Moxyland

Toby

The underway is so jammed I have to loop and thread between the press of commuters. No worries for a boy on the skinny, nipping the gaps. But I am worried (not much, but they’re only paying me the second instalment after mission accomplished) about the rest of Clan Stinger in my wake. Doyenne especially. That girl is built sumo. But a backwards glance reveals that she’s just ploughing that construction worker bulk through, the crowd sensibly parting for her, while Ibis (aka Julia from the barcade) slipstreams in her wake. I’ve lost view of Twitch, but I’m sure the little shit can take care of himself.

In realworld, Doyenne is a taxi driver in her mid-40s – maybe a tad decrepit for fun and games, but who am I to thwart her recreational? Cos that’s what it’s about, right? Re-creations of lives you could never live.

We’re all civilian. Specs were undercover, although I’m not going anywhere without my BabyStrange, that’s for you, kids, for your enjoyment. It’s switched to live-feed from my splinter-new phone, no delay on the uplink. It’s also perfect for hiding the telltale bulge of the .44 riding on my hip.

On the escalator, standing behind me, Ibis aka Julia checks her lipgloss in my coat. You gotta admire a girl who has the presence of mind to touch up her prettifiers pre-combat. She’s been relatively cold to me since we were reintroduced. But then, I didn’t call. But then, I never do.

‘You activated?’ she murmurs behind me, so soft only I can hear, cos we’re playing strangers for the moment, until such time as Doyenne decides we’re good to make our play. As soon as Twitch has scoped out the lie of the land.

I don’t bother to answer. As if I would have forgotten in the heat. My phone is already blinking blue, logged onto Playnet and legit with the relevant authorities – although unlike my crime-busting colleagues over here, I’m registered under a fake name. It’s not necessary, but let’s say I’ve developed a taste for anonymity, for taking on an artificial ID (like Diary isn’t an exaggerated persona already). I’m sure it’s all going to get terribly confusing. Try to keep up.

I grab hold of the rails with both hands and swing over the top steps, my coat flaring behind. Julia pushes past me, just another underway annoyance, her boots making sharp cicada clicks on the vibracrete as she vanishes into the cram. I swivel on my heel and prowl over to the newsstand to buy a bottle of water. No sense going into this dehydrated. It’s still lank early. Fourteen minutes ahead of schedule. We’ve got time to kill.

Doyenne’s strict on the punctuality, Twitch told me while we were sitting in the taxi waiting for her to come back from the petrol station loo, cos she has a spastic colon. He was switching through the motions on his rifle, checking the mechanics until the constant clack got to me, and I grabbed his hand to stop him doing it.

‘Leave him alone. It chills him out.’ Ibis aka Julia spoke from the front of the car, not even looking round.

‘Well, it’s riding me one time.’

‘He needs it. He’s OCD.’

‘For fuck’s sake. Can’t he take meds? Or a hit of sugar?’ My luck to latch up with a crew with sufficient medical ailments to fill a doctor’s waiting room. And that’s not even counting the guy I’m replacing, who broke his collarbone moving a fridge.

‘Nah. Meds blunt his focus. And Doyenne doesn’t shine to drugs, so don’t talk about whatever you’re on now, okay?’ She cocked her head over her shoulder, presenting a shadow of profile, just enough so I could see the dark mole at the corner of her lip that makes her mouth look faintly misshapen. ‘And besides, he’s fourteen. So lay off, okay?’

‘Okay. Kit Kat!’ I lifted my hand off his, and the kid went right back into the damn clicking, sliding the ammo clip out, slamming it back in. ‘Do your parents know where you’re at tonight, Twitch?’

He looked puzzled, although at least he stopped with the damn clicking for an instant, and then launched straight back into it, not looking up. ‘For your information, fuckwit, my mom was the one who hooked me up with Stinger.’

From the front, Ibis aka Julia snickered.

I take a sip of water and flip casually through the racks, sneaking previews on some of the pushmags, but being particular in not skeeming the gaming titles, cos you don’t want to be too obvious. Keep it tight.

‘You gonna buy that?’ The shop chick, a bovine dumpy blonde, eyes dulled by one too many soapcasts, picks at her teeth with a fingernail, intent on the blurbvert playing on the screen above the till.

‘Me? Hmm. No. I don’t think so.’

‘Well then, skip it.’

‘Hey, I already bought the water. Doesn’t that entitle me to browsing rights?’

