Asimov's Science Fiction: April/May 2013 by Penny Publications Read Free Book Online Page A

huge grey copepod squatting on its roof. The vehicle was painted white with fluorescent blue circles decorating it—a color scheme that had come to mean much the same as the black and white stripes of a wasp: danger. The driver and his mate, respectively a hulking man and an equally lethal looking woman, eyed me as they passed, the blue ring-shaped scars on their faces visible in the street lights.
    "Probably here in the hope of picking up any strays," I said.
    "There won't be any," said Harriet.
    "They would probably like to join in," I continued. "John told me that he had some trouble dissuading his hoopers from contacting me and offering assistance."
    Harriet dipped her head in acknowledgement. "Understandable, considering the history. Jay Hoop, his pirates, and their coring operation weren't very popular on Spatterjay."
    Weapons grade understatement,
I thought. It surprised me that Straben had managed to keep his headquarters here at all.
    "They're coming," said Harriet.
    Hobbs' Street was crowded, it being one of the most popular thoroughfares, and now it was becoming even more crowded. The thetics in the street were clad in a wide variety of clothing and their faces were concealed by syntheskin, but they hadn't managed to suppress their inclination to march along in neat squads like the soldiers they were meant to be. There were five street doors to Straben's conjoined buildings, which extended five floors up with the chainglass street roof attached across on top of the fifth. Fifty thetics were in the street, ten to each door, while a further seventy thetics clad in light space suits were, even now, moving into position up on the buildings' roofs, which were exposed to vacuum.
    I watched, through the eyes of my artificial body and through pin-cams the thetics all wore in their clothing. I saw those up on the roof avoiding the heavily secured air-locks, consulting building blueprints and selecting areas over which they glued down atmosphere shelters, before beginning to cut through below, thus making their own airlocks. They would be inside within five minutes. Meanwhile, those down on the street were moving in on the doors with sticky bombs or sausages of thermite, depending on the design of door concerned. I began walking.
    "So, Harriet," I said. "You seem a lot more coherent lately."
    She glanced at me, her reptilian face unreadable. "Do I?"
    "Undoubtedly," I said, watching her.
    "I've never been incoherent," she argued.
    "Not as such, but—"
    I couldn't take that further because a loud bang ensued, the explosion as bright as a welding arc, and a gust of smoke blew out into the street and then rose up toward the glass roof. People began yelling and running. It might have been thirty years since John Hobbs took control but there had still been incidents, and the people here still knew when it was best just to run. I noted that one of the doors had disappeared just as thermite flared further down the street and two more explosions occurred. I watched thetics pouring into three of the buildings, pulling short wide-blast sawn-off pulse rifles from under their coats. I saw thermite burn in a fast ring around an armored door then a central charge blow it inward. Just one more....
    I glanced over toward the door concerned as a machine gun began firing in short bursts. An explosion took out the door, but from a stone-effect arch above it a lumpish ugly security drone had dropped on a pole and begun firing a miniature version of the Gatling cannons prador favored. In annoyance, I saw thetics being torn apart, even one civilian who had been a bit tardy getting out of there. I reached down and flipped open the patches on my trousers, drew my QC laser and plugged in its power lead, then I drew the
other
gun, noting Harriet now watching me intently. Meanwhile a thetic opened out a telescopic launcher, shouldered it, and put a missile into the door arch. The drone arced smoking and bouncing out into the street.
    "Harriet—" I