The Knights of the Black Earth Read Online Free PDF Page A

known as Outer Rankin.
    Only the most
important clients were ever permitted to enter the agency’s corporate
headquarters, which was why the receptionist—a live, human receptionist—placed
her finger on the security button when the cyborg walked through the main
doors.
    It was a long walk
from the main doors—steelglass, blast-proof—across the polished floor to the
receptionist’s desk, and so she had time to get a good look at the cyborg. He
had obviously made a mistake.
    The Wiedermann
Agency took on cyborgs as clients, but such cyborgs were sophisticated types.
Expensive body jobs. Not even their own mothers could have guessed they were
more metal than flesh. Plastiskin and flesh-foam, muscle-gel and
quiet-as-a-whisper motors, battery packs and pumps enabled most cyborgs to
blend in with ordinary flesh-and-blood beings, the main difference being that
cyborgs always tended to look just a bit too perfect—as if they’d been
tailor-made, not picked up off the rack.
    This particular
cyborg was, however, what the receptionist would classify (did classify, for
security purposes) as “hard labor.” Most planets sent their convicted felons to
hard-labor camps. Located on frontier planets or moons, these camps were
generally mining communities or agricultural collectives. The work was hard,
physical, and often dangerous. Those prisoners injured in accidents were
provided cybernetic limbs and other body parts made to be strong, efficient,
and cheap—not cosmetic.
    This cyborg was
bald. Acid burn scars mottled the skin on his head. His eyes—one of which was
real, both of which were dark and brooding—were set deep beneath an overhanging
forehead. His right hand was flesh, his left hand metal.
    The security
diagnostic that came up on the receptionist’s recessed screen disclosed that
seventy percent of the cyborg’s body was artificial: left side, hand, leg, foot,
face, skull, ear, eye. But the receptionist could see this for herself. Unlike
any other cyborg she had encountered, this one scorned to hide his replacement
parts. In fact, he appeared to flaunt them.
    He wore combat
fatigues that had been cut off at the hip on the left leg, revealing a broad
expanse of gleaming, compartmented, and jointed metal. The left sleeve of his
shirt was rolled up over the metal arm, revealing a series of LED lights that
flickered occasionally, performing periodic systems checks. His metal hand
could apparently be detached from the wrist, to judge by the locking mechanism,
and replaced with different hands—or tools.
    His age was
indeterminate, scar tissue having replaced most of the original flesh of his
face. But the right half of his body—the half that was still human—was in
excellent physical condition. Arm muscles bulged; chest and thigh muscles were
smooth, well defined. He walked with a peculiar gait, as if the two halves of
his body weren’t quite in sync with one another.
    Truly, he was one
of the worst cyber-jobs the receptionist had ever seen.
    “I would have
sued,” she muttered to herself, and put on the Wiedermann smile, which would be
completely wasted on this man, who had probably come in to use the toilet.
    “Good morning,
sir,” said the receptionist, giving the cyborg the smile but not the Wiedermann
warmth that was reserved for paying clients. “How can I help you?” She could
hear, as the cyborg approached the desk, the faint hum of his machinery.
    “The name’s Xris,”
he said, a mechanical tinge to his voice. “I received a subspace transmission.
Told to be here, this building, eleven hundred hours.” He glanced around
without curiosity, but appeared to note in one swift overview every object in
the large room, including—from a momentary pause and stare—the surveillance
devices.
    The receptionist
was confused for a moment, then remembered.
    “You’re applying
for the janitor’s job. I’m afraid you’ve made a mistake. They should have told
you to use the rear