Inferno

“So you think he’s still on the island,” Devray said.

“Most likely,” Kresh said. “And I think it might be useful to proceed with more care than speed in picking him up. It might be that we can spot him and trail him for a while first. Maybe he’ll lead us to some of the others in the plot.”

“Hmmmph,” Devray grunted. “It’s a possibility. ”

“The other problem,” Kresh said, “is that if we go with a massive, all-out manhunt to chase him down, it will be all but impossible to keep the SSS from joining in. I don’t want the SSS in on this yet. Cinta seemed to be playing it straight when I talked to her, but I can’t count on that. My gut reaction as of right now is that the SSS wasn’t involved in the assassination, but we can’t run this investigation on hunches.”

“What do you do if you play it carefully, and then the SSS just happens to find Bissal before you do?” Devray asked.

“And he gets listed as ‘killed trying to escape. ” Kresh nodded and rubbed his eyes. “I know, I know. And there is the minor detail that most of the island is under SSS jurisdiction and neither your people nor mine have legal arrest powers here. There’s no way to do this right-just ways that are more and less wrong.”

“Then let’s pick a wrong way and get on with it,” Devray said. He thought for a moment. “How about this-we send pairs of discreet, plainclothes officers out to start the search. One Ranger and one deputy in each team. That way we share the blame, share the credit, and our people can watch each other, even if they don’t quite trust each other yet. I can see your arguments for moving quietly, but I say we have to move quickly.”

The room was silent for a moment as Kresh thought it over. He got up from his chair, leaned forward on the table, and then nodded to himself. “Very well,” he said at last. “Donald, issue quiet orders for a search as per Commander Devray’s suggestion. Picked teams of plainclothes Rangers and deputies, working in tandem.”

“Yes, sir. If you’ll excuse me for a moment, I will have to concentrate on my hyperwave links in order to make the arrangements. ” Fredda watched as Donald’s eyes dimmed slightly. Suddenly Donald was standing perfectly still, all motion stopped, an active robot turned utterly inert. Donald had in effect turned off his body for a time while concentrating on other things. It was rather disconcerting, even to Fredda, and she had designed Donald. We forget how unlike us they are, Fredda thought. Robots are shaped like us, walk like us, talk like us. But they aren’t the least bit like us. Not really.

After perhaps half a minute, Donald’s eyes brightened again and he came back to himself. “The initial orders have been relayed, sir, and I would urge both you and the Commander to review the final arrangements and brief the search perso

“Very good, Donald,” Kresh said. “Which reminds me-what the hell are we going to say when we brief them? It might be a good moment to review our current theory of the case.”

“Not much theory left to a lot of it,” Devray said. “We’ve got a pretty good idea of who did it and how. We just don’t know why he did it-or who he was working for, which might well come to being the same thing.”

“Okay then, you tell me,” Kresh said as he sat back down. “I’m so punchy right now I don’t know any more.”

“Well, where do we start? Let’s see. ” Devray thought for a moment. “ All right, last night what was clearly an elaborate conspiracy to kill the Governor went into action. We do not as yet know who set it in motion, or what their reasons for wanting to kill the Governor were. However, whoever the plotters were, they were highly organized and had significant resources at their disposal.

“Long before the reception took place, they were able to gain access to the security robots and doctor them. The robots were rigged with modified range restrictors. Ah, Dr. Leving, perhaps you can speak to that point better than I can. ”

“All of the SPR robots were indeed rigged with restrictors,” Fredda said. “That is, all but one of the robots was. I’ve just finished examining what’s left of that fiftieth robot-the one found in the lower-level storage room. Strictly speaking, it wasn’t a robot at all-call it an automaton. It didn’t even have a positronic brain. It was a machine with limited motor coordination, programmed to follow the next robot in line when they were marched down into the basement. That’s all it could do on its own.”

“Then what good was it?” Kresh asked.

“Have you ever heard the tale of the Trojan Horse?” Fredda asked. “It’s an ancient legend about a statue delivered to the enemy as a supposed gift, but filled with assassins who came out after dark and killed the defenders. That’s sort of what the automaton was, except it wasn’t filled with assassins-just assassination equipment, packed into its head and torso. The device for activating the range restrictors to shut down all the other robots, the blaster used to kill Grieg and wreck the SPR robots, and the device for simulating Grieg alive on the comm link-all of them were hidden inside the body of the Trojan robot.”

“Hiding the murder weapon inside the security robot. Someone has a nasty sense of humor,” Kresh said. “All right, then, the robots were all rigged. We’ve got to get started tracking those robots, and who had access to them. But don’t count on it telling us much soon. Rustbackers are good at covering their tracks. But we’ll get a team on it right away. Go on.”

Devray took up the narrative. “It would seem to me that the conspirators must have prepared the robots some time ago, setting them up either for this specific visit to the Residence or having them in readiness for whatever opportunity presented itself. My suspicion is that they were preparing for this specific visit. It has been publicized for some time, and they would have had the time to set it all up.”

“That brings up an important question that’s been bothering me,” Fredda said. “Why did they set up such an elaborate method of assassination? Surely there were easier ways to kill the Governor.”

“I’m not so sure of that,” Kresh said. “We keep-kept-very heavy security around him in Hades. There are far many more Three-Law robots around him there. Besides, I’m not sure that killing him was the entire point. ”

“Then what was the point?” Fredda asked.

“Killing him here. On Purgatory, where it would cause the most mess and controversy. At the Residence, when he was here to demonstrate his own authority. I think they wanted to do more than kill him. I think they wanted to damage his work, weaken him, discredit him, create an uproar. And using range restrictors out of New Law robots won’t make people feel happy or comfortable, either. It gives them something else to blame on New Law robots.”

“Ah, I think you’re wrong there,” Fredda said. “They failed in the attempt, but they went to a lot of effort to hide the use of the restrictors. That’s why the SPRs were shot in the chest.”

“But why didn’t he shoot all the SPRs?” Devray asked.

“I think I know why,” Fredda said, “but let’s come to that. “ She turned to Devray.

“All right, then, they set it up well in advance. During the party, Blare and Deam-the two supposed Ironheads who had orders to start a fight-came in, and the supposedly bogus SSS agents who had orders to extract them arrived as well. How, we don’t know.”

“Supposedly bogus?” Kresh asked.

“If you were sure they weren’t real SSS, wouldn’t Melloy be here?” Devray asked.

“Point taken. Go on. ”

“Before I do, just note that at least six conspirators got into the building. Blare, Deam, the three real or false SSS, and Ottley Bissal. The SSS was in charge of watching the door, but they let at least six people in they should not have-along with fifty doctored robots and Space knows what else. Either the conspirators managed to get false names onto the guest list, or the SSS were lax as hell-or the SSS was in on it. Also, don’t forget some SSS units supposedly had orders to do a handoff to the Rangers once the guests had arrived, but that was a false order to get those units out of the way. My Rangers never knew about the handoff, and no one seems to know who gave the order to the SSS.”