The Thinning

A Cyberpunk Revolution

Hiro Miyazaki

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Chapter 1

The smell of plastic was everywhere and in the drainage pipes, it was no different. Everything was made out of plastic. The shirt he was wearing? Plastic. His shoes, his goddamn underpants? Plastic. The drainage pipes, the medians on the roads for all he knew, hell, even the crank he had in a bag in the inside of his plastic jacket was probably 80% plastic too.

And where the hell was Steve? Davion had a big day ahead of him. Lots of places to go, lots of people who needed crank. This Steve guy had sounded desperate, which wasn’t usually Davion’s scene. Those guys usually flipped. But with the Crank King breathing down his neck, he was running out of options.

And so where did that leave him? Standing on the little walkway at the outer edge of the drainage pipe, watching the sludge slide down into the water, waiting for some psycho to show up, needing a fix. Helluva life he had.

But what else was he supposed to do? This wasn’t a world for nice people. It was a place where kindness would get you killed. And he should know because he’d seen it. He’d seen it a thousand times. It was no longer just “Nice guys finish last,” but “Nice guys wound up a trophy on some psychopath’s wall.” And that definitely was something he wanted to be.

Footsteps sounded up above him. Davion reached for the blaster he kept in the shoulder holster and waited for the signal. If he knew crank junkies well enough, and he did, Steve was sure to forget the signal at least once.

A second later it came: rat-tat-tat on the top of the drainage pipe. Wrong. Davion rolled his eyes. He was sure it wasn’t someone trying to get the drop on him, but how sure could he be? He waited again and this time, it came: rat-tat-t-tat. Also wrong.

He gripped the blaster tighter. If he didn’t get it right by the third time, he’d told Steve, he’d blast him. No questions asked. He’d send him into the ocean with all the other plastics, right out of the drainage pipe. He didn’t care. He’d done it before.

Murmurs came from over top of him. Curses. Pacing. Finally whoever was up there made the sound: rat-t-tat-tat.

“Took you long enough,” Davion said. “I’m down here.”

Steve crawled down from on top of the drainage pipe. He was skinny, covered in scabs. He looked, frankly, like shit, but what else had Davion expected?

Steve held out a shaking hand.

“Nuh-uh,” Davion said. “Credits. Hand them over.”

“I don’t have any.”

Davion wound up like he was going to hit Steve, but the junkie cowered and placed his arms over his head, protectively, and said, “Wait!”

“Make it fast,” Davion said.

“I can get them, of course. There was just a mix-up. You know, with the guy who owes me? I can get it to you this afternoon. All of the credits.”

“Not good enough. Take a hike.”

Davion tried to get around Steve, but Steve got in his way. He didn’t have time for this. There was a lot of work ahead of him and that meant a lot of travel, a lot of waiting for people to get the right knocking signal—and it was already dark.

“I can do it,” Steve said. “I’m a trustworthy guy.”

Davion went to push him out of the way, but the clicking of a switchblade opening caught his ear, even above the muck that was being shot out of the tunnel and into the water.

Steve’s eyes had turned desperate. He didn’t want to kill Davion, that was obvious. But he would if given the chance.

“I’m gonna count to three,” Steve said. “And if I don’t get the crank, I’m gonna—”

Davion landed a backhand against Steve’s jaw. He was expecting he’d have to do this, but he didn’t expect Steve’s jaw to be synth. Something cracked in Davion’s hand and he grabbed hold of it to ease the throbbing, instinctively put it between his legs, and groaned.

Which was when Steve shoved him into the side of the tunnel and placed a knife against his throat.

Behind Steve was the roaring of the drainage. Davion took a deep breath.

“I’ll get it for you, you psycho,” Davion said. “Just put the knife away.”

“I’ll kill you if you don’t. I swear.”

“I know. Just put it away. The hell am I gonna do with a busted hand anyway?”

Steve fell for it. He dropped the knife and Davion went for the blaster, but Steve was fast. He saw his mistake and pushed Davion into the wall harder, wrapped both hands around the blaster, and put everything he had into prying it away.

The son of a bitch. He was strong for a junkie. How much of him was synth? His muscles, maybe, because as hard as Davion tried—

Finally, Davion swung one of his legs out and swept Steve’s feet out from underneath him. Steve tumbled down onto his back, the roaring water just underneath him now. He put his hands up in surrender and something like fear came over him.

“Alright,” Steve said. “You win. I won’t do anything.”

But that was bullshit. Davion knew crank junkies too well to fall for that. He levelled the gun at Steve’s head and sent a round right in between his eyes. Bits of blood, bone, and metal flew out in all directions in a sickening sound that would have chilled Davion if he hadn’t done this a thousand times before.

The dumb bastard. Davion put his foot on Steve’s chest and sent the junkie’s body into the drainage. He even watched it fall out into the ocean, limp.

Another deal gone south. He was going to have to put a lot of work in to keep the Crank King off his tail.

***

Sometimes, when he stood outside Neoteric City, it was like seeing the place new. Even though he’d been born there and spent his whole life there—although where else could he have possibly been?—there was something nightmarish about it. Something almost surreal about how dark it was, the smells, and the sounds. And in those moments, he’d sometimes wonder whether it really had to be like this, if this was as good as it would get.

He opened the door to his apartment. Of course this was as good as it would get. What else did he expect? What did he think he deserved? This ratty apartment of his seemed tailor-made for him with its cramped quarters, empty bottles, and old VR set stashed away in the corner. He was every bit as austere, severe, and neglected as his surroundings.

What’s more, he was completely alone. Which was just as it should have been.

He sat down on the couch and looked at the VR set. It had been a long day. That first deal hadn’t gone according to plan and a couple of the others had stiffed him on credits. One guy had paid in fakes. He’d have to give that guy a visit tomorrow, but the thought of being around that junkie smell for any longer than he had to made him nauseous.

That meant maybe dusting off the old VR, didn’t it? Going into Eden. Dialling back on life. Not smelling these smells for even just a second, walking around in the digital environment with its clear-cut goals and cooperative play and all that. The opposite, in other words, of what it was like out here.

He took a deep breath and before he knew it, he’d turned the console on and placed the VR helmet over his head. The foam on the underside was a familiar sensation but it had become stiff with age. He wondered if he was ever going to have enough money to afford a new one but before that thought went anywhere, he blinked and—

There it was. Eden. The helmet stimulated his brain to make him smell flowers. To make him have to blink away the sunlight, to feel the breeze over his shoulders. He bent down and touched the grass and felt the blades against his fingertips.

Somewhere off in the distance, someone laughed. It drew his attention but all he could see were long, rolling hills adorned with trees, bushes, and animal life running from plant to plant. A world without death.

And then someone came over the hill, dressed in the kind of garb you’d find in books from the early 2000’s. T-shirts, jeans, sneakers. A far cry from the plastic he and everyone else wore out in the real world. And this character was a man, smiling and waving for Davion to come join him.

It was almost embarrassing. But he ran toward the man and up the hill until the party revealed itself on the other side. There were maybe thirty of them, each standing around, waiting for the leader, the one who’d summoned Davion, to speak.

The leader shook Davion’s hand and put his other hand on Davion’s shoulder. It was brotherly and it brought a smile to Davion’s face.

“We needed one more,” the leader said. “I’m Gatrix. We’re playing a friendly game of Find The Flag with some folks across the field there. You in?”

“Of course,” Davion said, but something uneasy came over him.

He paused, taking note of what it might have been. His jaw hung open and his eyes glazed over as Gatrix said something to him, but it was something he couldn’t make out. Because he knew what that feeling was—even though his brain was locked into Eden, there was something happening in the real world.

Gamers called the sensation Twin-Brain. It happened when your brain was getting data from two worlds at the same time.

What it was was annoying. He muttered something about being sorry and then took the VR helmet off and was immediately hit with how musty his apartment smelled, how the empty whiskey bottle at the other end of the apartment stank, how the air was stale and the furniture dusty.

This was no Eden. He nearly threw his VR helmet across the room as the knock sounded at his door, the one that had interrupted his game time. But as he went to rush toward it and throw it open, he remembered that this was likely going to get him killed.

He took a deep breath. His blaster was still in his shoulder holster. He took it out and stood up as slowly as possible. The knock was getting more and more urgent, louder. There was a voice on the other end.

“Davion?” it said. “Are you in there?”

Davion leaned against the wall just beside the door. He kept his blaster ready and raised.

“Who is it?” he said.

“Banks.”

Banks? That wasn’t possible.

Davion shook his head. “Bullshit. Who are you?”

“Open the door. Come on, man, you’ll see.”

Oh, he’d open the door, alright. He’d open the door and blast him to a million pieces.

He reached out for the doorknob and swung the door open, spun around so he faced the hallway, and levelled his blaster at what he was sure would be the man’s chest, already envisioning the violence that would come, the spray of blood, the body flying back into the wall.

He never pulled the trigger. He stopped. Sweat poured down his temples and onto his jaw. He blinked several times to get a better look at the man in front of him, the man who was covered in dirt, who wore rags for clothes and who shivered in fear, his eyes darting one way and then the other as if he expected someone to be following him.

It was a trick. Davion knew it was.

He grabbed the man by the wrist and yanked him into the apartment, threw him down on the couch, slammed the door shut with his foot, and aimed the blaster square for the man’s head.

“Tell me again,” Davion said. “Tell me who you are.”

“Banks,” the man said. He raised his hands in surrender. “I swear, man, it’s me!”

“But you can’t be Banks.”

Couldn’t it be? Even with the stubble and the dirt, it certainly looked like him. His voice was a dead ringer.

Except that Banks had died twelve years ago.

Chapter 2

He wasn’t sure how much time passed. He knew that neither of them moved for what felt like an eternity. That each breath could have taken anything from moments to millennia as far as he was concerned. The possibility that he might be dreaming dawned on him.

What he was looking at was an impossibility. It was a man long known to have died quite some time ago. A man whose funeral Davion had attended. Whose body he saw at the visitation. Who he saw get put in the ground.

So if this man was claiming to be Banks, then either this was an imposter—or they’d put someone, or something, else into the dirt.

“Start talking,” Davion said. “I wanna know who you are. I wanna know how you found me. I wanna know—Jesus Christ, just start talking, will you?”

“Okay.” The man—Banks, or whoever it was—sat up, never letting his hands drop from the surrender position. “My name is Banks. I’m a friend of yours. You’re in the directory. Honestly, you’re not that hard to find.”

“And what do you want?”

“Help.”

Davion shook his head. It really did seem like it was him. Everything from the way his jaw moved, how his lips pursed when he spoke, was all Banks.

Davion grabbed a chair and kept his gun levelled at the man as he sat down. He wiped sweat from his brow. His breathing was getting a little out of hand, but that was okay. He just needed to slow that down, right, take a deep breath…

“Who’s buried in your grave?” Davion said.

“I don’t know. It could be anyone. Could be a dummy for all I know. They do things like that.”

“Who does?”

“Who do you think?” Banks laughed. “The Saviors.”

That was always a bugaboo word amongst the paranoid members of society and probably was ever since they started. Davion remembered the history books well enough: The government had been given an increasing amount of power as the natural world was destroyed by the remnants of industrial technology. Eventually, people came to rely on them, the government, so much that the government became all-powerful.

Now, they mostly operated in secret. They doled out food, even if it was rarely enough. They made laws behind closed doors. And the rumors were that they behaved like spoiled Roman Emperors.

It was no wonder everyone got so paranoid about them. But faking a man’s death?

“You’re crazy,” Davion said. “Get out of my apartment.”

“But I—”

“You got a lot of nerve coming in here like this. Banks was a buddy of mine. A good buddy. I don’t know how you knew that or how you came to look like him but I don’t have time to find out.”

“I can explain—”

Davion pulled the hammer back on his blaster. The man claiming to be Banks stiffened. He licked his lips.

The man took a breath. But he didn’t seem to want to do as he was told.

“You have to listen to me,” Banks said. “I need your help.”

“Find somebody else. You have three seconds.”

Banks didn’t move a muscle. If anything, he seemed more resolute. Even as Davion counted down, slowly, trying to give the man time, he sat as still as a Buddhist monk, not sweating, not doing much of anything.

Davion counted down to one. His own heart raced and skipped and did all manner of nervous things. Was he really going to shoot this guy? He was sure he could get away with it in this rat hole he lived in. No cops ever came this way. Cops were for rich folks.

People around here dealt with things their own way. And that meant leaving everyone alone, no matter what they got up to. So, sure, he could shoot this guy. But could he shoot this guy?

He set his gun down in his lap. Banks smiled at him in a way that didn’t seem mocking or anything like that. He just smiled and waited while Davion closed his eyes, aware of the amount he was sweating, which was, by the way, considerably more than the man who, by all accounts, was about to be shot.

“See?” the man said. “I knew you wouldn’t shoot me.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because you’re a good man.”

Davion laughed. “You’ll have to do better than that. If you are Banks—and I’m sure you’re not—then you haven’t known me for quite some time. I’m not the man I used to be.”

“Sure you are. Now listen—when we were younger, we were at a dinner party, right? Or what we’d call a dinner party. Really it was a bunch of us sitting in an old warehouse drinking together and eating rations. It was you, me… I think Linx was there, remember her?”

“Used to wear leopard print.”

The man smiled. “No, sir. She used to wear leather pants.”

That was true. Davion had been trying to throw him off with false information.

“Do you remember,” Davion said, “what she told me? Right before we left?”

“That’s what I’m trying to say. She said, ‘All men are in a vast conspiracy to infect as many people with their nonsense as possible.’ And you laughed so hard you dropped a whole glass of—what was that stuff you drank?”

“Coolan’s. Laboratory beer.”

The man—Banks—smiled and nodded.

For God’s sake, how was that possible?

Davion stood up and walked toward him, his eyes glued to Banks’. There were lines around his eyes, more than you’d expect for a man his age. But there was no doubt now that this was his friend, somehow come back from the dead.

He shook his head and knelt down and placed a hand on Banks’ shoulder.

“Alright,” he said. “I think we need a drink. And then you need to tell me everything.”

***

They went into the bar next door, a place called Betty’s. It was as rough a place as any in the area, enough that anyone from another part of town tended to turn away in caution. At night, there would be men—always men—spilling out into the streets, throwing punches so hard it sounded like beating wet meat with a stick.

Banks, for his part, seemed right at home. Even as they walked past one man breaking another’s arm over a game, tucked away at a table in the corner, he either didn’t notice the brutality of the violence or didn’t care.

Instead, he waltzed right up to the bar, eager, ahead even of Davion and asked the bartender for the strongest thing he could get. Davion said he’d have the same and the bartender poured them each something that looked like it was out of a mad scientist movie.

It tasted like nothing he’d even had either. Davion coughed but Banks savored it and asked for another, which the bartender obliged.

“Feels good,” Banks said. “It’s been a while since I’ve had a drink.”

“You might wanna take it easy.”

Banks laughed. “The stuff I’ve been doing? Booze is the least of my worries.”

They sat for a moment in silence while Banks got accustomed to his drink and Davion ordered something more palatable. Just beer was all he needed and he waited for when Banks was ready to start talking.

“Some of it’s hard to remember,” Banks said. “You know? Like I was out walking, I remember—and I’d had this sense for quite a while that I was being followed. I’d hear footsteps behind me and whatever. But every time I looked, there was either nobody or, you know… Well, some nobody.”

“Sounds like paranoia to me.”

He shook his head. “That’s what I thought too. You know, I even saw a doctor? Anyway I—well, I was walking home the one day and I got jumped by a bunch of guys. Big guys with dark suits on. And masks. Real spooky things. These guys are cyborgs, I found out later. Headhunters.”

“For who? The Saviors?”

“You got it.” Banks finished his drink and ordered a beer. “I don’t really remember what happened after that. I just remember waking up in this chamber, like a medical something or other. And them doing tests on me.”

Oh, boy. This was where the paranoia turned into something more dangerous, Davion could tell. He adjusted his seat and made a mental note that maybe his friend had had some kind of emotional trauma. Or a total break from reality.

“Anyway,” Banks said, “all the stories they tell about the Saviors are true. You know, they take drugs like you wouldn’t believe. They’re always doing the most bizarre sex rituals and things, they’re not, you know… They’re not good people.”

“So that’s what they did? Turned you into a sex object?”

“Worse. They made us fight.”

Davion couldn’t help himself—he threw his hands up and rolled his eyes. Banks caught this, obviously, and tried stammering out a response before Davion cut him off.

“Look,” he said, “I’ll buy that they’re a bunch of crazed sex lunatics. Obviously. But that they, what, kidnap poor folks and make them fight? What do they do, put bets on you?”

“No. They just wanna see blood. It’s like a power thing.”

“I know this is gonna be hard for you to understand. But whatever’s happened to you, you need to see a doctor.”

Banks’ eyes lit up. He grabbed Davion by the wrist, his grip hard enough it surprised Davion, who tried to pull away but couldn’t break his grasp.

“Promise me you won’t do that,” Banks said. “You don’t understand. I escaped from there. They’re looking for me.”

“Then what the hell are you doing around me?”

“Because.” Banks was surprised. “You’re a cop. You’re supposed to handle things like this.”

Davion’s heart dropped. Banks had been gone for so long, he didn’t know everything that had happened in the meantime. Obviously. But that was why he found Davion. He wanted someone who could solve this problem for him.

That wasn’t Davion. He pulled out enough credits for the drinks and a small tip, then left with Banks in tow. Much as Davion wanted to ignore him, his old friend just wouldn’t leave him alone.

