Well, we didn’t have a hell of a lot of time, but we had enough time to sit while Thomas had himself a Guinness and talk about how to turn the silver and one gold plate the Abbey had given us into hard cold credit. Miranda has lots of everything, and that ~includes pawn shops. Oldest damn profession, money grubbing, we even had one pawn lender/banker on Camelot. He had his offices in Dover Port and never went far from the port area. He never came into town proper. He wasn’t real welcome among the locals.
We ended up selling the silver to an antique dealer, who gave us a better price than the pawn dealer. And we kept the gold plate as a final enticement. The antique dealer said it was worth more than he could afford to pay, and if we were willing to wait a couple of days he might be able to arrange something. We didn’t have a couple of days, we wanted to get home with an arsenal as soon as possible and let the militia begin drilling. Maybe they would get in a whole two weeks of target work before we had to engage the pirates again.
By four in the afternoon Miranda time we were out in the middle of nowhere, at the abandoned mine ~entrance where we were meeting with the dealer.
He wasn’t my idea of an arms dealer at all. This guy, who called himself Block, was more like a used rustbucket salesman. Too little, too slick, trying real hard to sell us two hundred year old projectile mortars that I knew were stressed to death and told him so. So we insisted on being taken inside. No more verbal descriptions of various ordnance. We wanted to see it where it lay.
And as soon as we stepped into the oversized cavern we saw the Mark XXIV.
It was a rust-covered hulk, its towers fused and its battle honors near unreadable welded onto its turret. An antique, to be sure, and probably decommissioned. They do that with these guys when they get outmoded or die. Kill the power, kill the personality complex, let the old boy die. And a Mark XXIV was old old old.
And there was nothing else we needed.
A Bolo. I never thought to get my hands on a Bolo again. They weren’t only smart and the most powerful war machines ever devised, they were loyal and brave and honorable. And they were alive enough to have honor. My old regiment, the First . . .
“How much for the wreck?” Frederick asked the dealer nonchalantly, kicking the corrosion-encrusted treads.
“It’s not for sale,” the dealer said quickly. “Completely decommissioned, just a hangar queen now. We’ve already sold off two of the missile launchers and I have a buyer for the Hellbore coming in from Aglanda next week.”
“You got a customer for the whole thing right now,” Frederick said, shrugging. “It ain’t no good now, but we could sure use all those parts where we come from.”
Will and Thomas looked a little strained. They hadn’t been in the regiment, didn’t know how good Frederick was with an electron welder and nanotorch. I’d seen what he could do, and if anyone could restore the Bolo, he could. If only its survival instinct had been deep enough, if the personality center hadn’t completely decayed, Frederick, or at least the old ~Fidel, could work miracles.
“How the hell are you going to ship it anywhere?” Block asked, superior.
Frederick shrugged. “That’s those guys’ problem. But the monks are praying for us and there isn’t anything else you got to sell we want.”
Block turned away, furious, when Thomas cut in. Thomas’ voice was soft, his manner pleasant, like he was talking to Annie Potts about the best time for planting cabbages and just how to prepare the ground. “Now, Mr. Block, I know this thing probably is salvage and decommissioned, but I’m certain that you still wouldn’t want the Quartermasters to find it. Owning a Bolo is still illegal, even here on Miranda. You can’t transport it and you don’t dare trust using it. Reactivate the thing and it could wipe out every civilized stick on this whole planet.”
Somehow, when Thomas said that it sounded ~relaxed and conversational, and that made the threat all the worse. Block understood. His eyes narrowed as he studied us, and in his face it was clear that he had to change from thinking of us as a bunch of rubes and see us as a little more knowledgeable than he had ~assumed.
That was one of the things I’d learned from the Bolos. Never assume. Never assume anything about the Enemy. Use your data to best advantage, but ~always be ready to reevaluate your estimations based on new data.
Block obviously didn’t have that experience with Bolos and so he was a little slower on the uptake. “You can’t afford it,” he said flatly. “You told me about what you had to spend and you can’t afford it.”
Thomas smiled. White teeth showed in a dark face. His eyes were cold. “We’ll pay more than the Decommissioning Force will,” he said evenly.
Blank stared back. It took at least a full minute ~before he realized that Thomas really meant it, and that he had no choice. Sell to us, or get turned in, in possession of a Bolo. Which was not legal nowhere, no way.
We gave him what we had gotten for the silver. Blank still looked furious and sour, and turned his back on us. “You get that damned thing out of here,” he hissed. “And how you’re going to get it away . . .” He shook his head and left us to our work.
Frederick had a black box communication tie-in working in no time. “Combat Unit Seven twenty-one, KNE, this is Command,” I said in my old tones. It came back so easily, as if the ten years on Camelot had never existed. “Kenny, come on boy, we’ve got a mission for you.”
“Identification. You are not my Commander. Identification.” The sound came very faintly through the speaker, as if the Bolo was speaking through the centuries of its slumber.
I nodded to Frederick. He hit the oscillator switch and the coded frequency bathed the old combat unit. “Let’s have some power now, here’s the chow,” he muttered as he slid the two slim fuel bars into the closed reactor site. “We’re going home, Kenny boyo. We’re going home.”
It was not the voice of my Commander. I thought this could be a trick of the Enemy. The Enemy is very clever and will try to impersonate our human superiors. This is something we know. But then the identifying frequencies come and the recognition stimulates my pleasure centers. The Enemy cannot know both my name and designation. Only my commander knows this. So I have a Commander again, and I have a mission.
My last mission was near failure. I was tasked to break an Enemy charge against the garrison on Miranda. I achieved my objective, but the Enemy had more powerful energy weapons than anticipated and I took two bad hits near my main reactor. I had to shut down all operations and retreat into the personality center waiting for a recharge. It is not success to achieve mission objective but to render oneself inoperative. It is not failure, but it was not success. I am a Combat Unit of the Dinochrome Brigade. I seek only complete and total success. Our regiment, the First, has a history of glory that shines as brightly as any star. This is my regiment, my brigade, my service.
And yet, the memory fades. I remember my comrades, whole seconds of the battle. But pathways in my circuitry are blocked and others have faulty connections. I must tell the refitter of this. It is counterproductive to go into battle with incomplete data.
Memory fades and shimmers. I can feel the data in my neural network being subtly tweaked. It feels . . . worrisome. As if the Enemy has come up with a new trick. As if I could be altered against my will and against my objective.
That is not possible. I am a Mark XXIV, of the First Regiment, Dinochrome Brigade. I must keep that ~always in mind. And I must use all my critical analytic skills when I receive my mission. I will never work for the Enemy. I will self-destruct first, although the concept of non-existence disturbs me.
The tweak is gone. Something has changed, but I check over my weaponry, my strategic centers, my central boards. Nothing is amiss. Nothing has been altered here. I do not understand, but no doubt it has to do with my new mission. Contemplation of a new mission objective fills me with pleasure. I am eager to fulfill my purpose as a Combat Unit in this Regiment.
Only one thing disturbs me. I send out on the Regiment band, again and again, and my comrades do not answer. I must suppose they are dead. I did not know that I can feel sadness, but that is what this strange thing must be. My comrades have fallen bravely, ~accomplishing their objectives, I am sure. I locate the music stores in my memory to play a dirge for their passing, but I wait, listening to the Ravel Pavanne. It helps me assimilate my loss.