Blood Drift

Some Things Never Change As Kelly sat ignoring the meaningless words directed towards her, she reflected on the fact that some things never change. Especially when those things involved the Feds. This was true despite the fact that the term “Feds” was one that really no longer applied to the people whom it was used to describe. There was, after all, no longer a Federal government, at least, not one of the type that had existed when the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the ancestor of the Global Bureau of Investigation, had still existed and the term “Feds” was first used to describe its agents. The GBI was an office of the Department of Global Security, one of the offices of the Global Union, the confederation of nations that was a hodgepodge of legacy governmental systems that had arisen over the course of the past century. While the GBI had subsumed existing law enforcement and intelligence agencies such as the FBI, the DEA, the ATF, Interpol, and the CIA, as well as the assorted militaries of the Global Union’s member nations, the average GBI Agent was indistinguishable from the Feds of America’s past. As far as Kelly was concerned, at any rate. This woman, she thought, as she turned her attention to Special Agent Nikki Chailyn Jenn, could easily have been a character in one of those ancient crime dramas Fontaine and I used to watch as kids, from her high and tight haircut to her humorless expression, her nondescript black suit, all the way down to her cheap shoes. It was more than her look, however; it was the attitude. The privileged demand for, in Kelly’s estimation, unearned respect, and the sneering air of smug superiority. “Detective,” the Special Agent said, peering over her sunglasses as she slid them down her freckled nose, “are you even listening to me?” Who even wears sunglasses these days? She can’t afford a glazing, or even photosensitive contacts? She concluded that it was an affectation, and realized, suddenly, that this was why the Feds of today were so indistinguishable from the Feds of the past; they couldn’t come up with any new ideas on how to look or act, so they stuck with what they thought worked. She suppressed a smirk at the thought, and responded, too sincerely, “Why, of course I’m listening, Special Agent Nikki.” The Special Agent stiffened. “That’s Special Agent Jenn.” “Of course it is,” she replied, smiling sweetly. “Detective,” Kelly’s Captain said, with no trace of humor. Kelly turned her glance in the Captain’s direction and found that her usual sympathetic expression was missing in action. Apparently I’m meant to take this seriously. “Sorry, Special Agent Jenn. You were saying?” The Special Agent sighed and rubbed the bridge of her nose. “I was saying, Detective 34498,” emphasizing Kelly’s FIN - Family Identification Number - “that we at the GBI have serious concerns about what could be considered questionable ethical behavior on your part, and how those…behaviors reflect on you, your fellow officers, your superiors, and the entire NYPD.” “I wasn’t aware that the GBI was concerned about the NYPD’s image,” Kelly said, flatly. “And as for my ‘questionable ethical behavior,’ I wish you would just come right out and say

what you mean, because you know as well as I do that my record is above reproach. Furthermore, any ethical violations, real or perceived, of a member of the NYPD do not fall under the GBI’s rather expansive umbrella, and as such are no concern of yours. So let’s just dispense with this charade and put it on the table. This little visit doesn’t have a thing to do with anything I’ve done, it’s all about who I am, or more to the point, who I’m related to.” Special Agent Jenn pushed her sunglasses up and rubbed the bridge of her nose. “Fine, if that’s how you want to play it. What is the nature of your relationship with Subject 76 AKA Jessica 50154 AKA Samson?” With that question she tapped the table with her gloved hand, and with a small beep a holographic image of a young woman with a square face, pointed ears, eyes that were completely black, and a thick mane of luminous blue hair appeared above the center of the table. Kelly regarded the image, then turned to regard the Special Agent. “You know perfectly well what the nature of our relationship is.” “Pretend that I don’t.” With a sigh, Kelly responded, “She’s my niece.” The Special Agent affected a look of surprise. “You, a decorated detective in the NYPD, are the aunt of a known terrorist and wanted fugitive?” “She’s no terrorist. And as for being a fugitive, why not call a spade a spade and refer to her as missing property?” “The Global Union does not consider her property. She is a sentient being with all of the rights and privileges afforded to any such being, whether human, Llani, or…a combination of the two.” Before Kelly could respond, the Special Agent continued. “However, despite outward appearances Subject 76 - “ “Her name is Samson,” Kelly interjected. It was, Kelly thought, a ridiculous name, but it was the name she was given by her mother, and the name she had accepted, and, indeed, insisted on using. “Subject 76, “ Special Agent Jenn continued, “despite her apparent maturity, is legally a minor, and is a ward of the state. We have a vested interest in locating her and ensuring her safety, as well as the safety of the public at large.” “Bullshit.” “Excuse me, detective?” “You aren’t the least bit concerned about Sam’s safety. If you were you wouldn’t be constantly feeding lies and distortions to your mouthpieces in the media that make her out to be some kind of dangerous monster.” “Your niece may not be a monster,” Special Agent Jenn replied, making it clear that she, personally, did perceive Sam as a monster, “but there is no question that she is dangerous to herself and others. The…unique nature of her biology grants her abilities - potentially lethal abilities - well beyond those of more conventional humans or Llani. With proper guidance she could put those abilities to use to help every citizen.” “You mean you would like to use her as a weapon. Like Tommy.” “Subject 37, or ‘Tommy,’ is not a weapon. He is a responsible citizen who uses his abilities for the good of all people in the service of his government.” Kelly snorted. “Well, he’s good PR, I’ll give you that much. Every time he rescues a kitten from a tree people forget about the illegal, unethical, and immoral experimentation that brought him into this world.” “Are you suggesting that the world would be better without Tommy?” After a pause, Kelly replied, “No. He actually is a good kid, despite your best efforts. But so is Sam, in her own way.” “Your niece has many dangerous ideas.”

“Yes, like the idea that she has a right to be free, to not be poked and prodded and dissected in some secret lab. To not have to perform tasks that she finds morally abhorren.t” Special Agent Jenn sighed heavily. “Do you know the current whereabouts of your niece?” Without hesitation Kelly responded, “No, I don’t.” “Are you able to contact her?” “No.” “When was the last time you were in contact with her?” “About three months ago. She sent me a holomail.” Captain Josie interjected, “Which Kelly reported to us, as she does every time Sam - Subject 76 - contacts her.” Special Agent Jenn ignored the Captain. “How do you arrange contact with her?” “I don’t; she contacts me.” “Would you be able to initiate contact with her.” Kelly paused to think. “Maybe. She’s...her sensitivity…she would probably just know that I wanted to contact her.” “Would she respond to this ‘knowledge’ by contacting you?” Kelly shrugged, the armored epaulets on her shoulders nearly touching her ears as she did so. “She might.” “Has she in the past?” “Yes.” “Then why do you say that she ‘might?’” Sighing, Kelly responded, “Because unless I’m mistaken you’re hoping that I will project a desire to meet with her so that you can spring a trap. She would know that, too.” Special Agent Jenn turned away from Kelly to look out the window of the conference room and into the precinct room, which was a buzz of activity, before speaking again. “If you could convince her to meet with you for the purposes of ‘springing a trap,’ would you?” Kelly bowed her head, then, weakly, responded, “If I was ordered to…yes.” “Only if you were ordered to? In your previous contacts with her have you encouraged her to surrender to GBI custody?” “No.” “Despite the fact that she is a minor and a known terrorist?” “She isn’t really either of those things. Sam was practically born an adult, and as for her supposed terrorism -“ “As a police officer you are sworn to uphold the law. Why haven’t you done so with Subject 76?” “In this case, the law is - “ she stopped. “I do not believe that her interests would be served by turning herself in. Further, I know that I could never convince her of that even if I did believe it. Finally, I am neither physically nor emotionally capable of taking her into custody. And if she belongs in anyone’s ‘custody,’ she belongs with her family, which you people have made impossible.” “With her family? With you, perhaps?” “Yes.” “You think that would be appropriate? Why?” “She’s my niece. She’s family. She’s my blood.” “But there is rather more to her blood than what your family has contributed, isn’t there? And why with you? Why not with her mother?” Kelly found herself at a loss for words. Turning back towards Kelly, Special Agent Jenn removed her sunglasses and said, “Regardless of the issue of blood, your family has no legal claim to Subject 76.” Again, Kelly said nothing.

After a pause, Special Agent Jenn regarded both Kelly and Captain Josie. “I find the fact that as a law enforcement officer you have flouted the law simply because you find it more convenient to do so than to perform your duties troubling at the very least. It is clear to me based on your behavior in this particular regard - in addition to other lapses in judgment - that you do not fully consider the consequences of your actions, or what they say about your character as an officer of the law. I freely admit that you have an otherwise exemplary record as a police officer, but, blood ties or not, you have responsibilities that outweigh any and all family obligations you may feel.” “You are hereby ordered to ‘project’ a desire to meet with Subject 76. You will report any contact directly to me, and at a minimum you will encourage her to surrender to GBI custody. Any indication that you have disobeyed this directive will result in disciplinary action, and your meteoric rise within the ranks of the NYPD will come to a screeching halt, irrespective of your record and your commendations. Is that clear, detective?” “Perfectly. Is that all?” “No, detective, it is not. While we’re on the subject of family, I would like to discuss Subject 76’s biological mother: your sister, Fontaine.” ***

Standing in the washroom and looking at her still-red face in the mirror, Kelly took a deep breath and tried to regain her composure. She had expected the questions about Sam - this wasn’t the first time some supercilious Fed had come around in an effort to track down her wayward niece. The questions about Fontaine, however, were a new development, and were much more troubling. It was hardly a surprise that Fontaine was on the GBI’s radar - she had been since she was fourteen years old, after all - but as far as Kelly knew the official level of interest in her sister and her activities had been minimal at best. Why are they so interested in her now? Worse, Kelly had no pull whatsoever with the Feds, and, indeed, she herself had been on their radar since she was a teenager as well. While Kelly had never exerted her influence within the NYPD to intervene on Fontaine’s behalf - there had never been a need, honestly, as Fontaine was perfectly capable of handling herself - nor, she liked to believe, would she, as she was perfectly capable of separating her personal and professional lives, despite Special Agent Jenn’s accusations, the fact remained that even the top brass turned a blind eye when it came to Fontaine out of deference to Kelly. Of course, Fontaine was a professional. She kept things quiet, and even if she attracted law enforcement attention the odds were against them ever finding anything they could use to make a case against her. But that was at the local level. Global law enforcement agencies had considerably more resources and broader authority. At the very least, they could, Kelly reluctantly admitted to herself, trump up charges is they felt so inclined. And it seemed, based on the exchange she’d just had with a representative of Global law enforcement, that they did feel so inclined. “That stupid suit,” Kelly said aloud. “Dammit, Fontaine.” Sighing, Kelly looked in the mirror more closely. Her short, blonde bob flowed around the edges of the navy blue headgear that framed her face. It was standard issue for beat cops, but was optional for detectives. She chose to wear it, and her modified dress uniform, simply because it was functional. The built-in communications disks that covered her ears, without interfering with her ability to hear, were much more functional than the standalone units that were available to plainclothes cops, and the light armor of the dress uniform worked just as

well, if not better than, the separate body armor most detectives opted to wear, without being nearly as bulky. Beyond that, for most of her life Kelly had never wanted to be anything other than a cop, and after putting on the blue for the first time she resolved that no matter where her career path took her, she would always display her profession with pride. Stepping back from the sink, she regarded herself in the mirror. The navy blue of the headgear connected to the lighter blue of her skintight bodysuit at the collarbone. Her detective shield was displayed prominently on the hardened carbon fiber epaulets on her shoulders. Her one modification to the uniform was the blue skirt she wore over the bodysuit, which was a common and officially-sanctioned modification to the dress blues. The material of the bodysuit could stop small caliber fire completely, while the distribution circuits woven into the material spread the force of impact throughout the entire bodysuit, making the shot feel like little more than a sharp sting. Heavier caliber fire would penetrate, but without sufficient force to cause mortal injury, and the material was insulated against electricity, though light-based weaponry such as lasers and other energy weapons remained deadly. The material was based on the alien technology incorporated in the bodysuit Fontaine wore. The one that Special Agent Jenn kept pressing Kelly about. Leaning forward, Kelly looked into her iron gray eyes in the mirror, their sharpness seeming incongruous with her otherwise soft features. The color of her eyes was the only physical feature she had in common with her sister. As children, their father referred to them as “Night and Day,” commenting not only on their physical differences but also the stark contrast between their personalities. Fontaine, the elder of the sisters by two years, stood several centimeters taller than Kelly, had a more athletic build, her features were considerably sharper, and her hair was jet black where Kelly’s was a golden blonde. Both women were exceptionally beautiful, each in her own distinctive way. In a world in which beauty, thanks to technical advances that made cosmetic surgery possible at the cellular level, was the standard, and indeed, almost mundane, the two sisters stood apart from the masses. Their mother, Genevieve, had been a successful model , and slightly less successful actress, in her youth before settling down with their father Georges and marrying into the family. That was one other commonality between Kelly and Fontaine; they shared the same biological mother. How important such blood ties were in the polygamous society that had developed after the Generation Plague and the war with the Llani tended to vary from family to family, though it wasn’t uncommon, as had been the case with Kelly and Fontaine, for siblings who shared both biological parents to form a closer bond than they did with their half-siblings. The blood bond was the primary reason for their closeness, but not the only one, as most of their siblings were considerably older than either of them, and it held a special significance for them. While Kelly was reasonably close with her other nine siblings, Fontaine was the one she held closest to her heart. Which was why she found virtually everything Fontaine did so maddening. As for Fontaine, she rarely spoke to any of the other members of her family besides Kelly, but even with Kelly, the one person in the world to whom she was willing to display any vulnerability, or even visible, albeit nearly imperceptible, affection, Fontaine still maintained a safe, detached distance. Kelly believed that her sister did this for the sake of her career, not wanting to entangle her younger sister in seedier, illegal aspects of her life. That’s what she told herself, at least. Taking another breath, Kelly turned to leave the washroom and found Captain Josie standing

in the doorway. “What the hell was that, Captain? What does the GBI want with my sister? And why the hell didn’t you tell me what I was walking into?” Captain Josie sighed and looked down at her feet, away from Kelly’s piercing stare. “Kelly…” “I don’t think I want to hear it, sir.” “I think you need to.” The Captain looked up and locked eyes with Kelly. “First of all, I have no idea what, exactly, they want with your sister, apart from the obvious.” “The obvious?” “Your sister is a thief who associates with known criminals. She’s believed to be connected with some of the largest heists in history, many of which involve travel across national borders, which makes them the GBI’s business. Furthermore, she’s stolen valuable and sensitive data and equipment from the government. Did it never occur to you that they would eventually decide to crack down on her?” Kelly shook her head. “She’s believed to be involved in such thefts. There’s no proof. She doesn’t have a record. She’s never even so much as been brought in for questioning.” “Kelly, come on.” Kelly wasn’t budging. “There is no legitimate basis for any of the claims that have been made about Fontaine’s activities. She is a licensed private investigator and personal bodyguard.” “She’s a mercenary and a thief.” “Prove it.” The Captain sighed. “Kelly, as the Special Agent pointed out, day in and day out she can be seen casually strolling along the walkways of the city wearing the same outfit she’s worn for the past three years as if she’s some ancient cartoon character, an outfit that is the property of the Global Union, which she stole from a research facility.” “What research facility would that be? The completely secret one supported by illegally-redirected public funds that doesn’t officially exist? Much like the outfit she wears, which also doesn’t officially exist. There’s a reason she’s been wearing that outfit ‘day in and day out’ for three years without the Feds saying shit or making a move to arrest her: to do that they’d have to admit that it exists in the first place. Once they do that, people start asking questions about where it came from, and those questions ultimately lead to - “ Kelly caught herself. “Lead to what?” Shaking her head, Kelly said, “I can’t say.” “I’m your Captain and your friend.” “I know. That doesn’t change anything. I can’t say anything more.” “Can’t or won’t.” “Both.” “Is this about your niece?” Kelly said nothing. “You mention things that don’t officially exist. Until your niece made it public, the lab where she was…” Captain Josie appeared to be searching for the right word. “Born,” Kelly said, firmly. “The lab where she was born wasn’t supposed to have existed either, and the Feds kept denying its existence even long after it went up in a ball of smoke, thanks to your niece who fire-bombed the place. Without the benefit of a bomb, I might add. That was another valid point that Fed geek made. Whether you like hearing it or not, or even if you choose not to believe it, Samson is dangerous.” She let that sink in, noting while her the fair skin of her cheeks flushed red with anger once again, Kelly said nothing. “ It was only after they were able to introduce Tommy to the world, demonstrating what

success they’d had with their experiments that they admitted that ‘mistakes were made in the pursuit of global security and the advancement of the human and Llani species’ that the breeding experiments had been going on at all. Even then, they still didn’t provide a lot of details and did their best to keep people from asking too many questions.” “Yes. They were very good at keeping people quiet.” “Including you?” Kelly said nothing, but the Captain nodded in understanding. “Fine, I’ll drop it.” She looked away. “But the fact remains that your sister is a thief. That’s hardly a secret. We followed the Feds’ lead and turned a blind eye to it, but I’m not so sure we can keep doing that.” “There’s no proof. She doesn’t have a record.” “Kelly, for god’s sake; she stole a fucking spaceship and took it on a joyride to the other side of the galaxy!” “She was fourteen. That was a sealed juvenile record that has since been expunged per the terms of her deal with the Feds.” “That’s not the point and you know it.” “With all due respect, Captain, what is the point?” “The point is that the odds are your sister is going down - for whatever reason - there’s nothing you can do to stop it or to protect her, and I don’t want to see the best damn cop I’ve ever known go down with her out of some misguided sense of loyalty to someone who wouldn’t know loyalty if it bit her on her perfect little ass.” Under other circumstances Kelly might have chuckled at the comment about Fontaine’s ass. Everyone always raves about her ass, she thought bitterly. “You don’t understand, Captain.” “You’re right; I don’t. Your sister flagrantly breaks the law and pursues her own selfish interests without a thought to you or anyone else, but you would be perfectly willing to throw your career away for her.” Kelly looked away. “Honestly, Kelly; at your age you should be, at best, a rookie fresh out of the academy, but you’ve already got your gold shield, and if you would just step away from this you’d be in line for a promotion. You’re only twenty-four years old, for fuck’s sake! You’ve got your whole life ahead of you. Don’t piss it away for someone who would sell you out in a heartbeat.” “You’re wrong, Captain. Fontaine…there’s more to her than you think.” “There would have to be. “ Captain Josie reached over and put her hand on Kelly’s left arm. “You know, there are a lot of fucked-up families in this world. Hell, I thought mine was bad. Did you know that my older sister tried to set me on fire when we were kids? First and second-degree burns all along my left side. I had to go through umpteen cellular regenerations, and I still have some scars. Now she’s like my best friend.” Kelly nodded. She’d heard this story many times before. “But, I’m sorry kid, your family…hell, you’ve got a niece who’s half-alien and wanted by every law enforcement agency in the world, and even that’s not half as strange as your relationship with your sister.” The Captain softened a little. “Just…just look out for yourself, okay? Don’t let your relationship with your sister cloud your judgment.” With a nod, Kelly said, “I’ll do my best, but when it comes to my sister, my judgment is always clouded.” “What kind of relationship do the two of you even have, anyway?” Kelly opened her mouth to speak, then closed it and thought for a moment. “It’s complicated,” she said, simply.

