Legion Of The Damned - 02 - The Final Battle (9 page)

The industrialist shook his head in disgust. Not everyone wanted to look young again and Chien-Chu Enterprises was working on more mature and ethnically correct models. He would ask Nola to arrange for a prototype the moment one became available.

The ornate lobby was empty as usual and the door leaped out of his way. Once on the street, Chien-Chu joined the early-morning throng of people who were headed for work. Most accepted the industrialist for what he seemed to be but some recognized him as a cyborg and edged away.

Unlike humanoid androids, many of whom
looked
human but had telltale A’s embossed on their foreheads to avoid any possibility of a mistake, civilian cyborgs were classified as sentients and bore no special markings. And, given the fact that civilian cyborgs were something of a new phenomenon, some people spent a lot of time and energy picking them out of a crowd, and having done so, subjecting them to the same kind of hatred reserved for aliens. Especial
ly since civilian cyborgs tended to be wealthy and were assumed to be greedy, grasping, and dishonest. Just one of the many challenges poor old Anguar had to deal with.

Chien-Chu allowed the crowd to carry him down into the maze of tubeways that crisscrossed the ancient city of Los Angeles. A quick check showed that he was right on time, as was his train. It arrived with a whoosh of displaced air, slid to a silent stop, and hovered over the rails. Chien-Chu made his way aboard, found a seat, and wound up surrendering it to a woman and two children. He could tell she knew what he was and didn’t approve. She accepted the seat as if it were hers by right and did everything she could to avoid eye contact from that point onward.

The train made two additional stops prior to arriving at Platform 47-East. It had been placed there for the convenience of Orion, Inc., a successful aerospace firm, and just one of the many companies owned by Chien-Chu Enterprises.

The industrialist had worked at Orion for two months now, just as he had worked at other Chien-Chu-owned companies since his well-publicized death, gathering data, evaluating procedures, and feeding the resulting information through Nola to the small cadre of managers who ran his empire, and never ceased to be amazed at Madam Chien-Chu’s unexpected business acumen. The whole thing was sneaky and, given his current duties, lots of fun.

Workers flooded off the train. Some knew him and shouted their hellos. “Hey, Jim! How’s it goin’? See ya on the line . . .”

Chien-Chu shouted back, traded friendly insults with the ones he knew best, and was carried up the escalator and into the locker rooms. The flat screen on the front of locker 1157 had a message on it. “Jim James . . . please report to the production manager’s office prior to starting your shift.”

Chien-Chu sighed, hit the accept button, and entered his code. The door popped open. The dreaded Mr. Conklin again. The two of them had butted heads three or four times in the past and would continue to butt heads as long as the production manager continued to treat sentient workers the same way he dealt with androids.

Chien-Chu stripped off the conservative butler-type suit that served as protective camouflage within the condominium, and donned a pair of gray-blue overalls, safety boots, and the blue bandanna he used to keep his blond hair under control. A wiry black man, his forearms covered with tiny scars where droplets of molten metal had burned their way through his gauntlets, punched Chien-Chu in the shoulder.

“Hey, Jimbo, what this shit about Conklin calling you in? Is that asshole bothering you again?”

Chien-Chu smiled. “You should never jump to conclusions, Kato. Perhaps Conklin admires the quality of my work and wants to thank me for my outstanding performance.”

Kato had lots of white teeth and they showed when he laughed. “Right, and pigs fly, too. You let the crew know if Conklin gets out of hand. The floor is a busy place and accidents happen.”

Chien-Chu smiled, nodded, and was secretly concerned. It was hard if not impossible to measure the negative impact that a person like Conklin had on productivity until you replaced them. And, given the fact that problems usually stem from processes rather than people, he was hesitant to fire someone without careful investigation. But when a manager was so disliked that workers fantasized about killing him you had to wonder.

Chien-Chu exchanged hellos with other workers, made his way out of the locker room, and headed for the lift that would carry him to the top floor. Doors whispered open, wood paneling embraced him, and mood music filled the air—none of which added one iota to the plant’s efficiency or made life more pleasant for the majority of the company’s workers. Chien-Chu felt annoyed and an array of feedback circuits told him that his face had registered that fact.

