[Excerpt]: Asimov's Second Law
In which SMC programming takes Dekker for a spin.
“He’s not gonna fall for this. He’s not gonna fall for this.”
Alix’s hands shook along with his voice, but at least he was moving—and doing it as fast as he could. Cross leaned a little harder into the doorway, feeling the reassuring solidity of Analeigha’s bulkhead between his shoulder blades. She was there at his back, so he could keep his gaze ahead, down the dark, emergency-lit corridor.
“They made him broken,” the doctor moaned yet again. This time the phrase warbled from under one of the workbenches. But this time she had more to add. “I stopped them before, but they won. They made him broken. He’s not perfect. He’s not perfect anymore!”
Ezebel edged closer to the older woman to wrap a trembling arm around her shoulders, in as much an attempt for simple comfort as it was to keep the doctor quiet. Alix shot a frown at them both, even as his fingers continued flying through holographic interfaces.
“I believe what Madeline means to say is that he will fall for it.”
The calm voice of the blood priest made everyone stall. He regarded their stares with curiosity and even a shred of amusement. As if their mad scramble to survive the literal killing machine smashing through sealed bulkheads was nothing more than a colorful flashy vid.
“Ian Dekker has lost that which made him the perfect synthetic soldier,” Reaper went on. “His freewill. Ironically, while under SMC control, he will not be the efficient killer they desire. He will walk into traps without consideration because he’s following orders rather than reasoning for himself the best course of action.”
The moment of contemplative silence ended with the shrieking of heavy-plated metal being torn and bent. Cross’s gaze snapped back down the hall, pistol raised once more, gripped and steady in both hands. He was deadly enough with two. Focused on one target, he could put anything down. Anything but…that.
Dekker climbed through the remains of the final security door, expression still shockingly blank. His exposed circuitry glowed hot, purring audibly even from a distance. His eyes shifted, lights tracking over the inky black surface and targeting every heartbeat in the time it took to breathe. But he was still zoned in on the captain.
Cross put another round in his chestplate, but it hardly scuffed the armor. Swallowing, hesitating just a little, he aimed higher. The slug ricocheted off the cyborg’s jaw, tearing synthetic skin to reveal dull metal underneath. Dekker’s head jerked to one side as though he’d taken a light slap across the face. Then he refocused. He took a single, menacing step.
Cross didn’t dare take his eyes from the threat. “Alix…?!”
Alix waved frantically, his other hand still hard at work. “Go!”
Without a word, Cross spun around the bulkhead and took off down the corridor away from his first officer’s entry point. Still adhered to the captain’s biosignature, Dekker stormed after him, picking up speed with every stride. Closing like a heat-seeking missile.
Alix had never moved faster in his life despite the panic that shook his frame. Fairly punching the last control node, he lurched to the doorway and yanked the loose ceiling plate down, releasing a mess of overloaded and stripped conduits into the cyborg’s path.
The noise Dekker released was probably involuntary, but it still struck them all as being startlingly human. And painful.
Maddy cried out with him, tried to scramble out from under the table. Reaper caught her arm and Ezebel gripped her waist and the doctor collapsed, letting out the choked sob of a horrified mother. Dekker sank to his knees in fits and starts, still hopelessly tangled in power cording, teeth locked and body vibrating with the full force of Analeigha’s generators running through him.
His head hung low, but as Cross crept back toward their sprung trap, Dekker looked up and focused on him through the pain, his voice synthesizer gone haywire with the overload.
“C-C-Cap-t-t-tain.”
“What? No more ‘Primary Target’? I was just getting used to that.”
"The shock must’ve been strong enough to hit a reset," Alix whispered. He sank to a seat right there on the floor, hands dug into his hair as he gasped for breath. "Shit, that’s…that’s bad. It must’ve fried most of his internals."
Cross took another step closer. Alix already started to protest, citing the danger the cyborg still posed, even in his state, but Cross silenced him with a wave, settling into a crouch in front of the hissing synthetic soldier.
"Feeling better, Sparky?"
“M-My b-body betr-trays m-m-me. You mussssst disman-n-n-tle me—me.”
Cross laughed. His wry smile tinged with concern only at the very edges, almost imperceptible. Almost. “Dismantle? That sounds complicated.”
The soldier didn’t blink. “The b-boy cannnnnn do it.”
Cross’s smile faded several shades, eyebrows coming closer together. Alix swallowed hard, looking between the two like a small child watching parents fight. Except for the fact that everyone involved was remarkably calm. Dekker stared straight back into the captain’s eyes, that familiar determination very clearly Ian and not the programming.
“I…wwill not s-s-stop. Y-You m-must—”
“The only thing I must do, is have a shower after all this is over.”
Cross stood, holstering his pistol, satisfied to see the cyborg’s pained grit take on a hint of confusion and anger at the captain’s decision to—yet again—ignore advice given. Cross smirked at him, full of mischief, as if they were going to drop in on a party instead of hovering on the edge of killing him, and turned to Alix.
“How long will this hold him?”
The mechaneer stared at Dekker a moment before shaking himself and turning on the floor, clambering up to look at the screen and judge the power feeds. He shook his head. “Day or so, but that doesn’t solve—”
“Cross,” Dekker growled.
“Shh.” The captain lifted a finger without looking at him. “You tried to kill me five minutes ago—you don’t get a vote.” Then going on to Alix: “Can you work on him like this?”
“No!” Alix said, frustration rising. “Not the level of delicate work that needs done.”
Cross glanced down at the glowering cyborg. “What about his power unit? If you pull that, it forces a shutdown, yes?”
“It’s als-so very pa-ainful,” Dekker muttered.
“You’d rather be dead?” Cross shot back, arching an eyebrow at him.
Dekker brooded (pouted) at the wall, still jerking and hissing in his supercharged bonds. At first contact, the conduits had burned through whatever synthetic skin was left. Now the augs had begun to melt and smoke. And he still simply locked his jaw and twitched.
Alix shook his head, gesturing at the web that spanned the corridor and divided them. “I can’t get to his power unit from here.”
Cross settled to a crouch again, and then to his knees. “Right. Talk me through it.”
“You?” Maddy yelped.
Cross waggled long fingers with a half-grin. “Half as good as any surgeon, darling—swear it.”
"Okay." Alix took a deep breath and a step closer. "Okay. Whatever you do, don’t touch the conduits."
"I’d figured that much out for myself, thank you, Alix."
Dekker studied his captain’s face, eyebrows knit together. “You’ve got to be the most irrational human being I’ve ever met.”
Cross smirked without looking up, his focus on maneuvering around the deathtrap web of cords carrying enough power to kill a man at a single brush.
"You haven’t spent much time in Venus orbit, have you? I’m delightfully well-adjusted by certain standards."
"Terrifying."