When they stepped out into the dark streets, the rain started. The wetness on Davion’s neck reminded him he needed a shower. Hell, Banks did too. So did a lot of the other people he saw wandering the streets. Crank junkies, by the looks of them.

The occasional car flew overhead. But Davion kept his gaze on the ground as Banks came up beside him and put a hand on his shoulder.

“What is it?” Banks said. “Jesus Christ, aren’t you gonna help me?”

“I can’t. I’m sorry.”

“Well, why the hell not? I mean, I came looking for you, I—I’ve always thought of you as dependable. Now what? You’re gonna, you’re gonna leave me out here, to get… I mean, Christ, man, they could kill me.”

“I can’t help you because I’m not a cop.”

Banks was shocked. “Well… So? Don’t you still have connections or something?”

“No. They know who I am now. Come on, man, you see how I live? I sell crank. You know the Crank King? You heard that name?”

Banks shook his head. “You’ll help me. I know you will. You were always good for it.”

Davion shook his head and went to leave, but Banks stuck something in his hand. Davion let it sit there and he watched Banks leave, walk up the rain-soaked sidewalk, and then disappear down an alley.

He’d left Davion a card with his address on it. But what the hell did Davion need that for?

He almost threw it into the gutter when something came over him. He didn’t know what. But he placed it in his pocket and walked the short way up the stairs and into his apartment.

An hour later, he got a phone call.

Chapter 3

The call had been frantic. It was Banks, obviously, but Davion couldn’t make out anything he was saying. Every word the guy said came out distorted through the phone because he screamed every word. Even as Davion tried to calm him down, there came the sound of crashing and more screams.

Davion’s heart almost stopped. Jesus Christ, was somebody killing Banks? He didn’t have time to think about it. He rushed out into the night, using his phone to hail an air taxi, his eyes darting around the skies until one landed in front of him.

The guy driving had long, greasy hair. And he smelled bad. But Davion got into the back anyway, gave the guy the address and told him to step on it.

“No can do,” the driver said. “One more ticket and I lose my license.”

“Oh, yeah?” Davion pulled his blaster out and laid it on the driver seat’s headrest. “If I were you, it wouldn’t be losing my license I’d be afraid of.”

“Alright.” The driver swallowed. “You crazy bastard.”

The driver hauled them up into the skies and pulled into air traffic. He ducked and weaved, crossed lanes vertical and horizontal, ignoring the barrage of horns and yells out of windows. He even started to sweat, darting his eyes over to Davion’s blaster.

“Hey, man,” he said. “You gonna get rid of that thing or what?”

Davion didn’t answer. Sure, he might get rid of it. If they got to the destination without any interference. Which, as it stood, seemed to be in the cards. But he’d have to see.

Traffic blurred. The engine groaned as the driver pressed his anxious foot down harder against the gas. Davion’s mind went back to the desperate screaming in Banks’ voice, to what he might find when he got to the address—Banks was crazy, that was for sure, but was that what Davion had heard in his old friend’s voice? Was it insanity?

That was outside Davion’s purview. All he knew was that something about that voice had drawn him toward it, some part of him that still wanted to—but he put that thought out of his mind. This wasn’t the goodness of his heart speaking, that was for sure. No, this was something else.

The driver set the car down in front of what must have been the most worn-down building Davion had ever seen. The smell of rot came through even the windows of the cab, the stench of rotten wood—and who made anything out of wood anymore? This must have been an old, old building. Davion coughed and pulled his shirt up to use as a mask, then got out of the cab.

“Hey!” the driver said. “That’ll be twenty credits, asshole!”

Davion looked into the cab at the man’s license on the back of the passenger seat and tapped his gun against it.

“Mo Sampson?” Davion said. “That you?”

Mo, the driver, swallowed. “Maybe. What’s it to you?”

“If I even get the sense that somebody’s after me, for whatever reason, I’m coming for you. Understand?”

Mo’s face went pale. It was at that moment Davion was sure the man would never go to the police. He didn’t have the balls to do it. He just put the cab in gear and flew away while Davion stood in front of this awful building, took a deep breath, ascended the short staircase to the front door, and went inside.

Inside was even worse than outside. There were ghostly moans and groans coming from all corners. There were dozens of rooms inside, each of them without a door, or with a door that was broken and strewn about on the ground. Beyond that, it looked like there were worn-out mattresses, people lying on the floor, covered in vomit, wearing tattered clothes.

Crank junkies. He probably knew some of these people. One of them he was sure he’d seen just the other day.

Nobody on the main floor was awake. Some of them, by the looks of it, weren’t even alive. He ascended the creaky stairs to the second floor, where there was someone standing in the hallway, greasy, pale, scratching his arms. He was mumbling something.

Davion gripped his blaster tightly. Just in case.

“Can you hear me?” Davion said.

The junkie nodded. “Scams! Screaming across the sky, the flaming rod of self flagellation. Ever seen a bum scream in the night? Farts as far as the eye can see, an intense ramrod of farcical patrons, none more useless than the last!”

“Do you speak English?” Davion’s patience was thin already. “I’m looking for someone. Goes by the name Banks.”

“They’re the ones what took my wife!” The junkie’s eyes opened wide. “Taller than a mule! Camels, dead, everywhere! Pustulated grains of sandpaper!”

Useless. Davion brushed him off, then looked around for evidence, something to point him to where Banks’ room was. The floors were so messy it was impossible to tell if someone had been through here recently or not.

He went up to the third floor. The lights flickered overhead. The stench up there was even worse than it was elsewhere. Davion tried to fan it away but it was no use. He opened the door to the first room and found it empty.

Which was odd. Every other room in this building was occupied. He entered and listened as intently as he could. He couldn’t hear anything, not a sound. There was the usual torn mattress, stained with urine and feces, both of which contributed to the smell. And there was a boarded up window. Crank junkies never liked to know what time of day it was.

But there was also a closet. Its door was closed. Something about it caught his attention and gave him a sense of dread.

He raised his blaster and aimed at the door.

“Is somebody in there?” he said.

No answer. But that didn’t mean it was empty.

He took one hand away from the blaster and reached for the door, keeping the weapon steady with his other hand. He wrapped his fingers around the doorknob, felt the greasy brass and turned, pulled the door away—

And something fell out.

He couldn’t help himself. He shot twice, missing both times, as he backed away from whatever it was, his eyes blinking rapidly. His heart almost burst from his chest. His breathing was fast. Intense.

It was a body. Banks’ body.

He was dead.

***

But how?

Davion flipped him over. The wound on his neck was the obvious candidate. It had been, by the looks of it, torn out. Banks’ eyes remained in terror. His mouth was agape and his shirt was slick with blood.

This had been what Banks had called him for. Someone had been killing him. And these junkies didn’t do anything about it.

But why leave him in the closet? Banks’ story ran through his mind, about the Saviors, the fighting ring, whatever that was. Had somebody killed him because of what he knew? If they had, maybe they left him in the closet because they were close to being caught.

If that was true, then how did they escape? The window was still boarded shut.

Davion left the room and went to the one next door. In it was a man who was clearly dead, but he let that pass. The boards of this room’s window had been removed. And the window itself had been opened.

Davion looked out the window. It wasn’t likely that a person could survive that fall. At least, not without breaking his legs. That meant someone with enhancements, at the very least.

Before he could leave and head back for the room with Banks’ body, there came the whooping of sirens. His attention was drawn up to the sky’s apogee, where a squad of police cars headed in his direction.

That son of a bitch. Mo. He’d squealed. Davion would have to pay him a visit when he got the chance. For now, he had to find something to go on other than Banks’ crazy story and the possibility of a murderous enhanced lurking around in the dark somewhere. After all, what was so interesting about a murderous enhanced in this town?

He ran back into the room Banks was in. He examined the body one last time, making mental note of the wound. An enhanced could have torn out Banks’ neck. For sure. Nothing else about him seemed to have been harmed.

So the body was left because the murderer was almost caught. He’d have to come back to that because the sirens were getting awfully close. He patted down Banks’ clothes to make sure there was nothing in there that might—but wait. There was something. Something in Banks’ pocket.

Davion reached in and found a piece of paper, folded. It wasn’t often you saw paper anymore. Davion wondered where Banks might have gotten it.

Meanwhile, downstairs, the front door was kicked open. The police were inside.

He put the piece of paper in his pocket and scanned for an exit. The only thing he could think of was the window in the next room, but, again, only an enhanced could make that fall.

He’d have to try something else.

He ran into the next room where the dead man lay. His stomach turned thinking about what he was going to do. But what choice did he have? He quickly stripped off his own clothes, threw his blaster into that room’s closet, took the dead man’s clothes and put them on. Then he laid down on the bed, almost held back vomiting from the smell, but then let himself vomit anyway, and began writhing around as if he was in pain.

He knew how crank junkies acted, maybe better than anyone. He screamed and spoke as much nonsense as he could muster, just like the man on the second floor.

“The screen is coming! False gods dying in the moonlight! A naked man pales in front of the broad strokes of guillotine while behind him stand a million mighty marches, all kicking their cans at the sight of strokes!”

And on.

The police inspected every room. They made fun of the crank junkies amongst themselves. They even brought Mo around to look at some of the men living in the building. Davion made sure not to look him in the eyes. Crank junkies never looked anyone in the eyes.

It took only minutes for the cops to give up. They told Mo if he saw this guy again to give them a call.

Oh, Mo’d be seeing him again. He shouldn’t worry about that.

Once the coast was clear, Davion threw himself off the bed and ran to the window. He stuck his head out to breathe in something closer to air than whatever he’d been breathing in for the last God knew how long. He threw up out the window and watched it land splat onto the ground.

He nearly collapsed. He couldn’t get the dead man’s clothes off him fast enough.

Then he pulled out and unfolded the piece of paper. It read:

“Davion. They’ve come for me. If you want proof, go to W 15th at 4AM. Stick to the shadows.”

It was 3:30. He put his clothes back on and headed out into the street.

Chapter 4

There was no more dangerous area of town than the one he was about to enter.

The stories of it were legion: It was a den of serial killers, sex criminals, human traffickers, and things so dark there weren’t names yet for what they were doing. Davion had been into the area before and so he knew his way around it decently enough.

The address was for a bar. And not just any bar. This was the roughest bar he’d ever been to. He’d been in there one time and saw a man get stabbed through the eye and thrown in a dumpster. When Davion had asked what it was over, the bartender said to him, “Boredom.”

Now, he walked in through those doors and felt right at home. He knew some of the eyes that glared up at him. Some of the men behind those eyes had picked fights with him before. More than a few of those had ended with Davion coming out without a scratch. Some of the others, by Davion’s figuring, had gotten lucky.

The bartender was a man named Henry. He was an old guy, partly enhanced after one of the patrons here tore his arm off in a disagreement over the bill. Henry not only got a new and better arm, but found the guy at his house later and tore off not just the man’s arm, but his other arm and both of his legs. Rumor had it that man was left outside to fend for himself and starved to death. Nobody came to help him.

Davion took a seat at the bar and ordered a beer. Henry gave him one and followed it up with a smile.

“Been a while,” Henry said. “A couple of the fellas have been asking about you.”

“Yeah, well, I’m not in the mood for a fight quite yet.”

“A few more of those and you will be. What brings ya here?”

Davion looked around at the crowd. “I’m not sure yet. What time you got?”

Something came over Henry. He averted his eyes, muttered some incoherent thing and then went back to polishing glasses.

Davion leaned over the bar.

“I asked what time you got.”

“I heard you,” Henry said. “Don’t think I don’t know what that means, neither. Look, you’re a good guy, Davion. But you wanna get the hell out of here if that’s what you came looking for.”

“And what did I come looking for?”

Henry shook his head.

“Alright,” Davion said. “A buddy of mine, guy named Banks. You know him?”

“Sure.” Henry nodded. “I knew him, that is. He’s been dead for years.”

“That’s what I thought too. Turns out I was wrong. He told me to come here at four o’clock tonight. But somebody killed him. I think it was an enhanced. You know anything about that?”

Henry looked down at his arm. “It wasn’t me.”

“Then who was it?”

“I told ya, you wanna get out of here. This isn’t some fun little project you can take up to kill some time.”

“Don’t I know it.” Davion finished his beer and pushed the glass forward to order another. “So what can you tell me?”

Henry handed him another beer. “That you wanna get out of here. How’s that? Just go. Leave. Pretend this never happened. Pretend you never saw Banks again.”

“Do they come in here? Is that what happens?”

“Who?”

Davion gritted his teeth. “Tell me if it’s the Saviors who come in here.”

Sweat dripped down Henry’s face. Davion had never seen him like this before, agitated. He was genuinely scared. His jaw shivered, his lips quivered. He was terrified.

Henry looked around the bar as if to make sure they weren’t being watched. Davion spun around on his stool to see what Henry saw and by the looks of things, everyone was caught up in their own business. Nobody seemed interested in them.

“Alright,” Henry said. “I can’t—I can’t tell you everything. But what I can tell you is gonna cost you.”

“How much?”

“How much crank you got?”

Davion rolled his eyes. “When the hell did you get into doing crank?”

“None of your business. How much you got?”

Davion reached into his jacket pocket and set maybe four grams on the table. Enough to last even a committed junkie a whole weekend.

Henry palmed the crank and put it in his pocket. It was clear by the look in his eyes that Henry had developed a habit. It was almost sad, thinking of what would happen to Henry in a matter of weeks if he kept taking the stuff. It didn’t take long to settle into your brain, that was for sure.

“I’ve seen some shit,” Henry said. “Kinda things you wouldn’t believe unless you saw them with your own eyes.”

“Kinda things crank helps you see?”

“Shut up.” Henry almost spat. “It’s not like that. Look, four o’clock I kick everyone here out, right? They go wandering through the streets. Some of them get rounded up. Those guys never come back.”

“Where do they get rounded up from?”

“I don’t think you understand. They don’t just take people they’ve come looking for. They take witnesses. It’s spooky, man. Not something you wanna be around for.”

“Call me curious.”

Henry rolled his eyes. “It’s your funeral. You wanna see something? Some of these guys live around the abandoned construction yard in the back. You can’t miss it. It’s a big bunch of steel beams and whatever else that never got finished.”

“Uh-huh. Then what?”

“Just wait around.” Impatience had crept into Henry’s voice. “You’ll see. But if you start hearing about a thing named Atax…? Well. You’re a tough guy. But not even you stand a chance against something like that.”

Whatever. Davion thanked him and left him a decent tip. The time was ten minutes to four, which gave him enough time to find a decent vantage point.

He went out the back and saw the building Henry had been talking about. There were floors, sure, but few walls. And no roof. Which meant the rain must have been a pain in the ass. But there were floors and on those floors seemed to be mattresses and the odd piece of other furniture.

It was the kind of place you expected the losers, the killers, and the sadists to live in. These kinds of people focused on nothing but their obsessions, their fantasies of what it would be like to hurt someone. They were the real dregs of society and they didn’t have time for material amenities. What mattered was making the fantasy come to life.

There was a large dumpster off to one side. Davion could hide behind there, he was sure. It was right next to an alley he could bail down in case he had to. With only a few minutes left until four o’clock, he crouched down behind it and watched.

The denizens of the bar fell out the back. There was a commotion, a bit of fighting. Someone said something about wanting to kill someone else. That was quickly broken up.

But as the rest of the men crawled into the abandoned building, one of the men stumbled out, a skinny guy who looked like he couldn’t hold his liquor very well. He folded himself almost in half and vomited. The contents of his stomach splashed against the pavement and he spat more than once and groaned.

“Drunk,” he muttered to himself, as if he’d asked himself how he’d gotten this way. “Go home…”

But then a sound came from the darkness: “Psst. Hey, mister.”

Davion peered around the dumpster as best he could. The skinny man looked over to his left, where there was a woman. And not just any woman, but a woman dressed in what could only be described as a set of plastic straps which barely covered her. She was calling to the skinny man by crooking her finger at him. The skinny man, for his part, looked around as if to check that this wasn’t some stunt being pulled for a hidden camera.

“Yeah?” the man said.

“I’ve been looking for you.” The woman turned and walked away from him. “Don’t you wanna come with me?”

The skinny man laughed to himself. He checked again for hidden cameras, for anything that should tip him off that this was a joke. He again found nothing. He only laughed to himself once more, reached into his pocket and pulled out a knife.

“You’re gonna regret this,” he said to himself. Then to her, “Coming, darling.”

Nothing about this sat right with Davion. It was obvious this was some sort of a trap. But he knew the man he was dealing with wasn’t a genius. So he got out from behind his dumpster—was that a stupid idea? He didn’t have a choice though, did he? He had to see what was going on.

He followed the skinny man through the dark as he pursued this mysterious woman. Davion was careful to time his steps with the skinny man’s, careful to pause when the man paused, to not make a single noise not made by the skinny man also.

There was an alley up ahead. The woman turned down it and the skinny man chuckled as he turned down there himself. Within seconds, Davion was standing on the other side of the corner, peering around to get a good look at them.

The skinny man had his arms wrapped around the woman’s waist. She was teasing him, pulling away every time he tried to kiss her. He thought this was funny and went along with it. Evidently she hadn’t seen the knife that he still held in his hands.

“You like teasing me?” the skinny man said.

“Is that how you feel?” she said. “Teased?”

“I feel like I wanna get inside you.” The skinny man laughed at his private joke. “You know what I mean? Is that what you want?”

“I only want to drive you crazy…”

“That’s the thing.” The skinny man pulled the knife-hand back. “I’m already crazy.”

