New Tales from Hilbert Space, Page 3

of those,” the officer replied.

  “Of course not. That’s why they are called stalkers. If you see them it is far too late.”

  “Well, thank you for the warning, but I think we will just let our robots handle that.”

  “No you can’t!” Rakni shouted. “That is too dangerous. The Madonian Stalker is very sick, contagious even.”

  “More reason to send the robots.”

  “On the contrary. I forgot to mention, that the Madonian Stalker is itself a robot. And it is infected with the Roborabies. Just think about what would happen if this computer virus would spread.”

  “I never heard of the Roborabies either.”

  “That’s because we did a perfect job containing it until now. Do you want to be the reason for the first outbreak of Roborabies? Just because we don’t have an appointment?”

  “Well… I guess that would be bad.”

  “Bad? It would be the end of your company. So please, just let us do our job.”

  “You have a point. You are clear to land. And good luck catching the Madonian Stalker.”

  “We did it!” Rakni shouted after turning off the intercom. “We have permission to land.”

  Pokk maneuvered the ship through the hangar doors, grazing them a little bit, before setting down on a landing platform. As the brothers got out, they were greeted by a security officer. “I heard you are here to deal with the Madonian Stalker. Do you need any assistance?”

  “Of course not!” Rakni said. “Although, a detailed map of this station would be quite helpful.”

  “I don’t know if I can share this information,” the security guard said. “This is very sensitive data.”

  “No problem. It will just take us a little longer to find the stalker. You might lose three or four robots to the Roborabies. They tend to be very aggressive once infected, each robot kills about ten people on average, before we can catch it. So that makes about…”

  “30 to 40,” Pokk helped his big brother.

  “Exactly, 30 to 40 casualties. It’s your choice.”

  “Well in that case,” the guard answered, “I think we can make an exception. There you go.” He uploaded a map to Rakni’s Widget. It showed every room, every exit, every single corridor on the station.

  “Thank you very much,” Rakni said. “This will make our job much easier. Come on Pokk, let’s go.”

  The two Dranik took lots of equipment with them and headed for the computer core of the station. As soon as they were alone, Pokk said to his brother, “You really need to explain the plan to me. What are we even doing here? And how should this help our rating?”

  “Patience, Pokk, patience. First we need to get to the computer core. And that won’t be easy. There is no direct way, it is completely isolated. See those pipes on the map. We have to go through them.”

  “Don’t tell me those are sewage pipes again.”

  “Of course not. I don’t think there are any sewage pipes on this station.”

  Rakni removed a panel from the corridor wall to gain access to the pipes that lead to the computer core. A foul stench soon filled the room.

  “How is that not a sewage pipe?” Pokk complained.

  “Well, technically that’s not sewage. It is just a liquid waste product that is formed when building robots. I admit, it smells exotic, but it ain’t sewage.”

  “No, it’s worse. It’s industrial waste. There is no way I am going in there willingly.”

  “Don’t worry, brother. If you don’t want to, you don’t have to go willingly,” Rakni said and pushed his little brother down the pipe before jumping in himself.

  “This is disgusting,” Pokk yelled. “I think this goo is even acidic.”

  “Only at first. You’ll get used to it.”

  “You can’t get used to acid. You are thinking of cold.”

  “Whatever. It’s not long. Follow me.”

  The brothers waded through the industrial waste, trying to keep their roots dry with little success. Finally they reached the computer core, before Pokk’s shoes dissolved.

  “What is this place?” Pokk asked.

  “This is the computer core of Auto-Ex. It is more or less the brain of all the automated extermination robots.”

  “And what do we do here?”

  “We are saving our business. As you are of course aware, all these robots have to obey the 729 revised laws of robotics. However, they are also exterminators, so they have to hurt some species at some point. This would obviously conflict with their laws. So they have two databases, right here in the headquarters. One is for vermin, pests and other lifeforms that the robots are allowed to kill. The other one is for all the other beings that need to be protected and in no way harmed. Now we simply switch those two databases and all our problems are solved.”

  “How would that help us? I see how that would destroy the company, but how would we gain anything from this?”

