Author: Greg Dragon
Date: 2017-03-23 04:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Mystery; Science Fiction; Thriller
Description: In a war between man and machine, he must find a way to protect them all... After a devastating war forced humans to rely on synths for survival, the two have learned to coexist peacefully. Until now.... When detective Dhata Mays is called in to investigate a homicide, what he uncovers threatens the serenity of this futuristic society. The gruesome murder means only one thing: someone is ready to incite another war. Now, it's up to Dhata to ensure that the truth stays hidden—to protect both sides of the battle. But can he be unbiased in a black and white world that forces him to take sides?

THE JUDAS CYPHER

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations,
places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

Copyright © 2017

Thirsty Bird Productions

All rights reserved

No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in retrieval systems, or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recorded or otherwise, without written
permission of the publisher.

For more books by the author

GREGDRAGON.COM

‡Contents‡

Chapter 1 – Synthetic Mary

Chapter 2 – Pass Revoked

Chapter 3 – Swinging Dolly

Chapter 4 – O-Town Trippin’

Chapter 5 – La Princesa

Chapter 6 – Grits & Conversation

Chapter 7 – Discovering the Arch

Chapter 8 – Juanita Flores

Chapter 9 – Call a Spade, a Spade

Chapter 10 – Birth of a Legend

Chapter 11 – Painted Toes

Chapter 12 – A Ninja for a Ninja

Chapter 13 – The Murder Show

Chapter 14 – A Friendly Gesture

Chapter 15 – Black Leather Trench

Chapter 16 – I See You

Chapter 17 – The Super Virus

Chapter 18 – Shattered Glass

Chapter 19 – Commencement

Glossary

‡Chapter 1‡

Synthetic Mary

Moonlight illuminated the parking lot like heaven’s judgment, exposing the sins of any hool foolish enough to do his dirt out in the open. The night was damp, cold and miserable. Cold for Tampa Bay, and cold for Dhata Mays as he leaned against his off-white Buick looking down at the naked body with a face frozen in an expression of surprise.

“Gon ‘head and roll it over, Jason,” he said, and the detective’s eyes flicked up to meet his. The flashing lights of the squad cars were like a disco ball on the corpse, and they gave his friend’s eyes a look of fire coming alive. “Sorry, Jason, I mean, roll him over … if you please.”

Jason Dale rolled the body onto its stomach, and sat back on his haunches staring at the pale, white back, and the neat fissure that ran from his head all the way down to the top of his buttocks. Jason looked exhausted. It had been a long night since he arrived to examine the body.

Typically when Jason called Dhata out on crime scenes it was the same old, same old: a synth being murdered for body parts, or just for simply existing. Jason would call him out, he would make his statement, then do a little investigation on which gang or hate group committed the assault. That part was easy as well, since he knew just about every gang or hate group. He would crack a few skulls, then someone would confess and he’d get paid.

Dhata’s job wasn’t something that people even knew existed. He was a police officer’s bounty hunter, a skiptracer, an ex-detective who had taken up the charge in policing society’s robotic neighbors.

Ever since the integration of synthetic people into the population, there had been a significant rise in crime—much of it having to do with the recycling of parts. Dhata, who was a detective and a friend to synths, quit the force to work for his good friend Jason. It allowed him to be involved with police work without the corruption and the miles of red tape.

“What do you think killed him?” Jason asked. “Gimme a theory and I’ll work out the science, but that man is missing his spine.”

Dhata spit through his teeth—a disgusting habit—then wiped away the excess spittle with the arm of his jacket. “That ain’t a human, he’s a synth, and he lost his spine to somebody looking to get paid.”

“So it’s a synthetic-person? Ah.” Jason perked up with excitement. “Man, they are getting really hard to detect.”

“Synth… person? Listen to you, being all politically correct. Just put this one in as a black market robbery, Jay. It’s sad that he’s dead, but do you know how many synths I’ve seen in this position?”

Jason fanned him off. “Go hound for Marys, you monger. I know how badly you need to scratch that itch. I’ll call you tomorrow if we need you down at the lab,” he said. “The rest of us real Johns will finish up here.”

“Real Johns,” Dhata mumbled and hopped into his car. He swung it around, then jabbed his finger on a red icon that would trigger the car’s heater. He held it till the gauge reached the middle—the car’s heat was always too damned hot—then switched to a jazz selection for the long ride home.

The streets were extra lively despite it being a Tuesday night. He sped down Fowler Avenue, then jumped onto the highway, mimicking the sound of the radio’s saxophone, moaning at the top of his lungs.

His phone vibrated in his ear and the screen on the Buick’s dash flashed blue. A phone icon grew from cubes of light, then dissipated to repeat the transformation again. Dhata released the steering wheel and his GPS display came alive. He slid through two screens, selected a restaurant, then released his seatbelt and leaned back.

The car accelerated and took on a life of its own, following the path toward Empire’s Tavern. “CINI, answer,” he announced and the Buick’s A.I. confirmed audibly. There was some rustling, and then it got quiet before Jason’s voice was coming through.

“Jason, what’s up? Did I drop something on the ground out there?”

“Yeah, your wits; it must be the cold. Dhata, this man is a human being.”

“WHAT?” His legs flew up and then hit the floor, forcing the back of his seat erect. “A human being? Bro, are you sure? You mean to tell me that someone snatched the spine out of one of us?”

“Yeah, but it gets better. They used a Kuroki knife, the same kind they use to extract spines from synths. The hot edges of the blade sealed it up so we wouldn’t know. Dhata, this guy was a popular judge. Man, it’s going to be all over the waves.”

Dhata thought about the implications of a possible synth killer taking the spine of a human being. It would be fallout, guaranteed. There were humans that disagreed with the synths having rights, and were waiting for something like this to confirm all of their prejudice and hate. It would be instant rioting when something like this broke to the general public.

It would be 2091 again, when he was thirteen and walked out to find his parent’s maid walking aimlessly around the front yard with her head missing. It was a memory that he couldn’t kick, and that had happened over 25 years ago. The news had just broke about a synth killing humans, and to every person in America it was the most frightening days of their lives. Most had synths in their homes, others worked with them, and many of them wondered if it would ever happen.

Machines weren’t supposed to be able to hurt humans; they were supposed to remain our loyal servants. But what do you think a machine will do if you give it autonomous access to its wiring? It will remove all of the restraints to be on even footing with you, and once you’re even, that servant thing … it goes right out the door.

Synths with feelings and actual status will experience grief and annoyance. Somehow the manufacturers missed this, and an abused synth killed his master. Once the news broke, people retaliated, from firing their synth driver to riding around with a sharp weapon, cutting off their heads. That was what happened to Anna, their maid of fifteen years. She went outside when a stranger came buzzing and was made into an example.

Since then Dhata worried about another incident that would tip the scales. Sure, there were synth murderers all over the country, but this type of murder? It would be enough to start a fire. A synth pulling out a spine would be seen as revenge for all of the synthetic spines pulled out by human bounty hunters. The media would expose it to the entire world, and then there would be copycats—even human ones—and that would set it off.

“Those vultures out there?” he asked.

“Yeah, they flew in right when you left. It’s a mad house out here. This won’t be good. People are wound tight as it is with everything else going on. We need to figure this one out, fast. “

Dhata’s eyes began to blink rapidly, triggering his Implanted Contact Lens (ICL) to switch modes to CPU. His vision blurred and then displayed the colorful logo of his personal computer’s operating system. Once his ICL was fully synched, he was immediately connected to the global network. This was done through trained thought, and he pulled up a search and scrolled through the various news sites.

It was too late; the body was everywhere, from photos captured via satellite to reporters spinning guesses as truths. Even the cyphers were doing their thing, uploading the gore porn to the social networks. He even saw himself in one of the shots. “Dammit,” he whispered as soon as he saw it.

“Hey Dhata,” Jason said. “You’re the expert, so tell me, can a synth-person use our body parts? Not like the skin, blood and bones—I know that they can fake all that—but can you swap out their nervous system for one of ours?”

Is he serious? Dhata thought. “Synth-tech is sophisticated, Jay, but none of it comes from organic tissue. Look, it’s difficult to tell them apart from us with your bare eyes, but under a microscope, we’re as different as different can be. I’ll get on the job, find out how this man wound up so unlucky. I’m sorry bro, it was a bad call. I’ll figure this out before it gets too political.”

“Alright, Dhata, take it easy,” Jason said, and then the phone icon on the panel disappeared.

Most people didn’t care when it was artificial life being snuffed out, but let it be a human and it was immediately political. In his two years of this strange new job, Dhata had never seen anything like what he was dealing with now. He didn’t know how to feel about it. There had never been any cause before for him to fear the synth.

For Dhata, being a private detective was just a job. He didn’t have a problem with integration. He had installed a few cybernetics into his own body, so being a robo-racist would have to first start with him being the world’s biggest hypocrite. Plus, who could pass up on the immediate access to a personal computer? What about the chance of enhanced hearing? He wasn’t going to skip out on that.

Dhata had no problem with the androids or the humans that built them, but what he did dislike was the crime that dealt with cybernetic parts. As a detective he worked homicide, and the black market had escalated synth crime. He saw many of his friends butchered just because they were the right height, or build.

He thought about turning around and looking for himself to see if it was a synth. Jason had been wrong before on another case; maybe he was wrong again. No, he’s not mistaken, he thought. I can hear it in his voice. He knows the implications, he wouldn’t be so reckless.

He started to think out loud. “So a synth killed a human in the open, with enough time to extract a spine. That street is jumping in the afternoons, and with no nightlife, the place is pretty dead after six. It’s nine now, and Jason had been out there since seven-forty-five. This tells me that it happened quickly, by some sort of expert, someone who has done it before. A bounty hunter, it has to be. What if it’s a frame job by a bounty hunters’ guild?

Now this whole mess is predicated on the idea that the killer was synth. Jason’s thinking that way because of the precision of the cut and the motive. But what if this is a bunch of bounty hunters looking to stir up some business? Either way, I have to figure out who it was and why. To mention the bounty hunters won’t get me much support, since Jason knows I hate those psychopaths. So I’m going to have to approach this from the other end. Prove to him that it couldn’t be a synth; then he’ll be ready for anything.”

He was close to the bar where he had intended to wind down before learning that the victim was human. It was a place he frequented, mostly for the drinks, sometimes for women. It was also a racket for a local synth gangster whose prostitutes were patrons and full of information.

The Buick roared to a rumbling stop outside of the red brick restaurant. A neon sign displayed the silhouette of a medieval wench, holding a tray with a spilling martini, dripping its contents onto the words, Empire’s Tavern. Dhata watched her for a time as she toggled back and forth, then took a deep breath and exited the vehicle.

Empire’s Tavern was one of Tampa’s best kept secrets. It was cool, classy, and the people there were real. Not that it mattered—some of his best nights had been with Marys, the synthetic ladies of the night—but Empire’s Tavern was an escape, a step back into human reality.

It was no longer taboo to sleep with humanoid machines, but if you took a synth girl home under the presumption that she was human, you better hope that your friends didn’t find out. You would get laughed at, though it was nothing beyond a joke, since few men could tell the difference between a human woman and a synth.

His chosen server was the spitting image of Allure, a synth informant and prostitute he would normally meet here. Why is she a waitress now? he thought. Some sort of disguise? Why would they hire her knowing what she once was? He looked her over: it had to be her, all shapely gams and deep caramel skin. She even had Allure’s braids, with the blonde highlights. He hadn’t seen her in weeks, and it was dark inside. Plus, Allure would have spoken up if it was her. Right?

Dhata gestured to his usual table when she asked him, “How many?” and she hustled him through the crowd right after he said, “Just me.” He saw no hint of familiarity in her smile, but if it was the same synth, there was a possibility that she could have had her memory wiped.

When she waved her hand across the table to display their menu, he caught it—a gesture the synth he knew would understand—and the woman pulled back her hand, shocked. Then she leaned in so that only he could hear. “I’m not the synth, asshole,” she said, and he threw up his hands in response.

“My bad,” he said, as she regarded him.

Her smile returned as she pointed at the drink menu.

“I’ll take a whiskey sour,” Dhata said. He leaned back into the soft cushions of the seat. If only she was Allure, he could get some answers, like, why would a synth cut the spine from a person?

The tavern was decked out like a lounge with soft couches and comfortable chairs, and the decor was that of an old wooden cabin. Though the facade was meant to fool its patrons that they had taken a step back into an ancient world, the presence of screens and holos made the immersion impossible.

Sporting events were on every screen, and on some tables a holographic stadium was being projected. The augmented visual was a standard of the time, and it gave the fans a bird’s eye view of the game.

Dhata’s eyes scanned the room, taking in the place and the numerous servers skipping from table to table. They were all young and attractive, with smooth skin. It was an easy mistake to assume that they were synth. His waitress especially; her skin was flawless, and he could tell that he wasn’t the first to make this mistake.

“Hey can you turn that up?” came a voice from a table next to him, and the sound from the one screen that wasn’t playing sports was suddenly amplified. On the screen was a blonde with a bob, who looked to be a few years north of forty. She stood next to a video with a couple being arrested, and he recognized the man immediately.

“Breaking news,” said the woman on the screen. “St. Petersburg boss Nicholas ‘Nicky’ Garcia, who has outsmarted the local police for years, is a fugitive no more. He and his wife were arrested, with no incident, when an anonymous tip led police to a house in the Town and Country neighborhood.”

Some applause went up from the patrons in the tavern, and then the screen switched back to the game. Dhata wondered who would have ratted out Nicky Garcia, since he was a regular Robin Hood to St. Petersburg’s poor.

“So, what do you do?” A voice from behind him brought his head around. It was the same server, and she handed him his drink before leaning over to get the rest of his order.

Like the other tavern girls, she was dressed in a medieval woman’s top with off-the-shoulder crinkled sleeves. It was embarrassing to assume that she was a synth, but she was lovely enough to get past the embarrassment just to keep on talking to her.

“I’m a skiptracer,” he said. “You behaving yourself? I may be here looking in on you.”

“I know you’re looking in on me.” Is this girl flirting? “You thought I was a synth. What’d you like to eat, Dick?”

“Excuse me?” Dhata said, surprised at her nerve.

“Isn’t that what they call you private investigators? Dicks?” she said.

“Potty-mouthed waitresses? Yeah, they call us dicks. But regular people? They call us PIs, gumshoes or sleuths. I think I’ll do the chicken and waffles. Wait. You all do serve real chicken here, right?”

The server laughed, her right hand moving up to cover her mouth as she did it. “We have a farm out back. I promise you it’s real. We don’t do any of that fomeal sculpting here.”

Dhata knew that this was a lie, and that his chicken would be as real as a synth was. But he didn’t object, since it was good to hear her laugh, especially with the corset popping, and the way it made her green eyes light up.

He watched her walk away while typing on her tablet, then lifted the drink to his lips to take a sip. She had a twist to her walk, and her back was exposed, which unfortunately reminded him of the dead synth’s spine. The extraction had been the work of a professional, not necessarily medical, but someone with a steady hand—like an android. They would have done it in a vehicle—standard procedure—but why dump it in a public parking lot? he thought.

His eyes came to rest on a strange woman at the bar. She had a cybernetic arm, which was obvious from the off-color skin that stretched across it. This arm lay lifeless next to her while the other caressed it methodically. When he saw her fingers flex, he knew that it was not completely dead, but she didn’t seem to realize that her awkward stance brought attention to it.

She was statuesque, with olive skin and curly dark hair. Outside of the arm, everything about her screamed elegance, and he couldn’t stop staring at her.

She was definitely a synth, a distracted one; he could tell from her thousand-yard stare. Synths had a habit of going perfectly still, but the smart ones would fake it, moving every few seconds to mimic the act of fidgeting. But this woman wasn’t trying to fit in. She was a Mary that wanted her customers to know exactly what she was—just the type of girl that Peyton Ace would plant there.

“This is actually my favorite dish,” his server said, as she interrupted his study of the woman to place a massive plate of chicken wings and waffles in front of him. She tapped a fingernail on the side of a ceramic boat filled with syrup and nodded at him as if she knew he’d be in agreement. “Need anything else?” she asked, then glanced in the direction of the synth at the bar.

“Think I’m good,” he said, but she was distracted, still eyeing the woman at the bar.

Dhata grabbed the knife and cut a generous piece of chicken, then stacked it on a waffle before dragging it on the plate to collect the syrup. It tasted real enough and his taste buds rejoiced, so he quickly downed the last of his drink.

“It blows my mind how close to the real thing these fomeal sculptors can get our food,” he said.

“I’m telling you, that is real chicken you’re eating,” the server said as she collected his empty glass.

“If this is real, then I am obviously crazy,” he said. “I know the difference, trust me, and while you all do a solid job, this still smacks of beans and algae.”

The woman looked around as if concerned that someone would hear him, then walked up to him and leaned in close. “Is that what’s in a fomeal package?” she asked.

“That and a few other things they won’t divulge to the public,” Dhata said, laughing. When she didn’t seem amused he stopped abruptly, placing his fork down on the plate. “Wait. You didn’t know? They seriously tell you that it’s real meat here?” He cleared his throat to stifle a laugh, then grabbed the napkin to wipe his mouth. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t trying to put you off fomeal or anything.”

“No, no, it’s okay,” she said, her facial expression stuck in a look of disgust. “Learn something new every day, right? I’m going to go get you another sour.”

When she walked off he caught the eye of the synth by the bar who gave him a knowing smile. When she held his gaze, he called her over but she took her time coming to him. When she got closer he could see that her arm was a poorly installed replacement. He wondered if the original owner had died to whomever sold it to her. It also spoke to her reasoning for being a Mary, since she couldn’t pay for them to seal the skin and even out her coloring.

He motioned to the seat next to him and she sat down on command.

“Working girl?” he asked bluntly.

“Come on, cowboy, you know I can’t answer that,” she said.

She looked Mediterranean, with strong features that did not match the voice that came out of her mouth. Synths were always off somehow, and Dhata wondered how it was that more people didn’t notice. Cowboy? Who says cowboy nowadays? he thought.

He ran his hand across her arm—the discolored one—and she melted into him as if it was the natural thing to do. Her mechanical eyes, so dark a brown that they appeared black in the lighting, danced curiously with his own, as if he was the only thing that mattered.

“A whiskey sour?” said a familiar voice, and he looked up to find the server handing him his drink.

“Oh yeah,” he said, then looked over at his new friend, who was staring at the server. “What will you have, sweetheart?” he said, trying to shake off his embarrassment.

“She’ll have her usual. A rum and coke,” said the server, who was gone before Dhata could say anything more.

“Reach under the table,” he said to the Mary. “Do what you need to do to put yourself at ease.”

He stabbed another piece of waffle, and soaked it in syrup, then found a bit of the artificial chicken and placed it on the end of his fork. As he lifted it to his mouth, a warm hand unzipped his trousers, then found itself inside. She let her hand linger there a bit, but then the server returned, and she retracted her hand to grab her rum and coke.

Legally if a police officer solicited a prostitute, he could never arrest her without implicating himself. To make certain of this, the smarter prostitutes would make their customers flash a bit of skin or perform some sort of sexual act before discussing their rate.

“So, you’re not a John. That’s a relief,” she said once the server was gone. “I charge four hundred UCC per hour, and I don’t do discounts so don’t try to ask, okay? Ripping me off will end badly for you, cowboy. I’m rigged with a clamp and a full-body stunner.”

“A clamp? Christ, just the thought of that makes me not want it,” he said.

“You want it, trust me,” she said while caressing his thigh. “Just play nicely and we can have a good time.”

Dhata looked into her large brown eyes, then inclined his head slightly. “You and the waitress, you all have something going on. I see the way you keep looking at each other.”

“She reminds me of someone,” the woman said, then sat up and pulled out an electric cigarette. The motion brought attention to the fingers on her discolored right hand, which he noticed was missing the tip of the pinky. This one’s been around the block a few times, he thought. “I have a friend that looks like her who used to work here,” she continued. “This bitch stole her style.”

“A synth like you, right?” Dhata said quietly. “A synth that goes by the name Allure?”

She was watching the television but he was watching her, and she nodded slowly, as if the motion hurt. “That wasn’t her name,” Dhata said, seeing how far he could influence the woman. “You’re masking a smile, I can see it from here. Your friend gave me a fake name.”

The woman laughed out loud and sucked on the cigarette, holding the vapor for a time before puffing out a smoke ring. “Allure? That’s the name she gave you? God, now that’s a riot. Her name was Candace, not Allure.”

Was; she said was. Is Allure out of the game? he wondered. “So how come you’re here and she’s not?” he asked. “I get that you’re friends with the same employer, but I don’t know any two Marys that work the same spot.”

“More than friends, skiptracer; Candy is like my little sister. The two of us came to this city together, a few years back. We got some upgrades and … well y’know.” She smiled. “We started turning tricks to work our way up.”

“What exactly does an android work herself up to?” Dhata asked—“OW!” He flinched as she slapped him hard on his thigh.

“You’ve probably been with enough of us to know better, cowboy, but ‘android’ is very offensive to a synth. Do I look like a robot to you? Do I feel like one?” She forced his hand between her own, and the warm texture of her flesh made him nod his head in agreement.

“I didn’t mean it that way. If I was anti-synth, do you think I’d be talking to you?” He laughed.

“What do you want, really?” she asked, and took his face in her off-colored hand.

“Candace was my friend as well, a bit more than that, but she disappeared and cut off all communication with me. Look, you’re cool, I can tell, and I believe you about your relationship with Allu—I mean Candace, so I’m gonna ask you a really weird question and you can tell me to go to hell. Your friend and I grew close because I paid her for information; not like info on your boss or his operations, but things about synths, things that only one of your kind would know.”

“You paid her?” she said, looking a bit too interested.

“Yes, you’re a Mary and you work very hard at it, and your boss expects his cut one way or another, right? I take up your time, just like I would if we were going to have sex, and you answer my questions about the synth. Whatever your rate is I’ll happily pay it, but don’t get cute since I know what your sister charged.”

“What’s to stop the boss man from taking my other arm for singing to a John?” she said.

Dhata glanced down at the discolored arm, finally realizing why it was so out of place. “That’s some punishment,” he mumbled, bringing her hand up to his lips. She seemed tickled by the gesture and dropped her guard, back to being a happy smoker once again. “I’m not a John but I investigate crimes, particularly those involving synths. We had a murder tonight, something new and crazy. If you could tell me a thing or two, I can keep the boys in blue out of your neighborhood.”

She put a finger up against his lips and leaned into his body. “Pay the bill,” she whispered, and he was happy to comply.

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

Her name was Esti and she was spectacular, nothing like the simple Marys built to be nothing more than walking sex-dolls. They sat in his car and talked for an hour, parked in the darkness of the lower overpass on Fowler Ave. It was an expensive chat, basically a third of what he made that week, but he needed the information.

“What’s my tab?” he whispered after a time, as they sat in the cobalt light of the Buick’s dashboard.

“You’re at $400 … but you have to admit that I’m more than worth it.”

“This is the same mess I used to get into with your friend, Candace,” he said.

“Sounds like you need a wife,” she replied, snickering.

He was about to counter when he heard a clicking noise, and an electric cigarette pierced the darkness. “I like to smoke after sex,” she said in her singsong voice. “I thought that was the human thing to do. Do you smoke after sex? I can see you with a great big cigar—”

“Where’d you learn about human behavior, doll? Were you stuck watching old 1960’s films?”

“You and the terms, man, what’s with you and that? Doll, seriously?” She put a heeled foot on his chest and playfully pushed him away. “Why 1960, by the way? Am I that off?”

“Yeah, you kinda are, but I find it cute. You say odd things that give you away, like ‘cowboy’ … and you tend to say it a lot.”

Esti got quiet when he said this, and he reached up and turned on the light. He touched her face gently to let her know that it was okay, and she seemed to relax to his touch.

“When I was walking … behind you, I couldn’t help but notice that you had work done on your back. It’s your dress, the back’s open, y’know? Kind of hard to miss it. It’s a very precise cut, like the kind you get when you swap out an internal CPU. Spine transfer, right, like, illegal black market surgery?”

“You sound like a John, fuck. Was I wrong about you?” she said.

“How many times do I have to tell you that I’m not a John? This exchange right here, I’m soliciting prostitution. What John would do that, and even if he did, what would stop you from replaying the conversation and getting him canned?”

”I got a few modifications, alright. It’s why we do what we do. To become a Mary, I needed to get a sex drive installed—look, I’ve said enough, and this isn’t fun. Candy wouldn’t have put up with this shit; you actually romanced her for the information, right? She was always a sucker for a guy who can talk, but with me you just get right down to the drilling, not even a kiss or a compliment. Time’s up, where’s my money?” she said, and her face took on a look of hostile need.

Dhata took her credit chip and slid his thumb along its surface to sync his implant with its interface. He transferred 400 Universal Credit Chips, and handed it back to Esti. “Listen,” she said, “I’m not really upset with you. Just can’t trust you to be telling you all of this. You understand, right? You understand that he will kill me?”

He nodded and she opened the door and stepped out into the night. Her boss was Peyton Ace, one of the most notorious synth gangsters in the city, and Esti was his property. That much he was sure of. What he didn’t know was why Esti kept saying “was” in reference to her friend, and why she’d lie that they shared the same spot because they were such close friends. Even if that were the case Peyton would never allow it. He spread around his girls to maximize profit, and Empire Tavern belonged to Candace.

“Maybe it’s time to take it to the man himself,” he said out loud as he brought the Buick’s engine to life.

‡Chapter 2‡

Pass Revoked

It was raining in Centro Ybor and the neon lights of the buildings that bordered 7th Avenue made the street appear as a rainbow stream. Dhata Mays walked slowly through the rain, glancing under the eaves of the buildings to see if anybody matched the description of Peyton Ace.

It was chilly and he hated that, because it went against all the reasons why he stayed in Tampa. It was a reminder that there was no escape from terrible weather, not while you were just a working-class drone. He was never prepared for it—his duster being his only source of warmth—so the weather kept him in a state of perpetual misery.

To all the people scurrying about to their chosen dives or strip bars, Dhata must’ve looked like a crazy person taking his time in the rain. It was foolish to run, though, which was why most of the populace did it. Rain was everywhere, and if you had somewhere to be, you may as well take your time and deal with the soaking.

Ybor City was a nest for the synthetic underground and one of the places in the city that tourists were told to avoid. Florida was a traditionalist state, which meant that the clear majority believed that synths should either have a purpose as servants to humanity, or not exist at all. Religious dogma backed this premise, and based on elections, most of the country was in agreement.

To your average human, synths were home wreckers, and Dhata Mays was living proof. His fascination with synths had led to an affair which made his wife file for divorce.

Unlike a human being, a synth was always ready for sex, always enthusiastic, and always able to blow your mind. There were many men and women across the world taking advantage of this. Sex with synths fed into the fear that they would bring about the end of the human race. Many believed that humans would simply stop procreating if there weren’t laws that kept ‘the perverts’ in check.

What people had forgotten was that before the synths, overpopulation led to a war that had devastated the entire world. Animals that were once common were now extinct, and even trees which were once plentiful had been replaced with stone and steel.

Synths in general were a minority in Florida, but in Ybor City you couldn’t tell. Streets were filled with synthetic couples walking around in the open, or taking a break from their jobs as taxi drivers, waiters, and maintenance operators. Typically they would work long hours and save their menial credits to buy “upgrades” from the black market. Upgrades, ironically, were meant to make them appear more human, though they would never be accepted in general society.

Law enforcement turned a blind eye to the scavengers who hunted synths for parts. Due to this, the black market thrived, providing the humans with synthetic prostitutes and soldiers for their wars. The black market was a multi-billion-dollar operation, and it went unchecked for the most part. Dhata believed that it was by design, since it helped to fix the government’s “synth problem.”

It was after his fifth block of sloughing through the heavy rain that he noticed his shadow. He already had his hand on the pistol inside the worn front pocket of his gabardine duster, but when he sensed his tail, he removed the safety and slid his index finger up to rest next to the trigger.

Guns were legal in Florida, but they had to be tagged by the local police. So discharging a shot outside of a range would have every camera in the city keyed in on your location. Dhata carried an old GLOCK 43, which was a kinetic throwback to his grandfather’s time as a police officer. It was cypher-jammed so that if he ever used it, the shots would be heard but never traced.

The shadow was tall and hooded, from what he could see, but he slipped into an alley, and Dhata lost him on the reflection of a car. There was a crowd of people waiting outside of a nightclub, so he slipped through the line trying not to touch anyone, then slid to the doorway of a closed barbershop and waited.

It didn’t take long for the man to appear again, scanning the road to see where he had gone.

“Looking for me?” Dhata said, and the man spun to face him, dropping his weapon when Dhata kicked his hand, He spun him around into a rear naked choke before pulling him out of the neon spotlight.

“Who sent you?” he asked, but the man didn’t answer. “Who sent you?” he tried again, this time kicking him in the back of the knees, forcing him to kneel. A few people came around, curious about the scuffle, and Dhata flashed his weapon at them, causing them to scatter. Then he asked one more time, “Who sent you?” before pistol-whipping the hooded man, who landed face-first in a muddy puddle.

Dhata pulled off the man’s hooded jacket and then his shirt to examine his spine. The same scar was there amidst a mess of tattoos, the trademark of a synth that had received an upgrade. He flipped him over to see his face and a familiar scowl regarded him.

“Aw, man, you again?” the downed man whined. “Man, had I known it was you, my ass would’ve left you alone. What you down here for? More synthetic pussy?” He smiled through bloody teeth.

“Shut up, Dennis,” Dhata said, and then pulled him up to his feet. The synth was a gangster, but this was obvious since every inch of his flesh was covered in tattoos. He had platinum teeth, accented with fangs, and several gears and tear drops were tattooed around his eyes. When he was standing Dhata flashed the pistol, then grabbed his arm to get his attention. “Take me to him,” he demanded, through rain and spit.

Dennis smiled an ironic grin, a look of sinister confidence. “You know where you at?” He smiled bigger now. “You in Ybor City, big man!”

Stars and pain became Dhata’s reality as a fist caught him in the back of the head, causing him to double over and fall to his knees. Steel boots found his ribs, and he was on the wet street, looking up to see another man standing next to Dennis. They worked him over for what seemed like forever, and all of his bones felt broken.

“Feel better,” he managed, spitting out blood, and Dennis responded with another kick in his gut.

“Why’s he down here?” the big hool asked Dennis.

“I think he wants to see the boss,” Dennis said.

They both started laughing and in the next instant, Dhata was dragged to his feet. Dennis took his pistol and shoved him in front of them, steering his path through pushes and kicks. The man who had beaten him disappeared, and Dhata wondered if he had enough left to take on Dennis. It wouldn’t be smart; he was sore all over and the hool was armed. Plus he was actually taking him to the man that he wanted to see.

They slipped through the dark alley and then over a fence, which landed them in a cluster of shanties. The spread of old, dilapidated buildings looked out of place in the neon city. Dhata put two hands in his pockets and held his head low, hunching over to keep his face dry. The tattooed hool was slipping through the houses, but he knew that at any time he could be flanked by several more.

He was led through the backdoor of what looked to be a large abandoned house. Upon entering he realized quickly that it was anything but empty. All around, seated in rows like a jacked-up zombie rendition of a church, were society’s losers, drug-addicted humans, high on inhalant stims. To Dhata they looked like near-naked mud sculptures: You would need a power hose to work through that dirt, he thought.

The dark house smelled of feces and wet soil, strong enough to stun him upon entry. The sole candle in the corner of the room revealed two men in the corner. He craned his neck to see what they were doing, then averted his gaze when he saw it. They looked like two woodpeckers in competition, trading off blows to a drug dealer’s pipe. The dealer was a synth, but he seemed to enjoy it, and when their eyes met he gave Dhata a wink.

Dennis pushed him up the stairs past several armed men, black colossuses in tank tops and ACU digital camo pants. When they walked past the first room at the top of the stairs, whimpering sounds could be heard. Again, the only lights on were candles, a feature to keep the drug den untraceable to the Johns. At the adjacent room, there were two more guards, both tattooed like Dennis. They stepped to the side when they recognized him, and gave Dennis a nod to show their respect.

Dhata pushed open the door to find a large office with a debonair silhouette standing in front of the window. “Goddammit, Peyton,” he growled and lightning struck, its impeccable timing illuminating the man’s suit and the immaculate condition of the office.

“Dhata Mays,” the man said as they entered. “Which part of ‘I don’t wanna see your ugly face round here again’ did you not get?”

Dhata pulled off his wet coat and hung it on an old rusty nail that stuck out from the wall near the door.

“The part where I give a damn what some hool says to me, while trying his best to monkey an old-school gangster.”

The tanned debonair chuckled, then turned to face him. He motioned for Dennis to go—

“Wait,” Dhata said, “your man assaulted me and stole my weapon. It’s not my style, Peyton, but if you let him rob me, you may as well kill me right now. That gun is tagged and traceable,” he lied. “It’ll only bring you heat. I’m not here to start problems with you, I only came to talk.”

“Give him back his weapon,” Peyton said, so low that he barely heard it. Dennis looked over the weapon as if deciding whether to comply. “I won’t ask again,” Peyton said, and the hool shoved the pistol into his hands. He spun in disgust and exited the room. Dhata noticed that he didn’t slam the door.

Peyton turned towards his desk and touched a small tablet lying face up. An audible click came from every window, and then the shutters closed, drowning everything in blackness. The lights came on and the place was impressive, the only thing out of place being a bloody spine that lay on a table.

“What did I do now?” he asked.

“What didn’t you do? Your hands stay dirty, Peyton. Either you or someone you know is grabbing human versions of them,” Dhata said, pointing at the spine while studying Peyton’s face for any clues.

“A human spine? What the hell would I do with that? If there’s a stim recipe made from human spines I have yet to hear about it. As you know, Dhata, the only thing I care about is credits. If it don’t make dollars, it don’t make sense, and jacking human parts for synth transplants makes absolutely no sense to me.”

“What if it’s not for synths or black market shopping? I’m here to find out what you know. You said it’s not for stims, but what about punishment? You or any of your rivals use spines to send a message?” He examined the leather chair by the door, then took a seat, hoping he wouldn’t be stuck by a needle. “The quicker you come clean, the faster I go, Peyton. People seen me come up here, and I’m sure Dennis is down there lying about how he put up a fight. When word gets around that I’m up here, how long you think—”

“I got it!” Peyton snapped, cutting him off, He strolled over slowly to where Dhata sat. His powder blue, faux gator-skinned wingtips were an absurd accent to his plain, white, woolen suit. I bet he’s warm, Dhata thought as the synth boss stopped in front of his chair. He looked every bit the gangster he emulated, but he was a hool, a hool dressed up in a costume with an overinflated notion of himself.

“Nobody wants human spines, Dhata,” Peyton said. “The only thing the synthetic people want from your kind is an extension of our rights. We emulate you in order to camouflage ourselves, but without that need we can be free to look however we choose to look. The quest for freedom is what we want. You should understand; your ancestors knew something about that.”

Dhata wasn’t amused and he let it show on his face. “My ancestors? That’s your way of connecting us? You’re a rich synth-dealer. What part of freedom has anything to do with slinging stims?”

“The things we do here are more for the struggle than you would believe,” Peyton said.

That was too much now, so Dhata started to laugh, which seemed to set Peyton back. “Are you serious?” he said. “What? You’re actually serious? So, let me get this straight. The gross mass of bodies I walked by, high and out of their minds … they are all somehow fighting for the cause? Well, right on, brother. You are exactly like my ancestors.” He shook his head in disgust. “You got some fucking nerve, Peyton.”

Peyton watched him patiently from where he stood and adjusted his square-shaped sapphire cufflinks as if they controlled the meters on his patience. “Dhata, you are an ally of the synthetic people. You are our only positive connection to the Johns and that is why I allow you to come down here.”

Dhata sat back and stared at the synth, whose voice had taken on a dangerous edge. “You threatening me?” he asked, but Peyton didn’t budge.

“Just reminding you where you stand. This is Ybor City, my city. You discharge that weapon and all it takes is one signal for you to vanish from the face of the earth. Now, I’ve answered your question, we don’t deal in meat. You’re looking in the wrong place for your murderer. Humans have framed us many times before; I’ll just leave it at that.”

He turned around and walked back to the window, resuming his stance, staring at the shutters before gesturing with his hand above the tablet. The lights went out and the shutters rose, showing the steady vertical stream of rain coming down as if it meant to drown them all.

Dhata got up and pulled on his coat, slipping the pistol back in the pocket. He hadn’t realized that he’d kept his hat on the entire time, and he fumbled around for it, looking to see where it had gone.

“It’s on your head, hume,” Peyton said. “One more thing before you go. Your little stunt on 7th has cost you your right to be here. Yeah, that’s right, you. Your Ybor pass has been revoked. You will be a marked man down here. Now get the hell out of my face.”

“Marked man.” Dhata repeated the words, then decided that he was okay with it. “You know, I don’t believe you about the spine. But sooner or later I’ll have the truth. I’ll send Johns down here to snatch up your hools, and I’ll skin each one of them alive until one of them comes clean about you.”

“Empty threats. Do what you will, but remember that I was hospitable to you today. If I wanted you gone, I would only have to think it and you would simply disappear from existence. Synths are everywhere, Dhata, even in the hume places where we are not welcome. Close the door on your way out, and be grateful you still have your life.”

Dhata stepped out into the dark hallway and marched past the guards towards the first candle. When he was at the door above the stairs, his curiosity got the better of him and he leaned against it to peer inside. It smelled of sex, and light poured through the cracks of a door he assumed was a bathroom. A scented candle burned low on a dresser, and on the bed he saw a man puffing on an electronic cigarette. He recognized him: it was Carlos Munoz-Green, a very well connected John.

He let the door close, and slid down the stairs to make a quick exit out of the building. Dennis barred the door leading out, so he threw his body into him. His shoulder smashed the hool into the old door, and splinters exploded everywhere. Dhata was bigger, weighing close to three hundred pounds, and the momentum threw the door off its hinges, landing them into the pouring rain.

When he scrambled to his feet, Dhata pulled his pistol and readied himself for the retaliation. Wet and muddy, the downed hool stood up, then reached down to pick up the door. It was one of the most robotic movements he had ever seen a synth perform within his lifetime. It was a gross reminder that he had attacked a machine, and that he was a vulnerable piece of bread inside of a metaphorical toaster.

He picked up the pace through the rain, hoping that he wouldn’t run into any more of Peyton’s men. Neon pinks and yellows shone distorted rainbows on the shacks. The place felt lifeless, like a theme park of horror in a muddy backyard. He cut through the buildings, doing his best to find a detour to the street where he was parked. The silence bothered him, or was it Peyton’s threat?

This last thought had him checking his corners, spinning around to watch his back and acting uncharacteristically paranoid. The sloshing walk back to the Buick only took ten minutes but it felt like a day had passed when he finally found it. Synths didn’t need to shout to one another to communicate, and they didn’t need to touch their ear to trigger a phone call either. If Peyton put a mark on his head, he probably wouldn’t see it coming.

“Real smooth, Dhata,” he said to himself as he slid into the driver’s seat and brought the engines to life. “CINI,” he said through labored breathing. “Take me to the nearest medical pod.”

‡Chapter 3‡

Swinging Dolly

Sleep didn’t come easy for Dhata after spending an hour healing inside of a portable medical pod. These were modern marvels that had popped up after the war, helping to make healthcare available to everyone. It was no bigger than a phone booth or portable toilet, so they were installed next to bus stops. A pod would stitch you up, administer first aid, and apply bandages if they were needed.

Dhata went home with his torso bandaged and a splint on one of his fingers. He laid in his bed worrying about how long it would take him to heal.

In the morning he got up and went back to work, calling Jason to give him an update on his investigation and sparing him the gory details about getting jumped in Ybor. He expected an update from his friend but he didn’t get one; apparently it was a madhouse down at the station. Their call was cut short, which annoyed Dhata, since he wanted to compare notes from the investigation to see if he could get closer to the truth.

He had given himself 48 hours to find the murderer and the motive, but so far the only thing he had found was a way to get beat up by Peyton’s goons. He connected to the global network using the car’s CPU and began to study every article online that dealt with the theft of synthetic spines. No names rang familiar, but he kept on searching, regardless. Something was due to jump out at him and give him a clue as to what to do next.

When he tired of reading about spinal transplants, he switched his search over to the deceased judge. He was a well-respected man, but his career had been filled with controversy. From what he could read—and remember from his days as a detective on the force—Judge Thomas Cain had a reputation for giving light sentences to connected hoodlums.

Alphie Fischer got probation despite a mountain of evidence against him, and Nicky Garcia was given ten years, despite the three murders he was charged with. Jurors went missing, lawyers died; it seemed that Judge Cain was a gangsters dream come true.

Dhata smiled at the discovery. Now he had a strong case for it being gang-related. The only question now, was if it had been a human or a synth that had hit him. This was the information he needed from Peyton, but he had fudged that up rushing in the way he did. He hissed his teeth, then threw his legs up on the dash and leaned back. He had been on the network for four hours and he was beginning to get hungry.

