3rd World Products, Book 16 (24 page)

I said, “Athena,” and before I could tell her anything, she said, “I’m with the child.” My probe showed her fields surrounding the kid and forcing respiration.
 

As I trotted out there, I saw the woman who’d been driving the SUV swoon a bit, then relax totally. My probe detected theta waves and I knew Athena was sedating her.
 

The SUV’s side door was crumpled inward and wouldn’t slide at all. I glanced around, saw Tanya catching up, and said, “Stand back.”
 

With that, I created field wedges around the door and made them swell. The door popped out of its frame and hung by its roller arms. I shoved it back as far as possible and Athena fielded the kid out of the wreck. The top of her field cocoon darkened against the bright sunlight as it emerged.
 

Athena disappeared within the SUV and reappeared next to the kid. She said, “Thanks for removing the door. I’ll talk with the authorities if you wish.”
 

I chuckled, “You know I wish, ma’am. Thanks. We’ll head back inside now.”
 

Tanya blurted, “What?!” Gesturing at the truck driver, who was now sitting near the woman in about the same state of sedation, she asked, “What about them?”
 

“He’s dinged up a bit. She’s just bruised and in shock.”
 

With that, I headed back up the slight slope to the restaurant. Tanya hurried to catch up and snapped, “You can’t just
leave
, dammit!”
 

“Of course I can. We can. All we can do is stand around down here. Did you see the accident?”
 

“No, but I saw you make a door
jump
off that SUV!”
 

“Yeah? Prove it. I don’t want the hassles and I’m going to watch the show from a distance.”
 

One of the other restaurant patrons had also rushed to the wreck. For whatever reason, he also headed back up the hill.
 

As we entered the restaurant, the waitress asked, “How bad was it?” and I answered, “As bad as it looks, ma’am.” And glanced back to see the guy right behind us. Good. Let him talk to her. Thumbing at him, I said, “He might know.”
 

The waitress switched her attention to him and Tanya and I returned to our seats. As we watched the wreck scene, I said, “We might want to hurry our burgers a bit.”
 

Tanya looked at me and I said, “Word of an AI at the scene will bring the NIA. Could be they’ll pretend not to notice us. Could also be they’ll want to talk. Do we want that?”
 

“
You
certainly don’t seem to think so.” She sighed, “And I don’t either, really. Sorry. I think I’m still a little tense.”
 

Our food arrived and we munched as we watched the world outside the window. A cop had arrived, then an ambulance, and then another ambulance and three cop cars. Athena spoke with the medics and maintained the cocoon as they unloaded a gurney. That they’d unloaded it at all meant to me that one of them had tried to take control of things before Athena felt he had a full understanding of the situation.
 

One of the medics suddenly froze at attention. The others backed away. With a dramatic gesture, Athena levitated the gurney. Its undercarriage folded up and it slid aboard the ambulance. The cocoon with the kid slid in after it and Athena turned to face the frozen medic.
 

Whatever she said seemed to have an effect; when she released him, he very obviously had a ‘
Yes, ma’am!
‘ attitude. He and his vehicle’s other medic quickly boarded their ambulance and it left the scene. The other medics quickly returned to tending the other wreck participants.
 

A nearby cop had apparently had sense enough not to try to intervene. Athena now turned to him. After a few moments, he gave her a nodding little tap of the hat salute and strode quickly to talk to one of the other cops. Athena vanished.
 

Tanya chuckled softly, “Wow! She ordered those guys around like a princess!”
 

“The medic tried to pull rank he didn’t have and take over the kid before he knew the full situation. The cop came over to back him up, but saw what happened to him. I’d say Athena explained everything as necessary to unclog things.”
 

Chuckling, “Unclog. I like that,” Tanya munched some of her fries and said, “Maybe coming back in here
was
a good idea. We get to see the whole show from up here.”
 

“Yup. Watch for suits. Two or more in a car. They’ll mill around and talk to people in an authoritative manner, but they won’t take over the scene from the uniform cops.”
 

