Mira settled down in a nondescript hotel room on the outskirts of Washington, DC. She had already done a “first inspection” of the site where Bennu’s sleep chamber lay, but that was from blocks away. Still, she now knew the general layout of the buildings - and which one was of particular interest.
It was time to get serious about her rescue attempt. That meant getting as close to the fences as possible, and she most certainly didn’t want to be easily remembered during the hours it would take! And THAT meant obscuring her rather striking looks.
Her travelling coat had been designed to help in disguises; it was not only reversable, but was responsive to Sunpower. (Indeed, it had some “woven” into it. Had she had its hood up when she was first attacked, the wrench blow to her head would, at the least, have been greatly softened.) But her hair had to go. She dissolved it with a bit of Sunpower and sighed. How out of balance she looked! A mousy brown wig, tinged with grey, replaced it.
Some carefully applied cosmetics concealed the beauty of her face and a pair of cheap thick-rimmed plastic glasses drew attention away from her eyes. She looked at herself in the room’s mirror. Satisfied, she took several items with her - her Weapon, of course, as well as the Documentator (covered to appear like a book), some Sunpower tablets in case she needed extra Power, (assuming she had the few undisturbed minutes necessary to manage an emergency Charge), and a bag of ball bearings and marbles.
She sat quietly on a bench near the entrance, apparently nothing more than another citizen enjoying the day, reading a book, nibbling on an occasional apple (a taste she shared with her Partner, as it would turn out), and feeding the local small fauna.
Fortunately, the curious, at least for the moment, held sway over the makers of war, and the sleep chamber was located in a facility controlled by scientists. Though it was guarded and protected by barriers, and warrior-men were present, many of them also curious, though for unpleasant reasons, there were no heavy weapons. Perhaps she could accomplish her rescue without having to kill again.
She drew upon her Power and her mind reached out, studying the defences and the finer details of the targeted building. The hours passed until it was time for her to leave.
Mira returned the next day, but now her attention was focussed on the guardhouse. She would need documents, undoubtedly signed and numbered. Everything had to be perfect. The general passes into the compound would be simple enough to make, but she would also need an “H2 certificate”, and that she could not prepare a day in advance. Tomorrow would be her day.
The next morning she removed fingerprints and traces of her body from her room before setting out. She’d have to make a very hasty exit after the havoc she would cause, preferrably with Bennu riding with her. Unfortunately that seemed unlikely; she had still not detected any trace of his mind. Assuming he were still alive, he’d have to be in a deep coma, presumably dying from Sun-starvation (she touched one of the tablets that could cure him for reassurance). Oh, sure, he could be back in hibernation, but it was absurd to imagine that the Immature, having forcibly Awakened him once, would permit that!
Most likely he was held at another site, being kept well away from his sleep chamber. Of course he was, as she sometimes teased him in jest, Bennu the Resourceful. He might also have managed to escape, and he would not prove easy to recapture. Or find.
She rechecked her disguise, took a maximum Suncharge, and biked to within a block of the site. She took out her Documentator and picked another spot not too far from the gatehouse. Her mind reached out ...
She blinked in astonishment. Why would even Immatures permit a person of such limited intelligence to possess a firearm, never mind giving him the responsibility of acting as the gate guard of an important installation? He was not terribly literate, for he was struggling his way through “comic books” meant to entertain the young. How was he supposed to verify passes? Oh, by their physical appearance and the signatures on them. And by verifying certain types, such as H2’s, by phone. When the phone was working, that is, and it wasn’t always.
Mira smiled gently - those broad grins typical of the two of them were too memorable! Phone trouble was something she could guarantee! She thanked The Light, gathered the information she needed, and put the Documentator to work. She walked back to her bike, stowed it away, and marched up to the main gate.
Guard (turning his comic book upside down to “hide” it from her): “Passes, please.”
Mira handed them over. She began talking as he examined them. “My car broke down and I had to take the bus -”
Guard: “Building F12, huh. You need an H2 for that.”
Mira: “I have an H2. Can’t you read?”
Guard: “Uh - oh, so you do. I’ll have to phone this in.”
Mira: “Well, be quick about it. I’m supposed to be there in 15 minutes, and it’s on the other side of this place.”
Of course the phone didn’t work right.
Guard: “Gee, lady, I don’t know. If I don’t get approval I could get fired.”
Mira: “Read the signatures. If I’m late you WILL get fired.”
Guard: “Oh, all right. I have to log you in and make you out an ID badge.”
Mira: “I’ve been here before - on days you’re not been on duty, thankfully. I have one.”
Her Documentator had been busy! She clipped it on.
The guard wrote the information into his log. //Nenub, huh. Another foreigner. We’ll let anybody into this place. Oh, well, at least she’s not Russian.//
He tripped the gate locks and it swung open. Mira stepped through it. He muttered: “Why are most women scientists ugly?”