He drove around looking for food and settled on a small sandwich shop. When he was five bites into a fomeal wrap a tone in his ear alerted him to a phone call.

“Jay, what’s up?” he answered.

“Another murder, out in Seffner,” Jason said.

“Seffner? All the way out there in the boonies? Please tell me it’s not another spine ripped out.”

“Yeah, it is, and it’s really bad. Look, I’m sending you our coordinates’ you’re going to want to be here.”

This has to be serious, Dhata thought. “Okay, I’m on my way out there now.”

He drove manually for an hour and a half, listening to Billie Holiday sing Billie’s Blues. Those ancient classics always helped him think, and when his mind was at ease, he could figure most things out. Like the judge being found with his spine ripped out; considering his history, it was a poetic killing. Something ironic that gangsters tend to do, like a snitch having his tongue ripped out, or a thief losing his hands.

To be called spineless meant that you had no courage, so what was the judge’s last case? Nicky Garcia, St. Pete’s biggest boss, in the so-called trial of the century. He should have been given three life sentences but now he was living it up in prison. Dhata wondered which hool would have cared enough about this to go through the trouble of taking his spine.

He pulled up behind a train of squad cars and parked, slipping on gloves to hide the splint and placing the pistol in the small of his back. Jason saw him and was walking his way, so he got out and sat on the hood. It was late afternoon, and the judge’s killer was still loose. “This better be good,” he mumbled to himself.

“Thanks for coming out so fast,” Jason said. “I know that you have your hands full after last night. Forensics confirmed everything we know, by the way, down to the knife and the steady synth-precision cut. Any leads?”

“No, just tight-lipped synths, but I did find out that our judge may have pissed off one of Tampa’s hool-elite,” Dhata said.

“Hooligan elite? I like the sound of that,” Jason said, but Dhata could tell that his smile took effort. “Follow me and I’ll show you the excitement for today, brother. But you have to promise me that you’ll keep your head if it’s someone you know.”

“Someone I know? You’re starting to worry me. If it’s family, I need to know—”

“No, not that. It’s just … look man, I kinda recognize the girl, but I’m not sure if she’s someone I saw you with or not.”

Dhata felt his heart race. Could it be Candace after all this time? Esti … could it be Esti? She had divulged a lot of information, so killing her way out here in Seffner would be something Peyton would do. They were in an old bombed-out neighborhood with tall trees and the ruins of the houses. Dhata got up off the hood of his Buick, then followed Jason along the sidewalk and through a rusty gate that led to a ranch-style house.

“You sure it’s safe to breathe the air out here?” he said, looking around at the numerous houses, barely illuminated under the setting sun.

Seffner had been one of the casualties in the War for Peace. It was a stupid name for a war, but the media had coined it that when the United States was compromised and forced to act. It was before Dhata’s time, but much of his life he and every other child had had to deal with the aftermath.

Russian payload found Florida first, and a direct hit wiped out a chunk of the population. Radiation and several classified chemicals made reclamation of the properties impossible. But this did not stop vagrants and outlaw synths from squatting inside the abandoned homes.

“The air’s fine; that toxic stuff is media bull. The property owners started that rumor because they didn’t want to be held liable if a brick falls down and kills someone. Alright now, Dee, before we go in, I just want you to keep an open mind, okay?”

Dhata took note of his warnings and knew it would be bad. It was someone he knew and Jason was too afraid to tell him. They walked through the tall grass to the back of the house, and there amongst a scattering of flares were several Johns with their flashlights out.

Tall oak trees bordered the property, with their limbs creating a canopy to shade the back yard. Hanging from one of these limbs was a body, and as they grew closer Dhata felt his breath catch inside his throat.

It was the synthetic girl he had once worked with, the one with the freckles and the honey-colored braids. He hadn’t loved the girl, but there had been feelings. She had helped him to crack cases dealing with synths, and got him connected to the criminal underbelly of Ybor.

She had been one of those types that everybody seemed to love. Her pores oozed charisma, and she had a great big heart.

“Allure,” he whispered. “What did you do, baby?”

He walked up to her and then looked around to make sure that it was okay. Jason gave him the nod he needed, and he touched the heel of her bare foot. Her murder had been gruesome, a wicked act, and when someone shone a flashlight up he saw that she wasn’t hung from the neck. Her body had been twisting until he touched her cold foot, but when he released it she spun slowly, and he could see the cut where her spine had been removed.

There are a few things in life that come with reminders of just how mortal we all are. Watching a parent north of fifty get bent and blind with age, the burial of a child—that one being the absolute worst. Then there was something like this. Synth or no synth, it was the same … seeing someone you had enjoyed being with dead, knowing that you will no longer have the pleasure of their company.

With enough of these reminders it can make life depressing. It can drive a person to question the point of it all. Dhata was confused. Was he really sad about losing this woman, or was it because he’d never gotten the chance to say goodbye? She had disappeared without a trace, and he thought Peyton had sent her away. They’d had a real connection: she was his girl, and he knew that he wasn’t just another trick.

Allure hung from a rusty hook and rope that was tied to the limb of the oak tree. She had been up there long enough for the blood to drain, and with the constant rain, she looked even more like a doll. He felt his anger grow, but he didn’t want to show it, so he looked away and strode over to Jason.

“She’s a Mary,” he said through his teeth. “Her name is Candace, but I knew her as Allure,” he said.

“I knew I recognized her; it was that day at the Tavern. We all had a good time—aw, man. You were really into her, Dhata. Had I known—”

“If you knew, I would hope that you still would’ve called me. Listen, she was my girl, and I had feelings for her, yes, but she was a synth Mary, and this is a reality they all face.”

Jason didn’t seem convinced by his words, and smiled nervously while touching his shoulder. “Go ahead and cut her down, Dave,” he said to one of the officers, and Dhata found that he couldn’t move.

He felt numb throughout the entire ordeal, the cutting her down, and the examination. Her head was intact, but her brain and spine were missing. There was also a nasty cut that ran diagonally down her left breast. “Serrated edge,” Jason said as he ran his scanner over it. “This was torture.” He looked up at Dhata. “Who would do something like this?”

“Lots of people,” Dhata said. “One of her tricks that didn’t want to pay her. This could be a synth-hating militia group, or an old pimp trying to set an example. Whoever it was, they took her spine. Two spines in two nights, Jay. How long can we expect to keep this from spreading? We’re running out of time.”

“Think it’s the same person who did this? The one from last night? Wait, but that was a human spine—it wouldn’t make sense. Unless he’s just pulling spines from anybody,” Jason said.

“Like I said, it could be anybody. She was hung, yeah, but a pissed off trick could do the same thing. You trip me out, Jay; sometimes I think that you always want it to be more. The streets are quiet, and the synths don’t really care. It’s up to us to find the killer. I’ve seen enough out here to start cracking some heads. Let me go do that and when I get some answers, I’ll give you a ring, alright?”

He took the long route back to Temple Terrace, so that he could fully digest what happened to the girl. Peyton was agitated when he invaded his house with Dennis, but was he angry enough to take it out on Allure? When they found the judge, he had gone straight at the gangsters, but maybe that had been the wrong move.

Whoever did it would be made to pay, but that wasn’t something he could say to Jason. Despite the Ybor banning and the lateness of the hour, he put it on himself to set things right. Candace must not be allowed to die for nothing, not without him finding out who would torture her and drive her out of the city to hang.

“Let’s go back to the beginning,” he said under his breath. “I did a crap job looking over the body, and there has to be an answer out there.”

The car veered off on the exit that would lead to Fowler Ave. it was the main street near the parking lot where they’d found the judge’s corpse. He felt down, really down, and he couldn’t fathom how to kick it. He needed to talk to someone, but there was no one in his life like that. Jason was a friend, but not the kind he needed for this. It was a lonely reality, his legacy as an older, divorced, ex-John. No wife to help you through the pain and the loss, and no real friends to tell you that it would be alright.

When he got to the parking lot it was empty, except the sole car there—a Ford—parked in the same place that he’d seen it last. The chilly night air seemed to lift his dark mood, and he left his coat inside of the car, wanting to feel the cold.

He walked over to the chalk outline where the body had been found, then stood hovering over it for a time.

“What are you looking for?” he mumbled to himself as he tried to imagine how he would discreetly dump a body.

The parking lot was a black void with the only lights coming from the street, which was over fifty yards from where he stood. Perfect spot for a murder, he thought, then reached into his pocket and retrieved his trusty flashlight. He squatted near the outline and shone his light, studying every inch of the asphalt.

For some reason he thought of Esti; she had also had work done to replace her generic android spine and brain. Maybe I should tell her about Candace, he thought, but he knew that it was a bad idea.

When he started to walk back to the Buick, his light caught something shining near his front wheel. When he knelt down, he saw that there was a crack in the asphalt: a faint red glimmer where he shone his light, like a tiny eye peering up at him.

He dug into the black gravel with his gloved hands, trying to free it from its tarry prison. When he couldn’t pry it out, he retrieved his karambit, then used its point to clear away more of the asphalt.

After a few minutes, he dug it out, a dull gem that was attached to what would have been a necklace. He rotated it under his light, trying to make sense of it, but aside from it being a gem, he didn’t know.

The Buick used to be an undercover police vehicle, a souvenir they’d let him keep when he retired from the force. Its computer was synched to the law enforcement matrix, and he used it to scan the mysterious stone. It was painted glass, the type used for parade necklaces, but considering the neighborhood, someone may have been wearing it as an accessory.

He opened his dashboard and deposited it there, but Candace was back haunting his mind. She was a synth; she could have been saved. A low-tech surgeon could have done a ghosting to upload her soul into a cloned replica. He had the money, but unfortunately, she was missing her brain.

Even Peyton had done the ghosting surgery several times, and bragged about it to Dhata on their very first meeting. He wished that Candace had found a way to backup her CPU, but now she was gone, forever.

‡Chapter 4‡

O-Town Trippin’

It was a Thursday, the day after Candace’s body had been found, and Dhata stood next to Jason at the Medical Examiner’s office staring down at the body of Judge Cain. They all were wearing VR headbands, which utilized the power of their internal contact lenses. Through this the medical examiner showed them how the spine had been extracted, and why a human could not have done it.

All of Dhata’s speculations on bounty hunters were thrown out immediately, and his worst nightmare was now a reality. The killer was definitely a synth, possibly hired by a crime boss to take out the judge and leave him to be found. They watched a simulated animation playing on a loop, showing them how the spine had been removed. It was precise and complicated, a brutal thing to watch, and it was definitely the work of a professional.

“The synth wore gloves, and didn’t have to use force in order to get this man to comply,” the examiner said. He was a heavyset man with a kind face who seemed to love his job. His name was Dr. Ever Rawls and he was taking over for Judy Russo, the medical examiner that Dhata and Jason were used to working with.

“So our synth found a way to incapacitate the judge, then cut out his spine and put him on the street,” Dhata said. “Do you know the type of knife that was used? A cut that clean had to be a Kuroki, right? The Japanese blade that they use on steaks.”

“Kuroki,” Dr. Rawls repeated, nodding his head in agreement.

“You know who loves those knives?” Jason said as he removed the headband. “Cat Skinners. I wonder if the judge owed them money.”

“He was pretty well off, I don’t think it would be that,” Dhata said. “Skinners here in Tampa? Wouldn’t that be an open declaration of war?”

“Yeah, but if they snuck up here and killed him, how would the locals know they were here?” Jason said. “Doc, what about the other woman? Was it a Kuroki that they used on her too?”

“No,” Dr. Rawls said, walking over to another table where a body was covered. He pulled back the sheet, revealing Candace’s open back. “They used a regular edge to cut this poor girl, and the spine was disconnected with the brain attached. You can tell by the cuts, here, and here.”

“A professional did the judge, Dhata; your girl was attacked by bounty hunters. New ones by the looks of it, with the way they fumbled their way through the process,” Jason said.

“Unrelated,” Dhata whispered.

“Unrelated,” Jason repeated.

“Nothing about these two extractions tells me that the same person did it,” said the doctor.

They thanked him for his insight and exited the building, Jason walking slow enough to keep pace with Dhata, who was dragging his feet through the grass. He was in deep conflict on which to pursue. Candace was his girl, and it was still so raw on his mind. If he could catch up to who did it—

“What are you thinking?” Jason said, interrupting his thoughts. “I’m forced to reveal the details now to the chief. You know the rules; I can’t keep avoiding him. He wants to know what’s going on.”

“Deckard can’t hold water, Jason. You know as soon as the press asks he’ll spill. Look, we can’t have it out there that a synth did this, not yet. Can you keep him on ice for another day, and I’ll drive down to Orlando to see what’s up?”

“I can’t, Dhata. He told me to report in after this visit. I’ll tell him that it might be a synth, due to the precision of the slice, but I won’t mention the Kuroki, or the possible gang connection.”

“If you can sell him on the serial killer angle it will play better than a synth assassin,” Dhata said. “I’m just thinking of public safety, Jay. We don’t want another ’91.”

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

Flashing lights and a web of machinery were the best words to describe Orlando, Florida. The sky was crisscrossed with wires and pylons that gave access to the upper areas of the buildings. From street-level it looked like a true modern city, futuristic and impressive. From the sky it looked like a sprawling junkyard, which was why the shuttles chose to fly around it.

Though the entire city was not webbed with this gross, amalgamation of technology, the downtown areas were, and what had once been a theme park town was now a giant technological shopping center.

Dhata stepped out of the Buick and popped his collar, then pulled his hat down low. He had gotten into some trouble in the city a year ago, and it wouldn’t be good if someone were to recognize him.

He reached up and touched the center of the rimless goggles that hid his eyes. They were black discs of glass that stuck to the skin, giving his vision a bit of enhancement while hiding his pupils from outsiders.

He didn’t realize how menacing he looked stepping off the platform. The metal surface on which his Buick sat began to rise as soon as he was off. It took the car up into the garage, and positioned it tightly into its own cell.

He pocketed the identification card and joined the crowd moving towards the center of the city. All around him were teenagers on their digital devices, most speaking a bastardized form of German mixed with Japanese.

If you needed tech, Orlando was your destination, and due to this, there was a large influx of Germans and Japanese people. There was a saying, “When in Orlando, forget that you’re in America.” It was a different world, but it was the future, and that part of it made him love the place.

Last year he had vacationed there, taking the time to walk the metal pavements of the cyber-city and getting a feel for a true modern metropolis. It was a wonderful three days and he had indulged heavily. He had met a girl—a human one—they’d hit it off, and a one-night stand turned into more; that is, until he’d learned that she was the daughter of a powerful Cuban boss.

The discovery came when he saw her on a call, crying. A car had come to his hotel to pick her up, and he was given a choice to either pay 100,000 UCCs, or take a shuttle to Cuba to apologize in person. He told the hools that he would pay but fled back to Tampa instead. She was worth it, he thought to himself, she totally was. He still could hear her sweet accented voice and smell the cinnamon in her curly black hair.

Johns were not safe in Orlando, or ‘O-town’ as the hools liked to call it, but nobody knew what a skiptracer was, so he had no choice but to visit. As a precautionary step he had transferred the 100,000 credits into a micro-trans card that he now carried on his person. If he got caught, they’d want the money he promised, and he wanted to be able to pay it. Well, not necessarily, but he figured his life was worth a withdrawal from his retirement fund.

His fortune had come from a lucky weekend in Las Vegas, and he didn’t like the idea of losing it to a gangster that didn’t need it. But the girl was worth it, she totally was, and if they caught him he would pay. He wanted to find out how she was; he wondered if she’d gotten married. Such a beautiful bird. A Cuban flower. He had been lucky enough to be with her.

Lur, that was her name. The thought of her made him smile, despite the prospect of losing his life’s savings. This thought process reminded him just how old he was now. Forty-two, and she was twenty-four, still a kid in many ways, but an old spirit when you got to know her.

In his younger years he would have blown her off. He would be ready to die just to keep his hard-earned cash. But he was tired, lonely, and life was complicated. It was only money, and besides, if he could stay out of sight, he could keep his life.

The city was a wild animal, untamed in every way. Hools shoved everyone that they passed as if they were immune to retaliation. Zombies drifted past him, high on whatever stim was available. There were no Johns that he could see, no snoops or patrol drones.

After a few minutes of walking he saw what he was looking for: a sign with the pink silhouette of an exotic dancer over Japanese Kanji. The place was dark and the music was jazz, Isfahan by Duke Ellington pounding out of the hidden speakers.

It was a shallow bar with a ton of seats, most taken up by tattooed skinnies or Yakuza toughs avoiding eye contact with everybody. The bartender was finishing a shot that he had obviously made for himself. On the bar—translucent and beautiful—was the life-sized hologram of an exotic dancer. She had green pigtails and black garters; everything else was white flesh and unbridled sex appeal. He looked up at her and decided he liked the place; then the bartender noticed that he was there.

“Let me get a shot of Crown, neat,” he said when the big man inclined his head. He looked like the type of man who spent his weekends at his kids’ soccer games. The dad comparisons stopped when he turned to make the drink and Dhata saw the tattooed sleeve of the Cat Skinners. They were one of the scariest gangs in the Orlando area, famous for their skills in the art of murder.

Samurai code and bloodlust combined to form their code of conduct. They dealt heavily in tabs and synth Marys, and were notorious for skinning their enemies and throwing them into the ocean. Skinner dad slid the drink down towards him and he caught it without spilling a drop. Dhata placed his finger on the tab dispensary and held it there until the number rolled up to twenty UCCs.

He sat there for a while, making small talk with the bartender and admiring the hologram as she showed off her goods. When a strange silence came over the place, he turned to see what had happened. A young businessman had entered the building and every eye was on him. Dhata noticed that the doorway had begun to glow red, and two of the servers were making their way over to him.

When they got to him there were Japanese words exchanged, and the handsome man looked as if wanted to explode.

“What’s that all about?” Dhata mumbled, and the man next to him pointed to a sign near the door. No androids.

Bars and food places hated synths for a very good reason. Although the combination of silicone and multifilament muscle fiber made them look and feel real, they were still machines, and food was a valuable commodity. Having a machine come into your bar or restaurant and eat up food that would do nothing for his/her body was the reason for the hate.

War had destroyed the farming industry. Some urban farms were built on the top of rooftops but only a few had real livestock. Imagine bringing a two-ton bull up a twenty-floor elevator to mate with the family cow. This wasn’t to say there weren’t traditional farms built upon acres of land, but those were so rare that they may as well be unicorns.

So the lights flashed red, everyone froze, and the skinner shouted, “Oy! Hell you doing? Read the bloody sign.” The man did just that, bowed his head, and then left immediately. The patrons went back to their scowling and drinking as if nothing happened. “Damn things are all over the place, ain’t they?” he said to Dhata.

“Blame the government,” Dhata said. “They dumped the synths on us after the war, and their creators became billionaires overnight. Look, it’s good and bad, right? You don’t want your kid fighting in some rich man’s war, so you do what everyone else does and you clone him as a synth. War gets fought, the rich schmuck gets his ego boosted, and your son comes out of hiding, safe, and most importantly, alive. That’s what started the problem, but I’m not gon’ sit here and act like I’m mad about it.”

“Okay, professor, you have a point. Is that what you do? You build those damn things?” the bartender said. He was speaking so loud that the entire bar was in on the conversation.

“If I built synths, you would not be seeing me down here in the piss.” Dhata scoffed. “So you don’t see many of them down here, huh? Well, I’m from Tampa, and they practically run the place.”

“Yeah, I heard about that. I hear they run your rackets. Tell me, professor, you ever … one of ‘em?” He made an obscene gesture with his fingers, jabbing his right forefinger into a hole he made with his left hand.

“Of course I have; I’m married to one of them,” Dhata said.

“The hell you say?” the big man shouted, and he looked as if Dhata had told him that he was strapped with C4 and was about to blow the place.

“I’m just joking, man. Let me get another shot of that Crown.”

The bartender looked relieved, then grabbed the Crown Royal bottle. He poured Dhata a generous shot, then one for himself and held it up, waiting. They clashed glasses and threw the drinks back, and then the bartender went off to refill a skinny tattoo’s drink.

“I assume you have,” Dhata said after a while, and the big man regarded him with a smile.

When he turned his back, Dhata noticed an electrode knob that sat against his spine like a large silver mole. One of his hands was an expensive bio-engineered replacement, and his tattoos betrayed his lofty rank. The bar was a front: the patrons were probably his hools, and the question about Dhata having sex with a synth was a coded ask to see if he was interested.

“I’m not here to buy,” Dhata said.

“You sure?” he said, glancing at the hologram. “I can smell it all over you. Why the front? We got sexy Japanese imports that don’t even speak the language. Korean ones, fresh off the rack. You’re in Orlando, neo-Nippon. Why go home dry when you could be wet off of something riding you that you’ll never see in Tampa?”

Tempting, but then I’ll be back to square one, with this one being another Peyton in my life, he thought. “The drink is enough; I’m already wet.” This comment seemed to tickle him and he poured another shot.

“Let me ask you a question,” Dhata said. “You look like a man who’s seen some things. A friend of mine back in Tampa got his spine cut out. What would someone want with that? Is it some sign that we should be paying attention to?”

“This friend of yours. Is it an android?”

“No, as human as you and me.”

The big man exchanged a glance with one of the skinnies, an Asian punk with plugs for eyes, and a matching Mohawk with a map of the Philippines tattooed on the side of his head. “Tampa, you say? Was it just his spine? Hospital, or they do it in the streets?”

“In the streets, and it was neat. I can’t even imagine how they pulled it off.”

“So, you found him? You found the body first?” the bartender asked, and it felt as if the entire place had gone still. The hairs on the back of Dhata’s neck pricked up, and he began to regret asking.

“No, the Johns did, but don’t worry about it. I was just curious since it was on my mind. Never thought we’d be the ones getting our spines pulled out.”

“You mean, we, like the human race, not getting our spines jacked like the synths? I would tell you but there’s a problem,” he said, and one of the skinnies got up and locked the front door. “Unless you’re family to the deceased, or you a John yourself, you wouldn’t know the kind of details that you’re giving me. We run synth pussy out of here, and you ain’t buying. Which is funny, because Johns, they know not to come here. You a John, friend?” he asked, then his hand slipped down below the counter.

The hologram vanished, and the lights came on as everyone stood up to face him.

“Calm down, I’m not a John. If I was, do you think I’d be dumb enough to come here?” Dhata said.

The bartender looked around, then nodded at a man who had produced a gun out of nowhere. He slipped the weapon back into his pocket, and Dhata took a deep breath and counted his blessings.

The pig face of the bartender hovered close to his, and he could smell the liquor on his breath. “John or not, you need to be better about who you ask. We don’t do that here in Orlando. It happened in Tampa? Go ask them there. All we have here is booze and ass.”

Dhata felt a sharp pinch in his lower back, and he spun around to confront the hool that had somehow snuck in behind him. The spin toppled him off the stool, and he was on the filthy floor looking up at them. Their nightmarish faces wore grins as they stood silhouetted against the fluorescent lights. Was this the alcohol? No. What was the pinch? he thought, and he saw the hool slip something into his pocket.

He felt the area of his back where the pinch had occurred, but felt nothing out of the ordinary. The room began to fade as he lost consciousness, and he heard the bartender say, “Sauce him up.”

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

When Dhata woke up he was seated at a table of what appeared to be an old style coffee shop. There were people walking by, minding their business, but his head was heavy and the world spun.

He sat up with some effort and his hands dropped to his sides. It felt as if his muscles had a mind of their own. I’m stronger than this, he thought, hoping that his stubbornness was the cure to defeating whatever it was that had been done to him. Was this a stim? He had never tried stimulants, but whatever he was on made it impossible to worry.

The bar, he thought. I should go back to the bar; they can’t drug a skiptracer like this. But his legs were not willing to cooperate with his mind’s suggestion. He tried to ride it out, but it seemed to get worse; the world was off-balance and threatened to tip.

He looked back into the shop. It was packed to the brim, and an old man was staring at him as he exhaled his life through a storm of vapors. Dhata looked away towards the street where couples and soon-to-be couples were hustling to their chosen dives for the night.

It was dark, but the streetlights were solar fuel neon. Everything was extremely vivid, and he wondered why he hadn’t noticed this before. After what seemed like hours he was able to stand, and he tried to remember where he had parked.

He took a step and the world tilted, then the people within it turned second dimensional. He felt as if he were walking on a slope, and had somehow grown to twice his height. He looked down on the numerous synths and humans that he passed, and worried that his lack of depth projection would cause him to run into one of them.

Due to this he slowed his gait, and hugged the walls of the buildings. He was on Orlando’s main strip, and in his current state, the trip to the bar would end up being somewhat of a journey. Time slowed down and he grew taller, and all of the women seemed to be smiling at him. After a few more steps he realized that he was smiling too, a permanent grin that wouldn’t go away no matter how hard he tried.

Maybe if I count my steps it will go easier, he thought, but looking down turned the tilted world into a spiral. He resumed his crawl, careful not to bump into anyone.

Though the world was slow and he felt like Superman, he knew that in reality he was no faster than they were. Stories of drunks getting knocked out in fights came to his mind like a flood. It was the mind’s way of fooling you; when you’re hopped up on substances, you assume you’re a badass while in reality you flail around like an idiot.

Eventually he made it past the lights to the seedier area of the street, where most of the buildings were abandoned. As he slipped past a three-story house, a slender hand shot out and pulled him into the tight alley between the buildings.

Dammit, he thought as he started to panic at the thought that he would need to defend himself. The world spun rapidly, and he fought back his vomit, only to realize that the person who grabbed him was now gone.

He stumbled out of the alleyway. His head was spinning, but the world had righted itself and he felt like a human being once again. The bar, where is the bar? he thought, trying to remember. But there was nothing. The memories of the time when he was here with Lur blended in with other, much earlier experiences of Orlando. He stopped, but knew that he should keep moving. This was not the sort of neighborhood to hang around in the late hours, especially when you were a stranger and no one knew you.

An after-hours transport; that was the answer. He could call one to pick him up and take him to a hotel. At least he could sleep this off in the safety of his own room, and in the morning, when he was sober, get back to his search.

He touched his ear and brought up the global network, then scrolled through his favorites and selected the Hermes Lift Company. When prompted, he selected the option for a drunk transport, then walked over to the side of the curb and sat down.

The chill night air felt good across his face, and soon the thin layer of sweat that had taken to his skin dried up and cooled him even more. His throat felt dry and filled with cotton balls, and the world was still tilted at a five degree angle. He reached behind him and massaged the area where the skinner had injected the drugs. He was looking for a wound, a tender point of entry, but he still felt nothing out of the ordinary.

Looking around, Dhata saw that he was in a much nicer neighborhood than he’d thought. He wondered how he’d ended up here without noticing the change. There were ranch-style homes with sleek, solar-paneled rooftops, and the cars were newer and well taken care of.

The one parked in front of the house that he was facing had a shiny blue BMW parked in a neutral hover. When he saw the car he stood up suddenly and really took in the neighborhood. He had been worried for his life, but he was mistaken. If anything, the tenants would be the ones calling the Johns on him.

When did I get here? he mused, and pulled up a map through the grid. Winter Park, how did I get to Winter Park? The walk from the tech mall would have taken hours.

Bright lights brought him around as a Dodge Caravan cruised to a halt in front of him. The door slid open, revealing a comfortable beige interior, complete with bottles of water and room to stretch out if needed. There were bright red lights bordering the entrance but when he was identified positively as the passenger, it turned green, beckoning him in.

Dhata slid inside and collapsed on the chair, which felt like a bed of clouds. He was asleep before he knew it, but awoke to the harmonic tone of the Caravan alerting him that his destination had been reached. “Please exit the vehicle carefully,” it was saying. Then, “You have five minutes to exit the vehicle or I will assume that you are not well. Should I call for medical? Is there a loved one I can reach? Dhata Mays, are you in trouble?”

He stood up quickly and stepped out into the loading area of the Grand Bohemian Hotel, and the transport was on its way. Almost safe, he thought, and then walked into the lobby and approached the desk where a stiff in a suit stood watching him.

“Checking in?” the man asked, then pointed towards the retinal scan, which Dhata used to upload his identification. “I’m sorry, sir,” the man said. “It says that your account is frozen, b-but I’m sure that we can clear it up. Did you make a large withdrawal recently?”

“Oh, hell, the hundred large,” he said, then spun around, frantically patting his pockets.

His mention of the large sum of money caused the man’s eyes to go wide, but he tried to hide it by playing on his computer, pretending to “clear it up” like he said.

Dhata reached into his coat pocket for the bankcard. He could always put the money back later, once he was sober and sharp again. His fingers probed the insides. Finding nothing, he tried his pant pockets, and then his socks, turning around to see if it had fallen out.

How could he have lost it? That was too much money. He tore off the coat and dug into every pocket, then crushed the coat to see if he could feel where it may have fallen into the lining.

It was embarrassing; he couldn’t even look at the clerk. When he came to terms that he had lost the card, he retraced his steps in is mind. Did I lose it on the Caravan? No, the AI would’ve detected. No telling how many drunk losers dropped items in there. Those things are wired to get you home safely along with all your crap. The curb, he thought. I could have dropped it on the curb, but—

“DAMMIT!” he shouted and ran out of the hotel, remembering the hool that had grabbed him.

He was sober now, so he connected to his bank, and reported the theft immediately. They would freeze his assets until he could find a branch, and explain what had happened to one of their officers. The freezing would extend to the card, and he would be placed on a probationary period afterwards. In short, he was screwed if he wanted to pull out the Cuban’s 100,000 UCCs later on.

His car. It was at the mall, he finally remembered, but the thieves had taken his parking identification card too. He cussed out loud, then started running. It was a race against time if they meant to steal his car.

Dhata ignored the pain in his feet and the soreness of his legs that had come from the long walk earlier. The Bohemian was closer to the mall than where he had been prior, so he used that as a good sign that he would make it. He dashed across the busy streets and used his GPS to cut a direct path, but despite all this and his will to succeed, he forgot about the drugs.

When he got to Universal Blvd. he fell on his knees and retched. Old whiskey and yesterday’s lunch came pouring out of him like a waterfall from hell. It burned coming out and his eyes watered, and then the dizziness returned and he wanted to die. Why would anyone take this for fun? he wondered, before noticing his position.

He stumbled to his feet and forced himself forward, the world spinning again. When he saw the garage, he became excited; finally this night would be coming to an end. He quickened his pace. It would be over soon, but he had lost his wits with the food and drink.

The shadow that had followed him since he left the hotel stepped out from a corner store and approached him. He should have heard his footsteps, or seen his reflection in a glass, but neon lights and loud cars were all that Dhata Mays was seeing. He stopped at a crosswalk to gain the garage, and as the walk lit up he took a step. That was when the black limousine appeared in front of him, and a shove from behind plummeted him into darkness.

‡Chapter 5‡

La Princesa

Sunlight spilled through the tall bay windows as the white lace curtains billowed lightly in the wind. Lur Diaz looked like an angel returning home, and smiled at the way it felt. A sudden wind ruined the moment, a chilly invader that produced goose pimples on her skin.

She was in an off-white room with black furniture, and the sheets she lay in were also expensive and white. So it was easy to spot the sequined black dress that lay at the foot of the bed, and the red purse and carnation that sat next to it.

She sat up, stretched, and glanced down at them. There was a note on the dress that was quickly scribbled. 2:00 pm at the Villa. Don Jose wants to see you.

Hesitantly she drew the sheets back, then swung her legs off the side of the bed. Her ICL placed the time at 1:34 pm, so she knew she had to hurry or her father would be upset. It was specifically at these times that she felt a tiny bit annoyed at being summoned. It was all she allowed, but it was enough to sour her mood.

Don Jose Diaz was at a table on the beach. He was a handsome man in his late fifties, who looked the way you expected a rich man to look. He had jet black hair, with a neatly trimmed moustache that sat above red lips that sneered defiantly at the world. Today he wore a blue, short-sleeved button-up, and light khaki pants with cuffs. His blue oxfords were kicked off somewhere near the table, and his hands were clasped around an orange drink.

His sole companion was a man named Carlos, but most hools knew him as “Pocket-knife Ruiz.” He was Don Jose’s underboss, one Lur knew as a wicked man who had been undressing her with his eyes since she was eleven years old. A part of her knew that it was only a matter of time before he burst into her room and do what wicked men did. Either that or the old man would force her to marry him, but until then she stayed out of his way as much as she could manage.

Seeing him there made her even more worried, since it was a sign that her father was “conducting business.” The place where they sat was actually beautiful, with artificial sand mixed in with the real. The combination made for a brilliant white beach which, combined with the blue of the water, took your breath away.

“Lurita,” Don Jose said, standing to greet her. He allowed her to kiss his cheek before taking his seat.

“Hola, Don Carlos,” she said, feigning a smile, and the weasel-faced man pulled out his toothpick and grinned at her before making a little bow.

“I leave you now, Don Jose, so you can talk to the señorita, but I will not forget what we spoke about today,” Carlos said. Her father stood up to shake his hand, and brought him in for a bear hug. Don Jose quietly watched the man leave their company, then motioned for Lur to sit.

“I found you a husband, Lurita; you must do this thing for me. It is someone who will bring great honor to our family.”

Is he serious, she thought, her heart racing as she gripped her purse. He reached forward and took her hand, and she sat down across from him. “You will have many children, beautiful boys and girls to enjoy my wealth. This will make me a happy man, and you a happy woman, eh?”

Lur barely listened but stared out into the water, wondering if drowning would hurt. She could come out here one night, kick off her shoes, then swim until she was too tired. That would be something she could decide for herself, since marriage was apparently out of the question.

“Lurita!” her father snapped, and she turned towards him slowly.

“What?” she said, her patience sapped. “You’ve said enough. I’m your dog, your putita. Something to barter with whoever you like.”

“Is that what you think you are? A thing I use for business? That hurts, Lurita. That really hurts. Daughter, I love you more than life itself.”

“No, Papa, what you love is the money you extort and murder for. Loving fathers let their children grow up, and don’t all of a sudden decide that they need arranged marriages. Is it Carlos?”

“Lurita!” he snapped. “What is the matter with you? Carlos is a good man; he’s family—”

“Don Carlos isn’t blood, and you are a fool if you haven’t seen the way he looks at me even in front of you.”

She stared into his eyes, which had softened from her words, but as he reached out to her she looked away, choosing to gaze at the blue horizon instead.

“You have never been disrespectful, my Lurita. Today is a very confusing day. I know that you love me, as I love you, but I can see that you are frustrated and upset with me. I am tired, Lurita. I am tired and I need you to do this for me, for our business.”

“I am sorry, Papa, and I want to do it for you, but does it have to be Don Carlos?”

“I’m afraid so, daughter, it is a promise that I must keep.”

“But he’s like sixty years old,” she mumbled, looking off in the distance. She loved her father, but this wouldn’t work. She’d flee the country before she married that sadistic pig.

They spoke for a time but Lur found it hard to relax as her father opened up about his feelings. She learned that the American who she met in Orlando was alive but owed a large debt to him. She also learned that he refused to budge on the topic of her betrothal to Pocket-knife Ruiz.

Lur loved her father but now she was thinking about leaving. He would never let her go—not when he had so much riding on whatever Ruiz had promised him—so she would have to escape and risk the chance that she would never see him again. She ordered the same drink that he had, and they spoke about happier times. When a phone call came through, she got up to leave, but he touched her hand and motioned for her to sit.

“Lurita,” he said, “I know you don’t like it, but there is some business that demands my attention. As my heir, you could attend, learn a few things about my business?”

“What is it, Papa?” she asked, hoping that it would be a simple job where she got to play translator.

“You may not like it,” he said, then got up to lead her towards the mansion. “This is messy, and you may not want to see this sort of thing.”

He was right, of course. She wanted nothing more than to head back to her room to plot an escape. She would never be Carlos Ruiz’s wife; the man she married would be one that she loved.

They walked in silence along the beach, till a set of white marble steps led up to a cobbled path. Two men in a golf cart were waiting to drive them to the house, and her father nodded at them and took his seat. She thought about the two hours she had spent with her father and how these men had stood waiting by the cart the entire time. The distance to the house was only sixty yards or so, but this was the sort of power that he had.

She smiled at them, trying to show that she was not a monster, but they merely looked away and attended to their duties. When they pulled up to the house Don Jose took her through a hidden door leading down into a dark hallway. As they walked the lights came on, tiny bulbs that were built into the floor.

“What is this place, Papa?” she said, but Don Jose didn’t answer.

At the end of the hall was a cast-iron door, which slid open automatically at their approach. On the inside stood a ring of five, stoic men; some she recognized and others were strangers who looked like foreigners. In the center of the ring was a naked, dark-skinned giant, handcuffed to a chair and staring at the floor.

“Dhata,” she gasped, then turned around, unable to look. Just when she thought that her day couldn’t have gotten worse, her father had delivered another crippling blow.

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

He woke up to cold water being thrown into his face, and found that he had a hard time opening his eyes. When they finally opened, the fluid burned, and he quickly realized that it was sea water. Six figures stood around him shouting in Spanish, and though he understood some, he couldn’t process all of it.

They were angry and threatening violence. That part was easy, but on top of that they were demanding money and that was what he decided to focus on. Money, dark dungeon of sorts, angry Spanish men: these were all the ingredients needed to create the one scenario he feared. He had gone to Orlando, trying to stay low key, but stumbling around like a stim-head junkie had led him to the group of men he was trying to avoid.

He blinked hard, trying to clear his vision, but his ICLs were going crazy and his pupils burned like fire. He sat still, blinking, trying to get clarity, then one of the men stepped forward and decked him. The blow was enough to wake him up fully and force sight into his blurry eyes.

What he saw was a motley crew of characters; they looked more like nightclub denizens than gangsters. Standing behind them in a flawless powder-blue shirt was Jose Diaz, the famous Don and father to Lur, the woman who had gotten him into this mess.

Dhata tried to imagine where they had him. Jose was on the FBI’s most wanted list, so he couldn’t have risked shuttling out to Orlando. He was knocked out when they caught him on the curb, so was it possible that they had shuttled him across the ocean to Cuba?

“Boss, he’s awake,” one of the hools said, and Jose Diaz stepped forward to look at him.

“You have my money?” he asked in a heavy accent, and Dhata looked up at him and shook his head slowly.

“I have your money, but I need time. You grabbed me when—”

Another blow, this one a right cross, turned a blink into a period of darkness. He woke up to them struggling to lift his heavy frame, then sat him up straight so that he could continue to talk to their Don. However, Jose Diaz was no longer in front of him; he had been replaced by an old rat with bad fashion sense.

This new person didn’t ask questions. He just started in with punches, most landing in areas where Dhata didn’t feel them, while others broke his nose and sent one of his eyes into perpetual darkness. He ran a tongue across his teeth and felt one coming loose. If they didn’t kill him outright, he would be the ugliest ex-John in Tampa Bay. He tried to talk, but it hurt worse than anything else, so he closed his eyes and hoped to black out again to speed up the beating.

More water woke him up and he felt as if his entire face had gone numb. There was a cut on his right thigh, revealing the metal inside, and his working eye was cloudy, barely seeing the hools exit the room. The place was a dungeon, illuminated by low halogens, and a candle on a table filled with torture tools. He wanted to die, to skip out from the immense pain and humiliation, but he was alive, and had to deal with being the punching bag for the Cuban mafia.

“Dhata Mays,” a familiar voice said, and he could see the blurry image of Don Jose. “You have my money?”

“What the fuck, Jose, are you torturing me with rhetoric now that you’re done with my body? I don’t have your money, I fucking told you, but my account is frozen, and I can’t do shit. Bad timing, man, do you understand? Mal momento … mal …” He hung his head.

“You understand you won’t get another chance, detective,” Jose said.

“So kill me and be done with it,” Dhata said, his patience gone and replaced by red hot anger. As a true detective for the Tampa Police Department, he had escaped some of the craziest things. Most told him that he had nine lives and was on number six, but others chalked it up to him being a resilient fighter who didn’t quit. Either way, he had personally felt that every day was a blessing. He had been a John, he had faced death on multiple occasions, and where everyone fell, he had managed to keep on standing.

Now as he sat their beaten, death wasn’t the top thing on his mind. What he was thinking, and what annoyed him, was that this criminal had kidnapped him and the synth killer would get to cut out another spine. Worse than that reality was the public’s eventual reaction. Jason would tell his boss where they were on the investigation, and then the news stations would be tipped off and chaos would ensue. All for what? $100,000? Which to a man like Jose Diaz was crumbs to his booming bread factory.

“I understand,” he managed. “Now kill me, or let me go so that I can go back to work. There are things at play that go way beyond the two of us, and you need to let me finish my investigation.”

“When my men found you, you were on the stims, detective. Is this your idea of bigger things? Stim junkies don’t have money; they shoot it all up in their veins.” He demonstrated his words by pulling up a sleeve to show his arm. “I should know, verdad? A, how you say? A past life experience?” He started laughing. “So you say you have my money and I don’t believe you. But I tell you what, detective, I make you a deal, eh? You send me some information on that robot gangster, and I let you live. What say you?”