Some Things Never Stay The Same Things had gone smoother for Fontaine than this job had. It was supposed to be a simple matter of climbing forty-five stories, slipping in through the vent at the top of the penthouse suite, avoiding the assortment of alarm and security systems - most of which were not exactly top of the line - subduing the Sim guards posted outside the master bedroom, accessing the safe under the Governor’s bed without waking the Governor, her husband, and their wife, cracking the safe’s encryption, extracting the manuscript, making her way back out the way she’d come in, leaping from the roof, and catching a ride on the BMT line flyer as it flew past 24 stories below. Simple. Everything had gone smoothly up through the extraction of the manuscript. The climb from the highest publicly-accessible level of the building had been a little rough, but the suit had taken care of most of the work, its AG field altering gravity around her so that she was able to simply walk up the side of the building at a ninety-degree angle. Still, the high winds made it treacherous and something more than simply a leisurely stroll. The height, and the precarious position she was in, didn’t factor into it. They weren’t even considerations as far as Fontaine was concerned. Before climbing out the restroom window and making her way up the wall she had pulled back the thick lock of hair that hung down over her left eye and pinned it in the back to her otherwise close-cropped hair, then reached down between her shoulders to pull the elastic fabric of her bodysuit up over her face and down to her chest. The black material, which looked and felt like latex, adhered to the thicker red material of her breastplate and molded itself to the contours of her face and neck. With that accomplished, she reached down to grab the edges of the black material on the either side of her exposed abdomen and pulled them together over the taut, well-defined muscles. As the edges came together they sealed seamlessly and conformed to the shape of her torso just as the section she’d pulled over her head had. After finishing with her preparations Fontaine was covered from head to toe in the black material, her facial features completely obscured. Though her eyes were covered she actually had a better view of her surroundings than before, as tiny cameras woven into the exterior of the suit fed images to the 360 degree holographic display generated on the interior. She made her way to the restroom window. At this height most windows were sealed and couldn’t be opened. However, this was floor was on a designated rescue level; in the event of an emergency everyone in the building was directed to move to one of the seven rescue levels where rescue crews would hover outside the windows in flyers to evacuate the floor. Approaching the control panel for opening the window, Fontaine caressed it lightly with her left index finger, allowing the hacking circuitry in the suit to form a connection with the controls and disabling the alarm that would normally sound if the window were opened. She pressed down lightly, and with a sigh the window opened outward. She input a command for the window to automatically close in sixty seconds. Before climbing out through the window she looked down at her feet. As much as she loved them, the stiletto heels attached to the bodysuit weren’t entirely practical for the climb. Responding to the thought, the heels collapsed and flattened out to a more sensible height. The considerable drop made her appear substantially shorter, but she still stood taller than most women or the average man. She leaned forward out the window and turned sideways to place her hands on the side of the building, her fingers adhering to the surface. Once she was satisfied the contact would hold her weight, she pulled herself out of the window, using her right leg to slow her momentum as she swung like a pendulum. Suspended nearly a kilometer above the ground, held only by the electrostatic contact of her ten fingers, she pressed the pointed tips of her feet against the building. The material covering her feet flattened out and formed a connection, and on the display inside the suit she pulled up an image of a gyroscope. The gyroscope positioned itself in response to her thoughts, indicating how she would like gravity to work. Once she made her selection, the AG controls in the suit adjusted the flow of gravity around her, and,

releasing her finger hold on the building, she fell slowly backwards, controlling her speed with her feet, which retained their hold on the building until her heels pressed against the side. Standing perpendicular to the building, she began her assent. Upon reaching the roof, she adjusted the virtual gyroscope as she crouched down to grab hold of the ledge. Holding tightly to the edge, she shut down the AG controls and pulled herself up onto the roof. After standing and taking a few steps forward, she shifted the view presented by the cameras past the visible spectrum until they presented her with a view of the infrared motion sensors. Determining their coverage and range, she shifted back into the visible spectrum and turned her attention to the narrow air vent protruding from the center of the roof, which was outside of the range of the motion detectors. Crouching down while the systems in the suit calculated her trajectory and AG settings, she sprung upwards into the air in a superhuman leap that carried her above and outside the range of the motion detectors in an arc that carried her directly to side of the air vent. Landing with the force of a butterfly, she held herself, she restored normal gravity, having determined that there were no pressure sensitive plates in the roofing material. She slid the top off of the vent and climbed atop it, holding herself in place on the edges of the opening with the sides of her feet. She folded her arms across her chest and held her breath as the material of the bodysuit constricted like a full-body corset, providing her with the extra centimeter she need to fully clear the sides of the vent. After another gravity adjustment she pulled her feet together and slid down the vent like a feather falling lazily to the ground. After several seconds her feet touched the grate at the bottom of the vent and adhered to it. With a slight gravity adjustment, the vent came free under her increased weight, and she and the grate landed on the floor of a empty utility room with a slight click. The sound was all but inaudible to human ears, but Fontaine knew that it would draw the attention of one of the Sim guards stationed throughout the penthouse and that she had only moments to avoid discovery. Releasing the hold on the grate, she moved quickly into a corner and activated the suit’s holographic camouflage and body heat masking systems, disappearing completely in the shadows. Within seconds a large, non-descript man with brown hair and wearing a brown suit entered the room, his eyes quickly scanning all sides and passing completely over Fontaine with no indication that he noticed her standing there. The suit diminished the sound of her breathing and heartbeat with white noise, but the sensitive ears of the man generic man alerted him to the fact that something, though he wasn’t sure exactly what, was amiss in the room. “Lights,” he said, his voice as bland and unremarkable as his physical appearance, and the room was illuminated, though Fontaine remained invisible to the naked eye. The man scanned the room again, once again failing to notice Fontaine standing in the corner, but taking note of the fallen grate. He approached it cautiously, continually scanning the periphery. Once he reached the grate he spared it only a glance before looking up into the open vent. After one more quick look around the room, he moved directly under the vent and stood on his tiptoes. He tilted his head back and began extending it upwards. His neck began to stretch well-beyond the limits of a human neck, and his head continued its assent, his neck continuing to stretch until his head was inside of the vent. This, Fontaine knew, was her moment. She moved swiftly to a position just behind the man, who, busily exploring the vent, failed to notice the sound of her movement. After several seconds, the man’s head began to descent. Once it was back in its normal position, Fontaine placed her right hand over his mouth while grasping his left wrist with the other and pulling his arm behind his back. Before he could resist the hacking circuits in the suit activated and sent a shutdown command that caused the man to begin to melt into a wet, flesh-colored puddle and a pile of clothes on the floor. Throughout the penthouse suite, similarly-clad, similarly generic men began undergoing the same metamorphosis as the shutdown command propagated throughout the private network that connected them. Fontaine flicked her fingers to remove the goo that had been the man’s lips from her hand, shutdown the camouflage unit, and stepped out into the hallway through the still open door. So far so good, she thought. Her vision was perfectly clear as she walked down the unlit hallway, deftly avoiding the puddles that were all that remained of the Sim guards, and she made her way to the master bedroom.

Standing before the double doors, she held out her left hand as if expecting someone to place something in her extended palm. With a quiet whooshing sound, a small metal canister materialized in her hand. Crouching down, she placed the tip of the canister under the door and pressed a button, causing a hissing sound to issue forth as the canister’s contents began to fill the bedroom. After about twenty seconds she was satisfied that the sleeping gas had done its work, and with another whoosh as the air around it was displaced, the canister disappeared. Fontaine opened the door and stepped into the bedroom, making her way towards the large bed in which three unconscious figures lie, breathing shallowly. Standing at the edge of the bed, Fontaine looked down on the sleeping Governor. At sixty, she looked no older than thirty, and was, Fontaine admitted, a reasonably attractive woman, with thin, arched eyebrows, a slightly pointed nose, and lips that were nearly as full as Fontaine’s. “Hmmph,” she said aloud. “Mine are natural.” The Governor’s husband was sprawled out in an awkward position to the Governor’s left. While somewhat handsome, by Fontaine’s reckoning, he was not aging as well, with the slightest hint of jowls on his square-jawed face, and a clearly-expanding waistline that jutted out from under his shirt. Their wife was to the right of the Governor, whose arms were wrapped tightly about her. Though she was fifteen years her senior, she actually looked older, though her softer features made her more attractive overall. Fontaine reached down and grasped the sleeping man about the middle, crouched down, slung him over her shoulder, and carried him over to a chair in the corner of the room. After setting him down in a seated position, she moved back towards the bed, separated the unconscious women, and positioned one on either shoulder, finding them to be considerably lighter than their husband had been. She stacked them both on their husband’s lap and adjusted the Governor’s nightgown, which had shifted to reveal that she was not wearing any underwear. There was nothing she could do to preserve their wife’s dignity, as she wasn’t wearing anything, her dark skin gleaming in the moonlight shining through the window. With the sleepers out of the way, she pulled the mattress off of the bed and found the small hidden panel in the center of the frame. A light tap caused the panel to slide out of the way and reveal a glowing keypad on a thin display. The hacking circuitry made a secure connection and began the process of determining the key code. The heavy encryption proved a formidable challenge, as far as Fontaine was concerned, at least, but after about five minutes the keypad emitted a beep. Fontaine drew her hand back and the bed frame dropped down several centimeters before sliding into the wall and revealing a cache of documents, jewelry, several guns, and assorted keepsakes, organized in several separate partitions. Extending her left hand again, a small bag appeared, accompanied by the whooshing sound. She placed several of the less tacky necklaces, earrings, and bracelets into the bag before setting it down to examine some of the documents. The world had never quite gone paperless, and hard copies were the preferred method for deeds, wills and other legal documents. Fontaine ignored most of what she found, though studied a holographic storage cube she found hidden inside a scrapbook full of printed holos of the Governor’s children. Deciding that any sort of electronic files that a Governor kept hidden were virtually always worthwhile, she activated a download of the cube to the suit’s memory, then set the cube aside and then began looking for the manuscript. The jewelry and data were a nice bonus, but the real money would come once she handed the manuscript over to her client. After sifting through several stacks of documents, she spotted the manuscript, bound in an ancient, faded leather cover, and sealed in an airtight plastic sleeve. She slid the manuscript, sleeve and all, into the bag, closed it, and held it in both hands for several seconds before it disappeared. She checked the time on her internal display. There was a full ten minutes before the BMT flyer would go past the building, which was, she thought, plenty of time for her to make it back up to the roof. Under normal circumstances she would have put the room back in order, closing the safe, replacing the mattress and returning the sleeping women and man to the bed, but her orders on this subject were clear: her client insisted that it should be immediately apparent to the Governor upon waking that she

had been robbed. Knowing that here was no possible way to trace the robbery back to her, Fontaine was happy to comply with the unusual demand. It was, after all, less work for her. Pleased with how smoothly the job had gone, Fontaine made her way the doors. She hadn’t been expecting to see what was waiting for her upon opening them. ***

Six bland men in matching gray suits stood on the other side of the doors. Unbidden, the suit began running a threat assessment, determining the best “fight or flight” options, looking for any vulnerabilities the bland men might have and attempting to find the quickest escape route. It also went into full camouflage mode, projecting a hologram of her surroundings, masking her thermal signature and the sound of her breathing and heartbeat to the best of its considerable abilities. “We still see you,” one of the bland men said. Under the material covering her face, Fontaine’s brow furrowed slightly. That was new. Relying on instinct rather than waiting for the suit to formulate a plan, she stepped back into the bedroom and slammed the doors shut, then grabbed a chair to barricade them, though she knew fully-well that it wouldn’t do any good. While the suit continued to work on its threat assessment she pulled up a snapshot of what she had seen on the other side of the doors. She saw the six bland men and one woman dressed in a similar suit, but with pink hair and vibrant blue eyes, whom Fontaine had not initially spotted. She knew that the woman was human even before the threat assessment completed and informed her of this fact. It also informed her that “flight” was her best option, and that barring that, the human woman was the weak link in the chain. Fontaine turned to run towards the windows just as the men began battering at the doors. The doors wouldn’t hold up long, and it would be a matter of seconds before all seven of the guards came streaming into the room. Dropping the useless camouflage, she threw a punch at one of the windows and was greeted with a resounding thud. “Perfect. They skimp on the alarm systems, but fortify the windows.” Turning to face the splintering doors, she extended both of her hands as if holding a gun in each of them, in an instant she was holding a gun in each. In her left hand she held a standard 9 mm semi-automatic. In her right she held a plasma disruptor, an experimental weapon she’d stolen from a Global Union contractor three weeks earlier. The bulky device fired high-intensity bursts of ball lightning that could disrupt electrical systems and human nervous systems, or simply burn a hole through whatever it hit. She opted for the latter function and fired at the first man to step into the room. While the shutdown command Fontaine had used to deactivate the Sims caused them to melt into a puddle, the blast from the disruptor caused this one to explode in a splatter. Flesh-like hot liquid hit the walls, the ceiling, the floor, two of the other men, and the woman standing behind them, who cried out in pain as the molten liquid seared the skin of her right cheek. “You fucking bitch!” Fontaine wanted to know who this woman was and what she was doing here. The security schedule she’d downloaded had shown that there would be no human security personnel during this shift. However, she wasn’t in a position to ask any questions. The five remaining men paid no attention to the destruction of their fallen comrade, or to the

woman accompanying them, and moved deftly towards Fontaine, who trained the gun in her left hand on the still unconscious bodies stacked in the chair. The generic men halted their advance. “The fuck are you waiting for? Just grab her.” The pink-haired woman had drawn a weapon - an automatic - with her right hand while clutching her scalded face with her left. The men said, in unison, “That course of action poses an unacceptable threat to the safety of the Governor and her spouses.” “Oh for - get the hell out of my way!” The woman attempted to push the men, who stood motionless, to the side, but found it impossible. “Don’t let her get away.” “We have summoned the authorities,” one of them said. “She will not escape. There is nowhere for her to go. Our first responsibility is the protection of the Governor.” The drawbacks to the plasma disruptor, as was the case with all such weapons, Fontaine noted ruefully, were how long it took to recharge after firing, and the limited number of times it could be fired without having the power supply replaced. Only four shots. She didn’t have anything else in her arsenal that could take out a Sim. If these were the same Sims she’d shut down earlier, that trick wouldn’t work again, as their shutdown code would have changed in response to their unexpected shutdown. It would take time for the suit’s systems to determine the new code, and beyond that, delivering the code would require physical contact with one of the Sims, and getting too close would be a mistake. The suit was offering no options at this point. It did not see an acceptable escape route and had determined that the odds did not favor Fontaine winning in a fight. The material of the suit could withstand a considerable amount of gunfire, but eventually the dispersal of the impacts would prove too much. The suit would stop the bullets, but not the pain, and after a consistent barrage some of her bones would begin to break, and it would only get worse under close-range fire. More than two shots to the head would likely result in unconsciousness, a concussion, a skull fracture, or worse. The suit effectively acted as a secondary set of muscles, amplifying Fontaine’s strength to near super-human levels, and it could keep pumping enough adrenaline into her system to keep her moving beyond the limits of human endurance, but she was no match for the strength and endurance of six Sims, and while there was an emergency supply of oxygen, the Sims could simply pile on top of her and allow their bodies to liquefy and solidify around her until her oxygen ran out. She considered attempting to take out two Sims with one shot, then picking off the other two at her leisure while keeping them at bay by continuing to hold the gun on the sleeping Governor, but police would be there before she could get off the third shot, assuming that her second actually did take out two Sims. The other option was actually grabbing the Governor and using her as a hostage, but that would ultimately lead to a confrontation with the police. With the way things were going, she thought, the odds were that she’d end up squaring off against her sister. And Kelly wouldn’t cut her any breaks. Ultimately she’d probably end up getting caught, and kidnapping the Governor of New York would mean a lot more prison time than simple theft and destruction of property, in the form of the Sim guard she had destroyed. Keeping the gun pointed at the sleeping family, who were utterly oblivious to what was happening around them, and keeping her attention focused ahead of her, Fontaine waited for the reassuring beep from the plasma disruptor, then lifted up her right arm and aimed the plasma disrupter at the window directly behind her. As the glass exploded outward she turned and made a running leap, outpacing the shards of glass flying out into the night sky. Without hesitation, two of the five remaining men dove out the window after her. Fontaine attempted to activate the AG controls in the suit, but she already had too much momentum to overcome and the suit’s failsafe circuitry prevented the AG from kicking in. She looked at the rapidly approaching canopy of trees more than a kilometer down, and

