Artificial Condition (The Murderbot Diaries, #2)(17)

A module could have put the shuttle into a safe orbit, but wouldn’t have been sophisticated enough to manage the tricky, flawless landing. I was hoping they wouldn’t realize that.

Tapan closed her mouth. Shocked, Maro said, “But the other passengers. The crew person. They would have killed everybody?”

I said, “If you were the only casualties, the motive would have been obvious.”

I could see it was starting to sink in. I said, “You should return to the transit ring immediately.” I checked the public feed for the schedule. There was a public shuttle leaving in eleven minutes. Tlacey wouldn’t have time to trace my clients and infect it if they moved fast.

Tapan and Maro looked at Rami. Te hesitated, then set ter jaw and said, “I’ll stay. You two go.”

“No,” Maro said instantly, “we’re not leaving you.” Tapan added, “We’re in this together.”

Rami’s face almost crumpled, their support weakening ter when the prospect of death hadn’t. Te controlled terself and nodded tightly. Te looked at me and said, “We’ll stay.”

I didn’t react visibly, because I’m used to clients making bad decisions, and I was getting a lot of practice at controlling my expression. “You can’t keep this meeting. They lost track of you when the shuttle didn’t dock at its scheduled slot. You have to keep that advantage.”

“But we have to have the meeting,” Tapan protested. “We can’t get our work back otherwise.”

Yes, I often want to shake my clients. No, I never do. “Tlacey has no intention of giving you back your work. She lured you here to kill you.”

“Yes, but—” Tapan began.

“Tapan, just hush and listen,” Maro interrupted, clearly exasperated.

Rami looked stubborn, but asked, “Then what should we do?”

Technically, this didn’t have to be my problem. I was here now and didn’t need them anymore. I could lose them in the crowd and leave them to deal with their murderous ex-employer all on their own.

But they were clients. Even after I’d hacked my governor module, I’d found it impossible to abandon clients I hadn’t chosen. I’d made an agreement with these clients as a free agent. I couldn’t leave. I kept my sigh internal. “You can’t meet Tlacey at her compound. You’ll pick the spot.”

It wasn’t ideal, but it would have to do.

*

My clients picked a food service place in the center of the port. It was on a raised platform, the tables and chairs arranged in groups, with displays floating above advertising various port and contractor services and information about the different mining installations. The displays also functioned as camera and recording chaff, so the place was a popular spot for business meetings.

Rami, Tapan, and Maro had picked a table and were nervously fiddling with the drinks they had ordered from one of the bots drifting around. They had put in a comm call to Tlacey, and were waiting for a representative to arrive.

The security system in this public area was more sophisticated than ShuttleSecSys but not by much. I had gotten in far enough to monitor emergency traffic and get views from the cameras focused on our immediate area. I felt pretty confident. I was standing three meters from the table, pretending to look at the ad displays and examining the map of the installations I had found in the public feed. There were plenty of abandoned dig sites marked, as well as tube accesses that went off into apparently nowhere. Ganaka Pit had to be one of them.

ART said in my ear, There must be an accessible information archive. Ganaka Pit’s existence would not be deleted from it. The absence would be too obvious to researchers.

That depended on the research. Someone working on strange synthetics would obviously care about where they were found, but not necessarily about what company had dug them up, or why that company wasn’t around anymore. But whoever had removed Ganaka Pit from the map would have been trying to obscure its existence from casual journalists, not erase it entirely from the memory of the population.

ART’s data had been correct; there were other SecUnits on this moon. The map showed logos from five bond companies that offered SecUnits, including my company, at seven of the most remote installations where exploration for mineral veins was still ongoing. They would be there to defend the claim from theft and to keep the miners and other employees from injuring each other as part of the bond guarantee. No SecUnits would travel through the port except as inert cargo in transport boxes or repair cubicles, so that was one less thing to worry about. My altered configuration might fool humans and augmented humans, but not other SecUnits.

If they saw me, they would alert their SecSystems. They wouldn’t have a choice. And they wouldn’t want one. If anybody knows how dangerous rogue SecUnits are, it’s other SecUnits.

That was when I felt the ping.

I told myself I’d mistaken it for something else. Then it happened again. That’s a big uh-oh.

Something was looking for SecUnits. Not just bots, specifically SecUnits, and it was close. It hadn’t pinged me directly, though if I’d had a working governor module, I would have been compelled to answer.

Three humans approached the table my clients were sitting at. Rami whispered into ter feed, “That’s Tlacey. I didn’t expect her to come herself.” Two of the humans were large and male and one of them lengthened his stride to reach the table. Maro had seen him and from the look on her face I knew this was not going to be a greeting. Scan showed he was armed.