‘You gotta buy.’

‘Fine.’

I skim the shelves and grab a dark porn push, way up top, hand it to her to scan and flash my phone at the till. And then I crack the seal and start paging through it in front of her, pausing to show her a grotesque special on page six, cranking the volume up. She grimaces, managing to look even stupider and uglier, and leans back on her stool, pumping up the sound on her soap to try and drown me out.

I’m enjoying this now. I flick through to find another disturbing combo – oh, don’t sweat it, it’s all digital re-creations, they wouldn’t really force a hyena to mount a nubile teenager.

Her repulsed reaction, the way I’m playing her, kicks up my rush. It’s a sugar–bliss combo, if you were wondering, just enough to remix my experience of the world a little.

I glance round to check on the mission status. There’s no sign of the little OCD monster. Doyenne is standing peering at the map but really scouting out the junction, looking through the screen to the platforms below; Ibis/Julia is sitting primly on a bench, reading a book, her

posture straight as an arrow.

Someone in the crowd jostles me harder than is politely acceptable, so I nearly drop the pushmag. Often, I get off on the tight; walking so close you can feel the swerve of the air currents between you and the people coming in the opposite direction. And it’s always fun to infringe on people’s personal space. But the crush is even thicker now, like fucking rush hour or like there’s a soccer game on. Last time Orlando Pirates played the city stadium, eight people were fatally squished in this very station.

I catch a glimpse of a sludge hoodie bobbing away, carried by the surge, and recognise it as Twitch’s signature style, or rather signature lack of style. Which means either that he’s fucking with me, or that it’s time.

I glance over at the team’s positions. The bench is vacant. No visual on Ibis/Julia. Doyenne is heading down the stairs at an easy amble. Nice of them to let me know. I sneak a peek at my phone, which is thrumming insistently with an in-game msg and an attachment of ID images.

I dump the pushmag in my pocket, saving it for later, and let the throng sweep me towards the lifts, as per our blueprint. It’s basic stuff. Ibis/Julia and Doyenne will take either end of the train, working their way down towards each looking for the terrorist called Unity, the one with the dirty bomb, while I cover the platform – and the little shit keeps a bead on all of us from some disused maintenance cube lodged in the ceiling. They got access to a maintenance cube through sheer fluke. Took them eighteen hours solid gamespace play to crack a drug-bust mission, and when they’d fragged every junkie in sight, they found all kinds of useful goodies tucked among their stash, including an access card that unlocks certain gameplaces realworld.

I click open the folder, flip through the images, supposedly uploaded fresh from the station security cams. Not actually, sorry to disappoint you. It’s all pre-scanned. As lucrative as play is, and trust me, Inkubate Inc. is paying Metro bigtime for the rights to play in the underway and set up gameplaces like Twitch’s maintenance cube; they’re still not allowed to interfere with actual realworld goings on in the public domain, which includes linking to the security cams for our gaming pleasure.

The photo-IDs are, in order:

A heavy in a gold vinyl tracksuit rubbed shiny with wear or maybe distressed on purpose, with tightly wound blond curls and a jaw designed to shatter all the bones in your fist.

A shaven-headed girl, around my age, done up all pantsula in pinstripes and carrying a black steel case, which is so blatantly obvious, I dismiss her as a decoy.

Another macho, business-slick in a suit with a gym bag slung casually over his shoulder, but it’s clearly heavy, which is a tad more promising.

And. Hey, there.

I reverse direction, grinning. Of course, I’m contractually obliged to let one of the fulltime members of Clan Stinger take the glory, but is it my fault I’m intuitive? If I’ve encountered the target previously? I send a msg to the crew, but who knows how long they’ll take to get back up here. It might be too late by then.

The people behind me don’t take too kindly to me switching against the flow. Some of them have their phones held up at arm’s length, beaming laser slogans in all caps above their heads: ‘ALL ACCESS’ and ‘PASSES FOR THE PEOPLE’. Some of the protesters don’t smell too fresh, and there’s a higher content of street kid per capita than usual.

And I finally twig why it’s so packjammed down here. The protest. Great fucking timing, although maybe that’s the point – to make it more challenging.

I shove through the press of bodies back towards the kiosk where the podgy girl is attending to a protester with springy little dreads and a leather bandolier strung with audio chips instead of cartridges that are broadcasting slogans at decibel in most of the official languages.