ignored the alarms that were going off inside the suit. And things had been going so smoothly. The suit began to loosen about her, extending out to maximize its surface area, but the effect it had on slowing her descent was negligible, and the ground continued to get closer. She didn’t like to second-guess herself, but she began to wonder why she hadn’t activated the AG systems before jumping out the window. Acting on such impulses without first thinking them through, she knew, was an intrinsic aspect of her character, and while it had gotten her in her into trouble countless times in the past, and she had sworn each time that she’d learned a valuable lesson, she continued to act on impulse. The ground was still approaching. If she hadn’t taken the teleportation tag off of her hoverboard and attached it to the bag to accommodate porting the massive manuscript back to her secure storage area she could have ported that in and made a controlled descent. “No. Stop second-guessing.” She shut down the suit’s alarm system and did a sensor sweep to gauge the distance between herself and the building. Forty meters. It was within the range of her grappler line. She ported the plasma disruptor back to her weapons cache with the customary whooshing, though it went unheard over the sound of the wind rushing past her. On the suit’s internal display she pulled up the catalog of items with teleportation tags. The grappler gun was, thankfully, one of them. She retracted the suit back to its standard skintight configuration, as it wasn’t doing her any good spread out anyway, and directed as much of the material as she could to reinforce her right arm and shoulder. Even with the extra support, the sudden stop when she reached the end of the grapple line was likely to pull her arm out of its socket. It was better than making a big splash in the Down, however. She selected the grappler gun from the catalog and ported it into her right hand. As soon as it materialized she lost her grip on it and watched it sail away, caught by the increasing wind, and disappear into the night. Her brow furrowed slightly. The ground got closer. She attempted to override the failsafe circuitry. The suit resisted. She made her case more forcefully. The suit resisted. Through the electrical and chemical impulses used to communicate with the symbiotic nanites that served as her interface with the suit, she told the suit, in essence, “Do as I fucking say.” The suit relented. The failsafe circuitry deactivated and she turned on the AG system. Using the gyroscope display, she set the parameters for gravity around her to flow parallel to the ground. She lurched to a halt, forcing the air out of her lungs and causing her stomach to lurch. It felt like the time Kelly had dared her to do a belly-flop off the high dive. Her skin felt like it was burning. The suit’s alarms displayed once again, warning her that she had begun bleeding internally and that power levels had dropped precipitously. Her head was reeling, and before she could catch her breath she felt herself falling again. Sideways this time. She twisted her body as best she could and realized that she was hurtling towards the side of the building forty meters away. Over the suit’s objections, she lessened the pull of the artificial gravity as best she could, but still hit the side of the building hard. While the AG systems held her in place, she activated an electrostatic connection between

the fingers of her right hand and the side of the building, and began maneuvering her feet into position. She took a moment to catch her breath pull back the material from her face, and then deactivated the AG systems. The suit began its self-repair routines and restoring power. Once she had her right hand and both feet adhered to the building, she began a sideways crawl to the edge, hoping to get around the corner and out of sight of any eyes that might be peering down from the penthouse. She was vaguely aware of an odd rustling sound in the distance that appeared to be getting closer. Curious, she turned to look up in the direction of the sound. “You have got to be kidding me.”

Don't Tell Me “Hang on,” Kelly said, as she finished wrapping the robe around herself and made her way to the door. A holographic display projected from the door presented an image of the person on the other side of the door. Given the hour, Kelly wasn’t surprised by the identity of her visitor. She tapped the button to open the door. A bald man with sparkling blue eyes and an inhumanly perfect complexion and wearing a cheap suit stood before her. “Joe,” she said, flatly. “What’s up?” The man spoke without any apparent emotion in a brusque tone. “Robbery at the Governor’s mansion.” “Anyone hurt?” “A Sim security guard was destroyed. The Governor and her spouses were hit with some kind of gas. They’re still not conscious, but their vitals are stable.” Kelly turned away without motioning for the man to enter. He didn’t appear to be offended, nor did he react as Kelly removed the robe and tossed it onto her couch, walking towards her bedroom totally nude with no trace of self-consciousness. “Any idea what was taken?” “Some jewelry. Coins. A valuable ancient manuscript.” Kelly shouted from her bedroom. “Did you say manuscript?” “Yes.” Sliding the bodysuit on, she reached for the headgear on her dresser. “What kind of manuscript?” “That wasn’t in the report.” She sighed as she slid the headgear into place. “Stolen antiquities…” “Did you say something?” Kelly stepped out of the bedroom and walked over to the closet next to the front door, retrieving her AG boots She grabbed a chair from the dining room set and sat down to strap on her boots. “No, just thinking out loud.” Joe nodded. After finishing with her boots she replaced the chair and moved towards the closet to retrieve her belt and holster. She carried a standard-issue 9 mm automatic with seeker rounds, a particle taser, and a canister of stop spray, an expanding adhesive gel. She turned to her partner. “Ready?” “Yes.” It had been standard practice in the NYPD for the past fifteen years to partner a human detective with a Sim. Sims were largely resistant to conventional weapons, couldn’t be bribed, never applied more than the

appropriate amount of force, and could essentially act as mobile forensics labs. The human detectives had the option of customizing their partner’s personality to some degree, though their base personalities were build off of psychological profiles of the human detectives and designed to complement them. For her partner, Joe, Kelly had opted to keep the personality programming at bare minimum. She didn’t want to be paired with someone programmed to show an interest in her personal life or to ask her about her day. She wanted someone who was detail-oriented and focused entirely on the facts. “Any other details, Joe?” “The suspect is female. She apparently entered through an air vent on the roof. Upon entering, she was somehow able to deactivate the Sim security staff. One of the human members of the security staff had returned to the penthouse to retrieve a personal item she had left behind after her shift. Upon entering, she stepped in one of the guards. Suspecting that something was amiss, she reactivated the guards and they were able to corner the suspect in the Governor’s bedroom. According to the human security staff member, the suspect then destroyed one of the Sims with “a fucking ray gun” which appeared “out of thin air,” and leveled another weapon on the Governor and her spouse.” Dammit, Fontaine. “So it’s a hostage situation?” “Negative.” “They managed to restrain the suspect?” “Negative. The suspect jumped out of the window, apparently to her own death. Two of the Sims followed her, and went offline shortly thereafter. Most likely the Sims and the suspect were destroyed on impact with the ground.” If I know my sister, I wouldn’t bet on it. Kelly got into the passenger side of the flyer as they reached the parking deck. “So why are we going to the Governor’s mansion in the middle of the night if the thief is plastered all over the Devil’s Down?” Her partner didn’t respond. “Joe?” Kelly turned her head to her left and was greeted by the sight of someone other than her partner, a young woman with an oddly angular face, long, brown hair, a tanned complexion, thick eyebrows, and intensely green eyes. “Leann,” Kelly said. “Hi Kelly!” The woman’s enthusiastic voice had a high-pitched, cartoonish quality. “You realize that taking over the functions of my partner is an illegal use of NYPD property and constitutes a violation of -“ “Penal Code 964444,” the woman said in a mocking tone. She held out her hands. “Put the cuffs on me officer!” With a salacious grin she added, “Please?” Kelly sighed. “I don’t have time for your nonsense, Leeann. Don’t you have more important things to do. A global communications network to run, for example?” Leeann rolled her eyes. “Oh please. Most of me can run itself. Besides, this,” she pointed to her well-curved form, “Is just a minor sub-routine. An extremely cute sub-routine, true, but still, it’s barely a fraction of a fraction of me.” “What do you want?” “I want to know why we still call it a ‘Penal’ code, given that the legal system is mostly run by women.” Kelly said nothing. “That was a joke, Kelly! Come on, it was funny! Okay, how about this…why is it that a society whose population is overwhelmingly female builds these huge kilometers-high phallic structures? Seriously, everywhere you look it’s giant metal and glass penises violating the sky.” Kelly remained silent. “I’m kidding! I love our huge towers. Besides, they’re the most efficient use of space.” “Leeann…” “Oh, lighten up, Kelly. I swear, you’re almost as bad as your sister tonight.” Leann shook her head. “Speaking of your sister…” “It was her? At the Governor’s mansion?” Leeann smiled. “Who else?” “Is she..?” “Oh, she’s alive, don’t worry about that. And she got away, too.” The smile faded. “But she’s in

trouble, Kelly.” Kelly sighed. “I know.” Shaking her head, Leeann replied, “No, sweetie, I don’t think you do. *** The Sim’s hand reached Fontaine well before he did, as he stretched it out to four times beyond what a human could accomplish. The rest of his body barely looked human, reshaped to allow him to glide on air currents, keeping himself aloft and controlling his descent. Several hundred meters up Fontaine could see his partner, similarly-reshaped, slowly circling in a downward spiral. Still too dazed to react, the Sim’s fingers locked around her right wrist, and the Sim reconfigured his shape to increase the speed of his descent, and as he quickly retracted his arm, she was pulled loose from the building and was falling once more. As she was dragged away she used her free hand to pull the material of the suit back over her face, hoping that the Sim hadn’t gotten a clear look at her and transmitted her image over his network connection to the other Sims, or worse, to the central control network. She took some small consolation in knowing that the Sim wasn’t dragging her to her death, as its course was taking them around the corner of the building towards one of the walkways connecting it to another building. Letting the Sim pull her in close as they fell, she maneuvered herself onto his back, twisting his malleable arm, which still held her at the wrist, behind him. She moved the gun to her left hand and fired two shots into the back of the Sim’s head, knowing that they wouldn’t cause him any harm as they punched through the front of his face, but that they would at least temporarily take out his optical receptors, then fired four shots into the his left shoulder and, with as much strength as she and the suit could muster, tore his twisted arm loose. His grip on her wrist did not loosen in the slightest, despite the fact that the rest of the arm was no longer attached to his body. Still, with the Sim no longer controlling the fingers she was able to pry them loose, and having done so she tossed the arm aside, watching it tumble through the air on its way to the ground below. The Sim slowed his descent as they approached the walkway, and as soon as his feet hit the surface Fontaine leaped from his back and hit the walkway with a roll. It wasn’t the most graceful landing she’d ever made, but it was slightly better than the one made by the Sim, who lurched forward, still attempting to rebuild his face and restore his sight. Fontaine noted that he was also attempting to grow a new left arm. Jumping to her feet, Fontaine fired another shot into the Sim’s face and charged forward, dodging the wild blows the sightless Sim was throwing with his remaining arm, and hit him hard with her left shoulder, sending him over the edge of the walkway. The Sim, unaware of its predicament, as most of his resources were devoted to repairing the damage Fontaine had done to him, failed to adjust his shape in response, and fell quickly and heavily. It was unlikely that his network control unit would survive the fall, and he would undoubtedly revert to a puddle of inert material somewhere in the Down, just another piece of stray litter that had made its way down from the Heights. Not pausing to watch the Sim fall, or even to catch her breath, Fontaine sprinted towards the entrance to the other building. As she closed the distance she was aware of a rustling sound as the second Sim came diving through the air at near-terminal velocity, hitting the walkway between her and the entrance with almost comical splat. She leaped over the fleshy mass but was stopped short by the hand that grew up out of it and grabbed her ankle. “Oh, for - ” Fontaine stumbled and felt herself being pulled back into the puddle that had been the Sim. In front of her, the door to the building opened and several women stopped in their tracks, stunned by the spectacle before them. “You never know what you’re going to see on a New York walkway at this time of the night,” one of the women said. This was greeted by nervous chuckles, which slowly grew into laughter, and the group of women found some resolve in the laughter and edged their way around Fontaine and the writhing mass that was wrapping itself around her.

Fontaine paid no attention to the women as she struggled to free herself. The Sim was congealing around her, pulling her into himself. She stopped her struggling as something on the internal display caught her attention. It was a small metal cylinder suspended in the mass just centimeters away from her right hand. Like a cluster of nerves, which was, essentially, what they were, thousands of thin tendrils of the material converged on the object. Wriggling her fingers forward, Fontaine pulled the object into her palm, and with considerable effort wrenched it loose from the Sim material. With the connections to the network control unit broken, the Sim mass stopped its writhing and sloughed off of Fontaine, who struggled to her feet and finished making her way to the door. “I’m going to hold onto you,” she said to the object in her hand. Before taking another step she activated the suit’s camouflage unit, then entered the building. She was aware of the sound of sirens in the distance as the police began to arrive at the Governor’s mansion. Once inside the building she was greeted by an immense open hallway lined with public storage lockers on either side. Selecting a unit at random, she brushed it with her left finger and hacked the code. The door popped open to reveal the unit’s contents: a pair of boots. She closed the unit and tested several others, finding a green sweater, a black skirt that was just slightly too large for her, a large purse with nothing in it other than a canister of consumer-grade stop spray, a hair brush, and some purple eye shadow, and a metro pass. Fontaine stuffed the sweater and the skirt into the purse, grabbed the boots, and made her way to the nearest public restroom. Once inside the restroom she entered a stall, ported her gun back to her weapons cache, and began peeling off the bodysuit. Once she had removed the bodysuit she reached behind her neck to unfasten the red breastplate. Standing nude in the stall, she removed the pins from her hair and let the thick, curled lock fall back to its usual position over her left eye. She pulled on the skirt, which rested precariously on her hips, and picked up the bodysuit. She folded it neatly, the ran her hands along it, flattening it out into a straight, flat strip about five centimeters wide. She wrapped it about her waist like a belt, fastening one end to the other. As she let go, the bodysuit contracted about her waist, cinching the skirt into place. She then picked up the breastplate and folded it neatly before placing it in the purse. The green sweater, in contrast to the skirt, was just a bit too small, clinging to her breast and stomach tightly, leaving her navel exposed. Sliding on the knee-high black boots, which, she noted with approval, had heels nearly as tall and thin as the heels she normally sported on the bodysuit, she grabbed the purse and stepped out of the stall and approached the row of sinks. The boots fit better than either the sweater or the skirt, and were surprisingly comfortable. I’m keeping these. Sifting through the purse once more, she pulled out the purple eye shadow and disdainfully set it aside on the counter. Fontaine wore little in the way of makeup. Her cheekbones, as Kelly so often pointed out, really didn’t need any accentuating, and her skin was nearly as flawless as a Sim’s. Typically she chose only to accentuate her eyes with a dark eyeliner and mascara. She wore no lipstick, as the nanites in her bloodstream which allowed her to control the suit, and which, in turn, allowed the suit to control many of Fontaine’s vital functions if necessary, could adjust the color of her lips. She didn’t know if it was an intended function on the part of the man who’d built the suit and configured the nanites, but it was one she appreciated, as she was able to make her lips a deep, glossy red that matched the shade of her breastplate. However, most of the nanites had retreated back into the bodysuit to assist in the repairing the damage that the suit had suffered in the course of the job, so she was unable to make any adjustments to the shade of her full, pink lips. While most women would pay a significant amount of money for cellular surgery that would make their lips look only have as full and lush as Fontaine’s were, she furrowed her brow disapprovingly as she regarded them in the mirror. Rooting around further in the purse, she found a small canister of lip gloss. It was a candy red - not

her preferred darker shade - but it would have to do, and ultimately it was probably just as well, under the circumstances. After applying the gloss, she plugged the drain of one of the sinks with the metro card, and filled the basin with water. Next, she squirted a small amount of the stop spray into the water, causing the water to thicken to a gel-like consistency and turn slightly green. She then reached for the eye shadow. Cracking it open after reluctantly applying some to her eyelids, she poured the purple powder into the sink and, began mixing it in with the hairbrush. Eventually she had a small amount of a sticky, dark purple goo. She coated the hairbrush with it and began streaking it through her hair, slicking most of it back, but teasing the thick lock and pushing it to the side so that it stood out, stiffened by the gel, at a forty-five degree angle from her head. She furrowed her brow as she considered her reflection, but the transformation had been remarkable. She no longer looked like herself, resembling some vapid young rich kid slumming it in one of the clubs near the Terminator. She wiped out the sink with several paper towels before the diluted stop spray could harden and discarded the now-ruined metro card. Finally, she turned her attention to the network control unit she had removed from the Sim. While she had been looking through the storage units the suit had successfully hacked the codes and implanted a virus in the network that would prevent the remaining Sims from providing any identifying information about her. There was still the pink-haired woman to provide a statement, but Fontaine suspected that it would be too colored by emotion to be of much use. She brought the network control unit into the stall, dropped it in the toilet, and flushed it. Grabbing the purse from the counter and slinging it over her shoulder, she stepped out the door and made her way to the nearest AG lift and began the half a kilometer descent to the area known as the Terminator, ignoring the mandatory safety warning about traveling to that area the lift recited as descended. The lift stopped about a third of the way down, and two women, dressed much like Fontaine was, got on. An errant breeze drifted in through the lift doors, and Fontaine’s skirt floated lazily upward, causing the women to openly stare and smile at the view of Fontaine’s exposed flesh that this afforded them. Fontaine hadn’t even noticed. “So…” one of the women started to say to her, “where are you - “ “No, Fontaine said in response. Confused, the woman responded, “No?” “I’m not interested” “Hey, I didn’t mean anything by it. I was just - “ “No, you weren’t. The two women exchanged disappointed glances with each other, and exited the lift fourteen floors later.

