Free Theme Planet by Andy Remic Page B

was naked, her bare feet treading softly, and she looked neither left nor
right.
     
    This is humiliating. You should
not be treated like this. You are their top killer, their top assassin! Never
have you failed your task. Not once has your target escaped. You always get the
job done, and done well.
     
    Be quiet, Zi. This is not the
time, nor the place.
     
    Amba continued to walk. She
passed two heavily-armoured, mounted AI machinegun turrets. They could decimate
a human in a heart-beat. Amba ignored their looming menace.
     
    I still think they treat you like
scum. Like a prisoner. You deserve more respect. You deserve more... honour! The FRIEND was hard against her
heart; a machine threat Amba was oh-so-reluctant to use. The FRIEND was the
most savage weapon she’d ever encountered. Simply terrifying.
     
    No, I disagree, Zi. There is no
honour in what I do. And they treat me in the way I would expect they treat any
dangerous, barely controllable animal. I am not proud of what I do, Zi. Killing
is not something I relish... it’s simply a means to an end.
     
    What end?
     
    Amba smiled internally. “Aah, you
cannot see that deep, can you?” Her voice seemed unnaturally loud, metallic and
abrasive in the hollow reverberating corridor. She felt Zi shrink back, like
the toad she was, and Amba found some small gratification in the flash of Zi’s
bright red fury before her dark sister departed.
     
    Amba felt Zi’s mental connection
fade like smoke.
     
    Good fucking riddance, she thought.
     
    The corridor ended, leading to a
massive chamber -more like the inside of some vast aquatic tank. The floor was
corrugated, the walls streaked with rust. High, high above swung several
ancient chains, thick enough to moor an Anti-Grav War Frigate.
     
    Amba looked around for a moment,
lips pursed, searching for weaponry or a threat of any kind. Warily - Amba was
always wary - she strode out towards the centre of the chamber, footsteps
echoing. Then she stood, and folded her arms across her breasts, and waited,
eyes forward, no expression on her gentle features. And that was the problem,
she knew. The way she had been designed. Amba was gently pretty. Not stunningly
beautiful – no - that would defeat the object. She was designed to be typical.
Average. A grey woman. Engineered normality -on the surface, at
least. Until she sprang into action. Until she began the killing...
     
    Amba.
     
    Anarchy Android.
     
    The most lethal lifeform ever
created...
     
    There came a clang, and
across the empty steel tank a wheel spun and a heavy door opened, very much in
the manner of a submarine hatch. A figure stepped through. He wore an
ankle-length black leather coat, and his hair was long and black, slicked back
around neat, powerful features. He strode forwards, and in his right hand he
carried a Zippo lighter, and his thumb constantly flicked the lid open, and
then closed it; open, then closed.
     
    He stopped several paces from Amba,
and stared at her without expression.
     
    She returned his stare, face
neutral.
     
    “Welcome home,” said the man,
finally.
     
    “It is good to be home, Cardinal
Romero,” said Amba, showing just the right amount of formal respect.
     
    Romero stepped forward then and embraced
her, and she held him for a while, thinking how easy it would be to kill him.
But then, why would she kill the man who created her? The man who gave her
life? To all intents, her living God?
     
    “Come with me, Amba. There have
been developments.”
     
    “You have another mission?”
     
    “Yes. Perhaps your most dangerous
yet.”
     
    “They are all the same to me,
Cardinal. Five or five thousand. It just takes more time.”
     
    Romero glanced across at her as
they walked, and he marvelled at her normality. At her modesty. At her...
average features, average physique. And despite everything, despite her
deliberate lack of what were fashionably considered “attractive” qualities in
contemporary society, he was aroused