Replicant Night by K. W. Jeter Read Free Book Online Page A

man's head back, staggering him against the door. He held on to the gun; when he'd regained his balance, he used his free hand to rub the bruise spreading along his jaw. A slow smile leaked out from behind his fingers.
    "What are you so worked up about?" The taller man's amused gaze regarded Deckard. "It was only a replicant. And maybe you didn't notice-it'd just killed someone. A human. Replicants who do that sort of thing aren't supposed to live." The smile grew wider and nastier. "Maybe you're upset because I was just . . . doing your job for you." One of the man's eyebrows lifted. "Isn't that what blade runners are supposed to do? Kill replicants?"
    "Fuck you." Disgust coiled Deckard's guts. He would've taken another swing at the man, this time to lay him out cold on the floor, but the notion of even that brief contact repulsed him. He turned toward the sweating, goggling figure of Urbenton. "Look-" His finger jabbed into the director's flesh-padded chest. "I don't know what the hell's going on around here. And as of now, I don't care. I'm leaving." He pushed past Urbenton and out the door.
    "Hey, Deckard-" The taller man's voice followed him out to the corridor beyond. He glanced over his shoulder and saw the man still rubbing his jaw and smiling. The man gave a slow nod. "We'll run into each other again. And then we'll have a lot to talk about."
    "Don't count on it." Deckard turned on his heel and started walking again, without looking back.
    "Sooner than you think, man." The other's voice faded behind him. "Sooner than you think ..."
    Halfway down the corridor, Deckard felt a tug at his elbow. He looked around and saw Urbenton trotting to keep up with him.
    "Wait a minute..." Urbenton panted for breath. "Come on, Deckard. What're you talking about? Leaving-you can't leave."
    "Watch me."
    The director grabbed Deckard's arm tighter. "You can't - we're not done with the shoot!"
    "That's not my problem." With the butt of his palm, he shoved his way through a wider set of double doors that led out of the orbital studio's offices and toward the landing
    docks. "Tape your movie any way you want to. I'm out of here."
    "Goddamn it, Deckard, you can't do this!" Urbenton's voice ratchetted higher and more emotional than when the Kowalski replicant had been killed in front of him. "You walk out of here, the money people down on Earth will be all over my ass!" He stopped and dug in, his weight yanking Deckard to a halt. "We've got a contract with you! Signed and notarized!"
    "You know what you can do with it."
    Urbenton's voice continued hectoring him, but he ignored it. Up ahead, through the segmented maze of container hoists and freight movers, he could see the smaller black ovoid of the skiff that had brought him to the Outer Hollywood station from Mars. The propulsion nacelles were streaked with corrosion, the rounded fuselage pitted with the wear of several years of interplanetary flight. His depleted finances had allowed for nothing newer or more serviceable than this craft; he'd checked it out as best he could, but the journey had still felt like travelling in a blind sarcophagus surrounded by cold vacuum. The whole time he'd been here at the station, he'd been dreading the flight back . . . until now. At the present point, Deckard didn't care whether the skiff's fuel and oxygen would last until he was in a closing orbit above Mars. Just as long as he got away at all.
    He worked at strapping himself into the skiff's tiny cockpit, letting Urbenton's yelped squall pass over him like the buzz of a grossly enlarged insect.
    "You're not getting paid, jerk-off!" Urbenton had gone into a vein-throbbing rage. His pink-ringed eyes looked as though they were about to jump out of his face. "That's the deal-payment's on completion of your contract. You were supposed to be on-set until principal photography's wrapped up-hit the road now and you don't get a penny, jack."
    "Like I care." Deckard punched buttons on the control panel,