“They’ll be the NIA?”
 

I chuckled, “You’re doing it again, ma’am.”
 

She mockingly echoed, ‘
You’re doing it again, ma’am
‘, rolled her eyes, and gave me the finger behind the napkin holder, presumably to shield it from anyone else’s view.
 

As she did so, a beige sedan parked in the restaurant’s lot. Two men and a woman got out. The woman was Elgin. As she surveyed the scene below and looked around, she spotted us. I smiled and waved. Without taking her eyes off me, she said something to one of the men and started toward us.
 

Tanya hissed, “Ed! That’s the woman who came to the apartment! What the
hell
are you doing?”
 

“What, I’m not allowed to have female friends now?”
 

“Goddammit, be serious! Why’d you get her attention?”
 

“We already had it, ma’am. I just helped her decide what to do with it.”
 

Elgin came in as Tanya hissed, “Dammit, this isn’t funny!”
 

“Then don’t laugh. Relax.”
 

Coming to stand by our table, Elgin said, “Well, fancy meeting you here.”
 

“That’s supposed to be my line, ma’am. Have a seat. Want anything from the bar? They have tea as well as booze.”
 

She sat down and said, “No, thanks. Would it do me any good to ask what your plans are for Marie Connor?”
 

“Well, we’re going to see her around one, I think.”
 

“Why then in particular?”
 

“First, because visitors screw up lunchtimes for patients.” Noddingly indicating Tanya, I said, “Otherwise, her friend Jessica was in a car accident this morning. She ought to be out of surgery by now, so we’re going to give her some time to wake up and visit her after we see Marie.”
 

Looking at Tanya as if to verify my statements, Elgin said, “There was an AI at this accident scene. One of yours?”
 

“A friend, yes. I don’t own any of them.”
 

“You owned one before. Her name was Stephanie.”
 

“So? I don’t own one now.”
 

“How can we know that?”
 

“Explain why you think you have the right to know that.”
 

Sitting back, Elgin said, “If they’re truly sentient, autonomous entities, owning one would be slavery. That’s a federal crime.”
 

“Athena.”
 

Elgin gave me a curious look and asked, “What about her? She was a goddess of…”
 

Athena appeared and fed Elgin some fairly heavy theta waves as she asked, “Yes, Ed?”
 

I held up a hand and said, “One moment, please, milady,” then I looked at starkly staring Elgin and said, “This Athena is as close to a real goddess as this world’s ever seen. Ask her whether she’s a sentient, autonomous entity or a slave.”
 

Athena chuckled and looked at Elgin as she said, “No, Agent Elgin. I’m most definitely not a slave.”
 

Elgin shook off some of her shock and almost whispered, “Uh… how do you know who I am?”
 

Putting up a two-foot screen, Athena displayed Elgin’s badge and ID, then split the screen and showed her gun and holster and the contents of each of her other pockets in separate panels.
 

Rather succinctly, she said, “That’s how.”
 

Staring at the screen, then at Athena, Elgin asked, “Uh, how can we contact you directly, Ms… Athena?”
 

Looking at Tanya, I chuckled, “Now
that’s
a one-track mind, ma’am. She’s a federal agent to the core.”
 

Elgin gave me a narrow glance, then looked up at Athena, who said, “You can’t.” She smiled at Tanya and me and said, “Goodbye,” then vanished.
 

Muttering, “
Oh, dear God
,” Elgin tentatively passed her left hand through the space where Athena had stood. She looked at me and asked, “Was that a hologram?”
 

“Nope. That was a field she uses to interact with people.” Thumbing at the window, I said, “Like when she helped at that accident a few minutes ago. Why don’t you know about her and the others? Larcon made some pretty comprehensive reports over the last few years.”
 

Her expression instantly wary, Elgin answered, “I, uh… At my… at our level, we don’t have access to certain highly sensitive records.”
 

