by Jim Keen
“The night they took me.”
“Yes?”
“Julia offered me a job. I never told you. Full employment contract, healthcare, the works.”
“Regret not taking it?”
Alice laughed so hard and long she had to sit on the concrete floor to regain her composure.
“I waited in that hospital for a full week. It was all the vacation I had,” Toko said, and a silence fell between them.
“Thank you,” Alice said at last.
He gave a tired smile, lost in thought. “That report. I had no choice. You understand that?”
“Yeah, I was a mess, and the NYPD can’t afford post-trauma therapy. I get it. I just didn’t know losing my job meant losing my friends.”
“You’re like a daugh—”
“Fuck you and your emotional blackmail.”
“Let me explain.”
“Go on.”
“You’d stopped listening. Pushed me away. I couldn’t help anymore.”
“I was in pain, and you took a vacation.”
He sighed in the cold, echoing garage. “I was ordered to cut you loose. Know what that means?”
She did. Failure to follow departmental instruction risked immediate contract termination.
“I don’t file the report and they fire me. Think I want this?” He gestured at his suit, accent thicker than ever. Vant dis? “Letting you go was the hardest day of my life. I would do it again though.”
She studied him. From their first day working together he’d protected her, been a mentor when needed, a friend otherwise. She admired him. He was strict and hard, one for the rule book, but was as close to family as she had left. Her parents were dead, brother in jail, and he’d been there when she needed it, right until the end.
“I understand your duty and responsibilities,” she said, “but I thought we were family. Dropping me hurt more than anything Julia did. Don’t ever ghost me again.”
“I won’t.”
She searched the concrete floor, saw nothing but faded oil stains. “How’s the family?” she asked.
“Good.” He looked down at Alice’s gaunt frame, the way her clothes hung loose around her. “Come over sometime, feed you up.”
“That would be nice, Toko, real nice. Okay, enough of this hippy shit. I want to get out there.” She nodded to the darkness outside. “Can you bring me my gear?”
Toko held out a bag. “Already done.”
The jacket was standard-issue black bulletproof weave. Her old jacket had an embedded smart-system that came close to passing the Turing test and being declared sentient. It had been a pain in the ass though, and those models had been phased out after one-too-many workplace lawsuits. This one was dumb, only acting as an extension of her phone. Thousands of microlights capable of displaying any message needed puckered its surface; at the moment an NYPD crest glowed a soft yellow. She slipped it on, and its heat-traced lining warmed to fight the chill. The hard shape of a ceramic knife sat heavy against her left arm. The gun was next, a black Walther PP_R that nestled into a shoulder holster. The drum accelerated metal fragments to railgun velocities, creating rounds with huge potential energy. One burst would slice a body apart at close quarters. Then a smart visor, pale yellow sunglasses that connected to her phone to provide a simple heads-up display. The badge came last, the bronze shield embossed on a scratched and dented NYPD smartphone.
“Gave me a used one, huh?”
“Do the job, you’ll get a new badge,” he said.
“Gee, thanks, Pops.”
He just looked back, face silhouetted in the hard lighting.
“Sorry, Toko. Been a long day.”
“So, you accept the role and duties required of an officer in the New York City Police Department?”
“I do.”
“You are now employed per the details of our negotiation. Long-term employment depends on satisfactory closure of the Julia Rothmore murder investigation.”
“Thank you, Toko. Any orders?”
“Yes. Talk to your brother.”
Sickness curdled in Alice’s stomach.
“When did you last speak?” Toko asked
“Right after Paulie and I were arrested, so … six, seven years ago. I saw him at sentencing—he was less than impressed that I chose the Marines over death row. I tried to keep in touch, but he never replied. What are you thinking?”
“Rikers Island burns more people than anywhere else in New York. Maybe some unregistered Betas ended up there. No tags, but residue in the ovens. Find one, find two, find a pattern.”
“He’s not going to talk to me.”
“You are police. He has no choice.”
