“So come on, what are our options?” said Caitlin impatiently.
Toby shrugged. “Go down there and hope that a sub-zero environment is outside its programming range, I guess.”
“Well come on, let’s do it.”
Toby didn’t move. “What do you think, Eve?”
The robot pointed at the trail they had been following. “Greater probability of survival continuing to follow this trail.”
Toby nodded, seeing that the trail lead to the training camp. “Let’s get moving.”
They started walking down the trail, Scotty scampering along behind. As they progressed down the hillside, the sun seemed to keep pace with them, sinking lower and lower in the sky, illuminating the ice with a succession of crimson and pinky-purple hues. And the lower they walked, the lower Caitlin’s heart sank, filling with a deep sense of foreboding. She realized Marty was becoming nervous as well, gradually slowing his pace and allowing Toby to overtake him and take the lead. They reached the bottom of the hill and Caitlin saw that the trail lead directly to a hole smashed into the wall. “What’s that?” she said, pointing.
Toby examined the hole and saw that rubble was strewn on the ice inside the stadium. “Whatever made this trail smashed its way into here”, he said.
Caitlin peered over Toby’s shoulder and pointed to an identical hole in the far wall of the training camp, next to a large refrigeration plant. “And then smashed its way out again.”
“Looks that way”, said Toby. He cautiously entered the training camp, Eve following.
Marty hovered at the entrance, stepping aside for Caitlin. “Ladies first”, he said.
Caitlin shot him a suspicious look and then stepped into the training camp. The icy cold hit her immediately, seeping into her sweat-soaked clothes. She shivered then followed Toby and Eve further inside, her breath steaming. She looked around apprehensively. The training camp resembled an ice-hockey stadium, only instead of a flat sheet of ice it rippled with whirls and indentations, simulating a wind-blown arctic landscape.
A figure loomed out of the darkness and Caitlin’s heart leaped before she realized it was Marty.
“Sorry…” Marty whispered. He looked around the stadium admiringly. “The design team really excelled themselves with this.” He glanced up at a small camera set into the perimeter wall and shook his head ruefully. “Shame no one apart from us is gonna see it.”
Something about Marty’s tone didn’t sound convincing and Caitlin nervously looked around the deserted training camp. “So where are these Ice Warriors then?”
Marty pointed to a door at the far end of the stadium. “Down there, still deactivated. Come on, let’s catch up with Toby.”
Caitlin turned to look for Scotty and saw he was still at the entrance, sniffing the ice suspiciously. “Come on, boy”, she called. The robot dog barked uncertainly, then leaped onto the ice. His legs splayed like a new-born lamb, then he found his footing, his tiny metal paws scrabbling on the ice. He joined Caitlin and she continued across the ice plain, reassured to have Scotty trotting at her side.
The moon rose, transforming the stadium into a polar landscape. Caitlin paused for a second, gazing up at the blue-black velvety sky, the stars twinkling brightly. She realized that this was the first time they had been free of the jungle canopy, allowing a sweeping, unobscured view of the sky.
Caitlin shivered, suddenly having the uncomfortable sensation she was being observed. She looked around her and saw that there were more cameras set into the perimeter wall at regular intervals. She watched them out of the corner of her eye as she walked and couldn’t shake the feeling that they were tracking her progress across the ice sheet. With relief she saw Toby and Eve were waiting for her further ahead. “I don’t think this is such a good idea”, she whispered to Toby.
“We haven’t much choice”, said Toby.
They started walking again, the ice rising up into a jagged hill. They climbed it with difficulty, their feet scrabbling for a foothold on the ice. They reached the summit and Toby pointed at the perimeter wall on the other side of the stadium. “Look, we’re nearly there”, he said encouragingly. “And with a bit of luck we’ve thrown De Coza’s mob off our trail.”
Caitlin nodded uneasily, seeing the route they were about to take passed a series of shadowy caves, each one large enough to conceal an Ice Warrior robot. She looked around and saw there were several other exits leading out of the stadium. “Maybe we should try a new direction, just to make sure?”
Eve decisively pointed to the hole in the perimeter wall where the trail continued. “Greater probability of survival continuing in this direction.”