The doors slid open and the industrialist stepped out into a luxurious reception area. A class VII android rose from behind a wall of mahogany and smiled. She-it had a halo of blond hair, blue eyes, red lips, and a voluptuous body. Rumor had it she was programmed to provide Conklin with more than just secretarial services. If so, that too went against company policy, and came out of the company’s bottom line. The android smiled, and if it hadn’t been for the A on her forehead, Chien-Chu would have sworn she was human. “Yes? How may I help you?”

“Jim James, here to see Mr. Conklin.”

The robot nodded politely. “Of course. Mr. Conklin is on an important call at the moment but I’ll let him know that you arrived.”

Chien-Chu chose a seat with a good view of Conklin’s glass-enclosed office. He couldn’t see through the electronically generated privacy haze, so he activated some of the on-board equipment that made his body so heavy, and watched the interference disappear. It came as no surprise that Conklin was sipping coffee and reading a news fax instead of taking part in a video call as his secretary claimed.

Fifteen minutes had passed by the time Conklin shoved the news fax into a recycling slot, said something to his secretary, and leaned back in his c
hair. He was still there, leaning back and looking superior, when Chien-Chu entered the room. Rather than greet Conklin as he was supposed to, sweat dripping and knees knocking, the industrialist took a moment to look out through the production manager’s floor-to-ceiling foot-thick armaplast window.

It provided a wonderful view of the main floor, where Chien-Chu worked. The frame of a Viper Class Interceptor had started to take shape. Clumsy forms moved here and there while jets of blue-green flame stabbed the murk. Welding was part science and part art, which explained why Chien-Chu liked it. The process itself involved heating two pieces of metal to the point where both were ready to melt, inserting filler metal between them, and allowing all three to mingle. The resulting seam, or fusion zone, would be as strong as any other part of the surrounding metal.

But, to guarantee the strength of the weld, the heated metals had to be protected from hydrogen, nitrogen, and oxygen in the atmosphere. There were various ways to accomplish that, such as spraying argon, helium, or carbon dioxide gases onto the metals while welding, or applying nonmetallic flux prior to welding, but Orion had chosen a third approach. By removing all air from the production area and creating a near-perfect vacuum, they had eliminated all contaminants, a much more efficient process when multiplied by thousands of welds.

Of course those savings were somewhat eroded by the fact that the welders had to wear bulky space armor and were therefore less efficient. Unless the welders were cyborgs, that is, men and women who needed very little oxygen, and carried what they needed within armored bodies. Which was the primary reason why Chien-Chu had been hired, although his previous knowledge of welding helped, as did the fact that he had excellent references from other Chien-Chu owned companies.

Conklin cleared his throat. His voice dripped with sarcasm. “Assuming you are finished admiring the view . . . I could use a moment of your time.”

Chien-Chu turned and looked down at the man in the chair. He had bio-sculpted features, a jeweled temple jack, and a weak, dissipated mouth. The cyborg waited for an invitation to sit.

Cultural norms suggested that the person who was seated had the advantage but the production manager felt intimidated. An absurd notion since the creature in front of him was little more than semi-skilled labor and a freak at that. He hoped his voice would sound appropriately stem. “Sit down. A complaint has been filed and must be reviewed.”

Chien-Chu took a seat. It was then that he realized Conklin’s desk had been placed on a platform that enabled him to look down on his visitors. “A complaint? About me?”

“Of course about you!” Conklin said irritably. “Why summon you to my office if it wasn’t about you?”

Chien-Chu shrugged innocently. “To jerk me around?”

Conklin flushed. He pointed a finger at Chien-Chu’s chest. “Listen, mister, you pulled the red switch, which cost this company thirty-five thousand credits! If there was any justice in this world I’d deduct every goddamned one of them from
your
pay!”