“Sensitive? Crap. She’s been written up in a newspaper. So has Sara, the station AI. And several others. There’s info about AIs all over the place. Say it like it is, ma’am; you aren’t allowed access to what you need and you aren’t allowed to use ‘untrusted’ info from outside sources.”
 

She met my gaze and said, “You sound as if you have some experience in my field or one very similar.”
 

That startled the hell out of me and I let Elgin see it. It actually pissed me off a bit. She should have known everydamnedthing in my NIA file before she’d met me.
 

I said, “And
you
sound as if you’ve been blindfolded, then told to look for something. What the hell’s wrong with your office? You aren’t some kind of low-rank new guy or you wouldn’t be telling a couple of other agents what to do.”
 

Elgin’s irritation showed as she sat straight and said, “I’ve been on other assignments. There was no need for me to know about you or your AI friends until a week or so ago.”
 

“That doesn’t excuse not being able to recognize all the players and name them. That’s called ‘basic preparation’, ma’am, and I think you’d find the NSA and other agencies
never
send their people into the field without it.”
 

Calling up a small screen of my own, I put her agency’s hierarchy on display and looked down the list. Ninth down from honcho Fullbright was Agent Hayes. I poked his name and his picture popped up with basic data.
 

Turning the screen to show Elgin, I said, “Get with Hayes. He knows me personally. Open
files as necessary, even if you have to dethrone some ego freak to do it. Don’t you
ever
show up ignorant again, lady. You don’t deserve that. Aside from the fact it can get you killed, I
know
the high level of competence it takes just to become a federal agent. The agencies search for that extreme competence, then they stifle it with endless political rules and bullshit. If you weren’t inherently capable of
far
better performance than you’ve shown me, you wouldn’t be carrying that damned badge.”
 

Elgin glared at me, then her glare softened a bit and she took a deep, pensive breath. Tanya had simply frozen at some point and stared over her burger at me like I was a Martian. Now she said softly, “Uh… Ed, it’s very possible she’s wearing some kind of listening device.”
 

Chapter Sixteen
 

Without taking my eyes off Elgin, I said, “No, that’s an absolute certainty, ma’am. She wouldn’t have come in here at all if someone wasn’t recording every word.”
 

“And you just took a big, fat swing at her whole agency.”
 

“Someday I’ll tell you about FBI Agent Amy. She got a bullet in the leg when a supposedly-secured prisoner with a spooky background got loose. The one thing a cop of any kind can never afford to be is ignorant.”
 

Elgin said, “That happened in North Carolina.”
 

Tanya looked from her to me and I nodded.
 

Leaning forward, Elgin grinningly said, “I’m not quite as ignorant as you think, but that was a fine little speech,
drill sergeant
. And thanks for your vote of confidence in my competence.”
 

“De nada, ma’am. You have pretty nice legs, too.”
 

Elgin blinked at me, then laughed. Tanya gave me an annoyed look and I shrugged.
 

“What? Now I can’t notice other women?”
 

That made Elgin’s expression change to one of startlement briefly, but she maintained her smile as she asked, “Uh… you two have something more than a friendship?”
 

I snapped, “Our business, not yours.”
 

“I see. I think. Oh, my…” She seemed to reorganize and said, “Back to Marie Connor. What are you going to do?”
 

“Visit her.” Sipping my tea, I said, “Elgin, Athena could simply touch Marie and treat her with nanobots that would reconstruct all her damage. I don’t know if that would also restore her brain functions to normal. Doesn’t matter for this discussion; Athena could do it. The law prevents her.”
 

Sipping again, I said, “A Robodoc could treat her the same way, but the clinics are all outside the country. Like I said earlier, I think this is a political setup for an election year tussle. I think you guys fed little hints that steered Tanya to me and I took over, just as you expected. But I’m sixty-two and there’s no way in hell I’m going to spend even one goddamned day behind bars over this, much less become a political puppet or spend a few years as a courtroom football. I’m not going to piss my remaining time away with that kind of crap.”