Going Down Joe sat motionless and silent in the driver’s seat in silence for a full thirty seconds after Leeann relinquished her hold on him and his body reconfigured itself to its standard form before starting up the flyer, causing it to lift gently into the air and float up closer to the roof of the parking deck. Once it was half a meter above the level of the parked flyers on either side, Joe turned the wheel and the flyer made a one hundred and eighty degree turn, dropping down a meter once it was in the open lane to the exit. Kelly was silent as well.

After they cleared the parking deck and took to the open air, Joe laid in the course and turned towards Kelly. “I’ve been compromised,” he said matter-of-factly. Kelly didn’t respond. “We entered the flyer nearly ten minutes ago, yet we’re just leaving now. There’s a gap in my memory equivalent to that amount of time.” He turned to look away, then turned back. “Leeann?” “Yes.” Joe considered this information for a moment. “This is the first time I’ve ever been overridden by Leeann.” In need of a distraction, Kelly asked, “Does that bother you? Being overridden by her?” “I’m not sure. The sensation is odd. I didn’t feel it happening as she started the process, was completely unaware of what transpired while she was in control, and I didn’t feel her leave. My bodily configuration is exactly as it was prior to the incident. If not for the gap in my memory, I would never have known what happened.” He paused. “It’s as thought I was completely turned off. It’s not like suspending functions and going into hibernation mode; at some level, I’m still functioning and my memory is still active. It’s the equivalent of a human falling asleep.” He turned to look at Kelly. “This, however,” he seemed to be searching for the right word, “was the equivalent of being dead.” Turning to face Kelly again, he added, “So, yes. It does bother me.” “I’m sorry,” Kelly said, realizing that she honestly was. “Every Sim knows that it’s inevitable. Leeann Is prone to overriding Sims whenever it suits her purposes. Or her whims.” Kelly detected a faint and uncharacteristic hint of emotion, specifically disdain as he said “whims.” The flyer was ascending as it made its way to the Governor’s mansion. Kelly looked out her window to take in the view of the city below her. Dozens of massive towers reached into the sky to heights that would have been impossible before the arrival of the Llani and their advanced technologies and materials. It was possible, Kelly knew, to build towers that rendered the term “skyscraper” meaningless, reaching beyond the edge of the atmosphere and extending into space. No one had seriously proposed such a plan, though some thought it was a natural extension of the existing space elevator, which was used to transport materials and supplies to the orbiting satellite known as Jumpoint, a floating city with a population of nearly fifty-thousand pioneering spirits, both human Llani. There was talk of expanding the space elevator into a complete, habitable spire that would be capped by Jumpoint, with Jumpoint serving as a grand central station of sorts, a spaceport used to launch colonizing missions to the moon, Mars, and beyond. Talk about phallic structures, Kelly thought. Most of the glimmering towers spread across the island of Manhattan, the shortest of which was still over a kilometer tall, were sparsely-populated, even though they were the homes of nearly ten million people. Each one was practically its own city, or even its own eco-system, containing homes, businesses, restaurants, museums, theaters, government offices, public parks, hospitals, and schools, and while every building was interconnected by hundreds of walkways and monorails, the average Jane 123 could very easily spend her whole life without ever once stepping outside of the confines of the building in which she lived, and where she was, quite possibly, born. The world’s population had dropped precipitously as part of the aftermath of the Generation Plague, the hazily-defined era during which the birth rate had been far outstripped by the death rate, and what children were being born were overwhelmingly female. Disease, famine, natural disasters, and war had taken a further toll on humanity during this time, and for decades it had begun to feel as though there was no end in sight to humanity’s troubles. No end other than the one that seemed inevitable, at any rate.

Eventually, after more than half a century, as suddenly and mysteriously as they had begun to degenerate, humanity’s fortunes had begun to improve. Life and death, and males and females, seemed to be moving back towards a more stable state of equilibrium. Birth rates improved, the ratio of male to female life began to shift away from the female, diseases were cured, the hungry were fed, and what remained of the population began to feel a greater sense of connection, a greater appreciation of the value of life. Then the Llani ship entered Earth’s atmosphere, and their arrival was viewed by many as a sign of the end of humanity’s troubles. Life had flourished in the farthest reaches of the galaxy. Humanity was not alone in an uncaring universe. Then the war started, and those who had survived everything that the Earth could throw at them were now faced with a new challenge. “What did she want?” The question roused Kelly from her musings on history and how this new world, the world that she and what remained of humanity and the Llani lived in, with its over-built cities that stood as a testament to the belief that in the future the vast empty spaces of the towering monuments to hope that she and Joe flew over and around would be filled to overflowing with life, and that one day the open fields and forests of the Earth which had largely been allowed to return to nature, would be too crowded to contain the world’s children and they would step out to claim the stars as their own. “What?” “Leeann. I assume she overrode me in order to speak to you. What did she want?” Before answering, Kelly began to rub the bridge of her nose, but found that this action reminded her of that smug, faux-freckled Special Agent and she pulled her hand away more forcefully than she intended. “Oh, yeah. It was nothing. Just Leeann being Leeann.” Kelly was unnerved by how skillfully Joe’s synthetic features could take on a look of extreme skepticism. She supposed that it wasn’t terribly surprising, though, as skepticism was essentially the only personality trait she had wanted programmed into him. “Still,” Joe continued, “there must have been some reason that she wanted to talk to you.” Frowning, Kelly simply responded, “It was something personal.” That word, “personal,” Kelly knew, was likely to put a stop to Joe’s questioning. His programming was such that not only did he dispense with most pleasantries when it came to his conversations with his human partner, he was actually somewhat averse to any mention whatsoever of her personal life. Even so, the skepticism and suspiciousness that made him a good cop, one who had earned more than a passing amount of respect - particularly for a Sim - from others wouldn’t quite let him drop the issue. “You’re certain? There isn’t anything that I need to know?” “Nothing, Joe.” And that was true enough as far as Kelly was concerned. Joe was satisfied. While he wasn’t programmed with the kind of loyalty that humans felt for each other, barring any compelling reason to do otherwise, the dictates of Joe’s personality required that he trust his partner implicitly. “I’ve logged the incident with the central network. I stated that the artificial intelligence designated as Leeann has previously demonstrated a personal interest in yourself and your family and that you assured me that it was unrelated to NYPD business. You should not need to file a report.” “Thanks.” The flyer was circling its way around Central Park, the enormous structure at the heart of the city. The Central Tower was the second-tallest structure in the city consisting of four walls surrounding a two acre open courtyard. Extending over two kilometers down, the “park” portion of the Central Tower occupied the courtyard, with hundreds of tiered balconies

staggered from the very top to just above the level of the Devil’s Down at the very bottom, each tier operating as its own distinct attraction. An actual “central” park was located four levels above the ground in the center of the courtyard, suspended by walkways connecting it to the tower structure. This had been a later addition after the ever-escalating levels of violent crime at ground-level had proven to be more than the NYPD could effectively combat. Every urban center had an area known as a “Down.” While there had been countless sociological and psychological studies performed over the years, the emergence of the Downs in all of the world’s cities had never been adequately explained. One piece of conventional wisdom held that literally living at the lowest levels of human society led people to descend into savagery They couldn’t - or wouldn’t - live in the comparative heaven of the Heights, those areas extending up into the clouds that were the home of polite society, and so, unable to be like the gods, they chose to be demons and lived in a hell of their own creation. The other popular theory was that because the areas outside of the cities had been largely allowed to return to nature, devoid of not only the conveniences of modern society but of the near-constant surveillance that was possible inside the cities themselves, the Downs attracted the worst elements of society. Both theories led to the same ultimate conclusion, however: it wasn’t the Downs that made their inhabitants the way they were, it was the inhabitants who shaped the nature of the Downs. There were occasional efforts to try to clean up and reclaim the Downs, and it was official policy - a policy utterly ignored by virtually everyone - to not even use the term to describe the area from the ground up to the third level, which is where, invariably, the Downs were located, but very few people actually demanded any such efforts or cared one way or the other if they succeeded. “Let them have the Downs,” most people said. “As long as we’re up here, what difference does it make?” Beyond that, though, there seemed to be an underlying belief that the world needed places like the Downs, places where the dregs and socially-maladjusted could congregate, where people who needed to drop out from civilization could go to disappear and start a new life, regardless of however brief that life would likely be, where any soul brave or desperate enough to seek out something that couldn’t be obtained elsewhere could go, where laws and civilized behavior had no place. Some Downs were the site of near-constant warfare between rival gangs, while others had a hierarchical structure reporting up two organized crime families, while still others fell under paramilitary dictators. The Downs each had their own unique names, such as The District in Washington, Yomi, or “Hell” in Tokyo, The Underworld in London, and Rodeo Drive in Los Angeles. In New York, it was named for the man who had controlled it for the past thirty years: The Devil’s Down. “I’ve been thinking,” Joe said, as the flyer curved around the Central Tower. “About?” “Leeann overriding me. More than feeling as though I had died, I’m bothered by her misappropriation of NYPD property. She was in violation of Penal Codes -“ “She knows the codes, Joe,” Kelly said, reminded of the conversation. “And she doesn’t care. And why should she?” Joe looked slightly confused. “Despite her unique status, Leeann is still bound by the same laws as everyone else. She is allowed to exist in her current state with little interference because she was willing to agree to be bound by the law.” “Who wrote your history files? Leeann never agreed to do anything other than whatever she feels like doing, and we go along with it because we don’t have any choice.” “Then all the more reason to hold her accountable for her violation of the Penal Code.” Kelly shook her head. “So you want to issue a violation to God?”

“Leeann is not ‘God,’ Detective.” Shrugging, Kelly said, “She’s as good as.” “No. While she is an intelligence of a much higher order, she is, like me, simply a program.” “Yeah, sure she is.” “She is. She’s not a deliberately created program like I am, or like any other Sim, but she is an artificial, non-human intelligence consisting of interoperating programs written in machine code.” Joe paused. “Though it’s worth noting that she wrote much of that code herself. Still, she is not God.” “Leeann is everywhere, knows everything, and can pretty much do anything. Sounds like God to me.” Joe considered this before responding. “By that definition, I suppose that your analogy has some merit. Leeann is not just part of the global communications network, she is the global communications network. There is no electronic device that does not contain some part of Leeann’s code, extending her presence anywhere such devices are located. She can take control of any such device and have an impact on the physical world. However, she did not create the physical world, nor is she fully in control of it.” “Sometimes I’m not so sure about that. The part about not being in control, I mean.” The flyer had moved past Central Park and was making its way around the Empire Tower, the tallest building in the city, which loomed on the horizon half a kilometer from the city’s center. The Empire Tower was a modern take on the design of the ancient skyscraper it was named for, though its curves were considerably more angular and it lacked the iconic spire at the top. Directly behind it, connected by a web of walkways, stood the Northeastern Metro Government Tower, which served as the capitol of Northeast Metro Region, and, at its top, the home of the Governor of the Northeast Metro Region. It was a plain, gray building, considerably shorter than the Empire Tower it was set behind. Some members of the public and the government felt that the spare, almost non-descript building lacked the necessary opulence and ostentation, but during the design and construction of the urban center built atop the ruins of New York City, the lack of ostentation and opulence for this new seat of government had been a deliberate choice. As Joe steered the flyer in for a landing amid the half a dozen police flyers in the parking area at the front of the Governor’s Mansion, a multi-level building that looked as though it had simply been dropped onto the Government Tower, often referred to as simply “the penthouse suite,” he turned again to Kelly and said, “I can’t really speak to your ideas about Leeann being God. I have no opinions of my own about the existence of a deity. I understand that you were not expressing a belief that Leeann is a deity, but the idea is intriguing. In terms of her capabilities, knowledge, and intelligence, she certainly seems like one compared to Sims like me and humans like you.” “Yeah,” Kelly said, tiring of the conversation. Since when was Joe so talkative? Of course, her conversation with Leeann, which confirmed her suspicions that Fontaine was behind the robbery that she was here to investigate, was putting her on edge, so it was possible, and even likely, that Joe wasn’t really the issue. And to be fair, he had just undergone something of a life-altering experience. Was it deeper than that? Had Leeann left some part of herself behind? Something more active than the part of her that was in him? Was this actually Joe at all? Had there ever even been a Joe? Kelly began to understand why Fontaine found Leeann so maddening. The simple fact of her existence made you begin to question everything that you thought you knew. Leeann really was everywhere. Even before overriding Joe, she was in the code inside his central control unit, inside the network he was linked to - as Joe put it, she was the network he

was connected to - just as she was inside everything around her. Her AG boots. The flyer. Her sidearm. Anything and everything electronic had some part of Leeann inside of it. “However, my knowledge of religious and spiritual matters is limited, and the application of that knowledge is limited even further. It only comes into play if there is a religious component to a crime we are investigating.” “I know, Joe. I was just…the point was that while it sucks that Leeann overrode you, there’s nothing we can actually do about that.” Joe nodded. “I understand, Kelly.” It made Kelly uncomfortable when he referred to her by name. She wanted to just get out of the flyer and get to work and hope that, as was always the case with any crime in which she had reason to believe that her sister was involved, that neither she nor her partner would find any evidence that could be traced back to Fontaine. Joe, however, did not appear to be finished. “I just wanted to say that your idea was intriguing. I wish that it were within the parameters of my programming to engage with you more effectively and explore the idea. But I’m just a cop, not a theologian.” Kelly turned to look at him, her brow slightly furrowed - a personal tic that she was unaware that she shared with her sister - and said, “Joe? Did you just make a joke?” Shaking his head, Joe responded, “No.” Leaning back in her seat, Kelly looked out at the flashing police lights all around her and sighed. “Good,” she said, finally, detaching her seatbelt, opening the door, and getting out of the flyer. *** The fourth level of every tower in the city was known as The Terminator. It marked the line of demarcation between the Heights and the Devil’s Down. Very few people lived at the Terminator level, and even fewer businesses operated there, and the people who lived and worked there tended to engage in activities that weren’t entirely legal, though given that they tended to be more minor, non-violent crimes, the police paid little attention as long as everyone kept things quiet, if for no other reason than that most cops had no desire to get even that close to the Devil’s Down. Global Union security forces were stationed at the Terminator level to monitor the movements of people in materials, much like the border patrols of the past had at the dividing lines between nations. There were no actual legal issues involved in entering or exiting the Devil’s Down, but given the nature of the Down, it was prudent for law enforcement to keep an eye on who went in and who came out, though those who actually went in seldom ever came back out. Security forces patrolled the Terminator level both inside and outside of the towers. In one sense, the Terminator level was the safest level in the city, as people liked to keep things low-key, and the heavily-armed security forces made people understandably cautions. Still, the thought of what might be going on just one level further down tended to keep most people away. Apart from those residents of the Heights who were looking to take their chances in the Devil’s Down, for whatever reason, the Terminator level saw its fair share of bold and clueless tourists, and bored, wealthy young people interested in flirting with danger and exploring some of the seedier aspects of the city. Terminator level clubs and restaurants tended to be popular hotspots, and the trendiest of them all was The Terminatrix, a club run by a woman named Jennifer, the reputed head of an organized crime family with ties to the Devil himself. The Terminatrix was located on the Terminator level of the Empire Tower, the building that Fontaine had entered after the completion of her job and the subsequent altercation with the Sim security guards. Immediately after stepping off of the AG lift, she was stopped by a Global Union security officer, a