Davion knew what was coming before she did. He cried something out to get her attention, but he was too late. Even as he ran toward them and she locked eyes with his, the skinny man’s attention couldn’t be pulled away from his task.

He rammed the knife up into the woman’s stomach. She grunted and her eyes bulged. The skinny man pulled the knife out and rammed it in again and again, quickly, laughing to himself as he did it.

The hand was like a missile, finding its target again and again. Each time brought a new wild look in the skinny man’s eyes. This was something he did for fun. He’d done it before. He probably thought about this night after night. Davion had known guys like him his whole life. He’d arrested them when he was a cop when he could. And as a crank dealer, he helped them get high.

And now his hand grew slick with what was inside that woman. Davion was sure the knife was starting to slip from his grasp. That much blood—it would interfere with his grip, he knew it would.

But as he looked closer at the man’s hand, frozen at the sight of something as brutal as this, he wondered—could he be seeing things? Because while he expected the slickness on the skinny man’s hand to be dark red, the colour of blood, what he saw was no such thing.

It was a transparent fluid. Like water, but thicker. It hung off the man’s hands in globs. And right as Davion noticed it, the man seemed to notice it also. The fire went out of his eyes. Confusion remained. The skinny man looked down at the woman and Davion followed his gaze.

There should have been guts pouring out of this woman’s stomach. But there were none. There were gears. Components. The woman was an android.

That was the trap. She was a lure.

The skinny man must have noticed Davion because suddenly his gaze shot up and the sadistic fire that was there only seconds ago turned into something vengeful. He pointed his knife upwards at Davion and took a step toward him.

“Who are you?” the man said. “Did you do this? You think this is funny?”

“Step back.” Davion gritted his teeth. “You don’t wanna get any closer.”

“Oh, yeah? You think you scare me? You not see what I just—?”

An engine roared overhead. Davion recognized it as being from a flight car. Something heavy. Possibly a truck. Something that could be used to carry people around.

The skinny man dropped his knife, placed his hands on the side of his head and screamed.

“They’re coming for me!” he said. “Jesus Christ, they found me!”

Davion had to run. But he couldn’t. His feet seemed glued to the ground. He tried to move but every muscle was so tense, frozen in place. Sounds were coming from all around him. It wasn’t clear where he should go. Should he go back the way he came?

He didn’t have time to think. Because all at once, a truck swung overhead, over top of the skinny man, who ran past Davion, pushed him out of the way, and went back toward the bar.

Footsteps came closer. The skinny man was right, it was the only place they could go. Davion put everything he had into running, drowning out the cacophony around him with thoughts of what might happen if he didn’t keep up his pace, if he didn’t put everything he had into running away.

The skinny man turned toward the back door of the bar. He grabbed hold of the handle and yanked on it. It was locked. The skinny man wailed. He turned around, looking for a way out.

But something came out of the darkness. Something big, something with weight behind it. It came from out of the abandoned building. Its eyes glowed red. It was shaped like a man, but it was much bigger than that.

A cyborg. Davion had heard about these things. He put on the brakes, skidded to a stop, and fell onto his side. The cyborg picked up the screaming, skinny man by the neck. He lifted him up with his enormous metal arm. He lifted him up like it was nothing.

“Take him!” the cyborg said.

And all at once, flight cars, trucks, and armed men came from all directions. Davion felt a hand grab hold of his shirt and lift him onto his feet. His heart stopped. He found himself staring into the face of a police officer, then a whole squad of police officers, all armed.

“Atax,” the cop said. “We have a witness.”

Atax—the cyborg. That was who Henry had warned him about.

But Davion didn’t let anyone respond. He pulled out his blaster, jammed it into the cop’s stomach and fired two rounds into him. His hand was smacked with the blood which shot out from the wound. He kicked the police officer away from him and ran toward the abandoned building.

Blaster fire sounded all around him. A whole squad of cops followed him.

There was no way out. He was surrounded.

Chapter 5

Panic. That was all he felt. His head closed in. His eyes bulged out of his skull. He wanted to scream. That thing was behind him. The cyborg, Atax—it was coming up on him. He could hear it. God, he could hear it. The footsteps. The machine. The cyborg.

Smells. What—vomit. Sweat. His own? The thing was coming. Eyes stared at him out of the darkness. His legs wanted to burst. But his feet… His feet kept moving. Even as they closed in. And they were closing in. They were closing in all around him. Bodies coming out of the shadows. Yelling. Screaming. Gunfire kicked up around his feet.

Something came out of his lungs. A scream. He’d never seen anything like that—Atax. The glowing eyes. The metal teeth. The look of something that had clawed up from Hell. And it was on his tail. It’d be faster than him. His time was running out.

They were going to take him. Take him to where they took his friend. His friend wasn’t crazy. He was dead. And he was right.

When he got to the other side of the building, his foot caught something and he tripped. His whole body skidded forward. His chin caught on the ground. He didn’t have enough time to catch himself, that was the problem. He only slid across the pavement, his skin screaming at him as it was torn open.

The footsteps were right behind him. He struggled up to his feet. Over his shoulder, that monstrous thing came. The thing that had taken the skinny man. Plus the whole army of police officers. They were coming for him and he couldn’t get up fast enough.

Then all at once, something passed over his body. A tingling sensation. At first he thought it was adrenaline but the police squad, Atax, everyone developed a strange, confused expression. Some of the cops even stopped and blinked as though they couldn’t believe what they saw.

Neither could he.

His arm was disappearing. If what he’d felt before was panic, this was something much darker. Much crazier. A pit of horror nestled in him and he screamed and looked around for his arm but found nothing. It was disappearing more and more, followed by the other one. Pieces flaked off like digital ash, glowed bright, and then flew away.

Someone yelled to grab him, but everyone, including Davion, knew they were too late. Something had gotten a hold of him. Something that was pulling him away, maybe even to his death. And the only thing he could think of was how lucky he was that he didn’t get pulled into the Saviors’ games. Whatever they were.

The strange feeling engulfed him. For a minute, all there was was blackness. It was like being in a dream. There was even a sense of waking up. Much to his surprise, his body returned. He patted himself down and felt his chest, his head. His legs. Between his legs, even, thank God.

But then why was everything black?

He extended his hands out and made contact with something like steel. He ran his fingers along it, trying to get a sense of what it was. But without light—well, the only thing he could do was bang on it, bash his fists against it. He called out for someone to help him but without knowing what he was in, he couldn’t know what—if anything—was on the other side.

Then light appeared in a thin line that illuminated part of his chest. It came from in front of him, along with a hissing noise as pressure was released and the machine he was in opened up to reveal a bright room, mostly plain, except for two people who stood in front of him.

His breathing was heavy. Where the hell was he?

He fell out of the machine and onto the ground. He felt the ground, felt how solid it was. He tried to catch his breath but couldn’t and only looked up at the two men, seeing Henry first, the barman, who knelt down beside him and extended an enhanced hand for Davion to grab onto.

Like he’d take that hand. He swatted it away and got to his feet, his eyes darting all around the room. He was sweating so bad he had to wipe it off his head. He fell backwards into the wall and pressed his hands against his chest.

“What,” he said, “in the name of Hell have you done to me?”

“It wasn’t my idea,” Henry said. “I just told him you might need a hand. And he owed me. This was the best he could come up with.”

“Who?” Davion said, but by then, he’d already seen him.

The Crank King was wearing a plastic crown on his head. He had eyeliner that looked like he was supposed to be an Egyptian princess. He wore purple robes like an old Roman Emperor and bare feet that seemed like they were always dirty. Presently, he had his arms folded and his chest puffed out. He was a bit overweight.

He smiled without showing his teeth. Davion couldn’t believe his eyes.

“You made it!” the Crank King said. “And just in time!”

“What is this?” Davion said. “What’d you do to me?”

“This?” The Crank King placed a hand on top of the egg-shaped machine Davion had come out of. “It’s called the Deus Ex Machina. It’s a teleporter. But only for sticky situations.”

“Teleporter? When did someone invent one of those?”

“His name was—you know, I don’t remember. He owed me some money. So I killed him and took the plans. You like it?”

Davion nodded. He was, of course, glad. But that didn’t answer the multitude of other questions he had, none of which the Crank King seemed keen on answering.  Davion didn’t get to even think of a response before the Crank King threw open the door to the room they were in to open up to—

Honestly, he could have guessed this was where the King would take him. It was an old hideout, one that was as secretive as a hideout could be. It was a kind of big hall with a number of machines, all of which were making crank. But there was a basketball court at the other end of the hall, at the end of a long, open space, like the inside of an enormous church.

There was a bar over to his right, which was nice. Without even thinking, he approached, ignoring that the Crank King was calling him[1][2][3][4]. He sat down on one of the stools, tried to ignore the sound of crank machines echoing through the long hall as he ordered the strongest drink the man had and took a long, thorough sip.

Meanwhile, the Crank King sat down on one side of him and Henry on the other. Frankly, Davion was more interested in ignoring them, even if they had just saved his life. But eventually, he just couldn’t put it off any longer.

“Well?” he said. “Which one of you wants to speak first?”

“You owe me,” the Crank King said. “A lot of money.”

Davion spun his stool around to face the man. His face was greasy. He had a lot of blackheads on his nose, which Davion had never noticed before. And his breath—but everyone knew about his breath. They say it was a case of halitosis that drove him to criminality. Couldn’t get a job in the real world.

But criminals always told stories. Spun yarns.

“What do I owe you money for?”

“You know,” the Crank King said. “Why are you playing this? The story you told was something like… I dunno, you got robbed coming out of one of the tunnels or something. By crank junkies.”

“That’s right.”

The Crank King smiled. “That was a lot of crank you lost.”

“You’ve got more. How much do you really think you lost?”

“I keep track. Of every penny.”

Davion snorted. “Makes you sound like a real—”

The Crank King grabbed him by the lapels. For a big fat guy, he was strong. Davion almost spilled his drink on the way up but made sure not to and didn’t even lose a drop. But his airway was being restricted by the Crank King’s fists.

“You think I brought you here out of the kindness of my own heart?” he said.

Davion gestured to Henry. “He said it was about money you owed him.”

“Are you kidding? This guy? I can just kill him. No offense, Henry.”

Henry shrugged.

“You owe me forty thousand credits. Either you get that for me, or you’re gonna—What do you know about this Atax character?”

“He’s big,” Davion said. “But he’s not so scary. Can you put me down…?”

“He’s more than just scary. He was once a man, they say. One of the killers you find out by Henry’s bar. He liked hurting people. A lot. One of the Saviors got a hold of him and every day, they’d take a little piece off. Death by a thousand cuts. Until one of these crazy bastards figured out there’d be another use for him.”

“How do you know this?” he choked.

“I’ve seen things you’d never dream of. I’ve met people you’ll never hear of. If you’re lucky. You understand?”

The Crank King dropped him back into his seat. This time, his drink fell out of his hand and smashed onto the floor. An urge crawled up Davion’s spine and into his head that he wanted to clobber the Crank King, but he’d seen what happened to people when they did that.

Instead, he just ordered another and adjusted his clothes.

“So what?” Davion said. “What about Atax?”

“He’s looking for you.” The Crank King smiled in that gross way again. “He knows who you are. Once he sees you, he’s got the whole database of people in his brain, they say. He sees you and he knows everything. You’re a loose end because you saw what they do and now he’s gonna come for you.”

“Okay. Let him come.”

“Should I?”

Davion caught on in that moment. He finished his whole drink and rested his hand on his blaster.

“You wanna bring him in here?” Davion said. “You wanna tell him where I am?”

“Tell me—Should I or should I not?”

Davion almost spat. Stupid son of a—Who was he kidding? That he’d give up his whole operation here, wherever this secret place was, over forty thousand credits?

Davion shook his head. “I don’t have it anyway. So I guess you better call your friend.”

The Crank King winked at him and left the stool. Henry followed. For a while, Davion just sat there. He had maybe three of those strong drinks and felt soupy enough he started laughing to himself. What kinda place was this anyway? The Crank King had his little private warehouse. There were bedrooms all along the back, he saw, right by those Grecian pillars that held the place up.

Where were they, underground? It was ridiculous. The Crank King was ridiculous. In fact, that piece of absolute garbage was lucky Davion didn’t just blow his brains out then and there. Wasn’t he?

Davion laughed. He laughed so hard he almost fell out of his stool. Some of the workers—slaves, more like it—who were working on the machines even looked back at him with a look that was between confusion and horror.

The Crank King wouldn’t give this place up for anything. Davion knew that. And with that in mind, he ordered another drink.

As he did, he became aware that the bartender was looking at something behind him. That there was a sound of footsteps and a low laugh coming from behind him. That a shadow was cast over him.

The crazy bastard did it. Davion spun around on his chair and looked at the Crank King, who leaned against the wall behind him. And in front was the monstrous figure of Atax, his devilish grin fixed like an old doll’s, his skin pulled back over his skull to the point that it seemed more like plastic wrap.

From out of that thing’s mouth came something like a laugh. But it was from somewhere else, somewhere no human had ever set foot. It made Davion cold and he reached for his blaster, but the machine got it first. It made a quick movement forward like lightning and swatted the weapon out of Davion’s hand, sending it spinning across the ground.

“You really did it, huh?” Davion said to the Crank King.

“Brought him here myself. How’s about it, Atax? What’s he worth to you?”

Atax didn’t answer. He only took a step closer to Davion while the crank dealer fell off his stool trying to get as far away from this thing as humanly possible.

“Hey!” the Crank King placed a hand on Atax’s shoulder. “You said you’d take him and go!”

Atax grabbed hold of the Crank King’s arm with his enormous, metallic hand and squeezed. The Crank King collapsed to his knees, pulling at Atax’s claws with his free hand.

His eyes bulged. Blood pooled out of his hand as Atax squeezed harder and harder until the machine put his foot on the Crank King’s shoulder and pushed with his leg while he pulled with his arm, tearing off the Crank King’s arm in a din of screaming before the King fell to the ground, pressing his good hand against his open wound.

“I lied,” Atax said, but it sounded like digital noise mixed with that awful laughter.

Jesus Christ, he’d done that for no reason at all. There was no reason why the Crank King should lose his arm, why he should be writhing in pain at that moment, grabbing his severed limb and frantically looking around his little paradise as the workers saw what had happened and fled. The barman and Henry fled too and the whole place erupted in noise as everyone but Davion tried to get away from this thing.

Davion was frozen in fear. He couldn’t move. He couldn’t imagine the pain that was coming his way.

Atax took a step closer to him. 

This was going to hurt.

Chapter 6

The exits were too far away. He wouldn’t be able to make them in time. He couldn’t run fast enough. Atax was fast, maybe faster than anything he’d ever seen. And cruel. No matter what he had to do, he had to find some way to at least—what, distract him so he could run away? That wouldn’t work. What the hell would he distract him with anyway?

The machine made a movement toward him. He’d have to think fast. The only thing he could possibly hope to do was kill the machine. Right? Which should have been easy enough. There was a man under there. Wasn’t there? At the very least, there was a face, there were eyes… It couldn’t have been impossible.

That would have to do. He’d have to pick his blaster up and hope Atax didn’t get to him first.

He dropped to the ground. All at once, there came the sound of a thousand gears turning as the cyborg took a leap forward, reaching maybe four feet in the air and laughing hysterically.

Davion dove for his blaster. His hand closed around it. His heart quickened. His mouth went dry. He was gonna do it, he was gonna get this son of a—

He spun up to face Atax and fired. But the shot missed. It slammed into the ceiling and dropped dust down on Atax’s shoulders as the giant machine landed in front of Davion, grabbed him by the arm, and squeezed. Davion didn’t even get to blink before he was thrown in the air. His stomach shot up into his throat. The ground receded and then came crashing toward him. Pain filled his body. He landed on the ground, shoulder-first. A snap echoed through his ears.

Everything spun. He was dizzy, confused. Then he remembered—Atax. He ignored the pain in his arm, pushed himself up to standing. Atax was coming for him, barreling toward him. Davion lifted the blaster, aimed right for the machine’s head, and fired. The round hit Atax in the shoulder. It barely registered.

Goddammit. Why couldn’t he just hit this thing?

He tried again. And again. He fired three rounds at the machine. The first two hit machine parts and ricocheted off of him but the third smacked him right between the eyes. Atax stalled, groaned, flipped over. Did a somersault. His momentum propelled him toward Davion, who dove out of the way as the machine skidded past him, ripping up the ground on either side of him.

That must have been it. Satisfaction coursed through Davion. He really was a good shot. People had said this to him over the years—

Atax got up. Davion gripped the gun tighter as the machine quite literally dusted himself off. The laughter continued. It was like a song glitching out, repeating the same artificial noise again and again. There was no shaking of the shoulders or broadening of the smile. Only that awful, grating laughter, endlessly, until finally Atax spoke.

“You think you can kill me?” he said.

“I was hoping to. You wanna give me another shot?”

“Go ahead. I’ll give you as much time as you need.”

Was it a trap? Was Atax going to pull a fast one on him? Dodge the round at the last second and then hit him with something killer? Not if Davion didn’t give him the chance, obviously. Whatever the last round had hit, it must not have been the human part. It must have hit metal in his skull. Something.

This thing could not be invincible. That wasn’t possible.

Davion raised his gun and fired twice, one at each of Atax’s eyes. If anything, that must have been where his weakness was.

The ding of the ricochets sounded again through the hall. Atax’s head jerked back from the force of each hit, but when he lowered his head to its normal position afterwards, there were only black marks on each of his eyes. Atax wiped those off, cleaning his own eyes.

