The Stainless Steel Rat

“You’re doing it again!” I howled. “Prodding my conscience to see how soft it is. Like keeping him around.” I pointed to Pepe Nero who was sitting near us in the restaurant eating slowly, mumbling to himself with vacant-eyed dullness. His old personality had been stripped from his mind and a new one implanted. Only the body remained of the old Pepe who had loved Angelina and stolen a battleship.

“The psychs are working on a new theory of body-personality,” Inskipp said blandly, “so why not keep him around here under observation? If any of his criminal tendencies should develop in the new personality we’ll be in a wonderful spot to recruit him for the Corps. Does he bother you?”

“Not him,” I snorted. “After the massacres he pulled for his psychotic girlfriend you could grind him into hamburger for all I care. But he does remind me that she is still out there somewhere. Free and planning new mischief. I want to go after her.”

“Well you’re not,” Inskipp said. “You’ve asked me before and I have refused before. The topic is now closed.”

“But I could…”

“You could what?” He gave me a nasty chuckle. “Every law officer in the galaxy has a pic of her and there is a continual search going on. How could you possibly do more than they are already doing?”

“I couldn’t, I guess,” I grumbled. “So the hell with it, as you say.” I pushed my plate away and stood and stretched as naturally as I could. “I’m going to get a large jug of liquid refreshment and go to my quarters and nurse my sorrows.”

“You do that. And forget Angelina. Come to my office at 0900 hours tomorrow and you better be sober.”

“Slave driver,” I moaned, going out the door and turning down the hall towards the residence wing. As soon as I was out of sight I took a side ramp that led to the spaceport.

That’s one lesson I had already learned from Angelina. When you have a plan put it into action instantly. Don’t let it lie around and get stale and have other people start thinking about it themselves. I was putting myself up against the shrewdest man in the business right now, and the thought alone was enough to make me sweat. I was going against Inskipp’s direct orders, walking out on him and the Corps. Not really walking out, since I only wanted to finish the job I had started for them. But I was obviously the only one who would look at it that way.

There were tools, gadgets and a good deal of money in my quarters that would come in very handy on this job. I would just have to do without them. When Inskipp started to think about my sudden conversion to his point of view I wanted to be well away in space.

A mechanic with a drag-robot was pulling an agent’s ship into place on the launching ramp. I stamped over and used my official voice.

“Is that my ship?”

“No, sir—it’s for Full Agent Nielsen, there he is coming up now.”

“Check with control central, will you? It’s going to be rush no matter how we handle it.”

“New job, Jimmy?” Ove asked as he came up. I nodded and watched the mechanic until he vanished around the corner.

“Same old business,” I said. “And how’s your tennis game coming?” I asked, lifting my hand with an imaginary racket.

“Getting better all the time,” he said, turning his head to look at his ship.

“I’ll teach you a new stroke,” I said, bringing my hand down sharply and catching him on the side of the neck with the straightened edge. He folded without a sound and I lowered him gently to the deck and dragged him out of sight behind a row of lubrication drums. I gently pried the box with the course tapes from his limp fingers.

Before the mechanic could return I was in the ship and had the lock sealed. I fed the course tape into the controls and punched the tower combination for clearance. There was a subjective century of waiting, during which eternal period of time I produced a fine heading of sweat all over my head. Then the green light came on.

Step one and still in the clear. As soon as the launching acceleration stopped I was out of the chair and attacking the control panel with the screwdriver ready in my hand. There was always a remote control unit here so that any Corps ship could be flown from a distance. I had discovered it on my first flight in one of these ships since I have always maintained that there is a positive value to being nosey. I disconnected the input and output leads, then dived for the engine room.

Perhaps I am too suspicious or have too low an opinion of mankind. Or of Inskipp, who had his own rules on most subjects. Someone more trusting than I would have ignored the radio controlled suicide bomb built into the engine. This could be used to scuttle the ship in case of capture. I didn’t think they would use it on me except as a last resort. Nevertheless I still wanted it disconnected.