“Why does it keep saying that?” said Caitlin irritably. “What’s so great about this direction?”
“I don’t know”, said Toby, “but as long as we’re still heading in the direction of the ship let’s give her the benefit of doubt.”
They trekked down the other side of the hill towards the perimeter wall. Caitlin approached each cave with trepidation, fully expecting an Ice Warrior to leap out on her. But the caves revealed themselves to be nothing but empty pockets of ice and they reached the wall without incident.
“See, I told you there was nothing to worry about”, said Marty, sounding half relieved, half disappointed.
Toby didn’t answer, his attention caught by the refrigeration plant next to the hole in the perimeter wall. He walked nearer and saw that part of the pipeline running from the machinery had been destroyed. Ice-cold glyco spurted from the broken pipe like a fountain, flooding over the wall to the jungle outside.
“What the hell happened here?” said Marty.
“The pipe must have got smashed up by whatever made the hole”, said Caitlin. She saw something embedded in the ice and stooped to pick it up. It was a long shred of rubber, black and frayed at the edges.
“What’s that?” said Marty, looking over her shoulder.
Caitlin thoughtfully ran her thumb down the serrated imprint rubber. She sniffed it and pulled a face at the acrid stench of burnt rubber. “Looks like part of the Boston Wrangler’s caterpillar track.”
“The Wrangler?” said Marty surprised. “You think that’s what made the trail we’ve been following?”
“It’s possible.” Caitlin looked at Eve thoughtfully. “So why’s she got us following the Boston Wrangler?”
“Hey, take a look at this!” yelled Toby excitedly.
CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO
VICTORIAN LONDON
Caitlin turned and realized that Toby had left the ice arena. She rushed to the hole and peered through and her eyes widened in astonishment. It was like she was looking through a portal into another world. Toby was standing in a Victorian English square. Tall, imposing houses with bay windows faced onto a communal garden surrounded by iron railings. Grubby, terraced streets branched off from the square, the red brickwork grimy and soot-stained. A public house stood at the end of a narrow alley, its sign reading The Ten Bells.
Caitlin stepped into the urban landscape, ducking under the torrent of glyco that cascaded over the wall. She gazed around her in wonder, the cold air steaming her breath. The moon was full, bathing the icy Victorian streets in an eerie glow. She walked towards Toby, the ground slippery with frozen Glyco. “Wow, what is this place?” she murmured.
Marty’s voice suddenly rang out, making them both jump. “I’m not a butcher, nor a Yid, nor yet a foreign skipper”, he intoned theatrically. “I’m your own lighthearted friend, yours truly, Jack the Ripper.”
Toby and Caitlin stared at Marty and he started to laugh. “This is what we’ve got lined up for our Halloween special in a few months’ time. I had the idea of the Toymaker building a Ripper-Robot to terrorize London. This is his Whitechapel training camp.”
Caitlin looked around her again and realized that houses in the square were just hollow wooden shells, arranged in front of a painted backdrop. She looked up and down the gloomy street nervously. “And where exactly is this Ri
pper-Robot?”
“Currently in the robot designer’s blueprints file”, said Marty, with a reassuring smile.
Toby and Caitlin traded uneasy looks. “Come on, let’s keep moving”, said Toby.
They started walking again, Eve leading them through the icy square, and Caitlin realized the set looked much larger than it actually was. The rows of slum tenement buildings receding into the distance behind the square were actually a series of painted backdrops, cleverly arranged to give the illusion of depth. Here and there jungle foliage had encroached the set, tendrils and creepers climbing the walls of the terraced houses and bursting through the cloth backdrop.
“So how come this ice doesn’t melt?” asked Toby, scooping up a handful and examining it.
“It does, but just very slowly”, replied Marty. “They developed it for the Winter Olympics, it uses this special polymer. Pretty neat, huh?”
They resumed walking, passing the pub and Caitlin lingered, peering through the old-fashioned, panelled window. Shadowy waxwork figures were arranged in a Victorian tableau as if frozen in time. Market porters and tradesmen were gathered around a piano, swigging tankards of ale, enjoying a sing-along. One or two city toffs wearing top hats and cloaks were dotted among the crowd, being propositioned by women in feathered hats and low-cut dresses.
