Retirement of Max Polokov
The retirement of Max Polokov is the first and most dangerous kill Rick Deckard makes after taking over Dave Holden's bounty list, an encounter that nearly kills him and reveals the lethal cunning of the Nexus-6 android brain unit. Polokov, the android who had already lasered Holden, impersonates a Soviet police officer from the W.P.O. named Sandor Kadalyi and attempts to assassinate Deckard with a disarmed laser tube, forcing Deckard to fall back on an old-fashioned .38 magnum pistol to destroy the Nexus-6 brain unit. The event establishes the extreme threat posed by the remaining escaped androids, validates Rachael Rosen's earlier warning about Nexus-6 agility, and earns Deckard his first thousand dollars of bounty money, which he immediately begins to spend on a down payment for a real animal.
Background and the Kadalyi Deception
After learning that Polokov had fled his apartment and his job at the Bay Area Scavengers Company, Deckard reported his failure to Inspector Harry Bryant and prepared to move on to the next target, Luba Luft. Bryant then informed him that a Soviet cop from the W.P.O., Sandor Kadalyi, was already in San Francisco and would meet Deckard to assist. While waiting on the roof of the Hall of Justice, Deckard received a call from Rachael Rosen, who warned him that an escaped Nexus-6 would be agile enough to get him before he could get it; he dismissed her offer of help and hung up. A hovercar taxi landed, and a red-faced, cherubic man in his mid-fifties wearing a heavy Russian-style greatcoat stepped out, smiling, and introduced himself as Sandor Kadalyi. The man carried an unusual type of laser tube, a subform Deckard had never seen before, which he claimed to have obtained on Mars. When Deckard inspected the weapon and squeezed the trigger, nothing happened; Kadalyi revealed that the triggering circuit remained in his own hand, allowing him to direct the beam irrespective of where the gun was aimed. Deckard instantly recognized the deception: "You're not Polokov, you're Kadalyi," he said, then corrected himself: "I mean you're Polokov, the android; you're not from the Soviet police." The android had attempted to pass himself off as the W.P.O. representative to get close enough to kill Deckard.
The Confrontation and Deckard's Counterattack
With his laser tube disabled, Deckard had only his regulation issue old-style .38 magnum pistol in its shoulder holster. The android, abandoning the pretense, dropped the triggering device and snarled, "Then I'll have to break your pencil neck," grabbing for Deckard's throat with both hands. As the android's hands sank into his throat, Deckard fired the .38 magnum slug into the android's head. The Nexus-6 brain unit exploded into pieces, a raging, mad wind that carried throughout the car; bits of it, like the radioactive dust itself, whirled down on Deckard. The retired remains of the android rocked back, collided with the car door, bounced off, and struck heavily against him; he found himself struggling to shove the twitching remnants away. Shakily, he reached for the car phone and called in to the Hall of Justice, saying simply, "Tell Harry Bryant that I got Polokov."
Consequences and Significance
The encounter changed Deckard's ideas rather massively. He realized that Rachael Rosen's advice about the Nexus-6 mentality had turned out to be correct, and he began to reconsider her offer of assistance. The event also demonstrated that Deckard was faster to react than Dave Holden, who had been lasered by the same android; Deckard credited Holden's experience with preparing him, but noted that Holden had not had such warning. The retirement earned Deckard his first thousand dollars of bounty money, which he immediately began to spend on a down payment for a real animal, eventually buying a black Nubian goat. The kill also established a pattern: Deckard would need to rely on his own instincts and unconventional methods, including an old-fashioned firearm, to survive against the Nexus-6 androids. The encounter with Polokov, who had tried to pass himself off as a W.P.O. man, also foreshadowed the androids' ability to infiltrate human institutions, as Inspector Garland and his Mission Street police station would later demonstrate.