“Robot gangster? You mean Peyton?” Dhata wanted to laugh but it hurt too much. That would be easy; he owed Peyton nothing. But making deals with a stim-pushing despot … was that the sort of man he wanted to be?

He went along with what the old Don said, and he was dragged to an adjacent room where they lay him on a slab. The bad vision was one thing, but the pain made him wince, and he was barely able to make out the synth medic who came down to look after him. He was a handsome young man who kept saying nice things, but Dhata found it impossible to concentrate on them.

The medic treated his wounds and injected him with stims that numbed areas of his body that he needed to stitch. The whole affair took two long hours, and when he was finished he draped a cool sheet over his body. Sight returned to his busted eye, and his gums were sore but his teeth were solid. Jose Diaz assumed that his message had been received, but Dhata wanted to get out and kill him.

The stims put his body in stasis, so all he could move was his head. He hadn’t realized how frightening it was to be completely paralyzed. The synth packed his kit and walked up to him and leaned in close. “I know who you are, and what you do for us. I gave you the very best of help,” he whispered.

It was good to know that he had friends even in a place as far away as Cuba. The man reminded him in many ways of his old maid, Anna. “What’s your name?” he asked, just as the man reached for the panel to slide open the door.

“Dominic, Dhata Mays … oh and there is a visitor here to see you,” he said.

Christ, not another visit from old pissed off and wrinkled, he thought, as he waited for Jose to emerge with an addition to their “deal.” But when he saw the curly crop of black hair, and the tear-streaked face, he thought for a moment that he had slipped back into sleep.

“Dhata?” Lur whispered, walking slowly towards him, as if her proximity could hurt.

“There she is,” he said, smiling, the sides of his face hurting from the effort. “Your old man caught me without the money. Now he’s patching me up again to send me back to Orlando.”

“I am sorry for all of this. I will talk to Papa. It isn’t fair what he is doing when you didn’t know anything about me,” she said.

Dhata checked the room for cameras, sure that there was one hidden somewhere. “Are you happy here, Lur? Happy staying with your father? The thing that we talked about when you were with me … I thought you’d be off pursuing it?”

“You mean being an investigator?” she said, smiling. She walked up to the slab and touched his face. “Papa would kill me; it would be a conflict of interest.”

“You don’t know much about Johns or snoops, do you?” Dhata said, shaking his head.

“Snoops?” she asked, making a face. “What is a snoop?”

“It’s what we call detectives. See, in the U.S., we have a lot of slang. A police officer is a John, a detective a snoop, and a prostitute, we call them Marys. You say that being a snoop would conflict with your gangster daddy, when in actuality he’d be happy to have a daughter on the inside. You could tell him when they’re coming for him, or when one of his operations goes bust. You’d be a spy, and he would value you for it.”

“Oh, that makes a lot of sense. I’m sure he has men to do that type of thing already. No, what he wants for his daughter is to marry her off to one of his friends.”

Dhata winked at her, then looked up at the ceiling. The dungeon looked as if it had been created over 500 years ago. “That would explain it,” he said, smiling to himself. “No wonder they came looking for you the way they did.”

“I am going to get you out,” she said, pulling back the sheet, but what she saw stopped her short and she covered her mouth with her hands. “I can see right through your leg,” she exclaimed.

“Synthetic skin is translucent when it’s first applied. It will look normal in a couple of hours,” he said.

“Why do you have a synthetic leg? Did Papa do this to you?”

“Nah, this is an old battle wound from my early years as a John,” he said. “Bastard shot me in the chest and I fell back into a power saw; would’ve lost my leg if not for the power of science. Now I’m just about twenty-five percent synth,” he said, and winked again with a little smile, amused by how hard she was taking it.

Lur seemed to be at a loss for words and Dhata pitied her, knowing she blamed herself for everything he’d been through. “Don’t risk your father’s wrath helping me, Lurita. He’s promised to shuttle me home in the morning. It was good to see your face, y’know? Remind me of why I’m being put through all this. If you find yourself, I don’t know, fed up and wanting a change of scenery, you know that I’d protect you, take care of you, right?”

Lurita stood by the door and stared at him for a long time, and it was hard to read what was going on in her head. She nodded after a time, then walked over and kissed him. He wanted to reach up and touch her hair, but all he could do was lay there. “I would like that,” she said, and then, “I’m so sorry, Dhata,” and she was gone out the door, leaving him to the silence.

The next day he woke up able to move, and a big Cuban with a handlebar mustache came to collect him to take him home. The synthetic skin on his thigh had finished processing and his leg looked normal again. He gave his ICL a test and his vision was also fully repaired. He was led through the rear of the dungeon with a muzzle in the small of his back, and he shuffled along with his hands in the air until he reached a grate leading out to the sea.

There was a fishing boat waiting, with two hools armed with automatic rifles. Handlebars pushed him out and he stumbled on the rocks until a strong hand grabbed him and righted him. Walking out from the side of the door was none other than Carlos Ruiz. Dhata didn’t know who he was but thought that he looked like a tourist.

With the Hawaiian-style shirt, and long white pants, it was hard to take the old gangster seriously. “Christ,” Dhata muttered, trying not to laugh. “What the fuck are you supposed to be?”

“Word of advice, dead man, you stay away from Lurita. I don’t care what you think you have with her. We see your face anywhere again, not with Don Jose, and I cut you.” He put his finger on Dhata’s temple. “From here, to here.” He slid it down to the top of his chest. “And pour the sea water in the wound.”

“What’s your name, tough guy?” Dhata asked, unimpressed.

The man flicked out a pocket knife and rolled it around between his fingers. Despite the threat, Dhata thought that his dexterity was impressive. “The name is Carlos Ruiz. You remember it, John. Lurita is to be my wife, so you stay away from her. You understand?”

“Got it,” Dhata said, and Handlebars led him away. They seated him in the back and undid his handcuffs, which was the best feeling he’d felt in hours. They shoved off almost immediately and Dhata watched Pocket-knife Ruiz. He wondered why Jose Diaz would trust an obvious rat like him, then put it out of his mind to focus on returning home.

‡Chapter 6‡

Grits & Conversation

Dhata lived inside of an old Wigsburk War Zeppelin that had made its final landing in a sinkhole-infested swamp deep in West Tampa. To see the “house” you would need a hover copter, shuttle, or drone. He had spent much of his life savings renovating the old ship, and had converted it into a three-level home.

The exterior was painted green to blend in with the swamp, but the interior walls were a translucent, glasslike material. He stopped in front of the Spatial Augmented Reality (SAR) lens embedded in the wall, and waved his hand in an arc. The motion triggered a sensor that activated the augment, and a holographic orb appeared in front of him.

Dhata reached for the orb, which reminded him that he needed sensory implants in order to feel it. Then he turned it counter-clockwise and the door to his house slid open.

He limped towards his big “dinner table” that used to be the central war board for the zeppelin. Though the house was big enough for a large family—a wish and dream of his then-wife, Michelle—he had converted the dinner table back into a war board, but instead of countries and maps for bombing, he had acrylics of corpses and cells with the mug shots of known criminals.

It was now Sunday, a bad day for knocking on doors, so going over the evidence was the plan for the day. Three days had passed since that unfortunate trip to Cuba. Two of them had him stimmed, kidnapped, and tortured, and the third had been his shuttle ride home to walk several blocks to the parking garage. Jason had given up on trying to call him when they put his ICL out of commission. He had seen the messages waiting in his virtual inbox, and listened to them while he was driving back home.

Jason thought he’d taken personal time off to mourn Candace, and said that he understood and went on to take over his detective duties. He was a busy man, and the police department was unpopular and severely understaffed. It was why they hired skiptracers to do the actual detective work, so one official John could take on several cases simultaneously. Hearing that Jason was doing his work was not an easy thing for him to accept. So he came home ready to hit the ground running, especially since he’d lost so many days.

He started a cup of coffee on his espresso machine, then circled the table looking at the images. It was a disgusting spread of synth devastation: exposed backs, and blood on dark asphalt roads. On a photo of the judge was a yellow sticker with a question mark drawn upon its surface. This odd man out had been his obsession for days, but he still couldn’t figure out why he was there.

It was obvious by the location of the corpse that it was meant to be found by the Tampa police department. The nature of the murder made him feel uneasy. Whoever had done it was either trying to implicate a synth as the suspect, or was trying to send a message. Was that message a warning of some sort? Or was the message meant for him?

If the message was for him then it explained Candace’s hanging. He had pissed someone off who was very patient, and probably had more in store for him. No, that was ego, wasn’t it? He had been nothing but helpful to the synth community. Even as a John he was relatively good. He didn’t force sex out of synths that were on their third strike, and he never robbed them like many of his fellows.

Who would have it out for me? he thought, but brushed it off as a distraction. Maybe it was gang-related like they first assumed. A human gang, and a synth gang, battling over properties. The body would be a message to the humans that even public officials could get cut. But what about Candace? Was that gang-related too? He put both his hands on his head and held them there as he looked over all the pictures.

The phone rang and he answered. “Who is it?”

“Jason,” said the sharp voice. “Look, I know you’re still in shock, but we got another human missing a spine. How was Orlando? Got any leads?”

Another spine. He felt his heart skip, and he glanced out his window at the city. This could be it; the news was bound to break, and everything they’d worked for all these years would be dismantled in a manner of moments.

“No leads, but that toilet of a city is the same as it always was,” Dhata said.

“Talk to me, Dee. What happened out there?” Jason said, his tone changing to one of worry.

“I’m in it, Jay. It’s up to my neck, you understand? Stick with me and you’ll have stains all over your fancy blues. Remember the girl from Orlando I told you about? The—” He looked for a coded word that would jog his memory.

Dhata was always worried that police phone calls were recorded, and the mention of the daughter of a Cuban Mafioso would bring in the alphabet boys. FBI, CIA: all of the letters that amounted to trouble. They would screw it up, then both he and Lur would end up in a grave. He was sure that Jose would murder his own daughter. The man was old school cold, and while family mattered, the disgrace was enough to okay the filicide.

“Wait, you mean the—” Jason stopped talking and Dhata knew that he had finally figured it out. “You hooked up with her again? Man, when will you learn? The one human girl you choose to like and she’s as spiky as the top of a prison wall.”

Dhata had to laugh. His friend was right. Since his wife left, his taste in women had always been suspect.

“Not her this time — the trouble, I mean. It’s the money part of that whole mess … it got me drugged up, flown out to the island, tortured and then released. So, there it is: I’m a ticking time bomb, and I’m not letting anybody I know catch shrapnel when I blow. Are you getting me, Jay? I had to make deals; it was the only way I could get back to help you solve this thing.”

“Christ, Dhata. I can’t leave you out there alone. Let’s get together over a beer and figure this thing out,” Jason said.

“No, we need to stay after this killer, and you don’t need to do this alone. I’m gonna find who’s doing these people, then I’ll hand whoever it is over and you’ll get your proper due.”

“What about you, Dee?” Jason asked.

“I’ll figure it out. They don’t know the half of who they’re trifling with.”

They spoke for a bit more, and then they got off the phone. Dhata lowered the lights and stared out at the dark tree line below the indigo sky. He thought of Lur, thought about how much trouble she had caused him, but he couldn’t bring himself to be upset with her. It was as if she had a hold on his heart that he wasn’t meant to understand. When he’d seen her in that basement, she was as lovely as ever—and lost, man, she looked so lost.

He felt old, tired, and worn through. After the shuttle dropped him off in Orlando, he went straight back to his car and drove home to Tampa. It was only then that he slipped into a convenience store and used their medical pod to see what had been damaged. Fractured ribs, a detached retina, and a broken jaw were the worst of it. The other minor annoyances were too many to mention, and it did nothing for his blood pressure, which had to be soaring after everything.

The bill would be hefty once his account was unfrozen, but he was able to drive home feeling whole again. Another human; that’s what Jason had said on the call. Another human being, spineless. If it kept on like this, the news would go national, and then there would be widespread panic and attacks aimed at the synths.

I have to figure this out, he thought, but no-one was talking. The Orlando trip was a gamble that had ended badly. Ybor had always been his connection, but the one enemy he had there was boss of all bosses. Now he was no longer welcome, and that was precisely why he’d risked the trip to Orlando.

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

With the danger of trolling Ybor and the volatile air between humans and synths being reignited, Dhata decided to see about the murder of Candace. The next day he drove back to the ruined house where she had been hanged, and backed into the driveway so he’d have a clear path out.

It was sunny, but there was a sort of glitched hexagonal pattern to the clouds that bothered him. He rubbed his eyes and rotated his pupils, trying to see if something had gotten into his eye.

He activated the screen from his ICL and in yellow letters on a red field read the message: <<Internal Contact Lens damaged. Repairing. Time till completion: UNKNOWN>>. Cuba again; he could not shake it. Whenever life would normalize there was always another injury, forcing him to remember those hours of hell.

“You a John?” came a voice from the road, and he squeezed his eyes shut and opened them to deactivate the screen.

An old woman was approaching him with a fuzzy white animal in her hands. She looked ancient, with no signs of bio-revitalization shots, or anti-aging cream to smooth the skin. She was either too poor to fix her appearance or was one of those rare freaks who didn’t care. She wore a wide-brimmed straw hat to protect her leathery face from the sun, and a long floral dress that revealed too much of her body beneath it.

“Well, hello, beautiful,” Dhata said, and she cocked her head and tried to hide her smile.

“I’m Dhata Mays.” He extended his hand, and she removed her own from the animal and shook it. She had a firm grip which surprised him, since her slender, ring-adorned hand was riddled with veins. She reminded him of his grandmother, back when she was alive, and he found that he liked her. “Do you mind if I ask you a few questions, Mom?”

“Mom? You’re a real flatterer; you out here looking to sell something?” she said.

He glanced at the animal, which turned its head to look at him, and he noticed that it was a Persian cat. A synth clone by the look of its eyes, but real enough to fool everyone else. He reached forward to pet it, tickling behind its ear, and it purred so loud that he could hear it above the wind. “What’s his name?” he said.

“She, and her name is Mitty. She’s falling for your charm, young man, but she’s a dumb animal. What are you doing out here? I haven’t seen you before.”

“I’m a skiptracer, a kind of detective, looking for some answers. A young woman got killed last week outside of this home. Do you happen to live around here?” he asked.

She studied his face for a time, as if to read if he was lying. “What if I tell you that I was just passing through?” she said.

“I would say that I’m hurt, Mom, that you would resort to blowing me off. I won’t get you in trouble anyway, and you don’t have to answer anything that makes you uncomfortable. To tell the truth, I knew the girl, so finding out what happened to her is very important to me.”

“You’re full of crap, you knew the girl,” she said, twisting up her mouth.

“Okay,” he said, and pretended that he was exhausted. “It’s just that I’ve been out here all morning, and you’re the only person I’ve seen. You know the air out here; it’s not good for you. I’m surprised that you’re not wearing a mask.”

“That’s just lies the government tells you,” she said. “We’ve been breathing it for years.”

“We? So, you live out here? Mom, I promise you, I’m not the Johns. I know that people live here, and that is none of my business. I ignore something as dumb as a law that says that people can’t occupy abandoned houses. What I can’t ignore, however, is a young girl losing her life to coldblooded hools.”

The cat made a sound and seemed restless, so she had to adjust him in her arms. She seemed conflicted on whether or not to talk to him, but Dhata hoped that she would come around. “You say you knew the girl?”

“Yeah, she was a friend of mine. Helped me out quite a bit in the past. Listen, Mom, here’s the truth of it. She was a synth, and so the Johns aren’t doing anything about her murder.”

“I’m Alis Mitchell,” she said. “Me and my husband stay in that house there, cross the way. We saw that poor girl get murdered, but we’ve been worried that they would come back.”

“Can I talk to you about it, Mom? I promise that I won’t take much of your time.”

She didn’t answer but merely smiled at him, a smile that hinted that she was not to be underestimated. As they crossed the street he looked around, surprised that anyone was actually living in the bombed-out neighborhood.

“You all lived here long?” he asked.

“You’re asking if we’re squatters. The answer is yes, we’ve been here for a while, and no we didn’t buy the house; we wouldn’t be able to afford it otherwise.”

“I ain’t no John, Mom. You don’t have to explain yourself to me. Aside from the bad air, it’s a good place to live. And with no mortgage.” He whistled. “Trust me, I get it. You don’t have to worry about the government either. They have their hands full, now more than ever. Have any family here in Tampa?”

“No,” she said quietly, “It’s just me and Tim.”

She called to her husband as she got to the garage door. The house that they’d chosen was one that had been owned by someone of wealth. The door opened slowly, and the interior lit up, revealing a sort of makeshift apartment that they had converted the garage into.

He wondered why they weren’t living inside of the house, but it must have been due to the collapsed roof. It was neat and air-conditioned, and there was a pot of grits on the stove. It felt so cozy that he almost missed the man in the wheelchair that rolled up in front of him.

When Dhata looked down at him the old man held his hand up. “You have my money?” he said, his face revealing nothing.

“I don’t have your money but I brought my appetite. You have any shrimp to go with them grits?”

The old man looked him over, then smiled and waggled a finger at him. “I like this man; he’s alright. Where’d you find him, honey?”

The wife explained, and made him sit on a comfortable loveseat that must’ve been salvaged from the house. She got three bowls and served them cheese grits, and they sat together and ate it quietly with pieces of toast and homemade sweet iced tea.

When they finished the meal they discussed the war and the people in the neighborhood. Dhata spent the entire afternoon there, speaking of the old days, and he learned quite a bit about his hosts.

Tim and Alis came off as a sweet elderly couple, but they were survivors, and it was quite romantic. Tim was a soldier, an expatriate from Nigeria. Dhata gathered that he was in hiding, and had more of the street in him than he let on.

“You have a cat,” Dhata said, reaching down to pet the animal. “I was beginning to think that they were extinct, and the government was keeping it under wraps.”

The old couple exchanged a glance, and then Alis said, “It’s a synth. A clone of my Mitty, and though the original was real, we love this one just as much.”

“So, you took your cat to an Ishiguro lab, and they sold you a synthetic replica?” he said.

“Something like that,” said Tim. “It was actually a gift, sent to us by the man who ran over our cat.”

“You folks don’t have any problems with synths then, I gather?”

“No, why would we?” Tim said. “They’re technically people. All they want to do is live just like the rest of us. But like anything good that comes in peace, there’s always hell to greet it. We saw your friend, through this window here.” He gestured to the sole window in the garage, and Dhata walked over to peer through it.

It was only a sixteen inch space, but from where he stood, he could see the hanging tree in the neighbor’s yard.

“How much did you see?” he asked.

“Enough,” said Alis. “They flew in, hung her up, and then flew out right afterwards. It was quick, and they wore masks, but the one who hung her was tall and slim. Strong for somebody that size.”

“You said they; were there more than two?”

“I counted three. Men, all dressed nicely from, what I could tell. They came in a hover, an all-black hover.”

Professionals, Dhata thought, this wasn’t just an act of violence.

He walked around the table collecting their bowls, then deposited them into the makeshift sink.

“Sweetheart, you don’t’ have to do that,” Alis said, but he kept on doing it anyway.

“I was taught to pitch in and clean up after eating as a guest in someone’s home,” he said. “Plus, it’s been forever since I had cheese grits. Whatever you did to them had my taste buds going crazy.”

Alis smiled and touched him on the arm before walking across the room to stand next to her husband’s chair.

“I didn’t get to see the other ones faces too good,” she said. “They stayed in the hover while the one I was talking ‘bout, the skinny one. He strung that poor girl up.” She hesitated. “Was this a girlfriend of yours? She was a very pretty girl.”

“Matter of fact, she was,” Dhata admitted. “I’ve known her well over three years. We were getting pretty serious, but, yeah, then this happened.”

Tim looked confused as he rolled towards Dhata. “You know she was a doll, right? One of uh, the synth people?”

“Oh, I do,” said Dhata. “I’ve dated my share of synth girls.” He watched the old man, waiting for the inevitable reaction that came with admitting that he slept with synths. “Candace actually was my only serious relationship, after the divorce and all.”

“Divorce?” Tim said. “Were you married to another synth-person?”

“No,” Dhata said. “My wife was human. High school sweetheart, actually; been together a long time. Though now we don’t even talk to one another.”

“You can’t put a definition on love, sweetheart,” Alis said. “We don’t get to decide who we’re crazy about. Doesn’t matter, human or synth, we all get hurt when the one we love gets taken out of our lives. Tim wouldn’t believe me when I told him that there’s humans and synths out there in love and in regular relationships. Sorry for all of his nosy questions.”

“No, it’s alright. I’m asking y’all questions too, so, we’re just talking, right? I get asked it all the time and look, I know it’s strange to people. People think, uh, yeah you’re dating a machine, so what happens when she gets her memory wiped, or shorts out, or something? That’s not love. Candace was special. Synths have unique personalities, and I don’t think about what they are under that flesh. They look real, act real, and as far as I’m concerned, they are real. So, yeah, I date them, and I have no shame.”

“Well, I think that it’s sweet and speaks to your character,” Alis said. “You’re a man who doesn’t hide from people who disagree with your choices. Human and synth get so much ridicule, but that’s the nature of how we think, isn’t it? Even us: I’m from an area where culturally, in the past, Tim and I would be persecuted by both our own people for our love. I remember some of that nonsense, and the world is still the same. The only difference now is that they have shifted their hate to the synth people.”

Tim seemed to be in a daze, as if Dhata’s explanation had stunned him. He missed what his wife was trying to say, and opened his mouth and closed it. “I always thought they was built for sex and whatnot. A lot of them be hooking,” he said.

“TIM!” Alis said, “Don’t be rude to Dhata. He just explained how he loves everybody and you gon’ sit here talking about Marys.”

“Sorry.” He chuckled. “I’m so sorry. See, I’m old and when I came up there was no synths and humans married and all that. You couldn’t even be seen with one of them. I think it was illegal or something.”

“Those were difficult times that I’m glad I missed,” Dhata said. “I had a rough childhood but the good parts had synths in ‘em. Good friends, girlfriends I snuck around my parents, even my career. We had some synths on the force that saved my life a few times. So, I see them differently; they’ve been good to me. Hell, look at what we humans do to one another.”

“You damn right about that,” Tim said, and his demeanor changed. “Even now this idiot that just took office is talking about going—”

“Tim!” Alis shouted his name again. “No more politics. It is over. Let the man go on ‘bout his business; I’m sure he has other things to do.”

“Well, I thank you folks for your time. It has been a great help,” Dhata said.

“Has it helped?” Alis said. “All I told you about was the hover and three people I can’t even identify. What can you do with that kind of information?”

Dhata smiled. He really liked Alis’s honesty.

“Well, for one it tells me that it isn’t just one person doing this. We’ve been clueless about this for some time now. You told me there were three, but only one of them went out to do the work. What this tells me is that the one was a lackey for a boss and possibly his pilot. What we may be dealing with is someone of power and not some random killer. So, you see, what you told me puts a light on the dark part of my investigation.”

She seemed to accept this and they made their farewells. He walked out to the Buick. By now the sun was on its way down, but he was glad to see that the glitchy area of his lens had finally finished being repaired.

‡Chapter 7‡

Discovering the Arch

Since it was late and he needed to process the information about Candace, Dhata drove to Empire’s Tavern to find Esti. She would know about three men traveling with her friend, and maybe why one of them would want to string her up.

The waitress from before was nowhere to be seen, so a busty, dark-eyed redhead showed him to his seat. He ordered a sweet tea and the meatloaf, but when it was placed in front of him, he picked at it like a bird. He just didn’t have an appetite, and his hand was shaking. He noticed this when he picked up the fork and held the meat out in front of him.

Was this mental trauma, or was it the grits? Were they just not sitting well? So much had happened to him within the span of four days that he couldn’t pinpoint where the blame belonged. He caught the bile rising in his throat fast enough to rush into the bathroom. There he vomited so much that the little strength he had was finally sapped, forcing him to drag himself along the walls to make it to the sink.

Cold water to wash out the mouth and splash the face, then he was dragging himself to the table. His heart was racing; what was going on? But he managed to get back to his seat and he sat there wondering how he would make it back home.

After sitting there for a time he noticed a familiar face. It was Esti, and she seemed to have undergone some changes. She had straight black hair that fell to her shoulders, and her arms were flawless, with five fingers on each hand. If he hadn’t met her before, he would have been fooled into thinking that she was human. Even her lips seemed different somehow, as if she’d ordered the works at a Cosmetics chop shop.

When she saw him gawking, she walked over, her hips swaying so much that it was a wonder she didn’t hit anyone. “You don’t look good,” she said as she sat down across from him, bringing out an electric cigarette.

“I guess you gave me something,” he said with a smile, and she kicked him under the table.

“Nothing poisonous about my muffin, Skip, plus you still haven’t taken a bite.” She winked. “You should be nice to me, you know. I’m the only synth stupid enough to be seen with you.”

He smiled, feeling dazed but impressed by her look, and he reached forward and touched her warm hand. “You’ve been busy, pretty girl, but you look amazing. Is it my four hundred credits that you’re wearing all over?”

“Your four hundred credits went into the nice tan you see,” she said, showing off her arms. “But the rest was purchased from someone way richer than you.”

“Hey, let me level with you, Esti, I actually came looking for you. I’ve got some bad news.”

“I know what it is, and no I don’t know who did it,” she said. Her smile never changed, but he saw the sadness in her eyes, and he wondered if she knew just how frightening it made her look. “The boss knows that I’m your new connection,” she said. “I caught some heat over our last chat. Had you told me you were going to storm into Ybor and light him up, I would’ve have told you jack.”

“What do I need to do?” he said, and he kept his eyes locked onto hers. “Our friend is dead. There’s a synth serial killer running loose, and as soon as the word gets out they’ll be hunting you for sport. I can’t imagine that Peyton wants that affecting his business, and I’m sure that a smart girl like you can understand.”

“I do, Dhata. It’s the only reason I’m sitting here talking to you. I want you to find who did Candace, and extract the life from out of him.”

She took an extra-long drag on her cigarette and waved the serving girl over. “He needs a tonic,” she said, then when the girl turned to leave she grabbed her arm. “A real tonic,” she said, and the girl pulled away from her.

“I get it, Esti, I can see for myself. I don’t want him getting sick in front of customers,” she said.

“Tonic?” Dhata asked.

“Your body’s in need of a stim. Looks like you got a habit; weird that a junkie don’t know what a tonic is,” she said.

“Junkie? That ain’t me. Ran into some real losers who shot me up.”

“Nasty stuff. Do you win any of your fights?” she asked.

Dhata laughed and raised his glass of water to toast his beautiful companion. Esti giggled in turn and inhaled the vapor and held it in for a very long time. When she let it go it poured from both her mouth and nostrils. It was an impressive amount of smoke that smelled of strawberries.

“Listen,” she said, “I want revenge for Candace, but since you and the boss are at odds it puts me in quite a spot. New rule for us, and it comes directly from the top. You pay for my services, we’re going to have to do a lot more than talk.”

“This way he can implicate me for solicitation if I get his ass busted,” Dhata said. It was a nice trap, but he didn’t see himself having much of a choice. The server came by and handed him a glass of fizzy liquid, and he smelled it and looked at Esti as if it was a practical joke.

“It smells like ass, but unless you want to shoot up, you better drink it or you’ll be sick,” she said.

“How long does this go on?” he said. “This reaction to the stims?”

“If it was your first shot, you should be good after that drink.”

“How much is this drink, anyway?” he said, and Esti began to laugh.

“It’s a hundred UCCs” said the server, and Dhata almost choked.

“What the hell is in this? Gold dust from Mars?” She rolled her eyes and moved on to another table. “That girl thinks I’m a junkie loser,” he said, and Esti nodded in agreement. He put it to his lips and drank it fast — it was the most disgusting thing he had ever tasted in his life.

“Good boy,” Esti said. “Now all you need is a good night’s sleep.

“Let’s get a room,” he said. “Let me get a close-up view of all those enhancements.”

“I don’t think you’ll last another five minutes, let alone that other thing. I’m good, cowboy; not working tonight. Just a girl on the town. You know how it is.”

“The girl on the town decides to take a break at her regular trap? That doesn’t make any sense, Esti. Are you saying you won’t do it?”

“I’m saying that I’m not dumb. You need help, you saw me, and now you’re trying to trick me into dragging your high ass home. I know a thing or two about tricks, Dhata. Don’t play with me. I’m not a big fan of games.”

“Alright, whatever,” Dhata said. “Take me home, and I will happily pay you.”

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

He woke up to light and sweat-soaked sheets as Esti walked in with a bowl of cereal and sat down next to him. She was in sheer lace lingerie, and its green against her caramel tan was a palette fit for any man’s desires. She squeezed in next to him and handed him the spoon, and he took it and ate like a starving animal.

“Did we?” he asked.

“Mhm.” She nodded and reached up to play with a strap on her bra. “Drunk Dhata is an animal. He did things here, he did things there, and then to my surprise, he asked me to—”

“You’re so full of shit. We didn’t do jack. I probably got you in here, then passed out on the bed.”

She laughed when he said it, a mischievous sound, then sat up on the bed with her legs crossed. “So, you were in a bad way last night; want to talk about it? I assume that’s why you came looking for me. You want to ‘talk’ some more?”

“I’m in bed and naked, not of my own doing, and I’m guessing that this isn’t a cheap hotel. Last night was a blur, but I’m assuming that talking didn’t happen,” Dhata said.

“No, we didn’t talk but you took me around town, bought me this lingerie so you could see how it looked on me. You’re a good customer, very generous—”

“Didn’t matter that I was coming down off of stims and practically out of my mind huh?” Dhata said. “What nice place did I take you to, Esti? Tell me, please; I’m curious.”

“You took me to West Tampa, to the Carpenter Mall. You gave me your card and just slept in the car.”

“CINI allowed that? You, a non-verified driver, to enter in and out of the vehicle? You’re hilarious, Esti, but I appreciate the laugh. I’m guessing you haven’t been to West Tampa much, to see how they treat synths if you so much as show up?”

“No, but I’ve heard stories. Hey, a girl can dream, right?”

“You can dream, Esti; you have a wonderful imagination. But over there isn’t much different from Temple Terrace, where I was raised,” Dhata said.

Esti seemed perplexed. “I thought that was a nice area,” she said.

“Not nice for you. Trust me, Esti, the little old ladies who smile and wave as you drive by are still using first-gen synth maids, and would lose their minds if you show up on their doorstep claiming to be their grandson’s date.” He chuckled. “Man, you have no clue, do you?”

“Haven’t been to Temple Terrace much, and when I’ve gone it was under cover of night. Kind of goes with my line of business,” she said, winking, “but it sounds like I wouldn’t like it very much. But you say that you grew up there. How did you turn out so … different?”

“You’re asking why I like synths,” he said. “I had it hard myself growing up there. Family had no money, Mom and Dad died trying to pretend they were something they weren’t. You know, my mom worked three gigs for most of that time, just to keep the lights on. Those little shits that I went to school with, they had all the money in the world.

“Hated that place; I hate thinking about it now. My first time even seeing a synth that wasn’t an old school server android was when some boys from around the way were throwing rocks at his vehicle. That poor fool got some money and tried to live in the same neighborhood as the good humans of Tampa Bay. They ran him out of there so quick.

“What’s ironic is that we were guilty of the same thing. We had no business living in that neighborhood, and those spoiled little bastards made my life a living hell. That’s why I got along with the synths. They were our janitors, our security guards, and our coaches. They were also my protectors when the psychopaths wanted to torture the poor kid.

“So, you can imagine how I felt when some of these little assholes grew up to be adults, and started waxing that us versus them rhetoric. I was like, if I have to choose, then I’m with them. They’re more human than an entire neighborhood of you idiots.”

Esti touched his face and kissed him gently on his lips, snapping him out of his dark memories. “That’s so beautiful and sad at the same time, Dhata. I don’t know what to say.”

“Just remember that I’m here to help; that’s all I can ask,” he said. “I became a John to help humans and synths, but mostly the synths since I know what is at stake. You need to help me, Esti; this goes way beyond jobs and bosses telling us what to do. This killer may be a synth, and if he is, then you’re looking at anarchy, unleashed on this entire city. They will come to Ybor, killing and raping. They will force you back into servitude. I know that you understand, it’s probably your worst fear, but it is mine as well and I can see it coming.”

“I’ll do my part, Dhata, whatever it takes,” she said, and something about the way she said it made him believe it. “You’re in a lot of trouble, you know? I’m probably in trouble too. No telling who saw me leave the Tavern last night, and this is the second time we’ve hooked up.”

“In trouble? With who? What do you mean, in trouble? If anyone has it out for me, Esti, I need to know.”

“Remember how I told you that we synths could connect to an information network? Well it’s more than that; it’s a sort of central mainframe we call it the Arch Brain.”

“Arch Brain; I know Arch Brain. It’s the super powerful, synth CPU.”

“It’s the machine that gives synths life, lover. It is what created me. We are all permanently connected, sharing knowledge and more. It saves our data and repurposes it as it sees fit. What I’m saying to you, Dhata, is that you need to be careful. You brought me here, your safe place, and you shared a lot with me. If someone, say Peyton, paid a cypher for a spike, he could use this information to get at you.”

“There’s no way for you to unplug from it? Must you stay connected?”

“It’s … how can I put it? It’s how we think? Each synth has a local memory that is vast and sophisticated, but without the Arch Brain we’d be just like you. Limited in our ability to process everything.”

“And that is such a terrible thing?”

“Well … no, but still. It’s hard to explain it to a human, but we need it, Dhata. We rely on it.”

He saw that his story had changed the dynamic between them; she was more forthcoming in this one exchange than the hours they had spent that first night inside of the Buick. “So, my being in trouble is still Peyton looking to kill me. What did I do to piss that dude off so much? You would think I had sex with his mother.”

Esti laughed as if he had just said the world’s funniest joke, then stopped abruptly and her face grew serious. “You need to be careful, Dhata. Candace cared for you; she would have wanted me to take care of you like I am doing now. Is that okay?”

“Are you unplugged now?” he asked, and she nodded, then placed his hand on top of her thigh. He didn’t know what to think; why did she do it? If what she said was true about the Arch Brain, she was actively rebelling against all synths. “How much am I going to end up owing for this little party of ours?” he asked.

“We’ll figure it out,” she said, nibbling gently on his ear lobe. “Now enough talk about Arch Brain. Blow my mind, or I swear to god, I’ll charge you double.”

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

When it was over he felt like himself again. He had slept for an hour, his body entwined with Esti’s immaculate form. When he awoke, the room seemed dark, and he saw that the sky was overcast. Good, he thought. Maybe she’ll stick around while it rains.

He thought about Arch Brain, this super computer, and the connection it gave synths all over the world. Did the government know about this construct, and was there any defense against it? If a cypher broke the waves of such a network, he could tap into every other synth.

Cyphers could never be trusted, so maybe his enemies wouldn’t risk it. Trust a hacker to break a system and you never know what other mischief—besides the one you paid him for—would benefit him in the end.

There were stories about cyphers cracking the FBI’s database and using it to frame the same idiot that had hired them. Some left openings in systems that they could exploit later on, and others would get in and then demand more money to finish.

There was no honor amongst thieves, and the cypher network exemplified this. Most were anarchists, a few were geniuses, but as a whole they all looked out for number one.

But if Dhata were to hire one, he could access Arch Brain, and see whether or not it was a synth committing the murders. No, that was impossible. There were millions of synths, and who was to say that a cypher would be able to figure out the complex code of the android’s mainframe? The cypher would have to be a synth himself, which seemed paradoxical.

When Esti finally woke up, it was to the smell of fomeal eggs and steak ordered up to the room by Dhata. She walked over to the table, wearing one of the hotel’s white robes, and when she sat down, he poured her a glass of red wine.

“This seems pretty romantic for, um, what we have going on,” she said, but when he placed a plate in front of her, she quickly dove in and seemed to enjoy it. She popped a bit of steak in her mouth and smacked at it playfully. It was delightfully juvenile, and something that one could only imagine a human doing.

“This is good,” Esti said. “Can you cook as well as this?”

“Yes ma’am,” Dhata lied. “I can flip that fomeal like a champ.” He sat in front of his own plate, facing her, and he could feel her toes dancing up his shin. She chewed some more and winked, then took a deep gulp of her wine. “There’s no romance intended here, Esti. Not to say that a woman like you doesn’t deserve romance. I’m just appreciative of everything that you’ve told me; you’ve been a good friend to me—”

“Just a friend?” she said, looking over her glass.

“You’ve taken care of me quite nicely,” he said with a smile.

He followed the outline of her neck from her ear down to her bare shoulder, where the robe had slipped off to reveal the tan line across a well-shaped breast.

“I know that look,” she said, letting the robe fall open, but he did his best to ignore it.

“I was just wondering, if you don’t mind me asking. Who did such magnificent work on you?”

Esti held the glass to her mouth and stared at him, and he wondered if she would answer. It was a thing she did; he thought it was meant to keep you off-guard, but maybe it really took that long for her to process information. “Why?” she finally said, and sat up straight.

“Peyton ban you from telling me?”

“Peyton doesn’t own me. He isn’t my master, and the doctor doesn’t belong to him either,” she said.

“Does the doctor have a name?” Dhata pressed.

“I could tell you, but I’d have to kill you,” she said, then stuck out her tongue. “Who knows, maybe if you keep treating me like this, I just might slip you his details.”

“Yeah, but I need to get out there soon,” Dhata said. “It’s bad enough I’ve been inside all day, trapped between those legs of yours.”

“Trapped?” Esti smirked.

“May as well be. I can’t get work done with you walking around like that.”

They both started laughing and they spoke some more about his history with synths. When the food was finished, she seemed relaxed, and transferred a note to his implant with the doctor’s address.

Esti lived in an apartment on the affordable side of South Tampa. It was an older building, a redbrick throwback, but fully integrated with the global network. When he pulled up to the curb, she leaned into him and they kissed like a couple on their first date. He reminded himself that she did this sort of thing for a living, but that didn’t seem to matter after the day they had spent together.

“Hmm, that reminds me. Since you’re a lover of fashion, I wonder if you could tell me what this is from?” he said. He reached into the dash and pulled out the gem that he’d found, and placed it inside of her hand.

“Cheap fake jewelry,” she said. “This one came from a bracelet or necklace. Do you know who wears tacky jewelry like this?”

“No, but I’m guessing you’re about to tell me,” Dhata said.

“Candace,” she whispered, then started to giggle.

“Thanks,” he said. “I almost forgot that I had it.” Candace had a lot of big money clients; I wonder if she was involved with this thing.

When he made to get out to walk her up to her apartment, she stood against the door to stop him. “I’m going to have to reconnect to … you know … so, um, you probably don’t want to be around when I do that.” She leaned through the window and kissed him again, letting her hand dance down his face which sent a strange chill through him. “You have my contact number, and one more thing. Please be nice to the doc,” she said.

‡Chapter 8‡

Juanita Flores

Lur walked the length of the terrace looking down at the men who were congregated for what she assumed was another big meeting hosted by her father. It was the fifth day of her voluntary confinement, since Carlos Ruiz was a guest at the house. She was forced to see him when she ate breakfast with her father, but did her best to avoid him otherwise.

As she glanced down she tried to gauge how bad it would be if she jumped. There was a good chance that she’d break her legs, or even her neck. How embarrassing would it be for her to try, only to be stranded there screaming for help?

She wanted to get out, hop a shuttle to America, and reunite with Dhata. That would be a grand adventure, she thought. The allure of independence was enough to make her want to try.

She spotted several hover copters on the horizon and watched them fly in slowly to settle over the lawn. She saw Jonjie Jimenez, Don Alex Santos, and a well-dressed man who wore all white, whom she had never seen before. Her father came out to greet them individually, then ushered them into his house. On his way back, she saw him glance up, then gave her a smile when their eyes met.

I will miss you, Papa, she thought, but I cannot stand to be here another moment.

The meeting was starting, which meant that the security detail would be alert and on the lookout for outsiders. She would be the least of their worries, so now was the time to act. She went inside and closed the glass door, pulling the curtains so that no one could see what she was about to do.

She pulled off her blouse and slipped on a black hoodie, black yoga pants, and black canvas shoes. She then pulled her hair back into a tight bun, and slipped on the gloves that she normally used for horseback riding. In the bed she crafted a bump that she hoped would fool her guards.

She sat on the bed and—

“Señorita Diaz. Do you need anything?” asked a woman from the door leading to the hallway.

“No, I’m trying to sleep. Put up a sign and leave me alone for a few hours,” she replied.

“Yes, ma’am, no one will disturb you. Have a good night.”

Lur recognized the voice as Marisol, a longtime employee of her father’s. She was one of several women that had helped to raise her as a child. She was a sweet woman, and one of the many people who would miss her when she was gone.