That was Mira’s disguise, of course. To reinforce it she replied: “I heard that! Why are most gate guards dumb?”
He picked his comic book back up and soon had forgotten her. She strode along the path to Building F12, then stepped off it and circled behind the building. There was a guard at the front of it, too, and it was too risky to try to talk her way in. Besides, there were cameras everywhere inside.
Well, almost everywhere. Her mind reached out briefly, confirming what she had learned. There was a small storage room with neither cameras nor alarms. She cut a flap into the wall with her rod set to “fine”. A bit of Sunpower swung the flap out until she could grasp it and pull it aside far enough to slip inside. She pulled it shut, again needing a dash of Sunpower to complete the job. So far, so good!
She cut the bolt on the door, loath to use even the least bit of Sunpower if she could avoid it. But it was wiser to use some to unlock the door across the corridor, for time was a factor. She had to step out of the storage room, pass in front of a camera, open the other door ...
There was nobody in the corridor, and the guard’s attention was occupied by somebody entering the building. A blur, a shadow, passed from one door to the other and Mira found herself walking down steps into the building’s utility room. She stopped halfway down, out of camera range, and studied the various cables and wires.
Those thick ones were obviously the main power wires. She traced others - those were the backups, and there were - yes! The camera feed cables. Out came her rod and a truly narrow beam cut most of the way through each of the main power cables - she was beginning to fully understand the reason for all of the training she’d undergone with her Weapon. A disintegration ray generator was a lethal weapon, of course - a Medallion could be, for that matter - but this was the way they were supposed to be used when destruction was called for. So far, all was quiet ...
She took a deep breath, grasped her Medallion and squeezed the wires together, immediately following up by slashing the others she’d identified. With a loud BANG! the short circuit she’d caused started a nicely smoky electical fire, which she aided with some Medallion-induced mischief.
Mira raced up the stairs and burst into the corridor screaming “FIRE! FIRE” at a group of people heading towards her. She blasted her way through a locked door - up the stairs, into the room behind the computers, destroy the battery backup, down the corridor, up the stairs - stop.
As she’d thought she’d learned, there was a cannister that could fill the room where the sleep chamber was with gas. She was behind one side of the room, the guard and controls on the other. She used her Medallion help her crush the tube leading into the room, then unscrewed it from the cannister. Just in time, too, for, as it turned out, the guard had orders to flood the room with gas in the event on a break-in, and with so many systems down, he decided to hit the button. The gas, having no place else to go, found its way to him and he promptly fell sound asleep, for it was very quick-acting. Indeed, it took out the other guards on the floor too, as they saw him slumped over and opened the door to check on him.
She carefully cut her way to the now unguarded sleep chamber. Obviously Bennu wasn’t in it. However, there was a thick binder on the “Peruvian Incident” in the lid. She picked it up from where it had been tossed by a disgusted scientist and began speedreading.
She learned the details of Bennu’s discovery, the forced opening of his chamber (and the inadvertent loss of his memories) - and his subsequent escape. //Escape! YAY, BENNU, GO!// and failure to recapture him. Praise The Light! Now to find him before Immatures did.
Much as she’d like to download Bennu’s special Training, she’d learned what she needed to know. Better to spend the extra minutes making her own escape. She reversed her travelling-coat, stripped off her makeup, discarded and destroyed her wig and glasses (and ID), and used some Sunpower to regrow her hair. Taking the report with her, she raised the hood of her coat and headed for an outside room.
She blasted her way through the wall and dropped the two stories to the ground. Hitting it rolling, she used a marble launched over her shoulder to knock out the one guard who might have been able to see her, and raced towards the fence. It was 12 feet tall and electrified, and impedence sensors would sound an alarm if she got within two feet of it. Drawing deeply on both her strength and Medallion power she high-jumped, “pushing” herself away from it as her hands would have made contact at the height of her leap.
She thudded to the ground safely on the other side, walked away, and was soon riding down the highway to freedom, her new ID papers now proclaiming her “Jane Smith”. With no perimiter alarms either registering or showing as disabled, and the fence itself clearly unbroken, the guards spent several hours carefully looking for her on site. By the time they concluded that she had escaped, she most certainly had.
Of course a report made its way to the agent in charge of recapturing Bennu. “Irma Nenub indeed!” he snorted. “She’s laughing at us.” Fortunately his orders had not yet been altered to include her, though, if he DID catch Bennu, Mira would have to attempt a rescue. Then he could get two for one, and a nice promotion. After all, since neither of them was actually an extraterestrial, this Mira couldn’t REALLY have a disintegrator. Still, she obviously was armed and the far more dangerous of the two ...
Well, I guess you could find one good thing to say about Justin Preminger. He wasn’t sexist.
Written July 2000 typed Dec 28, 2003 Copyright Richard Kaplan
(If one does try to coordinate the Tales and the Codex, this would have to take place during the period the Army had control of the sleep chamber. Presumably the President was the one insisting it be kept on a civilian site.)