Theme Planet (11 page)

Next, with Dex naked, Katrina
allowed him to undress her. She stepped from her slinky hydra-skirt (made
completely from different colours of suspension-matted oiled water) and they
held each other tight in the darkness, naked. In alcoves around the room,
sensing the mood, sense candles sprang into light and life. Gentle scents
wafted across the space; first, the wide ocean, then pine forests after rain,
then the crushed ice of a mountain summit.

“They think of everything,”
murmured Kat, squeezing her husband.

“They can only add to the
experience,” he said.

“They certainly can’t add to
this,” she murmured, her hands stroking down his body as she slowly lowered
herself to her knees. Dex shuddered, winding his hands through her hair, his
eyes closed and his face lifted to the ceiling.

“Didn’t realise it was my
birthday,” he managed.

Pausing, Kat said, “Just as long
as you’ve got those batteries charged...”

“All charged and ready, my love,”
he sighed.

She stood, and pushed him back
onto the bed, which gave a soft hissing sound and contoured itself around him -
almost a water-bed, but not quite. “Comfy,” he managed.

“It better be strong,” said Kat,
moving to him, climbing atop him, straddling him. He could smell her want, her
lust, her animal need. She oozed sex.
What a wife...

“You were right,” said Dex.

“What’s that?” purred Kat.

“This is definitely the best
holiday we’ll ever have…”

~ * ~

CHAPTER THREE

MISSION

Amba walked down
long, bleak corridors formed from tarnished steel.
She was naked, her bare feet treading softly, and she looked neither left nor
right.

This is humiliating. You should
not be treated like this. You are their top killer, their top assassin! Never
have you failed your task. Not once has your target escaped. You always get the
job done, and done well.

Be quiet, Zi. This is not the
time, nor the place.

Amba continued to walk. She
passed two heavily-armoured, mounted AI machinegun turrets. They could decimate
a human in a heart-beat. Amba ignored their looming menace.

I still think they treat you like
scum. Like a prisoner. You deserve more respect. You deserve more... honour!
The FRIEND was hard against her
heart; a machine threat Amba was oh-so-reluctant to use. The FRIEND was the
most savage weapon she’d ever encountered. Simply terrifying.

No, I disagree, Zi. There is no
honour in what I do. And they treat me in the way I would expect they treat any
dangerous, barely controllable animal. I am not proud of what I do, Zi. Killing
is not something I relish... it’s simply a means to an end.

What end?

Amba smiled internally. “Aah, you
cannot see that deep, can you?” Her voice seemed unnaturally loud, metallic and
abrasive in the hollow reverberating corridor. She felt Zi shrink back, like
the toad she was, and Amba found some small gratification in the flash of Zi’s
bright red fury before her dark sister departed.

Amba felt Zi’s mental connection
fade like smoke.

Good fucking riddance,
she thought.

The corridor ended, leading to a
massive chamber -more like the inside of some vast aquatic tank. The floor was
corrugated, the walls streaked with rust. High, high above swung several
ancient chains, thick enough to moor an Anti-Grav War Frigate.

Amba looked around for a moment,
lips pursed, searching for weaponry or a threat of any kind. Warily - Amba was
always wary - she strode out towards the centre of the chamber, footsteps
echoing. Then she stood, and folded her arms across her breasts, and waited,
eyes forward, no expression on her gentle features. And that was the problem,
she knew. The way she had been designed. Amba was gently pretty. Not stunningly
beautiful – no - that would defeat the object. She was designed to be
typical.
Average.
A
grey woman.
Engineered normality -on the surface, at
least. Until she sprang into action. Until she began the killing...

Amba.

Anarchy Android.

The most lethal lifeform ever
created...

There came a
clang,
and
across the empty steel tank a wheel spun and a heavy door opened, very much in
the manner of a submarine hatch. A figure stepped through. He wore an
ankle-length black leather coat, and his hair was long and black, slicked back
around neat, powerful features. He strode forwards, and in his right hand he
carried a Zippo lighter, and his thumb constantly flicked the lid open, and
then closed it; open, then closed.

He stopped several paces from Amba,
and stared at her without expression.

She returned his stare, face
neutral.

“Welcome home,” said the man,
finally.

“It is good to be home, Cardinal
Romero,” said Amba, showing just the right amount of formal respect.

Romero stepped forward then and embraced
her, and she held him for a while, thinking how easy it would be to kill him.
But then, why would she kill the man who created her? The man who gave her
life? To all intents, her living
God?

“Come with me, Amba. There have
been developments.”

“You have another mission?”

“Yes. Perhaps your most dangerous
yet.”

“They are all the same to me,
Cardinal. Five or five thousand. It just takes more time.”