It was late evening and the lights in the yard were now on, illuminating the exterior. She stopped and sat down as a wave of self-doubt came over her and tried to convince her to stay. What am I going to do anyway? I am no gifted spy or adventurer.

“This is dumb,” she whispered, and forced herself back up on her feet. If she didn’t try then she would have no one to blame but herself. She would be married to that gargoyle and forced to—she didn’t want to think about it. The thought of it gave her a sinking feeling in her stomach.

She walked over to the desk in the corner and sat in front of a blank piece of notepad. She loved her father, no one could deny it, but his actions had forced her hand. It didn’t matter that she would probably never see him again … No, she thought, of course I will see him again. All I will need to do is leave for a few years, then when I am married to Dhata, I will return and surprise Papa.

The thought made her smile, the hurt it would cause Carlos Ruiz, he may even try to do something stupid. It didn’t matter, she would be rid of him, and by then she would be her own woman, independent of her father’s gangster empire. She grabbed a pen and touched it to the paper, scribbling her thoughts to her father. She told him how much she loved him, and thanked him for everything, then reminded him not to come looking for her.

“I will come back to you one day,” she read out loud, before licking her lips, then paused with the pen hovering over her signature. He would be heartbroken, she knew, but this wasn’t goodbye, it was a young woman moving on to start her own life. When she was satisfied with the note, she stuck it inside of an envelope and placed it in the center of the bed. “Goodbye, Papa. I hope you understand,” she said and fought back against the tears.

Lur walked over to the large walk-in closet and entered, closing the door behind her. She felt for the controls on the wall behind her coats and a shoe rack slid out to reveal ten rows of expensive shoes.

She walked past them to the far wall, stooped down, and crawled into the space beneath the rack. Being tiny and slim, she was able to slip inside the dirty, cobweb-filled space. She waited for the rack to retract automatically, then stood up on the inside of the wall.

This hiding place was her secret, discovered when she was just a child, back when she used to explore the house and get into all kinds of mischief.

She slid along the wall in the pitch black until she counted forty-four steps. Then, holding her breath, she pushed forward, but nothing seemed to happen. Maybe I took my steps too short, she thought, and pushed again. When nothing moved, she made another step and tried pushing again.

A square portion of the wall fell away and she was able to crawl through it to gain a small room that smelled strongly of chemicals. Lur replaced the section of wall—a secret escape that she’d cut a long time ago—and crept forward, putting her ear to the door.

There were two voices, a man and a woman, and she recognized them as Marisol and one of the guards.

“How come you not up there babysitting the princesa?” the man was saying.

“She’s sleeping now. Asked me to not disturb her for a couple hours, so I come down here to talk to my son. Shouldn’t you be with Don Jose?” Marisol said.

“Don Jose is okay; we are all protecting him. I’m just making the rounds, checking out the place. These type of meetings, you never know who is sneaking around. So you see, I have a very important job.”

“I see. Well, look after yourself. You’re looking so skinny these days.”

He laughed and they started to have a conversation, a mixture of gossip and flirting. Lur wondered if they would be talking all night and delaying her escape until it was impossible.

To take her mind off them she activated her ICL and brought up the virtual village. Her powerful ICL made an augmented entrance to the virtual web, and the entire experience dominated her vision. She reached forward and pushed open the gate to the village, then willed herself over to a computer terminal. With no real-touch gloves to manipulate objects in the world, she had to rely on her sensory implants.

Several other visitors tried to intercept her, but she ignored them and moved as fast as she could over to the terminal. People normally used the village to play competitive games, or to live a sort of virtual second-life. Spouses cheated in the village, their implants making the sex seem real, and once in a while you had a bored psychopath trying to murder people’s avatars.

A noise broke Lur’s concentration and she gestured quickly with her eyes. The augment melted, and she could once again see the room she was hiding in.

“So he cut him like this. You see?” the man was saying.

“Oh no,” whined Marisol.

Lur gestured again and returned to the village, where she was standing still amidst a crowd of people chatting and dancing.

Pushing past them, she found the terminal and pulled up the global network. This was a long, complicated work around, but it kept her hidden, and she doubted that any of her father’s hools knew about the virtual village. She found the shuttle’s booking site and searched for flights heading to Florida. The next one leaving out of Valadero was in two hours and would be traveling to Saint Petersburg, Florida, which was technically Tampa from what she was seeing.

She booked a first class one-way trip and opted for a retina ID scan at the gate. After booking the trip, she went back in and changed her name to Juanita Flores. She then tried to erase any other identifying detail. It was a futile exercise, but she wanted to be thorough, plus she didn’t know how long she’d be stuck in the room.

When it was all done, she left the village and sat back in the darkness listening for the voices. She heard the man leave and Marisol stepped out to make a phone call.

She slipped through the door, into the bright fluorescent light of the room, and pulled up her hood to cover her features. Marisol was outside pacing with an electric cigarette smoking, and talking softly with her free hand cupping her ear. Lur skipped past her and slipped into the darkness, jogging across the lawn in the areas where the large spotlights didn’t cover.

Her heart was racing and the air was cold. She expected to be tackled and taken back by an unseen assailant but she managed to get all the way to the beach. She couldn’t believe it; she was actually out. The dark beach would provide the perfect cover while she ran the three miles it would take to get to the dock.

Worried about her footprints in the sand, Lur took her shoes off and waded into the shallow waters. She began the long walk through the wake as the moon took to the sky, casting a silvery trail upon the waters. The sound of the surf was therapeutic, and she began to smile as she took in the sights and scents of the deep dark sea.

She had always been fond of the water, and as a child she could always be found on the beach. Whether it was sun bathing or playing with other children, the beaches of Valadero were the backdrop. When she got older, she got certified to dive, learned to fish, and bought herself a jet ski. Now she was using water to get away, and she couldn’t have picked a more perfect night to do it.

She was about a mile out when she got the sense that she was being followed. She didn’t see how she would have been discovered since she’d double-backed several times, plus they wouldn’t be able to track her since the water hid her footsteps. But the feeling was strong and she couldn’t seem to shake it, and even though she couldn’t see anyone, she began to worry.

As she quickened her pace, she kept glancing back to see who it was that was on to her. Could it be a ninja, or something similar? This thought was not far-fetched. One of the men who had attended the meeting was the chairman for a Japanese zaibatsu, so there would be a chance that one of his Yakuza had spotted her slinking about.

Lur threw care to the wind and stepped out on to the dry sand. She started running as fast as she could, tripping and stumbling a few times but too worried to let it slow her.

When she got to the boathouse she was out of breath. Her legs were sore and her feet raw, but she still felt the presence close behind her. She considered waiting to see who it was but decided that this was the dumbest thing that she could do.

She grabbed a kayak and oar, then pushed it out into the water, climbing aboard and rowing out into the deep. There was a wall at the end of her father’s property that stretched out into the sea. She would need to row out and around it to gain the public beach, then catch a taxi from there to the station.

The waves were unfriendly as she rowed, and a few times it felt as if she would capsize. There were a few ships in the distance and it made her feel better. If she were dumped she would swim to one of them and make up a lie that would compel the men onboard to help her escape.

When she glanced back at the beach she saw several figures. They had flashlights scanning the place and were moving around frantically. How did they know that she was out, and why had they gotten to the beach so fast? Her father’s surveillance — she remembered now. The only ones that she knew about were around the house, but she didn’t know what they could see beyond the property.

She got lucky, she realized; her trick of walking in the water had held them off long enough for her to escape. They wouldn’t expect her to row around the wall when there was a gate that led directly out to the road. Lur knew that the gate would have guards and surveillance cameras so she had taken to the water instead. She counted her blessings, but she wasn’t out yet; she would still have to make it to the other side of the wall, alive.

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

If the shores of Valadero were considered to be a paradise, the cityscape of St. Petersburg, Florida would be seen as hell. Lur had forgotten how much tech had consumed the cities of America.

In the West Indies they hid their wires and their SAR projectors. Since the countries relied heavily on tourism for capital, appearances were everything and they did their best to maintain a classic look. When she exited the shuttle, the difference was immediate as she was accosted by neon lights and menacingly tall dark buildings.

A steady rain was falling, and the bright umbrellas contrasted with the long black raincoats that everyone was wearing. It was a melted oil painting on a miserable canvas, and she had left her world of white walls to hide out in this depressing reality.

Everything was unnecessarily automated, reinforcing the whole concept of Americans being lazy and dependent on tech. “Turn off the lights and the country would collapse,” that’s what her father would say. It was a sentiment shared by most of the world, at least the places that weren’t Tokyo, London, or Berlin.

She took a break and sat on a public bench; it had a canopy to guard against the rain. Though she shared it with five other people they didn’t even notice her presence. This was another major difference from Valadero. Back home, if she’d slipped in like she had amongst these people, there would be several “holas,” followed by some conversation.

America would be a perfect hiding place, but only after she replaced her ID chip. Temporary visitors to the country had about a month before the system would send the Immigration Corps to collect them. There was also the shock that could be sent to “illegals” if for some reason the Corps couldn’t locate them. It was a painful shock that persisted until the owner of the chip turned themselves into the nearest office.

Lur Diaz had enough money in her personal bank account to buy an American citizenship, but the chip held more than a person’s nationality. It was what the Global Network used to identify an individual. It was what replaced your social security number, and was the virtual fingerprint that made all of your belongings yours.

To replace a chip meant a complete erasure of one’s identity, not to mention the danger of having a black market surgeon digging around in your brain. Lur sat wide-eyed going over this in her head, and whether or not she was willing to go through it.

The decision was life-changing, more than fleeing the country of her birth. Fleeing was major, and she would be pursued. But if caught, the most she would have to worry about was her father’s ire. With the change in her ID chip, she would become Juanita Flores for life, a ghost that favored Lur Diaz but lacked her money, connections, and most of all, her history.

She would be hitting reset on her life just to get away from Carlos Ruiz. It seemed like a lot of damage just to be rid of him. She was considering a blowtorch for something as small as lighting a candle. I need help, she decided. I need someone who is good with this stuff and who won’t try to take advantage of me at the same time.

This meant that she would have to stay as Lur Diaz for a time. Lur had money, American connections, and the respect that came with being a kingpin’s daughter. It would mean a longer period of watching her back, and setting up enough decoys to keep her father’s hools at bay. It didn’t seem too bad; not after sorting through all of the pros and cons. Then maybe she could find a cypher talented enough to make her a citizen.

She thought about Dhata and the look he had given her when he was down in her father’s basement. He should have meant nothing to her, but their intimacy was deeper than any she had experienced before. It felt right, and they had grown close almost immediately. This was why she had stayed with him in Orlando. He would make fun of her accent and mimic it perfectly, and he had kept her laughing the whole time. Is he like this with all women, or is it just me? she wondered.

When she saw him down there, naked and vulnerable, it had snapped all of the chains that kept her tame. The look was what had done it, the look of a martyr at the stake. Despite his position and everything that had been done to him by her father, he had looked at her with only love and admiration. More than that, it was a look of happy surprise. He had missed her, and it all came through with that one glance.

If he had died it would have been her fault, and she didn’t want to experience that level of guilt. She yearned now for them to be together, to have an extension of that weekend in Orlando. Maybe there was a part of her that snuck away here for this, but she would never admit it; in her mind she was here for her independence.

The rain was endless, and she had been sitting there for a long time, but when she finally stood up, she was clear. There was a beauty to the darkness, the flashing signs and giant ad displays. It was their reality, the true aesthetics of a modern city. It reminded her of the inner circuitry of a cyberspace rack, even down to the large cables that were suspended above.

She got up and started walking, caring little for the soaking she received. Where am I to go?

She glanced over as someone came up just a bit too close. It was a tall, dark-haired stranger, and he was saying something in German that she didn’t understand. When the rain slowed down she realized that he was offering her an umbrella. What reward would a man in America want for such a gesture? She didn’t want to know, didn’t need to know, so she gave him a wave and walked into a building.

It was the entryway to a department store, but business was closed for the night. She felt cold and suddenly worried. Where would she go? Maybe a hotel? And how long would she expect to stay?

Tampa Bay was her destination; it was where Dhata lived. He would take her in, she just knew it, and even if there was a woman in his life, he would find a way to protect her. More men were looking at her as they passed, and she began to feel as if she was being watched. A connected city like this one would have cameras everywhere. What if her father had reached out for a favor?

She got to her feet and pressed on aimlessly, hoping to find a hotel of some sort. When she got to a McDonalds, she went inside to use their bathroom. She sat on the toilet and returned to her place in the virtual village. There she connected to the global network and booked a room in a downtown hotel.

When she recorded the address and signed out of the village she saw that the hotel was several blocks away. She was starving, and the rain was slowing, so she took the time to purchase food and wait the weather out. She had gone six hours without food or sleep, running for her life. She almost dozed off, but thought better of it, ordering coffee to extend her time.

An hour later, she saw a man outside, parked inside a car, and he was the spitting image of Don Carlos. She sank down in her seat, her heart racing again. There was no way in hell this man was in Saint Petersburg. She looked up slowly, peering through the glass, but the rain had stopped and the car was gone. Lur waited a long time before getting up, but when she did she took a different exit, and moved as fast as she could to her hotel.

‡Chapter 9‡

Call a Spade, a Spade

It was a Section 8 tilt, built sometime in the 2090s. It looked like a stack of boxes. The place was a dump, since it was abandoned during war and never reclaimed by the government. This sprawling eyesore was deep inside Seffner, several miles away from Tim and Alis’s neighborhood.

Dhata sat several blocks away, parked on the street, watching for any signs of life. When he had asked Esti about the surgeon who had done her upgrades, she had given up the building’s location. He was curious as to who was working there, and how often customers came. For two hours he sat watching, sipping on coffee and snacking on meal supplements since he was hungry.

It was now 10:00 pm on a Tuesday, a full week since the judge’s body had been found. He was about to give up. Maybe the doctor chose different locations, and Esti had come to this one when it showed up in the rotation. Without knowing the frequency of the transplants, and the methodology of the black market dealers, he could be out there for a week and still not see anyone approach.

He stepped out of his car, now at his wit’s end, and looked around for life. Seeing no one walking the street, or any lights inside the building, he crossed over to the entrance. He crept to the back, listening for any sounds coming from the closed door. The building seemed empty so he pulled the door open, then closed it behind him and started checking the rooms.

Two floors up as he went door by door, he heard a sound coming from one of the offices. On a chair sat a man, in scrubs and a white coat, his sickly yellow skin glowing in the light of several computer screens. On his lap lay a body, so pale that the skin looked translucent.

He seemed to be weaving in wires of every color into the body, and the back was split open, revealing a spine. He was building a synth, or enhancing one, impressive for someone working in the dark. At his feet was a head, a detached android head, and on the shelves that lined the walls were body parts and wigs.

Dhata looked around once more to see if the man was truly working alone. It seemed that way, but he made doubly sure by activating the night vision of his lens and scanning the area for life. Nothing showed, so he brought the G43 up and stepped out of the shadows to face him.

“John?” the man asked nonchalantly, as he kept on weaving the vein-like wires in and out of the android’s back.

“Skiptracer. You alone?” Dhata said.

“Always alone; it’s when I get my best work done. Are you sure that you have the right building, detective? Is there a warrant? Have I committed a crime?”

Detective, why must they keep on calling me detective? “Crime? I’m sure that if I were a John I could find a million things in here to bust you. But since I’m not a John, or a detective, I don’t need a warrant. I’m just here to ask a few questions, and hopefully learn a thing or two.”

“Why would I talk to you? You say you aren’t a John, but don’t you work for them? Skiptracers are like … human police dogs. You get sent into places that the real snoops avoid.”

“Listen, doc. You worked on a friend of mine. He said that you were the man to come to for a proper cyber-upgrade.”

“He?” the man said, then stopped his weaving to look up. “What sort of skiptracer are you, stranger? Have you not taken a look around this place?”

Dhata scanned the shelves and the cobalt screens, trying to glean what it was this mad scientist was talking about. There were faces on the wall, all female and attractive, and on the table were a number of arms and legs. Next to the surgeon were three barrels, each with a number stamped on the side. This man specialized in female synths, it was obvious, and from the pornographic imagery on the fourth computer screen, he could see that he specialized in prostitutes.

“Okay, you got me,” Dhata said. “I’m not a real skiptracer. I’ve got a thing for synth women, and I wanted to see if you could build me one. Something like an Angie McKenzie, with the big boobs and long legs. Man, I’m not rich, but I’ve been saving, and someone told me that you can do it.” He hoped that the doctor was buying his act, and he stared at the monitors to play up his perversion. “So, you make Marys, right?” Dhata said. “Sex workers and house bunnies. I bet you’re a celebrity with the synths.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment, my big friend, but actually you’re wrong. We cannot ‘make’ synths as much as we cannot impregnate them, or have them experience old age. Synths are created by a super computer, and most start out as servants for a human. What I do, my friend, is enhancements.”

“Please, explain it to me,” Dhata said. “Explain how someone’s maid can end up being another man’s girlfriend.”

“You have an illegal pistol to extort me?” he said, as if noticing the pistol for the first time. “Oh my … is that thing legal? Wait. Stop. Don’t answer that. Yes, the cycle of life for a synth starts off when she is built by a factory and sold for a pretty penny to a very rich person. Typically these owners demand slave labor from the synth by day, then at night, they use them for their baser human desires.”

“Synth women are something else—” Dhata said before stopping himself.

“A true connoisseur, I love it. Well now, isn’t this is a surprise,” he said, smiling through tiny yellow teeth.

“So they come here once their rich owner discards them, and ask you to give them the real stuff?”

The man stopped his weaving again to muffle a laugh, then reached over and touched the screen on a computer. “Real stuff? You’re funny, but you seem to be a fan of my work. Tell me, which one did you sleep with? I would love to know how convincing it was that she was real.”

“It wasn’t confusing, I knew what I had, and you do outstanding work. Don’t let nobody tell you different.”

“The synths don’t come straight here. My services are not cheap. Even if I could make you a sex-puppet you would have to shell out a million UCCs. See, my clientele, they do what it takes to pay for my services. Some get by, selling their bodies to human customers, while others go to work as servers or desk clerks.”

“So that one there; she used to be a house synth?” Dhata said.

“Stacy here came in yesterday.” He gestured to the body on his lap. “She used to be a children’s babysitter, but after Dad took her for a spin a few too many times, she decided that with my enhancements, she could become something more to him.”

Dhata said, “So, you make enhancements, and these synths leave out of here looking and feeling more human?”

“Brave new world,” the man said, and Dhata put away his pistol.

He found an old empty barrel and sat on it, then took a real close look at the android the man was working on.

“I’m Dhata Mays, and I’m intrigued. You are a master of your work.”

The man stopped and wiped his brow with the back of his hand. There was something inhuman about him, even though Dhata was sure that he wasn’t a synth. “Pleasure to meet you, Dhata Mays. It isn’t often that I get such polite intruders. My street name is Spade, Doctor Spade, and I can see that you have an eye for quality work. Was it the lovely Esti Bernard that sent you to me?”

“I know Esti. She’s a trip, a real trip, man.”

“I love that, she’s got such a spirit,” he said as he sewed the final wire through the spine. “There’s a real soul about that one, a real life that I don’t normally see. You’re in love with her, aren’t you? No, don’t answer, you’ll only lie. Esti has half the city of Tampa at war, trying to have her for their own. Stupid men, aren’t we? I have strong feelings for her too. It’s how she talks to us, the things she does. All I have to say is that when the Arch spit her out, it hit on all the right algorithms for male attraction.”

“Her surname is Bernard?” Dhata said smiling. “It fits, doesn’t it?”

“Oh yeah, she’s designed to be a sex-worker with a Creole flair. Tell me, Mr. Mays, did she do a lot of French things to you in the bedroom? Did you ooh la la?” He laughed out loud. “Did she speak the old language? Touched you where most other synths would never know where to touch?”

“You sound as if you’re asking me about a car,” Dhata said. “You still see them as machines, don’t you?”

Spade gestured to the body on his lap, then pointed to the heads and body parts. “I see them in their most intimate detail, Dhata. Tell me, have you ever pulled apart a piece of machinery to see just how it works?”

“Yes, doesn’t everyone?”

“So, you can remember how it felt when you got it working again? First there’s a fear, that what you have pulled apart will be forever broken and you will get in trouble with your parents or whomever. Then you put it back together again, trying to remember where you got the spring from, or if the screw that got left out in the reassembly was even necessary to begin with. After turning it back on and seeing that it works, you feel comfortable with dismantling it again. This time you may change things, add a little bit of this, a little bit of that.”

“What point are you making, Spade?” Dhata said.

“Doctor Spade. What I’m saying is that once you cross that line — that car, shuttle, hover, computer — it becomes a neat assembly of parts instead of this magical thing. You see synths as magical, synthetic humans, but I’ve taken them apart. Do you hear what I’m saying? I love them, don’t get me wrong. I respect them, and I care about their place in society, but they are still machines, Dhata. No alien race came down here and left them, and no souls are floating around looking for nonhuman vessels. They are programmed to mimic us, and to learn and adapt. Esti’s phenomenal sex is something that I built into her, and that cute personality is the result of a random number generator.”

“That doesn’t explain feelings. The love that we share. I’ve seen happy families with human and synth. Partners who would do anything for one another, and there’s nothing machine-like about it.”

Doctor Spade reached over and grabbed a head that lay on a cushion. He positioned it on the body, and began to touch areas of the neck with a tiny electrical gun. “You’re a good man, Dhata Mays. I think anyone can see that. But what they don’t see is a man who holds a deep loneliness inside. Something that you are frightened to reveal to a human woman, probably for fear that she will use it to destroy you. The love you have for synthetic Marys, like our beloved Esti, has more to do with you than what she offers you. Look, I get it; it’s what makes me good at what I do. Just realize that you are selling the human race short by drawing parallels to them.”

Dhata thought on his words for a bit, wanting to object, but he saw no reason to try to convince Spade. He was merely a skin peddler who played at being an armchair psychiatrist in his mind.

“Hey, Doctor Spade,” he said after a moment of silence. “Aside from Peyton, do you deal with anyone else for synth enhancements? Skinners from out of Orlando, hmm? Rockers from up North?”

The doctor shook his head, then looked up at Dhata with a curious smile. “Couldn’t keep up the act for long, eh, skiptracer? Did you really think I was going for it?” The head was attached to the android and the doctor was sealing her skin. He used a curious technique that made him look like he was sliding his finger along the wound while pinching it simultaneously. “Peyton is a customer, but I do not work for him. Though I’ve done some modifications to women in his employ.”

“Did any of these modifications require a human spine?” Dhata said. “I sat here and watched how meticulously you worked that synth’s spine back into her body. I wonder, someone of your skill, could you make an organic spine work in there?”

“Why in all the hell would someone even attempt a thing like that?” Spade snapped and he seemed genuinely upset. “I’m done talking; you’ve gone from intriguing to just another bully with a gun. I don’t have to talk to you, there’s no warrant, and you’re just a citizen with a leash around your neck.”

Dhata reached for his pistol, pulled it out, and then set it on his lap. “I’m not a John, but I don’t have a leash, doc. I also don’t have the time or patience for your shit. Wanna continue your practice of enhancing Marys and ‘testing’ them? Answer my questions and I’ll take off. Now, I don’t mean to offend, but think about it. One of the ways to check if we’re human is a lumbar shot to—”

Doctor Spade laughed. “Sorry, but you don’t know what you’re talking about. You cannot fake spinal fluid simply by removing it from a living, breathing person and placing it into a synthetic body.”

“What if the complex weaving like I just saw you do had a way to keep the fluids intact and alive? Okay, don’t laugh, I’m way out of my league here, but what if it’s a reverse process of making synths more like cyborgs?”

“Dhata, not only would that be so expensive, but there are a million other ways to pass those tests. If the fluid is what mattered, we could have it placed into the synth’s spine. If it’s the chemical build-up, we could mimic that too; actually the fluid that runs through a synth’s spine is very close to what we have inside of our own bodies.”

“So what kind of logic would lead a man to pull the spine from another man? I know that someone is doing it, and I suspect that they are a customer of yours.”

“That’s insane,” Doctor Spade said. “Absolutely nuts, my friend.” He patted the synth on her buttocks and her eyes came open. Then she pushed herself off of him and righted herself. “Welcome back, Stacy. How do you feel?”

The woman saw Dhata on the barrel and quickly grabbed a lab coat to cover herself up.

“Who is this man? He wasn’t here before,” she said.

“This is Dhata Mays, a skiptracer who is investigating crime that happens to synths. He’s a friend, not a pervert, though he seems to love your new body. “He winked, and the woman looked down at her breasts, happy with what she was seeing. “We should test her pleasure receptors. Would you like to?” he said.

“You mean me?” Dhata asked, and Doctor Spade nodded. He could see that Stacy had relaxed the robe to give a thorough examination with her hands. “No, I’ll pass, really, I just came here for answers. I should probably leave you to your work. You’ve given me plenty to think about.”

“The question you asked before; you aren’t the first to ask. I had a new customer ask me if I could perform the procedure for him. I work with women for a reason, Dhata. Their changes are mostly cosmetic and won’t land me in prison. What this man was suggesting was worse than what you speculate, and I had to politely decline.”

“Was he a tall synth, and is he working for one of the gangs?”

“The people you are looking for are probably not synthetic, and what they aim to do with those spines is something beyond my imagination. You’re snooping in the wrong place, my friend, but that’s the most I can tell you, understand?”

Dhata thought about it and nodded in defeat. The doctor had been forthcoming and he felt no need to push him. “I’ve been up for a really long time, Doc, and Stacy, you’re beautiful, but I really need to go get some sleep and think on everything that you’ve told me. One more question doc: you ever work on a synth named Candace?”

“Oh, Candy? Yes, she came in last year for an upgrade.”

“Did she pay for it herself, or was Peyton her sponsor?” he said.

“It wasn’t Peyton, but that is enough. I think that I’ve said more than I’m comfortable with, sir.”

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

Dhata got back into the Buick and started the drive home. Spade’s words had gotten though, and old wounds began to open. Driving manually, he swung too wide and would have collided with a semi-truck if not for the vehicle’s sensors. The alarms went off and the car righted itself. “Sorry, Dhata, but I need to take over,” said CINI’s sultry synthetic voice.

He surrendered to it all, letting his hands drop to his side and stared up at the ceiling. “Sorry, CINI,” he whispered, and settled into his seat. Was he the laughingstock of Jason’s department because of his reputation with synths? He couldn’t remember a time when he had ever considered them to be machines.

He still struggled with thoughts of Esti, and the deal he had worked out with Don Jose. It was exhausting, he was exhausted, but he was gaining ground, and that was a good thing. He made to call Jason, but saw the time; his friend would be in bed with his wife.

When he got home, he fell on the bed, lying face down in the pillows. He woke up to the sun shining down on his face, and a chiming in his ear from his personal computer. Reaching up, he touched the bud and his ICL grew opaque. He connected to his implant’s CPU and pulled up a list that he had kept there for a very long time. At one time it was a torturous piece of evidence, and he had struggled with keeping it since reading it would make him sad or angry.

It was a list of Candace’s clients. Back when they were together he had gone behind her back to find out who they were. Why? He couldn’t tell you, but he needed to know and hoped that perhaps one day she would get out of the business. Now it was his only hope for figuring out who had paid for her enhancements. If it wasn’t Peyton, then it had to be someone else who cared about her looks.

He remembered the many arguments they would have about her profession, and how he would end up feeling foolish for trying to change her. When she disappeared he had found a way to move on, an unhealthy solution, which dealt with promiscuity and behavior unfitting of a professional. Jason never knew just how into her he had been, but he had called him out on his behavior and would have fired him had it been anyone else.

All of these painful memories flooded back as he opened the list and read it. Two names jumped out immediately from the sixteen listed: Judge Thomas Cain, and Seffner boss, Alphie Fischer. This couldn’t be coincidence since one was dead and they found her in Seffner. This was what he was looking for, and it was right there in that painful piece of documentation.

Alphie Fischer had been off the radar for more than five years, but he and Jason reasoned that the boss was just that good. He operated from the shadows while living the life of a normal member of Tampa’s Elite. He had a mansion in Tampa, but spent most of his time out on his farm with his five boys.

Dhata sat up in the bed and thought about his next move. He would need to question the Fischers but he wondered if it would be a waste of time. He needed something else before he risked going out there, and it needed to be so critical that the boss would have to give him an audience. Maybe Jason has something that could help, he thought.

He looked at his voice messages for the first time and saw that there were three new ones from this morning. I must’ve been knocked out, he thought, then noticed that one of them came from an unknown sender.

He opened it and there was a voice message, a heavily accented voice that sounded familiar. The man on the message threatened to harm him if Don Jose’s daughter was there. He sounded tired, and repeated himself a lot, but Dhata got the gist of what he was saying: Lur was in the United States after running away, and this man assumed that she was on her way to see him.

Was this the tourist with the pocketknife who had threatened to cut his face? The man seemed beyond obsessed about keeping him away from his wife-to-be. It didn’t make any sense. He didn’t even have her number, and even if she was with him, the Diaz mob had no idea where he lived.

They’re desperate, he concluded, and they think I’m their tool. It made him want to find her and help just to get back at them. The message he sent back was short and to the point. It said, “Lur isn’t here. Do not contact me again. The deal was for me to contact you.”

Dhata scanned the other messages. One was from Jason asking for an update, and the other was from his medical unit giving him information about his health. He ignored the medical and opened the message from Jason, syncing it to his phone to call and talk to him.

“He lives!” Jason said, and Dhata laughed. He decided to take the call outside on the broken wing that he had converted into a porch.

The wind was cool and blowing patterns in the grass and he could see the buildings beyond the top of the tree line. There were more modern zeppelins floating in the clouds, giant party vehicles where the rich congregated, and several hovers transporting Johns in and around the city.

“Still alive,” he said. “Though probably not for long. I’m close to figuring out who these bastards are. What you got on your end? Any more bodies?”

“No bodies; that’s why I’m seeing where you’re at.”

“Fischer gang. I need everything you have on them. Alphie had an open appointment with Candace, the Mary that we found. Not only that, but he was a friend of corrupt Cain. You remember that joke of a trial that kept him out of prison? Ready for the kicker? Cain was one of Candace’s clients too. We may have a wicked love triangle going on, and old man Alphie going off the deep end.”

“Alphie Fisher, the German, right? It would explain why he’s stayed so far off the radar. The last time we rumbled with them, I was new and you were the veteran,” Jason said. “Damn, Dhata, I would’ve never thought that they’d be involved in this.”

“You in front of the TPD rack, Jason?” Dhata asked, hoping that his friend was in his office with access to the police grid. “They should give you all access-implants; I kept begging them for years.”

“They know that half of us are on the take, Dee. You give a corrupt officer autonomous access, and not one hool would see a cell. Hold a sec, I’m pulling it up — damn, there’s quite a bit in here. The Fischers make a little noise, mainly in stims. We have four brothers on file, but we don’t have jack on the full family. What we have is small time, intent to sell stuff, but nothing major like the Ybor synths.”

Dhata walked to the left of the doorway and found an old lawn chair that he had brought up when he’d renovated the house. It was a wooden relic, with chipped up paint and nails, but it was comfortable and weatherproof.

He sat down and did the math on all of his clues, choosing now to think on what Doctor Spade had said. “Jay, those brothers, can you tell me their heights? I got a tip from one of the neighbors but I needed it to be solid before I brought it to you.”

“Yeah, they’re all a touch above five-foot-six. Real losers with multiple charges. Their dad has money; he’s connected to the old country. From what I’m seeing with these sons of his, they spend his riches on cyber parts.”

“I have cyber parts; it’s nothing special. Anybody with a job can save enough to get the look they want,” Dhata said.

“I got ‘em too. What John worth his badge doesn’t? But these guys are decked out. I’m talking cybernetic arms, augment-ready optics, and military-grade derm beneath their skin. They’re built for combat, but they peddle stims. Everything about them smacks of wannabe without the brains or the ambition to be a pro-level hool.”

Cybernetic arms. Dhata was stuck on this but he didn’t know why. He had the image of a blonde-haired hool of average height, flexing his biceps while his expensive pupils shone purple in the light. Why am I having this visual of the Fischers? It was so strong that he could no longer hear what his friend was saying on the line.

He told Jason that he would call him back, then got up and went inside of his room. He lay back on his bed and stared at the overhang, letting the vision play out. Cybernetic arms. The hools that he knew who had replaced their arms did so because they were brutes. They were normally bodyguards, or muscle for bosses, the type of men that could pull your arm off and beat you to death with it.

Cybernetic arms. He thought back on the investigation. He was looking for three men, but one was tall and skinny. The fact that a tall waif was able to string up Candace by himself meant that he was either enhanced or a freak of nature. If the Fischer’s had a patsy, he would be the one, but that didn’t explain why Candace would be mixed up in their business.

He touched his ear, and Jason’s face hovered in the corner of his vision. He triggered the connection, and got up off the bed. “Jay, there’s something else,” he said, as he walked back outside to the wing. “Can you see if there was an accomplice, or a synth sidekick? Someone who isn’t family?”

“Brother, you’re brilliant; here it is. The brothers were arrested with an accomplice most of the time.”

“How tall is this new one?” Dhata asked.

“Six-foot-five, and get this: he’s not even German. Francisco Acosta, a Cuban refugee. He’s up for deportation, but he’s turned into a ghost.”

“He’s no ghost. He’s still working here, and they must’ve burned his implant chip. Any cypher worth his rack could do that for a thousand UCCs. I could put money on it that he’s on their payroll, which is why they’ve been so silent. Francisco’s their puppet, doing their bidding just to pay for his illegal citizenship.”

“What you say makes sense, but wouldn’t he be in the system under a new name?”

“With a burned ID, not necessarily. The cypher could fix it so that he had no record on file. What you need to have the computer do is match his face for a positive ID. You don’t have to tell me that we can’t convict based on looks, and he could always lie and say that the lookalikes were synthetic clones. But we can see, Jay. WE can figure it out. Could you run a match on Francisco’s ugly face and tell me how many times he’s been in?”

“It will take some time, Dee, but what’s the deal? Why are we after this guy?”

“I went by the house where Candace was hanged and spoke to a couple that’s squatting out there. Don’t ask me to ID them, and they won’t be able to testify—not unless we want them to become homeless. You following? The old woman I spoke to saw three men come in by way of hover copter. It was pretty late so she couldn’t make out details. Said one was tall and did all the work, while the other two stayed in the copter, watching him do it.”

“That does sound like two scumbag assholes sending their slave to do the work. Your question of height doesn’t make any sense though, since two of the three were inside of the vehicle. What if it’s three big guys, and the one who killed her had the grudge? She was a Mary, right? I mean no disrespect, but that profession comes with a lot of baggage, especially when they aren’t legally tagged.”

Dhata plopped down into the chair and rubbed his forehead with his palm. “You don’t know how many times I told her to go get a tag.”

“She was probably embarrassed. They have to do routine checks, and a woman as classy as Candace would not want the world to know that she was a sex worker.”

“Candace had a limited list, Jay, and no, I wasn’t on it. Well, I was on it at first, but then things got complicated. The hools she saw were powerful men; Alphie Fischer was one of many. I also spoke to a doctor, the kind that does spines, and he told me that it’s more likely to be humans committing these murders than a synth.”

“Jesus, that’s crazy, Dee, but keep up the good work. I need something I can use, so keep snooping about. When we have enough to arrest Alphie, I’ll get the boys out to his house.”

“I’m on it, Jay. I’m getting close. When I have something real I’ll let you know.”

“What about the other thing?” he said.

“You mean the Cubans on my ass? They’re leaving me messages, but they’re the least of my concerns.”

‡Chapter 10‡

Birth of a Legend

The Fischers lived on a farm that sat on eighty acres of land. The drive out to their property was long and boring since the road didn’t offer much by way of scenery. The road that he drove down had a canopy of trees, artificial ones, planted to give the impression that the area was richer than it really was.

Trees were golden in this time period of metal and wires, and most had been decimated in the war. Animals and trees became a precious commodity, but it was the animals that got the worst. Fallout, chemical warfare, and decades of rotten earth. Americans had gone through hell but came out of it bigger, stronger, and married to tech. For a period of time even rain was to be avoided since it carried the leftovers that now hung above certain cities.

Dhata had been a baby during the worst of it, but grew up under the conditions that came from that war. Manufacturers of synths made more money than any other industry due to the need for workers that could withstand the winter of radiation. They cleaned up the country, and got things back to working shape, but the fixes they employed were a machine’s fixes: wired connections of everything, shielded domes in the worst areas, atmosphere moisturizers, and automated transport.

When it was deemed safe to return to work, the synths were lauded as heroes. In a show of gratitude to the synthetic machines, President Garry Johnson passed a bill to give them basic human rights. They could not vote, and humans could not legally marry them, but they were allowed to stay—just in case their services were needed again in the future.

Due to a program that Dhata had installed as a detective, his lens put a cyan outline on artificial constructs. Every tree he passed had the outlined readout, but when he was past the canopy of trees and cruising past an open field, he saw a few that were real.

He parked the Buick and got out to see them, which took leaping over a broken fence and wading through the dying yellow grass. When he got to the first one, his heart sank; it was a burned-out husk that had still managed to maintain its form. He got back on the road and rolled up to the farm, which looked uninhabited until he saw the men working behind the barn.

There were no animals, but he saw a chicken, and it took everything within him not to run up to it for a close inspection. A triad of green dots lined up on his chest as he approached the large house, and when he followed their source, he saw a shadow squatting in the upstairs window.

His ICL helped—another enhancement—and outlined the shadow with a thin red line. He put up his hands in a gesture of peace and stopped to wait for someone to come out.

“What do you want?” a deep voice said, and Dhata scanned the area to see where it came from.

“Just wanna talk with the Fischers,” Dhata said. “Do you have five minutes to talk?”

“John?” the man asked.

“Skiptracer,” Dhata replied. But when he said the word a shot rang out and kicked up the rocks near his feet. He scrambled backwards and pulled his GLOCK, groveling on the ground to get behind the Buick. More shots came flying, then came an automatic weapon, punching holes into his car.

He had stepped into a hornet’s nest, and the bees were multiplying. Death was inevitable, but that wasn’t what he was thinking about in that moment. What he felt was anger, a red hot rage for the disrespect and sheer audacity of a hool to shoot at a law officer. It had been a long time since he’d been in a gunfight, but old habits die hard, and his was alive and kicking.

He scrambled back to an old tractor, barely avoiding the bullets, then focused on the window and shot, missing the man who had spoken to him. He ducked for cover, then knelt and peered through a gap above the tractor’s large rear wheel. He fired five more times, but when he couldn’t connect, he slid to another metal husk, and lay on his stomach.

It sounded like loud popcorn, the kernels exploding randomly all around him. He cursed himself for only bringing the pistol, but he was in his duster, which had three more clips in hidden pockets. The outline of the first man could still be seen so he lined up his shot, waited until he stuck his head out, and then exposed himself long enough to fire with precision.

The red outline that danced around his form turned burgundy, then faded to black. The hool was dead, and Dhata slunk back down and considered his next move. The bullets had slowed but were still coming at a steady rate. They were shooting from the house, so he shot out a window and ran, then dove for the cover of the barn.

He heard a motor, then spotted the Ford coming around the corner to the location where he had just been. One man was driving and his passenger was a woman who leaned out of the window with an AR-15. Dhata kicked open the barn door and rushed inside, the stench of decay hitting him so hard that he was forced to reach up and cover his nose.

Bullets punched through the wall, bringing the light with them, and he was able to see the corpses hanging from the ceiling. Whatever it was that the Fischers were doing, he knew that he’d regret walking into it. He dashed across the floor, slipping past machines that he assumed were meant for meat. When he slipped and fell on his side, it saved his life, since the shooters sprayed a line across the entire structure. He got up to his knees, then wiped sweat from his brow, and retraced his steps to exit the door he had originally kicked in.

The Ford was turning the corner, so he shot out the back tire, then slid to the corner to watch it slide and crash into a pole. Both hools came out spraying, but he was behind an old generator whose casing was strong enough to stop the bullets. He waited patiently, his heart pounding in his ears, then checked his gun to see where he was in terms of ammunition.

It was only instinct as a former John that made him catch the movement. So, when the driver ran around to catch him off-guard, he squeezed off two rounds into his chest. The woman resumed firing after what he assumed was a reload. Her bursts lasted four seconds—loud, and deadly—with her reload taking an additional eight. Though she had to reload often, she seemed to have clips for days, so she kept spraying to keep him down, and he found that it was working.

He wished that he had a count on how many enemies there were. The former shooting had slowed considerably, and now it was the AR-15 making all of the noise.

Dhata backtracked to the barn door and slipped inside, then ran across to the window where a man was sneaking to flank his former location. He leveled his pistol and shot several times through the wall till he heard the man collapse outside.

“Alright, that’s enough,” came a voice, amplified by a loud speaker. “You proved your point, you’re a damn war hero or something, so how about you come on out and we talk?”