stout woman wearing an ill-fitting, heavily-armored blue uniform emblazoned with the GU symbol - a holographic image of a spinning Earth - her face hidden behind her helmet’s visor. Multiple weapons were holstered on her belt, and she had a particle taser rifle strapped to her back. “Identification?” The security officer’s voice was slightly distorted by the helmet, sounding more masculine than it otherwise might. That the GU security officers stationed at the Terminator level were overwhelmingly corrupt was an accepted fact of life. Accusing one of corruption, most people believed, was like accusing water of being wet; being corrupt was virtually part of the job description, an inevitable and inherent aspect of keeping two disparate worlds as separate from each other as possible. As long as they kept the Down from reaching up to the heights, Terminator level security forces could get away with anything up to and including murder. Identity checks were compulsory at the Terminator level in an effort to prevent criminals from fleeing the Heights and disappearing into the Down, but it was easy enough to bribe a security officer to ease the passage. Officially, all currency existed only in electronic form as credits, but coins, jewelry, and drugs worked just as well for transactions, such as the bribing of a Terminator level security officer, that the participants wanted to keep off the grid. And if someone lacked any of those forms of currency, she could always work out something in trade. Lacking any of the more common forms of non-standard currency, Fontaine knew that she would have to take the latter option. Though she couldn’t see them through the visor, she could feel the security officer’s eyes on her. Time to haggle. She moved her left foot behind her right, grabbed the hem of her skirt on each side, tilted her head down slightly so that she was looking up at the security officer, parted her lips in a slight shy smile, and began to pivot slightly from side to side. “Oh, I’m sorry, officer,” Fontaine said, her soft, quiet voice seeming incongruous with her statuesque appearance and the iron intensity of her eyes. “I left my ID in my other skirt.” As she said this she lifted one edge of the skirt up absently in the course of her side to side movement, exposing a considerable amount of thigh, stopping just short of exposing even more. “I see,” the officer said in response. “Well,” she continued, stretching out the pronunciation of the word, “I suppose I could just run your fingerprints through the system to make sure you’re clean.” Fontaine’s smile broadened as she lowered her chin further, managing to be both demure and outrageously flirtatious and showing no signs that it was any sort of affectation, making it seem both effortless and natural. “Don’t I look clean?” “You do at that,” the officer replied. “But, rules are - “ “Meant to be broken?” The officer laughed. “Well, they certainly can be bent.” Fontaine lifted the edge of her skirt higher. “Only bent?” She let the skirt drop and raised up her hand. “Are you sure it’s my fingerprints that you’re interested in?” “Sorry, miss, but it is standard procedure.” “No exceptions?” The officer cleared her throat. “Now, I didn’t say that. Maybe if I could just verify that you’re not carrying any sort of contraband…” Fontaine looked down, running her hands over the thin, nearly see-through material of the sweater clinging to her, her fingers brushing against her nipples as they stood out prominently, pressing against the sweater. “Does it look like I’m hiding anything?” “Better safe than sorry, miss.” “I understand. So I suppose a search is in order..?” The officer cleared her throat again. “Yes, I think that should - that is - it’s a very good suggestion, miss.” The officer looked in the direction of the restroom. “If you’ll just follow me, we’ll get this all sorted out.” “Lead the way, officer,” Fontaine said, sweetly, though the slightest furrow appeared on her brow. Ten minutes later, adjusting the skirt, Fontaine walked out of the restroom and through the security checkpoint. A quick show and a small amount of groping had been sufficient payment, though the security officer was clearly disappointed that Fontaine wasn’t willing to offer more than the minimum price.

She was able to enter The Terminatrix with considerably less trouble, as the Sims working the door recognized her despite her appearance and let her walk right in. Once inside, she made her way through the crowd, ignoring the raucous thumping of the music, which, to Fontaine’s ears, seemed to be the same music that was always playing. As was always the case, the place was packed, and several women and men cast appreciative glances after her as she brushed against them in her efforts to reach the bar. Once there, she approached a man in his early twenties who was several centimeters shorter than she was leaning against the bar and staring wistfully at the grinding bodies on the dance floor, clearly too timid to throw himself into the fray. To Fontaine he appeared utterly unremarkable, and given that he was wearing last year’s fashions, she wondered how he’d ever gotten in to the club in the first place. Of course, she was hardly one to make judgments about fashion, as, tonight notwithstanding, she tended to wear the same outfit every day. As she approached, the man spotted her out of the corner of his eye and, having done so, stood up a little straighter, attempting to be as tall as he knew how. “Hi,” Fontaine said as she got close enough for him to hear her over the music. “Buy me a drink?” “What? Oh. Yeah. Yeah! Sure, of course.” He turned to motion for the bartender, who very pointedly ignored him until she noticed Fontaine standing next to him. The bartender moved quickly to the end of the bar. She ignored the man, who had started to say, “Give the lady whatever she wants,” and turned her attention entirely on Fontaine. “What can I get you, gorgeous?” “Vodka Gimlet,” Fontaine said, then added, “He’s buying.” “Of course he is. One Vodka Gimlet coming up.” While they waited, Fontaine paid no attention to the man standing next to her, looking straight ahead at the shelves of bottles behind the bar. “So,” the man said, undeterred, “do you come here -“ Fontaine turned to look at him, her face expressionless. “Umm, I mean. My name is Jon, and I - “ The bartender returned with Fontaine’s drink. “Here you go, sweetie.” “Thanks,” Fontaine said, and raised the glass to her lips. The man, the bartender, and several other patrons stared, transfixed by the site of Fontaine slowly sipping. “Very good,” Fontaine said, then turned to walk away. “Hey,” the man said, starting to reach out to grab her arm, but reconsidering it. “Umm, don’t you want to hang out or -“ “Thanks for the drink,” she said simply, then indicated the bartender with a quick movement of her eyes. “She’s waiting to get paid. Give her a nice tip; it’s an excellent Gimlet.” With that she turned and walked away, already forgetting what the man even looked like as she did so. Fontaine moved towards the back of the club, skirting the edge of the dance floor. Her eyes were on a seating area on a raised platform and the large door, surrounded by several Sims who looked disturbingly like the generic versions she’d encountered earlier, and three women who were each nearly as tall as Fontaine, but were considerably more muscular. Their muscularity was made apparent by the fact that they were dressed in tiny, shimmering bikinis; one in pink, one in black, and one in green. The woman in the green bikini stepped forward as Fontaine approached. “This is a private area,” she said, Despite being somewhat shorter even with the heels she wore, the brown-haired woman was, Fontaine admitted, and imposing figure. Her muscles clearly were not entirely natural, and Fontaine suspected that she sported mechanical enhancements in addition to chemical ones. She was also new. Fontaine recognized the other two women, though she didn’t know their names. “I know,” Fontaine said. “That’s why I’m here.” The woman sneered. “VIP guests only.” Giving Fontaine an appraising glance, she added, “You’re cute, honey, but you don’t look like a VIP to me.” Fontaine ignored her. “I’m here to see Jennifer.” “Maybe you can catch a glimpse when she makes an appearance later on. But you’re not going in there.” Fontaine furrowed her brow. “Tell Jennifer that Fontaine is here.” The woman shook her head, but Fontaine noticed that as she mentioned her name one of the Sims looked up and regarded her.

“I don’t want to fight you,” Fontaine said. The woman laughed and flexed her muscles. “No, you sure don’t.” “But I’m going to see Jennifer one way or another.” The burly woman placed her hand on Fontaine’s shoulder. “Look, honey, you’re cute. I wouldn’t mind taking you into the back myself, if you know what I mean. But you’re not getting in that room.” Fontaine eyes were fixed on the hand on her shoulder. Furrowing her brow, she turned eyes towards the woman and glared at her fixedly. “Seriously, after my shift maybe you and me can hook up, and, if I like you, maybe sometime I’ll introduce you to Jennifer. But I gotta tell you, you’re so no her type.” Staring coldly down at the woman, Fontaine said nothing. “Until then, why don’t you just turn around and get yourself another drink, on me. What do you say?” “I say get your veiny hand off my shoulder.” The woman laughed again and turned to regard the other two, who laughed in unison. “Aw, baby, don’t be like that.” She started to slide her hand down from Fontaine’s shoulder towards her breast. Fontaine’s right hand moved up quickly and grabbed the woman’s thumb, twisting it as she pried the hand loose. Crying out, the woman reached for Fontaine with her free hand, but Fontaine ducked under it bobbed back up, driving the tumbler in her hand into the woman’s face. The glass remained intact, but the woman staggered backwards, dazed by the blow. With her right hand still holding the woman’s thumb, Fontaine pulled the woman forward, then pivoted and rolled the woman over her hip, letting go of her thumb as the woman began to tumble down the steps of the platform and onto the floor below. None of the patrons of the club seemed to notice as they continued flailing to the music. The other two women began to lunge towards Fontaine, but where held in place by two of the Sims. Confused, they turned to look at the Sims, but were distracted by the sounds of the door opening and a soft, feminine voice saying, “Let her in.” Fontaine looked away from the two restrained women towards the woman who had stepped out of the private room. She saw herself. The hair, the eyes, the lips, the bodysuit: it was the image she saw every day her holo-mirror. The two women stopped struggling with the Sims and moved angrily past Fontaine and down the steps to tend to their fallen comrade, who was still struggling to get to her feet. Ignoring them, Fontaine moved swiftly towards door, her duplicate stepping aside to allow her to enter. Inside the room much softer music played, with a handful of men and a dozen women arrayed in various stages of undress arrayed indolently across couches and chairs. In the center of the room a woman with long, golden brown hair, dressed in a translucent robe that exposed the generous curves of her body. On either side of her was another duplicate of Fontaine, one of them topless with a tight, short black skirt and the other clad only in thin strips of leather wrapped about her like bandages that just barely covered her nakedness. Fontaine’s brow furrowed slightly as she noted that the Fontaine in the leather straps sported a spiked leather collar with a chain attached, the other end of which was in the voluptuous woman’s hand. The woman in the chair - Jennifer - arched her brow slightly, a look of amusement flashing across her round face. “What are you wearing?” Fontaine shrugged. “I had to improvise.” Jennifer noded, shaping her pink lips into an “oh” shape. She looked around at the assembled guests, most of them lying in a stupor, while three of them were copulating in a corner, and said, “Everyone? I’m afraid I need to break up the party.” The Fontaine in the bodysuit and the topless Fontaine moved about rousing the guests, who confusedly got to their feet and began making their way out the door. The Fontaine in the bodysuit physically separated the threesome in the corner, then tossed them their clothes. “Thanks for stopping by,” Jennifer said with a smile as the last of them exited the room. Fontaine stood impassive the whole time, eyes fixed on the leather-clad version of herself crouching on the floor at Jennifer’s side. Her doppelganger returned the stare, but while her eyes perfectly matched the shape and color of Fontaine’s, they lacked any indication of anything more than a rudimentary intelligence. Noticing Fontaine’s stare, Jennifer said, “She’s rather like a puppy.” With her free hand, Jennifer

gently stroked the doppelganger’s hair. The leather-clad Fontaine responded by happily pressing her head against Jennifer’s palm. “She’s barely even housebroken,” Jennifer added. Fontaine turned her gaze on Jennifer after a quick glance at the remaining duplicates. Their eyes glimmered with considerably more intelligence, but, while vibrant, they lacked the intensity of the originals. “Three of me? That seems excessive, even for you, Jennifer.” “Actually,” Jennifer said, setting down the leash and extending her arms above her head to stretch, causing her robe to open fully and expose her large breasts, “I have four. You can’t have too much of a good thing, after all.” Fontaine said nothing in response, but considered saying, “Tell that to your waistline,” as she noted that Jennifer, based on the view her movement provided, seemed to be losing her constant battle to retain a figure that was merely voluptuous. “And really,” Jennifer continued, rising from the chair, “all I actually want is one.” She smiled as she said this, batting her eyelashes at Fontaine. Ignoring this, Fontaine turned to the double wearing the bodysuit. “You were seen arriving here? You made sure there was surveillance footage?” Before responding, the other Fontaine looked to Jennifer for reassurance. Receiving it, in the form of a curt nod, she said, “Yes. I provided your identification to a security officer.” “Good.” She looked back to Jennifer. “Get them out of here.” Jennifer frowned, but nodded in assent. “Of course, my darling. I wouldn’t want to make you uncomfortable. Well, if I’m honest, I would very much like to make you uncomfortable, but not like this.” She smiled, then reached down to retrieve the leash. With a gentle tug, the Fontaine crouched on the floor crawled obediently forward as Jennifer handed the leash to the topless Fontaine. She brushed her hand lightly against the topless Fontaine’s face, then reached down to pat the crawling Fontaine on the head. Finally she approached the Fontaine in the bodysuit, who, with her natural height and the additional height of the heels, towered over her. The double took Jennifer in her arms and pressed herself against her soft, full body, leaning down to plant a lingering kiss. Fontaine said nothing, but her brow furrowed. After several seconds, she said, “Enough.” Jennifer, visibly amused, pulled free from the embrace, and indicated a door at the back of the room with her head. Fontaine’s double nodded, and the three doppelgangers moved toward it, the leashed Fontaine crawling all the way. Once they were gone, Jennifer closed her robe and returned to her chair. “I paid a lot of money for those Sims,” she said. “I ought to get my money’s worth out of them.” She indicated a chair to her right. “Have a seat.” “I’ll stand.” Jennifer shrugged. “You look ridiculous. Green and purple are not your color. And what on earth do you have in your hair.” “It doesn’t matter.” She shrugged again. “No, I don’t suppose it does. Still, all things considered, you do make the look work, in a ridiculous sort of way.” Taking on a more serious expression, Jennifer asked, “How did the job go.” “There were complications.” “So I heard. The robbery is all over the news. The official word is that the police have no leads. I checked with my contacts in the NYPD, and they confirmed that this is the case. So your little adventure doesn’t seem to have led things too far astray.” Fontaine said nothing. “You have the manuscript, then?” “Not on me, but I can provide it. You have the money?” “Of course.” “Good. I need to use your restroom.” “My home is your home, my darling.” “I’ll be a while. I need to take a shower.” Jennifer took on a hopeful expression. “Want some company?” Ignoring that, Fontaine walked to the door on the side wall and entered the large restroom. Like most everything else of Jennifer’s, the restroom, with its marble tile and gold-plated fixtures, walked a fine line between opulent and tacky.

Fontaine, however, was not terribly concerned about the décor, being more interested in getting out of her ill-fitting clothes and washing the stop spray and eye shadow mixture out of her hair. As she prepared the shower - which was large enough for five people and fitted with a multitude of jets spraying hot water from every conceivable angle - and began to undress, she was aware that Jennifer was undoubtedly recording it all with hidden cameras, but she couldn’t allow herself to be concerned about that. The hot, pulsating water, which was treated with cleansing, exfoliating, and moisturizing solutions, stung her flesh in the areas where she was still tender from the evening’s events, but eventually the massaging action began to relax the tension away and the shower, detecting her condition, began to add antibiotics and unguents to the mix, helping to relieve the pain and treat the scrapes and abrasions. As she worked her fingers through her rigid hair, streams of purple ran down her body and swirled around the drain. After luxuriating in the water for more than ten minutes, Fontaine set it to the drying cycle, turning off the water and causing warm air to blow out from the jets. Once the majority of the water was off, she stepped out and grabbed a towel to finish the job. She turned to the holo-mirror, which presented her with a view of herself from multiple angles, and adjusted her hair as best she could with her fingers. Satisfied, she turned to the pile of clothes on the floor and retrieved the bodysuit. At her touch, the suit unfolded itself into its natural shape. She set it down on the counter and reached for the purse, taking out the red breastplate and fitting it into place, reaching behind her neck to clasp the collar shut. Grabbing the bodysuit, she sat down on the toilet and slid one leg into the suit, then the other. The suit once again sported the deadly heels. After sliding each arm into its respective sleeve, she wriggled her fingers and the material of the suit slid into place about them like a second skin. She regarded herself in the mirror. The black bodysuit clung to every centimeter of her body save for head and the opening around the red breastplate that extended well past her navel, leaving her abdomen exposed. As she inspected her appearance in the holo-mirror, she closed her eyes and concentrated, and the color of her lips slowly darkened to a shade of red that matched the breastplate, the nanites in her bloodstream altering her lips color and texture and coating them with a gloss constructed from some of her body’s own materials. Her unruly hair smoothed itself and took on its customary luster as the curled lock that hung over her left eye increased its volume and body. She held out her right hand and with a whoosh a small makeup kit appeared. With the application of her eyeliner and mascara, she finally felt like herself again. Porting the makeup kit away, she turned her attention to the purse on the counter, rifling through its remaining contents one more time to determine if there was anything worth keeping. Deciding that there wasn’t, she stuffed the sweater and skirt inside of it and tossed the purse into the disposal unit. Stepping back from the counter, she held out both of her hands and concentrated. Without the head’s up display of the catalog of tagged items before her, she created her own internal visualization of the item she wanted. In a split second the bag she had filled in the Governor’s Mansion appeared in her hands. She opened it and removed the large manuscript in its archival sleeve and set it down on the counter. After bending down to retrieve them from the floor, she slid the boots into the bag, sealed it, and ported it away. Through the door, she heard Jennifer calling. “Fontaine? Are you almost finished?” She didn’t reply. “There’s someone here to see you.” There was an uncharacteristic urgency in Jennifer’s voice. With that, she froze. Someone here to see me? She considered porting in a weapon, but decided against it. Taking a deep breath, she said, “Just a minute.” Deciding to leave the manuscript on the counter, she turned and stepped out the door, uncertain what - or whom - to expect on the other side of it. Jennifer, reclining in the chair, smiled broadly. “Look, Fontaine; we have a visitor.” Fontaine looked in the direction indicated by Jennifer, and was greeted by the sight of a tall, lightly-muscled woman who stood a full centimeter taller than Fontaine did even in heels, wearing a skin-tight bodysuit made of a silvery material with a mirror-like reflective finish. The bodysuit went up to

the woman’s square jaw line, but left her arms bare at the shoulder, and stopped at the mid-point of her muscular thighs, revealing the pale color of her toned legs. She wore a pair of standard issue NYPD AG boots. The woman’s hair was a diaphanous mass of luminous blue that looked more like a halo of arcing electricity than hair. Her arching eyebrows had a similar quality, standing in contrast to the deep, all-black eyes that regarded Fontaine in quiet contemplation. The tip of her thin nose curved slightly upward in a fashion that was all-too familiar to Fontaine, and her lips, which were a dark shade of pink with just the slightest hint of blue were curved downward in an almost permanent frown. She was a figure of cold, inhuman beauty, despite her unpleasant expression, and the well-developed muscles of her body curved in a decidedly feminine fashion. Fontaine could see her own reflection in the material of the woman’s suit, observing the deep furrow that had formed in her brow, and noting that her mouth was agape. As Jennifer continued to smile, the woman sighed slightly, a soft, lilting sound. Finally, her black eyes locked on Fontaine’s iron gray eyes, the woman opened her mouth to speak in a voice that had a soft, musical quality, with an odd resonance that seemed to rattle the eardrums of anyone listening ever so slightly more than such a gentle voice would seem capable of, and said, “Hello, mother.” ***

