Free Steamrolled by Pauline Baird Jones Page A

appearance, it looked like a mutation of a car and an upside down train, with a little rocket ship stirred in. An inverted fan of dark metal at the front could be rolled back to reveal a view port or window shield. The wheels resembled those on an old stagecoach, but were metal and black. The surface was also black and a bit dusty. It appeared to be made from sheets of metal fastened together with rivets. In addition to the wheels it had a series of fins along the side and front. The wheels were retracted, the bug-like legs weren’t. There would be a hatch on the other side.
    He took another step toward it. Emily did too. She reached out as if afraid it was a mirage, and poked it with her finger.
    “It’s real.”
    “Yes.” He felt like the moment called for more, but didn’t know what that more might be.
    The edges of her mouth curved up. One finger became five, and then both hands made white fans against the dark surface. She leaned in and hugged it. Robert felt a stab of jealousy that made his nanites snicker.
    “I’m going to need a bigger museum.” The words came out on a delighted sigh.
    He looked at Ric and Carey, and peripherally, Fyn. Carey shrugged. Ric looked away. As if she sensed the attempted plot against her right of ownership, Emily turned, her back against the machine now, her posture defensive and unafraid of facing four guys, all of them bigger than she was. Not that she was in danger from them, but she didn’t know that. The angle of her chin told him she didn’t care.
    “It’s in my museum. It belongs to me.”
    “She has a point,” Carey said, not helpfully. “Though you are going to have a tough time explaining how it got here.”
    “I’ll think of something.” She turned back and hugged it again. It hissed steam, though whether it was a positive or negative response was unclear. Her hands swept up, started down. Stopped. She looked up. “Someone bent my bug.”
    Robert studied the spot, then looked at Carey.
    He shook his head, indicted the other side with the jerk of his chin.
    Robert touched the surface now, surprised to find it warm. He’d expected hot, with the steam still venting from the rear of the machine. He spread his hand across the surface, processing the sensation of touching, feeling an impossible machine, his fingers sliding into the indentation. Despite the veracity of the witnesses he had not, until this moment, believed this thing was real. His nanites dived in, as curious as he was, deploying drones. The nanites had, on occasion, been able to seize control of various ships’ systems in the Garradian Universe, and the hope was that they could do the same with the transmogrification machine. His link with them was active and easy this close, but thanks to his mental ability to multitask, he could continue to process other data, and watch Emily. He didn’t mind admitting that he liked watching Emily more than processing data.
    Her eyes widened. Her brows pulled together. Had she seen the brief flash of light that indicated nanite movement? Surely now she’d ask? Instead she stared. In some ways, it was more effective than a question. Did she do it on purpose? Her need to not ask warred with his need not to tell. She had more practice, but they had an audience that didn’t know about the nanites. That trumped her need to not ask, but still get answers. Or should have. He turned from the imperative he wasn’t sure he could resist and headed around the machine to the hatch.
    Emily—and her imperative—followed. So did his team.
    Robert studied the surface, looking for evidence that disputed Carey’s story about his original encounter with the bug. Instead he found the dent. Right where he said it would be. Size fit the bruise that almost took out Carey’s portal tracking device during his accidentally aborted test flight through the Garradian space-time portal.
    Emily reached up and touched the dent, her hand too small to fill it, her brows drawn together, but