Now Davion’s heart really clenched. The eyes must have been artificial. Whatever human was left in this thing, it wasn’t anything Davion could hit. And Atax must have seen this realization come over him because the laughing continued again and he began a slow, deliberate approach toward Davion.

All he could do was run. He put everything he had into it, pushing himself back toward where the Crank King lay on the ground, putting pressure on his wound and sitting up against the wall. Davion needed to get into the Deus Ex Machina. He needed to go somewhere else, anywhere else.

But he couldn’t work the machine on his own. He slid down next to the Crank King and grabbed him by his good shoulder, shaking him as Atax continued his slow approach, teasing Davion.

“The machine,” Davion said. “The teleporter. How does it work?”

“I can’t… I can’t—”

Atax was getting closer. And he moved faster now, now that he knew what Davion’s plan was. Davion had virtually no time to pull this off. He shook the Crank King again, grabbed hold of his hair and screamed into his face.

“Tell me how it works!”

“It—it only works one way. It can’t send anyone back out!”

Davion could have smashed the King’s head in right there. He thought about it. At least then if he lived through this, he’d have no debts to come back to. But something about the King lying there, pathetic, made him rethink it. He let go of the man and fell backwards onto his haunches, clenched his fists, and closed his eyes.

Atax stood over top of him. His shadow was deep. He placed a metallic hand on Davion’s back as if to comfort him.

Davion raised his gun one more time, but Atax grabbed hold of it and crushed it in his giant hands. Davion yelled as the machine picked him up by his shirt and dragged him toward the exits at the far end of the hall.

“This is your fault,” Davion said to the King. “All of this. You could’ve been reasonable.”

The Crank King said nothing. He only sat there, motionless. He’d be fine, Davion could see. The bleeding was slowing down and someone would be on their way to help him. But that arm was never coming back. He’d have to live the rest of his life as an enhanced.

What did Davion care anyway?

Atax took him up a long set of stairs which led up to the streets. The entrance looked like an old subway station and may have been exactly that. It was as inconspicuous as one could hope for. Nobody’d used a subway in hundreds of years. Everyone knew they were dangerous. People used to die in them all the time.

Atax threw Davion on the sidewalk. Four police cars greeted him. Men wearing SWAT gear, all with blaster rifles, all with a bead on him.

“What do we do now?” one the cops said.

“Throw him in the back.” Atax pointed to a flight car. “He has an appointment with Mig Cabe.”

“Mig Cabe?”

The terror in the cop’s voice was palpable. Atax must have heard this too because he faced the offending officer with a look that said not to ask any more questions. The officer merely swallowed, then opened the back door to the cruiser and shoved Davion in the back before closing the door behind him.

The cruiser was insulated so Davion couldn’t hear what was going on outside. He wondered who Mig Cabe was, obviously, but he wasn’t curious enough to stick around and find out.

There was a steel mesh divider between where he was and the front seat. And in their haste, someone had forgotten to handcuff him, which gave him an advantage. The problem was he didn’t know how sturdy the mesh divider was, but the even bigger problem than that was he didn’t have time to think about it.

He curled himself up to give himself the most leverage he could get. He didn’t even check to see if the coast was clear. He only unleashed hell on the divider, kicking it with as much energy as he could muster, over and over again, ignoring the pain in his legs, ignoring the possibility that this could be for nothing.

Outside, there was movement. Someone noticed what he was doing. But the divider was starting to give. He couldn’t stop now. He kicked again, then again, saw the divider buckle, then let loose with one as hard as he could manage and watched the divider fall away and drop into the front seat.

He had maybe seconds. He crawled over into the front seat. He knew how to get these things started without a set of keys. He ripped open the panel underneath the ignition tumbler, slapped a couple wires together, and felt the engine roar to life.

It was just as one of the cops grabbed hold of the driver’s side door. Davion put the car into gear and shot up thirty feet into the air with the cop still dangling off the side. When he slammed on the gas, the cops flew off from the door and likely fell to his death. But that wasn’t something Davion could think about. He had to get moving, he had to run.

He pressed on the gas as hard as he could. All around him, lights from police cruisers lit up the dark sky. He only focused on what was ahead, on the maze of buildings and traffic, looking for an exit, some way to lose them. He’d have to improvise, to move around as quickly as possible. They dealt with this kind of thing all the time, so they could get the jump on him, he knew.

An intersection came up ahead. He pulled hard to the left, felt the G-force press him away from his seat until the car righted. He went straight. There was plenty of traffic up ahead so he ducked the car underneath and close to the ground to get under it.

He looked into the mirror for a second. The number of cars behind him was almost unbelievable. They must have amassed everyone in the area. Doubt encroached on his thinking but he blinked and focused on the road ahead, on the alley that was coming up, that he could dip into.

He went to make the turn when the engine turned off. Panic came over him. He smashed his hand against the dash but the display was clear: The system had been overridden. They’d tried to catch him the old fashioned way. But they must have had wireless access to the car and turned it off.

He was fifty feet in the air. He was going down. He grabbed his seatbelt and threw it on quickly, braced himself, closed his eyes—

***

He wasn’t sure how much later he woke up. He knew there was the smell of smoke and his head hurt. He felt around where the pain was to see if there was any blood and there wasn’t. Thank God. But judging by the sounds coming from outside, he was completely surrounded.

He groaned. By now, he could pick out Atax’s footsteps from an audio lineup. The cyborg was outside the car, grabbed hold of the door,d tore it off, and threw it away. Then he ripped off Davion’s seatbelt and yanked him out of the car.

Atax lifted him up so Davion looked right into his lifeless eyes.

“Mig Crane’s gonna like you,” Atax said.

“Why? Because I’m handsome?”

“You’ll make us all some money. I can feel it.”

Atax pulled his free arm back and made a fist. Davion wished he didn’t know what was coming. He wanted to say he’d come quietly, but he never got the chance. The cyborg hit him in the head, hard.

Everything went black.

Chapter 7

The first thing he noticed was the smell.

That was quickly overpowered by the sound. The moans, the groans. All reaching through the confused, dizzy state of his brain, like wispy ghost hands grasping at his consciousness.

He blinked. The chains on his ankles and wrists made themselves known. He was chained to the wall, he saw, by big, iron links that rattled like some portent of doom. Even as his brain tried to right itself after what must have certainly been a concussion, what kind of place he was in was clear to him. It was Medieval was what it was. Like a dungeon.

And he wasn’t alone. Five other men, in varying stages of mental collapse, were also in the room, chained up to the walls, moaning, trying in their weakened state to pull the chains out. One of them looked like he’d suffered a stroke. He was slumped forward, only the chains keeping him from falling to the ground. Drool poured down his chin. His eyes rolled around inside his grey skull.

Davion shook his head and leaned against the wall for support. The chains were too short to allow him to sit, let alone lie down. His legs were tired and buckling. He didn’t know how long they’d been supporting him there but they were weak.

“Hey,” Davion said to everyone in the room. “Hey. Where are we?”

Nobody answered. He recognized the symptoms of crank withdrawal in all of them. They were like the living dead, completely useless. He cursed and examined where the chains were bolted in the wall. There was no way he could pull them out. The only light he had came from somewhere outside this room, from a tiny slit at the far end it looked like. That must have been where the door was.

A terrible sound echoed through the cell. The other men covered their ears as someone opened the lock on the door and opened it, letting light bleed in. It almost blinded all of them. Davion looked away for long enough to let his eyes adjust and then looked back to the large silhouette. The one he recognized as being Atax’s.

“Davion,” Atax said. “You’re coming with me.”

“Where?”

Atax stepped inside and toward him but Davion stood his ground.

“I wanna know where I’m going,” he said. “Where are you taking me?”

“Be quiet.”

Atax used a key to unlock the chains and then placed a strong hand on his neck. If Davion tried to escape, Atax would snap his neck in half. That was obvious. All he could do was follow the cyborg out the exit while the crank heads all begged for Atax to take them instead, to let them out.

With the light bleeding in, they looked like ghosts. The chains didn’t help. Their complexions didn’t either. They reached out like lost souls, moaned like them too, and then Davion was out the door and Atax shut and locked it behind him.

There was a short hallway, antiseptic and white, at the other end of which was a door. Beyond that was a long corridor which men and women walked up and down, talking to one another, wearing long robes and speaking in a kind of language Davion didn’t recognize at first. But the insignia on the wall? He recognized those. He recognized exactly where he was, particularly as they walked past the Senate Hall.

This was the government. And the men and women who walked up and down the halls were the Saviors.

It was almost lucky in a way. Most people of his stature never got to see them. They always worked in secret, never made televised appearances, nothing. One day, you’d be walking around, thinking you could get away with this or that thing and the next day, you found out it was illegal. In the corridors of power, many things of great importance happened. But all out of the reach of everyone else.

Soon enough, Atax took him to a room that was near the top floor of the building. It was almost like a dormitory or hotel and from each of these rooms came the moaning sounds of sexual pleasure, of drunk people singing, of loud music and laughter. These were people who never had to worry about anything. Who always had wine. Who always had men and women, whomever it was they wished for.

Bunch of crap, wasn’t it?

Atax shoved Davion toward the corner room and gestured for him to go inside. The thought of running obviously occurred to him but he wouldn’t be able to get around Atax. That, plus being unarmed—there was really only one choice and that was going in.

He opened the door. It was heavy. The knob on it was obviously made of some kind of expensive material, much different from the flimsy plastic things he was used to, the ones that melted in the summer heat. This was a door that was built to last.

And inside was no different.

The colors inside were ones he rarely saw in his natural habitat. These were bright, shiny things, tables that gleamed and lights that didn’t flicker and buzz. There was a four-post bed with immaculate sheets and the floor—the floor was so clean he could quite literally see his face in it.

And in the corner was a bureau covered in mirrors. In front of that was a stool and on that stool sat a man in a robe, inspecting his angles, pursing his lips, letting his mouth hang open, sticking his tongue out. This man looked young, didn’t have a gray hair on his head, nor a beard. And he didn’t seem to notice anything else in the room except for himself.

Davion coughed. The man jolted upright and spun around, a startled look about him. Then he giggled and held out his hand.

“You’re lucky you didn’t come later,” the man said. “You would have seen much, much worse.”

“I’ve always considered myself lucky.” Davion didn’t take his hand. “Who are you?”

“Well.” The man took his hand away, offended. “Isn’t that a first. You don’t recognize me? Most people do.”

“I heard about someone named Mig Crane. Is that you?”

The man—Mig Crane—blushed. He didn’t say anything but giggled again and went to a liquor cabinet at the other end of the room. He took out two glasses and a bottle of whiskey and poured one for both of them.

Davion took that. He savored the taste but then drank the whole thing back and walked over to the liquor cabinet to pour another.

“Sure,” Mig said. “Help yourself.”

“What do you want from me?”

“I heard you put up quite the fight earlier.”

Davion laughed. “Is that what they told you? Because for my money, any man about to be kidnapped would do well to go down swinging.”

“Kidnapped?” Mig Crane shook his head. “Impossible.”

“Says who?”

Mig walked until he stood two steps in front of Davion and then pressed his finger against the drug dealer’s nose.

“You’d have to be human,” Mig said, “to qualify.”

Davion slapped Mig’s hand out of his face. He couldn’t take that smug look, that shit-eating grin of his. He balled his left hand into a fist and let loose with a cross that he knew would devastate this frail, soft man.

He wasn’t wrong. Mig fell onto his back. Tears welled up in his eyes as he dragged himself toward the door. Davion stood over him, finished the whiskey, then threw the glass at Mig’s head, savoring the smashing sound, the blood that came out.

“Why are you doing this?” Mig said. “Why?”

Davion didn’t have time to explain. He didn’t want to. He was all rage now and after all he’d seen and been through the last however long, he was ready to crush someone, to unleash all of his rage at being—

But he never got to. Mig sent a kick into Davion’s groin that almost made him vomit. Then the Savior got to his feet and shoved Davion into the wall before pressing himself up against him, hyperventilating in sexual fury, even rested his head against Davion’s face.

“They said you were good,” Mig said. “I like that. Oooh, I loved that! Will you do it again?”

“Get off me.”

Mig let him go. Davion cupped his groin and leaned against the wall, trying to catch his breath. Mig was happy with all this. He wasn’t kidding when he said he liked it. He really did.

This was a sick man. And Davion had known plenty of sick men.

“Don’t kid yourself,” Mig said. “I could kill you if I wanted. But I don’t want to. I think you’re fun.”

“Then what do you want me to do?”

“The fights! Obviously. Didn’t they tell you? I mean, you must have been told because—you’re the one who was caught snooping, right? The one who—wait.”

Something lit up in Mig’s face. He put his hands on either of his cheeks and squealed before jumping up and down.

“Banks! Right?” Mig slapped his thighs. “We heard about you. Banks escaped—which is unfortunate but it does happen. He went, if I’ve got this right, he went to see you and asked for help. But you refused. Which is lovely. Then he… Did he call you when Atax was killing him?”

“Atax killed him?”

“Duh. He even left Banks there for you to find him. Which brought you to us. No loose ends. Understand?”

Davion shook his head. “He said you make poor people fight.”

“Correction. We make subhuman scum fight. Have you seen what we’re dealing with? Crank addicts. Spun out, well, not to sound repetitive, but subhumans. These aren’t human beings we’re dealing with. You should know, you’re one of them.”

“I don’t take crank.”

Mig smiled. “No. But you provide it, don’t you? You have a demon in you. Something that doesn’t care. That doesn’t like people. What was it that happened to you? Huh? Do you wanna talk about it?”

Davion spit on him. He watched the glob sail through the air and land on Mig’s face before he could even think about how ineffective that was likely to be. Of course, he was right. Mig liked it.

“Tasty,” Mig said. “You’ll fight tomorrow.”

“I’ll do no such thing.”

Mig snapped his fingers. The door opened and Atax entered, standing tall in front of the door, his arms crossed. Davion’s heart beat wildly. He grit his teeth. But he understood. Either he fought or Atax would have his way with him.

“What happens if I win the fight?” Davion said.

“Then you live.”

Davion nodded. Mig smiled at that and then ordered Atax to take him back to his cell. Mig liked him a lot. He was looking forward to seeing what became of this, how far Davion would make it.

But the whole way back to his cell, he didn’t even think of the fights. All he thought of was Banks. And something that Mig said. Just a few words that echoed through his mind as Atax chained him up again in that cell with all the ghouls.

Banks escaped. And Mig said it was unfortunate, but it does happen.

That meant there was a way out of here.

He was going to escape.

Chapter 8

How long was he in the dark for?

Sleep didn’t come easily, if at all. At times, it was hard to tell what his mental state was. The ghoulish sounds from the other inmates could have been the soundtrack to insanity. And they could have been the moaning of his own dreams. Which was which? Which was living or dead, asleep or awake?

And all the while, he looked for a way out. Banks had come up with something and it had been a success until they caught up with him. Others had done it before also. No offense to Banks, who was a good guy and all, but Davion was smarter than he was. At least, if his memory served him well.

But if that was true, then how did he go from being an upstanding police officer with a decent record to the kind of man he was now? Of course, he already knew the answer. And in the blackness, he tried to fight against it, against the memory, but it kept coming back. Whether as dream or memory, though…

It had started with a young man, a guy named Jamie. Davion was working homicide and had a backlog of cases so big it was becoming legendary around the office. That was when homicide cops used to do actual work in the poorer districts, before their job entailed monitoring the wealthy neighborhoods for intruders from the slums. In fact, the word “homicide” eventually stopped conjuring images of dead men, but rather ones wearing all black who hid in the bushes looking for people to rob. Funny how everything changes.

Jamie was brought into Davion’s office in his early 20’s, sobbing uncontrollably. It took him a few minutes to calm down, but eventually, after what must have been between five and ten glasses of water, the sobbing ceased and became only short breaths which made his whole body quiver.

Davion sat down behind his desk and waited a few moments before he started talking.

“Alright,” Davion said. “Start talking. What happened?”

“It’s my mom.” Jamie almost started sobbing again but caught himself. “She’s dead.”

“Uh-huh. How did she die?”

“Well, how the hell do you think she died? Do you people often come to homicide detectives for when somebody falls off a ladder?”

“You’d be surprised.”

Jamie pinched the bridge of his nose. “Fine. She was murdered. I was sleeping upstairs—yeah, I still live with my parents, but whatever. That part’s none of your business.”

“I didn’t think so.”

“Well, anyway, I heard a noise. And then I heard a scream so I ran downstairs. And there was this guy, this big guy. He had an axe. He was…”

“He was what?”

“HE WAS CHOPPING HER UP!”

A sob rocked through Jamie’s body. Davion was trained to see through people’s lies. But everything about this guy seemed genuine to him. Everything. The sobs, the guilt that was implicit, it all pointed to the guy telling the truth. For now.

Davion pulled out a tablet and opened the Notes file.

“Describe him.”

Jamie did. He described a man who was about six feet tall, 230 pounds. Muscular. White. Davion wrote all this down, wondering how in the hell he was going to find someone among the million people who fit that description, when Jamie’s eyes lit up as if a thought had totally arrested him.

“You know,” he said, “he looks like that guy Chris next door?”

A few minutes later, Davion hooked Jamie up with a therapist who specialized in this sort of thing and took a flight car to this man Chris’ house. The whole district was falling apart, every block covered in houses that were much older than three generations, usually with minor repairs and always with whole sections that were collapsing. Almost everyone who lived inside was exposed to the elements, and with the weather getting worse every year, that was an increasingly less-than-ideal situation.