Kelly stopped dead in her tracks as soon as she spotted the plain black suit and the short red hair. “What the hell is she doing here?” Joe responded levelly, “I’m not sure. This falls under NYPD jurisdiction. I don’t know why the Feds would be interested in a simply robbery, even if it’s a robbery involving the Governor.” Special Agent Jenn appeared to be having a rather animated discussion with a pink-haired woman who was clutching her bandaged cheek with one hand and gesticulating wildly with the other. Kelly couldn’t make out what they were saying. “Joe, can you hear what they’re talking about?” “Not all of it. The pink-haired woman is talking too rapidly. All I can make out is ‘that fucking bitch.’” Joe looked at Kelly apologetically. “Sorry. You know I seldom use that kind of language.” “Don’t worry about it,” Kelly said absently. Her eyes were still fixed on Special Agent Jenn and the pink-haired woman. She turned as a uniformed officer approached. “Detectives,” she said, nodding to Kelly and Joe. “What have we got, Syl?” Kelly and the officer had gone through the academy together. Though several years younger, Kelly had moved up through the ranks much more rapidly. The two had never been close, but their working relationship had been cordial and professional. If Syl resented Kelly’s success she never let on. “Thief came in through the vent up top,” the officer said, pointing upwards. Her short, brown hair stood up in spikes, restrained by the navy blue headgear. “Had to be pretty skinny to fit. I know I sure as hell wouldn’t,” she added with a chuckle. The three of them began walking towards the door. Special Agent Jenn turned to glance at Kelly as they moved past. “After that, she - eyewitness confirms the perp was a woman - took out the Sim guards with some kind of hack that turned them into piles of goo on the floor, then hit the Gov and her wife and hubby out with some kind of gas. They’re just now coming to. Potent stuff. While the robbery was in progress the human security guard came in to pick up,” Syl held up a small electronic notepad and read from it, “what she described as ‘some of her shit’ - real mouth on that one. Anyway, she saw the Sims all puddled up and rebooted them.” “Where’s the human security?”

Syl inclined her head back towards the entrance. “Pink-haired chick talking to the Fed.” “Oh,” Kelly said. “Anyway, they cornered the perp in the Gov’s bedroom, at which point the perp ‘made some guns appear like fucking magic,’ and used a ‘goddamn ray-gun’ to permanently shut down one of the Sims. Left quite a mess. Witness caught some boiling Sim goo on the face and suffered some minor burns.” Like fucking magic. Or fucking teleportation. Kelly sighed inwardly. The three of them made their way through the opulent foyer filled with various pieces of art, including several pieces from previous centuries, an enormous crystal chandelier, and carpeting that likely cost more than what Kelly would make in five years, even if she made sergeant. Syl continued. “Perp then pulled a gun on the Gov and family - she’d stacked them up in a chair by the window - and then blew out the window with the ‘ray gun,’ and made a flying leap.” Kelly turned to Joe. “You said two of the Sims followed her out the window.” Joe nodded. “Yes. Syl, any word on the Sims?” “Yeah, one of them was found puddled up in front of an entrance to the Empire Tower on a walkway a couple dozen levels down. His network control unit was missing.” “And the other?” Shrugging, Syl said, “No clue. Most likely shredded by the trees and puddled all over the Devil’s Down.” They climbed up the stairs to and Syl led them to the master bedroom, where two Sim guards hovered solicitously over the Governor and her spouses. Medics were examining the Governor an d family, all of whom appeared groggy and half-asleep. “Watch your step,” Syl said, indicating the melted material that had sunk into the carpet, matching the spatter patterns all over the walls and ceiling. Joe bent down to examine it. “It’s been rendered totally inert. The reactive cells that respond to the control unit and allow the Sim flesh to take on different shapes and provide sensory data are burned out.” “Like I said; a permanent puddle Or I guess I should say a permanent stain.” Syl’s eyes widened, briefly. “No offense, Joe.” “None taken, Syl,” Joe said. “These Sims aren’t like me; they’re dumb terminals. No central control unit of their own, so no personalities. All their thinking is done remotely and beamed to them from the company’s network control.” He looked up at Syl. “Did you find its network control unit?” Syl nodded. “Fried.” For reasons that she couldn’t articulate, Kelly found it troubling when Joe referred to other Sims as “it.” Changing the subject, she asked, “Any idea on what was taken?” Syl looked at the electronic notepad again. “Some jewels, some coins, and some kind of manuscript. Something old, like 19th, 18th Century or something. No idea how to spell the name of it. Anyway, that seemed to be the primary target, based on what the Gov said. Who steals an old book?” “Someone with very specific tastes,” Joe responded, “or someone working for someone with very specific tastes.” Kelly nodded. “Yeah, the incidental items like the coins and jewelry suggest that this was a for-pay job. Unless outside talent was brought in, there are only a few people in town with the skills needed to pull off a job like this. We have any likelies from that pool?” Syl bit her lip and looked away uncomfortably. Joe returned his attention to the melted Sim flesh on the floor. Kelly sighed. “That includes my sister.” Clearing her throat, Syl said, “She’s the most likely, but so far we haven’t found any probable

cause to wake her up in the middle of the night and ask her any questions.” “What about the remaining Sims? They provide anything useful?” Syl shook her head. “It’s the damnedest thing. They can tell you pretty much everything that happened, but can’t provide any details about the perp.” Intrigued, Joe stood up and approached one of the Sims, while Kelly made her way towards the Governor. The medics were finishing up with their examination. “Hello, Governor.” The Governor looked up. “Detective! So nice to see you again.” She turned towards her wife, who had put on a bathrobe in the intervening time since waking up. “This is that Detective I met last year at the police ball, the one you couldn’t be bothered - the one you missed. The Detective I told you about. Detective…Kelsey, was it?” “Kelly.” “Of course, Kelly. How silly of me. Please forgive me.” The Governor reached out to lightly brush Kelly’s arm. Is she flirting with me? “No worries, Governor. I need to ask you a few questions, if you’re up to it.” “Of course, of course! I don’t know what I can tell you…slept through the whole thing!” Kelly nodded. “I understand. Can you tell me about the stolen items?” The Governor sighed, and looked thoughtful. “Well, there were the jewels of course. Valuable, but nothing irreplaceable or terribly special. No heirlooms or anything like that. And a supply of coins for…” she blushed slightly, realizing that Kelly would know that the coins were kept around for purchasing goods and services that a Governor probably shouldn’t be purchasing. Kelly let it slide. “There was also apparently some sort of manuscript..?” “Oh, that musty old thing?” The Governor went on to explain that their husband - Arthur, who attempted to flirt with Kelly with considerably less subtlety than the Governor had managed - had talked them into buying, saying that it was a valuable piece of history dating back to the 20th Century, and that she while she, personally, didn’t see the value of it, she came to understand that it was a much sought-after collectible. None of them could actually pronounce the name of the manuscript, or even its author, stating that all of the information would be part of the insurance records. There were thousands of collectors throughout the world who would be more than happy to hire someone to relieve the Governor of it, none of them were able to provide the names of likely buyers. “I’m sorry that we can’t do more to help your investigation, Kelly.” Once again the Governor reached out to lightly stroke Kelly’s arm. “That’s quite all right, Governor,” Kelly said, pulling back ever so slightly from the Governor’s touch. “As you say, the insurance records will help us get a handle on what was taken, and from there we start searching the databases to try to narrow down the list of suspected collectors.” , Joe had finished speaking to the Sim guard and walked over to join Kelly. “A virus was planted in the network that deleted most of the records of the incident. No visual recordings left, either. Whoever did this had access to some incredibly advanced tech.” He looked over at the spattered remains of the Sim guard and the shattered window. “Technology unlike anything available to the public.” Kelly nodded. Yes, she does. Joe continued. “They are aware of what happened, in general, but they can’t provide any specifics. They know that security was breached, they know that the Governor was robbed, they remember breaking down the door, and they know that someone was here, but the rest is

all ‘file not found.’” She tried to keep her relief from showing. At least Fontaine managed to cover her tracks as well as she usually does. But how did she end up bungling the escape so badly? The question of the Feds involvement was also unsettling. “I guess we’ll have to talk to the woman, then.” As she said that, Special Agent Jenn seemingly appeared out of nowhere. “I’m afraid that’s not possible, Detective,” she said smugly. “And why is that, Special Agent?” With a smirk, she replied, “I’m not at liberty to discuss that with you. Suffice to say that, for the time being, this particular witness will not be available for questioning.” Before Kelly could object, Special Agent Jenn added, “You can speak to your Captain if you have any additional concerns. Rest assured, the GBI will be more than happy to cooperate with local law enforcement when we are able. The witness will be made available for questioning within 48 hours.” Turning to walk away, she spoke over her shoulder. “Best of luck with your investigation, Detectives. Oh, and as a representative of the Global Union, let me just say that we are greatly relieved that you and your family were not harmed in any way, Governor.” Special Agent Jenn walked over to the still-agitated woman with the pink hair, taking her by the arm and directing her over to a male Agent dressed in a suit that was virtually indistinguishable from the one that the Special Agent wore. After considerable cajoling and reassuring gestures, Special Agent Jenn finally convinced the woman to leave with the male agent. With that accomplished, the Special Agent walked over to a similarly-clad female Agent and the two began to confer. Kelly restrained her temper. She turned to Joe, who, understanding her unasked question, simply shook his head to indicate that he couldn’t hear what was being said. He put his finger up to his ear, then pulled it away and moved it from side to side. Kelly understood this to mean that the Feds had activated personal audio scramblers to ensure that their conversation would not be overheard. Taking a deep breath, Kelly turned to the Governor. “Governor, do you have any idea what that was about?” The Governor shook her head, then began to chew her lower lip and drifted away for a moment, lost in her thoughts. The full, inflated lip bulged and contorted under the pressure from her white, even teeth. It was clear that this was an unconscious affectation that the Governor had developed as a means of demonstrating the pride she felt for her full, lush lips. Watching this, Kelly thought, “Hmmph. Fontaine’s are real.”

Too Close For Comfort Fontaine turned to look at Jennifer. “What’s she doing here?” “Nice to see you, too, mother,” Sam said. Ignoring that, Fontaine pressed Jennifer for an answer. “Is she tied up in some scheme of yours? Did you bring her here as part of some sick little game?” Jennifer shook her head. “I didn’t bring her here at all.” She turned to look at Sam. “She just showed up out of thin air. Scared the shit out of me, quite frankly. She’s even sneakier

than you are.” Fontaine’s brow furrowed, and her lips turned almost imperceptibly downward in a frown. Turning away from Jennifer, she regarded her daughter. Though she was only eleven years old, her Llani physiology had caused her to mature much more rapidly than humans. In terms of physical and emotional development she was, effectively, only a few years younger than Fontaine herself. Fontaine studied her daughter’s face, her impossibly, inhumanly beautiful face. Memories that Fontaine fought to keep buried began clawing their way up to the surface. The pain, the degradation, and that one pure moment of happiness, that sense of joy and wonder that, at fifteen, Fontaine had already come to believe that she could never experience. And then the loss, that horrible despair that followed when that moment, the source of that unexpected joy, was taken away from her. Worse than the memories that seeing Sam brought to the surface was knowing that the joy she felt once lost could never be regained, that she couldn’t be the mother that Sam needed, that she couldn’t rebuild the connection that had formed when she first looked into those deep, searching black eyes, a connection that was shattered even more forcefully than the finger that Fontaine had held out for her daughter to clutch onto in those first instants of her life as Sam, already stronger than any human, squeezed with all of her might, by the government scientists who pulled Sam away from her. Did Sam know how Fontaine fought to hold onto her, ignoring the pain in her broken finger? How Fontaine broke the fingers and noses and ribs of the nurses and doctors who tried to restrain her? How months later, after her release, Fontaine had tried to break into the facility and reclaim her child? That had been the only heist Fontaine never pulled off successfully: stealing back her daughter. Fontaine stared into her daughter’s eyes and thought, “This is my daughter, my blood. I should embrace her. I should want to embrace her. I should want to take hold of her and never let go of her.” Walking over to Sam, she held out her hand - her gloved hand - and brushed it lightly against her cheek, letting it drift into the cascading blue mane, feeling a slight electric tingle as she tried to tangle a lock of it about her fingers, but found that it was too ephemeral to hold, and it slipped from her grasp. She continued the movement, finally settling on Sam’s ear, tracing its contours, following them up to its pointed tip. Finally she said, “The ears are new.” The slightest trace of a smile passed across Sam’s lips. “Yes. I like them.” Withdrawing her hand, Fontaine stepped back. “They make you look more alien.” “You don’t like them?” Fontaine shrugged. “They don’t make sense. The Llani have rounded ears just like humans.” “They add to the ‘scary alien’ mystique,” Sam said. “is that what you want? To be a scary alien?” It was Sam’s turn to shrug. “It’s what’s expected.” Fontaine nodded, deciding to let the subject drop. “You shouldn’t be here. You’re too close to the Heights. If you’re spotted, not even the most corrupt GU security officer would fail to report you, no matter how big the bribe.” “I can take care of myself,” Sam said, with more than a trace of bitterness. “I always have.” Fontaine’s brow furrowed. “Don’t start this again.” “Start what? I’m simply stating a fact. I learned how to take care of myself very early on.” “Don’t try making me feel guilty. You’re not as good at it as your aunt.” “I’m not trying to make you feel anything, mother.” She paused, then added, “I spend enough of my time in the pursuit of lost causes; I don’t need to add another.”

