Artificial Condition (The Murderbot Diaries #2) - Martha Wells Page 0,39

its feet and charged me, I caught it, went down on my back, and flung it off and over my head. I twisted around and up to my knees but couldn’t get all the way up due to the wound in my right thigh. The sexbot shoved upright and I grabbed its leg and popped the knee out of the socket. It went down and I took out its left shoulder joint. Slamming it down to the deck, I turned to see Tlacey reaching for one of the fallen weapons. I said, “Touch that weapon and I’ll take it away from you and insert it into your rib cage.”

She froze. She was panting from fear, eyes staring. I said, “Tell your sexbot to stop fighting.”

It was still struggling to get up and it was just going to hurt itself further. Especially if it made me mad again.

Tlacey straightened slowly, her jaw working, and the sexbot relaxed. I said, ART, cut off Tlacey’s feed.

Done, ART said.

Tlacey winced as her feed went down. I told Tlacey, “Give the sexbot a verbal command to obey me until further notice. Try to give it any other command and I’ll rip your tongue out.”

Tlacey huffed out a breath, then said, “Unit, obey the crazy rogue SecUnit until further notice.” To me, she said, “You need to get better threats.”

I put a hand on the nearest chair seat and shoved myself to my feet. “I don’t make threats, I’m just telling you what I’m going to do.”

Her jaw hardened. Two of the humans in the room had stopped breathing, the unarmed one that the guard had shot while aiming for me and the first one I had shot. Tlacey hadn’t noticed.

I looked down at the sexbot, which looked up at me. “Stay down,” I said.

It sent me an acknowledgment. I stepped over it, grabbed Tlacey’s arm, and dragged her down the corridor to the cabin where her guard had taken Tapan.

She said quickly, “So you’re a free agent, right? I can give you a job. Whatever you want—”

I thought, You don’t have anything I want. I said, “All you had to do was give them the fucking files and none of us would be in this situation.”

The look she threw back at me was startled, incredulous. I didn’t sound like her idea of a SecUnit, rogue or otherwise, I guess.

Humans should really do more research. There were operating manuals that would have warned her not to fuck with us.

Tlacey stopped at a closed hatch, said, “Bassom, it’s me,” and hit the release. The door slid up.

Tapan was half sprawled across the bunk on the far wall, blood spreading across the flower pattern on her T-shirt, drops of it splashed on the brown skin of the bare arm pressed against the wound in her side. Her raspy breath sounded loud in the small cabin. The bodyguard stared at us, eyes wide.

“He panicked when he heard the shots,” Tlacey gasped. “You can’t—”

Oh yeah, I could.

I swung Tlacey to shield me as the bodyguard brought up his weapon. Multiple shots hit her back but I’d already crushed her windpipe. I took another projectile in the chest as I crossed the cabin, threw him against the wall, jammed my arm up under his chin, and triggered my energy weapon.

I stepped back and let his body drop.

I turned away from it and leaned over Tapan. I said, stupidly, “It’s me.” Her eyes were shut and she was breathing through gritted teeth. I clamped my hand over the wound to stop the bleeding and said, ART, help.

ART said, I’ve been guiding the shuttle toward the transit ring, where I can dock it with myself. ETA is seventeen minutes. MedSystem is prepping for your arrival.

I sank down beside Tapan. She was just conscious enough to reach over and squeeze my hand. I pulled the useless combat override module out of the back of my neck and tossed it away.

I had made a huge mistake, which seemed blindingly obvious in hindsight. I had known the invitation to exchange the signing bonus for the files was a trap from the beginning and I should have convinced Rami and the others not to return to RaviHyral. The augmented human security consultant I was pretending to be would have done that. I was used to taking orders from humans and trying to mitigate whatever damage their stupid ideas did to them, but I had wanted to work with a group again, I had enjoyed how they had