‘I’m sorry, did I leave my phone here?’ I have to shout over the chips, pushing rudely in front of the protester, who skeefs me with a dirty look, to get to the counter.

The apparently not-so-dullard cow ignores me. And what choice do I have, kids? Really? The .44 is already in my hand, it’s only a thirty degree flex of my arm to pull it free of the holster and swing it up so it’s level with the bridge of her rather neat little nose. ‘I’d suggest you surrender the merchandise.’

The protester squawks and leaps backwards, knocking over a rack of mags, but the resulting crash is drowned out by the electronic chatter of the chips and the protesters shouting and the ambient crowd sounds.

The cow whimpers. She’s gone all pasty, which throws her zits into relief. Cunning bitch. Gotta admire the acting talent. You’d think she was the real deal.

‘I don’t have time. Just give it over.’

She opens her mouth as if to say something useful, but then goldfishes soundlessly.

‘Oh for fuck’s sake.’ I press the gun against her forehead. ‘Three, two…’ And sudden she finds her voice.

‘I don’t got nothing! Please!’

‘The package?’

‘Take it! Take it!’ But she fails to hand anything over, covering her eyes and quivering instead. I’m aware that a space has cleared around me, and my phone is vibrating frantically in my pocket.

‘Just give me the package and I won’t have to shoot you,’ I say, real slow, so she can’t misunderstand. Maybe I got it wrong and it’s the hip gangster girl or one of the heavies after all. In which case, I might have blown the whole fucking mission, exposed us too early. Fuck. And now I’m not so sure I looked at the picture properly in the first place. Maybe it was some other ugly fat girl plus wishful thinking on my part. Or maybe she’s an unwitting mule.

I vault over the counter. She shrieks and wedges herself into the corner, weeping now. I pull her down, so that we’re out of the limelight, crouched behind the desk. ‘Everything’s sony, honey, just chill. Stay right there. Don’t you move.’ I keep the gun on her, hunting around. ‘Where’s your bag? Where’s your fucking bag!’

She points wordlessly at a turquoise tote on a shelf. I press it into her hands, even though she doesn’t want to take it.

‘Open it.’

‘I don’t got nothing. I don’t.’

‘Did anyone ask you to hold something for them? Or give you something? A present?’

She’s scrabbling in her bag, spilling prettifiers onto the carpet, sobbing so hard her words hitch. ‘My… my… boyfriend.’

‘Yeah? What did he give you? Where is it?’

‘Th-this.’ She yanks off a plastech keyring attached to the bag’s handle – a mini-figurine of Anika, the virtua pop star.

‘Be careful! Shit.’ It’s not inconceivable that the bomb would fit inside a keyring. I take it from her gingerly and stow it in an inside pocket.

‘Now close your eyes.’

‘Why?’

‘Cos I’ve been wanting to do this ever since I met you.’

She shakes her head vigorously, sobbing hard. I shrug. She should have known what she was letting herself in for when she took on the assignment.

I pull the trigger.

The .44 kicks in my hand with a sharp metallic roar. Which should have been the end of her, only the blobby cow is still shrieking, clawing at the wet gobs splattered across her face. She squeals even louder when her hands come away sticky with sheen. I am way pissed now, kids.

‘What are you doing? You’re analogue, baby. You’re out. Fucking go down.’

She holds her hands out to me, all shaky disbelief, and catches me left-field by starting to cry, little pathetic mewlings.

‘Oh. Hey. Everything’s sony, okay? It’s not… Look.’ I’m about to wipe her forehead to show her, but I don’t want to get the dye on my BabyStrange, so I grab her by the wrist instead. ‘It’s purple, see?’ Inexplicably, she starts crying harder. ‘It’s not blood. You don’t gush purple. It’s just a game. It’s icy. Okay?’ But she’s sobbing so uncontrollably, I don’t think I’m getting through.

I holster the gun and start sliding away from the blubbering girl, making sure I still have the keyring. The hippie with the audio-chip bandolier barges in. ‘Bro, that was so uncool.’

‘Hey! She was registered gameplay. It’s not my fault she’s a rookie.’

‘Oh yeah?’ He bends down, comes back with her handbag and dumps out the phone, turns it over to show me. It hasn’t been chipped for ingame. It’s so outmoded, it wouldn’t even support the tech. Shit.