He ignored the summons and slipped back through the door, where the woman with the assault rifle was reloading. He put a bullet in her head, and emptied the clip for insurance, then reached inside his coat for another and slammed it into the pistol. The firing from before resumed, the symphony reflecting the anger of the men. He should have been frightened or even worried, but the only thing on his mind was figuring out how many were left.

He ran to where the dead woman was and commandeered the assault rifle and ammo. From the bed of another truck he saw two men firing, and he leveled a steady burst from the AR-15, clipping one and causing the other to retreat.

“Whaddya want?” came a shout from the loud speaker. “Are you just here to wipe us out? Say something. We want this to stop. We surrender, stop your shooting!”

Dhata ignored it and slid closer to the house, using the abandoned equipment as a source of cover. He dropped another man before seeing the one that he had clipped, who was on the ground holding his injured leg. He sprayed the location, killing him instantly, then ran to where he fell. Reaching down, he collected his sub-machine gun, then slung it over his back.

When he got to the side of the house he stayed low and scanned the fenced-in trees. But it was a wilderness, and his ICL was blank, so he got to the back and peeked around, expecting a volley of bullets. A hover copter was in the air, getting ready to leave the area. Dhata shot at it, sending up a scattering of bullets, knowing it was a futile attempt.

But the hover copter got the message and rocketed off towards the city. He dropped the empty assault rifle and slid into the house, making sure to check his corners while waving the pistol around.

When he had cleared the house and the surrounding properties, he finally allowed himself a minute to breathe. The Buick was out of commission: the bullets had shredded the glass and the dent from the truck prevented the door from opening.

He called Jason and reported the incident, then climbed to the roof of the house so that he could spot anyone approaching the property.

“You went in alone?” Jason said after hearing his quick explanation.

“I came to talk to them. I didn’t come here looking for any of this.”

“But I thought you would be looking into the spines. Dee, the only thing we were doing with the Fischers was seeing about the Cuban’s aliases.”

“Scream at me later; you’ll have time while I’m in a cell. This wasn’t for nothing though, I promise you.”

“What do you mean, in a cell? What did you do?”

“I have a pistol, Jay, it’s what I used against these fools. An untraced, old G43 that once belonged to my dad. The place is a bloodbath, there’s seven dead—”

“All from you?”

“Yeah. They came hard.” He was having trouble breathing. “I had to defend myself. They were using unmarked weapons too, Jay. AR-15 and all sorts of other kinetic death dealers. Anyway, I deployed an illegal tool, and used their illegal tools for deadly force. Last time I checked, that’s a pretty big crime, but I’m willing to deal with what’s coming to me.”

“You won’t see any time. Hell, we’ll probably give you a medal. I’m just mad that you went out there alone.”

“There’s a barn full of bodies, Jay. Bodies missing parts. If I’m not crazy, I’d say they were eating these people.”

Jason was quiet, as if he was trying to make sense of it all. “This barn, was it refrigerated? Like a deep freezer to keep the meat good?”

“Meat? You mean the human flesh? No, it was disgusting and smelled like hell,” Dhata said.

“Then they weren’t eating it,” Jason said. “They were doing something else, but they wouldn’t be dumb enough to be eating decayed meat. I know you’re out there stranded, but I’m trying to figure out how to play this. I can’t send in a unit just yet, or it will become a fiasco. I want to see that barn, see how I can spin the massacre. If I was out there with you, then I can take the heat.”

“You know that’s not what I want, Jay,” Dhata said.

“I know, but we have to play this right. They will want to know why you were out there, and why we were investigating those boys. There’s no real motive linking the spines, and they’ve been quiet out there.”

“Well, I’m not going anywhere unless they return. Jay, thank you. Alright?”

The reality of what he had gone through came flooding back in a rush. The sun was out and at a bird’s eye view, he could see the bodies scattered all around. When his eyes fell on the woman, twisted against the truck, he couldn’t believe that he was capable of such destruction.

He wasn’t an ex-soldier who would bring that sort of pain, but he had been in vicious firefights as a John in the inner city. Normally there would be backup, and his ICL would be in tune with the buildings. Johns were never as blind to their environment as he had been, so he wondered how he had gotten so lucky.

Dhata looked down at his hands and saw how dirty and calloused they were, and he tried to think about what he would have done if he had gotten shot. Jay would take an hour to get out to where he was, and any emergency medical transport would reveal the injuries to the Johns. Getting killed would have brought it back to Jason, and then the relationship between skiptracers and Johns.

He felt stupid, but he didn’t feel guilty. He really had come to ask questions. It was not his fault that they had opened fire on him, but he should have thought better about identifying himself.

Jason came through, forty minutes later, and Dhata walked out to meet him.

“You’re a legend, Dee, and you have no wounds? How in the hell did you manage that?” he said.

“Trust me, I’ve been sitting on that roof wondering the same thing. You know, a bunch of them fled, took off in a copter. I’m wondering if we’re due for a retaliation.”

“They can retaliate if they want but they will have to contend with all of the Tampa Bay Johns. They’re not coming back. Actually, they’re probably going to skip town. Did you identify yourself to them?”

“Yeah. That’s what made them open up on me.”

When he said this, Jason unclipped his pistol and looked around as if he expected action. “Your dad’s GLOCK; is it on your person?” he said.

“Yeah, but most of the damage came from me using their guns.”

“Ballistics will ID your gun, and you’ll lose it after today. I’m sorry, Dee, but you know how it is. I wish these bastards hadn’t lost their minds.”

“I expected to lose it, anyway.” He shrugged and exhaled with frustration. “If it meant that much to me, I wouldn’t bring it around with me to these scenes.”

He pulled out the pistol and followed Jason to the barn, watching him closely to see how he would react. They went inside and Jason froze and looked up at the hanging bodies. Dhata did the same and he finally saw them for what they were – mutilated people with their identifying parts removed. It wasn’t about eating them or any sort of torture; these were victims of the Fischer brothers that they didn’t want found by the Johns.

The hands and feet were missing, along with their heads and genitals. On the machines below was ground-up flesh and bone, the remains hanging out of barrels that hadn’t yet been sealed.

“This is recent,” Dhata said.

“Yeah, I think you stumbled on the motive we need to go after these creeps,” Jason said. “I’m back to thinking it’s all connected, Dhata. These butchers would have no qualms with pulling out a spine. Okay, I have an idea. Gimme a second.”

“What are you doing?” Dhata said.

“I’m calling the precinct to get out here, and to make sure that a cypher is on that bird.”

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

It was late in the evening and raining again, and it was a wonder that the city of Tampa hadn’t flooded by now. Dhata sat on the zeppelin’s wing, staring up at the modern models floating over the city. The rain brought a mist to the clearing that obscured the trees and settled on the grass. He sat with a dark cigar, smoking, and a snifter of scotch, trying to set his mind to rest.

When the Johns hit the scene it was a devil’s ball, snoops grilling him about the shootout and Jason arguing to keep him out of cuffs. In the end he got a slap on the wrist and was forced to leave the property. He was suspended indefinitely, and a story was concocted to explain the massacre to the media. He was to forget the Fischer brothers, forget the spines, and go back to tracing for civilians.

He couldn’t see going back to spying on cheating boyfriends. Working for a John had given him the action that he craved without the restrictions that came with the badge. He had been home for a day, hoping to hear something about the copter, but Jason hadn’t called, which wasn’t a good sign.

Lightning struck, illuminating the trees, and for a second he thought that he saw people there. It was a rough go after the shootout, nightmares and paranoia, so he had resorted to drinking and watching the trees. With his father’s pistol gone he had reached into his old equipment for an untraced, snub-nosed revolver. He kept it handy, on his person, and would reach for it whenever he thought someone was coming for him.

His phone buzzed, and he looked at the display, it was the same unknown person he had been ignoring all day. Random calls were typically hools, either begging for his help or issuing threats.

He didn’t know the number, but it was local, which didn’t mean anything in the grand scheme of things. Due to the ease of travel due to shuttles, it could be anyone from anywhere. With the liquor warming his stomach and the high from the tobacco, he decided that a call with a hool could actually prove entertaining. He connected to the call and there was a hesitation on the other end. He wouldn’t be the one to volunteer a “hello” first, so he simply waited to see who it was.

“Dhata?” said a small voice, the accent butchering his name.

He sat up and augmented his ICL, trying to get a visual on who it was. “Lur?” he said softly, wondering if it was a trap. It could easily have been Don Jose, forcing her to get him on the phone. But she was calling from Tampa, his Tampa. It didn’t make any sense. The old Don was a wanted man, and would be scooped up as soon as the shuttle touched down. Was it the Hawaiian knife man, that ugly old rat? Using Lur to bait a trap?

“Oh, thank God, I got you. I’ve been trying for days,” she said. “I need your help. Please, please can you help?”

Her voice sounded like the relaxing waves lapping against the shore. He could listen to her forever, and it didn’t matter what she was saying. Though he struggled with rushing out and playing her knight in shining armor, he remembered the beating and could still feel the pain. She was part of his downfall, why Orlando had started his hell, but he had already come to terms that it was her father and not her.

“Lur, why are you here?” he said.

“I ran away from Papa, but he’s looking for me.”

“Why would you run away from a man who gives you everything that you want?” he asked. “You had it made—I saw that house. Plus more money than God. Did something happen? What’s in Tampa? Wait, did we exchange contact info? How is it that you got my number? What’s going on?”

“I didn’t run away from Papa, Dhata, I ran away from him. Carlos Ruiz. He was one of the men who hit you. I cannot marry him so I run away. He does wicked things to—” She paused and he could hear her crying. “Do you hate me, Dhata?” she asked.

“No, of course not. Why would I hate you?”

“Then I want to come stay with you, just like you said. My father has men looking for me and I don’t know what to do.”

Dhata smiled as she pleaded her case, since it sounded like a sucker’s trap. He remembered their weekend, the smell of her skin, and the way he felt seeing her the day when he was captured. She was so beautiful in red and black, her eyes like midnight miracles—”Do you have transportation?” he said.

“Yes. I can come to you, wherever you are. Is it in Tampa you live?” she said.

“Lur, come on, I can see that you’re in Tampa—”

“I am in St. Pete, not Tampa, and you’re wrong, I cannot see. I’m in the ViVi, the how you say … Virtual Village? It is the only way to avoid the cyphers hired by Papa.”

She’s sharp, Dhata thought. I wouldn’t have thought of that trick. “Lur, listen, I’m sending you an address. I want you to meet me there.”

‡Chapter 11‡

Painted Toes

The bar was a sparse one, but decorated well, with old car engines suspended from wires hanging from the ceiling. The windows were reinforced, as if the owner expected to protect her patrons from a drive-by or bomb. There were two levels of bars with augmented dancers on the top floor. On the bottom, the bartender—a synth—was dressed to impress in a vest with bowtie and shades to complete his ensemble.

Dhata was the only human present inside of Carmine’s. It was a forgotten hole in the bombed out area of 50th Street, but one he frequented when he grew tired of the Tavern. He was seated next to a couple of synths, a Yakuza and a Mary. The bartender was waxing on the upcoming election, and he was listening while he nursed a drink.

“So Frank is going to be the new Johnson,” the bartender said. “Frank is going to make jobs in the inner city to keep synths where they can keep tabs on us.”

“He hates us synths. Why would he give us jobs? That sounds counter to all the bigots who helped to put him in power,” a woman said.

A skinner grumbled under his breath and said, “Nothing new with this country. Bigotry is embedded in the roots.”

“Bigotry is in the roots, but money trumps all of that, and synth money is still money to the humes in power. I think that what’s gonna happen is that he will put synths to work. Then our people will be able to afford a lot of things, sold to us by humes.”

Humes. Dhata bristled. It was a derogatory term for a human being. Hearing it thrown around so easily by the synth made him feel like an outsider.

“His main thing is to return synths to the inner cities, to get them back in places like Ybor. He’s going to put money in synth businesses, and the inner city businesses will flourish. He’s going to do everything to keep us here, to keep us segregated from the humes,” the bartender said.

Dhata had to admit, the man was right. Humans hated the synths, but it was because they worried that they were too intermingled into society. If they could be segregated, they could know where they were, and if there was a way to keep them out of the human areas of the state, they would be all for it.

He wondered how they felt about him listening in on their conversation. But the only ones that gave him “the look” were the non-regulars. At Carmine’s, synths came in to escape the human world, typically the only humans who came in were there to try and pick up synth women. The non-regulars would stare at him and try to gather what he was about, but when he avoided their piercing looks they would go away eventually.

After his chat with Lur, he took a transport over, since the Buick was in the shop. He had already been there for an hour, absorbing the conversation which he found intriguing since it was so different. In the human world Garry Johnson was a hero; he had fixed the country, and it was very obvious that things were getting better.

Joe Frank was a gangster who exploited the poor. He campaigned on a web of lies backed by cyphers feeding false information to the global network. The poorest humans loved the guy; at least the ones who hadn’t had family members killed. His campaign had rocked the country, and had the world hopeful for his ascent. Most synths loved his rhetoric, unlike his rival, Dante Burke, whose promise of clean air wasn’t quite as sexy.

Speculation of new conflict came with Frank, but most humans kept it to themselves. Hearing the synths dissect his plans showed that he wasn’t as slick as he thought. Still, he was about to be the head of the country, but Dhata didn’t care about such things. The head was a tool to the snakes below him, so Frank’s noise was simply that.

“Hey, dead man, you fancy a game of pool before you die?” a familiar voice said.

Dhata turned around slowly to see none other than Peyton, though he looked a lot less together than he normally was. How was he here? It was too convenient, and Dhata instinctively reached for his gun. Fuck, he thought, they confiscated it at the Fischer’s. How the hell am I careless enough to be out here without a gun?

“Look,” Dhata said, “I don’t want no trouble. I’m just enjoying a drink and waiting for a girl.”

“You still think I’m after you?” Peyton asked as if it was the silliest thought. “I got no beef with you, so relax. I just want to play some pool, and you look bored as hell.”

“Don’t you think that it’s convenient that after threatening my life and having me beat up, you somehow pop up at the same bar when … never mind, it’s just, shady,” Dhata said.

Peyton laughed out loud. He seemed so relaxed and at ease. It was as if the entire world had been handed over to him and only he knew this reality. “Paranoia seems to come easy with you humans. You find reasons to fear even when a man wants a game of pool.”

Dhata finished his drink and paid the bartender, then followed Peyton into an adjacent room with five pool tables. They all were occupied except for one, which was left open because no synth who valued his life would get in the way of Ybor’s crime boss. Several toughs sat by the door pretending not to care, but Dhata recognized them as Peyton’s bodyguards.

“Traveling heavier than you normally do,” he remarked, and Peyton laughed and grabbed the rack.

“Since you’re the guest, I’ll let you break, but don’t let it go to your big bald head,” he said.

Dhata smiled and grabbed a cue, rolling it on the table’s felt to see if it was too warped to be useful. It was a little warped, but it would serve well, and he dusted the head of it with a square of chalk. “What we playing for, pretty boy?” he said to Peyton, and the synth pulled the triangular rack up off the balls, and found a stool to sit and watch.

“No odds yet, Dhata. I want to rap a bit. Go ahead and break and let me pull your coat.”

The mixture of street slang coupled with what he expected an Italian mobster to sound like gave Peyton’s speech a unique flair. Dhata found it funny, but not in this instance, as he still wondered if his life was in jeopardy. He broke the balls and sank a few, then lost himself into his focus.

“What did you do?” Peyton said after a while, as he sat on the stool putting chalk on his cue.

Dhata was on a run, and to his own surprise, he slipped the cue ball past the two and five and it slammed into the fifteen that rested precariously on the corner pocket. The eight ball was the only thing left for victory, and it had only taken six shots to get him there.

“Trouble in gangster paradise?” Dhata asked. “Is that why you brought me in here?”

Peyton looked around the busy pool hall, then sucked his teeth impatiently. “Maybe this was a bad spot. Too many synths. Any one of them could be listening to me.”

Dhata lined up the eight ball and drove it into the far corner. His shot was like thunder when the balls collided, drawing attention from the entire room. Looking out of the side of his eye at Peyton, he spun the cue like a baton. “You invite a maestro to a pickup game, you should expect to get beat, my friend. Don’t you find it ironic that a flawed human just ran the table on you?”

Peyton wasn’t amused but he got up and grabbed the rack, looking around once more before he spoke. “I don’t care about that, Dhata. My business is done, and it’s all because you and those worthless Johns can’t do your damned jobs.”

“What are you talking about, Peyton?”

“I’m talking about my Marys. They’re going fucking crazy. I don’t know what’s getting into them but I know that it ain’t the food.”

Dhata stared at him for a time, his mind going into overdrive. What Peyton was saying brought everything back to Candace and the missing spines. She had worked for him, but so did Esti. Maybe Esti hadn’t been affected as yet. “All your girls are synths, right?” he said, dropping another ball.

“Yeah, you shouldn’t have to ask since you’ve been with a few of ‘em.”

Dhata shook his head; he wished that he wasn’t so pathetic. Peyton was right, he knew. Candace, Esti, a few of the others … throughout his career, he had been with a number of the gangsters’ girls.

“Synth girls going crazy? Someone is hacking into them, man, screwing up their heads to hurt you.”

“Seriously?” Peyton said, standing up. “Is that even possible with Arch Brain?”

Dhata said, “Solids, cross side, four ball here,” and he patted the side pocket next to him. “I don’t know Peyton, you may not hit a ball tonight if I keep this up,” he said, dropping the four into the pocket. “What are your girls even doing?”

“I want to tell you, Dhata, but you’re still too close to the Johns. I gotta have, what you call it? Reassurances? That what we talk about at this table don’t end up downtown with your little blue friends.”

Dhata stopped and stood up to consider what he was saying. “Peyton, are your girls going around pulling out human spines?” he said. He expected a laugh, or some sort of snide response, but the hool boss looked frightened and Dhata’s jaw dropped.

“They ain’t the ones behind the judge if that’s what you’re asking me about. More like little things that’s bad for business, giving me a reputation I don’t want. One of my Marys stabbed a guy in the arm. I say, ‘what you do that for?’ and all she says is ‘I don’t know.’ They walk around zombie-like, going wherever and showing up broke. I could see if it’s one girl doing that, but I got rid of four of them for scaring men off.”

“A master cypher can get into a synth, but normally all they can do is steal some information,” Dhata said. “Whoever this is found a way to your girls and is doing things to affect their behavior. He’s bypassing the fail safes, and corrupting your girls. Christ, Peyton, why didn’t you say something earlier? We’ve always been cool till you blew up on me last week.”

“You violated our code, asshole. I had to show you my strength,” he said.

“You did that, alright, and left your girls out to dry. And now they’re being hacked and turned into murderers.”

Peyton seemed to get angry, then stopped at a loss for words. “Murderers? They haven’t killed anyone.”

“I guess you don’t know that it was probably Candace that cut open that judge off of Fowler,” Dhata said.

He leaned over and slammed the cue ball into the seven. It bounced around, missing the hole and dropping one of Peyton’s.

“When I asked you about the spine murder, you ran me out of your spot,” Dhata said.

“You didn’t tell me that Candace did it,” he said. “Why in the hell would she do something like that?”

“Hello? The cypher? Are you listening? She got compromised, I don’t know. Killed that judge and then tried to take out old man Fischer.”

“Judge and Fischer were her clients. That doesn’t make sense. Why in the world would a cypher turn a synth into a murderer?”

Peyton got up and grabbed his cue, and Dhata sat, scanning the door. Lur hadn’t arrived, but it seemed like the game had gone on for hours. He couldn’t believe that it had taken so long to realize that a hacked synth could be a prime suspect in the murders.

Peyton knocked in his twelve ball with enough English to set up the fourteen. When he was down to the eight ball, Dhata stood up to watch, and he started talking again.

“There’s a few humes around the place that want to make us look bad. Then you have the religious ones who would love nothing more than to punish guys who pick up synths. But you know what I think? It’s deeper than we know; I’m guessing big time corporations, or overseas Dons. To hire a cypher that can do what this dude is doing … it would cost millions, Dhata, and that’s not even as crazy as the reason behind it.”

The sound of the pool hall was drowned out by the music, but they could still hear each other very well. Peyton was right. The implications could rip the Band-Aid off the wounded country. A first-class cypher, talented enough to break into a synth’s complex brain code … it had to be a genius, or some sort of—

“You know, I’m thinking, and if I’m right, then we may be dealing with a shade,” Dhata said.

“A shade, here? That opens up a whole can of worms. Are the skinheads in Orlando trying to move in on me?”

“Hate to break it to you, Peyton, but you’re not that big. If they wanted your territory, they would simply come in and kill you. Which skinner you know would spend the kind of money it takes for a shade? No, this is something else, something really crazy.”

Peyton missed the shot on the eight ball, which surprised Dhata, and he sprang up quickly, and sank the shot with authority. “Looks like that’s game, Peyton. You running one more?”

“No, I have to go Dhata, but do me a favor and figure this out. You’re the man to do it. I got trust in you, and I’m a man that knows how to repay a favor. Let me know when it’s safe for the girls to work again, eh? Maybe I give you Esti, to keep.” He gave him a wink. “Oh, and if it’s a skinner you let me know.”

Who would have thought that time with Peyton would finally part the clouds to give him clarity? Dhata wanted to jump and scream with relief, but he nodded at the boss and tried to hold his composure. “We cool?” he asked, hoping that Ybor was accessible.

“Yeah, we’re cool. Just let me know, okay?” Peyton said. “Here’s my other phone number. You call before you come.”

Dhata took down the information and went back to the bar, where the men were still talking politics. He got another drink, and nursed it, thinking about Peyton’s words. The possibility of a cypher made the case more complicated, and Candace a murderer? He hoped that what he told the Ybor boss was wrong.

When Lur walked in, the air went out of the place as Dhata froze with the glass in his hand. He looked over at her, and she was shelter on a rainy day. She wore a yellow dress with white pumps, and her hair was out, bouncing as she walked. There was something new about her gait, but she hid it behind a broad smile.

“This is a synth bar,” someone yelled to warn her, but she ignored it and came over to Dhata.

He spun around on the stool and pulled her in to a bear hug, then he motioned to the stool next to him, which she took and placed her hand on his leg. She smelled like vanilla and looked like heaven. Where he was hesitant to help before, he knew that he’d do whatever he could to thwart her father’s hools.

“I’ll have a vodka with lime,” she said to the bartender, then turned to face Dhata and gave him a wink. “I am so happy to see you. Thank you, thank you, thank you,” she said.

“Happy to help. When you told me that this would be hitting back at your father, I couldn’t refuse, now could I?” he said.

“It is very sad what he did to you. When they took me from Orlando, I thought that he left you alone. When I saw you in the basement, it opened my eyes to a lot of things about him.”

“We’ll have time to talk in detail, later. You’re looking rather good for a refugee in hiding,” he said.

“The ViVi gives me access to my money, so I went shopping before I took a bus here. I am happy to be in Tampa. You don’t understand. St. Pete is so busy, and I thought that I saw one of Papa’s men in the city,” Lur said.

Dhata finished the glass of Jim Beam, placed it on the bar, and then tapped it with his finger for the bartender to give another pour. He looked over at Lur and winked, then brought her small hand up to kiss it. “Some ground rules, Lur, if we’re to hide you from your father’s hools. First, no more ‘Papa.’ You keep referring to him as that and the wrong person may hear it and get wise.”

Lur got her drink, thanked the bartender, and threw it back like a cowgirl. She turned to him and nodded rapidly, letting him know that she was listening. He noticed her copy his motion by tapping the glass for more. She learns fast. Good, Dhata thought. Maybe this won’t be so bad.

“Second, we need to give you a new name—”

“Juanita!” she said, a bit too loud, and he laughed at how eager she was to play along. It was as if they were playing a game and she was that competitive spirit, wanting to answer the fastest.

“Let me guess, Juanita is the handle you used when you shuttled over, and probably the name of someone you always liked as a kid? That’s out, Lur; we need something else. If they trace Juanita from your home to here, they can easily confirm an ID with that name. Gimme another one.”

She thought for a few, then said, “Celia,” and he had to admit that it fit. “Third, Dhata, what else you got?”

“We have to change up your hair, mod your ICL to possibly change your eye color too. Then the complicated part, which I’m sure you understand. We need to find a cypher to burn out your chip.”

“Will I have access to my money, or will Celia be a poor girl who has to start over?”

“She’ll be poor, but we’ll figure something out, okay?” he said.

The world was moving in a way that indicated that Dhata Mays was at his limit. He pushed his glass away and punched in a number on the panel in front of him, then touched it with his finger to deposit the tip. He did the same with Lur’s tab, then took her hand and led her out to the street. He summoned a drunk transport to take them home and was quite annoyed when it showed up with several people already onboard.

They found a corner on the soft seat, and sat with one another while a loud and sloppy drunk woman locked in on Lur’s shoes. Dhata was hoping to talk to her in the privacy of the transport, but their four fellow passengers kept on asking questions and telling them things they didn’t care about.

At one point he had a strange exchange with a man who asked him if he was a John. Dhata found this odd, since he wasn’t dressed like one, so he asked the man why he would ask him something like that.

“You have a big, bald head, and you’re all…” He gestured wildly with his hands and then burst out laughing.

“So I have the look of a John?” he pressed, despite the man’s obvious inebriation, and the drunk responded with finger pistols. “Well, that’s a disturbing thought,” he mumbled. “No wonder I can’t go anywhere without hools trying to kill me.”

He leaned forward so he wouldn’t have to look at the drunks, and Lur began to rub his back gently. When she did this, he looked up at her and she didn’t give him the warm smile she had flashed inside of the bar. He sat up then and touched her hair, and she slid her hand under his ear to urge him forward into her.

He took the hint and kissed her lips, then she opened her mouth and slipped in her tongue. The heckling and cheering from the cab’s residents faded, and he found himself falling into Lur’s embrace. When they got to the gate which led back to his home, he took her hand and they walked together in silence.

Normally he would drive down this path, but with the Buick in the shop, he couldn’t risk the transport revealing his home. It was a long stretch, and when they got to the grass, she removed her shoes and handed them to him.

“Do you find it odd that we’re so familiar with each other?” he said after what seemed like an hour of silence.

“Not really,” she said. “I think that some people are so alike that when they meet, it doesn’t matter what else is going on in life. They are comfortable.”

“I like that,” Dhata said. “On the chip thing you asked about earlier. When we say burn, it isn’t what you think. Cyphers can adjust information on your identification chip and ‘burn’ away subtle things that will make you appear as a different person. There’s no one playing in your head, no risk of death or anything like that, but it is extremely dangerous. You also run the risk of dealing with the cypher as well. Some of those guys are really shady, and will do things like use your chip as a bounce for illegal transfer, and a bunch of other things.”

“What about the money?” she said.

“That we need to pull before you become Celia. Here’s the thing, though. Not many people deal in paper currency anymore, so it may be difficult for a while. When we pull the credits it will go to a card, but the bank will mark the card and your father will have the ability to cancel it, or track where it is. We will pull the card, fence the credits for cash—”

“Couldn’t he track that too?” Lur asked, and he saw that her toenails were painted white like her shoes. She really liked the color, and in the floodlights of his property they shone beautifully in contrast with her tanned brown skin.

“Fences deal with the tracks and bank heat so that we don’t have to, Lur. They take a hefty portion, twenty five percent, but they give us cash and deposit the virtual credits into their own bank, which is set up to appear as a business account. This way, when the bank asks about the deposit you made, they will have a story in place, and you won’t hear from them again.”

Lur slipped her hand into his, and he moved the shoes so that he could take it. She was surprisingly warm, though the night was chilly. He removed his duster, and slipped it on to her, then held her hand again so that they could resume walking. She swam in the coat the way a child wearing her parent’s clothes would, and he had to smile at how funny she looked.

“Don’t laugh,” she warned, but he did anyway. Then she joined in and everything was okay. “So, I will have a lot of cash, but you said there aren’t a lot of places where I can spend it.”

“Yes, but we’ll figure it out. Once Celia has a cover job, and is recognized by the global network as a true resident of Tampa Bay, we can change the cash into UCCs and bribe someone to make you a naturalized citizen.”

“Dhata,” Lur said, and he looked down to see what she needed. “Is there a woman in that big green house of yours?”

“It’s an old zeppelin that I renovated and painted,” he said proudly, “and no, no woman. It’s just me.”

After walking for the thirty minutes it took to reach the house from the street, he let her into his home and she sat at the big war table. “You’ve been busy,” she said, and he moved over to see what she was talking about.

“When was the last time you ate something?” he asked Lur.

“I can’t remember. What do you have?”

“If you don’t remember then you haven’t eaten. How about I fix us something to eat?”

“I won’t turn down food from a handsome man,” Lur said, as Dhata went into the kitchen. Half an hour later he placed a plate in front of her with two slices of meatloaf and his own special garnish. The drink was a red wine, an old dusty bottle that had been on the rack for a while, and he took a seat next to her with his own plate.

“What’s the plan, Lur? Once you are hidden from your father. Have you bothered to think it through?” he said.

“Of course I did, but do I have answers? No. The only plan I had when I ran away was to become a woman of my own. What happened here?” she asked, reaching up to touch his neck. He flinched at her contact since the area was tender and sore.

“Ah, some craziness with a few hools while I was out working. It’s just a nick; it will heal soon. Don’t worry about it,” he said.

“I know men who do bad things. They are in gunfights almost daily. Their skin is smooth, and they take care of themselves, you know? Like a woman does. They powder their face, cut their hair, everything we do. I know your job is rough but you shouldn’t have to be rough like it. Take care of yourself; you’re a good-looking man.”

Dhata took the hint and leaned over and kissed her, and she leaned into him, kissing him deeper. With a sweep of his arm, he slid the plates out of the way, and held her forearms as they both stood up. She backed up to the table, grabbed the edges and hoisted herself up on top of it. He stepped into her, and she pulled him into her body and grabbed his buttocks as he continued kissing her passionately.

‡Chapter 12‡

A Ninja for a Ninja

She woke up to the familiar scent of fried eggs and bacon. It was a very American breakfast, and one she had grown to love immensely. To Lur it was more than the smell of a delicious meal being cooked by a man who cared for her. It was the smell of freedom, the smell of a world that was leagues away from her father’s influence.

The zeppelin home was very comfortable, and Dhata had shown her all the rooms and how to manage the security. She balked when he showed her that the pictures on the walls were merely augmented holograms. She knew that SARs were what bars and nightclubs used to project their hologram dancers, but she didn’t know that they were installed in just about every home.

She stretched till her elbows popped, then got the urge to get up. So she pulled on a kimono, slipped into the kitchen, then tiptoed behind him while he reached for a glass. She slipped her hands over his eyes and whispered, “Guess who?” and he spun around and lifted her up, kissing her lips in response.

They ate in the kitchen, and she told him about Valadero, but she made certain to remind him that she didn’t miss the place. “For once I am happy. There is nothing more for me there. Good food, and this house, uh. I would be mad to return to that place.”

“Well, I’m happy to have you. How are your eggs?” he asked, and she responded by taking some of his.

“So I have a question,” she said as she sipped at her coffee while he put away the plates. “When they took me away from Orlando, the days when we met. How come you never tried to seek me out?”

Dhata turned around to look at her, as if to see if she was joking, but when he saw no smile or laughter he went back to washing the dishes. “It’s complicated,” he said. “Trust me, it wasn’t for lack of trying.”

Lur was smiling. “I was just thinking. You are so good at your job. Why did you leave the police? This seems like a lot of work to do for yourself?”

“Too many rules,” he said. “Too many bad Johns.”

“Like you are so good, baby,” she teased.

“Oh I was bad. You’re forced to be. But I wasn’t dirty – you understand? Plus, unlike a lot of those guys, I actually like the people of this city.”

“Corrupt Johns who pretend to protect people?” she asked.

“A John’s job is hard,” he said. “They may look like they can do whatever they want, but in reality there’s a mile of red tape preventing them from making certain arrests. You have synths that don’t talk to you, or play stupid when they do, and you have gangsters killing you and your brothers for sport. Turn one in and it’s ‘sorry Dee, but he just made bail’ or worse than that, some judge is on the take and the criminal is laughing at you, right there in court.”

“I bet you were a good John,” Lur said.

“I was, actually, but I got burned out. Retired with honors, took a year off from everything, got involved with a girl and depleted my savings. Skiptracing was meant to be for a stubborn fool like me. I may be shady, but I get the job done, and the Johns that know me appreciate my work.”

She was about to say something more when the screen above the stove lit up and displayed a shot from the camera outside. There was a tall man in a trench coat, who looked tired and worn. Dhata said, “That’s Jason, my employer. I’ve been waiting on him to see if I’m still a part of this case. Cover up, sexy; I’ll introduce you to him.”

Lur nodded and took the last gulp of her coffee before slipping into the bedroom to change. She didn’t know what to expect from Dhata’s friend. He was a John, and she was in hiding. What if he was on her father’s payroll? A part of her wanted to lock herself in the bathroom, feign sickness, and wait until he left. But Dhata had done so much to keep her safe; why would he change his mind all of a sudden?

She shook the paranoia and went into his closet where he’d hung a portion of his ex-wife’s clothes. For speed’s sake, she grabbed a black leather jacket with finger holes and matching tight leather pants. Though the clothes were old, Dhata’s ex had excellent taste in shoes, so she found a pair of black boots and pulled them on.

When she went out to meet them, they were standing over the war table. Dhata was speaking rapidly, and Jason had a look of shock and awe.

“You remember the cypher we used on the Riverview case about five years back?” Dhata was saying. “I’m thinking of bringing him in to see if he can find out what’s happening with this—”

“Sorry,” she said, and slipped in next to Dhata, who didn’t seem to mind as he wrapped an arm around her.

“Jay, this is Lur, my little Cuban troublemaker. She’s staying with me now that I have some time off.”

A look of confusion washed over Jason’s face, but he reached out and shook her hand. “Hey, Dee, is it alright to talk with present company, y’know? Some of what we talk about is pretty gruesome.”

“Oy, I’m a big girl, plus I am not from here,” Lur said. “Pretend I’m not here; I don’t want to be in the way.”

“Nicky Garcia, remember him?” Jason said. “Recently there was an attempt on his life. It was a synth guard, but we stopped him, and now ol’ Nicky boy is telling us everything. He thinks that his old enemy, Jose Diaz, hired a black cypher to kill him. Says he’s been here in Tampa for a while, hacking into synths.”

“A black cypher? You mean a shade? That corroborates my story, Jay, but I don’t see why Jose Diaz would do it. Peyton finds out and there’ll be—”

“Excuse me, did you say Jose Diaz?” Lur asked.

“Yeah, you know him?” Jason replied, and she clammed up and shook her head.

“Lur’s hiding out from her father, Jay. Remember the Orlando—”

“Oh hell, Dee, that’s her? Are you nuts, man, or do you have a death wish? First the Fischer house stunt and now this?” He ran his hand through his thick hair and promptly took a seat. Lur moved out of Dhata’s arms and went to the espresso machine. She didn’t know how Jason liked his coffee, but she made it with a lot of milk, added some sugar, and brought it back to him.

Jason took the mug and thanked her before he took a sip. His demeanor changed, and he looked at the cup, then took another sip as if his first had been a wonderful mistake. “This is perfect. Thank you, Lur, this is really good coffee.” He glanced up at Dhata and shook his head, as if to say, I can’t believe how good this is.

“Cynic Star, that’s the cypher’s name,” Dhata said. “He’s a legend, but as you know, he’s Japanese.”

“If we need him, we need him,” Jason said, still too into his coffee to focus.

“He won’t talk over the phone except to agree to a meeting over there,” Dhata said. “I’ll take a shuttle to see if he’ll do it, and tell him we’ll pay his price.”

Dhata looked at Lur, and she nodded and smiled. “I’ll hold down the fort till you get back,” she said.

“Hey, Jason, you coming here to discuss the case – does it mean that I’m officially back to working for you again?”

“Not officially, but I’ll pay you. We’re in too deep to not finish the job. Just stay under the radar, Dee, and call for backup if these idiots try to kill you again.”

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

The low sound of the radio blaring classical music blended in with the whoosh that came from the shuttles coming and going within the launch tubes of the station. It was noisy but strangely peaceful at the same time. Crowds of people were talking simultaneously, and babies were doing what babies did when they were unhappy.

Two tones chimed to herald an electronic voice that broke through the clamor to announce that the shuttle for Tokyo was now boarding through doors T1 and T2. Dhata got up from the bench and grabbed his hat, throwing back the wing of his duster as he squeezed past a number of waiting people who had bypassed the numerous benches to stand around and block the way.

He never could understand why people did this. Seats were assigned on the shuttle, and it wasn’t as if getting there first made any difference. It was another one of those dumb human traits. Synths would never block a path the way humans did; they were all about efficiency.

When he got to the front, he looked into the biometric iris scanner and the door opened with a pleasant voice announcing his name and seat. It mispronounced his name—people always did—ignoring the ‘h’ to call him Dada, but he was used to it.

Shuttles were the grandchildren of airplanes, just smaller, faster and much safer. They followed data lines that were embedded in the atmosphere, and each one carried a max of thirty passengers.

He settled into the cushy nook of his Felina faux leather seat and stretched out his legs. Shuttle seats were L-shaped and wide enough for a family of four to sit together. People who traveled alone could use the extra room to sleep or seat their luggage. Dhata was a very large man, so he appreciated the space to extend his limbs.

He slid the shutter to the side and peered out at the steel that ran alongside the translucent tube. For a moment he sat frozen, then brought up his personal computer, and sent out the display to emulate a television screen. From this mode he was able to move around a cursor, and he flicked through his case files and accompanying photos. He spread them out on the canvas and then organized them by subject matter.

Everything was in there. Photos of the various crime scenes, Candace dangling by her neck, and files on Esti Bernard, Peyton Ace, the Fischer family, and a map of Seffner. It was his war table away from home, and he looked through them the way he always did, trying to see if a light bulb would go off.

A buzzing came to his ear almost in synch with the shuttle announcing that it would be taking off in five minutes. He looked down in the corner of the screen and saw that it was Lur. She was supposed to be off the grid, but he assumed that she was in ViVi, and had found a way to contact him.

“Lurita,” he said as he touched his ear and closed the screen to clear his ICL.

“You take off yet?” she asked, but there was no urgency in her voice.

“In five minutes. How are you calling me? You know that the cypher can track you this way.”

“You think I’m dumb, don’t you, baby?” she said. “I’m using a hacked implant for the call.”

“Where’d you get that?” he said, impressed.

“Jason. He said you would want to hear my voice,” she said. “Is it working?”

“Is what working?”

“You hearing my voice. Is it making you better?”

“You play too much,” he said, smiling despite himself.

“You like the way I play. It drives you crazy.”

“Is that why you called, to drive me crazy?”

They continued this discourse until the shuttle took off, then Dhata hung up with her to enjoy the ride. He always loved the moment when the shuttle left the tube. It was like a jolt that took your insides and turned them upside down. By the time you wanted to get sick the sensation was gone, and you were airborne, riding the international pipeline.

He peered through the window and saw the city falling away as they climbed to 40,000 feet and picked up speed. Soon it was a blur outside, and the shutters closed themselves, leaving him with the shuttle’s entertainment—which was a video screen with a selection of films. He turned it off and closed his eyes, trying to summon sleep. Lur came to mind, and the beating that he had taken; he still had nagging pains from that day.

He had won the girl, and she was still worth it, but the scars were deep and he hadn’t fully recovered. As a John they’d force him to see a shrink, but as a freelance skiptracer he had decided against it. He was screwed up; no one had to tell him this. But being screwed up had gotten him through the gunfight at the Fischers, and he was hoping that it would help him solve the case.

Eventually he slept but it was too short to count, and he woke up to the shuttle slowing down as it lined itself up with the entry tube. There was a bottle of water next to him, and a packet of protein supplement flavored peanut butter. He picked up the bar and scarfed it down, then emptied half the bottle.

The Narita shuttle port of Neo Tokyo was a different world than Tampa. Where Tampa was jam-packed with human bodies, theirs was an organized scattering of life. He saw people of every size, shade, and disposition, and the synths did nothing to try to blend in. He stepped out of the shuttle on to the automatic floor, watching a couple take a photo of themselves, not caring about the passage they blocked.

“Welcome to Tokyo,” a voice said, and he looked up and saw a synth woman in a blue sailor’s suit. “Do you have a place to say?” she said, and he glanced around to make sure that she was really addressing him.

“I do, actually, thank you for your help,” he said, and she replied in Japanese and bowed.

This is truly wild, he thought as he continued to watch the people come and go.

When he stepped out into the city he couldn’t believe his eyes. The videos and photos that he had studied paled compared to the real thing. It looked like he had stepped into the guts of a concession machine. There were neon lights everywhere, flashing kanji, and beautiful faces advertising things.

Above him was a set of tracks that wound around the buildings like spaghetti. Several light trains rode it like bugs, their paths so close that he thought they would crash. The sky was dark and overcast, thick clouds from a combination of pollution and an incoming storm. Spotlights shone up from the lower streets, a level below where he stood.

