August 10 2127

  The video pulled form the memory chip faded like an echo in a cave. It was slow and muddy. I witnessed the worst days of a man's life through his eyes. I felt a chill run down my spine thinking about how Mr. Clarke must have felt. Running my fingers over my dataport, I shuddered to think about how quick the pre-installed security software would have turned me in for illegal media.

  Valencia pushed the memory player aside, and turned to me, “Mr. Taylor. What do you know of the Illinois special election of 2078?”

  “Well, it was an election for a federal house seat. It was highly contested, but in the end, it didn't matter. The city was destroyed later that year, and he was at home”, I replied,

  “Correct. Well, during a summer meet and greet event, I had to pull security for Mr. Psalma. He decided to have a weekend of public events near a music festival in Millennium Park. He'd set up a place to speak next to The Beans, and during that, we'd found out that there was a hit placed on him. OCP wanted him alive as they were paying top dollar to help him win. He was ki-”

  “The beans?”, I asked, interrupting her.

  “Yeah, there were these two ugly bean shaped statues in Millennium Park. My parents told me there used to be only one, but there was a petition to add another, smaller bean, a few years before I was born. My parents signed it, thinking they were hilarious.”

  “You'll have to show me, but anyway, what happened at the park?”

  July 1 2078

  Life marched on, and so did we. It was now the end of June, heading into July. We were informed before the month swapped over that we were going to be moving from nights to days, and I won't deny it was nice to get my nights back.

  On that last Friday before the shift change, we were told of a fun little change of plans. We were running a meet and greet event for this guy running for congress on the first of July. His name was Jimmy Psalma, a fresh faced candidate from Bluff City, Illinois. He was still bright eyed and chipper, despite the underlying rot in his demenor. He was propped up by OCP's purse strings, because he said the funny words that OCP liked. By running on these promises of working to making the country more business friendly, he was well liked by those up above, and he was a major advocate for the private policing system for the past few years. Overall, he seemed like kind of a unkind guy, but he was our man.

  I was more mad about, was this interrupted my plans for that weekend. I had gotten tickets for a music festival over in Grant park, but instead, I now had to go and run event security for a guy who made me miss Pegasus and the Stanky Hanks. So with 8 Bennies down the drain for the tickets, another 7 grand on some custom light panels that slotted into my armor sockets, and the effort it took to find a maker who wasn't trying to put a virus into my brain, I was none too happy with Mr. Psalma.

  I woke up at 0200, much to Miss Seuse's excitement. After rustling the blankets for that first time, she rushed to me, demanding my attention. After I began petting her, she began to knead, and soon, she bagan to fall into the armor sockets. What a baby girl.

  “Miss Seuse, you need to get some object permanence”, I told her.

  “Mrow!”, she replied.

  “Meow, indeed."

  I got out of bed, washed up, and went downstairs. It was time for breakfast. In the kitchen I poured some granola into a yogurt cup for myself, and for Miss Suese, I poured some kibble into her bowl. I went to the table and sat down before eating.

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  “We're not so different, you and I”, I said looking down, before taking a bite of my breakfast.

  After finishing my breakfast, I laid in bed, watching movies until it was time to leave. I was out the door by 0500, and with no time left for faffing about, I grabbed the L to the city center. The train ride in was peaceful from both the rattling of the tracks providing a nice lull and the slowly raising sun twinkling the windows of the towers downtown.

  Now, finally in the city center, I exited the train platform and walked to the security entrances near in the carpark of the OCP building. I got the locker rooms off of the armory, and got into the uniform and armored up. By the time I'd finished getting ready, Daniels was in the armory, beginning to brief us on today's task. For the first time since our night at the docks, James had rejoined us, looking significantly worse for wear.

  “So, the first half of the day is just be patrolling the city”, Daniels began, “At noon, you'll go to Millennium Park, and run security for Jimmy Psalma. It should be a nice, easy day for you all. You'll just have to keep people away from his sitting area and whatever else he wants from you.”

  “Sounds easy enough”, said James.

  “Well do try to avoid getting shot. Again”, Daniels replied.

  “Oh, be kinder. He looks better with that steel jaw. You get steel teeth too?”, Alex teased.

  “Titanium, actually, but my arms have plenty of steel, now”, replied James, pulling of a glove, showing his cybernetic hands off.

  “Try not to eat too much concrete there, bud”, joked Max.

  We finished goofing off... I mean, we finished our pre-shift meeting, and headed the the Garage. We checked an SUV out from the motor pool. Alex once more took the wheel, and off we went. The first few hours of our patrolling were quiet and uneventful. Eventually we all decided to stop for coffee.

  We found a shop while on patrol, and pulled into a parking spot. We all hopped out of the cruiser, and meandered toward the coffee shop. We got to the door, myself covering the rear. Since I was far enough behind the other three,

  While entering the coffee shop, I heard someone say, “Hey officer.”

  Turning to look at the people trying to get my attention, I saw two people.

  One of the two people was flipping me off, the hand tilted 90 degrees so the thumb could be sticking skyward. The other, on the other hand, was filming a video and laughing to herself.

  “Happy 'Thumbs-up Thursday'”, the person said.

  “But... it's Friday”, I replied, returning the gesture with a confused, friendly wave.

  Unbeknownst to me, OCP started a campaign the prior day, called “Thumbs-up Thursday.” It was an attempt to better relations between the company police and civilians. It didn't go over too well, what, with half of the city using it as an excuse to tell us to fuck off.

  We received our coffees and soon we were back on patrol.

  While driving around the city, I received a call, “Officer Sanford, Dispatch here. We received a message from an informant of ours. He claims he has credible evidence Mr. Psalma will be in danger at his event today. Go meet up with him, and assess the evidence, and do make sure his event goes off without a hitch. Make sure nobody knows about the issue.”

  “Understood. Send us the address and we'll be underway”, I replied to dispatch.

  “Hey, guys, somethings up. I'll send you the details once I receive more information.”

  “Oh, great”, replied James.

  A notification popped up onto our HUDs with the address and the informants description. It was a short drive away. We drove the block a few times, looking for someone who fit the description. A man in jeans and an orange hoodie. About the third loop around the block, we found someone matching that description.

  We all looked at the man, as James opened up his door. Standing before us was a familiar face, laden with glowing tattoos.

  “Jesus Christ, it's you fuckers again. Go park and we can talk” Tycho said as unhappy as ever to see us.