I hightail it through the crowd, ignoring dreadlock boy’s recriminations shouted after me. The protest is going off, it’s too thick to move without worming between the bodies, and the amplified chatter is deaf-making. I duck down besides a motobin that’s been stopped in its circuit by the human traffic, humming quietly to itself, and check my phone. My msgs display various riffs on ‘where the hell are you?’ from all three of my clan mates.

Surprisingly, Ibis/Julia is the most graphic of all of them, threatening my mother with violence if I don’t get my skinny ass down there immediately. Maybe I’ll take her up on it later.

But right now I have bigger pilchard to panfry. I skip the rest of the msgs and reload the target list, flipping through the visuals to saggy cow, who is indeed the girl I just fragged in the face, down to the last inflamed zit. This is all seriously dubious.

I sit tight and wait for an answer. The motobin is a little slow, only now detecting my proximity. It swivels on its axis and gapes its flap at me hopefully, waiting for a deposit. No one gets back to me, not even Twitchy, who is supposed to be holed up at high altitude.

Fuckit. What else to do? I throw myself back into the fray, all bargey elbows to get through the toyi-toyi, because the protesters seem to be holding fast to their positions. If they hoped to stop the station functioning today, they’re doing well.

From the plastech pedestrian tunnel that crosses over the junction, I can see it’s mal chaos below. On the platform, only heads are visible in the mesh of people, like coloured pixels, shoving in different directions. The trains are at a standstill, but there are bursts of flashfire going off inside the compartments, six or seven while I’m watching. I skeem I’m not the only player here today with corrupt data.

A ripple of quiet spreads out from one side of the station as the audio chips suddenly fade out, as if they’ve been dampened. The protesters’ voices sound hollow without them, too warm, too varied without their mechanical accompaniment, and even the voices are starting to falter. I can’t see shit, but I can anticipate what’s coming.

‘This is the South African Police Services,’ the announcement blasts over the PA as the protesters and the civilians all fall respectfully, no, fearfully, silent, so now we can hear the shouts from the platforms below. The toyi-toyi-ing wavers and stops as people turn expectantly to the entrance, where uniforms flanked by Aitos are descending the stairs in perfect formation.

‘This is an unlawful, unlicensed gathering. You are advised to disband immediately.’ It’s pre-recorded. Legislation bars the cops from opening their mouths unnecessarily. There’s too much room for human error, which means ammunition for the human rights groups – for all the teeth they’ve got.

It’s the same reason the cops are indistinguishable behind their flicker visors – on purpose, kids, so you can’t lay an assault charge if they beat you into submission too vigorously.

‘Repeat: You are advised to disband immediately. You are in violation of section 14(ii) of the Transport Authority Code, as well as section 11.2(vi) of the Commerce Protection Act.’

I start edging towards the lift. I’ve no intention of sticking around to see the standard spiel play all the way through.

‘Warning: If you choose not to disband immediately, it will be assumed under the Tacit Liability Act that you are fully aware of the potential repercussions of your unlawful actions and that you waive your right to seek any kind of legal recourse or financial compensation for any injuries or damages incurred in the course of law enforcement response.’

The uniforms have stopped, arranged in an invert V down the main stairwell, while the Aitos spread out through the crowd, yipping in excitement. It’s enough to inspire some of the people to disperse, mostly nervous commuters.

‘This is your last warning.’

The tension dies unexpectedly, like a battery running out of juice. It’s like the crowd collectively shrug all at once, and start disassembling peacefully and in an orderly fashion so as not to piss off the cops or, more importantly, the dogs.

But then the lift doors open and it becomes obvious the msg hasn’t reached the lower floors. Doyenne bursts out, splattered with dye, but not enough to take her out of the game, grinning like a berserker, rabid with battle lust. I’m close enough to see the purple smear over her mouth, as if she’s wiped the back of her hand across it. She grins wider and launches into the painfully over-quoted line from Sleepers Phoenix – ‘Hi-de-ho, neighbours! I regret to inform you it’s time to die!’ before opening random fire on the crowd.

Chaos breaks out in shockwaves from the nucleus of the lifts. People drop to the ground, screaming, unaware that it’s a game, cos they’re idiots, cos you’d never mistake the sting of a dye pellet for a bullet. Others, caught in the panic, surge towards the exits. And then in one convulsive move, everyone drops to the ground, twitching, phones crackling as the defusers kick in.

Unfortunately, mine doesn’t go off, which is plenty worrying if the uniforms notice that I’m packing an illegal mod. I drop too, bit of a delayed reaction there, kids, but pay it no heed, and try to avoid the thrashing limbs all around me as I start inch-worming across the floor towards the nearest exit.

