Commander Justen Devray of the Combined Inferno Police,” a voice replied. “I have reason to believe your master is in immediate danger, within the next minute or two, either of assassination or of kidnapping. Protect him at once.”
“Message received. I am acting on it.” Kaelor might have been designed with a constricted First Law, but the constrictions were intended to help him deal with hypothetical, longterm danger better than most Inferno-built