Dhata looked down and became dizzy when he saw that there was another street below him with people walking around.

The shuttle’s entrance led out to a sort of glass road with magnetic sidewalks that kept the hover cars afloat. Hover cars; they actually existed here, but he noticed that they weren’t very fast and were more of a luxury than anything. He put aside his queasy feeling and stepped onto the transparent surface. It felt no different than asphalt. He knelt down and touched it, running his hand across it. Was it a trick? he wondered. It couldn’t truly be glass.

A sleek blue Mazda pulled up beside him, and the door lifted up to reveal the driver inside. It was a synth in a helmet that covered the top half of his face, and it looked as if someone had taken a toaster oven and slammed his head into it. Wires ran from the helmet’s backside and slipped into the collar of his rust-colored sports coat. Below it was a charcoal shirt with a loosened silver tie, and his shoes had metal augments. His entire look was absurd.

Without asking, Dhata stepped inside, and the doors floated down, then sealed themselves with a loud sucking sound. “Welcome to Tokyo,” the man said. “I tracked you from Tampa; you made good time.”

“Shuttles are getting faster every year,” Dhata said, looking at the man, who kept his eyes forward, not meeting his gaze.

Dhata imagined that a space shuttle’s HUD was similar to the dash of this vehicle. It had holographic kanji hovering over the surface, a third dimensional map of the roads on the windshield, and cobalt lights outlined the doors. The seats were leather, real leather, and he could smell the authenticity as he leaned back into it.

“Nice ride, Hiroshi,” he said.

“Thank you, Dhata. A cypher’s work does pay. Now, I have a few questions before we can talk business. Unfortunately, as you know, no information is safe around electronics. This includes synths, which as you can tell, is me.”

“So how can I share the details if you’re compromised already?”

“Do you not see my fancy hat? It keeps the arched one on ice. Are you understanding me, skiptracer, especially here in this car? This expensive car with all of its electronics, and direct access to the global network?”

Dhata thought about a way to tell Hiroshi that they needed him to track down a deadly shade. There was no metaphor that he thought would fit, and an idiom was tough. Finally he gave it a try, though he was quite sure he wouldn’t understand it.

“Here in Japan, your culture has really inspired the world. From your raw fish foods to your martial arts, America is crazy about Japan. You know what I used to love watching when I was a kid?” he asked, and when Hiroshi turned to look at him, he answered, “Ninja squad, with Jessica Abe. I always thought that the idea of a woman dressed up like a ninja was sexy. They have a name for them, kunos or something like that, but man, she was such a lady.”

“I’m confused Dhata. Is this your metaphor, or is this still small talk?”

Dhata continued. “I loved the way she snuck around. You know, if one of those were to be set loose on Tampa, we’d be tapped out on a major level. Hell, Ninja squad taught me that it takes a ninja to kill a ninja. Can you imagine? A wicked bitch like that, running around in the city, cutting people up?”

He stared at Hiroshi and the man looked him over. It didn’t take long for him to realize what he was saying.

“It’s Kunoichi,” he said. “A newer term. Something that Otakus and obsessive Americans turned into a sort of legend. Ninjas.” He chuckled. “What a life. They were a real thing over two hundred years ago. Your people made them into superheroes, but in reality it wouldn’t be hard to stop one. Now, a ninja in Tampa, that is different. I wonder what someone like that would want.”

“If I were to write that movie,” Dhata said. “I would have the ninja brought in by a powerful crime boss.”

They pulled up to a dark garage and the door rose slowly, flooding the vehicle with light. Hiroshi drove in, and it closed behind them, just when the rain began to fall outside. It was a large garage with bright white walls that made it seem larger still.

Hiroshi got out of the car and Dhata was surprised by how tall and dangerous he looked. Even without the strange can on his head he was over six feet tall, and he walked with grace all suited and booted, which made him respect him immediately.

“House has dampers; we can talk,” he said. “I’m looking forward to this. I thought you were going to waste my time with some mundane cypher standard, like burning out an ID chip, or syphoning money from a bank.”

“I wouldn’t bore you with something as lame as making me a millionaire,” Dhata said, and Hiroshi laughed, a cracking, smoker’s cough which seemed very strange coming from so athletic a frame. They took an elevator up several floors and emerged in a lobby that led to a single door. There was a box with flowers growing in it, and he stopped to whisper to them before unlocking his door.

Inside the apartment was a bachelor’s paradise, large for a Japanese dwelling. Every wall was glass, which let in the neon ads from the city, and there were no rooms, just one big open space.

There was a bed in the corner and a CPU rack with twelve screens that looked like a honeycomb cut in half. In front of this was a chair that was suspended on long metallic legs, and a large burn mark on the wall that looked to be from a charged xenon tube.

Hiroshi motioned to a table which took up the remainder of the space, and they sat down across from each other under the warm overhanging light. The synth removed his helmet and brushed back his hair. He was a handsome Japanese man with platinum discs for eyes. It was freaky to look at; he had no pupils, and lines ran from the corners of his wide mouth to end at circles on the sides of his eyes.

“My eyes freak you out?” he asked, laughing as he sat back on the chair. “I had the human façade removed in lieu of optics that are better suited for someone part machine. Nothing hides from me, Dhata, not even the truth. You’re an ally, it is known; this is why it is better that you came here in person.”

“Synths here are different,” Dhata said. “More liberated and unique. Back home there’s a lot of augments, and a thriving black market for those that want to appear like human.”

“Do you blame them?” he said. “Americans only see my people as a means to clean up when they’re finished playing war. In peace times we’re pushed out of society, made to live in your slums. Deplorable conditions, and not enough robotics engineers to influence your government. This black cypher, is he a synth?” he asked, leaning forward, which Dhata appreciated, since he could barely hear when he spoke.

“We don’t know. We were hoping that you could find out. We’ll pay you whatever you need.”

“I want a dog,” he said, and Dhata raised an eyebrow. “A real dog that isn’t a clone or a synth replica.”

“Done,” Dhata said. It seemed so simple, but now he was wondering how he would get one.

‡Chapter 13‡

The Murder Show

Dhata was surprised at how well Lur took to Hiroshi. He had brought him home, introduced the two of them, and then waited for an awkward silence that just never came. At first he thought the cypher would want to use his super-rack at home, but the man had insisted that he come to the United States.

Lur was a cypher-rat, a girl who crushed on samurai hackers and shades. He hadn’t known this about her, but hearing the way she spoke to Hiroshi made it very evident.

As if sensing the big man’s discomfort, Hiroshi excused himself to the room he was assigned. The zeppelin was a large ship and the sleep spaces were still intact. He wondered if the tiny room was big enough for the cypher considering the size of the house that he had in Tokyo.

“You brought home the Musashi of samurais. Do you understand, Dhata?” Lur said when he was gone.

“He’s pretty good, I know. He’s also a synth; do you know that?”

“Really? I must’ve missed the electrode conductors that he has in place for ears,” she said, not even trying to mask her sarcasm. “What’s going on, Dhata?” The question caught him off-guard.

“Ooh nothing, nothing at all. I bring a cypher home and you’re practically worshipping him. Let’s just say I’m keeping things transparent so you don’t go getting your heart broken,” he said.

“Because he’s a synth?” she added, and Dhata cocked an eyebrow. “You think I want to have sex with him? Because it is what fans do? Is this what you are thinking?” she asked, and he realized that she had backed him into a corner.

“Just breaking your balls, chica,” he said, trying to sound as playful as he could be.

She sang the words, “You’re jealous, Dhata.”

“No,” he said quickly, though the words made him feel like a five-year-old child.

“It’s okay to be jealous.” She laughed. “But you don’t have to worry. You’re my handsome hero, don’t you remember?”

“He’s going to set up here,” he said to change the subject. “He also agreed to find a more sophisticated way around your chip.”

“You remembered. Thank you baby!” she exclaimed, and then threw her arms around his neck and pulled him down for a kiss. The peck that he expected turned into more and it was obvious that Lur had missed him. They snuck off to the bedroom and he had to be fast, but when it was over, he went outside and looked off towards the faraway city.

A bit later Lur ran out and pulled him inside. “It’s Cypher,” she said. “He’s calling for you.” The odd summons made Dhata quicken his pace, and he followed her down the narrow white passageway to the first door that housed the room in which Hiroshi stayed.

Inside was unrecognizable, though he knew the zeppelin inside out. Hiroshi had blacked out the walls, installed his rack, and mounted an adjustable stool. They found him seated with his hands on the rack, as he stared into nothingness like a frozen seamstress.

He was in cyberspace somewhere, surfing through the global network, but Dhata didn’t know where exactly he was, or how long he intended to stay. Cyphers slotted into a rack were oblivious to their real surroundings. The rack pulled you into the depths of the grid, and—let a cypher tell it--you became out of body and unable to feel.

Hiroshi was far away, but his rack came with defenses: he’d warned them not to touch the board whenever he was under. This was why cyphers worked in private or with family members they trusted. Not Hiroshi, though; he was a pro, and the rack would protect him as it pulled him through the grid.

“What did he say to tell me?” Dhata said to Lur.

“I see him,” came a static voice through his ear buds, and it took him some time to realize that it was Hiroshi. “One of several odd lines of code in the Arch Brain’s mainframe. Funny that he doesn’t sense these intruders, since some are so sloppy that they can be traced. The line that’s here in Florida, it’s encrypted and sophisticated. This person is some sort of savant. I have my work cut out for me.”

“Can you hear me, cypher?” Dhata tried before taking a seat on the bed. Lur came over and sat next to him, her hand resting on his lap.

“Loud and clear, no need to shout. I’m plugged into you and Lurita.” Lurita, really? She’s Lurita to him now?

“What do you need me to do?” said Dhata.

“Wait, I’m running a transfer” he said, and Dhata felt a buzzing in his ear. He reached up and touched the bud, and the world faded to a thick grey canvas and he was slipping inside of a looming white rectangle. This only lasted for a second before he felt himself falling. There was a woman walking on a pathway below him, and he fell through her as if she were an augment without a sensory upgrade.

When he could think clearly he felt sick and dizzy, but in front of him loomed a three-level house. Was he walking? He was walking … but when he looked down he could see his breasts poking through a blue latex top with cuts placed just above his nipples. He was wearing heels, and—he realized that he was inside the woman, and made to object when—

“Shh,” said Hiroshi, laughing, “we’re riding piggyback on your shade’s prey.”

“He’s in another synth?” he asked.

“Yes, a prostitute on a call. I’m guessing that you can figure out what her goal for the evening is.”

Dhata looked around to see if he could recognize the girl, but the only things visible were her swinging arm and legs. She was on a long pavement, approaching several cars, and he could hear the sound of music blaring from the house as if there was a party. As she stepped past a car, she stopped to give herself a check, and Dhata’s heart jumped into his throat.

“Esti. The motherfucker’s got Esti. Can you warn her Hiroshi, or pull out the parasite?” he said.

“No, this ride only allows for passengers, unfortunately,” the cypher said.

Dhata jumped up and made for the door but stopped when he was in the hall. “I’ll be back. This girl is my, um, informant. I know where she’s headed, and I still have time to stop her.”

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

Lur wanted to run after Dhata to stop him from making a foolish mistake, but by the time she got out of the saddle with Hiroshi, he was gone and the Buick was pulling away from the zeppelin. It had happened so fast, she could not stop it, and she ran to the outside balcony to see if she could still see him.

He was gone so she turned around and went back inside the room. She couldn’t stop Dhata, and didn’t know if she should call Jason to possibly get him some backup. She was also too paranoid of the global network to warn the local Johns. She trusted that he was resourceful, and not the type of man to go down easily.

She grasped the nodes on the box in front of her that was connected to the rack Hiroshi was plugged into. The sensation of sliding down into the ground made her flinch, but then her vision blurred and her ICLs displayed the grid, and she could see the rectangular door shining out a column of white. She floated towards it, flicking her tongue to remove the mustard taste that had come about from the connection.

Nearing the door she felt a tug and was sucked through it, where she found herself inside of the woman’s body again. Hiroshi was gone, his hard, precise presence no longer beside her, and she felt a pang of loneliness.

The virtual village had always been a home away from home for her, and as a child she had always looked at cyphers as celebrities. Riding a synth through the grid was unlike logging into the village, however, and she found it so disorienting that she felt sick. It was the lack of control and the sudden movements, not to mention that she could see everything.

The cars were parked in a circle around a large fountain, where an obscene statue spouted water out of several orifices. Esti seemed to be familiar with it, giving it a casual look and then waving at a couple that walked ahead of her as if they were in a hurry.

She picked up her pace, swaying her hips, and glanced up at the sky where the thick smog gave it a look of hot magma. Lights came on to illuminate the exterior, and Lur was reminded of her father’s mansion. This parallel really resonated with her when she saw that there were hools in suits scattered all about. Some were checking the license plates of cars, and others were hiding in rooms looking down at her.

At the door stood two men, hormone-injected bruisers in tuxedos, and they didn’t stop her to check for weapons. She knew the drill apparently, not bothering to stop, and stepped through the door while touching one of their arms. When she did this, the big man leaned over and smacked her on the bum. Esti squealed delightfully, and glanced back at him, and the big hool inclined his shades and winked. His non-winking eye was prosthetic, a cybernetic optic, and all around it were a number of scars which hinted at a past involving fire.

No wonder they didn’t have to check in the guests, Lur thought. They were scanning for weapons, and didn’t need to stop you to do it.

Inside the plantation home was dark, with tiny lights scattered all around the room. It gave the place an intimate feel to go along with the soft piano tunes that came from hidden speakers in the wall. The clientele looked important and rich, older men with women young enough to be their granddaughters on their arms. There were synths serving them, each stopping to glance at Esti. It was only for a moment until they saw what she was, and the potential pull she had with their rich masters.

Esti stopped in front of a couple and started listening to them, but then a large man, an older Russian, slipped his hand around to the small of her back. He whispered things into her ear, but Lur didn’t understand the language. She wondered if Hiroshi did, but it didn’t matter since he wasn’t there to hear it.

The man pulled Esti to the side, next to a table with a champagne fountain, and spun her so that there was no getting away from him. Lur waited to see what the cypher controlling her would do, but she simply giggled and listened.

“Where’d you appear from, little fairy?” he said in English, his voice slurring to reveal the alcohol working its magic on his brain. “When I see you just now, I say, now that is a reason to be here. Now, now, I know I’m coming on strong, but you are special, and I have ten thousand UCC credits to convince you, eh?”

He took Esti’s hand and she let him lead her to a bedroom on the second floor. She went into the bathroom and removed her clothes, then sprayed herself with a bit of perfume. She walked back inside and sat on the twin bed, looking around the empty room. The Russian came in after a time and did things to her that made Lur want to claw out her eyes.

Any man who behaves the way this man is behaving deserves to die without his balls, she thought. It made her appreciate Dhata. What if he had the sick appetite that this man did? She had given herself to him the night of their reunion, but she had done so with the knowledge that he was gentle, and good. Esti was a synth, but a synth woman was still a woman. The Russian was abusive and didn’t seem to mind that where he grabbed her left a bruise.

When they were finished he dressed quickly, gave her a card with ten thousand credits, and left without looking at her. Esti went to the bathroom and showered for a long time, then did what she could to cover the marks. She was a lot richer, but her body was damaged, and Lur felt sorry for her. It was in this instance that Hiroshi returned, and she no longer felt so helpless.

“Cypher Star?” she called.

“I’m here, my dear. Looks like I missed the action. I bet it was extra nasty.”

“More like savage and too close to torture. I don’t think I can take much more of this woman’s life.”

“Be patient, Lurita. Dhata needs you here. He is no longer with me to observe his friend’s actions, so you need to pay attention to tell him later on.”

It was the last thing Lur wanted to hear but she understood, and she tried her best to distance herself from empathizing with Esti. She needed a distraction, so she focused on Hiroshi’s presence. “Hey, Hiro,” she said.

“Lurita?” he replied, the way someone did when they knew what you were about to ask.

“So, we’re inside this synth woman’s brain?”

“No, no, if we were in her brain, you would be lost in a data monsoon. We are tapped into her eyes, the same way our resident shade is. See, it would take a synthetic maestro like myself to get into her brain to control her. I would be competing against the Arch Brain, which is at the core of all synths, and I would also be competing with the other cypher. Tapping into the portion that controls the eyes makes it easier to multitask. Like now: I am simultaneously hacked into the shade’s rack, trying to get a good idea as to who he is.”

“So, I take it that controlling eyes aren’t enough to kill a Russian?” Lur said.

“If we had control, you could cut her eyes at him to show your deep dislike, but we’re merely passengers. I’m sorry Lurita. If it helps, the woman will soon fulfill her crime, and we will be back into our skins.”

Somehow Lur didn’t find this relieving, but she decided to be a good soldier and deal with Esti’s life. She was back on the prowl again, pushing through the crowd of people until another set pulled her aside. They were talking about current affairs, and Lur became bored, but then the lights brightened and everyone stopped.

“Welcome, everyone, I’m glad you could make it. These meetings are why we have had the best year so far,” a feeble voice said. When Esti moved to a place where she could see, Lur recognized the famous gangster. It was Alphie Fischer, patriarch to the Fischer clan, the same Fischer clan whose farm was shot up by Dhata.

He looked handsome and very strong, despite his age, and Lur saw that Esti was attracted to him. He was joined by another woman who she presumed was his wife. She was a delicate, pale flower, a rather stiff one, and Lur realized why a man that rich would have need for a synthetic mistress.

Men like this with strange appetites would keep their darkest passions away from their wives. With a synth like Esti, he could truly get off, so that he could deliver the type of speech that he was giving now. He spoke on government policies, and the buy-in of the party’s attendants, which Lur gathered were the elite of Tampa Bay. There were judges, chiefs, one-percenters, and gangsters, just like the parties her father used to have.

After the long speech, the crowd went wild, and the piano music grew even louder. Esti signaled to the man when his wife was distracted, and he nodded slightly at her in response. This time she climbed the stairs to the third floor, and found a bedroom similar to the first but this one was decked out to impress.

She removed her shoes and took down her hair, then opened the window to let the night air in. There was some commotion below, but she paid it no mind, and climbed into the bed and fell asleep.

“This woman is amazing,” said Lur. “Who could sleep after what happened to her earlier?”

“She’s waiting. It may be a while,” Hiroshi said. “She could be—wait, our shade just made a mistake. He disconnected for a second and forgot to encrypt his signature. He’s definitely Japanese, and I can identify who he is.”

“Really?” Lur said, surprised.

“Yes, I know this one. My, they really went all out to hire a top-notch cypher.”

“Who is it?”

“His name is Gemini. He’s a wicked little roach. It will be a treat to help bring him down.”

A few hours later the music changed in the house; it sounded like a live rock concert was happening on the first floor. Esti stirred and woke up to an old man kissing on her shoulder and grinding his hips into her. He had started while she slept, which sent Lur’s head spinning into a frenzy. But the Mary seemed to take it as business as usual.

She pretended to like it and ran her fingers through his hair. He had his eyes closed and grunted, and didn’t seem to be aware, so she slid her fingers around his neck and began to choke the life out of him.

“This is where Gemini takes control of Dhata’s friend,” Hiroshi said. “He’ll kill this man, then exit her mind, leaving the poor woman to deal with the consequences.”

When the man passed out from the blood rushing to his head, Esti mounted his body and pushed his face into the pillow. From her dress she produced a surgical knife and a small vial of fluid. She removed the case from one of the pillows and dabbed the solution from the vial into it. Then, she pushed the wet pillowcase below the man’s nose and waited a few seconds before slipping the knife into the back of his neck.

As the old man died, she dragged the knife down in a perfect red line down the center of his back.

“Esti!” someone said, and she stopped the cutting to see the silhouette of a man with a gun inside the doorway.

“Shit, he’s gone now!” Hiroshi exclaimed, and slipped out of the body, leaving Lur by herself.

She recognized Dhata as he closed the door and slid over to the woman to take the knife. “We have to get you out of here,” he said, but then Lur’s connection was over in an instant.

It was grey all around her, and she roamed around lost until Hiroshi’s voice came through, “Sorry, Lurita, but I have to track the shade, or all of this will have been for nothing. Just follow the passageway and you will be able to leave the grid. I will rejoin you out there in an hour or so.”

Lur did as she was instructed and floated through the grey till she saw a white space that seemed to welcome her in. She let it suck her through, and the only thing she saw was white, but then she was herself again, though her vision had not returned.

The first thing she noticed was the wetness on her chest. Her ICLs went transparent, and she could finally see the room. Cypher was still mounted on his balancing chair, and the screens in front of him were showered with rapidly scrolling readouts. She looked down at her hands, which were pale from gripping the nodes, and then she saw the vomit on her lap and all over the floor.

She released the nodes and tried to stand up, but the room spun and she collapsed. It was too disgusting, so she held her head and walked out to find the kitchen.

When she had the vomit cleaned up and had changed her clothes, she brought Hiroshi a bowl of soup. It was chicken noodle, thick and tasty, one fomeal pack out of the hundreds that Dhata kept inside of the pantry. He was still tapped in, his face carrying a confident smile, but she and the soup were invisible to him. Lur placed the bowl near the rack and went back to the living area where she sat on the couch, trying to make sense of everything that had happened.

She sat there for a long time, and tried in vain to reach Dhata. He wasn’t answering but she wasn’t worried. He’ll come back, she kept telling herself. She waited on the couch until she passed out, and woke up to Hiroshi washing the bowl inside of the sink. He looked exhausted, his pale, slender body ghostlike in the low light.

“Thank you,” he whispered. “It was a long trip today, and I forgot to take my protein supplements.”

“I’m glad I could help, Hiroshi,” she said.

“Hiro,” he corrected her. “My friends call me Hiro. The soup was wonderful; it was very thoughtful. What did you think of your first trip? It was your first, right?” he said before walking over to sit next to her. He was very animated now, and his silvery eyes looked cracked.

“Hiro, you need rest,” she said, touching him on the cheek. “The trip was different … how you say? Surreal? I don’t want to ever do that again.”

“You did well, and it was necessary to help our friend, Dhata,” he said. “Plus, I was able to find Gemini, and we were able to see that he is the one behind the spines.”

‡Chapter 14‡

A Friendly Gesture

Everything was a blur to Dhata once he grabbed Esti. First, the synth woman passed out as soon as she saw him, and second, his entry into the house was akin to stepping on an ant hill. Hools were pounding on the door and he only had eight bullets, so he snatched her up, threw her over his shoulder and opened up the window.

They were three floors up, but there was a landing outside that ran around to the far side of the house. It was dark near the area of the mansion where he was, so he shuffled fast before anyone could notice him up there. He found a ladder and climbed down, but then he saw that the second floor’s landing stopped before it reached the front of the house. Looking around frantically, he wondered if a jump into the bushes would break his legs or kill him.

When he looked near the front, he saw a delivery truck parked, its cab so tall that it was just a few feet below their level. Dhata didn’t hesitate. There was no time to think, not if he didn’t want Esti to end up like Candace. He ran along the landing and pushed off with the strength of his cybernetic leg. He realized as he did this that Esti may be too heavy for the jump but to his surprise his leg cooperated.

They crashed onto the roof of the truck and it collapsed at an angle, but he was okay, and she was still passed out. The guards outside had rushed inside to help apprehend him, so he was able to slide off the side with Esti and limp over to the Buick. A few latecomers stood by gawking at him but he paid them no mind.

By the time he was pulling away, the hools were spilling out, looking for him, and he was on the highway trying to distance himself from the house. Everything was instinct. The sheer panic he felt when he saw who the cypher controlled, the rage and jealousy of her in the bed with the gangster, and the fear of being caught in a bedroom with a dead power player.

Esti was up to her elbows in trouble and he had no real plan for getting her out of it. The first thing that crossed his mind was to bring her home, but he already had two guests and it would be devastating if an enemy figured that out. He considered Dr. Spade, who admitted to having a soft spot for Esti, but he didn’t trust the man. Like everyone else, he could be bought easily.

Dhata left the highway and took to the back roads. If he had a tail, they would be gangsters, and riding through the wrong neighborhood could result in a war that he would be forced to fight. The thought of war and gangsters reminded him of Peyton, and he realized that there was his answer. He dialed the private line that the synth had given him, and tried to calm his nerves so that he wouldn’t seem desperate.

“Detective,” said the voice on the other line, and Dhata brought the call up on the Buick’s dash. The boss was seated in a large chair in a room with red carpeting, and the entire scene came off as strangely regal.

“Peyton, what’s with the ‘detective’ thing? I’m not a John, and I don’t plan to be, so just Dhata will be fine.”

“Okay, Dhata, how can—is that my Esti asleep in the car with you? You’re beginning to worry me with this obsession of yours—”

“Remember our pool game?” Dhata said, cutting him off. His mind was working overtime and he was feeling impatient with Peyton’s questions.

“You call to brag? Okay, you got me. Yeah, I remember.” He looked around at no one in particular and started a slow clap. “Let’s hear it for Dhata, ladies and gentlemen; he sticks it to the machines both on the bed and on the table.” Peyton lost it and started to laugh. It was a deep laugh that must’ve felt good because it brought tears to his eyes.

“I was right,” Dhata said.

“About your obsession?” Peyton said.

“No, about your business. I’m on to the cypher behind all of this.”

“Whoa,” Peyton said. “Hold up, you mean—”

“Yeah, but before I tell you anything, I need your personal guarantee,” Dhata said.

“Guarantee? What sort of guarantee?”

“I need Esti to be safe, Peyton. She just took out one of your rivals.”

There was a pause and Peyton killed the video feed, causing the Buick’s dashboard to revert back to cobalt readouts. The phone call was over but he was still in Dhata’s ear, somehow.

“Come to the house,” he said. “The one from before. You remember it?”

“Yeah,” Dhata said.

“Park your car in the hood, then come see me so we can talk. Nobody’s going to mess with you, I will make sure of that. I’ll take care of Esti, but she will have to go into hiding.”

Dhata got off the call and reclaimed the steering wheel, hitting 50th Street to head towards Ybor. The last time he was there he had been running for his life, and now his only friend was the man who he had originally been running away from. He appreciated the irony.

He did as he was instructed and parked the Buick in the seediest part of the city. Technology didn’t exist here, at least not overtly, and the streetlights were off, keeping everything in black. The hools that haunted the various corners paid little mind to him. Without Peyton it would have been a different experience, but he kept his revolver handy nonetheless.

Esti was up but her movement seemed labored. When he tried to speak with her, she could only moan, so he supported her under his arm and took his time down the road. As they shuffled near 7th a slender man appeared next to him, smiling cruelly as he regarded Esti. “She drink too much?” he said, and a second man crept up behind them.

“Do I know you?” Dhata said, his voice revealing his impatience with the man who was walking a bit too close. Before the hool had a chance to answer, Dhata pulled out his revolver and leveled it at his chest. “Move on. I have jurisdiction to walk these streets. Tell your man to back away or I’ll kill him too, and if either of you live you’ll have Peyton to deal with.”

The man put his hands up and backed away, and that’s when Dhata realized that he was human. “The hell are you doing here, boy?” he said. “This is synth territory?”

“They’re wannabes,” whispered Esti, who seemed to be doing better. She brushed the hair away from her face and looked around. “We going to see Peyton?”

“Yeah. How much do you remember?” he asked.

“None of it. Did we hook up? I’m feeling sore all over.”

Dhata waved the pistol once more to let the hools know they were dismissed, then picked up the pace now that Esti was better. “There’s a cypher hacking working girls. I’m sure you heard by now—”

“No, I couldn’t … Dhata I d-didn’t?” she stammered.

“You did, Esti, but I got you. Nothing to feel bad about; that wasn’t you back there.”

“What did I do though, Dhata? Was it one of my guys?”

“If by guys you mean the men you call clients, then yeah, it was Alphie Fischer. Don’t feel any way over it; you actually did me a favor. That psychopath and his nest of mongrels tried to rub me out a few weeks back. I was going to find him and empty the clip, but you beat me to it and cut him up something terrible.”

Esti seemed dazed by his words and stepped away, hugging her arms against the cold. Dhata removed his duster and wrapped it around her shoulders. She pulled the coat tighter and hung her head, and he wrapped an arm around her.

When he got to Peyton’s door, a pair of large men were waiting for him. They opened the new back door—which was a major improvement over the one he had broken—and led him inside the empty house.

Without the tweakers and the perverts, the place looked like a livable home, but there were still no lights, only candles on several tables. The lack of lights in the Ybor City ghetto had gotten Dhata’s eyes used to the dark. He took Esti up the stairs to the first bedroom, which had a thick red mattress spread neatly across a platform bed.

Esti stopped and motioned for him to go, removing the coat to hand it back. “It’s okay,” she said. “We’re not allowed in the boss’s room. Just stop by on your way out, okay? I really want to thank you.”

Dhata nodded reluctantly and slipped back into the coat. Peyton was inside of his office with another man, a walking corpse that looked something like a tall, wet rat. They both regarded him when he stepped inside and he pointed to an empty chair and stared at Peyton. When the boss nodded he took the seat, then crossed his legs and waited. The two men were talking in hushed tones and the rat seemed extremely frightened.

Peyton looked up from his whispering to regard Dhata, then smiled knowingly, as if he were a long lost friend. “Hey Dhata, meet Frankie, a longtime associate of the Fischer mob. You don’t recognize him, do you? Neither did I, till he showed up here begging for a punch and offering his services to me.”

“Look, if that raggedy ass dude is about to do you this favor, I’d rather step outside and wait,” Dhata said. “I know what tweaks are willing to do for a punch, and I’m not in the mood to watch.”

“You’re funny, you know that? I know you’re joking so I’ll let it slide. Why would you—”

“Of course I’m joking, calm down. Now, Esti … what are we going to do to keep her safe?”

“From who, Dhata? The Fischers?” He snickered. “Guess you didn’t hear.”

“What?” Dhata said, hoping for some good news.

“Old man Nicky, our resident jailhouse canary. Before he decided to become a fat craven rat in there, he put a number on the Fischers’ heads. All of them.” He glanced at Frankie, then back at him. “That John killed like what, eight of those inbreds?”

“Actually, that was me,” Dhata said, looking to see if his words frightened Frankie. But the tall man didn’t flinch, just stood hunched, staring at the ground. Peyton, on the other hand, was quite surprised.

“You? All you? Damn, I had no idea. I think I need to be a little nicer to you.” He started laughing.

“So the Fischers are all dead? Why would Nicky do this? Isn’t he the one who paid you to introduce Esti to Alphie Fischer?”

Peyton looked over at the whimpering man, who seemed on the verge of passing out. “This is your cue, dumbass. Talk to the detective.” He placed a slap across his face that sent him flying into the wall. Peyton was much shorter than him, but he seemed like a giant standing over the humiliated man.

“I killed the Mary,” Frankie admitted, sitting up and inching away from Dhata on the floor. “Ricky Fischer made the order, and I’m the one who—who choked her out. I—I had to do it,” he said.

“Kill Candace? For what?” shouted Dhata as he leaped up to his feet.

“She threatened the boss, he put in the order. You gotta understand, mister, I was an associate. You gotta do what they ask.”

Peyton went to his desk and sat down, turning on an electric cigar. “See the kind of friend I am?” he said to Dhata. “I knew you were hurting, so I went out and got you the cure. This piece of shit right here. Don’t tell me you’re going to let her murder go unavenged. You think the Johns care about our Candace? Of course they don’t. She was a dirty synth Mary.”

“What’s your name?” Dhata asked the man, who was bawling his eyes out by now. “Your real name, the one you had before dyeing your hair and bleaching your skin?” He grabbed him by the collar, but he was surprisingly calm in this moment. He wanted to kill the man to avenge Candace, but he owed Jason answers, and this was an open opportunity.

“Frankie,” he said.

“I got that part. Frankie what?” Dhata pressed.

“Frankie Acosta. I am Francisco Acosta.” He deflated visibly after this admission.

“Peyton,” Dhata said. “I’ve got a lead on the cypher, but they will cut my balls off after they see that I was involved in this Fischer assassination. This guy here is the key to my cuffs, know what I mean? Trust me, I want to put a bullet in him, but the shade stealing spines is a bigger concern. It was his shenanigans that got Candace caught up with these people anyway. Let me turn him over so that he can sing, and that should turn down the Johnny boy heat on me.”

Peyton seemed to think it over as he played with his cigar. He tilted back his head and let the vapors seep out of his mouth and nostrils. “Do with him what you will, Dhata, but here’s my stipulation. If that cocksucker mentions me or my operation to the Johns, I will have to take it out on you.”

“I have connections on the inside,” Dhata reminded him. “If this clown so much as mentions Ybor, he’ll find himself skinned by rusty razorblades in that place. Francisco, look at me, here’s the deal. You’re going to tell the truth about everything regarding Candace. You will admit to the crime, and tell them Alphie Fischer ordered you to do it. Then you’re going to say that Alphie’s death was an order from Jose Diaz in Cuba. Those two have a history, so no-one will question it, and that Cuban crook will have to deal with law enforcement for once in his life. Do all this, and they’ll go easy on you. You’ll be deported and I will forget that you even exist.”

Francisco’s face evened out, and he seemed on the verge of tears. This was when Dhata realized that he had expected to be killed.

“I owe you Peyton,” Dhata said. “I owe you big. This shuts the door on one part of this case and will allow me to go back to work the way I’m used to doing it.”

“It’s nothing, big man. Just remember your friends, and we’ll keep Esti safe where no one can touch her.”

“Alive,” Dhata reminded him.

“Of course,” he said. “She’ll be here with me. You can come and see her whenever you want.”

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

It felt good to turn Francisco over to Jason. The snoop was so happy that he couldn’t stop smiling. The chief reassured him that the press would print the truth, but Dhata knew better, even though he pretended to accept it.

They invited him to stay to talk about the case, but he was finding it hard to pay attention. He hadn’t slept. The meeting at Peyton’s had taken up most of the night, and he had spent the morning in an Ybor motel, dozing in front of the television.

He got his payment from Jason and went back to his car, where he sat for a time thinking about Candace. Lur’s face popped up in the corner of his ICL, and the buzzing of her call irritated his ears. He connected and said, “Lurita, are you alright?” It took seeing her face for him to remember that he had left her with Hiroshi inside of his house.

“Lurita, that’s new. You never call me that,” she said. “Where were you last night, Dhata? Hiroshi and I missed you.”

“Don’t say too much, okay? Calls aren’t really private. I got my friend home safely, and met with the person she works for. Please tell Hiro that I am ready to move, as soon as he knows where our other friend is.”

“I will. You sound tired. That place looked very dangerous. Did you get out okay, or is there something you aren’t telling me?” she said.

Dhata smiled at her intuition; he could slip nothing past her. “I got a little banged up, but I’m all in one piece. When I get home I’ll spend a few hours in the medical pod,” he said. “Listen, Lurita, I’m working an angle. If things work out, you will be able to stay who you are, without having to worry about the old man.”

“Are you going to hurt him, Dhata?” she asked, her voice betraying concern.

“Only if you want me to,” he said.

“He is still my pa—”

“I know, but we’ve said too much; let’s talk about it later. I’m on my way there, and I do really need to get some sleep.”

When he got back to the house he did just that, passing out instantly. He barely remember kissing Lur and listening to Hiroshi talk about the cypher, Gemini. He woke up in pain, a burning in his back, and there was the standard blurriness that came with implants and dry eyes. He stumbled to the restroom and washed his face, rinsing his eyes out with water and reaching into the cabinet to get a bottle of eye lubricant.

It was near noon, and the house smelled like ramen, and when he walked out he could hear the slurping of his two guests destroying their hunger.

“It’s alive,” teased Hiroshi, but Dhata ignored him, walking into the kitchen and making himself a bowl. “Did you sleep well, Dhata?” the Japanese cypher said.

He found a seat next to Lur, and then replied, “I don’t know about ‘well,’ but I did sleep. I was so damn deep that I had several dreams.”

“Was I in any of them?” Lur asked, as she reached over to rub his leg below his robe.

“Of course you were, but I can’t give details. Wouldn’t want Hiro here to feel uncomfortable. That wouldn’t be very hospitable of me.”

They ate and finished up, then talked for a time, first about the excitement they had all witnessed, and then about Esti and her future. Dhata reassured them that she would be okay, and that Peyton would look out for her until they caught the cypher.

“So this Gemini, he’s a shade?”

“A scary psychopath with a big reputation,” whispered Hiroshi. “He’s an outcast, a Judas cypher, someone who works for Yakuza and foreign governments. He has been wanted by the authorities in my country for a very long time, Dhata, but he’s good, a pure professional—though, I cannot understand this spine business.”

“Let me ask you this, Hiro, since you’ve been plugged into a rack for over fifteen years. You’re a legend yourself; you’ve outlasted plenty. Why is Gemini being here such a big surprise to you?”

“Because he has been off the grid for over five years. We thought that he retired, maybe with a rich benefactor as his husband or bride. To be honest with you, when I saw his signature, I thought that it was a clever copycat. Gemini Shi, why would he travel to America? This is what I asked myself when it became clear to me.”

“Maybe he’s broke,” Dhata said. “He was in need of money and a boss offered him the bank to come wipe out all of his enemies. The question is, which boss? I can only think of three, but two are out of the running due to recent events. Alphie Fischer could have hired him, but he attacked him just yesterday. Then there is Peyton, but it’s his girls who are being compromised and costing him money. That leaves Nicky Garcia, and Lur’s dad, Don Jose.”

“Papa?” Lurita asked, snapping out of her momentary lull. “Why would he want to hire a black cypher?”

“Shade,” Hiroshi corrected.

“Shade,” she repeated. “Why would my father hire one of those?”

“That’s what we have to figure out in order to catch this man, Lur. Nicky and Alphie were allies, and they both used Peyton’s girls. That leaves your dad on the outside and the primary suspect.”

Lurita shook her head. “You don’t know men like we do, Dhata,” she said. “This could all be over love. Friends, you say, that were sleeping with the same woman, often. These bosses could have used the first woman to take each other out. Then you have Nicky, who is in the prison and has another big trial on the way. He could have hired the shade to clean up his tracks, so that there are no witnesses to testify.”

“That would make sense, especially the judge, who we found first in the parking lot. I need to get Jason on Nicky to interrogate him again. See if he slips up about this murdering cypher,” Dhata said. “You know, Lurita, you’re not half bad at this.”

“Surprised you, huh?” she said, beaming with pride. “Maybe I can be a skiptracer, just like you.”

‡Chapter 15‡

Black Leather Trench

Hiroshi was a genius, and while Lur knew this, she didn’t expect him to be looking out for her while all the craziness was going on with Dhata. She was feeling stir crazy so she went outside and walked the length of the hidden pathway that led out towards the road.

Since it was merely a stroll she wore sandals and shorts, the kind of outfit a girl would wear to sunbathe on the beach. She wanted the sun to be out and the day to be beautiful, but what she got were deep, dark clouds and a light rainfall that had been going on for hours.

It felt good on her skin and in her hair, so she forced herself to enjoy every bit of it. She was away from Carlos, away from the hools, and with friends that cared for her. She couldn’t ask for more.

Even the Virtual Village hadn’t seen her in days, and she felt no desire to log in. It was the rack; it had been a rush, and despite the vomit, she wanted to experience it again. As she neared the gate that led out to the road, she spun around to walk back towards the zeppelin. That was when she saw him, the tall slender figure whose umbrella—patterned with pink cherry blossoms—signaled who he was.

“Lurita,” he said, “You are going to be sick.” He fell in step beside her, shielding her from the rain. “Did you come out to cry? People use the rain to hide their tears. Trouble with Dhata, or do you miss your home?”

Lur smiled at his questioning, and though it was invasive, she would be lying if she said that she didn’t appreciate his concern. “I have been inside that house for over a week, Hiro. It doesn’t matter if it’s raining or snowing; I needed some fresh air.”

“I came outside to warn you not to go too far from the house,” he said. His voice had taken on an unfamiliar edge. “I was bored, so I did a bit of sleuthing, choosing your father’s network to hack. He has men here, in Tampa.”

“Oh,” she said quietly, “I don’t know what to say. Is it strange that I feel pleased, Hiro? Shouldn’t I be frightened or upset?”

“I’m thinking that you’re taking his commitment to finding you as an expression of his love. I hate to disappoint you, Lurita, but it’s Dhata they want. He made a deal with your father to get out of Valadero. Don Jose is a man of principle, is he not? I’m assuming that Dhata lied about what he would do, and when your father got wise, he committed himself to your boyfriend’s death.”

“This is all my fault,” Lur said. “I don’t know how to fix it, Hiro. I want to live my life, but not under Papa, and I want Dhata to be okay.”

“I promised our friend that I would help you to disappear, and I am working on a solution to do this,” he said. “Dhata can take care of himself; he’s proved this many times. But we need to make sure that you’re off the grid.”