Red handles were located throughout the production area and were used to restore a breathable atmosphere in case of a suit puncture or similar emergency. Chien-Chu had pulled one of the handles two days before, when a red-hot chunk of metal had fallen from the scaffolding’s upper deck and landed on a worker’s upturned back. She felt the impact and screamed as the metal burned a hole through her armor. The cyborg had grabbed a handle and pulled. Chien-Chu eyed the other man with something akin to disgust. “Yeah, you could dock my pay
, or
you could thank me for saving Risa’s life.”

Conklin’s eyes were slits. “If you had, I would. But an examination of the woman’s suit showed that while the metal penetrated the
first
layer of armor, the second layer was intact, and completely adequate for a normal exit.”

“And how,” Chien-Chu demanded levelly, “would I or any other member of the floor crew know that?”

“By damned well taking the time to look!” Conklin said shrilly, “and pulling the handle in a genuine emergency!”

“Which would leave no time to save her,” Chien-Chu said in the same calm voice, “and violates accepted safety procedures. Procedures you are paid to enforce . . . which is why you’re afraid to fire me.”

Conklin jumped to his feet and pointed towards the door. “Get out of my office!”

Chien-Chu ordered his body to stand and it obeyed. “And a nice office it is. Tell me something, are the people at HQ aware of it?”

Conklin tried to answer but was so angry the words were incoherent. “Office! Out! Get now!”

Chien-Chu nodded and strolled out of the office. The beautiful android wished the cyborg a nice day, picked up a radio-borne summons, and wondered how badly Conklin would beat her. Like all of the more sophisticated robots, she had feedback circuits that delivered something akin to human pain and didn’t reli
sh what was coming. But her preferences meant nothing in the face of the programming that overrode what little bit of free will she had. The android hurried into Conklin’s office, closed the door, and disrobed. For reasons she couldn’t fathom Conklin liked to beat her while he had sex with her. She bent over the desk and waited for him to get it over with.

Chien-Chu left the elevator on the main floor, stepped over to a bank of public com sets, and keyed some numbers. Nola was up and cheerful as usual. Her face was wrinkled but still beautiful. Chien-Chu inquired after her health, listened to the usual minor complaints, and her plans for the rest of the day. Then, when that part of the conversation had run its enjoyable but predictable course, he told her about Conklin. She agreed with his recommendations and promised to implement them within the hour.

Cheerful, and more than a little pleased with himself, Chien-Chu reentered the locker room, grabbed a protective vest, a helmet with face shield, a tool belt with power supply, and a pair of gauntlets. He was still pulling the gloves on when he approached the lock. Everyone else had cycled through thirty minutes before, so, with the exception of a rather taciturn low-grade robo-cart, the industrialist had the airtight enclosure to himself.

He checked to make sure that his body was sealed, received confirmation that it was, and waited while the atmosphere was removed from the lock. A green light signaled vacuum, the hatch irised open, and the robo-cart trundled out. Chien-Chu followed. The vacuum meant nothing to his internally pressurized body and he gloried in the atmosphere of the place.

The ship’s U-shaped frame curved upwards like the ribs of some prehistoric beast. Lasers flashed as fellow workers used crosspieces to tie the frame together, cut holes for the fiber-optic cables that would tie the vessel’s electronics together, and attached the first of the hull plates.

The truth was that he loved this work more than building Chien-Chu Enterprises and more than the sculptures he had cut and welded together in the old days. The fact was that it felt good to work with his hands, to build something strong, to bend metal to his will. He grinned, started up a ladder, and was hard at work five minutes later.

Meanwhile, high above, Conklin had turned his secretary so he could slap various parts of her plasti-flesh anatomy, dominate her with violent thrusts of his penis, and look out the window at the same time. Something about having sex while watching lesser beings work added spice to the occasion. Yes, some railed against what they called “enhanced masturbation” as being somehow evil, bu
t would have been even more outraged had he forced real women to submit to his desires, which proved what idiots they were.

Conklin had just established a comfortable rhythm, and was building towards the inevitable climax, when the comset buzzed. He wanted to ignore it, wanted to achieve orgasm first, but there was no denying the call. His boss didn’t call very often, but woe be to the person who wasn’t there, or didn’t respond when she did.