When Tony returned to his room, it had been cleaned, and there was a small package on the counter with a quaint note on Merdian Arms stationery:
Mr. Shepherd,
Please find enclosed a portable bit-vault with the full sum of the bounties for the individuals who attempted to burgle your room. As promised, all of their belongings have been shipped to their next of kin. Again, you have my sincere apologies for the unforgivable lapse in hotel security. I hope your room upgrade and comped stay will smooth over the discomfort you’ve had to endure.
Sincerely,
Titania
Hospitality Director
The Merdian Arms
“Huh,” Tony muttered, amused and almost a little guilty for letting the synth assume full responsibility for something that he’d expected to happen. He opened the little box, took out the fancy little rectangular chip, and held it up to his good eye so the bio-reader would recognize him. After a moment, his AUI indicated it was pairing, and then a window popped up displaying the balance: 43,211 Sol-bits.
“Holy shit,” he chuckled. “Those were some naughty goons, Nora. Transfer this into my online bit-vault.”
He watched as the balance zeroed out, then tossed the chip back into the box. His smile fell away as an image of the blue-haired girl’s face flashed through his mind. He quickly banished the thought; now was the time to be hard. He could be soft later, when this business was done, and he had Addie by his side. “Message Titania. Ask her when the outfitter is coming.”
Nora’s response was almost immediate—a not-so-subtle reminder that Titania was a fancy AI with emotion protocols. “He’s on his way now, Tony.”
“Good.” He flexed his mechanical hand, glancing down at the glossy, deep-red polymer. He was sitting on more than 200k Sol-bits—considerably more than he’d come to District One with, despite his acquisition of some pretty damn good tech. “Time to spend some of it.”
The outfitter was another outdated synth—no surprise—but, like the others in the hotel, he was professional to a fault, with that same stilted manner of speech that only added to the charm of the experience. His name was Julius, and he handed Tony a catalog—an actual booklet with laminated illustrations—of his offerings. As Tony perused it, sitting in the parlor of his suite, Julius mixed him an old-fashioned with top-shelf bourbon and a shave of orange peel that seemed pretty damn real.
Handing the drink to Tony, he asked, “Anything catch your eye?”
“Quite a few things. I like the, uh, Diplomat line. I need a blazer, slacks, and a shirt—all in your charcoal graph-weave. A carbon-thread trenchcoat with the reactive plating. Um, the polished monosole boots with carbon-ceramic heels and noise-dampening tread.” Tony flipped a few pages and pointed at a picture. “I want one of your vintage leather holsters for this piece.” He drew his mass driver, and the outfitter took it, his brass fingers deftly checking that it was safe before turning it this way and that.
“I can’t make a shoulder holster for a pistol this size; it would look absurd.”
Tony snorted. “I know. Hip is fine—like the one I have, but leather.”
“You’ll want conditioned leather, and my genuine cowhide is ten times the price of synthetic.”
Tony nodded.
“Excellent, a gentleman of discerning taste. Synthetics can’t match the quality of my leathers, and there’s something about the feel and smell that’s incomparable.”
The irony of a synth telling him about the benefits of genuine leather wasn’t lost on Tony. He tried to keep his smirk minimal as he nodded. “How long?”
Julius’s face looked metallic, but his lips moved like flesh as he frowned in consideration. After a moment, his crystalline eyes, softly glowing with amber lights, focused on Tony’s, and he said, “I’ll take your measurements and get to work; all the materials are in my shop. If you’re willing to pay a small rush fee, I can have everything ready by morning.”
“And the cost?”
“Everything, with the rush fee included, will come to 16,249 Sol-bits.”
Tony’s eyes widened a little. It was more than he would have paid for a suit even back when he’d been working with Cross. “That’s pretty steep for a suit, even a bullet-resistant one.”
“I’m an artist, Mr. Shepherd. This hand-crafted attire will elevate you to another plane—one where the immortals walk, looking down upon the lowly dross.”
Tony chuckled and shrugged. “Fine. Let’s do it.”
Julius nodded, taking hold of his left pointer finger and pulling. With a rattle, a fine, brass chain extended from the fingertip, and he held it wide as he said, “Please stand, and I’ll commence with the measuring.”
Julius was thorough, quick, and precise. He left Tony’s suite five minutes later with the promise that he’d have his order ready before breakfast was served. Meanwhile, Tony wondered if he’d even need the suit. He didn’t know what Jen was going to ask of him next. He didn’t know what their eventual meeting would look like, assuming he managed to worm his way into arranging one. Still, he figured it was better to be prepared than to have to buy something off the shelf that would make him stand out like a newly hired corpo-rat on his first day at the office.