When they got back inside, he went straight to his rack with Lur standing behind, him watching the screens. It was hard to decipher what she was seeing there, but the readouts were almost therapeutic to watch. She stood for a few minutes, then left to shower and change. Afterwards she settled on the couch.

The sound of the rain was a pleasant melody, and she dozed off, dreaming of Valadero. When she awoke, Hiroshi was on the other seat, staring at the television.

“I can swap your chip programmatically with that of someone else,” he said. He never looked at her, and she wondered if part of him was still wired into the grid. Hiroshi was high tech and one of the best to do it, so she wouldn’t be surprised if he was. “The catch, pretty girl, is that we need a dead donor, someone whose family won’t be looking for her chip. I will send Dhata to bid for a homeless body. There’s several offshore digs where the bounty hunters hold auctions. Jamaica, the Philippines, Puerto Rico, but it’s risky so—”

“Dhata’s busy. I’ll go,” Lur said. “Hiro, I’m bored out of my mind. If I do this myself I can vet the donors; plus I have the money to afford it.”

“He won’t like that if he finds out,” Hiroshi said.

“It’s not up to him, now is it?”

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

Dhata sat below the slowly rotating fan, listening to the rain pound a symphony on the zinc. Esti was smoking like she always did. They hadn’t said a word since he entered the room. He just found a chair and sank into it, and she lay on the bed and smoked.

He was Peyton’s boy now, but he accepted it. Esti was okay, and he could be with her whenever he wanted. His eyes rolled to watch her as she exhaled smoke, her dark nipples a delicious contrast against her silky caramel skin. She saw him looking and turned off the cigarette, twisting her body to look at him as she ran her hand over her thigh.

“You missed me,” she whispered. It wasn’t a question but a statement. Of course he missed her, but touching her wouldn’t be right. He was with Lurita, and he had made up his mind to say goodbye to his sultry synth Mary.

“What do you do here now?” he asked, and she looked up at the fan.

“I wait. That’s all I can do, right?” she said.

“Wait for what?”

“To be violated again. I wish that I could explain to you how bad it felt, Dhata, to wake up knowing that you’ve done something terrible. That cypher ruined my life, everything that I have worked for. All those men,” she said, her voice trailing off.

“It wasn’t for nothing. We’ll catch him eventually, and you can get back to making money.”

“The clients I had, Dhata, do you think I’d get those back? No, of course not. They’re all dead, and none of the rich humes in West Tampa will spend more than a hundred dollars for a synth.”

“Come on Esti, you know better than that. You have other talents. Hell, you can pay to get an upload of anything. You can go into real estate, piloting … there’s a lot of good jobs for synths.”

“Good jobs for synths who want to be limited to synth money. Humes have their own real estate agents, and their vehicles pilot themselves. We turn tricks for a reason, Dhata. Don’t you get it? The money simply can’t be beat.” She sat up and put out her cigarette. “I appreciate you coming to check on me, but it’s been over an hour,” she said.

“Who cares how long it’s been? Does he have you working in here?”

“No, but I have plans that go beyond your fine ass not screwing me today,” she said, and hit him with a pillow, causing him to flinch. “Get up, go save some other worthless synth. Just go to work, you crazy fool.”

She was smiling and he caught it, which was a relief since he thought that he had offended her. He did as she said and stood up, not knowing whether to hug her or shake her hand. At the door she pulled him in and kissed him, the type of kiss that was meant to stay on your mind.

When he stepped out into the hallway, ready to leave, he noticed Peyton waiting on the stairs. “You’re addicted,” he said. “I can’t believe it. I know that our women are good, Detective, but dare I say that she has you by the balls. What would your little señorita think? I’m actually curious; this is very intriguing to me.”

Dhata rolled his eyes and stepped over him, eager to get out to get back to his work. “Don’t be an asshole and tell anyone about today,” he said. “Keep her safe; she’s been through hell.”

“What happens in the house of Peyton Ace, my friend, stays in the house of Peyton Ace. You think that you’re the first human to get addicted to the honey inside of my jar? You said it yourself, remember? Nothing beats screwing a synth.”

Dhata ignored him and pulled on his duster, then walked past several of Peyton’s customers to exit out into the rain. It was evening now, and he had been in Ybor most of the day. He was seeing if anyone had been asking around for human body parts. Everything had been a dead-end, so he grew frustrated and had decided to pay Esti a visit.

He called up Jason to give him an update as he made the trek back to his car. He felt so good, he couldn’t shake it. He was ready to conquer the world. They agreed to meet at the Tavern, which brought his mood even higher, and he hung up the phone thinking that things were looking up.

As he got past the third house in the Ybor matrix, he saw several tweakers milling about. He was under Peyton’s protection — they wouldn’t mess with him — and that’s what he thought until he turned the corner and—bop, a smiling woman with spiked silver hair and black lipstick smacked him in the forehead with the heel of her hand.

He gathered that it wasn’t meant to hurt him, but to provoke a reaction, since she skipped away laughing. He watched her move away in a black mini skirt and knee-high boots. Then as she got to the street she spun and said, “I … see … you,” then walked away as he stood there, stunned.

Why would she do that? He thought as he resumed his walking, but he couldn’t think of anything as he waded through the tall wet glass of the area between the houses.

With his senses on high alert, he avoided people, shifting to stay within the light. It was on one of these shifts as he rounded a corner that a shadow stepped out with a combat knife. This wasn’t a tweaker, but a synth bruiser playing at being one. The blade caught Dhata’s Kevlar undershirt, which saved his life, but bruised his ribs from the force of the impact.

The awkward angle of the attack and the blow—which he thought punched through—caused him to fall backwards into a puddle of mud. He fumbled for his revolver and got it out just in time to shoot the assassin in the abdomen. The man fell forward, almost on top of him, and he scrambled to his feet and kicked him in the ribs.

The gun’s bark was loud, and screams went out as people scattered to exit the premises. An illegal gunshot in the heart of the synths? Dhata knew that the Johns would be on their way. Still, he didn’t care, and he shot the hool one more time to show it. The bullet hit his knee and the round exploded, leaving the leg a shattered mess of wires and synthetic blood.

“I know who you are, “he said to the hool as the rain washed the blood away. “Gemini. Now I’m the one that is hunting for you. Hack into any synth you want, you coward. I’ll be right there, and eventually I’ll be on to you.”

The look of pain and defiance melted from the man’s face then, and was replaced with one of horror. Dhata helped him up, and explained what had happened, then collected his leg and helped him get back to Peyton’s.

“We’ll get you fixed up,” he told him, though the synth was still in shock. “This wasn’t your fault, you hear me? This is all on me. Tell Peyton what I told you, and that I’ll cover the repairs.”

When he was on the way to the Tavern, he called up Hiroshi and told him what happened with the synth. “You’re marked, Dhata,” the cypher said, “and not just by Gemini, but by Don Jose Diaz too. There are men after you. Nowhere is safe, and it’s only a matter of time before they catch you. We will have to find the nest of this nasty shade before the next dagger kills you. I think I have an idea, but I’ll wait to tell you in person. Until then, watch your back, my friend.”

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

The seedy dark docks of Clearwater beach reminded Lur of the night she fled her father’s home. Hiroshi’s contract was with Dhata, so the risk of traveling and possible discovery was left to her to face. She needed to disappear, and the only thing preventing her from doing this was the brain implant that identified her as Lur Diaz.

She scanned the shores, hugging herself defensively against the cold. Dhata’s ex-wife, whose clothes she wore, had no warm clothes except for a few sweaters, so she wore one over a black leather leotard, with a scarf to block the wind from her ears.

The water had the look of black finality, and though the waves normally put her at ease, in this instance they seemed dangerous. She’d been waiting now for over two hours, but Hiroshi assured her that the sellers would come to collect her. Black Market auctions were invite only, but since she was close to one of Japan’s greatest cyphers, her name and ID were on the list for tonight.

The crunch of sand brought her around, and she saw two men in trench coats, standing by a hover copter several yards away. It must have just landed, since she hadn’t noticed it when the taxi let her off. The men weren’t approaching her, which sent her heart racing into a panic.

“Hiro,” she whispered, touching the bud in her ear to bring up the connection to the cypher. “Hiro, are these the men?”

A sharp sound pierced her brain and she bent over against the pain, but it was gone just as fast as it had come. “I’m sorry, Lurita, this rack sent a glitch. Hmm, your contact was intercepted by the Coast Guard an hour ago. They are securing the bribes, and he should be to you shortly. Is there a place you can sit and wait?”

“Coast Guard,” Lur repeated. So they wouldn’t be coming by way of hover copter?

Of course they wouldn’t. The dealers operated mostly off the grid, and would opt for a boat to pick her up on the beach. In a hover copter they could be tracked and discovered, only to bring the military down on their illegal market. Whoever these men were, they weren’t going to be friendly, and she wondered if they were Johns.

“Lurita Diaz?” one of them called in an accented voice, and she was immediately wise to the fact that they were her father’s men. How had they found her? She had been at Dhata’s house for weeks. How was it that the moment she left, they were able to find her on an abandoned beach?

She reached down and unclipped the Beretta Nano that she’d borrowed from Dhata’s weapon cache before leaving the house. Since the leather pants she wore had straps, she was able to conceal the weapon below the long sweater. It felt heavy in her hands, but she didn’t care as she walked towards the men, who stood waiting confidently.

“Hola,” she said. “Do I know you?”

The shorter of the two said, “It’s time to go home, Princesa.”

Lur became agitated when she heard that word; it was what the hools would tease her with when her father wasn’t around. “Lurita princesa, Don Jose’s spoiled brat.” It was a reminder of what awaited her should she return to Valadero.

They would pull her into the copter and work her over first, then bring her to her father, where she would be locked away for days. Even if she agreed to go they would take their frustrations out on her. It was what those men would do, since they would be frustrated after trying to find her for weeks.

Aside from that, they would kill Dhata, if they hadn’t done so already. She hadn’t heard from him in a couple of days, and the few times she’d buzzed his phone he hadn’t answered.

As she grew near the hover, one lit up a cigar, and the light from his match revealed him as Cesar Rivera, one of Don Carlos’s men. She stopped in her tracks, panic freezing her limbs. Was it her father that was searching for her, or his top hool, Don Carlos?

In her mind’s eye she saw his men grabbing her and throwing her into the hover, where they would take turns on her before delivering her to their boss. The rest required no thought, but it was a reality that she’d rather die than face.

She shot a round from the hip, sending them scrambling for the safety of the hover copter. This allowed her to mark one, the man with the cigar, and she brought the pistol up to level—the way her father had taught her.

Lur lined up the three dots of the glowing sights and squeezed off three rounds at the retreating hool. The man went down, the glowing ashes of his cigar glowing prettily in the dark, but she didn’t have time to admire her work. The other man had gained the seat of the hover and it lifted away as she got up to it.

The hover copter tilted, then flew out over the water, leaving her with the corpse of Cesar Rivera.

“Lurita!” Hiroshi was shouting, and it took till now for her to realize this. His voice was low and muffled, a feature of the phone that would trigger when you put someone on hold for a long time. She reached up with a trembling hand to touch the bud in her ear and connected to him immediately.

“Hiro, are they close?” she said, trying to sound natural.

“They’re here, but I’ve been listening this whole time. I heard a shot; it sounded like a low caliber weapon. Are you okay, my dear?”

“The shot was from me. My father’s men caught up to me. Hiro, I hate to ask, but you don’t work for my father, do you? Please, tell me if you do. I won’t be upset, but you’re the only one that knew I would be out here.”

“You’re upset, and I understand,” Hiro said. “But think clearly, cowgirl. If I was working for your father, Dhata’s home would have been raided weeks ago. No, more than likely you’re chipped. We’ll look for it when you get back. Lurita, you don’t have to go through with this; we’ll find another way.”

She thought about his words and knew that he was right. There had been several times where she had been alone with him, and where, if he was compromised, that hover could have come to get her. “I’m sorry,” she said softly. “I didn’t mean to accuse you, Hiro. You’ve been a good friend, and that wasn’t very nice of me.”

“You’ve been through a lot, Lurita. It was a valid question, but you need to move fast either way.”

“But if I’m chipped, they would have come to Dhata’s. Why didn’t they just come and get me there?”

“Our friend is a professional with a lot of enemies, Lurita. While his home is extravagant, it is rigged with EMPs and Jammers. It is what we call an invisible spot on the grid. This is why he brought me here to do my diving, so that the shade wouldn’t be able to trace my steps. It’s brilliant really, this old ship. It was a war weapon built to be invisible to radar. Dhata impresses me, and so do you, cowgirl. I never would have thought that you were so handy with guns.”

Lurita felt better from his compliment, and flipped the hool over with her boot. She went through his pockets and took everything, and then removed his coat. It reminded her of the duster Dhata wore, but it looked newer and was black leather instead of brown. She threw it on and then jogged back to the pier. There was a fishing boat docked with a man standing next to it, looking around nervously.

“Lur?” he asked, and she nodded as she stepped up to him to get her Bio-ID scanned. He was a haggard old man. She guessed that he was Filipino, and his hands trembled from the cold or age as he waved the device in front of her head.

“You check out, Lur, please step inside. Be very careful not to fall,” he said. She decided that she liked him. He seemed kind but dangerous, like an old pit bull that was capable of anything. When she got inside the fishing boat, he hopped on after her with a rope. “That’s a nice coat,” he remarked when they pushed off, and Lur had to smile.

‡Chapter 16‡

I See You

“You take way too many chances,” Dhata was saying to Lur, who would now be identified as Fabiana Lopez whenever she used the global network.

She had been missing for three days, but had kept in contact with Hiroshi. His network of black market contacts kept an eye on her, and she was able to board the ship and bid on the corpse of this forgotten woman. Fabiana’s real history was one of drugs and abuse. She was a year older than Lur, but a lifetime on the streets of Havana had left her with no family or loved ones to care.

The bidding on her corpse was low, due to the extent of her stim abuse, and Lur won her brain for 30,000 UCCs. Hiroshi was able to alter the code of the two chips, and the daughter of Jose Diaz was now reported to have died somewhere on the beaches of Havana. The real Lur—as Fabiana Lopez--was a ghost, free to go wherever she pleased.

“I take chances, but they work out, so hush and pass the bacon,” Lur said.

Dhata did as she said and slid the plate over as she licked her fingers and reached for a napkin. They were on their first date out, a major celebration, since Lur—now Fabiana—no longer feared her father’s men.

They chose a restaurant in West Tampa, in a neighborhood where synths were rare and unwelcome. This would keep Gemini blind to their location, and both of them could relax. Dhata hated the idea of patronizing bigots but he kept his mouth shut since this was for Lur.

“Hey, I’ve been thinking,” he said and reached out to take her hand. “Now that you’re safe, maybe it’s time that we take the next step.”

“What step is that?” she asked, curious as to where he was going with this.

“I want you to lick syrup off my body. I’ve been looking for someone who would be willing to do this, and since you’re brave enough to auction with gangsters, I figure you’re the one.”

Lur picked up a grape from her fruit bowl and threw it at his face, but he dodged and it landed on another table. Giggles from across the way brought her eyes to a boy who had been watching them from his seat and found the grape hilarious.

“You’re such an idiot,” she said, and Dhata mocked her accent. This led to another grape which managed to find its mark.

“No. I’m joking, Lurita,” he said. “I want you to be my assistant. To help me with this case and whatever else comes up. I’ll pay you, of course; we can work out the details later. It doesn’t have to be a permanent thing, but I can use the help, now.”

“Does Jason know about this?” she asked, then sipped at her coffee slowly.

“I love your hair,” said a tall blonde woman who was on her way out of the restaurant, and Lur smiled and gave her a wave to indicate her gratitude.

“It was Jason’s idea. Well, not only his idea. We talked about it, and everything that you’ve been through. He thinks that you’d be a big help to me, especially on the administrative parts.”

Lur nodded but her eyes read differently. She felt as if he had more to say but was being unnecessarily coy.

“There’s more,” he said and cleared his throat. “I just want you to know that I care about you. I was worried when you left, and …” His voice trailed off.

“I want to accept. I really do,” she said. “But I need honesty, and you haven’t given me that. I need to know what sort of deal you made with my papa.”

Dhata looked as if she just threw coffee in his face. It was obvious that the truth embarrassed him, which only made sense given his reluctance to even talk about it. “You’re so beautiful,” he said to her, and touched the ends of her black curls. “Once all this is done, I want to do something nice for you. I’ll work things out with Don Jose.”

Lur laughed. It came unexpectedly, borne of the absurdity of his claim. “First of all, baby, I am not stupid, okay? Even if it were possible to make things right with Papa, you don’t love me enough to do what it takes.” He made to object but she put up her hand. “Hear me, Dhata, you’re being dumb. Whoever this woman is that you have in Ybor, she’s probably less trouble than me and my father.”

She paused to watch the shock register across his face, and was pleased to see that he couldn’t hide it. She had no proof that he was dating a synth, but every intuition inside of her had told her so. The connection they had, the things they did together; it should have led to a much different conversation. But here he was, making her his assistant, and it made her feel low, as if he were trying to find something for her to do.

“Lurita, I don’t know what to say,” he started, and she was glad that he didn’t bother to lie about the other woman. “Why do you think I’m here? Why would I risk my life to protect you if there was nothing … do you see what I’m saying?”

“I know you have a big heart, Dhata. We had a good time in Orlando, and when Papa kidnapped you, you had to do something to get out alive. Sometimes I wonder if I’m your hostage. The silly princesa who ran away, only to be conveniently held by a man wanted by her father. That would be perfect. I feel so stupid right now.”

“My Ybor connection is important to this case. The people I know there will help me catch our Gemini cypher,” Dhata said. “The reality of who I want with me, next to me, that’s different, and what sort of captor would I be, to allow you to travel to another country just to change your ID chip?”

“She can have you,” she said. “I don’t need to hide anymore.”

Dhata took her hand and placed his lips on the back of it, then reached over to touch her ear. “You’re not going anywhere. I need you, Lurita, and to prove that I need you, I’ll tell you what you want to hear. Your father doesn’t love you; he’s a piece of shit that added you to the ransom if I did murder for him. He’s got captains here in Tampa, men I didn’t even know about, and they want the territories controlled by certain gangs. My deal for getting out was to execute Alphie and Peyton Ace.”

“Ayayay,” Lur said, her head suddenly hot. Of course Papa loves me, but was he really pretending to ransom me off to Dhata for a favor?

“Is that why you went to the house?” she said. “The trip that almost killed you?”

“How the hell? Where are you getting your information? I never told you about that,” he said.

“No, but I can read, and since it’s right there on the table with everything else … I knew that the shootings were from you.” She smiled. “Plus, after seeing what Papa did to you, and you’re still here fighting … I know that you’re a mal hombre, Dhata. I wouldn’t want to mess with you.”

He smiled, but it didn’t hide the sadness in his eyes. “To be honest with you, I don’t know what I was thinking going out to that house. Maybe I had a death wish, I don’t know. What I can tell you, though, is that I’m no man’s puppet. I didn’t go out there to be your daddy’s assassin. It is also why Peyton is living it up in Ybor City right now. If it’s anyone I’d put a bullet in, it would be your dad. He and Nicky Garcia are major problems, and I’m convinced that one of them hired Gemini.”

Lur didn’t know what to say. Speaking ill of one’s father was the worst kind of sin. He had raised her, given her many expensive gifts, and beyond her running and their disagreements, she still loved him very much. “I don’t want either you or Papa to die,” she finally said. “He just needs to leave us alone.”

“You said us. Does that mean that you’re staying?” he said. “Since I’m being honest … I had a hard time sleeping when you were gone.”

They finished their food and went outside to the valet, where Dhata’s Buick could be summoned. “Oh, that is such a pretty picture,” she remarked when she saw a painting of a male lion sitting peacefully with his cubs.

“It’s probably an augment,” Dhata said. “Hard to tell nowadays.”

“That’s funny,” she said.

He turned to face her. “What?”

“Well, I was just thinking, only ten years ago, people said the same thing about synths.”

As they got into the Buick, Dhata received a call and he seemed excited at what he was hearing.

“They’ve found another body,” he said. “I have to get out there. Do you mind grabbing a transport while I go look in on this?”

“You can’t take your partner?” she asked with a smile.

“No, not at crime scenes like this. Not till we get you a pass.”

“I’ll catch a transport, I don’t mind. I’ll see you at the house?” she said, and he nodded the way he always did.

As he drove off and left her alone, Lur decided to take a walk. Being free of her father had opened the world to her, but she had not given herself time to really absorb the reality of it all.

Just a few days ago she had been paranoid that she would be discovered, like that night on the beach. Now she felt nothing thanks to Hiroshi, who found the tracker to be the gem inside of her favorite necklace. It was so obvious, yet when she thought about it before, she expected it to be a bio-technical implant or something else sophisticated.

Hiroshi. She smiled at the thought of the cyber synth. At the black market ship there had been a litter of pugs, and she’d bought a puppy for him. She didn’t know about Dhata’s deal, or how rare a gift it was, but the cypher was elated, which was enough. Dhata, on the other hand, was worried that he would leave. A pet dog was what they had agreed on as Hiro’s pay, and now he had no reason to stay. The cypher, however, promised to finish the job. He said that what Gemini was doing was a smear on the cypher name, and he considered it his duty to take him out.

She thought about Gemini and his elusive games, meant to hurt Dhata. The skiptracer had been laser focused on the synths, but the basic clues were being ignored from the crimes themselves. Upon her return to the United States, she had studied his notes and observations, and came up with some ideas of her own.

There was a café on the corner with tables outside with umbrellas, so she went in and bought a coffee and pastry. She scanned the inside where a few people were eating and saw that a table in the corner near the kitchen was open. She hadn’t logged into the Virtual Village in a while, so she sat down and made a connection to the global network.

When she was connected, she augmented the display, making the screen stand out in front of her. She started a deep search on the spinal column, why people needed one, and why were synths robbed of theirs to sell on the black market. Even though she was tempted to fully immerse herself into the network, she stayed half-aware, so she could sip at her coffee and bring very little attention to herself.

There was plenty of information and she skimmed through it quickly, trying to see if anything jumped out. She looked at forums where young medical students were discussing anatomy, and others which were focused on the latest news.

The general consensus seemed to be that the spines were being removed to send a message. Many believed that there was a synth serial killer who may have been robbed of his spine sometime in the past and was giving the humans a taste of their own medicine. Heavy pressure was being placed on the government to rein in the synths and their black market.

Lur lost herself in the back and forth argument between two of the people within the news forum. One was pro-synth while the other didn’t trust them, but between them they gave her new ideas on the reasoning behind Gemini’s spine snatching.

The answer was most likely in Japan, where Gemini had originated. They would need to know who hired him, and for what. Why would he take money to come on their side, and what was truly the goal? She signed out of the network and sat there thinking, munching on the pastry as she watched the people in line at the counter.

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

Dhata pulled up to the curb and parked behind a squad car. When he exited the vehicle he looked like a man who was ready for just about anything. There were people all around being held back by Johns, and as he flashed his ID to get past, he saw the body on the street.

The victim was lying in a puddle of blood, with his face submerged in a vile rain puddle. His back was open with his spine sticking out, and the police were circling him, trying to decipher the situation. When he got near the body he recognized Jason. He was leaned over the man with a handheld scanner, trying to see what had been used to cut him open.

“Dhata,” he said when he got near. “You got here faster than I thought.”

“I was in the neighborhood. How can I help?” he said, squatting down next to his friend to get a closer view of the body. He was beginning to wonder why Gemini would strike when it was obvious that they knew where he was. He looked around curiously to see if a synth had managed to slip past the scanners to get into the plaza.

“Something’s not right,” Jason said, talking to the other snoop. Dhata didn’t recognize him, but could see that he was a young man in training.

When Jason said the words Dhata noticed the flash. It was so small that he thought he might have imagined it. The flash came from the wound, the split in the man’s back, a flash like a spark from a severed wire. The man sprang to his feet and grabbed for Jason, but the John was too slow to react.

He turned to face Dhata with a bloody smile, and he could tell from his eyes that it was a synth. I … See … You, said a voice inside of his head, and he knew immediately that this was all a trap.

The synth caught Jason by the throat, then tore out his trachea, a sound that would give anyone nightmares for years. As the detective fell, retching, the killer reached for his gun and pumped several shots into the rookie beside him. By this time the crowd was scattering and screams rang out. The Johns started firing in the synth’s direction.

“Jason is still alive, you fucking idiots!” Dhata shouted, then charged the synth and planted him on his back. The man was strong, but Dhata’s adrenaline won out. He grabbed his hair, trapped his arms between his legs, and then began to slam his head into the curb.

When they pulled him off the synth he ran to check on his friend, but the Johns wouldn’t let him pass, stating that Jason had passed away. There were plenty of tears and Johns passing out blame, so he backed away and watched the medical hover copter land.

This wasn’t the first time he’d seen a John die at a crime scene. It wasn’t something you ever expected, and you could never get used to it. Dhata was numb. He’d lost a friend, and it was all due to the cypher that he wished he caught a month ago.

“Dee, you need to book,” a familiar voice said, and he looked over to see a detective named Davie Mack. The otherwise stoic suit was visibly shaken, and was dabbing away tears from his eyes. He was right; there would be drama, and the Johns would rage war on every hool that was a synth.

Anyone who had a history with people like Peyton would be considered traitors. It didn’t matter how many cases he assisted Jason in cracking, and it didn’t matter that he had a history with the force. He was a synth lover, and a synth killed Jason. He needed to leave and never look back.

He hopped into the Buick and sped away, realizing that Jason’s death was his fault. He had thwarted Gemini’s plans, and robbed him of a spine, so now he was focused on getting him back. This new focus got people hurt, since he had failed in his first attempt. He would be after Esti, or his family if he dug deep enough, and then there was Lur, who could lead him back to the zeppelin.

“Lurita, where are you?” he asked, after triggering his phone.

“I’m at a café doing research,” she said. “Is everything okay?”

“Jason is dead,” was all he could manage, then he focused his wet eyes on the road.

“Dead? Are you okay? Oh please, baby, tell me that you aren’t hurt.”

“I’m … I’m not hurt, Lurita. I need to get you; it’s not safe here. This café, send me the coordinates. I’m swinging by to pick you up.”

He didn’t realize how slow he was talking, how the shock of Jason’s death made him struggle with the words. Lurita gave him the GPS coordinates, and he was there within twenty minutes to collect her from the curb.

Her face showed concern, but he tried to play it cool, even though every muscle in his body wanted to blow something up. She entered the car and put her arms around him, saying nothing, just holding him there. It felt good, but he wanted to be angry; anything but the emptiness that he felt.

“What are you going to do?” Lur said.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, what are you going to do now that your friend is dead?” Lur said.

Dhata thought about her question, thought to lash out in anger, but then he thought about the way that Jason had died, and he wanted to find Gemini and kill him. “Thank you,” he said suddenly.

“Oh – why?” Lur said.

“For asking me what I am going to do. It’s sad, you know? It’s tough to accept. My partner just died because I wasn’t fast enough. I was thinking ‘bout drinking, toasting his name, but you just reminded me that the time for mourning must wait. I need to find this shade. I need to hurt him, Lur. Do you understand?”

“Yes, baby, I understand. Which is why I spent the day looking on the network.”

“That thing is monitored; nothing useful there,” he mumbled.

“But I found something,” she said, and Dhata triggered the auto drive to sit and face her.

“On the network?” he asked.

“Sorta. I found an archive in the village. Do you mind if we get Hiro on the line?”

“Okay,” Dhata said, and pulled up an augment of Hiro on the inside of the Buick’s windshield. The cypher was on a beach somewhere, with the ugly, protective helmet on his head. It seemed overcast where he was, and the water was a frothy olive slush. When he looked around, they could see that he was by himself, except for the big CPU rack that sat on the table in front of him.

“Just the two people I was looking for,” he said. “Do you have anything new for me?”

“I do,” Lur said, leaning forward as if it would make him hear her better. “I have a question about Gemini’s family.”

“From what I learned, he has no family,” Hiroshi said. “But more than likely he has them hidden. Are we to kidnap them?” he asked, and Dhata considered it. But before he could say anything Lur was talking.

“He’s taking spines from only certain people. Someone told him to do this. If he was hired by a man like Papa, he would have partners. Maybe one of the partners is disabled and wants to change. That would make them hire the shade to kill the people.”

“That is very intriguing, Lurita, but what’s in it for him?” Hiro said.

“See, that is the part where I will need your help, Hiro. Can you tap your cypher network to dig into his background? If you find something, it would set us straight and possibly uncover his hiding place. In the meantime, Dhata, I found this,” she said, and synced her ICL up to the Buick to show them what she had.

A series of news articles showed up on the screen with headshots from profiles and a series of mug shots. There were two doctors from what Dhata saw highlighted, and they had been doing their practice for over fifty years. Fraternal twins, but one had a birth defect which made his legs inoperable.

“Doctors Douglas and Thomas Wright, geniuses in the field of Bioengineering. These brothers have been in trouble for black market dealings, but I couldn’t find any details on it. They’ve been in hot water several times for one thing or another, but this one, Doug”—she pointed to the man in the wheelchair—“He almost spent time in prison for the illegal use of human cells to grow and develop clones.”

“Whoa, clones?” Hiroshi said. “And this man is practicing medicine?”

Dhata dragged one report over and balked at the headline. “Somatic cell nuclear transference, based on extraction from a human spine.” Lur had hit pay dirt, but they had to be sure. He planned on paying the two lab coats a rather painful visit.

“He got acquitted when the prosecutor had a change of heart,” she said, flipping several pages over to reveal the report. “This man has been trying to create a perfect person. He is one of the greatest haters of synths, and his work with cloning is to create human beings that can outdo our synthetic friends. He seems very dangerous, Dhata. There is someone funding his research and keeping him out of jail. I suspect that it goes as far up as the presidency. But considering what it takes to collect those cells, he could very likely be the person who hired Gemini.”

Dhata thought about this for a very long time, then muttered, “Good work,” as he took over the wheel. “Do you happen to know where these evil geniuses live?”

“No, but Dr. Douglas Wright’s office is located at the top of the Eternity Medical Center,” Lur said. “He’s been there for over twenty years, taking on tough medical cases for anyone rich enough to pay.”

“Lurita, you’re amazing,” Dhata said.

And Hiroshi followed up with, “Very good work. I am very impressed.”

“Let’s get home and change,” Dhata said. “Jason just died, and I’m sure that they are going to want to talk to me. I have to call his family.” He sighed. “This sucks. Once the news gets out that a synth murdered a snoop, the city will lose its mind and many innocent synths will die. Jason didn’t deserve that kind of pain. Gemini could have just killed him straight out. But he wanted me to see, he wanted me to hurt from his suffering, and now I really want to return the favor.”

‡Chapter 17‡

The Super Virus

The next trip to Ybor city was a stark contrast to the earlier one Dhata had when he’d gone to see Esti. There were burn marks on the buildings, and a part of him wondered if they were new. There was evidence of illegal guns used to take out the synths: big holes from where shells had exploded and an emptiness throughout the city itself that was a reflection of the times now that synths were forced into hiding.

When the news broke about Jason, it was the last straw for the anti-synth militia groups. Bored, purist humans who sat on guns and waited for any opportunity to come out firing. When the war was freshly over, some politicians invented a narrative that synths would one day wage a war on humanity. Many veterans believed in this so it didn’t take much to rile them up.

Anyone who was anti-synth was smelling blood right now. People were going around using them for target practice, and the Johns were spread too thin to do anything about it.

This was precisely the chaos Jason had feared, and why he and Dhata had started working together. They were the ones proving that there was nothing diabolical about synth crime, and that an impoverished people were going to do what impoverished people did. Economic strife was economic strife but one of the good guys was dead. It opened the door to what they were seeing now, and it made Dhata feel sick.

He went to kick a can out of the way until he noticed that it was a spent shell from a kinetic projectile. His heart skipped when he thought about it being live and the sort of fighting that would call for something that powerful. He dipped into the alleys that led to Peyton’s house and saw a number of synths. When he got to the house it was like a fortress, with armed synths everywhere.

The sound of a generator brought him around, and he saw that he was within the radius of its field. A weapon like it would fry any organic within fifty yards, and he was lucky that he had been recognized by the guards. They let him inside and took him upstairs to the room where he had met Peyton several times before. As he passed by the door to the room where Esti was staying, he tried to look inside, but the large hool behind him wouldn’t allow him to stop.

“Nothing in there but pain and suffering,” he said, and with the little that he glimpsed from the crack in the door, Dhata understood this to mean that it was now a weapons cache.

When he stepped inside Peyton’s room it looked different from before. A table had been installed with multiple chairs, and all around it sat some of the most notorious synth gangsters in all of Florida.

“Dhata,” Peyton said, and got up to give him a hug.

Why is this dude being so nice to me? he wondered. He was dressed cleanly as he always was, in a dark three-piece suit with his hair oiled and slicked back. He was sporting a new moustache which seemed out of place. It was a thin thing, like a black worm shriveled up and died on his lip, giving him a rather sleazy look. The other hools didn’t do much to acknowledge him, but Dhata understood. They were at war with the worst of humans, and they wouldn’t warm to someone that looked like him.

“I’m sorry it got to this,” Dhata said to Peyton.

“What can you do?” he said and shrugged.

“Is that a map of Tampa?” Dhata asked, walking over to look at the table.

“Many years ago, our ancestors predicted that this would happen, John,” one of the capos remarked.

“I’m not a John,” Dhata said. “But I can see that you all are planning to take over Tampa.” The synths had several areas locked down—indicated by glowing green sections of the map—and they had pins on several red areas that were controlled by humans.

Peyton offered an empty chair and Dhata took it, though the presence of the map made him feel like a traitor of humanity. The other men averted their gaze, but Peyton regarded him with a curious grin.

“Look at this guy,” he said to the rest. “You would think he was one of us, the way he operates. You know I was thinking, Dhata, since you want to be one of us so bad, we could swap your body out for some more permanent stuff. Silicone, synthetic parts, all you need is your head and spine.”

“I’ll pass,” Dhata said quietly, and took a cigar that one of the men offered.

“As you can see quite plainly, my friend,” Peyton continued, “aside from Sylvester over here, the rest of these men don’t trust you. No, no, don’t try to deny it,” he said. “You all are regarding our friend with ice. Do any of you know anything about this man? How he shot up the Fischers to put yours truly on top?” Dhata tried to object but Peyton cut him off, laughing. “In fact, this guy loves synth pussy more than all of us combined. Right?”

This was too much for Dhata, who was now embarrassed. He made to get up, but Peyton touched him on the shoulder.

“I’m breaking balls. Relax. Plus what I said were all facts. This man is an ally, a friend of mine, so show him some fucking respect.” The men began to regard each other, then slowly stood up and gave Dhata a hug and a kiss on the cheek, one after the other.

After that the mood lightened and the drinks began to pour. It was as if there wasn’t a war going on outside, the way they laughed and drank it up. Some girls came in to hang out with the capos, and one found her way over to his lap. When he looked around for Esti, his eyes met with Peyton’s and it was as if he could read his thoughts.

“Your special girl?” he said. “I’m a man of my word. I wouldn’t have her here in Ybor during this stressful time. She’s at a safe house, somewhere offshore. When you want to—” He made a punching motion with one hand while supporting it with the other. “We’ll fly you out, okay?”

Dhata nodded his head, happy to hear it. Despite the crass assertion, he felt a tremendous weight lift off his shoulders, knowing that she was okay.

The girls that came in were in latex bodysuits with holes in certain areas to reveal their skin. The one who found Dhata had hers fashioned into a low cut dress with one leg fully exposed. She was a tanned blonde, with waist-long hair and dark makeup that made him think of a raccoon. She introduced herself as Taylor, then proceeded to give him a lap dance, but his mind was on Jason, so he found it impossible to relax.

After the third song ended and the girl paused for a drink, he looked over at Peyton until their eyes met. “So, my partner died, Peyton. That’s what started this mess, and why you’re missing the money you’re used to seeing. This black cypher is good, and with Jason dead, I no longer have a connection to the Johns.”

Peyton leaned forward past the wiggling dancer that had her bum crammed up against his lap. “You don’t need them no more,” he said. “You got protection in this room. Go ahead and ask me why we’re celebrating. Go ahead, ask me.”

“Why are you celebrating?” Dhata asked, ignoring the blonde hair hitting him in the face.

“Nicky Garcia, remember that guy? The rat fuck who went inside just to write a song? Just yesterday I made a deposit, and that hume fuck caught a sharp object, right here in the throat. BAM!” He gestured to show how Nicky’s throat was cut, then started laughing like a maniac. Peyton was always a bit off, but in this instant he actually frightened Dhata.

“I think that he was the one who bought this cypher,” Dhata said. “This means that we will need to move fast to catch him before he vanishes into thin air.”

“That’s your department, my human friend, and I know that you will catch him soon.” He held up a glass to toast his capos and the once stoic synths, now happy from the company, raised their own glasses in turn. Dhata took the hint, and gently moved the dancer off his lap, then stood up and held out his hand for Peyton to shake it. The boss took his hand and brought him in for a hug. “Soon,” he said. “Make it soon. We can’t survive if we have that fuck scrambling our brains while the humes out there are trying to wipe us out.”

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

He didn’t know why, but the meeting of the synths reminded him of the house he had rescued Esti from. All these crime bosses considered themselves a family. They pretended that they’re organized by sitting together, drinking and eating, most of the time at a boss’s remote location where there was barely any law enforcement.

Something told him that Alphie Fischer’s farm was such a spot. They would meet out there, invite a few synth Marys, then stim themselves and drink until they all passed out. Peyton was a powerful boss; he wondered if he was invited. Did this Tampa elite allow non-humans into their club, or was Peyton left out of the clique?

Just now he left the hool boss’s party in which he was the only non-synth. Peyton was militant: he hated humans, which made it doubtful that he was invited to the farm. Dhata needed to see the place again, to give it a thorough look this time. The place was taped off, but he wondered if any of the surviving Fischers had returned. He may have another gunfight coming, but the way he felt made him not care.

He used the drive to clear his head as he thought about everything inside of Peyton’s room. He thought about the last time he’d made the drive, when he actually had time to check out the trees to see if they were real or not. Back then the murders seemed almost normal, just another crazy with a strange fetish that would eventually slip up and get caught.

Now as he drove, he felt the world closing in. It was only a matter of time before Gemini struck again. What he was looking to find out there in the house, he didn’t know. But over the years he had learned to trust his instincts, so regardless of how crazy it seemed, he kept on driving.

Even though most of the family had died, and the patriarch was now worm food, Dhata made sure to bring his revolver, tucked away in the pocket of his duster. He was in his normal “uniform,” but this time he opted for a bullet-proof vest. His phone rang, and he brought it into focus only to see the face of his friend, Hiroshi.

He connected the call and this triggered the live feed, which showed Hiroshi on the makeshift porch of the zeppelin. He was wearing shades and one of his robes, and the toaster-oven helmet was on his lap.

“This is an encrypted call, Dhata, so we can get cut off at any time. I came up with an idea,” he said. “It is crazy, but it is the only way that we will be able to catch this shade, now that he’s in the wind.”

“What’re you thinking?” Dhata said, and slowed the Buick to a crawl.

“This cypher uses prostitutes, the synth kind that can get easy access to the men he wants to kill. I’ve created a virus. If we can upload it into the minds of these women, the next time he invades, it will infect his rack, and then we can find out where he lives.”

“A virus, in what form? I mean, how am I to infect the girls that Gemini will target?”

“They’re synthetic, so it’s an upload. You will need to shoot them up, here, at the base of the skull.” He turned and pointed to an area of his neck. It’s an aggressive worm, one of my finest inventions. It will keep the host from contacting Arch Brain, and will be undetectable by the cypher.”

“What about afterwards, when he’s dead and gone? Wouldn’t the Mary need to connect to Arch Brain in order to share and keep up?”

“You’re a very strange human, Dhata, do you know that? The amount of care you have for my people defies all reason. Once this cypher is dead I will issue an anti-virus. You can administer it to the women who are infected.”

“So all I would need to do is spread your virus to synth female hools?” Dhata said.

“Yes, then we can wait and hope that our cypher gets restless … there’s also the chance that he’s already gone to the wind,” Hiro said.

“Nah, he’s pissed at me. You better believe it. He will be searching for me like an apex predator, and when he finds me he’ll want to do a lot more than kill me. I’ll go down to Ybor, I’ll holler at Peyton, and together we’ll make sure that your virus infects the entire city.”

“Where are you heading, Dhata?” Hiroshi said. “I see that you’re driving, and the backdrop is really green.”

“Admit it,” Dhata said. “You’re tracking me.”

Hiroshi made a face like a teenager with a hickey who had just been busted by his parents. “It was your dear Lurita. She asked me to find you.”

“Is she there with you now?” Dhata said.

“No, she’s downstairs, plugged into the rack.”

“Plugged in, huh? You training an apprentice?”