  “Less competition, little brother, less competition. Without Auto-Ex there will be more jobs for us. A genius plan, isn’t it?”

  “I’m not sure. If you really think it saves our business.”

  “Glad you agree.” Rakni smiled while removing a panel from the main computer and tearing out a few cables. Then he pulled out a small cube and switched it with a similar cube. “That was surprisingly easy. Now all we have to do is get out and wait for job offers.”

  “Not through the sewage again.”

  “I told you, that’s not sewage. But don’t you worry. Now that our job is done, there is no need to keep a low profile any longer. Take a look at the map. Our ship is parked here. If we go in a straight line, we should be there in no time.”

  “But there are no corridors.”

  “Not yet,” Rakni grinned while charging up his disintegrator. A thick, red energy beam made a hole in the wall of the room, big enough for a Dranik to squeeze through. And in the wall directly behind it. And in 8 further walls, a parked freighter and finally the exterior wall of the station. “Follow me,” said Rakni and squeezed through the first opening.

  They arrived at the docking area rather quickly and without touching any corrosive material.

  “Look, Pokk,” Rakni said while pointing at the exterior hole, which was by now sealed by a force field. “They also have one of these holes, like Koriba Station. Must be the next big thing in space station design.”

  “Rakni, you won’t believe it!” Pokk shouted. “I already double checked, we have 27 new job offers. It really worked.”

  “Told you so! Without competition I can see a bright future ahead of us. Let’s get started. What’s the best offer?”

  Pokk looked through all the offers and soon found something interesting.

  “That sounds very good. They offer 1000 review points and a guaranteed 5-star review for every kill.”

  “Sounds good! And what exactly is it, that we need to kill?”

  “Doesn’t say. But for 1000 points it must be something enormous.”

  “You are right! Let’s go.”

  After a short but bumpy journey the Extermination Brothers arrived at their destination: The Norian Weapons and Arms Research Station, or NOWARS for short.

  Pokk opened an intercom channel to request landing permission, but the reply was unorthodox. “Land wherever you want. They are everywhere! Shoot, as soon as you see one of them!” Pokk heard gunfire, then silence.

  “I don’t think that they have a problem with roaches or ants,” Pokk pointed out.

  “I would not worry too much. This is a weapons research facility. Of course there is gunfire. And those are very busy people, they have better things to do than talk to us. Although I think it is a little bit rude to end a conversation like this. Whatever, let’s just dock somewhere and then we can get started.”

  Pokk docked at the outer landing ring and the two Dranik entered the station. Since they didn’t know what enemy they will find, they wanted to play it safe and took nearly all their equipment with them. Of course they had
Old Roasty and Rakni’s disintegrator, but just to be safe they also carried different types of poison and a few pulse grenades. Rakni also brought an armor breaking missile with him. They lost the missile launcher years ago, but the missile itself was in perfect condition, Rakni ensured his little brother all the time.

  The station looked like a battlefield. The walls were full of holes, made by projectile and energy weapons and thick smoke suggested that even explosives were used here.

  “Those must be some pretty nasty rats,” Pokk noted.

  “I don’t think so. Weapon testing is the job of these people here. Of course this place looks a little messy. I don’t think they have time to clean it all the time.”

  “And where is everyone now?”

  “Lunch, maybe? I don’t know. As long as they give us a good review in the end I really don’t care.”

  As silent as two heavily armed Dranik can be they moved through the corridors, looking for the unknown enemy.

  “Stop!” Rakni suddenly shouted. “I think I heard something. Behind the next bend.”

  Slowly the brothers sneaked forwards only to see an Auto-Ex robot, sneaking in a very similar fashion.

  “They hired Auto-Ex as well!” Rakni yelled angrily. “I can’t believe it.”

  The robot took a quick look at the Extermination Brothers and scanned them. After that, it stated in a distorted voice, “Race: Dranik. Classified as vermin. Exterminate! Exterminate! Exterminate!”

  It rose its arm and fired a few energy blasts at Rakni, who was able to dodge them. His brother immediately retaliated by firing Old Roasty. The outer hull of the robot caught fire, but it was otherwise completely unharmed. It took aim,