The thought brought his eye to mind, and he had Nora message Wizzie to check if the mod-tech had been able to find him a match for his Aurora Tech eye. He told himself he wanted his eyes to match in case he had to blend in somewhere—the chrome eye felt like an identifier tag—but the truth was he was being vain; when the time came, he didn’t want to confront Jen with the cheap, almost-rust-tech eye in his skull.
While he waited for a response, he paced back and forth on the plush carpeting, looking out the penthouse windows at wintry New Manhattan. The snow on the nearby roofs had stuck, and the blanket of white did something to calm his nerves. People walked the sidewalks in dark winter attire, but here and there a bright red, yellow, or white coat stood out. Tony smiled, imagining that one of the yellow ones was Addie’s.
“Wizzie responded,” Nora announced.
“Summarize.”
“He says he wasn’t sure you were serious, but he did a little digging. He can get you a matching eye, though it’s a lower-end model—it adjusts iris styles more slowly, struggles with color balance in low light, and tends to ‘ghost’ during rapid focus shifts. He says your superior eye should compensate for most of those shortcomings.”
Tony pursed his lips, slowly nodding. The fact was, his Aurora Tech eye was already working pretty damn hard, compensating for the disparities in his vision caused by the industrial eye he’d acquired in the Blast. “And the cost?”
“45k for the eye and a 3k finder’s fee.”
“Tell him to make it happen. Have him send it here via courier. You’re authorized to pay him and the courier.”
“Message sent.”
He inhaled deeply, letting the anxiety of spending another pile of bits leave with his exhale. “Call Titania.”
A moment later, a call window appeared on his AUI, and Titania’s brass and silver face appeared. “Can I help you, Mr. Shepherd?”
“I need a cyber doc—someone who isn’t going to sell me out or ask too many questions. Can you recommend anyone?”
“Of course. I’ll just need a few minutes to check availabilities. When were you hoping to be seen?”
“Tonight or tomorrow.”
“That will complicate things slightly. Nothing I can’t work around, however.”
“Thanks, Titania, one more thing: can you have some gun-cleaning supplies sent up?”
Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.
“Of course. Anything else?”
“Not at the moment.”
“Very good. I’ll be in touch.”
As the call window snapped shut, Tony walked over to the little bar in his parlor and asked Nora, “Do I have what it takes to make a drink like the one the outfitter gave me?”
“I don’t think so, Tony. I don’t see bitters or orange peels in the liquor cabinet. You’ve got cocktail cherries and sugar cubes. Try a few drops of espresso instead of bitters—it won’t taste the same, but it’ll still be good.”
Tony shrugged and then followed Nora’s suggestions, constructing a drink that, in the end, was good, but lacked the magic of the drink Julius the outfitter had made him. Still, he was in a mood, his mind constantly trying to drift to dark places, so the drink and the view from his parlor were almost like therapy—or so he told himself.
When the member of the hotel staff brought up a small tray loaded with solvent, oil, swabs, and disposable paper-mesh rags, he got to work cleaning his new gun. It wasn’t necessary; a mass driver like his could probably fire a thousand rounds without needing cleaning, but the process was relaxing to Tony and helped pass the time. He was just fitting the housing back into place, covering the heavy magnet coils, when a new message flashed across his AUI: Eric.
He set the gun on the coffee table. “Play it.”
Eric’s face resolved in a new AUI window. He looked like he was outside; his cheeks were flushed, and some of his tightly coifed blond hairs were blowing back and forth on his forehead. “Hey, T. Good news: Jen got back to me. She’s…” He sighed, shaking his head as he sniffed. Tony could see the buildings behind him move with his steps. “She wants to test you, I think—a job. I mean, man, if you can pull this off, it’ll clear the runway, so to speak. Can’t talk about it like this—gotta be secure. I’ll be at the Ghost Ship tonight after ten. If you make it, you make it. If you don’t…” He shook his head again, shrugging as he frowned. “Might as well clear out. Like disappear.”
The window snapped shut, and Tony grinned. “Now we’re talking.”
“Tony, the Ghost Ship is an operator club known for discretion. You’ll be required to wear a blocking device upon entry. I’m not—”
“I know the place, Nora. Don’t worry.”
