A Toaster on Mars (17 page)

‘That's a very silly name,' Astrid said.

‘I know. I did not choose it.'

‘But a very impressive door,' Blake said, strolling over to it. ‘Almost impossible to break through. The glass, too, I suppose.'

‘The glass is made of tetrahydrazanitum, capable of withstanding the direct impact of a nuclear warhead. The door is composed of high-grade titanium with a polycarbonate interweave.'

‘And the lock?' Blake asked.

‘A multi-numeric combination for which there are over 200,000,000,000 different combinations. Entering a single wrong number in the combination will result in
the release of deadly toosanium gas.'

‘Isn't that—'

‘Yep. It's the gas that turns you inside out. One second you're thinking about your next cup of tea, the next your skin is inside your body and you have to learn to play tennis using your lungs as arms.'

Astrid grimaced. ‘Sounds horrible.'

Blake grasped the handle of the enormous door and gave it an experimental tug. It wheezed open.

‘Oh dear,' Tisklixion said. ‘They're always forgetting to lock it.'

Blake and the others peered into the huge chamber beyond. Hundreds of feet across, it was an almost perfect circle. Signs hung from the walls:
Abandon all hope, ye who enter here
;
Turn back before it's too late
; and
No ball playing in this area
. Hundreds of defence drones, shaped like frogs, hung from the ceiling.

‘Can we do anything about those drones?' Blake asked.

Nicki was already typing on her datapad. ‘I'm feeding instructions into the defence system.'

‘What sort of instructions?' Astrid asked.

‘Half a pound of butter…two eggs…cook at 200°F…'

‘Will that help?'

‘Did it confuse you?'

‘Yes.'

‘Then it'll help. I'm also uploading a software update to the system, but it's actually the
Margaret

Selby Cookbook
.' She finished typing. ‘We should get suited up.'

They pulled the jet harnesses from their backpacks and struggled into them. Blake and Astrid had played scarmish when they first met, but he had been no match for her. She moved through the air as though she were born to fly. His own moves resembled those of a duck with a broken wing. They were lucky Astrid still owned several packs from her competition days.

‘Is this on right?' Blake asked.

‘Only if you like flying upside down at high speed,' Astrid said.

She removed the harness, righted it and strapped him in. Blake couldn't help but notice her perfume. What was it?
Paris Deluxe.

‘Why are you grinning like a loon?' she asked.

‘Just thinking of the old days.'

‘We did have some good times, didn't we?'

‘What went wrong?'

‘I said we had
some
good times. There were also a lot of mediocre times—and plenty of downright awful times.'

‘We were both to blame,' Blake said. ‘It takes two to tango.'

‘If one of us doesn't make it,' Blake said, ‘the other has to carry on.'

‘I know. For Lisa.'

‘It always should have been about her.' He felt hot and embarrassed. ‘I'm sorry about the birthday party.'

‘Me too.' Pulling him close, she kissed him on the cheek. ‘Let's go.'

Blake pointed at the computer in the rotunda. ‘Defence drones will start dropping from the ceiling as soon as we enter,' he explained. ‘They're armed with short-range guided missiles.'

Astrid peered up at the ceiling. ‘They look familiar. Aren't they—'

‘You're thinking of that ancient computer game,
Space Invaders
,' Nicki said. ‘They're the same design.'

‘Great,' Blake said. ‘We're about to become part of a computer game.'

‘But you don't get three lives here,' Astrid said. ‘One mistake and you're dead.'

‘Fly in a zigzag pattern,' Nicki instructed, pointing to the rotunda. ‘The attacks will stop once we get within ten feet of the computer.'

Blake's stomach was churning as he activated his jet pack. The control was like the throttle of a helicopter. Twisting it increased power. Moving it from side to side adjusted the direction. Even a child could do it, and a lot of them did.

But that didn't make him feel any more confident.

‘Okay,' he said, swallowing. ‘Let's do this.'

He released a burst of power, lifted off the ground and flew through the door. Immediately, drones began to drop. Blake zigzagged, but the drones almost seemed able to anticipate his next move. Missiles started to fly at him.

He caught a glimpse of Astrid moving through the air like a starling. No wonder she'd won three gold medals at the Galactic Games. Nicki, by comparison, was operating more like an out-of-control rocket.

There was an explosion near Blake. He veered to the left, but overcompensated and struck the ground sideways, skidding. Somehow he managed to switch his rockets to full power.

Ka-boom!

Another blast just missed him.

Where's the rotunda? It's gone!

No. It was directly ahead. He was tempted to fly straight at it, but that was suicide. A missile would take him out first. He continued jerking about in mid-air, finally crashing sideways into the building.

‘That's the worst landing I've ever seen,' Astrid said, already dusting herself off.

‘Thanks.' He climbed to his feet. ‘Where's Ni—'

But he didn't get to finish. Blake pushed Astrid to the ground just as Nicki crashed into the monitors above their heads. Sparks, broken glass and metal went everywhere.

‘Oooff!'

‘Get off.'

‘You're squashing me!'

The remaining drones were returning to the ceiling. Smoke filled the cavern. The floor looked like a battlefield. Bombs had hit the ground in a dozen places.

‘Good job, tin girl,' Blake said, standing up. It looked like Nicki had taken out quite a few drones.