Davion knocked on Chris’ door. A few seconds later, it was answered, and there, sure enough, was a man fitting Jamie’s description. He was surprised to see a cop but he let Davion into his house, unable to disguise his nervousness. In fact, he appeared so nervous that sweat was practically pouring out of his face.

Inside was worse than outside. There was leftover food everywhere and garbage bags piled up in a corner. Garbage removal was entirely privatized now and many of the companies knew they could make more money in the rich districts than the poor ones, and so most of the impoverished neighborhoods were quite literally covered in garbage. How anyone dealt with this smell was beyond Davion’s grasp, but here he was…

They sat down at the dining table and Chris offered him some coffee, which Davion took before taking out his tablet and, again, opening the Notes file.

“Did you know—let’s see… Mariam Godfrey?”

“Sure,” Chris said, pouring coffee. “She’s lived next door for years. Is something wrong?”

“I’m just wondering what kind of a relationship you guys had.”

“Cordial. Friendly. As I say, we’ve lived next door to each other for years. We got to know each other’s lives pretty well. But still, I wouldn’t exactly consider her a friend.”

“Why not?”

Chris shrugged. “Just someone to talk to is all.”

“Did you two ever fight about anything?”

Chris set down the coffees and took his seat. His brow was furrowed, his hands clenched into one another. He was more than nervous now, he was tense, suspicious. Every muscle in his body confirmed this.

“I think,” Chris said, “that you wanna tell me what this is about.”

“Fine. She was murdered.”

Davion half expected something like shock to register in Chris’ face. That didn’t usually mean anything, often murderers were shocked to find out that they’d been caught. It meant they’d overlooked something. It also meant, in theory, that an innocent person had just been given information they didn’t have before. So, again, it didn’t mean anything for someone to be shocked.

However, Chris didn’t express anything of the sort. In fact, he only nodded and wetted his lips, even unfolded his hands and took a sip of coffee.

“I guess,” Chris said, “that you’ll be wanting to know about that Jamie boy, then.”

“Why’s that?”

“Well… Look, I don’t wanna come across like I’m trying to throw him under the bus or anything. But his mother and I talk every morning and I do live next door, as you know. So I heard them arguing. And sometimes she talks about what’s going on with him.”

Chris shuffled his weight, likely to find comfort that he couldn’t get at the moment. His nerves were getting the best of him. Davion knew he wore a particularly hard stare at the moment.

“She keeps trying to get him to leave. Like, every day, she says he’s gotta get a job and he’s gotta find a place. He just throws these fits. Doesn’t offer her any reason, he just insults her.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yeah. Why?”

“Because he says he thinks you did it.”

Chris must have been stunned. It was as though someone had pressed the pause button on him. And he sat like that for a long time, as still as anyone Davion had ever seen. Then a few minutes later, he grabbed hold of his coffee mug and held it tight enough Davion wondered if it would shatter.

Chris took a long drink and shook his head. Then he shook his head again and kept opening his mouth like he wanted to say something.

“That rat son of a bitch,” Chris said. “Pinning this on me. I never did any such thing.”

“Were you always cordial with her?”

Chris slammed his fist on the table. “I said I never did such a thing. You hear me?”

“Then where were you last night?”

“I—I can’t say.”

Davion leaned in. “Why not?”

Chris went to answer but shook his head a final time before hanging it and refusing to meet Davion’s eyes.

“You’ll never get it out of me,” Chris said. “But if you wanna take me away, you’d better come back with some evidence and an arrest warrant. You hear me?”

Davion heard him loud and clear. In fact, everything about how Chris had comported himself pointed toward his guilt. But there was still that bit about Jamie arguing with his mom that he couldn’t quite make out. It only complicated things. But he had a feeling that if he asked Jamie, he could get a straight answer.

He was right.

He talked to Jamie later that afternoon. He’d just gotten out of talking to the therapist when Davion found him and brought him back into his office. The guy was drained, pale. His eyes were beat red. He looked like he’d just fall asleep standing up if you let him.

But he was reasonable and came back into Davion’s office and sat down while Davion ran through everything Chris had told him about how Jamie and his mom argued with one another.

Jamie looked like he might explode.

“He said that?” Jamie said. “How could—but that’s…”

“Is it true?”

“Sure, we argue. Look, I know that I should be getting my own place. But I get these panic attacks? I have a hard time living in the world, you know. It makes me so uncomfortable just being around people.”

“The thinking here, obviously, is that she asked you one too many times and you finally flipped and killed her. What do you say to that?”

Jamie pinched his nose. “Maybe you should ask Chris what kind of a relationship he had with my mom. How he’d come over during the night and I’d hear them. Like, hear them. It was excruciating.”

“How come you didn’t tell me this before?”

“I’m tired. I’m angry. I just saw my mom get killed. I don’t have everything at the front of my memory.”

That was fair. With that information, Davion was able to subpoena some phone records and listen to calls Chris had with Jamie’s mom, read some texts between them. They were definitely having a sexual relationship. It all started with Jamie’s mom being miserable over the death of her husband. Chris had come over to console her and one thing had led to another.

But there were some records indicating that she wanted to break off the relationship to focus on healing. Chris hadn’t liked that. He’d gotten mad more than a couple times over it.

Also, Davion figured out where Chris had been the night before. He’d been with another grieving woman across town. They’d had an argument when she wanted to end the relationship also. This seemed to be a pattern for him.

That, plus Jamie’s testimony, was enough to get an arrest warrant. But by the time he showed up at Chris’ place with a few other cops to take him in, Chris had done what most people do and asked if he could get dressed properly. He was in his bathrobe and underwear. Davion said that was fine and let him go, but placed an officer outside his window in case he tried to escape.

A second later, a blaster round came through the wall. It narrowly missed Davion but it hit the cop next to him in the leg. Blood splattered everywhere. It had hit the femoral artery, which sprayed like a leaky firehose all over the walls. That cop died minutes later.

More blaster rounds burst through the walls. Davion kicked the door in and dove inside, landing almost miraculously on the bed and letting off three rounds, the last of which hit Chris between the eyes. The back of his head opened up and his brains shot out onto the wall before his body collapsed in a heap.

But it wasn’t over. In the ensuing weeks, the investigation continued. One of the lab guys suggested that DNA of Chris at Jamie’s place was planted. Davion didn’t understand the technical side, so the lab guy explained to him that it wasn’t in a place one would normally expect to find DNA, which tipped him off.

Furthermore, the text conversations in which Chris got mad at Jamie’s mom occurred after Chris had reported his cell phone missing. It looked as though someone else had been using that phone to send angry messages to Jamie’s mom in the weeks leading up to her death.

Davion stopped sleeping nights. Eventually, he returned to the home which was now Jamie’s and confronted him with this information. Jamie’s story stopped being consistent. He made little slip-ups, which, when pressed, led to further mistakes.

All of a sudden, Jamie was wound tight. He said he didn’t like this line of questioning. He said Davion was trying to get him out on his own, just like everyone else in his life. Jamie snapped and pulled a lamp out of the wall and tried to hit Davion with it, who threw him to the ground, disarmed him, and took him in.

An investigation of the basement found the bloody axe buried behind the wall. Jamie wound up doing a life sentence for murder.

It was strange, because Davion was of course used to people lying to him. Homicide was a long sentence and someone who was willing to commit murder was, more often than not, willing to lie. But something about Jamie’s performance hit him in a way he didn’t expect. Maybe it was all the years of seeing scum act in scummy ways and this was just the final domino. But he found himself increasingly paranoid, increasingly distrustful of human motives.

He spent more and more time alone. He became known as a misanthrope. His captain repeatedly asked him to go in for therapy and he consistently refused. He just wanted to be left alone.

At a certain point, he figured—if everyone was bad, why was he wasting so much time being good? Not long after that, he took a bribe. He was caught immediately. They suspended him without pay before firing him altogether. They said it was either that or jail.

As everything in his life got darker and darker, as he spent more and more time being one of the scum he used to want to put away, he always thought back to that case with Jamie. And how before that happened, he was such a naive person, someone who trusted people. But this wasn’t the kind of world in which you could trust someone. And he should know—because trusting him, at this point, would have been a terrible mistake.

***

He woke up.

That time, he was sure he was dreaming. But he woke up into the same nightmare he’d been in for God knows how long. The moaning continued, the shuffling of bodies, and the clanking of chains. The thin slit of light that seemed to illuminate only the eyes of everyone in the cell, giving them a particularly ghost-like effect.

And he was still trapped. After all this time and all this certainty with regards to his ability to get out of a tight situation, still there was nothing which suggested itself as a means for getting out.

For example: He and everyone else were locked away in here, in the darkness, chained to the wall. There was one exit, which was always guarded. Movement was severely limited. There were no vents. No weapons at his disposal. And he was growing increasingly weak with each day that passed without food or water.

Anger overtook him. He wanted to be able to tear the chains from the wall. But he’d already tried that. In anger, he kicked the wall behind him because all he wanted was to be able to—

Something in the wall bulged. He stopped and looked around to see if anyone had noticed. They didn’t seem to have. And while he didn’t dare kick at the wall again, he did crane his neck to be able to see which part of the wall he’d touched.

It was subtle, the change. He could only see it because of the light coming in through the door. But one of the bricks in the wall, all of which were large, had budged slightly. Only slightly. But if Davion was right, maybe if he could get out of the chains, that might be the way out of here.

A second later, the door opened. Everyone was blinded again from the light and blinked to adjust their sight, while one of the guards unlocked Davion’s chains. He collapsed onto the ground and found himself looking at the feet of Mig Crane, who stood above him, stark naked and chugging wine out of a bottle. Some of it spilled down Mig’s face and he wiped it off with the back of his hand. He was drunk enough his eyes were spinning. His voice was thick, his head wobbled. He pointed at Davion.

“Take him with, uh, us,” Mig said. “He’s fighting tomorrow!”

The guards picked him up and dragged him out into the hallway.

Chapter 9

That night, Davion was hooked up to an IV. Within the hour, he started feeling better. His thoughts stopped seeming distant. He stopped thinking everything around him was a dream. Even as surreal as this situation was for him, he knew where he was and why and he knew what was expected of him.

The doctor they assigned him was a woman named Riley. More than once, Davion saw her sleep with her patients. He saw her take crank at one point also. Davion knew this was a society with few rules because nobody policed the poor and the rich could do whatever they wanted. But seeing a doctor strung out on crank, chewing her tongue and cheeks and having multiple sexual partners in one day…? Even he hadn’t seen that coming.

Just before dusk, Doctor Riley came in to check on him. Her eyes spun around inside her skull while she looked over the charts. He said “Mmmhmm” almost compulsively.

“You’re looking good,” she said.

“How would you know? Can you even read the chart right now?”

Doctor Riley threw the chart onto the floor. She leaned over Davion, who was supine on a hospital bed, and almost growled.

“You don’t scare me,” Davion said. “I know they need me.”

“I’ve broken some limbs before a fight. More than once. Sometimes they just like to watch people get the crap kicked out of them. What do you think about that?”

“I think if I wasn’t so weak—”

Doctor Riley pulled out his IV from his arm. And not that she removed it, as a doctor would, but she yanked it by the cord so that it ripped open his arm. Blood squirted from the wound. He went to place a hand over it to stop the bleeding, but she grabbed him by his shirt and threw him onto the ground.

His back ached. He groaned and tried to get to his feet but she kicked him in the sides again and again.

He coughed. Eventually, the kicking ceased and Doctor Riley lit up a cigarette which she ashed onto his back. He was in a terrible amount of pain. His body was weak. He needed food. That IV was going to be his lifeblood.

“I wish you luck,” Doctor Riley said. “I really do. But there’s no way you win at this point. You understand?”

He sure did. He wanted to kick himself in the ass now, but all he could do was collapse. Doctor Riley left, her heels clicking noisily against the floor. Davion curled up into a ball and was able to put enough pressure on the wound to stop the bleeding. But that wouldn’t matter—he was just too weak, too malnourished.

A few minutes later, the door opened and Mig Crane came in. His drinking hadn’t stopped. He was drunker than he’d been before. He was drinking out of a new wine bottle, which was now almost done.

The Savior stumbled into the room, giggling to himself. He didn’t say a word as two guards grabbed hold of Davion again and hauled him up to his feet. Whatever happened next, Davion wasn’t 100% sure of. He certainly blacked out at some point. Little flashes of light would intrude on his unconsciousness every now and again. Faces floated past him. Voice crawled into his ears.

When he opened his eyes fully next, he found that he was on all fours. Underneath him was sand. He ran his fingers through it to make sure that was what it was, and it was true. It was also hot. He wondered briefly if he was outside, but a quick look up revealed that there was a giant metal border, on one side of which was a screen, currently off, and a glass dome over top of that. All of which was under a large and bright array of lights.

On the outside were the Saviors. They were engaged in all manner of immoral acts, but most of them were cheering, staring intently through the dome. They were seated in what must have been bleachers of some kind, but in the middle of all those was a throne, and that was the chair which Mig Crane sat on.

Mig stood up and raised his hands for silence. It took everyone a minute, but eventually, they complied and looked at Mig, who by now was on yet another bottle of wine and had the appearance of a man who was close to vomiting.

“Ladies and gentlemen!” he said. “I’m sup—do you want a speech or not?”

Everyone booed.

“Fine!” He sat down. “No speech! Just killing!”

Everyone cheered. Bottle after bottle of liquor was opened. Drugs were taken. And at the far end of this dome Davion was in, a door revealed itself by opening. It slowly went upwards, every inch of which drew more cries from the hungry audience.

Davion got to his feet. His knees were weak, wobbly. His vision was blurred. No matter what came out of there, even if it was a colony of ants or a single fly, he wouldn’t be prepared to fight it. His whole body wanted to collapse into a heap and just die, but his mind propelled him forward with everything that it had.

He shouldn’t have insulted that doctor. Now he was really screwed.

Out of the shadows came a man. He was small but he had determination written all over his face. The kind of determination one would normally get from knowing that the wrong decision would lead to your death. It was that determination which was lodged somewhere deep in Davion’s subconscious, amidst all the layers of exhaustion. The man was otherwise dressed in ill-fitting clothes, his pants were ripped and the toes of his shoes were open so that they looked like the mouth of a strange bird.

Which was when Davion recognized him. It must have been the exhaustion that prevented him from making the connection sooner. But it was the skinny man, the one he’d been tracking before he was captured.

The skinny man recognized him at the same moment, judging by the change in his expression. But before either of them could speak, and Davion wanted to, Mig Crane’s voice sounded over the PA system.

“What a coincidence!” he said. “The drama increases!”

“Drama?” the skinny man said. “I’m gonna kill this bastard too quickly for that. You could’ve saved me!”

Davion wouldn’t take the bait. He looked around for weapons, anything he could use. But the only things in this pit were the two men and the sand. Which meant they’d have to fight with their bare hands.

Then, all at once, the screen on the other side lit up. The digits “5:00” appeared in red and began counting down.

Davion looked up to Mig, who was laughing hysterically.

“Five minutes!” he said. “If one of you isn’t dead by then, the room will fill up with gas—and neither of you will walk out of here!”

Davion shouldn’t have diverted his attention. He was still looking at Mig when the skinny man’s fist clocked him in the jaw and sent him tumbling downwards. He remembered then that this guy was a killer and that he did so for fun. Davion wouldn’t be able to pull any punches. But how much fight did he have in him?

He lashed out with a kick that landed right on the skinny man’s knee. The man yelped and stumbled backwards, but Davion had wanted the kick to actually break the knee, which didn’t happen.

Still, it gave him just enough time to get to his feet and land a combo, hitting the skinny man in the stomach as well as square on his nose. Blood burst forth from the wound and covered Davion’s hand. The man stumbled backwards two steps and Davion went to meet him there, hoping to land a cross in his jaw and knock him out.

He never got the chance. The skinny man swung his leg out and collided with Davion’s feet. He didn’t fall, but he stumbled, and that was enough for the man to grab him by the collar and throw a series of jabs between his nose and teeth.

His teeth were loosening. They were going to fall out.

Davion managed to slip one of the punches and throw an elbow into the man’s stomach. The man wretched and bent over and Davion figured on going for the stomach again, grabbed him by the shirt, and brought his knee up twice into the man’s guts until he puked everywhere.

Davion let go. The man dropped to his knees. His shirt was covered in vomit. The clock said they had three minutes left, which was more than enough time. He’d just have to get behind the man and snap his neck. That was the only way out of here.

Too late, however, he saw the man reach into his pocket. The lights gleamed off of something the man had in his hands. Davion knew what it was immediately. He jumped backwards just as the man swung the knife at him but the sand caught his heels and he fell backwards onto his ass.

The man dove at him. He held the knife so the blade jutted out the bottom of his hand. Davion got out of the way just in time. The knife harmlessly went into the sand. Davion stood up and kicked the man in the ribs, then kicked at his arm, hoping to dislodge the knife.

A pain registered in his calf. He’d been stabbed and he knew it. The Saviors were chanting now as Davion pulled away from the man. The knife was still in his calf. The man hadn’t pulled it out in time. That meant Davion had an advantage, however slight. He was bleeding and the exhaustion was getting worse. Thirty seconds remained on the clock. He’d have to make this fast.

The man’s eyes were wide. They almost glowed with rage. He held out his hands in a way that said he was going for the throat. Davion grabbed hold of the knife and pulled but the pain got the better of him. He needed to get it out fast. Come on, dammit, do it, just do it…

He pulled the knife out. The man fell toward him, aiming for Davion’s throat. But as he fell forwards, Davion held the knife out in front of him. The blade slid easily into the man’s belly. He spat blood.