“It’s a thorough blocker, Tony—your augments will be disabled, and I won’t have access to your audio or visual feeds—”
“Nora, I know. Trust me, the whole reason the place is famous is because everyone inside gets the same treatment. Doesn’t matter if you’re a corpo president or a street-rat banger. Cross is a big corp, but they don’t have the pull to make the Ghost Ship bend the rules.”
“Understood…” Nora sounded crestfallen, though Tony knew it was only because he’d dialed up her emotiveness a little.
He picked up the gun and gave it a final check. After he’d slid it back into the holster and stared out the window for a while, he contemplated making another drink, but then Nora announced, “Titania is calling.”
“Accept.”
As her face resolved in a new window, the synth said, “Mr. Shepherd, I have good news. If you have time this afternoon, one of our frequent guests, Doctor Bishop Clyburn, has an availability at 1530.”
“Really?” Tony glanced at his AUI. It was just a little past one. “It depends—I’m expecting a package, and I’ll need it before I go to the doc.”
“He has a two-hundred-bit cancellation fee. Shall I book the appointment?”
“Yeah, book it.”
“Very good. I’ll vouch for him personally, Mr. Shepherd. Doctor Clyburn has been a valued client for decades.”
Tony nodded, his eyes drifting over to the liquor bar. “Great, great. Thank you, Titania. Talk to you soon.” He closed the window and started toward the bar—one more drink wouldn’t hurt. “Nora, light a fire under Wizzie’s ass. Make these pieces fall into place.”
“Do I have authorization to offer him an incentive?”
“Yeah, but don’t go wild.” While she worked to get his eye delivered more quickly, Tony did his best to recreate the drink Nora had walked him through earlier.
In the end, the pieces did fall together; Tony’s eye was delivered a few minutes before three, and a cab ride over to the doctor’s office only took twenty minutes. Of course, Wizzie got another five hundred bits out of Tony—his fee for fetching the eye himself. Tony wasn’t worried, though; in a few days or a week at the outside, he’d be free to earn more bits—or he’d be dead. In either case, he wasn’t going to sweat a few hundred bits here and there.
Clyburn had an office in the Honda Megatower, about halfway up on the 124th floor. It was a high-end sort of clinic, but small, with only six plush, synth-leather chairs in the waiting room, and not even a synthetic receptionist—just a check-in kiosk. Tony arrived ten minutes early, and after he’d checked in, he sat down and watched the adverts playing on the wall opposite his seat. The minutes ticked by, and when the doctor was officially thirty minutes late, Tony looked toward the closed door leading deeper into the space and contemplated peeking through.
“Nora, contact the office and let them know we’ve got other appointments.”
A few minutes later, Nora said, “I’ve received a response. The doctor sends his apologies, but there was an emergency with the patient ahead of you. He anticipates another fifteen minutes before he can see you.”
Tony sighed and leaned back, staring at the wall where a woman was showing off her new cybernetic hand, which allowed her to perform better at her job restoring old paintings. The minutes ticked by, and Tony’s imagination and paranoia began spinning stories in his mind. What if Jen had put the word out to chop-docs and cybernetic clinics?
He didn’t think it made sense, though. Why would Eric arrange a meeting if they were trying to nab him in other ways? Tony had passed the little initiation test with the goons in his hotel room, and Titania had vouched for Clyburn—
His spiraling thoughts were interrupted when the door slid open and a young woman with bright red curls and wearing peach-colored scrubs, said, “Shepherd? We’re ready for you now.”
Tony stood, his earlier worries suddenly feeling stupid. He clutched the little box containing his eye as he approached the door.
“I’m so sorry about the wait. Sometimes surgeries can be a little unpredictable, and we just had a doozy.” She smiled and put a hand on Tony’s shoulder. “Don’t you worry, though! Doctor Clyburn’s never lost a patient.”
“Uh, right. Wasn’t really worried about it before now…”
“Damn it—my mouth. Please don’t say anything. I already got written up last week for that kind of thing!” She pointed. “Is that the device? Your appointment was for an eye, right?”
“Yeah, but I figured I’d need to consult with the doc. No idea what he’s gonna charge for the install.”
“Of course! Come with me, and I’ll get your vitals, then Doctor Clyburn will sit down with you.” She led him down a very sterile-looking hallway, past a pair of doors, and then into a small room where she pointed to a blue plastic ring on the ceiling. “This scanner is going to map your organs, bones, implants—all that stuff. It’ll get your vitals, too. I need you to get undressed first, though.” She pointed to the counter where a yellow crate sat. “Put your clothes in there. You can keep your underwear on.”
