“In your case, I know that,” she said. “Tech, Lexi, and Rev, especially, did excellent work.”
“Did we uncover anything more on his background?” Tech asked. “There’s something about him that doesn’t correspond to my expectations of his abilities.”
Zodavia, as always, seemed unruffled. “I expect you will uncover that during the interrogation. Ace, I will read your full report.”
“I’d really appreciate if you could bring your resources to bear as well,” Tech said. “I know you have access to some other areas that we don’t.”
“If I have time, I will look into it,” she said. “Is there anything else?”
“Nah, that’s good. Glad to be of soivice,” Ace said.
“Again, good work. Zodavia out.”
Tech sat back in his chair and folded his arms as everyone else got up. Ace came over to stand by him. “You want to do the interrogation or should I?”
“You go first,” Tech said.
“Awright. Let’s change into some clean uniforms, eh?”
They changed along with Slam and Duck in the locker room, and while Ace went off to interrogate Zebediah, Tech went to see to Rev. But the roadrunner didn’t answer his knock—still sleeping, probably—so Tech sat in his lab reviewing the medical data from the prisoner, trying without much success not to worry about Rev.
The DNA, retinal patterns, fingerprints, blood sample, and dental print wouldn’t really tell them what they needed to know. The skin analysis might tell them where he’d been in the last week to month, depending on how frequently he bathed (Tech was betting on the month side of the scale). The real information would come from the interrogation.
The blood sample, though, might still be of interest. What was bothering him about Zebediah Fudd was not so much how a hunter from the backwater of North Haverbrook had obtained a highly classified experimental weapon, but how he had the reflexes and accuracy to fire and hit Duck in a fraction of a second. In the fairly long list of non-natural substances found in the prisoner’s bloodstream, he found his answer.
At least, he thought he did. His database contained a catalog of over a hundred thousand known chemical substances and compounds, but there, in between the alcohol, artificial sweeteners, preservatives, caffeine, and various mild hallucinogens, was a big fat UNKNOWN. He asked the medibase to isolate the compound and identify chemically similar substances, and it replied that it would take it about an hour to complete the search it had already initiated. Tech sometimes assigned the medibase the personality of a snobby butler in his thoughts, because its stilted, artificial voice always sounded reluctantly obedient.
He killed time modifying his crawler because he’d already had the idea for it, and then got sidetracked on another idea he’d had. By the time the medibase cleared its throat (with his standard alert sound) to let him know it was done, it took him a moment to recall exactly what it was doing.
A brief scan of the data brought a smile to his muzzle. “Damn,” he said, “I’m good.” The three known compounds the medibase had returned in its analysis were all from the amphetamine family, drugs designed to sharpen senses and speed up reflexes. That didn’t explain the accuracy, but it solved half of the riddle.
Zebediah hadn’t had any unidentified pills, patches, or liquids on his person at the time of his capture. Maybe because he was in hiding, he’d set them down, or didn’t think he’d need to have quick access to them. Certainly his reflexes had been extra-sharp when Rev had caught him. Three more seconds and he might have succeeded in drawing his gun.
“Tech?”
He turned and waved Duck into the lab. “I haven’t finished your fight reel from the battle room yet.”
“Oh, that’s not what I wanted to talk about.” Duck shuffled his webbed feet. Tech raised an eyebrow but didn’t say anything. “I didn’t know the thing with you and Rev was, you know, more than just that one time.”
“You didn’t?” Tech reviewed the past couple weeks in his head. They hadn’t really said anything about it to Duck, nor had he seen them together again after that. He supposed he could see where Duck, self-absorbed as he was, would have missed any other context to what he’d seen.
Duck shook his head. “I thought he just got horny, you know, and talked you into it, or maybe you were swapping, or… anyway, don’t know, don’t want to know. I thought that was kind of gross. I didn’t realize you guys were, like, dating. And stuff.”
“Oh.” Tech couldn’t think of a single thing to say.
“So I just wanted to say, you know, good luck.”
“Well, thanks.” Tech studied Duck. “Does this mean you’re going to do your reel yourself?”
“No,” Duck said. “I figure you still don’t want Ace to know. You know, good ol’ wholesome boy scout Ace, never know how he might react.”
“What about Slam?”
“What about him? He can barely dress himself, he should care who’s sleeping with who?”
“Whom. And you shouldn’t put him down so much. It has an effect on his psyche.”
Duck rolled his eyes. “He can take it. He’s used to it. If he doesn’t want to get picked on, he should shape up. It’s not hard.”
Tech shook his head. “I can’t figure you out,” he said. “You come in here and wish us luck, a really nice thing to do, and then you go back to being a gigantic ass.”
“That’s me,” Duck said. “A really nice ass. But don’t get any ideas. I like girls.”
“Yours isn’t half as nice as Rev’s,” Tech said. “Not that I’ve made comparisons or anything.”
Instead of sputtering, Duck grinned. “Even if you did, the fact that he’s letting you bang him renders the comparison pointless.”
Tech laughed. “You really are an ass.”
“Just finish my reel.” Duck paused and turned on his way out. “And see if you can include any footage of that Zeba-whatsit guy on it. Especially if he gets in the news.”
“If who gets in da news?” Ace said