Romero glanced across at her as
they walked, and he marvelled at her normality. At her modesty. At her...
average features, average physique. And despite everything, despite her
deliberate lack of what were fashionably considered “attractive” qualities in
contemporary society, he was aroused by Amba. More than she could have ever
believed.
Like a sister,
he thought.
A very special sister.

Still.

There was a job to do.

They reached the doorway, and
stepped through into a warmer environment filled with carpets and glass wall-coverings.
A slender robot stood there holding a gown, and Romero gestured. Amba allowed
the robot to place the robe over her shoulders, and she stared for just a few
moments too long at its polished metal face.

She’s still touchy, then,
thought Romero. And gave a
tight, fleeting smile. That was good. That was information he could use.

They moved past guards and
automated AI turrets, down a maze of corridors and through several bullet-lifts
which dropped them at dizzying speed further and further below the streets of
London.

Eventually, they emerged into a
large, plush room. Fountains tinkled, whiskey running through crystal. The
walls were decorated in fifty-metre high gold and silver murals. Statues in
obsidian were placed at strategic locations, and Amba sensed their hidden
high-power weaponry.

“This way.”

Romero led her across the vast,
garish office, to a genuine oak table around which fifty men could have
comfortably sat. Romero took a seat, but Amba remained standing.

“Your tastes grow ever more
extravagant,” she observed.

“It is a privilege of status.”

“Some would call it tacky.” Amba
gave a smile, but Romero caught the falseness behind the movement. After all,
he had designed her. He had engineered her to... perfection.

“You are well, then, Amba? You
know, you are my personal favourite of all the Anarchy models. You do
know
that,
don’t you?”

“I know,” said Amba, gently, not
looking at him. “What is the mission?”

“So clinical.”

“You made me this way.”

“So we did.”

Romero smiled, reclined, took a
cigar from a box and lit it with his golden Zippo. He smoked for a while,
watching her. She had left the robe open a touch, and he had a tantalising
glimpse of her modest breasts.
Am I that sad? That I lust after the androids
I create? Or is it the danger element... even though I created her, even though
I designed and coded her genetic structure, she has far surpassed all
expectations; has fought and clawed her way to the top of the hierarchy. She
has made killing an artform. Even now, she is expecting the random test of her
abilities... waiting for it. But then, a creature like Amba sees death and
murder in every possible situation...

They fast-roped from the ceiling,
dropped like stones down a well. There were five Anarchy Androids dressed from
head-to-foot in black cotton. Each carried a curved black sword and had been trained
to the point of extinction with said weapon. They were experts.
Masters.

They attacked, their movements
fluid, from between the statues. Amba somersaulted backwards from a standing
position without even tensing her muscles, and swords whistled through the air
beneath her; she twisted and kicked off a statue, spinning her trajectory and
taking a blade against her arm on its flat side: landing, sliding her arm down
the blade to its owner’s wrists and breaking them with a swift twist and
crack.
She dropped to one knee, taking the sword from unresisting hands, and rammed
the point into the attacking android’s groin before standing and front-kicking
him from the blade, then reversing it as another leapt from behind and
skewering his throat. She stepped left, ripping the blade out sideways in a
shower of gore and twirling it expertly as she turned to face the remaining
three. They spun their blades slowly, spreading out to surround Amba, and
charged as one, and Amba stepped back to the nearest statue, slicing her sword
through its protective shell and dropping flat to the floor as the AI’s
self-preservation took over and all the statues in the room came alive with
heavy-calibre machine-gun fire. Bullets screamed through the air, and the three
remaining Anarchy Androids were slammed and peppered with bullets, jigging like
marionettes with tangled strings.

They hit the ground like
roadkill.

Smoke curled through the suddenly
silent room.

Slowly, Amba stood, and tossed
the sword onto one of the torn, ragged corpses. She walked over to the desk,
tilting her head to watch Romero. He was smiling, and still smoking. None of
the bullets had gone near him. The AIs were well-programmed like that.

“Predictable,” she said, and took
a seat across from him, folding her arms.

Romero shrugged. “It’s good to
see you still have the edge.”

“What’s the mission?”

“Again, straight to the point. As
usual.”

“It’s what I do. There’s no point
pretending otherwise.”

“Don’t you have...
downtime,
Amba? Don’t you have any hobbies?”

Amba fixed him with a baleful
glare, and a chill ran through Romero. She might be plain. She might be a
grey
woman.
But when that stare drilled through your soul, you knew you were
dealing with somebody who had sidestepped from the path of humanity. This was
no pussycat. This was a psychopath.

“No,” she said.

Romero gave a curt nod, and slid
a tablet to her. Amba took up what appeared to be a small grey slate, and
accessed it with her thumb-print. The grey flickered and displayed an image: an
old man, dressed in a smart black suit. The image animated in fits and starts,
moving, then freezing, then moving again. To the left, data scrolled in bright
green letters.