“Uh, now?”
“Yep. I’ll step out. As soon as you’re ready, stand in that green circle and the AI will start the scan.”
She started for the door, but Tony shook his head. “Hey, listen. I’m not going to do that.”
She looked at him with wide eyes, her mouth partially open, but seemingly unable to voice a response.
“Look, I value my privacy, and I’ve got some tech that I don’t need other people knowing about.”
“I can assure you that we value our patients’—”
“Nope. Let the doc know that he can scan my eye socket, but that’s all we’re going to do today.”
She stared at him for a minute, yellow-green eyes expressing her confusion. After a moment, she shrugged and pointed to one of the two chairs along the wall. “Please take a seat, and I’ll get the doctor.”
Tony nodded and sat, watching as she walked out. Thankfully, the doctor didn’t seem to hold a grudge about Tony’s noncompliance; he came into the room almost immediately. Clyburn was a stocky, middle-aged man with a very healthy, silver-gray head of hair. His right arm was a stainless cybernetic model with an extra digit, but otherwise, he was rather nondescript.
In a deep, almost jovial tone, he said, “Not a fan of scanners, huh?”
“Nah, Doc, I’ve got some healthy paranoia—necessary in my line of work. I’m getting an eye replaced; no need to scan me down to the nanometer.”
“Fair enough, Shep. Can I call you that?”
“I don’t care.”
The doctor chuckled, scratching the rough gray stubble on his jawline. “It’s been a long week. You’re my last patient. Let’s get this done, huh? Come into my operating room, and I’ll have the autosurgeon scan the eye, then I can give you an estimate. I assume we’re replacing the industrial model?”
Tony followed him out of the room, replying, “Yeah. I have another Aurora Tech one here.”
“Great! Easy, easy stuff. I’ll need to build up the eye socket. We’ll need some synth-flesh—new eyelids, eyelashes, part of the eyebrow. I’ve got some good stuff, though—micro-level texture and hue matching. Nobody’ll be the wiser.” He stopped by a gray metal door and tapped in a code. It slid open, revealing a relatively small but very clean surgical space. The autosurgeon looked brand new.
“Can you use a local?”
Clyburn turned to regard him, his eyes narrowing. “You want to stay conscious while I scrape out your eye socket, then graft bones, flesh, nerves, and an eye implant into it?”
Tony shrugged. “I mean, yeah. If you can block the nerves or something so I don’t—”
“Fine, fine. What do I care? Go ahead then, hop up. Titania told me to take good care of you, so I’ll do it. You aren’t the first operator I’ve worked with.” He laughed, shaking his head. “Not by a long shot.”
“That obvious, huh?” Tony handed him the box containing the eye.
“Well, the gun, the paranoia—yeah.”
Tony climbed onto the table and lay back. The autosurgeon brought back memories of Azalea, and his fingers twitched near the grip of his pistol. If the doctor noticed, he didn’t say anything. He was busily tapping away at the surgeon’s controls. A moment later, one of the arms, equipped with a thick lens surrounded by a heavy plasteel housing, swung over and hovered about two centimeters from his eye, then began to click and flash, moving in a slow circle around the socket.
“I’ll have it mapped out in a hurry. Hold still, now. I need a blood sample to program the synth-flesh.” Another arm swung over and pressed an auto-sampler against his neck. It clicked, Tony felt a pinch, and then it swung away.
The girl with the red curls came into the room, rolling a stainless cart. Tony could see little plastic-wrapped packages on it. “Klea’s going to prepare the synthetic materials for your eye socket,” Clyburn said.
“Sounds good,” Tony replied, watching as the scanning arm pulled away.
“Ah, this eye is second-hand.” Clyburn remarked, then added, “No matter. The nerve stem’s intact—I don’t see any obvious damage. We’ll know soon enough.”
“Should I begin, Doctor?” Klea asked.
“One minute. I’m examining the scan.” Tony watched as the doctor’s silver brows furrowed in concentration. “Whoever installed that industrial model did a nice job—easy surfaces to graft onto. We’ll need to repair and replace some of your extraocular muscles. Just a minute.” Tony wondered what he was waiting for, then the doctor said, “27k for the installation, all-in.”
Relief washed over Tony as his nerves finally settled. There was nothing more reassuring than good old-fashioned greed. “Sounds steep, but what do I know? Go ahead, Doc—I can cover that.”