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Monday, June 11, 2283, 2014 hours
With a heavily encrypted brief message, Sethra announced an impromptu meeting in his cubicle, sending the chime to Byron, Zuzana, Veronee and Eddie. By 2030, they had all gathered in his cubicle. Byron set a small Roomba robot in one corner of the room. It suspiciously resembled the one that had been cleaning in Rec #2 during their card game. He telescoped an antenna on its top surface. He flicked a switch on a remote control fob then pocketed it when he was satisfied with the steady green LED glow coming from an indicator light next to the antenna.
Sethra and Eddie shared their suspicions about Security Chief Michael Covington with the other three, who were equally chagrined with the revelations produced by Sethra’s data mining.
“Son of a gun won’t even submit to regular medical checkups, as required by A-3 protocol,” huffed Eddie. “And he seems a lot fitter and healthier than most of us. Add to that what we’ve learned regarding the almost certain foul-play that was involved in Matteo Brummett’s death, and we have ourselves a gen-yoo-wine ‘bad guy’. I had lunch with Mephord and convinced him to remove Covington from his post for at least a few days. He didn’t like it, but he did it. And I gather the Chief was quite understanding and cooperative. To me, that just makes him more suspect. If he were truly uninvolved in Brummett’s death, why didn’t he react as most people would? Irritable, insulted, resistant?”
“Because,” ventured Zuzana, “he believes he’s covered his tracks thoroughly, and that there’s nothing forensics can discover that would indict him.”
Byron nodded agreement. “Yeah, Zuz is right. This guy, as Chief of Security, is one highly trained asshole, I can tell you. I understand he was Special Forces back before The Attack. Navy Seal, I think. He probably feels the confidence of an adult pitted against children. But overconfidence can be a person’s undoing.”
Sethra said, “We’re going on a little jaunt this evening, compadres. I’ve a mind to personally examine the supposedly failing Shaft cameras and run my own diagnostics on them.” He indicated a heavy plastic tool case with a carrying handle lying on his cot.
Zuzana unzipped the heavy duffel bag she’d brought, and unloaded five radiation suits with hoods. “I borrowed these from an Environmental supply cache. Five suits won’t be missed, especially since they’re disposable. We’ll be going into the Shaft itself, so we know we’re going to be exposed to higher levels of radiation than down here. But with the suits’ protection, and a mega-dose of anti-radiation meds, we’ll be no worse for wear if we limit our exposure to under an hour.” Eddie arched an eyebrow at this evaluation, but didn’t comment.
Byron showed off his pistol, and explained its function, which drew whistles and utterances of genuine admiration from the other four, both for his ingenuity and his daring to create the device. “The gloves of the radiation suit will suffice to adequately protect my hand if I’m forced to use the laser setting which, I will add, can give a burst up to 1.8 seconds in duration that will cut a hole through up to twelve inches of steel or nine of ceramal alloy.”
“Or separate a line of Security guards’ torsos from their legs,” added Sethra, grinning. “But no killing unless we have absolutely must.”
While Eddie busied himself giving everyone anti-radiation injections, Byron looked at his wrist chronograph and explained, “At 2100 hours, a large corridor polishing robot will just happen to be ‘cleaning’ this section of corridor. I’ve modified it by removing the motors that drive its cleaning brushes. So, there’ll be room enough for us to squeeze inside via a maintenance hatch. It will then take us to an area of Engineering, Level D, where there is a power conduit tunnel. Although very few people know this, it leads, round-about, to the Shaft.”
“I wondered about that,” said Zuzana. “I thought the security access tunnel was the only way to get into the Shaft.” Byron nodded and grinned, “You’re supposed to think that. Everyone is. I’m not even sure Administrator Mephord knows about this. I do, because I program maintenance robots to take that route to the Shaft for the typical stuff: structural integrity degradation checks, voltage spikes, seismic shifting, that sort of thing.”
Zuzana beamed a smile at Byron. “You’re one handy fella to have around.”
“In a number of capacities,” he quipped.
Monday, June 11, 2283, 2057 hours, Sethra’s cubicle
Sethra entered the necessary command on his lap terminal, sending a fairly mild surge through the circuits on which this corridor’s lighting depended. “The hallway outside my door is dark now. It’ll stay that way for a little over five minutes, while Engineering runs remote diagnostics to see if it was caused by a momentary power surge, or if instead there was a major blow, and the distinct possibility of a fire-hazard. When the diagnostic comes back okay, some lazy bum in Engineering will reset the board remotely, turning the corridor lighting back on, rather than take the time to come investigate personally.”
“Nice,” said Byron. “We’re all just a bunch of lazy bums in Engineering.”
Sethra grinned, then added, “While we have dark, the large floor polishing robot will arrive, and we’ll clamber aboard unseen by corridor cameras which, for some strange reason, aren’t equipped with the typical IR and UV detectors...”
“Compliments of yours truly, six months ago,” added Byron.
A little less than three minutes later, Sethra said, “Door, open. Close and lock when room occupants have exited.” The door swooshed aside, and the five bumbled their way forward in darkness, then clumsily boarded the large robotic vehicle. Once the vehicle’s access hatch closed, the unit accelerated smoothly down the corridor.
“The ride to our drop-off point outside the power conduit tunnel should take about sixteen minutes,” Byron reported. They could vaguely see one another because of some small internal lights inside their unconventional transport. Byron placed his pistol in a Velcro chest pouch on his radiation suit. He would have easy access to it, simply by ripping the pouch open at one corner. Sethra rode squatting, right hand holding onto a heavy aluminum bracket, his case of tools propped between his knees. “Good times,” he said, looking at the others, and grinned. “Good times.”
Couple more from me (enjoyed the read! Thmbsup Hurry up with your writing!!!! Kiss):
Prologue:
Page 8 "anti virus" could be "anti-virus" / "antivirus"?
Chapter 1:
Page 9 "existing infractstructure" should be "infrastructure"
Chapter 2:
Page 10 "accompanies group pasttimes" should be "pastimes"
Page 10 "wiggle-room for screwups" should be "screw-ups"
Page 10 "Excute these commands" should be "Execute"
Chapter 3:
Page 11 "responsibility lays on the shoulders of a leader" I would have said "lies"?
Page 11 "ongoing coverup, if there is one" should be "cover-up" or "cover up"
Page 11 "heavy plastic toolcase" I would have thought it should be "tool case"?
Page 11 "Zuzana unzipped the heavy dufflebag" same for "duffle bag"?
Page 11 "The ride to our dropoff point" should be "drop-off" or "drop off"
Chapter 4:
Page 12 "here for millenia after we’re gone" should be "millennia"
About the Author:
Page 14 "last few year’s in DonationCoder’s" should be "years"
Page 14 "local methodist church" should definitely be "Methodist"
A grammatical error:
Quote
Sethra was unlatched his toolcase and opened it.
Should be, (I think):
Sethra had unlatched his toolcase and opened it.
Chapter 5:
Quote
He peered out over the assembled for a few moments,...
Possibly:
He peered out over the assembly for a few moments,....
or:
He peered out over the assembled personnel for a few moments,...
I'm gonna add some Thanks You's in the front matter, mentioning names of proofreaders. Next upload will have Chapter 6 plus correction of their -> there in Ch. 2.
are you taking proofreading finds?
Interesting that you chose to use a pen name.
Just sort of did it on a lark. When I get as popular as Stephen King, I'll follow in his footsteps and drop my equivalent of his Richard Bachman there seem to be a couple of formatting artifacts that I presume are not present on an ebook device.
Where do we purchase!