CHAPTER 10

While it should have caught someone's attention, no one seemed suspicious of the energetic bot that entered the casino, strangely through the front door. The fact that it immediately resumed its position at the front desk didn't send signals of intrusion, but that it was promptly getting back to work—even though there was no reason for it to be accessing the room database when it didn't have a client, or to be using the front door rather than the service door. And why should anyone notice? Robots were generally reliable and didn't need constant supervision. It would take a fairly noticeable malfunction to occur, or for someone to complain before a bot drew any attention to itself.

"Room 674," Zee noted to himself as it would be contradictory for him to speak such information out loud while pretending to be a bot. If he was with Ro, and she'd been looking over his shoulder, he would have read it out loud for her benefit.

But, she wasn't with him, and every second he was away from her, the potential for her to end up in a dangerous situation was growing greater. Even though he was sure that she was still sleeping in her bed, unaware of his absence, nightmarish thoughts of someone breaking into the room without him there concerned him, but more worriedly, the thought that Ro would come looking for him if he wasn't there when she woke up. He couldn't count on her to be sensible and wait in the hotel room for him, expecting him to return. She was just as daring as he was sometimes, and possibly even as much as a risk taker.

In any other instance, he might trust her not to come looking for him, but not this time. With his inkling from earlier, she'd know what was on his mind, and what he was doing right now. He had to hope that she didn't wake up and that she didn't find out, because there would be no sound reason he could give her for his audacity.

Struggling to withhold his anticipation, Zee made his way to the elevators, and then pushed the button for the sixth floor. He changed his appearance in the privacy inside the elevator by himself. This was it. The elevator doors opened on the sixth floor. He turned right, as the rooms guide directed.

The hallway was silent, as it should be. Everyone on the floor was resting quietly. He stopped in front of room 674. Everything was quiet here too. He hesitated. What if he opened the door and it wasn't the person he was looking for? What excuse would he give them? Or what if no one was there? Should he keep looking around? Being a doctor, he imagined Dr. Anderson would retire early to bed, and wouldn't be out this late at night. But… what if he was there when he opened the door? Zee imagined he'd first apologize for the intrusion, then would get right to the point. He wouldn't let this precious time be used unwisely. It painfully reminded him of the small bit of time he'd had with Dr. Selig. He hadn't even gotten to tell him that he was Zeta before Dr. Selig's assistant had pulled him away to the emergency escape pods. And then… He didn't wish to think about it. If he concentrated too hard on the negative things in life, he'd miss out on all of the good things there were left for him.

He reached out to knock on the door first. It would be the polite thing to do, but on a second thought, the element of surprise seemed more important than polite manners. Instead, he reached for the door handle. The cable in his wrist snaked out, and began to decode the lock. The door unlocked, and he was able to turn the handle.

There was only one light turned on in the far corner of the room. It was a reading lamp, which had not been left on accidentally, but was appearing to be providing sufficient light for the man sitting in the chair beneath it to read his book by.

Zee cautiously entered the room. He couldn't tell if the man was still awake, or if he'd fallen asleep reading. The lack of an alarmed response to his intrusion into the room seemed to prove that he was sleeping, but his upright posture and the way his head hasn't rolled off to either side didn't make it seem like he was sleeping. He looked closely at his eyes. It was hard to discern if they were closed or lowered because he was looking at the page. "Dr. Anderson?" Zee finally had the nerve to ask.

"Zeta," the man mumbled, lifting his eyes to meet his. "I've been expecting you."

"You have?" Zee naively replied.

"Of course."

Zee turned around suddenly, as he heard the door to the room right behind him opening. But, it was too late. He was surrounded on both sides, as while he turned to face the agent in the room behind him, he heard the shot come from behind him, from Dr. Anderson…

He was immobilized in the energy force field. So, Ro was right. Dr. Anderson was really an undercover agent. He should have detected that he was wearing cosmetic make-up, and that he really wasn't the person he was looking for. Then, as be tried to further analyze the situation around him, his motor functions shut down and he lost the ability to differentiate who or what was around him. He tried to reach behind him to pull off the spider-like inhibitor, but then another one was thrown. The agents were prepared for him. He couldn't pry the inhibitors off and evade the barrage of retaining cords. There were too many of them. The binary code of his processor began running, "01010010…" It had been spelling the thought that was about to cross his mind before everything shut down. However, it only got as far as "R".

Ro sleepily looked over towards the window. She was about to roll over and go back to sleep when she realized that Zee was not indeed by the window as she'd almost dreamed he had been. Unalarmed, she looked to another corner of the room. No Zee. She rolled over onto her back and sat up slightly. It was hard to focus on anything in the room because of the lack of light, but she was certain that if there was a large man in the room, she'd have recognized the shape, no matter how little light there was. "Zee?" she called out. If he was in the room, she certainly wasn't seeing him. Or was he trying to hide from her?

There was no answer. "Light," she called out. The lights didn't turn on. And why should they? This was a cheap hotel, that didn't feel it was worth installing automatic light sensors. She turned towards the night stand, and began to fumble for the control switch to the lights. She squinted her eyes as the lights turned on, then began to scan the room again. "Zee?" she warily called out.

He wasn't here, and she certainly doubted that he was just in the restroom or something stupid like that. She sat up abruptly, and threw the comforter and sheets off. As much as she would want to believe that he was just going out for ice she knew that he wouldn't be going to get her ice in the middle of the night when she certainly wouldn't have much of a use for it while she was sleeping. Something was wrong. He was gone, but where did he go?

She paced around the room. She stared at the chair by the window, almost hoping that if she blinked, he'd suddenly appear when she opened her eyes again. But no, her problems weren't about to be resolved so easily. She knew better than to expect things to go her way, and for everything to work itself out problem free.

Her gaze drifted to the window. The curtains were somewhat disturbed. Zee had been looking out of the window. She parted the voile curtains and looked out. With the lights on, it was difficult to see out of the window because of the glare. She pressed her face up against the window, but then thought better of it considering that these windows probably hadn't been cleaned in a while. She returned back to the bedside lamp then turned down the light, and returned to the window. She could see much easier outside now. Like a lighthouse, standing bold against a grey sky, was the Hilton.