Nicki glanced at her ruined outfit. ‘You're going to pay me back for this,' she said. ‘This is a Roscoe Diamond suit—and they don't come cheap.'

‘We'll sort all that out later.' Blake turned to the computer terminal. ‘Let's steal the program and get out of here.'

Nicki plugged into the console. ‘I'm integrating with the GADO software. Interfacing with the security system.' She pushed a few buttons. ‘Hmm.'

Blake looked at her, worried. ‘What does
hmm
mean?'

‘There are approximately ten billion different combinations,' Nicki said.

‘Sprot.'

‘It's going to take a while.' She hit a few more keys. ‘That's it. I'm in.'

‘What? I thought it was going to take a while.'

‘I'm a cyborg. Three seconds is a while.'

After another moment, she disconnected.

‘Good news, carbon-based life forms. I've got Maria.'

‘Yes!' Blake and Astrid cried.

We might stand a chance of succeeding
, Blake thought.
Now we just need to get out of here.

He stared across the chamber. The doorway seemed miles away. But they had done it once, so they could do it again.

‘You'd better give us copies of Maria,' Blake said. ‘Just in case.'

Just in case you don't make it
, he thought. Nicki copied the file and handed separate datacards to them.

Blake perched on the edge of the rotunda, his heart thudding. He hadn't felt this afraid the first time, but he hadn't known then how hard it would be.

The air was still thick with smoke, but they couldn't delay any further. The security forces would be here in minutes.

They took off, each in a different direction. Astrid made good time, of course, crossing half the chamber before Blake had barely begun. Once again, the GADO system appeared to be out-thinking him at every turn. He was about to zig when he spotted a missile heading towards him and desperately threw himself to one side.

Boom!

The blast spun him about wildly. His head slammed into the ground. Struggling to climb to his feet, he could not tell up from down. The world started to go dark.

No! I've got to keep moving.

He blindly reactivated the jet pack and took off again. In the distance, he could make out Astrid's form silhouetted in the doorway.

But something was flying through the air towards him.

I'm finished
, he thought.
But at least Astrid's made it.

The thing slammed into him, carrying him towards the ceiling.

What the—

‘We're almost there,' a voice said directly in his ear. ‘Just hang on.'

Nicki!

She'd come back for him. The chamber whirled around him as they arrowed towards the doorway. He saw Astrid dive out of the way. An instant later, Nicki and Blake crashed through the gap, rolled a few times and slammed into the wall.

26

‘Is that for real?' Lisa asked.

‘It is, indeed, a real wall,' Panty replied. The AI's voice had now transferred to the hallway and was broadcasting from speakers set into the ceiling. ‘Though a very old and dilapidated wall. Long overdue for demolition.'

‘But, the painting—'

‘My senses do detect an image on the wall,' Panty admitted. ‘It appears to be a man seated in the midst of a group of hungry and desperate men. I believe they're about to launch a cannibalistic attack upon him.'

‘They're not about to eat him. That's…oh, never mind. Is there art on every floor?'

‘Most of the floors have been cleared of art and other valuables.'

‘What other valuables were there?' Lisa asked.

‘Gold, diamonds…'

‘And why were they removed?'

‘To make room.'

‘For?'

‘Dirt.'

‘Why?'

‘Why?' Panty asked. ‘Why is there a universe? I could ponder the mysteries of time and space all day. Why am I a computer? Why am I running this building—'

‘Where's the dirt coming from?' Lisa interrupted.

‘The basement.'

‘Take me there.'

Within seconds, Lisa was back in the elevator.

‘Why are we stopping?' she asked after they'd dropped twenty floors.

‘A maintenance droid is joining us.'

The elevator stopped and the doors slid open.

‘Woah,' Lisa breathed.

The entire floor was filled with neat cubes of dirt, stacked one on top of the other, all the way to the ceiling.

Dirt, dirt and more dirt.

A maintenance droid dragging an empty mining trolley trundled down a narrow corridor between the stacks of earth and backed into the elevator. Lisa was squeezed into the corner.

Dirt
, she thought.
What the sprot?

The elevator descended again.

‘Are we heading to the basement now?' Lisa asked.

‘We never go anywhere else,' Panty complained. ‘It's always the basement. Never anywhere interesting.'

The elevator finally shuddered to a stop and the doors opened. The air was thick with noise, dust and smoke. Shuttles were delivering dirt to conveyor belts, machines were compressing it into transportable cubes, and droids were loading them into trolleys.

‘I've never seen anything like this,' Lisa said as she stepped out of the elevator.

‘The same thing is happening next door.'

‘Next door?'

‘In the Cantos building,' Panty said, sounding miffed. ‘Canty thinks he's so much better than me.'

‘Canty being…?'

‘The AI operating the building.'

‘Oh.'

‘It's always
I'm two floors higher than you
and
My hard disk is bigger than your hard disk
and—'

‘I get the idea.'

Lisa glanced towards a tunnel where delivery trucks, driven by creatures that looked like giant rats, were manoeuvring in and out. Lisa wondered if they were Xebians.

Lisa made her way to the mouth of the tunnel. It had been cut from the hard earth with mining equipment. Lights, water pipes and air ducts were suspended from the ceiling.

‘Where does this lead?' she asked.

‘To a location some three miles away.'