I’m not the only one unaffected. Almost none of the protesters are KFC. There are about forty of them, standing defiant in the epileptic human sea jerking around their feet.

‘And what are you going to fucking do now?’ shouts one of the protesters. The sound is amplified, distorted, but the voice sounds very familiar in its puffed-up wankery.

‘Your weapons are useless. We defy your attempts to regulate society. We’re voluntarily disconnected! Voluntarily disenfranchised! You cannot control us!’ He holds up the remains of a smashed phone, then drops it to the ground.

I catch on. It’s Tendeka and his BF surrounded by all manner of ragtag humanity; bergies and skollies and street kids who all have one thing in common – they’re homeless and phoneless. Which only means that when they call the dogs in, they’re going to be more savage than usual.

Already the cops are switching over to canister guns. It’s all strict by-the-book procedure. Verbal warning. Defuse. Dogs. It never takes more. Even the most defiant bloody-minded idiot tends to shut up and give up when facing down those teeth. Well, except for Doyenne.

By the lift, Doyenne has two Aitos attached to her, one worrying at the sleeve of her jacket, the other tugging her jeans, but she’s still laughing, still pumping slugs into the crowd and swearing soldier, clubbing alternately at the dogs’ heads with her free hand. Two pellets explode across the second dog’s flank, the trajectory coming from somewhere up high – like a ceiling hideyhole. Fuck, Twitchy. That’s a disconnect offence. I duck my head, smirking, as an Aito bounds across the spasming flesh, its paws coming down heedlessly on groins and heads.

One of the cops fires a chem cap into the thicket of the protesters, hitting Ashraf solidly in the chest, the impact knocking him back into the mass of bodies writhing on the floor.

By now, the Aitos have pulled Doyenne down, but now they look up, ears pricked forward as they pick up the telltale chem scent, and abandon their victim to bound towards the protesters.

The next bit is mess. Tendeka and his ragtag regiment yank out pangas. The first dog to reach them goes down with a meaty thwack more robust than the art thing, which goes to prove, kids, that the attack at the gallery wasn’t in aid of animal rights at all. I file this for reference. Ten’s bunnyhugger boyfriend would surely disapprove – if he wasn’t a little preoccupied drowning in a sea of thrashing limbs.

The Aito howls, but comes straight back up, its lip hanging off its jaw, exposing the teeth. The kids shriek, more horror than rage, lashing out as much to keep it at bay as anything else.

It goes down under a torrent of blows, real Rwanda.

On the stairs, one of the cops raises her baton and then lowers it again, uncertainly. Several of the others are locked in a screaming match, because this shit is way outside the bounds of procedure. People aren’t supposed to attack the dogs.

A sharp keening buzz undercuts the noise, a subsonic signal to the Aitos, which all lose interest at the same time. Together, they raise their heads, then bound back to the cops, to the tune of their master’s audio, abandoning their targets.

It’s only temporary. Trust me on this. There’s gonna be a bloodrush for sure, and it’s only going to get uglier. I’m preparing to scram, shifting my weight onto my knees so I can launch towards the exits, when something unexpected happens.

The cops wait for the dogs to reach them and then turn sharply and tromp up the stairs, withdrawing.

It’s apparent no one knows what the fuck this means. There’s a wailing from the other side of the hall, like someone has figured this can only signify heavy shit to come, but minutes pass. There’s no indication that the cops are coming back.

People scramble to their feet, helping each other up, laughing in relief, or bleating. The civilians don’t know what hit them. Even some of the gamers are displaying classic shock. Couldn’t cut it in realworld after all.

I’m already up, halfway to the exits, when runt boy peels out from behind a pillar, and tedious deluxe, sticks his gun in my gut.

‘Oh fuck off, Twitchy, the game’s over.’

‘We’re gonna go find Ibis. And Doyenne,’ he says, all steely determination, despite his hand shaking so hard he has to steady the barrel of his gun against my navel.

‘You fragged a police dog, Twitchy. You think they can’t trace your bullets?’ They can’t, but

I’m not gonna tell him that.

‘Only with dye! I thought it was—’ His left hand is switching the safety on and off relentlessly.

‘Part of the game? Got carried away? Like that’s going to stand you in civil rehab. It’s still an attack on police property. If you’re lucky, they might downgrade the charge to defacing police property.’