Davion pushed the man off. The Saviors had gone crazy with bloodlust. He had only ten seconds and the man was still alive. He didn’t want to kill him. But that gas…

Davion wrapped his arms around the man’s head and pulled. A second later, the man’s body went limp. The crowd roared. The gate behind him opened and a pair of guards came out, seized him, and took him down the hallway back to the doctor’s office.

He passed out before he made it.

***

He woke up later, back on the hospital bed with another IV sticking out of his arm. Doctor Riley, he could tell, was disappointed to see him. She wanted him dead as much as anybody else, he supposed, which he didn’t blame her for. He was just enjoying the feeling of healthiness that came over him, of rest.

There was also his chart, next to him, with a number of files paper clipped in. He couldn’t help himself but look them over. They had an awful lot on him. And that they used paper still—that was a symbol of indulgence. Paper was rare, if not impossible to find.

A few minutes later, Mig Crane entered. The Savior cheered, hooped, and hollered. He remained naked but however many bottles of wine he’d drank was beyond Davion’s ability to tell. He could only guess by how hammered the man was, which was, possibly, the drunkest Davion had ever seen anyone in his entire life.

“What drama!” Mig said. “Excitement! Did you see the look on that man’s face when you stabbed him?”

“How could I miss it?”

“Well the good news is, you won. The even better news is that we want you to do it again! And again and again—until somebody beats you!”

Davion almost spat. But he knew better from last time. This wasn’t a man you could brow beat or humiliate. This was a man who enjoyed the dark side of life. He was impossible to get into a corner.

A few minutes later, Davion was taken away. He put on being limp for them. He knew it’d make them feel confident, powerful. They were beating a man who’d just killed a guy, in their imagination. That put them above him. It also made them less likely to ask questions—like why was he holding his fists so tight?

If they’d looked, they would have seen the paperclip.

And one look at his file would have told them he could easily pick the locks on those chains.

Chapter 10

He didn’t want to wait. Nor could he have, if it were possible. He needed to get out of there as soon as they closed those doors. The instant he heard the sound of the door locking, that was it—he’d use the paperclip to unlock himself, push back the brick in the wall, and crawl, he hoped, to safety.

The guards finished locking him up. He faked being tired. He drooled. The only thing he couldn’t have faked was the pain in his leg, which remained genuine. But he ignored it as best he could as they locked up his legs and then left through the door.

A second later, the sound of it locking came. And Davion got to work.

The first lock came out easily. But it was a little loud, which made him pause a moment to look at the door and see if there was any movement. There wasn’t any that way, but through the darkness, someone off to his right spoke.

“Hey,” the voice said. “Hey!”

“Hey what?”

“You’re bustin’ outta here!”

“Shut up,” Davion whispered in the most aggressive voice he could. “Or when I’m done here, I’ll snap your neck.”

“You don’t wanna do that. Please. Listen, my name is Shane. And I’m—”

One of the other inmates groaned. Davion ignored it and unlocked the chain around his wrist before he got to work on his feet.

“I have a family,” Shane said. “Two kids. I’ve been in here for—jeez, I don’t know how long. They’re probably still looking for me.”

“I said shut up.” Davion finished unlocking his feet. “I can’t take you with me.”

“Why not?”

“Because with two of us out there, we’re for sure gonna get found.”

Shane sobbed. Davion could barely see him through the dark, but he could see he wasn’t like the others. He wasn’t a crank head, that was for sure. In fact, there was a gentleness about him that was disarming.

He’d for sure get killed in the fights. But Davion couldn’t do anything about that. Because he knew he was right, two people were more likely to get caught than one.

“Just listen to me,” Shane said. “Please. I won’t be a burden, I swear.”

The other voices called out through the dark. “We won’t either!” “Yeah, we can help!”

“See?” Davion said. “Now keep your trap shut. You didn’t see me go out this way, you got it?”

Shane continued begging but Davion didn’t listen. He got down on his knees and pushed back the brick in the wall. It took everything he had, it was a sizable piece, but eventually, he got it moved and was able to look beyond it.

Sure enough, the other side was mostly empty, but for pipes that ran through it. It was behind everything, behind the walls. That would absolutely give him some space to look for a way out, to figure out where this building was located and find a way out from there.

Putting Shane out of his mind, he crawled behind the brick and pushed it back into place. The din behind him had gotten so bad it had attracted the guards, whom he could hear bursting into the room.

“What are you—oh, crap. Where’d the other guy go?”

“Behind the brick!”

That was bound to happen. All it did was move up his timeline a little.

Davion rushed through the open area, looking for an opening he could see through. Behind him, the guard moved the brick out of place and called his buddies over to have a look. Soon enough, they’d be crawling around there with him.

There was a light coming from somewhere up ahead. He ran toward it, trying not to run into pipes and things but it was so dark he didn’t have a choice. He tripped and spun out, smacking his head off something. And all the while, footsteps sounded from behind him.

The light, meanwhile, drew near. Eventually, he realized what it was, a vent whose adjoining pipe had become detached. And it was right about eye level, so he was able to look through it and see what was on the other side.

Just his luck: It went right into the break room where a group of guards were right at that moment. One of them, however, was standing with his back, facing the vent, which meant Davion could maybe—

“There he is!”

They’d seen him. He pushed the vent as quietly as he could, pulled himself up into the opening, looking down on the guard in front of him. They were telling stories about women and laughing hard, when suddenly Davion popped down behind the one closest to him, put his arm around his neck, and grabbed his blaster from his holster.

Everyone in the room was stunned. Davion held the gun to the man’s head and backed up into the wall.

“Call them off,” Davion said. “Call everyone off or he dies.”

To his shock, everyone in the room laughed. Did they think Davion wouldn’t do it? He pressed the gun deeper into the man’s head, the man who was now sweating so bad he looked like he was melting.

But before long, Davion saw what was so funny. The guards in the room drew their blasters and fired, tearing apart the guard’s chest into a million pieces. None of the rounds made it past the body however, and Davion was able to take out at least two before the body practically disintegrated in front of him.

There were only two left at that point. Davion crouched down and hit both of them, one square in the face and the other in the throat. The second man’s esophagus burst open and he lay on the ground choking and grabbing at his wound, while Davion kicked open the door to look at the world beyond.

It led straight to the outside. That was good. There was a flight car parked right at the edge. Someone was getting out. Davion didn’t care who it was. But he seemed to be waving up at someone to get their attention.

Davion ran. Behind him, the guards poured out. They opened fire and kicked up dirt around his feet. One of the rounds landed close enough it made him spill. His gun flew from his hands and skidded across the ground.

He picked himself up. Come on, come on. He could get there, he was almost at the car. He picked up his gun again and aimed it at the driver, who put his hands up in shock.

“Get away from the car!” Davion said.

He spun around and shot two more blaster shots. One hit a guard in the arm. The other missed.

That was fine. It held them off long enough for him to get to the car. He grabbed the door handle. He opened it.

And then the sky erupted.

All he could do then was look upwards. Even though he knew well ahead of time what had happened, who it was who’d come for him, he looked anyway. It must have been instinct. He even raised his blaster, knowing it was useless.

Atax was on him. He’d jumped from one of the windows of the government building and was nearly right in front of Davion.

Before Atax hit the ground, Davion hit him twice. Neither shot did much of anything. He tried to fire a third time, but Atax swatted the gun from Davion’s hand, grabbed him by his shirt collar, and lifted him over his head before smashing him down the ground.

The wind was knocked out of him. Davion tried to breathe but before he could, Atax picked him up again and slammed his head into the flight car.

With his face pressed up against the car, he was able to look out at the whole city. From up here on the hill. Way up in the clouds. He could see why they liked it up here. It made the rest of the city seem so small. Usually it seemed enormous when you were in the thick of it. But not from—

Atax threw him. He skidded along the ground. This time, the pain was severe enough there was no getting up. And he knew it. All he could do was lie there, his eyes half-open, his nerves screaming in pain. There was nothing else to do. He was busted.

Atax picked him up. He was laughing that terrible laugh again.

Davion wished he could hurt him. Wished he could tear his head off for everyone to see. But instead, he remained limp as Atax picked him up and dragged him back toward the government building.

“Just kill me,” Davion said. “For Christ’s sake…”

“Kill you?” Atax laughed. “I’m gonna have way more fun doing what I have in mind. And I hope you have fun too. Because I’ve been wanting to do this since the first time we met.”

Davion screamed in horror.

Chapter 11

Knowing what was coming and being unable to stop it—that was the worst part. Being locked in a cell for days at a time, sure that was bad, but the inability to know what was coming at least left open the possibility of release. Now, as he was taken into a small room, a surgical room with a steel bed and a counter covered in tools,  he was in a greater state of panic than he’d ever known. On the other side of a wall and door was a garage filled with vehicles, the sounds of which nearly erupted his eardrums.

Atax threw him onto the surgical bed. Davion thrashed around as much as possible, trying to weasel his way out from underneath the machine, but Atax was stronger by a wide margin. The cyborg not only held him down but had him strapped in within seconds, completely pressed up against the cold steel of the bed.

Davion gritted his teeth. His whole body tensed, clenched. He was as tightly wound as he could have possibly been. Spit came from his mouth in angry bursts as Atax hovered over the counter, dramatically perusing the implements in front of him.

“Which do you think would hurt the most?” Atax said. “I always liked the armpit. But it bleeds too much.”

Atax saw something that he liked. He picked it up and examined it. But what was it? Davion couldn’t see past the tears in his eyes, the tears of rage.

But the whirring sound tipped him off immediately. He froze as Atax turned around. His eyes stayed on the dentist’s drill in the cyborg’s hand. The one that drew closer and closer. Like an angry bee.

Laughter filled the room. Davion’s eyes might have popped out of his skull. He knew he was screaming but it was disembodied. It came from somewhere else. Someone else. Something else, even. And all the while, there was the whir of the drill as Atax placed his hand on Davion’s forehead to keep him from moving.

He tried to move. But the straps were tight and the robot was strong. Atax’s taut face, the glass eyeballs, and the perpetual smile from the skin being pulled back took up all of his vision. Something like insanity descended on him as the drill found his front tooth and pressed inwards.

Bits of tooth sprayed around the inside of his mouth like sand. Even if he could have moved, he wouldn’t have dared. The pain was so immense, so all-consuming, that he couldn’t think or do anything but lay motionless.

Nobody would come save him. He was alone in the den of the beast. And to think of how close he was to—

Atax pressed the drill into the lower tooth. The process began anew. Was this a nightmare? Was this his body, undergoing this level of agony? How could he be awake when all of this was impossible? The cyborg. The cyborg’s face. The sound of the drill. The pain. The taste of bone fragments flying around inside of his mouth.

His eyes stopped tearing up. He had nothing left in him. He went limp even, just before Atax pulled the drill out of his mouth and turned the device off.

“Are you falling asleep?” Atax said.

The cyborg caressed his chin. It was distant, dream-like. As though there was no hand on his chin at all. But the memory of one.

Atax brought the drill down into Davion’s chest. It woke him up. A scream escaped, louder than ever. He saw his own flesh torn open by the device, his blood spray around like a hose. Words screamed forth inside of his brain but none of them could make it into his throat. He wanted to ask why this was happening. What he could do to make it stop. What Atax would need from him in order to put him out of his misery.

He didn’t even need to live. At this point, he didn’t care. Just so long as the pain stopped.

But he couldn’t speak. Try as he may, all he could do was scream. And the drill came down again and again onto new parts of his body until his throat was so hoarse he couldn’t scream anymore.

Atax took the drill out. Davion slumped under the restraints. His breathing was slow. Faint. He felt like a zombie.

“What do you want?” he said, finally.

Atax said nothing. He only left, leaving Davion in his restraints. He even turned the light off before he closed the door behind him.

The whole room was black. Now all Davion had were his thoughts. And of those, he mostly had memories of pain. The sand-like feeling of broken teeth in his mouth didn’t help and try as he may, he couldn’t spit those out enough to get the texture out of his face.

He was left like that for days. Every morning, Atax would come in, give him water and food and then torture him again. By the end of the week, Davion was missing all of his fingernails. He had several broken toes and one of those was missing, thanks to a set of bolt cutters. It was a nightmare from which there was no escape.

But by the end of the week, he wondered if he deserved this. If maybe he was scum, just like the people he sold crank to. The memory of him as a good man stung after all the pain he’d gone through that week as if this was penance and goodness was making itself known in the most painful way possible.

He’d only wanted to save his own ass. He knew that. That was why he’d tried to escape. That was why he maintained his plan was to go into hiding again, why he knew he’d get a hold of some crank when it was safe to start making money again. He’d held himself up as the highest value. He’d said that his wants and his safety were the things that mattered most.

But what about what was going on in this building? What about the corruption and the evil that happened behind all of these closed doors? Hell, behind open ones too? Wasn’t this something worth fighting over?

He didn’t have an answer right away. Atax came back every day for a whole other week, trying new methods on him from waterboarding to bringing in an audience to humiliate him in front of. There was no convincing this thing because it was all pleasure to him. There was no goal except the accumulating of pleasurable experiences and seeking out new ones to replace whichever ones passed into the sands of time.

It was Hell. And there was no way out.

Finally, at the end of the second week, Davion was sure he was going to die.

He was getting bedsores now. Or else something else had gone wrong with his back. His skin had turned grey. He was emaciated. He was sure if he saw himself that he’d say he looked like something out of an old horror comic. Something wretched. Something inhuman. Something from a world of pain.

That last part was true. But did it have to be this way? Did he have to lie in his own filth? The emotion which came over him was vengeance, but that turned into a bitter rage at the state everyone else in that building was in and that returned once again to his bitterness at his own self.

How had he let himself become like this? How had he let himself fall so far?

That was the real source of embarrassment.

And then finally, Atax came in on what must have been the sixteenth day. And Atax made a mistake.

It was obvious that Atax was losing his interest in torturing Davion. By that time, Davion didn’t even so much as scream. His soul was callous. He stared Atax directly in those strange eyes of his every time the cyborg cut him, hit him, burned him. He gave the machine nothing in response and the machine had a real need to feel constant pleasure.

Atax gave up. He got angry. He’d been cutting the skin around one of Davion’s fingers and peeling it back. Like a banana. And while it hurt maybe worse than anything thus far, Davion remained calm, motionless. He didn’t shake or quiver with pain. He removed himself from it and gave Atax not a drop of what he was looking for.

Atax yelled. He threw the knife down at Davion and stormed out of the room. Outside came a din of noise as Atax smashed into things around him, knocked things over, made people scream.

But the knife was beside Davion. It was within reach.

He’d have been lying if he’d said he didn’t think of using it on himself. But that righteous indignation welled up inside of him at just the right time. He didn’t just want his revenge. He wanted this whole system to come down. He wanted the Saviors to be brought to their knees. He wanted no more people kidnapped to kill each other for sport.

He didn’t want to live in squalor. Or sell drugs. Or hang around with serial killers and rapists. He wanted something like a normal life. And he knew everyone else wanted the same thing.

He picked up the knife. He held it firmly in his hands to where his hand shook. It was his last chance—he could jam it into his side and let out all of his blood and leave this stupid world behind.

Or he could start cutting the straps.

It wasn’t even a contest.

Chapter 12

He fell out of the bed. His body smacked into the floor. He was amazed at how little strength he had left. But he had to get up because someone would be in here before long. Someone who would certainly kill him.

The plan was simple: He needed to get into the garage next door. There were flight cars there. If he got into one on time then he could high-tail it out of here, presumably before anyone was able to catch on and get a hold of him. The problem was that he was so damn weak, he didn’t know if he could make it to the door.

He grabbed hold of the counter and pulled himself upwards. His mouth was dry. Everything in his body felt numb. And it was hard walking around with one of his toes missing, which he’d anticipated. Taking a step, which he did, took everything he had. And even then, it wasn’t enough. He’d have to do it many more times—

He collapsed. He growled under his breath. Frustration came over him in a tidal wave. He grabbed hold of the counter again and pulled himself up, but it was just as a sound came from the other side of the door.

Someone was coming.

It wasn’t Atax. These were human steps. Or, that’s how they sounded. It was hard to know how many of his organs were still functioning properly. His brain was certainly one of those. But he held himself steady and placed his knife behind his back and waited for the door to open.

When it did, it was Doctor Riley.

She was stunned to see him awake. She chewed on her own tongue, her eyes darted around inside her head. She didn’t know what to do but by the looks of things, she liked her chances against him.

“What are you doing up?” she said.

She made a movement toward him. But as she laid her hand on his shoulder, he grabbed her wrist and yanked on her arm with everything he had, in order to spin her around. A half-second later, her back was against him and he had a knife up to her throat.

She smelled like a crank junkie. It almost made him sick. Until he remembered how he must smell to her.

“What’s in the garage?” he said. “Come on, the one next door. Is it just cars?”

“Y-yeah. Just cars. Why? Are you—?”

She gasped, but he pressed the knife into her throat and she quieted down.

“Is your car in there?” he said.

She nodded. He held out his free hand for her keys and she understood immediately. She slapped the keys down into his hand, which would save him time from having to hotwire it, and then he pushed her toward the door.

“Go on,” he said. “Take me to it.”

She did as she was told. She stepped toward the door, albeit slowly. Everything about her posture, her body language, it all said to him that she was planning something. But it could have been the crank she was on. All crank junkies looked suspicious.

