Utopia

That was important. Cinta’s side was playing rough, but there were limits. She was smart enough to know that sooner or later-probably sooner-the CIP would be able to trace this whole operation to her SSS covert action teams. She would just as soon the official complaints did not involve fatalities. The dirty-tricks techs could promise whatever they liked, but explosions had a way of not staying controlled. Things were going to have to get very bad indeed for her to be willing to risk pressing that button. The main thing was that they had separated Lentrall from his security detail-in fact prevented them from hooking up at all.

Everything ought to work. It was a reasonable, straightforward plan. But there had been so little time. Welton had moved too quickly from ordering contingency plans to ordering the snatch itself to take place immediately. Cinta didn’t like rushing things. That was the way mistakes got made.

“Plaza team in position,” the voice in her ear reported.

Cinta studied the plaza through the magniviewers, but there was no way to tell which of the dozens of people there were hers. Good. Then maybe no one else would be able to spot them either.

Robots. Robots were going to be the problem. Cinta could count at least ten of them in the plaza. They would, of course, move instantly to prevent a kidnapping-given the chance.

But, if all went well, they wouldn’t get the chance. Cinta looked up Aurora Boulevard. There it was. A land-transport bus, parked a few blocks away. In a minute or so, it was going to be heading toward Government Plaza at just slightly too high a rate of speed. Cinta smiled to herself. It was hard to control that particular model of bus. If the driver wasn’t careful, there was likely to be an accident.

JUSTEN DEVRAY WAS nearly home when the call came in. Gervad was flying them by the slow, scenic, restful route. Justen had had a long day, and he was glad of taking the easy way home. He liked to unwind on the ride home. A long day indeed. It was midday on the day after he had started work. He had been up nearly thirty hours straight at this point. Strange to be flying home to rest in the bright light of midday.

His eyes were heavy. He was almost tempted to turn off the hyperwave tuned to scan the police frequencies. But the constant low mutter of voices was a part of the everyday background of his life. He left it on, leaned back in his chair, and shut his eyes.

And then he heard the voice.

“CIP Metro Dispatch, this is Government Tower Topside.”

Something about the voice jerked Justen awake. Then he understood. It was a human voice. A robot should have been the one handling communications from the rooftop guard post. And another thing: Lentrall’s security detail was waiting for him on the rooftop landing pad.

Suddenly Justen was wide awake. He sat bolt upright in his seat. “Turn this thing around!” he told Gervad. “Back toward Government Tower at full speed.”

“Yes, sir,” the robot replied, calm and imperturbable. He brought the car about in a wide arc and headed back toward the center of the city.

Justen reached for the scanner controls, and turned up the volume.

“-ave an accident in progress here,” the voice went on. “A transport landed a little hard, and one of the containers on board must have popped a seam. We’ve got a flammable liquid spill up here. Can’t tell you more than that. The robots up here have forced us off the roof proper.”

“We are receiving hyperwave reports from the security robots on the scene, Government Tower Topside,” a calm robotic voice replied from somewhere, probably CIP HQ. “Clean-up crews are being dispatched.”

The damned fools! Justen stabbed at the controls, and set his aircar mike to the same frequency. “This is Commander Devray, en route to Government Tower and monitoring. Who is that at Topside?”

“Sergeant Senall Delmok, sir.”

Perfect. Delmok was the least experienced officer on the Topside detail. “Delmok, since when are cleaning supplies delivered to the roof landing pad? What do you think the city tunnel system is for?”

“Sir? I, ah-”

“It’s not an accident, Delmok. Someone has deliberately shut down the rooftop landing pad.”

“But why-”

“I don’t know,” Justen said. “Maybe they plan to land on it. Get back out on that rooftop and get your people in control of it. That is a direct order.”

“But the robots are keeping us-”

Justen cut him off. “CIP Metro Dispatch. Are you still on this line?”

“Yes, Commander,” the calm robot voice replied

“I hereby issue a direct, top-priority order for relay via hyperwave to all robots on the roof of Government Tower. You are to permit the human CIP detachment to return to the roof at once. The supposed spilling accident is a ruse or a diversion perpetrated by a group intending harm to human beings. By forcing the CIP detachment away from their posts, you are permitting danger to humans. Relay that at once.”

“Yes, sir. It has been relayed.”