“I guess. No promises though.”
“Paul has no one to blame but himself.”
“Think that makes a difference? Okay, leave me alone. I need to think.”
“We have a meeting with an FBI consultant tomorrow at nine. Don’t be late.” He smiled, gave her an awkward hug, and walked away.
Outside, glittering Blade Towers rose above the dark streets. Tomorrow was tomorrow, deal with it then. She lifted her left hand, its skin like melted plastic under the electric light. She needed a drink, and she needed to talk to Conner. Maybe she could kill two birds.
6
Alice looked at the Hopper she had arrived in. Fast, but she didn’t want to fly above the city; had been away too long and needed to get back into it. A bike stood charging in a rack on the far wall. Printed from dark blue plastic, its frame cradled a large battery and two thin tires. Bright headlights glowed to life as she approached.
“Where to?” it asked.
“Brooklyn.” She swung a leg over and settled onto the flat seat. The frame adjusted to her weight while the motor powered up with a chirp. She squealed down the corkscrew ramp and onto clattering streets far busier than they looked from the Hopper. She realized it was Saturday, the young and foolish testing their cool. The only vehicles moving were ancient black-glass lozenges that tossed her reflection back, drivers lounging inside, not trusting autonomous systems. It was the pedestrians who strutted carefree, peacocks looking for trouble. She eyeballed each one as she rolled past.
What were they selling?
How much?
Runners or perpetrators?
People studied her with curiosity until she held their gaze. Yes? Eyes down—no trouble here, Officer, just moving on.
Street-level tech was cheap and old—no one with real money operated at this level. The odd business aerostat buzzed past, their bulbous chrome forms catching the neon lights as they ducked in and out of doorways, while black stealth drones ghosted overhead.
The bike ran silent at low speeds, its tires crunching over glass bottles and plastic syringes as she let the city come to her. Voices, shouts, dub music and country escaping behind closing doors, the burble of old gasoline V8 engines carrying Cosa Nostra to and from hits. Smells now, food trucks with sizzling meats that made her stomach groan with longing. Fast-food joints, grease-smeared windows hiding blurred figures. Every wall smothered with Televideo posters, their animated displays illuminating the slick street surface. Once, they had sold the usual range of street merchandise: drugs, knives, Virts. Now, they all ran the same political adverts, plastic voices chanting the slogans:
“On to Mars! A job for everyone!”
“Leave today! The oceans of Europa need you!”
“Stamp Out the Unemployed!”
And over and over again:
“America, Back to Work!”
Far more than she remembered were the homeless and unemployed; dark crowds huddled around smoking fires, thin clothing hiding bruised flesh. A shot rang out, the muzzle flash illuminating an old woman’s leering face as the slug hissed into the night.
The Brooklyn Bridge was still closed, its festering hulk a no-go zone, so Alice headed for the reopened Manhattan Bridge. She flicked the bike left and right, slow at first, then faster as she got a feel for its heavy weight. Joining
the access ramp, she mingled with the flow of ancient cars like a shark ghosting prey. Enough. She wound back the throttle; the bike dug for friction, then launched forward on a rising scream of power. Left to avoid the convertible, hard right, back three lanes, and around a blue Jaguar. She hit sixty, and her jacket lit up, embedded lights flashing NYPD in moving text that wrapped her torso; at ninety, the whole jacket blazed white, destroying any shadows that clung to her. The collar inflated, the cold leather giving way to soft plastic ready to deploy and cover her head should she drop the bike.
No chance.
The frigid air stung her eyes until her vision became nothing but blurred streaks of the surrounding cars. Her lips stretched back in a grin, teeth chattering while her hair formed a rod perpendicular to the road. Alive, she was alive. The cables of the bridge, individual at first, merged into an interference pattern that joined the wind roar, creating a tunnel of light and sound.
Exit signs appeared, and her jacket buzzed to let her know it would be wise to slow down. She did and clicked her lapel twice to enter undercover mode. All lights extinguished, she dropped into Brooklyn like a jet-black torpedo.