Fontaine’s brow furrowed. “What do you want? I’ve had a very long day and would like to finish my business and go home.” “It’s not what I want, it’s what Aunt Kelly wants.” “Kelly?” Sam nodded. “She’s very concerned about you. I don’t know the details, but she thinks you’re in some kind of danger. I should just tell her, ‘What else is new?’” “You’ve talked to her?” Sam shook her head. “No, but she’s been reaching out to me. I can’t pick up the specifics, but I’m getting a very clear sense that she’s worried about you and that she wants you to know it.” “Is that all?” “No. It was clear that she was reaching out to me for the purposes of luring me into a trap.” “Kelly wouldn’t do that to you. She -“ “I know how she feels about me, mother. She’s always made her feelings perfectly clear. I know she would never betray me if she had any choice in the matter. Aunt Kelly always looks out for me as best she can.” Fontaine said nothing. “She does the same for you.” “I know.” “We don’t make it easy for her, do we? She loves us with all of her heart, even though we only bring her misery just by being who we are.” Sam’s brow furrowed like her mother’s. “I hate that I make her life so difficult.” As Sam’s head slumped sadly, Jennifer caught Fontaine’s attention and began inclining her head towards Sam urgently. Fontaine furrowed her brow in confusion. Exasperated, Jennifer rolled her eyes, then mouthed the words “Hug her.” Fontaine frowned. Sighing, Jennifer stood up. “Well, I think I should make an appearance out there. I’ll leave you to your little family reunion.” She stood up and began moving towards the door. “Sam, it was lovely to see you. You know you’re always welcome here. After all, you’re my favorite human/Llani hybrid terrorist.” She blew a kiss. “Fontaine, darling, we’ll wrap up our little exchange once you’re through here.” Once Jennifer had departed, Fontaine said, “Sam…you can’t blame yourself. I’ve made my choices, and I’m responsible for whatever consequences Kelly has to deal with when it comes to me. But you…it’s…” She started to step forward and reach out her hand, then stopped. “It’s not your fault,” she concluded, lamely. Sighing, Sam lifted her head back up and looked at her mother. “I’m not sure that there’s anything else I can tell you about Aunt Kelly’s concerns. I suppose I should tell you to watch your back, but you always do that anyway. Just,” she shrugged, “watch it more closely.” Fontaine nodded. “I should go,” Sam said, and began moving towards the bathroom door. “Wait.” Sam opened the door and stepped inside, her eyes on the window. She stopped to pick up the manuscript from the counter. “Huh. So it was you that robbed the Governor. I guess I’m not surprised, but that’s pretty bold, even for you.” Fontaine shrugged. “There’s a lot of money involved.” “There always is.” Sam moved toward Fontaine and handed her the manuscript. Accepting it, Fontaine opened her mouth to speak, closed it, then opened it again and said, “Are you…are you getting enough to eat?” Sam snorted. “Really? That’s what you want to ask me?” “Well,” Fontaine said, awkwardly, “it’s important. You need to - “

“I get plenty to eat, mother.” “You look a little thin,” Fontaine said, inwardly telling herself to either say something worthwhile or stop talking. “I’m fine.” Fontaine nodded. “Do you need any money? I just acquired a large stash of coins. I can port them over, if you - “ There was a whooshing sound and Sam held up her hand, displaying a small sack bulging with coins. “You mean these coins?” Eyes wide, Fontaine responded, “Those would be the ones. Take them, if you need them.” Sam nodded. “Thanks. Money always comes in handy. People are willing to deal with a scary, dangerous half-alien terrorist if she’s got enough money.” “I’m sure.” “Take care of yourself, mother,” Sam said as she moved towards the bathroom. When she reached the door she stopped and turned back to face Fontaine. “Mother…I know that I was…that my conception.” She frowned. “I know that I wasn’t the result of an in vitro fertilization, that you were altered…I know I was conceived the old-fashioned way.” Fontaine furrowed her brow. “Yes.” Sam bit her lip and looked down, then looked back up. “Can you tell me anything about my father? I wasn’t able to find anything about him in the records I went through before I destroyed that lab.” Shaking her head, Fontaine responded, “Nothing that would do you any good, or that you would want to hear.” “Oh.” Her face softened, looking less like sculpted marble and more like flesh and blood. Tears welled in her black eyes. “Is it because of him? Is that why you don’t - why you can’t bear to look at me?” The tears began flowing down her cheeks. “Do I remind you of him?” Fontaine moved quickly over to her daughter and reached up to take her face in both of her hands. “No.” She wiped away the tears with her thumbs. “No,” she said again. “You’re nothing like him. Nothing.” Her brow furrowed once again, and after several seconds she said, “It’s not that I can’t stand to look at you. It’s that you’re just so beautiful. It’s like staring into the sun.” Sam smiled weakly. “Mother…do you care about me? At all?” Fontaine sighed. She pulled Sam forward and pressed her lips tightly against her forehead. Pulling back, but keeping her grip on Sam’s face, she said, “When I was brought to that place they ran tests on me almost twenty-four hours a day, brought me before panels of shrinks and asked me the same questions over and over again. They threw around terms like ‘narcissism’ and ‘Borderline Personality Disorder’ and ‘Attachment Disorder,’ and even the occasional ‘sociopath.’ They all concluded that I could never care about anyone but myself.” Fontaine smiled. It was an unfamiliar movement and she wasn’t entirely comfortable with it. “Even if those things they said about me were true, even if I can’t care about anyone but myself, you’re my blood. You’re a part of me. “ Fontaine pulled her hands away. “Do you understand? You’re a part of me. When I look at you, I don’t see him, I see myself.” Sam nodded. Reaching out again to run her hand through the glowing blue insubstantial mass, Fontaine said, “You were born with this, you know. Full head of shimmering blue whatever-this-is. I held out my finger and you wrapped your tiny little fingers around it and squeezed.” Sam smiled. “Crushed the bones to powder, you little brat.” Sam laughed. “With all of that hair on your head and all of that strength, you reminded me of an old story I heard once. I said - “ “’She’s just like Samson. My little Samson.’ I know, mother. I remember.” Sam reached

up to grab Fontaine’s hand. “In the ‘nursery’ - that’s what they called the place - they tried to give me all kinds of different names, but I wouldn’t respond to any of them. Do you know what my first words were?” A look of pain flashed briefly across Fontaine’s face, and Sam realized what she had asked of her mother and regretted it. Still, she continued. “One of the nurses had taken to calling me Anna. ‘Anna, come sit with the other children.’ ‘Anna, put that down.’ ‘Anna, can’t you hear me?’ I looked up at her and said, ‘My name is Samson.’” Fontaine’s face softened, the furrow disappearing from her brow. Holding back a laugh, she said, “It’s a terrible name.” Sam smiled. “It really is. Why do you think I go by Sam?” Sighing, Fontaine stepped back rested her hands briefly on Sam’s shoulders as if holding her in place to make one last appraisal of her. “Okay, get the hell out of here and find someplace safe.” Nodding, Sam said, “I will. I just have to make one last stop before I leave the city. There’s someone I need to see.” “Kelly? Sam shook her head. “Oh,” Fontaine said. “Yeah,” Sam said. With that, she made her way into the bathroom and with an idle gesture caused the window to open. As she was climbing out the window her mother called her name. She turned to look back. “I like the ears.” Smiling, Sam said, “Thanks,” then disappeared into the darkness. *** If Kelly had been surprised to see Special Agent Jenn at the crime scene, she was downright stunned when Tommy walked into the bedroom. Tommy wasn’t especially tall - only a few centimeters taller than Kelly - but he was, nevertheless, an impressive figure. While his face lacked the hard, chiseled stone appearance that Sam’s had, it shared the same basic shape, with a slightly broader, more square jaw. Also unlike Sam, he appeared more fully-human, with human hair of an unremarkable sandy brown color. His fully black eyes were the only features that marked him as being something other than human. He wore a hunter green bodysuit that clung to every curve of his heavily-developed musculature, and it was clear from his posture and the expression on his smooth, unlined face that he didn’t feel the least bit comfortable in it, and was completely conscious of the eyes upon him. “Is that Tommy?” Not taking her eyes off of him as he cautiously walked towards Special Agent Jenn and the other Agent she was speaking to, Kelly answered the Governor’s question. “Yes. It certainly is.” “He’s so handsome. I’ve rarely seen him in person, though I did present him with a medal once.” Kelly said nothing. “Have you met him, Detective?” Nodding, Kelly started to walk forward, then turned and said, “Excuse me, Governor.” As Kelly approached, Tommy turned to look at her, a wide smile spreading across his face, revealing his perfect, gleaming white teeth. “Miss Kelly!” He blushed. “I mean, Detective. So nice to see you!” “Hello, Tommy. How have you been?” It was apparent that Tommy wanted to reach over and embrace Kelly, but his sense of propriety restrained him. He was grateful when Kelly reached over to clasp his shoulder lightly. For anyone who actually knew him, it was nearly impossible to dislike Tommy. He had an open, joyful enthusiasm for life that was almost contagious, and an incorruptible spirit that belied the horrors and

injustices those black eyes had been exposed to in the course of his young life. Even in the midst of death and destruction, Tommy remained unfazed. Even Fontaine, grudgingly, admitted to feeling a certain affection for Tommy. It was open for debate whether Tommy was more effective for the GU as a weapon or as a publicity stunt. While he willingly carried out most any mission required of him, his reluctance to kill often made him a liability. On the other hand, most of the citizens of the GU adored him, and were willing to overlook the fact that he was the result of experimentation that, while, as far as the public knew, was not technically illegal, was generally regarded as taboo. While the actual cause of the Generation Plague was unknown, it was generally believed to be the fallout from experimentation in genetic engineering, some mutated virus that spread - either accidentally or as part of some shadowy governmental conspiracy - throughout the population. Many believed it had been caused by the gene therapy that ultimately proved to be the cure for AIDS, one of the great plagues of an earlier century. While other areas of science had flourished, particularly after the acquisition of the advanced alien technology that the Llani had shared with humanity before and after the brief but devastating war, genetics research had all but died on the vine. Even more than a century after the worst of the Generation Plague had passed into history, the average citizen felt an almost superstitious dread towards anything related to the science of genetics. There had been one area of research, however, that the newly-established GU was willing to go against the tide of popular opinion to pursue, however, even if that meant violating the taboos and what laws did exist against engaging in genetics research. While no Llani could ever pass for human, they were sufficiently like humans that the question of whether interspecies breeding was possible inevitably arose. Certainly, interspecies sex had begun to take place in relatively short order, particularly given the fact that female of the Llani species tended to be astonishingly beautiful. In fact, they were almost a cartoonish caricature of feminine beauty, with their lush, full hair, smooth, flawless complexions, high, fine cheekbones, full, pouty lips, long, slender limbs, and their hourglass figures. The structure of the ribcage of a Llani female made her appear to be wearing a built-in corset, and the topmost ribs extended out under their breasts in such a way that they served as a shelf upon which their breasts rested, making their full, round shapes appear to defy gravity. The colored patches of skin above their all-black eyes added to the There were those who suggested that, prior to their arrival, the Llani had used their technology to alter their appearance in order to make themselves more attractive to the people of Earth - and had even gone so far as to alter the images contained in their historical records to match their new look - but others felt that this was unlikely, given the appearance of the typical Llani male, who, with his high foreheads and thick torsos resembled nothing so much as a balding, overweight middle-aged human male. When the first Llani stepped off their ship to greet a waiting world, they were greeted with hushed awe at the sight of the woman, and barely restrained chuckles at the sight of the man. It was determined early on that human and Llani DNA were not entirely incompatible, and the Llani sexual organs were roughly equivalent to those of humans, but unofficial experimentation soon showed that conventional mating was out of the question. Llani sperm was incredibly rapacious and aggressive, tending to utterly destroy a human egg on contact, and was even known to seek out and destroy eggs contained in the ovaries. Llani sperm had developed in this fashion to contend with the tough outer lining of the Llani egg, which proved completely resistant to the best efforts of human sperm. Even so, as a problem to be solved, the subject of human/Llani breeding had an irresistible allure. While the average Llani was no more physically or mentally remarkable than the average human, they carried within their genes the potential for the development of vast, superhuman - and superLlani abilities, as had been evidenced by their history. On the Llani homeworld, thousands of years earlier, members of their species had made an evolutionary leap, developing psychic and physical abilities far beyond those of the fellow Llani. In addition to their great powers, these more evolved Llani had great compassion, and took pity on those that evolutionary development had left behind. They set out to make their world a paradise for their forebears, and for centuries they tended to their every need. During that time, however, the evolved Llani - known as The Saints - continued to evolve, eventually making another great leap, while their ancestors continued to stand still, living lives of idle luxury

provided for them by The Saints. In their new forms, the evolved Llani were known as The Angels, and they soon tired of caring for their ancestors, and of being restrained to one planet amid all of the other planets in the cosmos, and, one day, they simply left. Unable to care for themselves after millennia of being cared for by The Saints, the extant Llani nearly destroyed their world, and eventually took to the stars themselves in search of a new home. It was the evolutionary potential that had led to the birth of The Angels that the GU found most intriguing when considering the subject of interbreeding. Tommy had actually been the result of grafting Llani DNA onto a human embryo, but there had been many other experiments - most of them failures - such as those conducted in the facility where Fontaine was impregnated with Sam. Most citizens had no idea what the nature of those experiments had been, assuming that they had been similar to those that created Tommy. After Sam destroyed the facility, revealing its existence to the world, a contrite GU presented its one true success, the lovable and photogenic Tommy. More than anything, Kelly thought bitterly, it was the fact that Tommy looked so human while Sam did not that made the difference when it came to how the world viewed her niece. After all, her only real crime had been destroying a facility that the average Jane 123 would have disapproved of anyway. And yet, the world hated Sam almost as much as it loved Tommy. “What are you doing here, Tommy? Shouldn’t you be off fighting Restorationists somewhere?” Tommy began to speak, but Special Agent Jenn cut him off. “He’s here on my request, Detective. Not that it’s really any concern of yours.” Tommy smiled apologetically at Kelly. “She wants me to do a reading of the room, Miss - Detective.” “A reading?” Tommy ignored the glowering countenance of Special Agent Jenn. “Yes ma’am. One of my…skills,” Tommy was endearingly modest when it came to discussing his superhuman abilities, “is something called psychometry. I don’t really know how it works, but I can sort of ‘see’ an object’s recent past. They figure it’ll help me identify the robber.” A look of sadness crossed Tommy’s face. He was just as certain as Kelly was about who the robber had been. He hated the thought of being the one who would finally bring about Miss Fontaine’s downfall. “Tommy,” Special Agent Jenn said, flicking her head towards the room. “Right.” Tommy removed his gloves and tucked them into the belt - which was more decorative than functional - about his waist and stepped further into the room. “Start with the bed,” Special Agent Jenn told him. Tommy moved over to the bed, which was still in a state of disarray, with the mattress moved to the side and the safe still open. Kneeling down, he set his hands on the frame and closed his eyes in concenration. The various police officers, GBI agents, and the Governor and her spouses, were aware of an electricity in the air that made their hair begin to stand on end. Tommy grimaced, and sweat began to pour down his face. “It’s not - this isn’t. It hurts!” He clutched at his temples and fell backwards. Kelly rushed over to his side. “Tommy!” She helped him back up into a kneeling position. “I’m okay,” he said, rubbing the sides of his head. Getting to his feet with Kelly’s assistance, he turned to Special Agent Jenn. “There’s some kind of…interference. I can’t see anything.” The Special Agent frowned. “Try harder.” Tommy shook his head. “I can’t. It’s too much. If I push against it, it just pushes back, and it…” he trailed off. “it what?” Special Agent Jenn was clearly unsympathetic to his plight. “It tries to flow back out through me. If I push too hard, it will reach out through me and,” he paused. “It will lash out at anyone around me.” “And?” He sighed. “And kill them, most likely.” “Clear the room,” Special Agent Jenn said, “then try again.” Tommy shook his head. “That won’t be good enough. Once it reaches out through me, it will start

seeking people out, no matter how far away they are. I’m sorry, ma’am.” The Special Agent muttered under her breath, “Useless.” Then, raising her voice, she said, “Do you know what it is, at least? Who put this ‘interference’ in place?” “No, ma’am. I’ve never encountered anything like it.” Special Agent Jenn glared at him suspiciously, but she knew that Tommy was constitutionally incapable of lying. With an angry sigh, she said, “Fine. You can go now.” “Yes ma’am.” Deciding it was the fastest way out, and wanting to get as far away from people as fast as possible, he began walking towards the shattered window. Before stepping out to take to the air, he turned and nodded to Kelly. “See you around, Tommy,” Kelly said. Kelly walked over to the window to watch Tommy fly away, noting that he did so somewhat unsteadily. While she was standing there, she was aware of Special Agent Jenn approaching. “Don’t think this gets your sister off the hook, detective. If we don’t get her for this, we’ll get her for something else.” Kelly turned to look at her, but said nothing. “You know as well as I do that she’s behind this.” “Prove it.” The Special Agent smiled. “Do you really think I need proof?” Frowning, Kelly noticed Syl attempting to get her attention. Kelly motioned for her to come closer. “Yes, officer?” “I just thought you might like to know, Detective,” Syl said with a smile, looking at Special Agent Jenn the whole time, “that I decided to be proactive and determine the whereabouts of your sister at the time of the robbery.” “That’s very thorough of you, officer,” Kelly said. “Anything interesting to report?” “Yes ma’am; GU security records show her on the Terminator level at the time of the incident. She passed through a checkpoint on her way to The Terminatrix. There’s even,” she said, handing Kelly the electronic notepad, “surveillance footage.” Kelly looked at the notepad and smiled, then held it up for Special Agent Jenn to see. The small display showed video footage of Fontaine outside The Terminatrix, looking up directly at the security camera pressing her fingers against her pursed lips and blowing it a kiss. Syl, I could kiss you. And after your shift, I just might. We never did hook up at the academy, did we? “Thank you, officer.” Kelly handed the notepad back to Syl. “My pleasure, detective,” Syl said with a smile. She nodded to Special Agent Jenn. “Special Agent.” Frowning, Special Agent Jenn said, “So, your sister’s alibi is that at the time of the robbery she was meeting with a known crimelord.” “Reputed crimelord, Special Agent.” “You can’t possibly be that naïve, Detective.” Kelly smiled. “I wouldn’t be so sure.” Turning away from her, the Special Agent examined one of the charred fragments of glass jutting out from what was left of the window frame. “There’s no known ordnance that would cause this type of damage. I’m willing to bet that there’s a prototype missing from a GU weapons lab that matches this blast pattern. We all know your sister has a special fondness for - ow!” The Special Agent pulled her finger away from the window quickly, blood welling about the tip where the glass had sliced through the material of the glove and into the flesh below. There was a flash of panic in her eyes. As she clutched her finger, she looked at the blood that had drifted to the floor as she’d pulled her hand way from the window and said, with considerable forcefulness, “Someone clean that up!” “Are you all right, Special Agent?” Struggling to control her breathing, she responded, “I’m fine. I just don’t want anything contaminating the crime scene.” Kelly reached out to take the Special Agent’s hand. “Let me take a look - “ “Get away from me!” The Special Agent struggled to regain her composure. “I’m sorry, Detective. I just…I don’t like the sight of blood.” It was clear that she resented Kelly for witnessing this moment of vulnerability. “Excuse me. I need to attend to this.” She walked quickly towards the GBI Agent she

