Unwise Child

ouncer chimed. Mike narrowed his eyes and turned on his door screen, which co

Sergean

ike, thumbing the unlocker.

on the screen. Not until the officer finally pushed open the doo

id Mike, "you

," said Cowder. "W

e door to his apartment, stil

een back in

urb anything. I figured maybe your lab bo

ened?" the

ng except the details of his

s phoned me to make sure I was in the room and

think it was a J

having to call him. But if I couldn't do that, I'd aim the launcher and set it to fire by remote control. Then I'd go to the phone, cal

we can go in there now? The HCN

ners; they're still working, and the filters are efficient enough to take care of an awful l

in a few minutes, but they'll probably just confirm

er to the door, and began running it over the tape. It fe

ow where the rock

got a call a few minutes back from t

didn't work easily, but it did open. The odor of bitter almo

pire of the cathedral. "There's your launching site.

he

opped their launcher and two unfired rockets, and then tried to run for it. Result: one dead kid, one getaway. One of the cops

n an oath, except that it avoided all mention of the Dei

er. "You think you k

hat most of the damage had been restricted to glass and ceramics. The furniture had been tumbled around but not bad

all the way home from Harry's. Nothing I could lay my finger on, really. I tried to see i

f their members got picked up, so they decided to teach me a lesson. One of them must have come up here, even before I left Harry's. The other followed me, just to make sure I was really coming ho

ed squads are rounding up the whole bunch for questioning. They call thems

thing that gets me is this revenge business, though. Kid

le different. The girl you caught and the boy who got

t," Mike said. "

off. Larchmont's the name. The kids are Susan and Herbert-Sue and Bert to you. Bert's s

wall to look at his Dali. It had fallen to the floor, but it wasn'

shed figurine and looking at it. "I wonder if the s

han I'd care to think of. The mother was married before. Divorced her

d if it wasn't that, the sociologists woul

ade good grades in school, joined the Space Service, has a perfectly clean rec

t ought to be food for h

at's probably the lab boys. I told them to come over

hen Cowder identified the men

most a professional job. TNT war head, surrounded by a jacket filled with liquid HCN and a phosphate inhibitor to prevent polymerizati

"Well, the room's all yours. It

Perkins, "but we'll

on the shoulder. "I'd like

office. He opened his desk drawer and took out the littl

ber? I got to thinking that maybe this could have caused it. I think that with a little more po

ly. "Maybe the kids will go on to using something else if vibroblades don't w

You know-if you're one of the real biggies, you carry a vibro. A year from now, it mig

o his coat pocket. "Thanks again, Mr. G