Freedom Club Read Free

Did you plan any Lebensstörung this evening?”
    “Wha?”
    “Were you planning any LS activity tonight?”
    Choeng stared at Hugo with horrifying condemnation. “Terrori...? I ain’t no damn terrorist! Just trying ta buy some toys for my kids!” Choeng swung his head to and fro. “Gotta have toys on Christmas, I said! It’s wha...it’s wha...”
    Choeng went to sleep as a large puddle of drool fell to the ground. It was sizable and a small mop-up crawler came by to clean it.
    Hugo had all he needed and ripped off the gloves. “Why the hell did you guys call me out tonight? I can look over the recordings, but even without drugs I know he’s not responsible for tonight’s LS.”
    “We didn’t call you out, detective,” replied the officer. “I’m just securing him until the de-foaming crew gets here. You can release him if you like.”
    “Hell, no!” Hugo snapped. “He didn’t back down after he was warned. He’s obviously a threat. Incarcerate him!” Hugo looked to the side thoughtfully. “Still, if you didn’t call me out, what’s behind that workflow?”
    Hugo tossed the gloves on the floor and used his wet hands to bring up the case order again. Drilling down, he saw that the initiator was a technician named Flip Weebles from Vitalli Payment Processing in Tempe, the company that had installed the POS scanners. Hugo grabbed Flip’s embedded phone number and got him online.
    “This is Detective Hugo Kosterlitsky, from the SWCISA. You initiated a workflow related to LS tonight?”
    Flip looked a bit dumbfounded. “Uhm, me? No, I’m just the maintenance technician. They sent me out to fix the downed payment system. But I reported all this to the office. Maybe the Sentient there changed the workflow status.”
    There was that word again, Sentient. It stood for Sentient Being. Not only a perfected form of artificial intelligence, but a human-like artificial consciousness. Biological in nature, Sentients presided over people as administrators, managers, coaches, what have you, making all types of mundane decisions. For the most part, they did a good job. But some people had issues with them. They feared the Sentients’ growing influence over society. Or, seen the other way, they feared man’s diminishing role. It was a philosophical matter for the most part, and as Hugo saw things, an issue of perspective.
    Hugo eyeballed Flip and huffed angrily. “So, there’s no LS activity going on here tonight.”
    “Well, I don’t know if it’s LS, but it sure is strange,” Flip said, chuckling. “Never saw a system so messed up in my life!”
    “What’s strange?” Hugo demanded.
    “Uh, well, it’s hard to explain. Maybe I can show you.”
    “Bring it here. I’ll send you my location.”
    “Might be better if you come down to me,” Flip countered. “The system is too big to move from the machine room, and I still have a lot of work to do if you want this stuff online by morning.”
    Hugo brought up his pathfinder and located Flip somewhere in the northwest basement. It wasn’t too far. Containing his frustration, he reluctantly agreed.
    “Alright, I’m on my way. Don’t move until I get there!”
    “Sure thing,” Flip replied.
    Hugo dropped the call and started toward the maintenance elevator without much thought.
    “Detective, you want me to keep this guy here until you come back?” the DPS officer asked.
    Hugo didn’t look back. “No, he’s all yours!”
    Following a hidden maintenance corridor, Hugo soon found a service elevator that unlocked immediately and whisked him to the basement. Crawlers infested the corridor and scurried about the dimly lit walls using low energy lights, their leg chatter buried beneath the din of thrumming air units. Stepping into the alien environment he looked around to get his bearings. The air reeked heavily of polyurethane and pneumatics.
    Hugo checked the filtered map again and headed through a labyrinth of concrete corridors jam-packed with pipes,