Caitlin turned away from the window, then paused, unsure whether she saw one of the figures in the pub move slightly. She turned to the robot dog who was waiting for her patiently. “Scotty? Here, boy.” She patted the window ledge and Scotty jumped up onto it. Caitlin trained the robot dog’s glowing eyes on the row of waxwork figures;
Sailor…
Barman…
Victorian gent…
She froze as the light revealed a dark figure wearing a white goaltenders hockey mask.
The Ice Warrior slowly turned to look at Caitlin and she backed away from the window, almost paralysed with terror. With a fluid movement, the robot launched itself at the window, legs outstretched in a lethal kung-fu kick. The glass exploded into fragments and the Ice Warrior hurtled through the air towards Caitlin, its razor-sharp ice skates slicing towards her neck.
CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE
THE ICE WARRIORS
Caitlin recoiled and her feet shot away from under her on the slippery ice. She crashed to the ground and the Ice Warrior sailed overhead, its gleaming ice skates skimming past her scalp. The robot landed cat-like on its feet, spraying up a sheet of ice shavings, then swivelled around to face Caitlin again.
Caitlin scrabbled to her feet and started to run down the street, her feet slipping and sliding on the ice. The Ice Warrior skated effortlessly after her, lithe hydraulic muscles clad in skin-tight black nylon. She risked a look behind her and saw the robot was gaining on her, its white fibre-glass face blank and expressionless, the eye sockets black empty hollows.
She turned a corner and saw Toby and Marty rushing towards her, alerted by the sound of smashing glass. “There’s something after me”, she panted, “one of those Ice Warrior things!”
Toby shot Marty a furious look. “Come on, let’s get out of here!”
They turned towards the jungle and were greeted by the terrifying sight of a squad of Ice Warriors skating in formation towards them, arms and legs moving in synchronization, white hockey masks glinting in the moonlight like skulls.
“Run!” Toby yelled.
They scattered in all directions.
Marty weaved through the backstreets, pursued by a pair of Ice Warriors. He ran along the back of the square then pelted down a narrow alley, the click and swish of the approaching ice-skating robots getting louder and louder. He sprinted to the end of the alley and reached the edge of the set where the ice petered out. The Ice Warriors skidded to a halt and stared after Marty as he scrambled through the thick vegetation to safety. Both robots took a couple of tentative steps off the ice, wobbled precariously, then retreated back to the set.
They turned in search of easier prey and saw Caitlin run past the alley, another Ice Warrior on her tail. They eagerly joined in the hunt, chasing her down a side street. Caitlin raced forwards, the frozen air burning her lungs. She skidded around a corner and saw a street market further along the street. Hope surged within her, seeing that the ice abruptly ended near the first market stall. She sprinted forwards—
BANG! Caitlin crashed full-pelt into some sort of invisible wall. She flew backwards and fell to the ice, winded. She painfully climbed to her feet and realized with dismay that the market she was running towards was just a painted backdrop stretched across the street.
The three Ice Warriors swooped towards Caitlin, sensing blood, and she spun round frantically, searching for an escape route. She saw that the impact of her collision had created a small tear in the canvas. She clawed open the fabric backdrop and tumbled through the cloth just as the first Ice Warrior reached her.
Caitlin found herself in a pitch-black corridor of space, formed by one backdrop resting against another. Awkwardly she started to run, edging sideways down the narrow gap. Something brushed her nose and she stifled a scream realizing it was only the coarse fabric of the backdrop. She forced herself onwards into the black void, trying not to think of spiders or snakes or scorpions or a million other jungle creepy-crawlies that could be nesting between the two backdrops. She paused for a second and twisted her head, checking to see if the Ice Warriors had followed her. All was quiet, the only sound her heartbeat thudding in her chest.
SLASH! An ice-skate blade abruptly sliced open the fabric backdrop inches away from her face and Caitlin screamed as a white expressionless face loomed through the gap. Splayed metal fingers grasped the ripped fabric and tore open a large opening, and Caitlin realized with horror that the Ice Warrior was climbing in after her. She screamed again and started to run, shuffling crab-like down the dark claustrophobic corridor. She turned and saw that the robot was now hobbling after her, its ice skates click-clacking on the concrete. More Ice Warriors appeared behind it, a cluster of white bobbing faces just visible in the darkness. Whimpering in terror, Caitlin ran onwards.