His eyes are bugging out, but he won’t let up on that damn safety catch. On/off/on/off, not unlike his brain malfunction.

‘But what about Ibis?’ he whines.

‘I’m sure Julia will be fine.’ He winces at her real name, and the implication that I might know her on more intimate terms. Someone’s crushing on their clan mate badly. ‘Doyenne, though, she’s gonna need a whole lot of patching up, thanks to you. You really peeved those dogs. If I were you, Twitchy, I’d bail before they come looking for you.’

I shove the gun away – a pellet that close would leave a nasty bruise – and just for spite, ruffle his hair. But just as I’m about to make a graceful exit, dumping the kid and the whole bad situation, the sprinklers embedded in the ceiling open up.

Twitch looks up, holding out a hand, like a kid catching snowflakes. ‘Wha—?’

‘Shit, don’t let it touch you!’ I pull up the hood on my coat and tuck my hands under my armpits, but it’s too late, there’s already a fine mist on my exposed skin.

‘Why? What is it? What’s the matter?’

People are looking up, raising their faces to the spray; others, the sensible ones, are running for the doors, pulling their clothing over their heads. Some crusty chick in beads is dancing in it, kicking out her legs, like it’s a rave.

‘Chem marking. So the Aitos can follow you, whee, whee, whee, all the way home.’

A feminine voice crackles over the intercom – the SAPS’s virtua spokesperson, who manages to sound warm and impersonal and regretful all at the same time, like a beautiful chiding mother from a Fifties sitcom.

‘Important message. Brought to you by the South African Police Services. We regret to inform you that due to an attempted insurrection by terrorists using banned technology, the SAPS have had no alternative but to make use of statute 41b, Extreme Measures, of the National Security Act,’ says the voice, sweet as high-fructose corn syrup.

‘In accordance with this statute, activated for your protection, you have all been exposed to the M7N1 virus, a lab-coded variation of the Marburg strain. Do not panic.’

This has the opposite effect. A shock of people rush for the exits. Against my better judgement, I yank Twitchy out of the way, so that we’re both wedged tightly behind the pillar while the crush surges past.

‘Repeat. Do not be alarmed. The M7N1 Marburg variation is only fatal if you do NOT report to an immunity centre for treatment within 48 hours. Repeat. It is NOT fatal if you present yourself promptly for vaccination treatment. Vaccination is 100% effective within three hours with minimal lasting side-effects. Vaccination treatment is a free service offered by the South African Police Services.

‘Be advised, that if you choose NOT to report for vaccination, you can expect the following symptoms. Within three hours, your throat will become sore and inflamed. Your mucous membranes will become irritated. Within six hours, you will experience coughing and sneezing. Within 12 hours, your eyesight will become blurry. You will present with flu-like symptoms. Within 18 hours, your muscles will ache and you will experience prolonged coughing fits. Within twenty-four hours, you will feel weak, and you may notice traces of blood in your mucus and your urine. This is an indication that the virus is taking hold and beginning to break down your soft cell structures. After 48 hours, your organs will start to liquefy and collapse. You will be coughing blood uncontrollably, and you may be unable to breathe. Within 50 to 60 hours, your stomach acids will reach your heart and lungs. The virus has limited capacity and is not contagious.

‘South African Police Services strongly advises citizens exposed to the M7N1 Marburg variation for their protection to report to an immunity centre immediately. Should you be too weak to report to an immunity centre, please call the South African Police Services and we will dispatch a mobile service to collect you. Again, this service is free, provided in the interests of public health and safety. The South African Police Services are dedicated to serve. How can we help you?’

Pressed against my chest, Twitch starts to cry. It seems the appropriate response. Talk about a come-down.

We coop up in the kid’s sniper hidey-hole to wait it out. Just because we have to turn ourselves in doesn’t mean the fuckers aren’t going to be waiting for us with a little encouragement. I’m not going to meekly tramp out with the herd and see what happens. I need some time to think, some time to suss out exactly what this means.

The hidey-hole’s normal purpose in life is as a maintenance cluster, where the VIMbots go to recharge, happy and humming. We have to boot some of them out to make space for us – it’s not like they don’t have work to do with the mess outside – and even then, we’re both sitting hunched with our knees up.

When it gets too cramped and boring, I send Twitch (real name Eddie, he tells me) out to scout, half hoping he won’t come back. But he crawls back in a few minutes later, so I have to fold my knees up again to accommodate him. Just when the pins and needles were wearing off.

