Less Than Human
by Maxine McArthur
When a factory worker is mysteriously killed by a robot, cybernetics engineer Eleanor McGuire is unwilling to call the incident "human error." In a different part of Osaka, four teenagers are electrocuted in an apparent group suicide, and Police Inspector Ishihara isn't convinced it was self-inflicted. When their investigations cross paths, the foreign scientist and the aging cop find a trail that will lead them to more murders, corporate crime, and a strange online cult led by a secretive guru who promises immortality to his followers if they help him destroy civilization. But how can McGuire and Ishihara stop this psychopath if he doesn't seem to exist?