More robots arrived, carrying the replacement mattress and sheets. No doubt the substitutes had been taken from Anderson’s cargo container, since he wouldn’t be needing them now.
The final cleaning robot departed her room, making way for the newcomers. When the robots finished placing the mattress and setting the sheets, they departed.
With a sigh, Rhea arose and entered her bedroom. There was no sign of the bloody mess that had tainted the room. She still didn’t feel like sleeping there, however.
Well, she wasn’t going to sleep out here, that much was certain. She felt safer within the Faraday cage. She wasn’t quite sure why. She glanced at her HUD and confirmed that she had no Net signal already.
She didn’t bother to activate the usual virtual decorations she liked to festoon her room with; she wasn’t in the mood for them.
Instead she lay down. On the floor. She didn’t quite feel ready to sleep in the bed, even if everything was clean. Not when the previous owner had only just died.
Rhea realized she’d forgotten to shut the door behind her. Like most entrances in Rust Town, it was manually operated. While the parts necessary for remote interfacing were dirt cheap, manually operated doors provided an extra level of security: without a remote interface, a door couldn’t be hacked.
She got up again, and before she could close it, she heard clangs, rising in volume, coming from outside the room. A glance at her overhead map showed the blue dots of Will and Horatio approaching.
She peered around the bend and saw Will and Horatio pulling themselves into the adjacent cargo container via the opening in the floor.
She retreated into her bedroom and sat down on the floor, propping her back against the wall.
When Will entered, he gazed down at her and frowned. “Don’t like your new bed?”
“I’m not ready to sleep in a dead man’s bed, not just yet,” she said.
Will nodded and shut the door.
Rhea appreciated the added privacy. No one would be eavesdropping on them now.
“So,” Will said. “The other Wardenites are clean. For now. No chips. Horatio and I are also good.”
Rhea nodded. “Not surprising. But would you mind if I scanned you myself?”
Will gave her an incredulous look, but then shrugged. “Horatio?”
The robot came forward, and removed one of his fingers, which functioned as a portable scanner. She took the device and ran it over Will’s head, then Horatio’s AI core.
“Clean,” she said, giving it back to Horatio. “Hope you’re not insulted.”
“No,” Will said. “Someone from your inner circle just tried to assassinate you. You have every right to be overly cautious and suspicious of everyone, even your friends.”
“I knew you’d understand,” she said. She glanced at Horatio. “You finished examining the body, I assume?”
“Yes,” Horatio said. “It was indeed a mind hijacking chip.”
Rhea tapped her chin. “I wonder why he was only armed with a laser cutter? You’d think he’d have something more powerful. Don’t get me wrong, a laser cutter can do plenty damage when misused. But still.”
“Given all the security cameras you have throughout the place, sneaking a weapon inside would be rather difficult,” Will said.
“Actually, about that…” Horatio interjected. “During the autopsy, I also found this in the lower intestines.”
He produced a small spherical object.
Rhea extended a hand toward it, but then stopped herself. She wasn’t all that big on touching something that had been in a dead man’s intestines.
“What is it?” she asked.
“A fragmentation grenade,” Horatio replied.
Rhea hissed and stepped back a pace. “Why are you bringing it in here?”
“No need to panic, I’ve disarmed it,” Horatio said.
“I don’t care, get it out of here!” Rhea said.
Horatio shrugged, then started for the door.
Before the robot reached it, she asked: “Why didn’t Anderson detonate it when he had the chance?”
“I believe he had no control over the device,” Horatio said. “Whoever sent him wanted to dictate the timing behind both your deaths.”
“The Faraday cage,” she said. “It saved me.”
“Yes,” Horatio agreed. “The walls of the cargo container would have interfered with any remote arming signals.”
“But the Faraday cage… wouldn’t it have prevented the attack order from reaching the chip in his brain?” Rhea pressed.
“Not if the order was received outside your room,” Horatio said. “Once given, Anderson would have followed the order even after losing communication, until the success or failure of the mission.”
“Okay,” Rhea said. “Let me know if anything else surfaces.”
“Will do,” Horatio said before opening the door and leaving.
She glanced at Will.
“So, what now?” Will asked.
“Now I sleep,” she said. “And hope someone can dredge up something on this Veil in the morning.”
4
Rhea had set her mind-machine interface to wake her with the dawn, and at the designated hour her eyes opened. She was surprised at how well she’d slept, given the events of the night before. She thought she should feel shaken in some way. But then she reminded herself that she’d faced an army of deadly bioweapons.
Takes a lot more than some botched assassination attempt to faze me.
Though her room had no windows and was completely dark, she knew it was sunrise courtesy of the clock overlaid in the lower right of her HUD, which remained visible at all times, regardless of the light output. It currently read five in the morning.
She rubbed her eyes and rose groggily. She half-expected to feel stiff, but as she stood up gracefully and without effort, she remembered she was no longer completely human. For a small instant she had forgotten she was a cyborg. It happened from time to time, usually upon waking.
She glanced at the untouched bed then went to the door. She opened it only to discover Horatio seated on the floor just outside.
“Have you been here all night?” she asked the robot.
“Will thought it would be a good idea,” Horatio said.
“Will had nothing to do with it,” Rhea said. “The idea was all yours, wasn’t it?”
“The idea was mine,” Horatio admitted. “But I did tell Will. He agreed I should guard
