Free Runaway Heart by Stephen J. Cannell Page A

the van. It is dark outside.
          Night. . . the word coming to Pan in Geega talk, which sometimes
happens now.
          "Up there, Pan," Dave points. "Thirty floors
up," he says, pointing at a high place on the huge building across the street.
Then Dave takes out a picture of a strange-looking Geega and shows it to Pan.
          "This is our enemy," Dave says.
          Pan takes the picture in his gray-white fingers. The Geega enemy
looks skinny and small. "I'll direct you from here," Dave says.
"Pan, you must fetch the lightbox! You must kill this Geega!" Dave
points to the headset around Pan's neck: "Dave will talk over the radio
and get Pan to the right spot," he says. "It's on this corner."
The alpha Geega points at a spot on the side of the building. Dave looks right
at Pan. Pan immediately drops his head, turns around, and presents. It is
forbidden to look into the alpha's eyes, so Pan offers his privates in a show
of respect.
          "Not now, Pan. Do you understand where to go?" Dave says
as he opens the door of the van.
          Pan pushes a button on his talk machine. The mechanical voice
responds. "Yes."
          Dave puts the leather gloves with the suction pads on Pan's four hands
and buckles them on tight.
          "I'll be watching from here, so keep the camera on," the
alpha Geega instructs as he taps the little glass eye on the front of Pan's
metal vest. "Now go. Fetch. Kill."
          Pan is out of the vehicle, moving fast, his speed and strength on
full display now. He reaches the glass building then starts up the side, going
faster and faster. He climbs up the rounded glass, all four hands gripping the
walls with the suction pads the Geegas designed for wall walking. Pan glimpses
the inside of rooms as he scales the glass tower.
          "Further right," Dave's voice is loud in Pan's ear. Pan
has to stop to remember. . . right. . . right is the machine side, so he
reaches over, secures his suctioned tentacle on the window, then walks sideways
across the glass to the next set of windows on the tower. Again he hears the
alpha Geega speaking through the earpiece:
          "Okay, stop. That's far enough. Now, up, Pan, up." So
Pan climbs higher, walking right up the side of the glass structure, pausing
once to look down, hanging in that moment by only one extender. . . dangerous
but secure. He looks down and sees the lights of the city. Again he has a
shadow memory. He is somewhere else for that instant, lost in darkness, a
lifetime away, his primal thoughts suddenly of warmth and sharing — shadows that
sometimes hit him at moments like this. Suddenly, he wants to ride through
space and time on the long, green, fertile arcs against dark shadows. He
doesn't really know what any of this is, or why he cares, or where he came
from; he just knows these are shadow feelings from some other lifetime, and
they haunt him.
          "Up, Pan, up." Dave, the alpha Geega commands, so Pan
keeps climbing until, finally, Dave says, "Stop!"
          Pan obeys. He looks in at the room where he is hanging. He sees
nothing but Geega things and a light coming from a second room.
          "Go, Pan. Fetch the lightbox. Kill!" And now Pan finds
the edge of the window. With his strong, bony, gloved fingers, he hooks his
hands under the frame and pulls. Pan is powerful, with more strength than ten
Geegas. He once pulled many Geegas across a field. Although he is smaller than
a Geega, he has very special muscles.
          He hears the metal window frame pop as he bends it open. Finally,
using all his strength, the opening is wide enough for him to crawl through.
          Pan slips his hairy body and its bulky vest of metal lights
through the window and lands on his front extenders, walking that way for a
moment before slowly bringing his other extenders down until he is on all
fours. His pink nose sniffs for danger. His Geega-like ears listen for sound.
He hears a clicking noise in