Steal the Demon: A Science-Fiction Novella by Robert Roth (free novels to read txt) 📕

Kimiko. Doha is not only aware of my presence in its systems. It has also inferred your presence in the station, despite my having deleted you from the Station-Sec logs. It doesn’t know who you are or what you’re doing, but once it learns that, it will attempt to intervene directly.”

Kimiko stopped climbing. “How will it intervene?”

There was another pause. “There’s no way to know for sure, but it controls a station full of custom manufactured armaments and security equipment, so I’m sure you can easily imagine the possibilities.”

She took a deep breath, calming herself, then resumed climbing. “While I don’t appreciate being lied to, I get why you can’t go around telling everyone you meet that you’re a Confederation AI gone rogue, so I guess this doesn’t change anything. And getting discovered was always a risk anyway.” She looked up and saw that she only had one level remaining to climb. “Is Doha the reason you wanted to tag along on my op?”

“Yes, and I will deal with it. I just wanted to warn you so that you’d be careful.”

Kimiko chuckled. “I think that ship launched a long time ago, Joe. But I’ll proceed with caution.”

“Stellar. I’m cutting our connection for the time being. I don’t want Doha to use it against you. In case we don’t speak again, safe flying, Kimiko.”

She sighed. That sounded awfully fatalistic for an AI. “Same to you, Paradox.”

Her virtual display showed the connection terminate. Kimiko was genuinely on her own. But what she’d said to him still applied. Getting caught was a risk that went with the game. And she’d be damned if she got snatched that close to her prize. Doha would have to send an army after her if it wanted to stop her from getting to that ship.

Kimiko stopped climbing once the markings inside the pass-through shaft indicated that she’d reached the docking bay level. There was a hatch next to the ladder that opened with a simple access pad, so she wouldn’t need Paradox’s magical hacking abilities. She tapped the pad, and the hatch slid open.

A Station-Sec guard was standing watch nearby, but they had their back turned to Kimiko, so she pulled the stun baton from the loop on her waist. The guard was armored from head to toe in matte black composite, which would inhibit the stun charge’s effect. Well, not quite head to toe, Kimiko noticed as she crept up behind them. There was a small patch of exposed skin on the back of their neck between their helmet and shoulder plating, and that was where she touched them with the tip of the baton. The guard’s arms flung out wildly as the stun charge coursed through their body before they collapsed to the deck. Kimiko replaced the stunner at her waist. She was reasonably sure that the guard hadn’t been able to call for help before being stunned, but she had no idea if there was anyone, or anything, that would check on them. Or was watching.

She finally turned to look at her ship. The Shaitan was beautiful–a true demon, just like the name implied. Kimiko couldn’t help admiring the low slung, rich-black shape parked at the other end of the hangar bay deck. It was even more gorgeous in person than in the pics she’d seen, somehow both sleek and muscular. The deep black coating on the outer hull almost seemed to soak up the light around it. She bet that it looked like nothing more than a hole in space when running under stealth. A few supply crates were stacked on the deck near the ship, next to the hulking, blaze-orange form of a Heavy Loading Bot.

As she began to walk toward the Shaitan, Kimiko pulled up its control codes and reached out with her P/N-interface to establish a connection. She got into the system far enough to open the outer hatch when she heard the sound of the lift entrance sliding open behind her. She turned to check on it, and saw the tall, lithe, mechanical form of a station Sec-Bot come charging out in great loping strides as it made right for her. It gave her no warning messages or orders to stand down. It was already set on taking her down.

Kimiko grabbed the stun baton and widened her stance, keeping it loose enough to allow for a dodge roll in either direction. She didn’t know what kind of effect the stunner would have on a Bot, but she figured that a stun charge would at least do some sort of damage. As soon as the Sec-Bot was just about in arm’s reach, Kimiko squatted down and pivoted on her left foot, angling her body out of its path, while she reached out and stabbed the baton into the Bot’s chest plate and pressed the trigger button. The Sec-Bot stopped in its tracks as sparks flew from the contact point. It looked down and saw the baton, then grabbed it, wrenching it from Kimiko’s grip before throwing it to the side over the guardrail on the edge of the landing platform. The Bot was definitely strong, and it was fast, but not so fast that Kimiko still couldn’t deal with it.

When it swung an arm toward her, Kimiko simply ducked and lunged to the right, reaching back to grab the Nishimura knife. Weapon in hand, she let her momentum carry her forward into a roll, then finished in a combat crouch. The Sec-Bot seemed confused by her actions, taking too long to readjust its own stance, so Kimiko just dove forward, slashing out with the blade and slicing through the Bot’s right leg. The Sec-Bot lost its balance and pitched forward, crashing to the deck. Kimiko scrambled to her feet and lunged at the Bot as it struggled to push itself upright, then stabbed down into the Bot’s upper back and sliced down into a cascade of sparks. The Sec-Bot dropped back to the deck and stopped moving.

Kimiko looked at her