Not that it appeared to make any difference to the female writhing beneath him. From the information his sensors conveyed, the Beta determined that her thought processes at the moment not only were indifferent to the man’s tone, they verged on the unfocused.
Nothing ventured, nothing retained, Beta decided as he turned back to Maggie. “Darling, forgive me.”
To his considerable surprise, she smiled warmly. Surely she could see through his words the feeble attempt at manipulation? Surely the female of this species was more perceptive?
Apparently not. She moved suggestively against him. The Beta Unit filed this new information emotionlessly. It was not his function to judge the social reactions of other species. Besides, he didn’t have the time to render opinions. He was too busy doing his job. He concentrated on the words and accompanying movement of the couple nearby.
Just now they were rolling about on the sand. The Beta promptly began rolling with Maggie. She giggled, which if not the same reaction as the other young female below, at least was not hostile.
“You’re my Juliet, my Venus,” Blake murmured to his cheerleader.
Higher on the sand the Beta whispered throatily, “You’re my Juliet, my Venus.”
Maggie sighed beneath him, her eyes closed tight. This struck Beta as most peculiar, since it seemed logical that now would be just when these creatures would want to see each other. He held off asking Maggie about it, deciding rightly that this would be imprudent.
This was easy, he decided. All he had to do was keep mimicking the words and actions of young Blake, who just then was biting his lady’s ear.
This further confirmation of the primitive nature of the human species did not surprise the Beta. He was careful to note the intensity of the bite before duplicating it, reasoning correctly that it would not be appreciated if he drew blood.
He imitated the bite precisely, resigned to carrying on the charade to its eventual conclusion. Again the female beneath him giggled.
“Oh, Alex.”
She kissed him passionately before zipping up the sleeping bag the rest of the way. This occasioned a moment of panic on the Beta’s part since it temporarily obscured his vision. He twisted around inside the bag. To his relief his new position did not displease Maggie, and he was once more able to study the activity below.
There wasn’t much to see now. Both young humans had all but disappeared inside their own sleeping bag. He could still hear them quite clearly, though, thanks to his advanced audio sensing equipment.
“The other girls,” Blake whispered, “meant nothing to me. It was you I always wanted with me. You. You!” More kissing sounds, followed by the girl’s voice.
“Oh Jack, talk dirty to me!”
The Beta tried to interpret and organize this dialogue as Maggie pulled him deeper into the confines of the sleeping bag, shutting off his view a second time. Her hands were very active. The Beta allowed his human form to respond appropriately (that much programming was provided for, at least) while he made mental notes and recorded the information for future use.
“The other girls meant nothing to me,” he whispered. “It was you I always wanted with me. You. You!”
He then kissed Maggie and waited for the next reaction.
There was a reaction, all right, but not quite the one he’d anticipated.
The sleeping bag stopped moving as Maggie suddenly froze beneath him. He could feel the sudden tenseness in her and wondered frantically what he’d done wrong.
What now? He considered repeating the short speech and decided not to since the effect it had produced was not the one expected.
“What . . . other . . . girls . . . ?” Maggie inquired through clenched teeth.
Definitely the wrong speech, the Beta decided. It was obvious some sort of reply was expected, but he was at a loss what to say. All he could think of to do was to plunge ahead and hope for the best.
So he said, “Should I talk dirty to you now?”
Evidently it was not an inspired choice, because a furious Maggie suddenly began fighting her way clear of the sleeping bag’s confines while trying to refasten her clothing at the same time. She was still working on the latter by the time she’d escaped the bag. She stood glaring down at him as she worked with buttons and straps, her feet sinking into the soft sand.
“What’s wrong?” the Beta inquired weakly. “What did I do, what did I say?”
Her fingers worked on her pants. “Well if you don’t know, I’m certainly not going to tell you!”
Human, he thought. How typically human. How was he expected to cope with such an absurd social fabric? How was anyone expected to handle a race that came forth with statements like that?
As far as the Beta was concerned, Maggie’s words closed the last circuit. He was out of patience, out of confidence, and out of control. He climbed out of the sleeping bag and confronted her, and he was at least as mad as she was and twice as frustrated.
“That’s it, that’s all I can stand! I give up! Let them requisition me for spare parts, let ’em recommission my logic function, let them assign me to quality management. . . . I can’t take it anymore, I’ve had it!” Maggie stared back at him in astonishment.
The Beta finished it. “I’m not Alex Rogan!”
From his position in the bushes overlooking the beach, the state trooper monitored this exchange with interest. As he listened he quietly removed the pistol from the holster at his hip. It was not a standard-issue .38. In fact, it had no caliber at all, relying for its effectiveness on a silent pulse of contorted electrons.
That was appropriate, though, because nothing about the trooper was standard-issue. Not even its face, which was a latex-like material stretched over false muscles connected to his own. No electronic illusion this time, but a true mask.
Keeping its eyes on the target it raised the peculiar pistol and aimed carefully. The target was still unaware of its presence and it waited for a clear shot. The cluster of adolescent humans did not notice him either, engaged as they were in the performance of their primitive rituals farther down the beach.
Maggie finally found her voice and, with it, the only explanation she could come up with to explain Alex’s bizarre behavior.
“Alex, I thought we’d talked about this before. I thought we’d agreed between us that no matter what any of the other kids tried, no drugs.”
“I’m not functioning under the influence of hallucinogens, Maggie, or anything else. They’d have no effect on my system in any case. Nothing would, unless you spiked my receptors somehow.” A sound made him pause, followed by the sight of a half-glimpsed shape moving in the bushes above them. Its silhouette was human, its infrared image decidedly alien.
“Maggie, get down!”
The Beta lunged at her as the assassin fired, caught a single burst in his side just beneath the left arm. Cloth and imitation skin disintegrated. The shot would have killed Alex Rogan or any other organic instantly. It only scorched the Beta’s lining.
He tried to turn to get a better view of the assailant while shielding Maggie at the same time. Any other night Maggie would have enjoyed the tussle and would gladly have let Alex come out on top, but just then she was more than a little confused and unwilling to continue without a much better explanation of his behavior.
One thing she noticed immediately, however. It struck her even more forcibly than his inexplicable actions.
“Alex, have you been working out?”
“Have I what?” Electronic eyes searched the vegetation surrounding the parking lot.
She pushed against him, trying to get up. He didn’t budge. Strong as she was, she couldn’t move him an inch. It was like pushing against iron.
“When did you get so strong? Damn it, Alex, let me up!”
“I can’t, and stop squirming. They’re shooting at us.”
Either it didn’t register or else she didn’t believe him. When they seized on a thought and made it their own, the Beta had learned, humans were impossible to persuade. It was part of the same biological equation that made Alex Rogan a potentially great Starfighter but kept Earth classified among the immature worlds.
“What are you talking about, Alex? I swear, I don’t understand you anymore.”
“I told you,” the Beta snapped as he tried to get a fix on the assassin’s position. It had to be moving now, wondering why its first shot hadn’t turned its target into a motionless mass of smoldering flesh. Confusion would buy the Beta some time. “I’m not Alex. I’m a duplicate of him, a simulacrum, a Beta unit.”
“Your elevator’s not going all the way to the top, is what,” she said, gaping at him.