11
I left the hotel in the afternoon. HARA activated her hologram in the hotel parking lot and walked with me as I made my way to the car.
“You know, big guy, being a bodyguard usually implies that you actually stay with the body you’re supposed to be guarding.”
“Sexy is perfectly safe inside the hotel,” I said. “You saw the security system. And Carol’s there.”
“True.”
“Besides I’m a PI first and foremost. If I can find PATA quickly, I can turn them over to the police before they make their move. That way we can get out of babysitting duty entirely.”
“Okay, I won’t argue you with you on that one,” HARA said. “You want me to do the legwork.”
“Right. Scan all databases and files for any information on PATA.”
“Way ahead of you. There’s nothing in the public files but I’ll try phishing some of the more secure databases and see if anything turns up. I may have to grease a few palms though.”
“Sexy’s paying the bills. Just try to get a receipt for the bribes.”
“You’re a laugh riot, handsome,” she said. “I’ll let you know when something interesting comes up.”
“Great. And can you net me with Tony, I … Did you just call me handsome?”
“It’s a figure of speech, you lunkhead. Don’t let it go to your head.”
“You’re creeping me out, here HARV.”
“It’s HARA, handsome.”
“Stop it.”
“You know you’re kind of cute when you get angry.”
I waved her away. “Don’t get me started!”
“Okay, but I think you better hit the deck now,” she said.
“What?”
She put her manicured hands on my shoulders and pushed me to the pavement just as a massive laser blast sailed over my head. The heat of the blast singed the hair on the nape of my neck as it passed over and hit one of parked hovercrafts nearby, incinerating it in a thunderous fireball.
“Did you just push me?” I asked, as I crawled quickly across the parking lot surface, seeking cover beneath the crafts.
“I have limited tactile abilities now,” HARA responded, her hologram crawling beside me. “That was Dr. Pool’s upgrade earlier this afternoon.”
“You can be solid?”
“Only parts of me and only for short periods of time.”
“Wow.”
“You’re sort of missing the big picture here, Zach.”
I popped my gun into hand and peered out from behind the rear end of a parked hover limo.
“Tap into the security cams and let me know what I’m up against here. But first net with Carol and tell her to make sure Sexy gets to a secure location.”
“I don’t think we have to worry about Sexy or anyone else being in danger here.”
“What do you mean?”
“Take a look.”
HARA pointed toward the airspace just above me. Sure enough a handful of familiar looking small spherical camera bots floated around us.
“Roundtree.”
“That’s a fair assumption,” HARA said. “It looks like they’ve begun work on episode number two; Zach Johnson versus a quartet of level five battlebots.”
“Battlebots in a parking lot. That’s first class entertainment, all right.”
“Maybe the Kabuki episode tested a little too highbrow for them,” HARA said. “You’re lucky they’re not using monster trucks and supermodels now. By the way, you better run. Northeast would be wisest.”
I sprang to my feet while simultaneously keeping my head down (which isn’t easy) and ran for the northeast end of the parking lot just as the second battlebot let loose a blast from its cannon. The blast hit the limo and blew it to smithereens.
“Head for the barrier,” HARA shouted
I did as I was told and hightailed it toward the waist-high hard plastic barrier encircling the border of the parking area. I could see all four bots now as I scanned the lot. There were two on the south end and two on the west with both pairs closing in, trying, I suspected, to pin me against the hotel on the east side of the lot. I fired a series of high powered blasts from my gun as I ran but they bounced off the bots’ shells, doing no damage at all.
“This is not good,” I said, diving behind the barrier.
“They have blaster resistant outer shells,” HARA said. “Your gun’s not going to be much use.”
“We have to get them away from the hotel before someone inside gets hurt.”
“You mean like your client?” HARA asked. “Funny that the only times she’s been in actual danger lately is because of you, isn’t it?”
“Hilarious,” I said. “Now why do these bots look so familiar to me?”
