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Authors: Ian M. Dudley
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The wind picked up, rocking the aerodynamic-in-marketing-brochures-only Studebaker. Normally, Marlowe would have enjoyed the rolling motion, found it relaxing. But he was heading towards the Ministry of Policing, and there was nothing soothing about that.
With the wind came acid rain, pelting the car like a blizzard of ball bearings dropped from a cargo plane. When he bought the Studebaker, the dealership had convinced him to buy a Teflar coating to protect the paint from the polluted rain water. Every time it rained on the car, Marlowe was reminded of that expensive waste of scrip. The cracked and peeling Teflar coating now actually trapped the acid rain, sandwiching the corrosive liquid directly against the paint. Well, not so much paint now as primer and, in spots, bare metal. Fortunately, aside from the eyeball on the hood, the car was painted rust red anyway, and from twenty meters away, while the car was moving at twenty kilometers per hour, it didn’t look half bad.
The business complexes thinned out, intermingled briefly with the industrial warehouses, and then abandoned the warehouses to their own devices. The space between buildings grew with each passing kilometer, revealing flat plains of yellowed grass and mud. The outskirts were approaching, and soon Marlowe would be matching wits with Obedere again.
The Ministry of Policing building was situated out in the middle of nowhere, with no buildings around to compete with it and easily defended, wide-open plains surrounding it. The first overt sign he was getting closer was the Great Barrier, a three hundred meter tall giant ring of hardened ceramic and concrete encircling the complex. The road ran straight up to the ring, and then stopped. Only magnetic propulsion systems and airborne flitters could proceed beyond this point. As a defense against ground traffic, this was an added feature. The magnetic conduit under the road continued up just under the surface of the barrier, and Marlowe had to check in to make sure the Ministry of Policing Traffic Controller maintained magnetic resonance. The Traffic Controller generated a cancellation field in the steel running up the steep slope of the barrier, effectively stopping all vehicles on the ground. With the proper clearance, a driver could have this magnetic cancellation field inverted, allowing the car to climb the side of the barrier, albeit very, very slowly, given the angle.
Marlowe transmitted his clearance, which would also ensure that Obedere was informed of his imminent arrival. The code was acknowledged and accepted, and Marlowe leaned back in his seat as the car reached the edge of the barrier and started up. The slope was gentle at first, about ten degrees, but grew steadily steeper until peaking out at seventy degrees. The inexorable tug of gravity pulled Marlowe into the back of his seat as he stared at the sky, and then shifted as they crested the barrier. The ‘Service Magnetron’ light in the dash that had been flickering as they traversed the slope went dark as the car returned to a normal, parallel-to-the-ground orientation. This sort of travel was very hard on the Studebaker.
The other side of the Great Barrier had a much gentler downward slope. This allowed police ground traffic on the inside to move quickly to any point on the barrier where an unauthorized intruder was attempting to gain entry. Not that they’d had anyone attempt such a suicidal endeavor in recent memory. But there was a saying in the City. “Coups happen.”
Crossing the Great Barrier meant they only had another twenty kilometers to go before reaching the complex proper. But even at this distance, Marlowe involuntarily groaned with terror as the obsidian pyramid appeared on the horizon. Thirty stories tall (and at least twice as deep), the black marble building stretched up into the sky like an inverted cone of death. Tiny elevators moved up and down along the
With the wind came acid rain, pelting the car like a blizzard of ball bearings dropped from a cargo plane. When he bought the Studebaker, the dealership had convinced him to buy a Teflar coating to protect the paint from the polluted rain water. Every time it rained on the car, Marlowe was reminded of that expensive waste of scrip. The cracked and peeling Teflar coating now actually trapped the acid rain, sandwiching the corrosive liquid directly against the paint. Well, not so much paint now as primer and, in spots, bare metal. Fortunately, aside from the eyeball on the hood, the car was painted rust red anyway, and from twenty meters away, while the car was moving at twenty kilometers per hour, it didn’t look half bad.
The business complexes thinned out, intermingled briefly with the industrial warehouses, and then abandoned the warehouses to their own devices. The space between buildings grew with each passing kilometer, revealing flat plains of yellowed grass and mud. The outskirts were approaching, and soon Marlowe would be matching wits with Obedere again.
The Ministry of Policing building was situated out in the middle of nowhere, with no buildings around to compete with it and easily defended, wide-open plains surrounding it. The first overt sign he was getting closer was the Great Barrier, a three hundred meter tall giant ring of hardened ceramic and concrete encircling the complex. The road ran straight up to the ring, and then stopped. Only magnetic propulsion systems and airborne flitters could proceed beyond this point. As a defense against ground traffic, this was an added feature. The magnetic conduit under the road continued up just under the surface of the barrier, and Marlowe had to check in to make sure the Ministry of Policing Traffic Controller maintained magnetic resonance. The Traffic Controller generated a cancellation field in the steel running up the steep slope of the barrier, effectively stopping all vehicles on the ground. With the proper clearance, a driver could have this magnetic cancellation field inverted, allowing the car to climb the side of the barrier, albeit very, very slowly, given the angle.
Marlowe transmitted his clearance, which would also ensure that Obedere was informed of his imminent arrival. The code was acknowledged and accepted, and Marlowe leaned back in his seat as the car reached the edge of the barrier and started up. The slope was gentle at first, about ten degrees, but grew steadily steeper until peaking out at seventy degrees. The inexorable tug of gravity pulled Marlowe into the back of his seat as he stared at the sky, and then shifted as they crested the barrier. The ‘Service Magnetron’ light in the dash that had been flickering as they traversed the slope went dark as the car returned to a normal, parallel-to-the-ground orientation. This sort of travel was very hard on the Studebaker.
The other side of the Great Barrier had a much gentler downward slope. This allowed police ground traffic on the inside to move quickly to any point on the barrier where an unauthorized intruder was attempting to gain entry. Not that they’d had anyone attempt such a suicidal endeavor in recent memory. But there was a saying in the City. “Coups happen.”
Crossing the Great Barrier meant they only had another twenty kilometers to go before reaching the complex proper. But even at this distance, Marlowe involuntarily groaned with terror as the obsidian pyramid appeared on the horizon. Thirty stories tall (and at least twice as deep), the black marble building stretched up into the sky like an inverted cone of death. Tiny elevators moved up and down along the
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