She opened the door out to the hallway. Davion held onto her for balance and it worked. He didn’t buckle or stumble or anything. But there were sounds everywhere; people were walking around. And she was moving too slowly, so he pressed the knife into her back and directed her toward the garage.

There was a regular door that led out into it. They walked out onto the cement and looked around at the layers and layers of vehicles, the many floors that ascended upwards to God knew how tall. And all the while, Doctor Riley kept trying to slow down, trying to get him to stop moving. She was trying to get in his way.

“Which one is it?” he said.

She pointed at one right in front of them. He pushed her toward it and tried the keys, which worked. Okay. That was good. They were going to get out of here. He could bring her as a hostage maybe, or—

Behind him, the door opened. What was left of his heart clenched in his chest and he looked over his shoulder just in time to see two guards, standing side by side. They looked on, dumbstruck. Each with a blaster in hand.

Oh boy.

“Kill him!” Doctor Riley said.

They raised their weapons. Davion clenched onto Riley’s shirt and pulled her in front of him so the blaster rounds caught her in the face. An explosion of blood and bone rocked his body. She flailed around, her nerves sending spasms all along her arms and legs while her head was reduced to a broken Pez dispenser.

The blaster rounds kept coming. Davion fell backwards toward the car as Riley’s body was reduced to nothing until he could open the car door. He fell inside and slammed the door shut behind him, keeping his face away from the window.

“Get him!” one of the guards yelled. “Sound the alarm!”

Davion threw the engine on and put the flight car into gear. It raised a few feet off the ground and he pulled out of the parking space and lined it up with the guard. He rammed the car forward and pinned one of the guards at the waist, between the car and the wall. When he pulled back, the two halves of the man slid away from each other while the other guard screamed and opened fire.

Davion swung the car around. He swatted the guard into the air. His body collided with the ceiling. Blood splattered and dripped down onto the windshield.

Someone must have heard the commotion. Because the alarm went off in giant, loud whoops that ripped through the air. Davion’s sensitive ears felt like they’d burst. All around him was movement, chaos. Flight cars sprung to life and guards poured out of the doors and into the garage.

Davion grit his teeth. The exit was just ahead and beyond that, the perpetual black of the sky. He was going to make it. He was going to make it and he was going to come back and end this whole regime. He was going to come back with back-up. He was going to spring the prisoners and end the Saviors once and for all.

But first, he’d have to make it through the door.

He pressed down on the gas as hard as he could. The engine roared and the G-force pressed him back into his seat. Blaster fire rang all around him and collided with the hull. The car rocked. Davion’s brain was on fire, his mouth dryer than it had ever been, his whole being wanted to tear free from itself, to explode out of his body, to be anywhere else other than where he was.

The exit came. It was right there, a matter of yards, of feet, of—

Something landed on top of the car.

He knew who it was. He could tell by the way Atax’s metal legs clinked against the roof. The crunching of metal came next as Atax shoved his hand into the roof and pulled, intending to open the car like a can of sardines. Davion wouldn’t let that robot bastard get him a second time. Not when he was so close to getting out of here.

As the car exited the garage and into the night, Atax ripped enough of the roof off to be able to look down into the car. To be able to reach for Davion. To laugh to himself at what Davion knew must have been a ghost-like thing, a skeletal man with a wild look on his face.

“I’m gonna enjoy this!” Atax said.

But he wouldn’t. Because right as the car exited the garage, Davion spun the car into a barrel roll. He kept his hand turning the wheel so that the car would spin and spin relentlessly. Dizziness overcame him. For a second, he thought he might pass out. But Atax was losing his grip, slipping against the hull of the car.

Finally, the cyborg shot free from the car and hurdled toward the ground. Davion righted the car right as it happened, then looked past the dizziness and into the path ahead of him. Behind him was a whole army of flight cars, all amassed to take him back.

But they’d never get him. Not with the distance he had on them. They’d never be able to catch up.

He was right. He lost them right as he entered the city’s limits. He used the darkness to hide. And since this wasn’t a police car, nobody had access to the controls to stop it. He was a free man. For now.

***

There was a building in the far corner that he’d been to a dozen or more times. It was tall and had a landing pad on the roof that had been neglected for what may have been decades. It was where he met the Crank King when large shipments were coming in. Sometimes the King needed backup. Sometimes Davion was that guy.

When he landed the flight car on top of the roof, he was greeted by several men with guns. He didn’t think anything of it. He landed as though there was nobody there and opened the door to the car and spilled out.

“Where is he?” Davion said. “Where’s the Crank King?”

The men looked at each other like he was crazy. He must have been. They were clearly shocked by his appearance, he could tell. By his labored breathing. The retching sound he kept making and his inability to keep himself on his feet.

A few minutes later, the Crank King arrived. Davion had known he’d be here. This was the only safe place for him to hide out. Which meant it was maybe the only safe spot in town for Davion to be in.

The Crank King had an enhanced arm now. It didn’t look too bad.

Then everything went black.

***

Davion woke up some time later. He was told it was a couple weeks. The Crank King had hooked him up to an IV and given him a steroid treatment which made him feel stronger when he awoke. But not at full strength. At least his breathing seemed to have returned.

He lay in that room on a comfortable couch for a few hours before the Crank King arrived. Davion could tell his presence wasn’t exactly welcome here. But the King still thought Davion owed him. So he had to keep him alive.

“This was a ballsy move,” the King said. “You’re lucky I’m such a nice guy.”

“Sure. Now you think I’ll pay you back.”

“Won’t you?”

Davion smirked. But the King wasn’t in a joking mood. He sat down across from Davion and placed his hands in his lap. He still wore that ridiculous purple robe. And that hat. It was hard to take a man seriously who looked like that.

“Okay,” the King said. “You survived. How?”

“There’ll be time for that later. Right now, I need your help.”

“I’ll say. You haven’t seen the news yet?”

Davion shook his head. The King pulled out his tablet, opened the news section, and handed it over to Davion, who propped it up on his thighs. It was a news woman, professionally attired, with a serious look about her.

“—named Davion is being sought after by the Saviors themselves. A spokesperson for our benefactors had this to say.”

It cut to another man, an older man. He spoke in an urgent tone.

“We all receive our goods from the Saviors. All hail them! They give us our food. Our water. And this man Davion has not only defied them but tried—and failed—to embarrass them. He’s been spreading lies and slander. Which is why—it’s with a heavy heart I tell you this, ladies and gentlemen. But the Saviors have instituted a ransom policy.”

He cleared his throat. “Our food and water supplies will be cut off until Davion is turned in.”

Chapter 13

They called it the Thinning.

The panic was almost immediate. Rioting happened within minutes. The whole poor section of town was ripped to shreds, burned to the ground. Human screams were constant. It was a vision of Hell, of Man unleashed from civilization. Untethered. Become, yet again, barbaric.

Anyone who had to venture into the streets came back with stories too unbelievable to be true. Of families torn apart by ravenous hunger. Of junkies sucking each other’s blood to get high. Bodies piled up in six foot stacks or used as sandbags. Gunfire never ceased. People destroyed one another.

It lasted days before Davion was able to get up and walk around. The steroid and IV treatment was working. The rage in him hadn’t died down. He started waking up and exercising. He was on a mission now.

But the meeting he knew was coming—that came sooner than he’d thought. It came when the Crank King entered his room with a blaster in his hand that he kept out in the open. So Davion wouldn’t forget it was at play.

Davion sat up on the couch he lived on. He met the King in his eyes. The King was more intense than maybe he’d ever seen.

“You wanna give me up,” Davion said.

“It’s nothing personal.”

“But you’re running low on food.”

The King nodded. It was just as Davion knew it would happen. He knew that everyone else in the building was saying the same thing. Why hold onto this guy for a lousy debt when the Thinning was going to kill them all?

And you know what? He understood in a weird way. At the very least, he didn’t blame them.

“Do you know what they do?” Davion said. “The Saviors.”

“All I care about is that they give us food and water.”

“They take people. Human beings. They kidnap them off the streets and make them fight to the death. For amusement. They’re a degenerate bunch. They’re always—”

The King held up his hand. “What they do is their own business. I need to eat.”

Davion put his head in his hands. The desperation was palpable. Even the great Crank King could be persuaded by taking away what was necessary for him to live.

There had to be a better way around this. Some other tactic he could try.

“Let me ask you this,” Davion said. “Say you give me up. Right? What stops them from doing something like this again?”

“Then I’ll give that person up too.”

“And what if it’s you?”

The King shook his head. “I’m not in the habit of getting on their bad side.”

“But that’s the point, isn’t it?” He stood up and paced back and forth. “You’ll never know when you’re on their bad side until it’s too late. Because they can do anything. They make the rules. We live by them.”

“And in return, we get to live. We get to do whatever we want. There are no cops here anymore. Do you not see the kind of living we get to make is because of them?”

“You’re missing the point.” Davion looked him right in the eyes. “We need to get rid of them.”

The King threw up his hands in defeat, but Davion sat down again to keep his attention. The King must have changed his mind about giving up on the conversation, because he resumed eye contact.

“We can get rid of them. We have the numbers. We have the weaponry. All we need to do is get everyone together and—”

“I’ll stop you right there.” The King cleared his throat. “Nobody’s gonna wanna do this. Nuh-uh. Not ever.”

“Why?”

“Are you serious? We’re all gonna get killed is why.”

“But—no, some of us will, sure. But not all of us. We can take them out.”

“You’re crazy,” the King said. “And that’s coming from me.”

“Maybe.” Davion leaned forward. “But what do we have to lose? If you turn me in, they will come for you eventually. But if we get rid of them, we can—Jesus, do you wanna spend the rest of your life around this kind of filth? The streets are disgusting. Everyone you know is an absolute animal. How many sex criminals do you hang out with?”

“They’re not criminals if the cops don’t care.”

“See? Come on, man, don’t you want something else? Something better?”

The King pinched the bridge of his nose. He was thinking, Davion could tell. It was a gamble that somebody like him would be tired of this world and of everything in it. That he’d want things to be different, better. But that gamble seemed to have paid off.

The King set the blaster down onto the floor. He nodded as if he couldn’t believe his own thoughts and maintained that look for what felt like minutes.

“Okay,” he said. “But how do we get the boys on board with this?”

Davion smiled. “That part should be easy.”

They started by sending out e-fliers. Then they wandered the streets and whispered in everyone’s ears. They got a hold of the weapons dealers the King worked with and told them what the plan was.

Davion was right to bank on the people’s horror. Everyone was disgusted with what the world had become. With who they’d become. Many of them protested that they’d be better off throwing Davion to the wolves, but Davion’s line about them being next in line worked almost every time. The few that it didn’t work on were persuaded by the sheer number of people who opposed them.

The numbers grew. The whisper network along with it. Eventually, they staged a meeting place in an old warehouse by the docks. It was attended to by the hungriest, angriest people Davion had ever seen. He used up the remainder of the King’s food stash to feed them and in doing so, broke down the last reservation they may have had regarding helping him pull this off.

The plan was simple. They were going to march all the way to that hill, taking cars with them, all of them heavily armed. And they were going to rip the capitol building to the ground brick by brick. Anyone who gave them a hard time would be shot. Anyone affiliated with the Saviors was going down. Saviors themselves would receive no clemency.

The crowd was riled up into a frenzy. Weapons were passed out. The Thinning had almost destroyed their spirits. But Davion had given them their spirits back. For the first time in a long time, he wanted humanity to succeed. And he had hope that they would.

It wasn’t long before the police came down on them. But the people were armed. They were angry. Determined. The police were caught off guard and were brought to their knees quickly. They retreated toward the capitol with the people in hot pursuit.

Davion took the lead. He urged everyone forward and opened fire on as many of his enemies as he could. In no time at all, there were bodies everywhere, an even greater number than during the first days of the Thinning. But the people’s hunger reminded them of what their duty was. And Davion did his part as well. With the Crank King beside him and the King’s lieutenants, each with his own platoon, none of which stayed together but turned into a chaos so profound that the police and the guards couldn’t get a hold of them.

It was working perfectly. They stormed the capitol. They tore down the walls and opened fire. The smell of blood filled the air. All around Davion, people exploded from blaster fire but he quickly found cover and took out his enemies until he could get to his destination.

The cell he’d been kept in. It was just down the hall.

He took out three more guards on the way over, cutting them in half with his blaster, until he came to the door. He blew the lock with a single round and kicked the door in to find the ghastly array of men still hanging from the walls—

And among them was Shane. Shane who now looked so confused and malnourished he almost didn’t recognize Davion when he saw him. But soon enough, his face lit up and his mouth widened and tears streamed from his eyes.

“It’s you,” Shane said. “You came back for us.”

“Don’t make too big a deal out of it.”

Davion fired at the chains which held the men up. He had a duffel bag with weapons in it which he threw on the ground and told them to take up. He told them everything they were doing, how they were taking the Saviors down right then, that this was the only chance they’d ever have.

“Are we winning?” Shane said.

“I think so. But you’ll have to fight hard because everyone on our side’s next to dying of hunger. Just remember everything they did to you and take them out, all of them. Got it?”

Shane nodded. The others did too.

They ran off through the hallway and toward the sound of gunfire while Davion stayed behind. He looked at the chains from which he’d hung not so long ago. He remembered the fear and the darkness. A rage burst up through him and he fired at the chains, reducing them to rubble. He shot at the walls and watched them crumble.

And then he ran back out into the building. He ran out to where the people had the Saviors on the ropes. To where Saviors were pleading to be left alive and were met with blaster fire. The Senate room was torched. Bodies were thrown into the flames.

This was a revolution. Davion had no disgust for this behavior. This was justice, redemption. This was the wrath of God in the people’s actions. He killed more people than he’d ever thought possible. And he savored the sound of walls collapsing, of explosions in the distance. They’d caught the Saviors off guard and that was enough.

Or so he thought.

He remembered, of course, where Mig Crane lived. That room would be burned in his mind forever. That degenerate scum. That filth. His brain turned over the scene again and again. How much Mig enjoyed pain and humiliation. How inhuman he was. Everything that had happened to Davion as a result, all the way down to the fight and beyond.

He was going to kill Mig Crane. He was going to strangle that bastard. Throw him out the window. Do whatever he had to do to make sure he stayed dead.

Davion entered the hallway. At the end was the door. Mig Crane would be hiding in there, he knew. He’d be cowering, hammered, shaking. Would he have someone with him? It was hard to tell. Davion hoped Mig wouldn’t be alone, so that he’d see himself be humiliated in front of someone.

But as he walked the length of the hallway, a rumbling came from somewhere. It started ahead of him and then grew and grew until it seemed to come from all around him.

How could he have been so stupid? How could he have forgotten? After all this time, how far they’d come, he didn’t think this would happen? He didn’t think he’d be meeting him again?

The ceiling caved in. Davion took two steps backwards and gripped his blaster tight. All around him was dust and noise until the dust settled and the silhouette became the man himself, Atax, standing tall, still with that awful smile, still laughing that awful laugh.

“I was wondering when you’d show up,” Atax said.

“Did you miss me?”

Atax nodded through his laughter. “Of course. I’ve been dreaming about you. But you seem different. Angrier.”

“Shut up.” Davion spat. “And come over here and fight me.”

Atax punched a fist into the opposite palm.

And then he ran toward Davion.

Chapter 14

Everything had a weak point.

For a human being, it was the softness of the body. The whole human person was a disturbingly vulnerable thing. The body needed to be shielded in clothes which protected it from harm. Houses had to be built for this reason also. Groups were assembled to develop strength in numbers.

Nothing on Earth could be built without a weakness. Even Atax, seemingly bulletproof, had to have something about him which could be exploited. It wasn’t his eyes. Nor his face. That left three options, as far as Davion could tell. Maybe there was a mechanical portion of his body which could be harmed and therefore shut him down. Maybe Atax could be overcharged and malfunction. Or maybe—and this was a big maybe—there was something about the back of the machine’s head, something exposed there. Every other attack Davion had used had been on the front. Maybe the back was a weakness.

He didn’t have time to think about it any further. Atax shoved him to the ground, grabbed him by the ankle, and threw him into the wall before picking him up again and throwing him into the opposite wall. All of the injuries Davion had sustained recently made themselves known again. He was weaker than he was a few weeks ago. He was missing a toe, for God’s sake.

What chance did he reasonably have against this thing?

He caught his breath. Just in time too, because Atax attempted that move a third time. Davion was able to get out of the way and get on his feet. He fired three blaster shots at the cyborg, all of which glanced off. Atax laughed like he couldn’t believe they were trying this again.

But the point wasn’t to hurt him. It was to create noise, to keep Atax’s attention from being able to focus. If that would even work. But he had to try.

Atax lunged at him and Davion ducked. The machine flew past him and Davion used the moment to take a better look at Atax’s machine body. There just wasn’t enough time to see if anything about him could be exploited that way. Which made the first possibility null. There was no way he could learn that in enough time so he could pull it off.

So what about overcharging him?

They were in a long hallway. But there were doors to rooms everywhere, behind which could be something. Davion kicked down one of the doors and entered to find a Savior hanging from the ceiling, having gotten to himself before anyone else could.

Atax burst through the door. Drywall exploded around him while Davion looked for something, anything. Come on, there had to be something…

Atax lunged and this time, hit Davion square in the back with his shoulder. Davion fell forward, nearly losing control of the blaster but held on long enough to flip over onto his back. The cyborg figure loomed over top of him, reached for him, reached in the direction of his throat.

What was there in the room? A chair. A bed. A sink on the far side. Something which smelled terrible and might have been the dead body.

