[ID]entity by PJ Manney

Author:PJ Manney [Manney, PJ]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2017-10-10T06:00:00+00:00

After 20.7 minutes, a dinghy came to rest at the base of the rocks. A man jumped out of the dinghy and came straight for Tom 2.

Time to play dead. Tom 2 made anything that still worked look like it didn’t. His only thought: Take me with you.

A deep voice, from the area of the dinghy, yelled in Wenzhou dialect, “Well? Broken or not?”

Tom 2 was shifted, dangled, inspected. He released all his joints and didn’t move or focus his eyes. He looked like a life-sized marionette.

In a high-pitched voice, the man holding him answered, “Nothing works.” He tried to lift Tom 2. “This thing’s heavy! Help me.”

“Leave it for the tide,” said Deep Voice.

“You’re nuts,” said High Voice. “One cousin has a doll factory and another does electronics. They could copy this in a week. Think of the money we’ll make. Better than whale shark, tuna, even kidnapping!”

“We need to get rid of it before we hand off the hakgwei,” said Deep Voice. “Don’t want trouble.”

A quick search of hakgwei found it as a derogatory Mandarin term for a dark-skinned foreigner, literally “black ghost.”

Cai/Ye was correct. The fishing boat carried Dr. Who. And it sounded like they had her alive.

Tom 2 heard footsteps, then had a sense of being dragged by four arms, even though his tactile sensors were offline.

“Watch out!” said Deep Voice.

They dropped him and leapt for higher ground. Tom 2 heard the wave coming in, then the gurgle of water in his circuits. Qi Jiguang’s lesson was clear. Beware of wannabe pirates, regardless of who they worked for. Real pirates would have done a better job.

Then, silence. His audio apparatus had failed. He had failed. He would never find Dr. Who.

Then, nothing.

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