Read Online The Credulity Nexus by Graham Storrs - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Graham Storrs
Tags: London, CIA, Berlin, space, fbi, MI5, Moon, robot, LA, Space Station, mi6, lunar colony, transhuman, credulity, gene nexus, space bridge
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seconds to reach the
Earth. The distance made conversation impossible.
Celestina
stood up on the chaise longue and spread her arms wide, luxuriating
in the touch of the gentle breeze on her body. She leapt into the
air, transforming as she did into the great and brilliant ba of the
ancient legends. With a mighty beat of her rainbow wings, she
soared into the sky.
Chapter 10
Rivers
Valdinger clung to the retracted landing strut of the Virgin
Galactic VG3000 suborbital hopper. Ice powdered her robotic body
and the air pressure was virtually zero, but neither of those facts
bothered her much. Her new body was as comfortable working in hard
vacuum as it was in the Earth's atmosphere. What did bother her,
very much, was the message that had just come through from
Celestina.
Rivers knew
she was in trouble. She'd bungled the robbery at the lab. But the
package should have been in the big, refrigerated cupboard where
they said it would be. She wasn't supposed to have to tear the
place apart searching for it.
It was their
fault. They'd screwed up, not her. And when they sent her to
Heathrow to get the guy who was supposed to have taken it, they
didn't say anything about a load of British secret agents with
machine guns. It wasn't right. Celestina's people were supposed to
be the best. They should be giving her better intel – a bit of
support, for Christ's sake!
But, as usual,
Rivers was on her own. The story of her life.
She looked
down at the scarring on her abdomen. Whatever her new body was made
of, it was tough. That guy had emptied a clip into her at close
range, and all she had to show for it now was a sprinkling of
little grey marks. Maybe she shouldn't have run for it when the
spooks showed up. Maybe she could have taken them. But it had
creeped her out, the way that Rik guy had kept firing right at her
brain box, like he knew just where it was.
The roboticist
at the hospital had told her that her body could stand a lot of
punishment, but that she needed to protect her brain box at all
costs. That was the only part that wouldn't regenerate, the only
part that could kill her if it was damaged. At the time, she'd
thought that made her pretty much invulnerable. Now she wasn't so
sure.
It was a safe
bet Celestina also had some way of killing her if she felt like it.
She'd worked for the old bitch for enough years now to know she
always had some way of getting at the people she wanted to punish.
But that had never worried Rivers before. She'd always been the
Golden Girl, a star performer, teacher's pet. There wasn't a
smarter, faster, more successful cat burglar on the East Coast. At
twenty-two, Rivers had been at the top of her game, taking only the
best jobs, getting her commissions directly from Celestina herself,
with the weight of the whole organisation behind her if she needed
intel, or enforcement, or some official to turn a blind eye. They
called her the Black Cat, and she had it all.
Then those
asshole cops somehow managed to stake out the museum job, and came
bursting in on her and her team, shouting and yelling like madmen.
“Police! Drop your weapons! Down on the floor! Do it!” The
bastards. It still made her blood boil, remembering it.
She took down
three of them before they managed to return fire. Served them
right.
The engines
suddenly screamed into life. Rivers felt her mass shift. Weight was
returning, climbing slowly up to one-and-a-half-G. The hopper was
braking, falling out of the sky in a controlled arc that would hit
Los Angeles International Airport smack on the hopper's designated
landing pad.
She should
call Celestina now. She might not have a chance in LA. But what
could she say? Celestina's image came into her head as clearly as
if she was on a comm link. It was how she had looked when Rivers
woke up in the hospital.
“ I thought I was dead,” Rivers had said,
looking around. She felt fine. No pain. No wooziness. Just clear,
bright hospital light, and that smell of antiseptic
Earth. The distance made conversation impossible.
Celestina
stood up on the chaise longue and spread her arms wide, luxuriating
in the touch of the gentle breeze on her body. She leapt into the
air, transforming as she did into the great and brilliant ba of the
ancient legends. With a mighty beat of her rainbow wings, she
soared into the sky.
Chapter 10
Rivers
Valdinger clung to the retracted landing strut of the Virgin
Galactic VG3000 suborbital hopper. Ice powdered her robotic body
and the air pressure was virtually zero, but neither of those facts
bothered her much. Her new body was as comfortable working in hard
vacuum as it was in the Earth's atmosphere. What did bother her,
very much, was the message that had just come through from
Celestina.
Rivers knew
she was in trouble. She'd bungled the robbery at the lab. But the
package should have been in the big, refrigerated cupboard where
they said it would be. She wasn't supposed to have to tear the
place apart searching for it.
It was their
fault. They'd screwed up, not her. And when they sent her to
Heathrow to get the guy who was supposed to have taken it, they
didn't say anything about a load of British secret agents with
machine guns. It wasn't right. Celestina's people were supposed to
be the best. They should be giving her better intel – a bit of
support, for Christ's sake!
But, as usual,
Rivers was on her own. The story of her life.
She looked
down at the scarring on her abdomen. Whatever her new body was made
of, it was tough. That guy had emptied a clip into her at close
range, and all she had to show for it now was a sprinkling of
little grey marks. Maybe she shouldn't have run for it when the
spooks showed up. Maybe she could have taken them. But it had
creeped her out, the way that Rik guy had kept firing right at her
brain box, like he knew just where it was.
The roboticist
at the hospital had told her that her body could stand a lot of
punishment, but that she needed to protect her brain box at all
costs. That was the only part that wouldn't regenerate, the only
part that could kill her if it was damaged. At the time, she'd
thought that made her pretty much invulnerable. Now she wasn't so
sure.
It was a safe
bet Celestina also had some way of killing her if she felt like it.
She'd worked for the old bitch for enough years now to know she
always had some way of getting at the people she wanted to punish.
But that had never worried Rivers before. She'd always been the
Golden Girl, a star performer, teacher's pet. There wasn't a
smarter, faster, more successful cat burglar on the East Coast. At
twenty-two, Rivers had been at the top of her game, taking only the
best jobs, getting her commissions directly from Celestina herself,
with the weight of the whole organisation behind her if she needed
intel, or enforcement, or some official to turn a blind eye. They
called her the Black Cat, and she had it all.
Then those
asshole cops somehow managed to stake out the museum job, and came
bursting in on her and her team, shouting and yelling like madmen.
“Police! Drop your weapons! Down on the floor! Do it!” The
bastards. It still made her blood boil, remembering it.
She took down
three of them before they managed to return fire. Served them
right.
The engines
suddenly screamed into life. Rivers felt her mass shift. Weight was
returning, climbing slowly up to one-and-a-half-G. The hopper was
braking, falling out of the sky in a controlled arc that would hit
Los Angeles International Airport smack on the hopper's designated
landing pad.
She should
call Celestina now. She might not have a chance in LA. But what
could she say? Celestina's image came into her head as clearly as
if she was on a comm link. It was how she had looked when Rivers
woke up in the hospital.
“ I thought I was dead,” Rivers had said,
looking around. She felt fine. No pain. No wooziness. Just clear,
bright hospital light, and that smell of antiseptic
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