But over top of Atax: the sprinkler system for the fire alarm. It was a terrible idea, a stupid idea. This wasn’t a cartoon, it was reality, and reality at that moment was a murderous cyborg coming to pull his head off from his body.

He had to try.

He shot up into the ceiling. Four rounds hit around the sprinkler and the alarm went off. Atax’s attention was directed upwards as the water fell down on him and Davion held his breath. Maybe there’d be sparks. Maybe there’d be a fire, an explosion.

Instead, there was nothing. Nothing except Atax’s laughter.

“Did you think you’d get me with water?” Atax said. “You can’t kill me! Nothing can kill me!”

Dammit.

Atax reached for Davion, but Davion rolled out from underneath him. The odds of there being something about the back of the cyborg’s head that was a weakness was as unlikely as anything he could have ever dreamed of. Maybe the machine really was unkillable. Maybe this was the end of the line.

Davion was running out of energy. Atax was toying with him, letting him get a head start on him. Letting him run around. The sound of his laughter was deafening now, more maniacal, as though the mechanism which produced it was going crazy itself.

Finally, Atax had had enough of toying with him because Davion took a blow to the back that nearly killed him. It felt as though he was only kept apart by rubber bands, that his substance had cracked with that hit. He tumbled toward the window and the drop ahead of him drew near. It was a long way to the ground. He was lucky he didn’t fall through to his death.

Atax grabbed him and lifted him over his head. Davion’s stomach sank. He could see already in his mind what the drop would look like, the ground rushing up to him. He knew it was too far for him to make it. That he’d die when he hit the ground. Or if he didn’t, by some miracle, then a lifetime of suffering was all that lay ahead of him.

And that goddamn laugh. The incessant laugh. Atax’s body adjusted its weight to throw him away. Davion was up over the cyborg’s head and for the first time—yes, for the first time, he could see the back of the machine’s head and what was there… It was too ridiculous to be true.

It was a head of wiry hair. It wasn’t mechanical like the rest of him, but it was covered by a shielding portion of his back that ran up behind his head. Davion still had the gun too but he only had a split second before Atax would hurl him through the glass and to his own death.

He had to try. He yelled with everything he had, aimed the gun right at the back of the machine’s head, and fired two rounds at close range. The sound of shattering bone filled his ears. Blood splashed against his face and Atax’s body froze all at once.

The cyborg’s arms twitched. The speech modulator, the one which made the laughing sounds, went on the fritz. Then the body fell backwards and Davion landed with a thump that rocked him.

For a moment, he could only lay there in silence. He half expected Atax to get up again, to come for him like at the end of a bad movie. But the cyborg body was perfectly still. Blood poured out of the wound in torrents. His lifeless eyes only stared up at the ceiling but none of the rest of him made any motion whatsoever.

Davion got up to his feet. There was a cheering sound that came from every corner of the building. He savored that as he walked out into the hallway and looked down, again, at the door to Mig Crane’s room.

His mind was focused in a way that it had never been before. He felt every step he took. Every breath. Every inch closer he came to the door was an inch closer to all this being over. To the suffering these people had wrought being over.

He stood in front of the door. It was like being a Zen master, the focus he had. He wondered if he could hear Mig Crane through the door, if he was whimpering inside still. He smiled at the thought and pulled his leg back.

He kicked the door in. It took everything he had. But the door crashed inwards and Davion stepped inside, his gun drawn.

There was nobody there.

Panic set in. He threw the mattress off the bed. He tore the closet open. He checked everywhere he could think of before he ran out into the halls, opening doors, kicking doors in, throwing things all over the place to look for him.

He was nowhere. A ghost. Davion wondered if maybe someone else had gotten him earlier and he hoped they hadn’t. But it wasn’t impossible. So many of the Saviors had been caught and captured and killed. It could have been…

Some time later, he descended the stairs and found the crowd of people at the main entrance. They were cheering. The resistance had destroyed the Saviors. The government was theirs.

***

In the weeks that followed, Davion and the Crank King spent a lot of time piecing everything back together. There were media outlets which needed their freedom back. Supply chains needed to be repaired.

It was strange how much damage the Saviors had really done. How much of the world was dependent on them. How, frankly, screwed everyone was without them. It would take a long time to devise something that would work better in its place. Something that liberated people instead of enslaved them. Something that would bring hygiene back to the streets, stop leaving people cast aside.

It would be a monumental shift in the way everyone did things. But the memory of the Thinning was strong. And with it came the desire to move away from the way things had been. Away from the chaos. The depravity.

There were setbacks. Pitfalls. Great strides forward. And always Davion was there to help, to add his input when it seemed prudent. But everyone who saw him over that time knew that something was off about him. He was thinking about something. Always, always thinking about something.

Because they checked over all of the bodies. They tallied the dead Saviors. They had their names. Their origins. They learned the history of these people in a way that was never available to them before.

Nobody ever found Mig Crane.

Davion was assured that some bureaucratic error must have taken place. That maybe he wasn’t really a Savior at all, even. Maybe he was some hangers-on who pretended to be one of the big boys. But Davion knew that wasn’t true. He knew that this man was out there somewhere.

He spent whole nights thinking about it. How Mig could have escaped. Where he could have escaped to. Nobody else was concerned about it but him. And he knew why. He had the burning desire for vengeance in him. He wanted satisfaction. He wanted to kill the monstrosity who’d put him through absolute Hell.

Every minute that went by without that happening was an eternity. But eventually. nobody wanted to help him anymore. Everyone told him it was a lost cause and that they had a civilization to build. They had to find the right people who knew the right things to make sure this project didn’t turn into something much worse than what had come before.

And they were right. He had to put it out of his mind. And for periods, he could. But it was always late at night, by himself, with just his thoughts, when it would come back to him. The way Mig liked being spat on. How close Mig had held his body to Davion’s. His smell.

The fight in front of all those people. The way he was kept in that cell.

When those thoughts came back, he found he couldn’t think of anything else. He’d drift off to sleep and dream of finding Mig Crane.

But maybe he never would. Maybe he’d spend the rest of his life looking for something that would never be found. Something beyond his ability to even look for it. Because everywhere he looked, there seemed to be nothing. No trail. Nothing.

And still, he’d fall asleep. And he’d dream of finding the man who almost ruined his life.

Chapter 15

Ten years went by.

A number of little towns had sprung up in the wastelands outside the city. Things were changing. Technology was enabling people to live in places they’d never dreamed of being able to live in before. The mass exodus out of the city was not only an expected result of these technologies but also an expected result of having lived in the city for so long. Everyone still had memories of what that was like. They saw streets which reminded them of where people had been shot. Where they’d had their first hit of crank. All of their worst memories were tied up in the city. And so they left.

One of these towns was a place called Newton. It was small, as all these places were. But it was a popular spot for men and women who’d been on the dicier side of morality, even for how people were before. This was where the killers hung out. The ones Atax would have gotten along with just fine.

It was here that Davion arrived. He was wearing a long duster and a hat, with a gas mask to cover himself from the fumes. The large dome around the city stood before him. He knocked on the pressurized door and it was opened.

When he stepped inside, there was a small man, almost like a mole, who greeted people and helped them find their way around town. He was called Tony, he said, and the way he spoke was nervous, frantic. He didn’t like Davion’s presence, particularly as Davion had gotten himself quite the reputation for overthrowing the government all those years ago.

“Are you looking for a place to hide?” Tony said. “Or just a place to rest?”

“A place to rest is fine.” Davion looked around. “Not much to it, is there?”

Tony shook his head.

There was a small little town square. Around it were a series of small, plastic buildings, all of which looked as though they’d fall over at any second. There was garbage in the streets. Crank junkies either dead or out in the elements—as much of the elements could be felt under a dome. It was almost like the city was before. Some people didn’t like change, he supposed.

Tony brought him over to the hotel and talked to the hotel manager about getting Davion a room. It was here that Davion took off his mask. He was well-worn now. Wrinkled. He had gray in his hair and his beard was getting longer. The hotel manager knew who he was immediately, but didn’t seem phased by his presence. He gave Davion a room and let him stay there as long as he wanted. A hundred credits a night.

Davion didn’t thank him but took the room. He didn’t have a whole lot in the way of stuff with him, but what he did have he laid down before he went back downstairs to look for the bar. That was a little place in the back, where he found Tony, skipping out on his duty as a greeter to play cards and have a couple with two men who looked like rough trade.

“Mr. Davion!” Tony said. “Are you—are you happy with your accommodations?”

“Couldn’t be happier. I could use a card game, if you got one going.”

The men looked at each other. Tony pulled on his collar.

“Sure,” Tony said. “Why don’t you sit down?”

Davion sat down and Tony dealt him a pair of cards. Ace and a four. Not great. But he threw in some money to see what would happen and ordered a drink when the server came by.

“I’m looking for someone,” Davion said. “A guy who goes by the name Jax. You seen him around?”

Tony shook his head. “No, no. Nobody like that here.”

But there was something about Tony’s expression that didn’t sit well with him. Davion threw some more money into the pot and leaned in close to get a good look at Tony. The small man cowered under his gaze.

“You sure?” Davion said.

“Very sure. Not that many people around here.”

“Fine. It’s just that I know for a fact someone saw him coming this way about a week ago. So either he’s moved onto the next town over or else he’s still here. Which is it?”

“Maybe he didn’t come here at all.”

“And lived out in the elements longer than need be? I don’t think so.”

Tony quivered. The other two men at the table must have sensed what was coming because they got up and left at the same time. All of the eyes in the bar were on the two of them and of those, mostly were on Davion.

Davion gently reached across the table and grabbed Tony by the collar. He pulled him in close. Tony whimpered. He closed his eyes.

“Tell me where he is,” Davion said.

“No. I mean, I don’t know.”

Davion pulled his blaster out and set it on the table. Tony practically squealed when he saw it. A commotion was starting around them. People were getting excited. There might be some blood tonight.

“Tell me,” Davion said.

“No. I don’t—”

Davion leveled his blaster at Tony. He had half a mind to blow the bastard to kingdom come, when suddenly a deep voice sounded from behind him, drawing his attention.

“You got me,” the voice said. “I’m Jax. What do you want?”

Davion shook his head. It couldn’t have been. All this time—this man was young. Bore a mustache. This wasn’t the man he remembered in the slightest.

He stood up and walked toward him to get a better look.

“It’s not you,” Davion said. “But we need to talk.”

***

Davion had a drink with Jax up in the hotel room. Jax explained his entire story to him, that he was a drifter, that he’d changed his name from Michael a few years ago and had been wandering around looking for a place he belonged in. He didn’t know anything about being a Savior. Nor about someone named Mig Crane.

For his part, Davion told him about himself. How he turned down a high-level government position to work as a cop again. How he was a captain now. And about how Mig Crane had stuck with him for over ten years. How he’d scoured every inch of earth he could find to get a hold of this man. But he’d turned up nothing. And now it looked to be another dead end.

“I’m sorry,” Jax said. “I didn’t think any of those bastards got away.”

“They didn’t. By the looks of things.”

“Well,” Jax said. “Maybe we should just get good and drunk about it. What do you say?”

Davion raised his glass of whiskey in agreement. He took a long sip and examined the room. It was just like his own, but on the other side. On a lower floor. And this one had a balcony, except that the balcony looked like it would collapse under even a light weight.

Maybe it was time to give up. He hadn’t stopped searching ever since the revolt. But more and more, it had dawned on him that maybe this was a stray hair that would never get plucked. An itch that would never be scratched. He’d searched for this man to the detriment of his own life. He had nothing but his job and this search. And that was all.

He sighed and leaned back in his chair. Maybe it would feel good to give up. To admit defeat. But then, maybe it wouldn’t. Either way, the search was over. And that meant tomorrow, he could just go home.

Behind him, the toilet flushed. The door to the washroom opened. The whiskey came over him in a nice way. He felt totally relaxed.

Which was when Jax pulled a garrote over his throat.

Davion may have been a little drunk, but he wasn’t slow. He saw that thing coming over him and in a second, had his hand up to stop it from getting to his throat. The wire dug into his hands and blood spouted from them. He kicked himself up and away from the chair to try and hit his killer against the wall. It took two tries before it worked.

Once it did, Davion smashed his head backwards, repeatedly hammering Jax against the wall until Jax’s grip loosened just enough so Davion could slip out from underneath it. He spun around and pinned Jax to the wall with his forearm. He ignored the bleeding in his hands.

“How’d you do it?” Davion said. “Plastic surgery?”

“Obviously.” Jax—Mig Crane—almost spat. “And you didn’t see through it! Some detective.”

Davion swung him to the ground and reached behind him for his handcuffs. But right as he did, the door burst open and Tony came in holding a blaster that he had aimed right at Davion’s chest.

He was small enough it looked comical. But Davion knew Tony would be pissy about Davion bullying him earlier. So he only raised his hands and backed away from Mig, who got to his feet and dusted himself off.

“Just in time,” Mig said. “Shoot him!”

Davion knew Tony would. So he quickly fell to his knees. Just in time. The blast smashed into the wall behind him about where his head would have been. Davion drew his own blaster and fired three shots into Tony, blowing his jaw away from his face and sending his corpse spiraling toward the ground.

Mig was on the run. Davion chased after him, bolting down the stairs. Two men met him at the bottom of the stairs with blasters and Davion cut them both down. He was getting tired already, no doubt from his age. He couldn’t chase bad guys quite like he used to.

He followed Mig out into the streets. A crowd of people met him outside the door to the hotel. Davion shoved them out of his way and hit the streets, got a clean shot on Mig, and fired.

He missed. Mig ducked at the last second. He was running toward another bar. Davion went to follow but someone grabbed hold of his shirt. That person got the butt of his blaster right to the teeth and let go.

He ran into the bar he’d seen Mig go into. Everyone sat at their tables, perfectly calm. It was as though nobody had gone into there at all. But Davion picked up on it right away. In this town, nobody ratted out anybody. And you could do whatever you want.

Someone snorted crank off their table. Davion grabbed that person by the back of the head and smashed their nose down on the table. Someone else at the next table tried to pull a gun on Davion, but Davion aimed the weapon at him and told him to sit down and the man listened.

Davion pressed his blaster into the face of the crank snorter.

“Where’d he go?” Davion said. “And if you say ‘Who?’, you’re dead.”

The man shook. The whole bar looked at him to see what he’d do. What he did was he raised a shaking hand and pointed at the bar.

A shot rang out. It hit the crank snorter right in the face. Davion didn’t see where it came from but he knew enough to throw the table onto its side and hide behind it.

Blaster shots ripped into the table. They were coming from the bartender, Davion saw. So he leaned around the side and shot back and hit the guy in the neck on his first try. Blood sprayed everywhere and the man lay on the ground, screaming for only a second until he was dead.

Davion got up and leveled his gun at the remaining attendees of the bar.

“Anybody move,” he said, “and you’ll wind up like that guy.”

Nobody moved. Davion walked as deliberately as possible to the bar and peered down behind it, where he saw Mig shivering with fear.

What he saw too late was the baseball bat.

The bat collided with Davion’s face. He fell backwards amidst a whole roomful of cheers. He felt the blood coming down from his face and into his mouth. His eyes watered. He couldn’t see anything.

He stumbled back as Mig came over the bar and hit him again. This time, it was in the ribs. Davion coughed and fell onto his back when two more hits with the bat came down on him.

“You took everything from me,” Mig said. “Do you know what my life used to be like? I had money. I had girls, boys. Whatever I wanted. Every day, I smelled blood and I loved it. God, I miss the—but I can smell your blood!”

Mig bent down and stuck his nose over Davion’s upper lip. He took a long inhale and laughed to himself. He danced around with the bat over his head.

“It smells as sweet as ever! Doesn’t everyone here like the smell of blood? Come on, give it a whiff!”

Davion didn’t let him get any further. He lashed out with a kick to Mig’s knee that hyperextended it so bad he could almost see fragments shoot out like shrapnel from a grenade. Mig screamed and fell down to the other knee while Davion got up, grabbed him by the back of the head, and pressed his blaster into Mig’s neck.

“Go ahead,” Mig said. “Shoot me. Take everything from me again, see if I care!”

Davion scoffed. He pulled out his handcuffs, kicked Mig onto the ground and cuffed his wrists together before he picked him up again and walked him to the exit. Mig begged and pleaded for someone to help him, to get him out of this. But all they did was sit idly by. They didn’t watch. They barely made any motion toward him.

Mig was distraught. He screamed and cried. Davion only smiled to himself as he made it to the exit. Around here, you could do whatever you wanted. You could be whoever you wanted, no matter how vile. But nobody, not a soul in the world, would do anything for you.

Davion would make it all the way back to the city. He’d bring Mig with him. Mig would stand trial like a regular person. He’d be given respect and a fair hearing. The sentence he would get would be what he deserved. No more and no less.

Davion wondered how watching that all would feel. After becoming something less than human, he would be treated as one after all this time.

A human who was cleaning up the streets the best he could. And who could trust other humans to try and do the same. What would this world look like when they were done with it? Davion and the rest of his people would find out together.

[1]Has he been here before? He seems very comfortable and nonchalant.

Also - so Henry has basically saved him, right? No "thank you"?

Thirdly - while I like this better, the outline says that Davion finds a hideout he knows. Think we can incorporate that idea (and also cover for the currently out-of-place nonchalance) by having Davion already having been here before? The bar could be a new addition that he wants to take advantage of.

[2]That's a great idea.

[3]I added something in the previous paragraph.

[4]I like it!