money was on escaping.
Sullivan moved quietly down the grate. He had the wall to his right and the giant coffins to his left. If he was lucky there would be another door at the other end.
“We going to do this the hard way then, Sullivan? Your call.”
Sullivan hit the far wall. It was a dead end. There was a heating vent he thought about trying, but who was he kidding? There was no way in the world that he would be able to fit in there, and he didn’t want the indignity of getting shot in the ass while his shoulders were stuck in a duct. That meant fighting his way out. His hand landed on something leaning against the wall. It was a big spanner. Nice and long with all the weight at the end. Perfect for cracking skulls. Sullivan took the wrench in hand.
He risked a peek. The leader gave some hand signals. The four men spread out, one on each of the far walls, two in the center. Once they were formed up, they all started walking his way, torches bobbing along ahead of them. They were treating this like a pheasant hunt, walking the field, down the levies in a line, keeping an eye on each other so he couldn’t sneak between them, until he had nowhere else to run. They intended to flush him out.
The gunmen were halfway down the room, nearing where Sullivan was clutching his spanner, when there was a loud rumble from the hallway. At first he thought that another part of the building had fallen down. The rumble came again and he realized it was a footstep.
“What the hell was that?” The flashlight approaching on his side bobbed away.
“Quiet!” snapped the leader.
Sullivan used the distraction to his advantage. He covered the distance between the coffins swiftly. The light came back around. Sullivan caught the man by the gun hand and swung him facefirst into the nearest metal coffin. He tried to fire his gun, but Sullivan blocked the hammer with his thumb. He tried to push away so Sullivan clubbed him on the back of the head with the wrench.
Lights flashed his way as Sullivan shoved the dazed man into the open. The others opened fire. His victim took a round in the chest and sprawled forward. Sullivan felt a bullet burn across the back of his hand. He dodged back around the coffin, but the pistol he’d hoped to secure went bouncing across the grate to disappear into the shadows.
The guns were quieter with the mufflers attached, but the bullets sure made a lot of racket as they punched holes in the sheet metal he was hiding behind. There was a lull as empty magazines were dropped and new ones slammed home.
“We got you now, Heavy. Nowhere for you to hide.”
There were three of them left and they knew exactly where he was. He was pinned down. They’d fan out and soon enough one of them would have a clean shot… He had to get out of here. It was hard to hit something with a pistol in one hand and a flashlight in the other, which might give him a chance, but he’d probably still get ventilated. Sullivan prepared to run for it.
There was a metallic thud as something shook the grating. “Greetings, EGE guests. Allow me to help make your visit a pleasant one,” a new voice boomed.
“What the hell is that?”
Sullivan peered around the corner. It was the thing he’d glimpsed in the hall. The flashlights gave him a better look at it this time. It was shaped like a man, mostly. The head was a disproportionately small oval ball with two rectangular glowing eyes. The torso was round too, like a pot-bellied stove. The arms and legs were too long and too thin, with bones of pipe encircled in metal skin. The feet were huge and splayed like a duck’s, probably so that the mechanical oddity could keep its balance.
There was a scratching of a record, like an automated player making a new selection. “Due to the delicate nature of EGE scientific equipment, no weapons are permitted in EGE Shelved Projects areas. Please, place your weapons on the floor and wait for an EGE representative to secure them for you. Thank you for your cooperation.”
“Well, ain’t that something? It’s one of those mechanical men I read about in Popular Mechanics. Welcome to the future, boys.”
“We don’t have time for this. Shoot it, Willis.”
There was the muffled snap of a silenced pistol and a ding noise as the bullet bounced off the mechanical man’s rounded torso. It barely even swayed.
The record player scratched and rattled as a new track was put on the turntable. “Warning. Please desist from damaging or defacing EGE property.” Logically, Sullivan knew that it was impossible for the prerecorded voice to know, but he could have sworn the mechanical man sounded annoyed.
Willis shot the mechanical man four more times.
This time there was no warning. The mechanical man raised one arm. There was a loud clack that Sullivan recognized as the charging handle being worked on a Browning 1919. The thunder of the 30-caliber machine gun filled the room. Sullivan covered his ears.
The three men twitched and jerked as shell casings spilled from the machine’s arm and fell through the floor grate. After a ten-second burst, the firing stopped, and the smoking metal arm was lowered. They were well past dead.
The mechanical man made a rumble as its torso swiveled toward the coffin Sullivan was hiding behind. The record player scratched. “Due to the delicate nature of EGE scientific equipment, no weapons are permitted in EGE Shelved Projects areas. Please, place your weapons on the floor and wait for an EGE representative to secure them for you. Thank you for your cooperation.”
The wrench hit the floor immediately. Sullivan came out with his hands up.
Brief pause. “Thank you for your cooperation. EGE representatives will be along shortly. Please enjoy your visit to the Shelved Projects Branch.”
“Thank you,” Sullivan said. “You mind if I search those fellas?”
It took awhile for the mechanical man to pick the right record. “I’m sorry. I do not understand your question.”
“Great. Just tell me if I start to do something against the rules.” He picked the one that had been acting as the leader. Sullivan checked his pockets, careful not to get blood on himself. There was a wallet and a badge holder, which he took, though he was careful not to pick up any of the perfectly good guns that were lying around.
The mechanical man lumbered closer to see what Sullivan was doing.
“What are you?”
“I am an EGE Tele-Automaton Mark Five. I ensure the safety of the EGE Shelved Projects Branch.”
“How do you work?”
“Through a strategic partnership between Cseska Robotica and Edision General Electric, the EGE Mark Five series operates on a proprietary system combining state of the art scientific methods and ultramodern engineering.”
“Uh huh…” Sullivan could see the lightly glowing carvings on various parts of the mechanical man’s body. It was spellbound. Cog science had figured out a way to connect this thing directly to the Power. And thinking of Power… How had these guys been able to block his? Sullivan continued his pat-down and found something odd. One of the men had a small orange Bakelite box in his pocket. Sullivan opened it up and saw that it had some sort of gem inside. One fingertip set it spinning.
“Warning. Please desist from damaging or defacing EGE property.”
Sullivan looked up at the mechanical man. “What?” The mechanical man shook as he lifted the box. “This thing hurting you?” The glowing spells seemed to flicker. Sullivan took a step closer and the mechanical man drooped. The arms fell with a grinding noise and hung limp. The lights behind the eye holes gradually went dark. He walked over and knocked on its chest. It was dead or asleep. Sullivan looked down at the mysterious box, shrugged, and shoved it in his pocket.
Picking up one of the hand torches, Sullivan inspected the coffins. Now with more light, he could see that there was a porthole in each one. A quick look inside revealed that there was a different type of mechanical man in each one. Some looked quite a bit like his new friend, bulbous and odd; others were rougher, like boxes with girders for limbs; while a few were much more streamlined, man-sized and looking like a knight in a suit of armor. All had been spellbound, though these seemed inactive. Too bad he didn’t have more time to explore, but he had to get out of here.