Alice hopped the bike onto the sidewalk, and rolled to a stop near one of the expressway’s huge concrete piers. A taxi hissed past in the sky, and she followed the red taillights as they faded into the sulfurous gloom. The highways were the province of the autonomous trucks, and those vast rigs roared overhead at two hundred miles an hour, their electric whine broken into staccato gunfire as they hurdled expansion joints in the old concrete.
The Crazy Horse looked as she remembered—its flickering neon sign the only hint of life among the shattered array of derelict buildings. The wind changed, and a waterfall of icy runoff found every hole in her bulletproof jacket. She shivered and bunched her hands in thin pockets.
Why the delay?
Because she couldn’t tell if this was real, or the hallucinations of a tortured mind. Memories of pain rippled deep inside her.
Had she escaped? Or was she still tied to the chair, Katz sharpening his blades with a sly smile?
She sat back on the bike and smoked a cigarette.
No—that happened, but this is now. Time to get it on.
More Hoppers flew by, white streaks across the yellow pollution. She checked her phone and reread the NYPD’s report on the Professor. The archive had nothing new; hers the last entry. Alice switched her gun from its jacket holster to her right pocket, and checked the knife.
“Bike?”
“Yes?” Its cheap voice buzzed more than spoke.
“If I’m not back in thirty minutes, call an ambulance.”
“Confirmed, Officer Yu. Conditions active.” The bike hunkered down, plastic frame contracting.
Alice looked left and right: nothing moved.
She took one last inhalation of the foul air and ran across the road to the small door. It was as she remembered—old, peeling green paint—with a handwritten note pinned to the wood: No Unemployed, No Cortex, No Dogs.
“You got that right,” she said and stepped inside.
7
A dormant part of Alice stirred to life the moment she crossed the threshold. Emotions chilled, training back online, focus razor sharp. Everything in the dank room gained a preternatural clarity.
“Shut the damn door.” The Professor scowled from behind the bar, gaunt skull turned to watch a small TV.
Her fingers twitched.
The Crazy Horse resembled a million other dead-end dives—small and narrow, bar along one wall, booths along the other. Old rock music played, the air thick with drug smoke and sweat. Three large men in stained overalls sat to her left, construction workers covered in white plaster dust. Their reprinted arms bulged with muscle, zip scars inflamed by immune system errors. Cheap work, maybe from the High Line. They would get involved, too dumb to spot real trouble when it arrived.
A man and woman played pool in the small room to the rear. The woman nodded respect to Alice’s police uniform, donned her jacket, and exited to the rear. The man gripped his cue with two large hands and watched her. With a minimal twitch she checked the corners—empty—and crossed to sit on the same stool as last time. The Professor had grown a scruffy beard to hide his gaunt face, a filthy apron tied around his thin chest. His eyes flickered from the TV’s busted screen and he saw her, hard blue eyes widening in shock.
“You seen Conner?” she asked as if it were last year.
He turned to her. “You.”
“Yup. You seen him? I have questions that need answering.”
He squinted, eyes narrowing on her. “He was here a while back, made a call then left.” The Professor, ex-Harvard graduate, ex-Cortex employee, blew his nose into his hand and wiped it across a filthy bar towel.
“When?”
“You have New York’s entire surveillance apparatus available to you, Officer, may I suggest you use it as you leave?”
“I like to keep my relationships organic. Now stop being an asshole and get my usual.”
He moved slowly, like a rusted machine weighing its options, and poured neat vodka into a filthy glass. He placed it in front of her and stepped back, his hands dropping below the bar.
Alice made a point of ignoring him and turned to the TV. It hissed static and switched from a Six-Thirty report to a newscast. The big story was more unrest at the Hudson Employment Center. She didn’t know why they called them that; the centers were internment camps, everyone knew it, no one would say it. The camera showed the center as a dark gray disk; the surrounding black water filled with hundreds of orange dinghies buzzing across from Jersey. She’d seen this on the southern wall, the jeeks—street scum—would hit every entrance at once to get a few bodies through. Things really must be falling apart if the Hudson Camp was a destination.