‘Well?’

‘I didn’t. I was—’ The little shit can’t even look at me.

‘You’re hopeless, Eddie.’ I scoot past him on my butt, only to have a VIMbot zoom in the flapdoor and ram full-throttle into my shin. ‘Fuck!’

I chuck the VIMbot out of the cluster and drop down out after it into one of the toilet stalls, nudging the door open cautiously with my boot. The bot is already fully recovered. By the time I nip a glance around the edge of the men’s room door, it’s already skittered away.

The station is deserted, although there is a droning coming from somewhere near the entrance. There are no trains running, at least not here, but there’s a dull sound that could be rumbling in tunnels further away. The space is eerie without people. Déjà vu city. I’m almost expecting to hear a rusty gurgle.

The surfaces are coated with a damp beaded film, like the walls have been sweating. I know I’m already infected, but can you blame me for not wanting to touch anything or prolong the exposure?

There is a human bundle collapsed on the stairs, which I have every intention of ignoring. I touch my hand to my gun, even though it’s only loaded with chemdye. I’m still trying to figure out whether it’s better to head down to the tunnels, try and find a service exit or just, fuck it, go out the front, when there is the squeal of tackies on wet marble behind me. I tighten my grip on the .44, but it’s only Twitch/Eddie, looking even paler and scared, oblivious to the squelch of his sneakers. I flap my hand at him and he gets it. He shifts to his toes, so that the rubber doesn’t squeak so much.

He points at the bundle and whispers, cos speaking would be too loud in all this space, even if we were absolutely fucking totally positive that no one else was around. ‘What’s that?’

‘Don’t worry about it. It’s nothing. Leave it.’

‘Is she… dead?’

‘How the fuck should I know? Just fucking leave it.’

‘But what if it’s—’

‘It’s not.’

‘Oh.’

‘C’mon.’ And he pads after me, obedient as a puppy, up the far side of the stairs, far as possible from the bundle.

The murmuring is getting louder. ‘Please be advised…’

‘Hey, Buzzkill?’ I cringe at the pre-assigned call sign.

‘It’s Toby. Okay? Just—’

‘Toby?’

‘I said, don’t look. Ignore it.’

‘Toby. She’s moving.’

‘I don’t care.’ But I look despite myself. And I don’t know what I’m expecting, her face to be caved in, insides leaking out, even though they say this fucker doesn’t work that fast. But who knows? Could be three hours or three months. They could have released the wrong fucking bug. For all I know, it could be the fucking flu and it’s all a big psych. I look long enough to see that the pink sheen pooled underneath her body is not her liquefying interior but part of a slinky dress, long enough to see that it’s not Ibis/Julia. ‘Niks to do with us.’

‘…is closed.’

‘But—’

‘Just shut the fuck up and just fucking leave it, okay!’

But it’s like the gun all over again, the misfire in his brain.

‘Toby?’

‘I’ll leave you here. I swear.’ He shuts up for at least five seconds.

‘More info?’

Then he says, sullenly, ‘Your coat is still on.’

‘Taxis are wait—’

‘Thanks.’ But as I touch the seam that deactivates the image capture, there’s a snatch of green and silver reflected in my sleeve.

‘Shit.’

‘…transport you to Junction.’

Kendra-sweet is limp and unyielding when I yank her to her feet, my arm around her waist, ignoring the gloppy strands of puke clinging to her hair and streaked down the front of the pink dress, like she’s been on a particularly heroic binge. ‘Dammit. Help me!’ But Eddie is hesitant.

‘Please be advised…’

‘What’s wrong with her arm? What if—?’

‘It’s not.’

‘…to terrorist action.’

‘But how do you know?’

‘More info?’

I pull the gun on him. Precarious, cos I’m holding up K, still unconscious and leaden against my hip. Eddie blinks at it stupidly. ‘You’re not allowed to shoot a clan mate.’

‘Try me.’

We load her up between us, though the little shit is careful not to touch her or the spillage on her dress. She gags like she’s going to kotch again, and Eddie nearly drops her. I cuff him with the back of my hand, the one that’s not holding her up, so I knock his hoodie back off his head with the muzzle of the gun. He whimpers.

At the entrance, there is a row of lumo orange infocones in a row as sharp as soldiers, effectively cordoning off the area.

‘This station is closed. Taxis are available on the concourse to transport you to Junction. Please be advised. This station is closed. More info?’