Not far away, in the middle of the square, Eve battled against a pack of Ice Warriors, a spinning, weaving, killing-machine. Toby stood at the sidelines watching with a mixture of helplessness and pride as his robot savagely dismembered and decapitated one robot after the next. She dispatched the final Ice Warrior and the deafening clang of blade against blade abruptly ceased.
Toby suddenly became aware that Caitlin was screaming and he looked around him in confusion. A terraced street opposite the square caught his eye, the brickwork seeming to bulge outwards. It split open and Caitlin tumbled through the hole in the backdrop onto the ice. She scrambled to her feet and started to run. Three Ice Warriors slashed their way out from the canvas backdrop and glided menacingly after her.
“Come on!” Toby yelled to Eve and started running towards Caitlin.
Two of the Ice Warriors turned as Toby and Eve approached, ready to fight. Toby frantically unshouldered his backpack, searching for a weapon. The lead Ice Warrior swooped towards him and Toby fumbled the backpack, dropping it. He suddenly remembered the screwdriver in his shirt pocket and yanked it out. He rammed it into the speeding Ice Warrior’s eye socket and the robot keeled over, sparks fizzing from its hockey mask.
Eve decapitated the second Ice Warrior with a casual karate chop to the neck, leaving Caitlin to deal with the final robot.
Caitlin heard the swish of skates behind her and realized the Ice Warrior was fast closing in on her. She faced the robot, knowing she was unable to outrun it.
“Come on, Caitlin!” Toby yelled. “You can fight this thing, I know you can!”
Toby’s words were meant as encouragement but they had the opposite effect on Caitlin. Suddenly the memories of a hundred karate championship fights came flooding back to her; the confidence, the self-assurance, the trust she placed in her body to do exactly the right move at exactly the right time. But that was before the a
ccident and she knew with bleak certainty that her instincts had deserted her. Her body felt stiff and unresponsive and she realized she was shivering, partly because of the cold but mainly with fear.
The Ice Warrior picked up speed, arms powering, building up momentum.
“Caitlin, move!” Toby shouted.
But Caitlin didn’t move, rooted to the spot with terror. The Ice Warrior launched itself into the air, legs scissoring. Caitlin threw up her hands to protect herself and one of the robot’s ice skates sliced through her arm, severing it just above the elbow. And the last thing she felt as she crumpled back into a faint, worse than the fear, even worse than the pain, was a terrible sense of shame and disappointment in herself. She blacked out, collapsing into a heap on the ice next to her severed arm.
CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR
LOST ON THE ICE
De Coza’s convoy entered the ice stadium through the hole in the perimeter wall. As soon as Blast Furnace rolled onto the ice the robot started to slow, uncertain which direction to head. It faltered to a halt and De Coza turned impatiently to McBride. “What’s the matter with it?”
McBride inspected Blast Furnace’s heat-sensor monitor then looked dubiously around at the ice-field that surrounded them. “She’s not built for this sort of environment”, he said apologetically. “It’s way off her programming spectrum.”
De Coza cursed, kicking the side of Blast Furnace. “Useless piece of junk!”
“Take it easy”, said McBride angrily. “We were going to have to stop to charge-up anyway.”
“So now what do we do now?” asked Kennedy.
“Try to find a power source for these robots, I guess”, replied McBride.
“And then what?” demanded De Coza. He pointed to all the doors leading from the ice stadium. “They could have gone anywhere!”
CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE
THE SEVERED ARM
Eve followed the trail through the jungle, Caitlin’s body slung over her shoulder. Toby and Marty followed, Scotty trotting after them. They reached a clearing and Toby called over to Eve. “This will be okay, put her down here.”
Eve unceremoniously dumped Caitlin’s body on the ground and Toby shot the robot an exasperated look. He knelt down next to Caitlin to examine her injured arm and Marty stared in shock at the wires and synthetic muscles, cleanly sheared through. “What the hell…?”