She turned back to him. “I asked you a question.”
“And I answered.”
Alice nodded to the TV. “Plenty of space in there for bar staff. Doubt you’re on the irreplaceable list.”
“Those people deserve their fate.” She watched red spots appear in his cheeks, anger sparked by the hated subject of the unemployed. He’d once been a star, and it was easier to blame his fall on someone else than look in the mirror. “The unemployed have their hands in the pockets of the working class. To suggest I belong in such a place does you a disservice. That being said, you were a rat, so maybe it is you who should be camped there.” His voice carried the dry and clipped tones of a college lecturer.
Chairs scraped the wood floor behind as the three guys stood and approached. The smell of alcohol, sweat, and hashish grew. She’d forgotten to let Central Dispatch know where she was, so no backup. Rusty, out of the groove.
“Tell me, Officer,” he continued, “is it fair that our rewards go to lazy, ignorant people sitting at home watching Virtuals all day?”
“There are no jobs left; what choice do they have?”
“What part of that is my fault?” He rubbed bony hands on the filthy apron tied around his waist. “The phase-change was obvious from a year out, but they let themselves be replaced by machines. There was time to retrain if they so desired.”
“New skills won’t help, there’s nothing left out there. It’s all gone.”
“I went from the halls of Cortex to this bar in twelve months, but do you hear me complain? No. I found new work and so could they, no matter how menial. I’ve had enough of looking after those who missed the exit signs. President Harper agrees with me—we elected her to fix this mess, and she will.”
“You think?”
“How long has it been? Three years? She’s got the Wall back up and Mars open for business. Freeloaders can take a turn in the chair as far as I’m concerned.”
“She causin’ you problems, Prof?” one of the men spoke from behind, voice thick with alcohol.
“This fine person here worked undercover, and did her upmost to bring down Five Points. If she’d had her way we would all be in Rikers Isla
nd.”
“That anyway to talk about an old friend?” she asked.
“Do you have any idea how hard it was for me to pretend to like you the last time we met? Oh yes, Conner told me all about you. In fact, he asked me to keep you here while he got the car. All those lies, all that deceit, and for what? Five Points took you in, gave you a family, and you betrayed us.” He raised an old shotgun from behind the bar. “At least now I don’t have to pretend.”
“That fancy Harvard degree ever teach you threatening a police officer is a crime? Put the cannon away before I charge you.”
The Professor nodded over her shoulder, and a rough hand grabbed her left bicep.
Alice put one foot on the floor, another on the bar’s brass foot rail, and tensed her muscles. She tried one last time. “I need to speak to Conner.”
“I rather doubt he feels the same. Now then, what should we do with you?”
Alice braced her legs to get a stable fighting position, then in a blur, grabbed the arm that held her and stood, twisting as she rose to throw her assailant over the bar and into the Professor. The man was big, and the Professor tumbled backward, crashing to the floor. The large gilt mirror on the wall toppled forward and fell onto them, shattering into thousands of glittering glass fragments that showered the room like confetti.
Boom.
The shotgun fired, the sound deafening, and the shot passed an inch from her face. She used her momentum to continue her pivot and swiveled around to face the other two attackers. They were only starting to move, mouths open to shout. Too late. She kicked the first between his legs, and he stiffened as if electrocuted, then collapsed to the floor howling. The third got a good punch to her face, but she rode the blow and threw him across her hip and to the floor in a smooth judo move. He rolled and tried to stand as Alice stepped forward and hit him hard on the chin. He slumped back to the floor, eyes closed.
The fight had lasted less than five seconds.
The man who had been playing pool walked halfway across the room toward her, cue held over his head like a baseball bat. He changed his mind and backpedaled one step at a time, eyes locked on hers.