“Probably because you saw the prototype at Dr. Pool’s lab,” HARA replied.
“These are Randy’s bots?”
“It appears as though his lab has the special effects contract for your series.”
“Great,” I said. “At least we’re keeping this all in the family. Net Randy now and put him on the wrist com.”
Randy’s face appeared on the screen on my wrist com just as another blast from the approaching bots exploded a sports hover nearby.
“Yes, Zach. How can I help you? Oh, I see the battlebots have arrived. How are they performing?”
“Oh, pretty darn well if you’re trying to kill me,” I said.
“Good. Don’t destroy them too quickly,” he said. “I don’t want people to think that they’re easy to beat.”
“No problems there, Randy, my gun isn’t working against them.”
“Are you using the bot-buster ordnance?”
“The what?”
“The bot-buster ordnance that I designed for your gun. I sent you a memo about this last month.”
“Randy, I don’t read your memos.”
“You don’t?”
“They’re all like twenty pages long. I don’t have time to read the specs on every new gadget that you create.”
“I’m guessing that you’re regretting that now, huh?”
“Randy!”
“That’s specifically why I gave Faux these bots for this episode. I knew you’d be able to beat them with the special ordnance.”
“Well, you should have told me that.”
“I signed a confidentiality agreement, Zach. It wouldn’t be ethical.”
“Randy, your ethics are about to get me killed.”
“Wow,” Randy replied. “Talk about your moral dilemmas.”
I poked my head above the barrier and saw the bots approaching. They had to weave their way to me, moving in and out of the rows of parked hovers. I saw the cannon of one glow red as it moved. HARA followed my gaze and confirmed my suspicion.
“It’s powering up for another blast,” she said.
“Good. Help me with my aim,” I said. “Big bang, tight.”
The gun’s OLED flashed in recognition of my voice command and I pulled the trigger and sent a very tight blast of energy at the bot’s cannon. My blast hit the mouth of the cannon just as the bot fired and the two blasts exploded in unison, rupturing the bot from within.
“One down,” I said, diving back behind the barrier. “Get ready to move, HARA. They’re getting a little close for comfort.”
“Ready when you are, big guy.”
“Now!”
I leaped over the barrier and made a charge through the lot, heading west, where there was now only one approaching bot. Even with one bot destroyed, I still wasn’t all that optimistic about my chances.
“By the way, Zach,” HARA said, her hologram running beside me (in high heels), “you’re going to love me for this.”
“Now’s not really the time, HARA,” I said.
“I know that you don’t really encourage me to act independently and all. But I sometimes ignore you when it comes to that.”
“That’s an understatement. Is there a point here?”
I glanced over at the remaining bots, which had altered their paths and were now weaving through the parked hovers toward us. I could tell at least two were charging their cannons.
“The point is that I read Dr. Pool’s memos. They’re actually quite interesting.”
“Good for you.”
“And I found the bot-buster memo to be particularly cogent and well-constructed.”
“So?”
“So I took it upon myself and loaded the ordnance.”
“You what?”
“You’re locked and loaded, big guy. Go save the day.”
“HARA, you’re a dream.”
“The voice command is biggy-biggy-bot-boom.”
“That’s a pretty wimpy sounding command.”
“I wouldn’t complain if I were you,” she said with a smile.
“Biggy-biggy-bot-boom!” I said, still weaving between hovers.
The OLED flashed again and I let a blast loose at the nearest attacker. The recoil from the blast nearly knocked me over but it did its job on the other end, cleanly piercing the battlebot’s shell and blowing it to bits. I spun around and fired off two more rounds, falling back to the ground as I did so. Two more bot-shaped fireballs lit up the lot and showered the expensive hovers with high-tech drek. After that it was eerily quiet in the parking lot save for the cacophony of hovercraft alarms that the firefight had set off.
“Something tells me that I won’t have any problem meeting my car insurance deductible this year,” I said.