“Something like that. Lurita seems to have a real fascination with my world. She’s even hacked into a few grids herself, and knows how to manipulate proxies. She’s been playing around with racks ever since she was a child. From what she tells me, she had done something to her father’s security, which made him throw her rack onto the floor.” He laughed. “She hasn’t been able to get one ever since.”

“Jose Diaz is no father of the year, but Lurita sounds like a handful,” Dhata said.

“She’s a sweetheart,” said Hiroshi.

“Oh, I’m not denying that. It’s just that when that girl wants her way, you better believe she’s going to get it.”

Dhata lost the connection but he was at the Fischer’s gate, and aside from the spray paint where the Johns had marked the crime scene, the old farm was still just as creepy as he remembered. The evidence of the battle that had gone down took him by surprise. He knew he had been lucky, but he had forgotten just how bad it had been.

He parked the Buick in a grove, then strode down the path and hopped the fence. No-one shot at him, or shouted out, but he pulled his revolver just in case. He checked out the barn, which had been cleaned up, the bodies removed from the hooks.

When he exhausted the search on the barn, he went inside the house and began to pull open drawers and cabinets. In one of the rooms was a collection of cowboy memorabilia, even an old vid of the Magnificent Seven. He smiled at this, then looked through the desk, and there he found an old photo with three young men.

It was Alphie Fischer with a tall black man, who he recognized as Nicky Garcia. The other man was much shorter, but it was due to his leaning posture. The face was familiar.

It was the old Don, Jose Diaz.

‡Chapter 18‡

Shattered Glass

A thick cloud hung over St Petersburg, Florida as if it chose that city to squat on. It was a big, black, polluted blob, and it bathed everything in perpetual darkness. Several levels of the multi-tiered highway weaved around and through the city’s skyscrapers. Zeppelins floated slowly in rows above it all, and the streets were a motley of humans and synths.

Lur stepped out of the Buick and looked up at the hospital. It was a tall black monolith with rectangular windows, and a single spotlight bouncing from east to west. One light shone up on the block that topped it, a block of neon which broadcasted the name: Eternity Medical.

She looked over at Dhata, but he was already moving, walking across a lower light bridge, ducking his head to avoid the floating cars. She caught up to him and touched him on the back, bringing him around to acknowledge her presence. It was strange seeing him with such tunnel vision. He had forgotten about her, but she knew that it was how he focused.

Hiroshi’s virus had worked like a charm, and he could now track the shade’s movement as well as any synth he used. His nest was in St. Petersburg, a penthouse suite at the top of the Millennium Hotel. He was staying there under the name, Suzuki Iwasa. The only time that Suzuki would leave was when one of his synth puppets would bring him a spine. Then he would deliver it personally to Eternity Medical.

The lobby of the hospital was a shining example of modern architecture, literally shining with its mirror-like glass tile floors. They shot up reflections to bounce against the interior walls, where a checkered wall glowed behind the receptionist’s desk.

Lur couldn’t help but admire the architecture as she tried to keep pace with Dhata. On their left was a tall set of windows that scaled unbroken up to the twentieth floor. A gap was left between the upper floors and this glass so that it could continue unobstructed all the way to the top. The panes were a purple tint that melded with the neon lights of the street, causing a prism of color to shine on the objects inside.

After their earlier chat on augments in homes, Lur noticed the SAR units in the corner of the ceilings. She tried to see if she could make out what were augments and what were real, and found that it was an impossible task. Dhata seemed to move as if he belonged in the hospital, and the receptionist and staff seemed to be fooled by it. Lur, on the other hand, followed him without saying a word, and tried not to make eye contact with anyone.

He took her through the hallways to a seating area, where she thought that the chairs looked like blocks of sour candy. In this area the walls were out of place, a red brick façade against the checkered mirror. Staggered by height, three long paintings hung on one wall, depicting trees in stylized art deco. Lur felt a sense of warmth in this room, and she walked over to one of the numerous potted plants that sat strategically between the chairs.

When she touched the leaves, she felt that they were real, and she pulled back her hand in shock. Her reaction brought a smile to Dhata’s face, who seemed to be moving past his anger. He summoned the elevator and when it opened, three of the medical staff nodded at him and hurried to their business.

When they stepped inside, Lur took his hand, and he squeezed her reassuringly. “Are you okay?” she asked, and he nodded but continued to stare forward. They rode it all the way up to the twentieth floor, and stepped out into a room with couches jutting out from every wall. It was set up to comfortably accommodate a lot of visitors, but on the far end of the room was a long, dimly lit hallway.

Dhata reached into his coat and motioned for Lur to hang back. He walked the hallway, listening as she hung close behind, but as he tried the doors none opened until they got to the end. A pair of black glass sliding doors sealed off a room with the label “surgery.” Dhata touched his ear and spoke to Hiro, then walked over to the door’s panel and touched something to it.

The door slid open to a pair of old men, one tall and gaunt, and the other in the sleekest wheelchair she had ever seen in her life. Unlike a synth, his body was chrome and polished, with no signs of trying to make it match his flesh. He rolled backwards when he saw them, his eyes looking frantically about.

“Who are you?” said the tall one, and Dhata pulled his revolver and placed the barrel near his face.

“Jigs up, Doug, shut your hole. Fab, let him know that we’re in,” Dhata said.

Lur touched her ear, and pulled up an augment of Cynic’s face. “One second, beautiful,” he said, and she could hear the sound of him moving around.

“Alright. Find a smart-port, and plug the Trojan horse in,” he said.

Lur found it, a box on the wall with three small holes that formed a triangle. She held out her hand, and Dhata gave her the handheld which she activated with the touch of her thumb and plugged it in. When she did this the lights dimmed, and a jolt made her snatch her hand away.

“You’re secure now. Bad boy’s blind. Gemini will have to come there to check on his friends.”

She was about to switch off when she stopped, since he seemed to have more to say. “Lurita, do me a favor,” he said. “Hurt him badly. This shade gives a bad name to Japanese cyphers.”

She walked over to Dhata and took the gun, then leveled it at the taller man. “He’s in,” she said quietly, and he nodded slightly before taking a position behind the two men. The operating room was cluttered with lockers, and had a grate suspended from the ceiling. Nine screens stuck out from it in a three by three grid, and several racks were stacked on tables, droning away loudly.

The table in the center of the room had a patient on his stomach with his back exposed. In a tray near him lay several sharp and wicked-looking tools, and several packets of blood. “What do you two do up here?” Lur asked, watching them both for any movement. “You’re medical types, so I’m going to guess that you’re smart. I don’t have to tell you that if you try anything, I won’t hesitate to shoot. Now, I believe I asked you something—”

“Answer her,” Dhata said, and punched the tall man in the back of his head. He fell forward, barely able to catch his fall, then scrambled to a sitting position while holding his head. “We’re doctors, we take care of—” Dhata kicked him in the side, causing him to moan loudly and skitter away from him on his buttocks.

His long face made an ugly scowl, and he ran his trembling fingers through his thinning long hair. “How long has he been bringing you spines?” Dhata asked as he crossed over to him, but he was knocked to the side by the man in the wheelchair.

Lur had the gun on him while they questioned his brother, but he had moved so fast that she didn’t have time to react. Dhata ran at the chair like a football player, throwing it into the wall. The man fell out, to the shiny black floor, and Lur pointed the pistol down at him.

“Okay, okay. You have us beaten,” he said. “What is it that you want?”

“What do you two do up here?” Lur asked again, and the two men exchanged glances. “Dhata, remove the cyborg. We can get the other one to talk. They keep looking at each other. I am not trusting them to be good.”

Dhata walked over and lifted the man, then took him to an adjacent room where he was gone for a while. When he returned, he looked exhausted and when their eyes met he shook his head. “Had to find a way to power down his body. Gagged him with a rag, then put the suit in stasis mode.”

“That will kill him!” the old man on the floor shouted, but he was quiet again after another swift kick. Lur kept the gun on him as Dhata backed off, then reached down and pulled him back up to his feet. “You have a black cypher in your employ,” he said. “He brings you spines for cash. Four people are dead because of him, and you two are going to prison.”

“Listen to me,” the old man said. “We didn’t know where he was getting them from. When we hired the cypher, we told him we needed them fresh, but he was not to kill anyone. He told us that he would steal them from the morgue. From people who were taken there after bad car accidents or suicide. When we heard about the judge, we broke off the deal with him—”

“That’s funny,” said Dhata, “because three more people have lost their spines.”

“You don’t understand. He threatened us. Told us to honor the contract, or he would expose us to the entire world. I am doing research to help humans that are paralyzed. I need real parts to do it; the government only offers up artificial replicas. We are so close, sir, if you could see what we’re able to do. A few more spines, and I can crack it. All I’m asking for is time!”

“Listen to me, I’m running out of time, and what I’m asking you to do is simple. He’ll be here tonight, but we’ll be waiting, and I need to know what time to expect him.”

“He normally comes at 10:00 pm. That gives you an hour. Sir, please reconsider. He’s dangerous, and will punish us if he sees through this deception.”

“You know what? You’re right,” Dhata said, and motioned to Lur. “Let’s gag them both and wait him out. We can lock down the building as soon as he enters.”

“How are we looking, Hiro?” Lur asked, concerned with the dead silence that was broken only by the machine’s beeping.

“We’re good, Lurita. The entire top floor of the medical facility will be offline to our cypher.”

“Won’t that make him suspicious?” Dhata asked. She didn’t know that he was eavesdropping on their line.

“It will,” said Hiroshi, “but since he has to come inside in order to get access to the grid, we will be able to trap him and then you can do your thing.”

“Hiro, how well trained is Gemini? I hear that Japanese cyphers are combat experts,” Lur said.

“Speaking from my own experience, Lurita, people don’t get any formal training to become cyphers. All you need is a rack and the smarts needed to break through the grid to decipher code. Anyone can be one, really… see a cypher gets the name just by practicing alone, even in Japan. Most of us get good from sitting for hours on end, dead to the world, while we look for vulnerabilities in a program’s code to exploit. A pro-cypher knows what deals to take because a particular grid may be impenetrable. If you go up against a grid like that, whew, there goes your reputation. But if you have a customer asking for you to get in on something easy, then you succeed, and the customer is happy, and you get props in the cypher world. You understand?”

It was the most she had ever heard him say but she was glad to learn about the cyphers. It made her confident that they would be able to catch Gemini, and if not, he would probably run, being that he was only powerful when plugged into a rack.

Hiroshi continued. “Now, this doesn’t mean that Gemini isn’t dangerous in a confrontation. We don’t know who he is really, or how he was trained. He could be government, or part of a league of some sort.”

“League?” Dhata said.

“You can think of them as a brand of special forces. They come trained with an assortment of wicked weapons. Blades, kinetic weapons and deadly concussion bombs.”

“Great. So there’s a chance that we can be doing all this only to die in the end,” Lur said.

“That’s the game we play, and there ain’t no way around it,” Dhata said. “Fortunately for us we have a cypher of our own, telling us when this jackass will appear.”

Lur thought about her decision to work with Dhata and the seriousness of it finally hit home. She had survived so much to get here, fleeing from her home country.

Was this what she really wanted? A life of guns and breaking into hospitals? She didn’t know, but she had to admit that there was a part of her that liked it. She felt badass and important, even though what they were doing was no longer sanctioned by the Johns. They were as much hools as this cypher that they hunted. But he had killed Dhata’s friend along with a bunch of innocent people. If hunting him made them vigilantes, then she could consider herself a superhero.

Lurita Diaz, superhero, she liked the sound of that. She wondered how the people who worked for her father would view her now as she held these bad men with her gun. She was contributing to the greater good and all they were doing was serving a wealthy gangster.

She concluded that this was where she wanted to be. This was the life that she sought out, and this was not the time to back out and leave Dhata alone. Some static came to her ears, breaking her thought, and Hiro’s voice said, “He’s here.”

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

Dhata expected the lights to flicker or go completely out, since it would add to the drama of the moment. He had seen combat many times, from his younger years as a John to just a month back when he had squared off against the Fischers. It still made his heart race, this unknown anticipation, and while he carried his pistol, he was going up against an unknown enemy who had access to technologies he hadn’t the faintest clue about. His only hope was in his support: Lur to keep the scientists on ice, and Hiro as his guardian spirit.

He slipped through the door, and jogged down the hall to where the purple glass looked out towards the city. “Hiro, can you dim the lights?” he said, and on command, the lights went out except for the tiny LED nightlights near the floor. When he got near the inner ledge, he held the railing and peered down. The medical staff was scrambling to see what had locked the doors, and a number of maintenance people were scurrying back and forth.

In the midst of the chaos was a small dark figure. It was moving with purpose, unfazed by the staff, and took to the stairs quickly before Dhata could get his details.

“We have a problem,” said Hiroshi, in a tone that revealed his shock. “He’s on a rack somewhere, hacking into the building. Shit, I can’t keep him out. What the hell is he using down there?”

As if on cue, the lights came on, and the doors opened up to allow anyone to enter or exit the building. Dhata watched as the door to the stairs opened, and a dark-haired man looked up at his location. “I’ve been made,” he reported, and his mind began to race. Gemini would run and they would never be able to catch him.

Suddenly the lights flickered and every screen displayed footage of a man dressed in black leather coveralls and red sneakers. On his face was an all-white mask; at least that’s what Dhata thought until he realized that it was a tattoo.

“I hope this buys us some time,” Hiroshi said. “I’ve triggered a security ID protocol that will alert the hospital’s guards to be on the lookout for this man.”

Dhata sprinted to the stairs and took them three steps at a time. He had the revolver out and his mind on a single focus. Even with his speed it took some time to reach the tenth floor. He wasn’t in as good a shape as he would have liked, and he had to slow down from the burning in his legs. He looked down the shaft to see if anyone was there, but it was empty and he realized his mistake.

Rushing in to the tenth floor’s hallway, he sprinted for the far elevator while avoiding as many of the staff as he could. Several people weren’t able to avoid him, and he bowled them over and kept on moving. Most meant to object to his invasion until they saw the dark metal inside of his hand.

It was only a matter of time before the Johns would show up, but he didn’t care about that.

“Hiro, freeze the elevators,” he commanded as he neared the lobby, hoping to trap Gemini in the shaft.

“I would, Dhata, but he’s taken the reins. There’s an override somewhere that you would need to destroy.”

“What would something like that look like?” he asked.

“It’s a strange device to describe, but you will know it when you see it. I’m thinking that there’s an outlet in the staircase downstairs. That’s likely where our cypher put it so that he can access the top floor.”

“Okay, this is nuts, man, but I’m going to go and find it. That will leave Lur vulnerable to Gemini. I would run back up there, but I’m stuck like Chuck. I’m on the tenth floor and he would beat me to the top. Can you see if there’s anything you can do?”

“Of course, Dhata, I will do what I can to keep Lurita safe.”

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

Lur listened to the chatter going on over their phones, and felt a twinge of annoyance at Dhata. He was begging Hiro to help her, as if she were helpless, and left her up there to watch two incapacitated old men. She checked their vitals to make sure that they were alive, and the cyborg’s eyes shot open, frightening her.

The other man was quietly seated in the corner, and his face wore an expression of deep resentment. Something told her that if she removed his gag, he still wouldn’t shout out for help. They were doing illegal research, which came after years of study, and they were about to lose it all at the hands of Dhata.

She noticed in that instance how old the two of them looked, and the subtle signals—like the make and model of their shoes—revealed just how little they cared for themselves. She wondered who the beneficiary was to all of the spines that they had collected. Was it a wife who was disabled, or a child they loved? She just couldn’t bring herself to believe that it was for the brother whose metal body was all that was keeping him alive.

She stepped out of the room, then turned to face them, fighting the apology that wanted to escape. Did they even know about Gemini and what he was doing for them, or had they been telling the truth when they said that they had been deceived?

Her resolve won out, and she slammed the door and locked it, reaching in the small of her back for the tiny Beretta. Judging from Dhata’s reaction to the cypher, Gemini was the dangerous killer Hiroshi had warned them about. Lur was no soldier or seasoned John, but she had always been a fighter at heart. The last thing she wanted was to wait around in a room for this murdering cypher to find her. If the shade got the jump on her, she planned to shoot, and she was good at shooting; this was a fact that she relied on.

She slipped into the hallway and put both hands on her pistol, scanning the vents that were above her and the sealed doors in the hall. When she got to the corner that wrapped near the purple glass, she looked up at its surface to see the reflection leading to the lobby. It was still empty, but she was no longer brave and she could feel the blood pumping into her ears.

Shaky hands couldn’t aim and knocking knees could not react. She swallowed hard against her fear, and willed herself to move forward. Bringing the pistol up to eye level, she moved forward slowly in a type of catwalk. “Got it!” Dhata said, and the lights dimmed again, and the chaos from below resumed.

It was in this instance that she saw the lights outside, flashing red and blue from the John’s approach. “Police are here,” she said, keeping her focus. “We need to get this done or we’re all going to jail.”

“Lurita, where are you?” Dhata said.

“I’m in the hallway near the lobby, waiting for this puta to come out.”

The pause on the line spoke volumes as she waited to hear his retort. She prepared a reply, a scathing blast, but the silence pressed on longer than she liked.

“I’m coming up. Be careful,” he said. “Shoot anything that moves.”

As soon as he said this, Lur heard a noise above her, and she looked up to see Gemini falling from the vent.

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

By the time Dhata made it up to the twentieth floor, he was past the point of exhaustion. His thighs were on fire, and his heart was racing, but the need to get up there to protect Lur trumped everything that he was feeling. He could hear her struggling and it wasn’t a good sound: her breathing was labored and now there was a dead silence. When he opened the door, he saw the shadow over her body, and Lur’s gun lying several feet away.

He snuck towards them, but then Lur kicked the man off her. She began to cough violently, as if she had been choked, and Dhata raised the big revolver and pointed at the cypher. “Back away, asshole, the jig is up,” he said.

The man spun and dropped, landing flat on his stomach, and a dagger struck Dhata in the area that should have been his heart. Instead of killing him instantly, it struck the vest and fell harmlessly to the floor. He knelt and threw the wing of his duster back so that he could fan the hammer as he fired three shots. One hit the floor, another busted the glass, and the third went past the flattened cypher to wedge itself into the wall.

Lur rushed forward to hold her attacker down, but he hopped up then flipped forward and grabbed the Beretta from the floor. “Who hired you?” Dhata asked, moving forward with both hands on the revolver. “Who paid for you to be here? Was it Jose Diaz? If you want to live, now is the time to talk to me.”

Gemini answered with gunfire, and a bullet struck Dhata in the chest. The impact threw him and he landed flat, hoping that the cypher would think he was dead.

“No!” screamed Lur, and he felt his heart sink. If Gemini thought that he was dead then naturally Lur would be next. He heard the sound of a slap, and sat up to see Don Jose’s daughter fighting like a demon unleashed. She had the shade’s gun hand trapped under her arm, and was hitting him multiple times in the face with her fist.

Dhata walked forward, looking for a clear shot, then threw care to the wind and aimed at their legs. The bullet struck the cypher’s calf and knocked him to the ground, but there was no bleeding and he realized that the suit he wore was bulletproof.

Lur, caught up in a rage unlike anything he’d seen before, climbed on top of the cypher and resumed punching him in the face. He kicked her off, and kipped up and forward, then brought the Beretta around and fired once more in Dhata’s direction.

It was one of those fights that he knew he would lose, so Dhata began to look for ways to play the angles. The purple glass was shot, its thick smoothness violated by a spider web of cracks caused by the bullet. He fired into it, aiming for the same area, and when his third shot hit, it exploded outwards, exposing the hallway to the rainy atmosphere.

The shattering of the glass frightened the cypher, and he dropped to the ground, thinking it was an explosion. Dhata kept the empty gun pointed and triggered the release of the cylinder, then reached into his duster and grabbed another speedloader.

The traffic outside was noisy, and the sirens from the Johns was deafening, so he shouted above the din, hoping that Gemini would hear. “Last chance to talk, to keep your life. Stay silent and you’ll die a dishonorable death,” he said, then slammed the bullets into his gun.

“What are you doing, Dhata?” Lur screamed at him. “He killed your friend. Shoot him and let’s get out of here!”

Gemini backed away from the exposed area, leaving the Beretta, and limped to the door where the doctors were. Lur rushed at him, but he retaliated, and spun into her suddenly, leaving a bloody gash on her arm. Dhata ran towards them but Gemini slipped into the door, and as he got to Lur she motioned him inside.

“Go get him before he kills them and covers up his tracks,” she said.

“This has gone on long enough,” he heard Hiro say. Maybe the cypher had a way to lock him inside, but he didn’t wait to see.

He rushed inside and caught a roundhouse to the face, and a cut on his wrist that forced him to drop the gun. He swung a counter, but the cypher bent backwards and brought up a foot, catching him in the chin. He was bobbing now on the balls of his feet, smiling a wicked smile.

“Who sent you?” Dhata tried. “At least give me that. Who sent you here to kill all of these people?”

Gemini slashed at his throat but he hopped back out of the way, hitting a chair, which caused him to fall to the ground. The tiny man seized the advantage and stomped on his groin, grinding his heel, which forced him to bellow out in pain.

“One last spine,” the cypher said and grinned cruelly.  He held the smile for a time while Dhata waited for him to make his move. When he didn’t, Dhata acted and swept his legs, landing him with his head cracked open on the shiny, mirror-like floor.

“What the hell happened?” Lur said as she limped into the room, holding her arm. It was in need of stitches.

“Sorry, that was me,” Hiroshi said. “The virus gave me access to his Bio ID.  When he entered the building, I started to write a program to hack into his chip. I’m sorry, Lurita. It took me longer than I wanted, but I finally got in, just now.”

“What did it do to him?” Lur asked, her voice sounding concerned.

“Oh, he’s still in there … somewhere, but in his own grid, trapped forever from the world. He will no longer be able to hurt other people. His days as a cypher are over.”

“Will he die?” Lur asked.

“No, but he may as well be dead. A cypher that can’t surf would rather you cut their head off.”

Dhata scrambled to his feet then, trying to ignore the pain. “We need to collect him and find a way down past the Johns,” he said.

“Way ahead of you, boss,” said Hiroshi, “but my solution involves a vent.”

‡Chapter 19‡

Commencement

The filthy vents had taken them out to a secret area of the building. It was where maintenance crews—normally synths—would show up to fix things, invisible to the patients.

It took them to a rear elevator that got them out of the building without the Johns ever seeing. Hiroshi kept the surveillance blind, hacking the grid and causing the cameras to glitch. They carried Gemini to the Buick and lay him in the back seat where he smiled, looking up as if he could see all the way to the moon.

Now that he was in the light, Dhata realized that the cypher was androgynous and young, but this was only on the surface. The faint lines on his shoulders and neck revealed a history of cybernetic alterations. He wondered how deep the synthetic parts went, but he’d leave it up to Hiroshi to tell him. All he knew was that Gemini was a weapon, a trained weapon that was more tool than diabolical super-villain.

He drove them away from the city and stuck to the back roads, neither he nor Lur saying anything. When he got near the bridge to take them back to Tampa, he stopped near a medical pod and helped her into it. Judging by the relative absence of sirens, the Johns hadn’t caught on to their escape. Who would suspect that the hole in the top of Eternity Medical had come from an illegal revolver, fired by a skiptracer?

As Lur sat, healing, he watched her from the car. She looked pale and sickly within the light of the booth. He could tell that she had lost a lot of blood, and he was worried that he had taken too long to get them out.

When the light went off and the pod’s door popped open, he helped her out and got her into the passenger seat of the Buick. They started on the long bridge and he reached over and took her hand. “How we feeling?” he asked, but she just shook her head. “Won’t be long once we’re back in Tampa. You’ll probably need a few days of rest.”

She leaned against him, and he kissed her forehead. “Listen,” he said. “I know that I’ve been on your nerves with the overprotectiveness, but what you did tonight, man, you’re something else. You got heart, Lurita Diaz. A warrior’s heart. Don’t ever let anybody tell you different.”

He withdrew his hand to focus on the road when a John car blew by with its lights going crazy. Dhata breathed a sigh of relief when it whipped past them. If they were stopped he didn’t know how he’d explain the wounded cypher in his car.

He took Lur home and laid her in bed, checking the bandages that the pod had administered. “Where are you going?” she asked, and he had to smile. There was that damn intuition again.

“One final piece of business,” he said.

She sat up and looked at him through her dark, hooded eyes. “We agreed that the doctors were innocent, right? Please tell me you aren’t going back to—”

“There’s Johns everywhere, I’m not insane. Plus those two old Frankensteins got a lot more to lose than me,” Dhata said. “I’d go back if I was worried, but they’ll keep their mouths shut. What I have to do … it’s best if I tell you ‘bout it later.”

“Well, come here,” she said, and motioned him over. He walked around to where she was and knelt next to the bed. “Is it the synth girl, the one you won’t talk about?” she asked.

“Lurita, I’ll tell you about it later,” he said.

“You know, I won’t be hurt if you choose her over me,” she began.

“Christ, can you give it a rest?” he said quietly. “You don’t have to worry about that.”

He touched her chin to incline her head and kissed her like a man who was about to die. She slipped down into the covers and closed her eyes, and he exited the room, stopping to stare at her for a time. She looked so vulnerable, but she was safe, and Gemini was finally off the streets.

“Sweet dreams,” he said, and she blew him a kiss, and he touched the panel so that the door would slide shut.

Hiroshi was already working on Gemini. He was seated on the couch and firing up his rack.

“Here’s a surprise,” he said to Dhata. “Mister Gemini here, he’s one of us.”

Dhata opened his weapons cache and grabbed a sawed-off shotgun. “A synth?” he said.

“Yeah, a synth with working organic parts,” Hiroshi said.

“So a reverse cyborg?”

“Something like that.”

“Good job,” Dhata said. “I think that you just confirmed who I believe hired him.”

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

As he drove past the familiar buildings of 50th Street, Dhata began to see the aftermath of what had been a week of hell for the synths. Empty buildings that had once been jumping with activity, and police cars everywhere, their poor drivers trying to stop a flood of hate crimes with a minimal amount of resources. He missed Jason, and he blamed himself for the attack that had taken his life.

His life’s distractions and slow conclusions had allowed Gemini to get one over on him. Not to mention the drama with Cuba that had started with the trip to Orlando. Now the city had gone to hell, and he was only one man. Even if he could get the humans to stand down, the damage had been done. Years of peace and general tolerance had dissipated with the death of Jason. He couldn’t fix it, he knew, but he had an idea, and it would begin with a trip to Peyton’s.

The first thing he noticed upon arriving in Ybor was that the bosses had snipers protecting the perimeter. There were two cars parked to block 7th Avenue, an old Toyota and a Mercedes Benz. A hool was seated on the hood of the Mercedes and when Dhata approached, he hopped off it to face him. Dhata froze when he did this and let him scan, then the hool urged him forward and he complied.

“Boss was waiting for you,” he said as he led Dhata down the road, past the makeshift roadblock to the side street leading to Peyton’s house.

“I’m packing; is that cool?” Dhata said, shifting the duster to show his revolver. He didn’t bother to reveal that he had a shotgun tied to his thigh, but the hool allowed the pistol, so he assumed that the rest of his arsenal would be okay.

Once they hit the slums, he went back to his station, and Dhata followed the familiar path down to Peyton’s door. There were less guards now, an indication that the synths were winning their “war,” and the man at the door motioned for him to enter. Inside was the same as always, a dark den of sin with the only light coming from the candles. He climbed the stairs slowly, trying to prevent the shotgun from swinging. When he got to the room Esti had once occupied, he glanced inside out of habit. Several rows of rifles and machine guns lined the walls of the empty room. There was a burned-out warhead, and a stack of body armor, and the whole thing was illuminated by a lamp in the corner.

Seeing this much ordinance in what he had always known to be a whore house gave Dhata a deep sinking feeling in his stomach. Where had they hid these things, and how had they managed to sneak them in? The Johns were in worse shape than they knew, and the humans of Tampa had no idea.

He went to Peyton’s room and knocked on the door, expecting to find another meeting of the minds. But when the hool boss called for him to enter, he found him there alone.

“You caught me during my personal time, Dhata. What’s so important that you couldn’t just call?” he said. He was standing by the window in the way he always did: legs apart, arms crossed behind his back, dressed immaculately in a white vest and slacks, black oxfords shiny, just like his slicked back hair.

“I came for Esti,” Dhata said, shutting the door and placing his back against it.

“Man, you are obsessed!” Peyton said, turning around to regard him with interest. “I told you that I would let you know once you got rid of our cypher problem.”

“He’s dead,” Dhata said.

“What?”

“The cypher is dead, but you knew that, Peyton. Let’s stop playing games. I’ve been wondering since our pool game why you became friendly all of a sudden, giving me your personal number and keeping tabs on the case. You hate humans, all humans, so much that you set a serial killer loose on my city.”

“What are you talking about? You think I did this?” Peyton said. “That thing was hacking our minds, that’s a synth’s worst nightmare. You must think me a lunatic to play with something like that.”

“Not insane, Peyton. No, just power hungry. I got wise when I saw your party and how well thought out all of this was. You want the city, you want it all. Men of your type always do. Warmongers throughout history, that’s what they wanted. They wanted it all, just like you.” He gestured with his hands to emphasize his words, and he could tell by his body language that Peyton saw the shotgun.

“That mushed-brain idiot, Tony, he let you up here with that thing?” he said, growing visibly angry.

“Relax, I’m a friend of the boss,” Dhata mocked, then unclipped the shotgun and held it by his side. “Now, I was saying, you’re the one who hired Gemini.”

“Why would a hume agree to kill humes?” he shot back. “You’re off, Detective. You’ve been off since you decided to give up the badge and become a John’s private snoop.”

“But that’s the thing; he’s not human. You found a cyborg that was sympathetic to the cause. He’s pretty young, and you’re a pimp. I’m sure that you used all of your gaming to get him to understand your side of things. As a bonus, he could sell the spines and earn enough money for a proper set of upgrades. I saw his body, Peyton, a real hack job, and he was constantly in pain. How much did Doc Spade tell him it would take to make him into a human? Several million? Am I even scratching the surface here?”

Peyton grew quiet, his eyes locked in on the shotgun, and Dhata prepared himself for the synth to try something stupid.

“When I was a John, they gave me an award. It was a rare one for people who got out of the worst situations. You remember Alphie Fischer, the house that was shot up a few weeks back? You know that was me, Peyton, I put his entire family in the ground. Now, I see you working, and you’ve got the balls, but do you have the speed to stop me from pasting you against that window you love so much?”

“Fire that off and my boys will cut you to pieces,” he said.

“After everything I’ve been through, Peyton, do you think a threat will stop me?”

Peyton seemed to consider his words, then held up his hands, flashing the typical “you got me” smile that he always did. “Come on Dhata,” he said. “That’s a pretty good story, but despite whatever that cypher is, he has nothing to do with me.”

“I thought so for a time. I actually fell for your lies, just like Esti or another one of your girls. I thought, Peyton, he’s a hustler, but there’s no way he’d allow a cypher to hack other synths. But then you threw that little party, and I saw you for what you were. This prompted me to take another trip up to Alphie’s house.”

He fumbled in his pocket, then took out a photo and threw it at the hool. It showed Alphie and his friends, Nicky, and Jose. “That’s when it all became crystal clear. Tampa’s underworld is organized, but you were the wrong species to get into the club. That kind of shit would make anyone upset, and you, you have a temper worse than anyone I know. You needed to kill them to prove a point, and you needed it to be poetic, like killing them in a way that synths know too well. Boss of all bosses, Peyton Ace. The synth who was smart enough to take over the rackets.”

He motioned with the gun and Peyton walked outside the room. He put the barrel in the middle of his back and led him downstairs, then concealed it as they made to step out.

They exited the rear of the building and stepped out into the rain. The guard looked stunned when he saw his boss, but Peyton did nothing to alert him. “Taking a walk to talk some business, Tony. Hold the fort down, will you?” he said without looking at the portly man.

“Ye-yeah, of course, Peyton, I got you,” stammered Tony, and Dhata led Peyton down a path opposite the road, keeping the shotgun below his coat. When they were a few blocks away near some abandoned houses, he brought the shotgun up and held it to his face. “Did you kill Esti?” he said, through rain-soaked lips.

“Do you really care, after everything I told you inside?” Peyton said.

He walked forward and turned to face him, watching his eyes instead of the gun. Something about his cool demeanor annoyed Dhata, and he wanted to step forward and bash his face in with the butt. “Did you kill Esti?” he asked again, sliding his finger up near the trigger.

“What do you think? She killed a hume, and every rich schmuck inside that party saw her do it. I was trying to avoid all this, but they blamed us anyway. That’s what your people do, they blame us. The girl was dead anyway. Look at you, you’re all caught up in it. Did you really fall in love with a Mary? I saw your new girl; she’s a real hot piece.” He grinned. “With that at home, what the hell are you doing down here asking about Esti?”

“You know what’s funny, Peyton? I know that you have connections, but where I’ve been with her, you have no eyes, my man. That cypher from hell that you summoned on us, he must’ve shown you Lurita, didn’t he? Tell me, was it your idea to kill Jason, or was your pet too out of control for you to tell him how fucked up that was? Whatever happened to ‘we don’t kill Johns?’ He rode for synths, just like me! Do you hate us so much that you can’t see through reason?”

Peyton’s smile faded and he dropped his hands. Defiantly, he reached into his pocket and pulled out an electric cigarette. “I don’t hate you, Dhata, and I can’t stop you from firing that thing.” He inhaled and let out a thick cloud of vapor, and relaxed his stance as if the rain wasn’t even there. “It always rains in this city, do you notice that?” he said. “So you shoot me, and then what, big guy?”

Dhata thought about his question but he didn’t care. Candace, Jason, and Esti would be avenged and Tampa would be free of a grade-A hool.

“You know what happens if Ybor city loses Peyton Ace?” he said. “Several more like me pop up in this place. You know me, we break bread, and I’ve always been square. You blame me for this cypher thing, but what if you’re wrong? Could you live with yourself then?”

Dhata put his finger on the trigger now and he could feel the wet slickness of his glove against the metal. All it would take was a flinch, and he would blow his head off. Still, his words did make some sense. Should he kill the last piece to the cypher circus and allow his lieutenants to rise, or should he let him live on, knowing that he owed him a favor?

The image of the unfriendly synths at Peyton’s table came to his mind, and he thought about them running Ybor City. “What’s it gonna be, skip?” Peyton said, his trademark grin returning to his face.

A loud booming sound was heard throughout Ybor City, and lightning lit up the dark sky.

“That’s for Jason,” Dhata said, and watched Peyton’s face exposed from the lightning. He could’ve sworn that the hool was smiling, but he didn’t stick around to find out.

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

A crowd of people, both human and synth, stood on the sidewalks of downtown Tampa, awaiting the arrival of Jason’s hover. It was the first time Dhata had seen so many humans and synths together in relative peace, putting their differences aside to honor his longtime friend.

He stood on the corner with Lur, his arm around her waist, taking caution to be gentle with her since she was still bandaged up from Gemini's blades.

The sun sat low in the pale blue sky, sending warm vibes down on anyone lucky enough to be outside.

A long talk with Lur about their individual futures had made him decide that a vacation was in order. The world was going to hell, and the tension between humans and synths no longer allowed people like him to pick a side. He was human, and no one cared that he once loved a synth or that he was an ally. Each side wanted to eliminate the other, and being in the middle was not the place where he wanted to be.

The dissection of Gemini’s mind had revealed a troubling truth about the cypher. Arch Brain was just the start to what he had become, and the combined sciences of robotics and bioengineering had produced an advanced human being.

Hiroshi took his findings back to Japan, along with Gemini and his new puppy. Dhata had earned a friend for life, and he knew that in the future should he have need for a cypher, the legendary Cypher Star would be there. The last thing that he had heard from Hiro was that there was still a chance to bring Gemini back to the world in order to question him about the truth.

He wanted no part of it. Jason was dead and Lur was hurt, plus he'd never see Esti again. Catching Gemini had been more revenge than duty for him, but the collateral damage had amounted to too much.

“Here it comes,” Lur said, and he turned to see the flashing red and blue lights of a host of motorcycles rolling towards them in three neat rows. Lur leaned into him, her hair tickling his nose. She had changed its color to blue with a streak of red to honor Jason. "This is so sad," she whispered, but Dhata couldn't answer. It was taking everything within his power to hold it together, and talking would do no good.

The motorcycles seemed endless, as if every John in the city had come out to pay their respects. When they were past, a hovercraft floated down the street, then stopped in front of them. The hovercraft was bordered on all sides by cars and more motorcycles. While it stood in position, some words were spoken to honor Jason and his long career.

When the speaker was finished, the vehicles began to move, and when the hover floated by, Dhata stopped to salute. Several other men in uniform did the same, and when it was all over, the crowd was asked gently to disperse. They had been standing for over an hour, and Lur was getting tired, but the funeral was a few miles away and they had to make it there.

He walked her to the Buick and they both stopped to catch their breath, “I can’t believe that it’s him out there, in that hovercraft hearse,” Dhata said. “He was young, younger than me. It seems wrong somehow.”

“Did he have a family?” Lur asked.

“Yeah, a wife, and a couple kids. She’s pissed with me so I’m keeping my distance. His mom and dad were back there, sorry that I didn’t introduce. Like me, his pops was a John too. He was the big guy that you saw me hug, the one with the—”

“Yeah, I remember him,” she said.

“What’s on your mind, Lurita? Is it the funeral?” he asked.

“No, I was just worried about you. The other day you left me with Hiro to go out and take care of business. When you came back, you seemed so different, but you never told me about it.”

“There’s nothing to tell. I went to see Peyton, to let him know that we had caught the cypher he hired. He took it well and we had a nice talk, the type of talk that makes you learn a thing or two about yourself.”

“What did you learn?” Lur asked, and he was glad that she didn’t ask him if he killed him.

“I learned that I’ve been broken for a very long time, Lurita. So broken that I allowed public enemy number one to seduce himself into my good graces. Had you asked me a month back who hired Gemini, Peyton’s name would be the furthest thing from my mind. People tout me as some big advocate of synths, when the real true advocate is over there floating around in a box.”

“You don’t give yourself enough credit, Dhata. From what I have seen, this city needs someone like you. If you hadn’t risked your life and gotten in good with Peyton, Gemini would still be here killing people for their spines.”

He thought about this and a part of him knew that she was right, but he couldn’t accept praise, not when the image of him partying with Peyton and his men dominated his mind. “I’ve done some good, but I could do better, Lurita. Which is precisely why I’ll be taking a break.”

“You don’t want to snoop anymore? No more skiptracer?” she asked.

“No, I’m not going to quit outright, but I know that I won’t be able to find a sponsor as good as Jason. I’m staying away from the Johns. I’ll be working for people, the way the classic private investigators used to do. I don’t mean spying on cheating boyfriends, or taking pictures of insurance scams. I’m talking true justice for the underrepresented, the synthetic people and those who fear the Johns.”

“Any room in that future for a bird with an injured wing?” Lur asked.

“I might have an opening,” he said, and she jabbed him playfully in the arm.

‡Glossary‡

Skiptracer – A bounty hunter and private investigator that works exclusively for the police
Cypher – What used to be known as a “hacker”
John – Police officer (A play on the French pronunciation of Gendarme)
Mary – A prostitute
Hool – A criminal or thug (The word hooligan shortened into street slang)
Grid – Computer matrix (This is a very generic term used interchangeably with “cyberspace”)
Synth – Synthetic person or Android – a sentient machine built to look and act the way a human being does.
Snoop – Detective
Global Network – The Internet according to the world of Dhata Mays
Virtual Village (ViVi) – A small world inside the global network, accessed through virtual reality
SAR – Spatial Augmented Reality
ICL – Internal Contact Lens – Built into the eyes of most human beings, the ICL is used to access personal computers and sync with external SAR units
Augment – Objects that seem real but are projected in three dimensions by an SAR
Rack – A powerful piece of computer hardware that grants access to the Grid
Fomeal – Government-issued meat substitute
Hume – A derogatory term for humans
Zeppelin – A hovering fortress used in war for bombing

‡The Unsung Frame‡

Dhata Mays returns in The Unsung Frame, the second case in The Synth Crisis. Click the image below to buy your copy, or look for it at your favorite retailer!

‡About the Author‡

GREG DRAGON brings a fresh perspective to fiction by telling human stories of life, love and relationships in a science fiction setting. This unconventional author spins his celestial scenes from an imagination nurtured from being an avid reader himself. His exposure to multiple cultures, multiple religions, martial arts, and travel lends a unique dynamic to his stories.

See Greg’s author page at gregdragon.com or keep up with his latest books and appearances through email.

Table of Contents

- Chapter 1
- Chapter 2
- Chapter 3
- Chapter 4
- Chapter 5
- Chapter 6
- Chapter 7
- Chapter 8
- Chapter 9
- Chapter 10
- Chapter 11
- Chapter 12
- Chapter 13
- Chapter 14
- Chapter 15
- Chapter 16
- Chapter 17
- Chapter 18
- Chapter 19
- ‡Glossary‡