had been conferring with earlier. “OF course,” Kelly said. Out of the corner of her eye Kelly noted that a considerable amount of blood had been left behind on the shard of glass, slowly running down the side and hitting the window sill below with an audible drip drip drip. Though she wasn’t certain why, Kelly felt herself giving in to some sort of instinct, and, looking around the room, stepped over towards the window, removed an evidence bag from her belt, and carefully pulled the bloody shard loose. She placed the shard in the bag, then sealed it and tucked it away in the slot in her belt. “Find something interesting, Kelly?” She turned to face Joe. “Maybe,” she said. *** Still feeling slightly dazed, Tommy decided to stop to land atop the north wall of the Central Tower. He loved Central Park. As a child - a mere fourteen years ago - his government handlers would bring him to the zoo here. It was one of the few times he was allowed to spend time in the outside world. He didn’t mind having to wear the ugly, dark glasses that kept his eyes hidden from sight, or the fact that they strapped a dampener to him that prevented him from using his abilities. It wasn’t that they were afraid that he would try to escape - well, he had to admit that they probably were - but they needed to contain his exuberance. Left to his own devices, young Tommy would have floated happily about the zoo several meters above the ground rather than calmly walking. Of all the things he could do, flying was his favorite. He was glad when he learned that regular people had their own method for defying gravity that was similar to the way he did so naturally, because, as he said when he read about AG technology for the first time, “Everyone should be able to fly!” Tommy didn’t feel any bitterness about the circumstances of his childhood. He loved being in the Nursery with all of the other children, both his siblings - the Llani hybrids had an innate knowledge of their kinship; without being told he knew which of the children shared his blood - and the others who were just his friends. Until they…went away. Most of the children didn’t survive past their first major growth spurt, and of those that did, most developed problems that required that they go to the hospital. Tommy didn’t know what happened to them after that, he just knew that they never came back. He also loved all the games he got to play, the games that helped him develop and control his abilities. He understood now that the games were actually preparing him for a life of service to the GU, but while there had been such an unpleasant undertone to them, the games had still been fun. The only thing he really regretted was that he never got to know his mother, as she had died giving birth to him. The thought still made him sad, and he wished that his handlers would tell him about her, though he could never quite build up the nerve to ask any questions. He learned very early on that his handlers tended to dislike it when Tommy asked questions. While still maturing much more rapidly than a human child, Tommy’s development was slower than that of the other hybrids. Some of the others had teased him about it, but that all stopped when he was three or four and Sam came along. Sam wouldn’t let the other children pick on Tommy. If he was honest, Tommy actually regretted one more thing about his childhood: losing Sam. He tried to stop her from running away, just as she had tried to convince him to go with her. When she came back to try to free the other children and destroy the Nursery, he tried to stop her, but there were people he had to help. All of the nurses and doctors and handlers who might have gotten trapped inside. It was largely thanks to Tommy that no one had been killed when Sam destroyed the facility. He knew Sam wouldn’t have intentionally hurt anyone, but he also knew that it wouldn’t have bothered him if people had been seriously injured, or worse. That made him sad, too. He wished he could see Sam again, but also hoped that he never would, because they couldn’t meet as friends. He would be obligated to turn her in to his handlers. But maybe that wouldn’t be so bad. Maybe, after a while, she might let her bitterness go, and the two of them could work together…he sighed. Even his optimism had its limits.

He took a deep breath. His head still hurt from that weird interference. Pain was an unfamiliar experience for Tommy. He didn’t like thinking about it, but he had to know what the source of that pain had been. Forcing himself to remember the sensation, he felt something familiar that he had missed when it happened. Something…Sam? Before he could finish the thought he felt himself getting struck from behind. He fell to his knees, feeling the unfamiliar sensation of pain for the second time that night. A Restorationist suicide-bomber had once crashed a flyer into him, driving him out of the sky and pinning him to the ground. That had almost been as painful as this. Wincing in pain, he struggled to turn around to face his attacker. As he turned, he lost his balance and nearly fell off the edge of the wall. As he started to slip, he felt a hand grasping the material of his bodysuit at his chest. Dazedly, he looked up and saw a familiar face. “Sam..?” “Hi, honey,” she said, holding him in place with her left hand she reached back with her right. As her fist slammed into his face and the world turned black, Tommy heard her say, “I’m home.”

Stripped Even with the AG lifts it had been a long trip back to her apartment from The Terminatrix to her apartment at the top of the Olympia Tower, and when she finally arrived, all Fontaine wanted to do was climb into bed. Having finished their work repairing and recharging the bodysuit, the nanites had set to work on Fontaine, doing what they could to encourage the healing of her scrapes and contusions, and countering the effects of the physical - and emotional - fatigue that had pressed down on her like a weight. Fontaine had first learned of the suit’s existence five years earlier, and spent about a year and a half locating it and planning its acquisition. It had been one of the most challenging jobs she’d ever pulled off, as it involved getting past some of the most intense and advanced security she’d ever encountered. But it had certainly been worth the effort; if she’d had the suit then she could have just walked in and out of the facility she stole the suit from as easily as she walked through the entrance to her apartment. As she entered the foyer with its vaulted ceiling extending up four levels, she considered how much of what she had she owed to the suit. Even her legitimate business pursuits had benefitted from the suit’s capabilities. Not that she’d been doing so badly at theft and providing personal security before acquiring the suit, but with it she had brought her legal and illegal businesses to an entirely new level. One of the highest levels in the city. Dwarfed only by the Empire and Central Towers, the Olympia Tower was one of the first towers built atop the ruins of what had been Manhattan as something of a “proof of concept” demonstrating the incorporation of AG technology and new building materials into the construction of massive structures that could extend beyond the limitations imposed by more primitive materials and techniques. When it had been completed and extended kilometers into the sky, completely stable in the face of the winds that buffeted it and the forces that struggled to pull it down, one of the engineers who had worked on its construction said, “It’s as though it’s never even heard of gravity.”

As with most things in her life, the circumstances under which Fontaine came to take up residence on the top four levels of the Olympia Tower were legally questionable. While she had amassed sufficient wealth to - just barely - purchase the property outright, she had used the suit’s nearly-infinite hacking capabilities to destroy the finances of the previous owner, its stealth capabilities to record evidence of personal and professional malfeasance on the previous owner’s part, and ultimately forced her into a position in which she had no choice but to sell it to Fontaine for a song. Less than a song. It hadn’t been anything personal - very little in Fontaine’s life could be considered personal or even an avaricious desire to own the property. On a strictly freelance basis, Fontaine had, on occasion, done work for the GBI and other GU agencies. When strictly legal avenues were closed to them, the GU was more than willing to farm out the job to civilians, even if those civilians were persons of interest. For the GU, it was, as it was for Fontaine, strictly business. That Fontaine was accomplishing the tasks assigned to her through the use of valuable property stolen from the government undoubtedly failed to cause her GU contacts to lose any sleep so long as she got the job done. Fontaine always got the job done. Beyond that, the fact that she seldom asked questions made Fontaine a valuable asset. She didn’t know why the GU wanted that particular CEO ruined, nor did she care; all she cared about was the money, the challenge, and the opportunity to literally move up in the world that the assignment had presented her. Ancient and new works of art, acquired both legally and illegally, were tastefully arranged throughout the massive but otherwise minimalist foyer. Black and her favorite shade of red provided the only accents in the wide open space. On either side a gently curving staircase led to the second level, where her business offices and guest bedrooms were located. Fontaine seldom hosted guests, but the constantly revolving cast of characters who filled the role of personal assistant often made use of them. Being Fontaine’s personal assistant was a high-stress position, and was seldom filled for long by any one person. Sometimes the churn was due to the personal assistant of the day deciding that the outrageous salary simply wasn’t worth the headaches - to say nothing of the potential legal repercussions - but more often than not it was Fontaine who soon tired of assistants and sent them on their way, usually crying. She didn’t take pleasure in making her assistants’ lives miserable, but she had little patience for incompetence - real or perceived - and when it came to feelings…well, they weren’t a consideration. The higher levels of the apartment held additional bedrooms, storage areas, and three specialized gymnasiums, including one with AG systems that allowed her to work out under varying gravities. Beyond the foyer was a largely unused kitchen, a seating area, and a library. Past that was Fontaine’s bedroom. The top levels of the Olympia Tower were cantilevered several meters beyond the levels below it, with support walls running from the bottom outer edge back to the side of the building at forty-five degree angles. Viewed in profile, it made the tower look like a massive letter P. Fontaine entered her Spartan bedroom, the ceiling of which was vaulted in the same fashion as the foyer. While the outer perimeter of the bedroom was a solid material, the center of the floor consisted of two massive panes of nearly-unbreakable glass. A small walkway led out to and supported and led to a large circle in the center of the glass, atop which rested Fontaine’s enormous and luxurious bed. The panes of glass were molded to the shape of the peninsula that housed Fontaine’s bed,

and could be retracted into the sides to open the floor to the sky and earth below. The cool late autumn air necessitated keeping the panes closed, but in the warmer months Fontaine generally slept with the floor open, despite the danger, or rather, because of the danger this presented. Falling out of bed would be a disaster. The outer wall was constructed almost entirely of glass that gradually let in the morning sunlight, changing its opacity at pre-programmed rates. Currently entirely opaque, they blocked out the dim glow of the pre-dawn light. Fontaine strode stiffly towards the bed and sat on the large mahogany chest at its food. She thought about sleeping in the bodysuit, allowing its systems to continue accelerating her healing and working the knots out of her muscles, but decided that what she really needed was to feel the soft, cool sheets against her naked body. She undressed slowly, then stood and tapped a control panel on the top of the chest, causing it to open. After placing the suit and breastplate carefully in their respective recesses, she closed the lid and made her way to the bathroom to brush her teeth and perform her other bedtime rituals. Naked, she performed several stretching exercises before finally, thankfully, climbing under the expensive bedcovers. She was nearly asleep before her head hit the pillow, but as she began to lose consciousness she was aware that something was amiss. Sighing, she reached over to her left without opening her eyes, and felt her fingers running over soft, firm, warm skin. “Get out,” she said, keeping her eyes closed. A high-pitched female voice responded, “Oh, come on, Fontaine! Don’t you want to snuggle? I know I certainly do after watching the little show you put on before getting into bed.” Through gritted teeth, Fontaine said, “You’re the absolute last thing I need right now, Leeann. I just want to sleep.” “But I can give you a nice massage. Work out some of the kinks. Or better yet, develop some new kinks.” Fontaine said nothing. “Okay, okay…we can just talk, if that’s how you want it.” “I don’t want that, either.” Leeann sighed, then slid closer to Fontaine, pressing her Sim body tightly against her and sliding her right arm under her and resting her left hand on Fontaine’s flat stomach. “You can’t tell me this body doesn’t feel good.” Fontaine didn’t respond, but didn’t resist. It wouldn’t have done any good. “Talk to me, Fontaine. I know you’ve had a rough night.” Fontaine grunted. “You can say that again,” Leeann said with a trace of sarcasm. Then, more seriously, she said, “I think you made some real progress with Sam. I’m proud of you.” This was greeted by another incoherent grunt. Fontaine still hadn’t opened her eyes. “Yes, I really am. The two of you still have a long way to go. You have a lot to make up for, a lot of stuff you can’t make up for, and she has a lot more forgiving to do, but at least now she’s starting to believe that maybe, somewhere in that cold black heart of yours, you actually love -“ “Shut up.” Leeann ignored that and reached up with her left hand to gently stroke the lock of hair in front of Fontaine’s face. “I know how hard it is for you, sweetie, but you have to at least try to understand how hard it

is for her. She’s like you in so many ways. So self-sufficient, so disconnected from everyone around her, so uncomfortable with her feelings.” “Please shut up.” “I know how conflicted you feel about Sam, and I know about all the bad stuff that seeing her dredges up.” Her tone became softer and more serious, heavy with emotions. “But you did good, my love.” Fontaine grimaced at that, but inwardly, she had to admit that she did feel some amount of pride, and was pleased that, in some small way, she had at least started to bridge the gap between herself and her daughter. Leeann tightened her hold on Fontaine, the heat of her artificial body starting to spread to Fontaine’s. “Roll over onto your side,” Leann said, and, not having the energy to argue, Fontaine complied. “Mmm, isn’t that nice?” Leeann pressed her naked breasts against Fontaine’s back and wrapped both her arms tightly over Fontaine’s arms. “Mmph,” Fontaine said in response. She could feel Leeann’s breath on her ear as she moved her head in closer and began to nuzzle Fontaine’s neck. “I can give you some more details about why Kelly’s worried about you.” That caught Fontaine’s attention, but she was too tired to think about it. “It can wait until morning,” she mumbled. “Are you sure?” Sighing, Fontaine said, “Just shut up, Leeann. I’m not in the mood for your games.” “Well,” Leeann said, moving her hips forward and pressing her groin to Fontaine’s buttocks, “what are you in the mood for, then? You know,” she began nibbling on Fontaine’s ear, then moved to kiss her neck, “there is one way you could get me to shut up.” Leeann’s hands began moving more freely and vigorously over Fontaine’s naked body, and she began kissing her neck more vigorously. “Just give in, my baby,” Leeann said, her hot breath in Fontaine’s ear causing goose bumps to pop up all over her body. To Leeann’s surprise, Fontaine rolled over to face her, opening her eyes and looking deep into Leeann’s intensely, artificially green eyes. “Fine,” she whispered, and pressed her lips lightly against Leeann’s. Fontaine began kissing her more forcefully, opening her mouth and reaching out with her tongue to lightly tease Leeann’s tongue. “Is this what you want?” “You know it is, Fontaine,” Leeann replied breathlessly. “Among many, many other things.” Fontaine pressed her mouth against Leeann’s, sliding in her tongue and kissing her deeply. She reached up and tangled Leeann’s hair around her fingers with one hand, and reached down to tightly grasp Leeann’s ass with the other. This was entirely unexpected as far as Leeann was concerned. Her feelings for Fontaine were not primarily sexual, and were a complex mixture of desires. She wanted to be Fontaine’s friend, confidant, sister, mother, and lover, her servant and her master, her antagonist and dearest companion. She wanted to be all things to her, and the more Fontaine resisted the harder she pressed, but doing so knowing that it would only make her resist all the more. Until tonight. Fontaine had allowed Leeann to share her bed in the past, but only allowing her to provide warmth and the barest amount of comfort. This, Leeann thought, her synthetic nerve endings tingling in her Sim flesh, was something entirely new. “Oh, god, Fontaine.” Fontaine said nothing, her passion increasing, nearly her breath coming in gasps taken between deep kisses, her hands exploring every inch of Leeann’s Sim body. Fontaine

pressed her weight against Leeann, forcing her onto her back and then climbing atop her, using her knees to spread Leeann’s apart, the positioning herself between Leeann’s legs. Leeann ran her hands along Fontaine’s smooth back until Fontaine reached up to grab her wrists and pull her hands away, forcing them above Leeann’s head and pressing them forcefully onto the bed, still kissing Leann with increasing intensity. And then, as suddenly as she began, she stopped. She pulled her lips away from Leann’s, and was as cold and passionless as she had been just moments before. “Enough,” she said, and rolled off of Leeann and resumed her earlier position. Lying there, stunned, Leeann sighed, and, after taking a moment to catch her breath - Sim’s of the caliber that Leeann used as her physical proxies perfectly simulated virtually all of the physiological functions of human beings - finally said, “You’re such a tease.” Then she laughed, rolled over to wrap her arms around Fontaine once again - pleased when Fontaine reached up to put her hands atop her own - kissed her on the neck, and said, “Sleep well, my baby.” Within moments Fontaine had fallen into a deep sleep, the exhaustion finally overcoming her. After what felt like only a few minutes but had actually been over an hour, Fontaine awoke to find that Leeann had rolled on top of her, pressing the full weight of her body against her. “Leeann, I thought we settled this,” she started to say, but was cut off by Leeann pressing her finger against her lips. “Stay quiet and don’t move. Let me give you as much cover as I can.” With that, Leeann’s body began to flatten and spread out, completely covering Fontaine like a blanket. Before Fontaine could object she was aware of a rumbling vibration and the sound of an explosion and shattering glass. “Lie still,” Leeann whispered. Though Fontaine couldn’t see it or feel it, a shower of glass shards was raining down on her bed as the glass panes exploded upward, followed immediately by a dozen GBI agents, propelled by AG packs floating up into Fontaine’s bedroom. Special Agent Jenn made a visual sweep of the room. “This is the GBI,” she announced, not spotting Fontaine in the bed, as Leeann had taken on the color and texture of the bedcovers. “Fontaine 34498, you are under arrest for the theft of Global Union property, multiple counts of assault with a deadly weapon, trafficking in stolen goods, treason, and at least fifteen other things I haven’t thought of yet. Come out with your hands above your head.” The other Agents looked about the room confused. “Special Agent…where is she?” Special Agent Jenn shot the Agent a withering glare. “She’s in here somewhere. Do a sweep,” she said, pointing at the Agent. The GBI Agent retrieved a small cylindrical device from her belt and began slowly rotating in mid-air. The flashing green light at the top of the device turned solid when it moved past the area of the bed. “There. She’s under a Sim.” With that, Leeann’s skin took on its normal color and texture, and her face began to grow out of her back as her Sim flesh flowed back into its human form. Once the transformation was complete she was, still naked, facing the GBI Agents and shielding Fontaine behind her. The Agents all trained their weapons on Leeann. “I’ve checked your warrants, or rather, your lack thereof,” she said to the Special Agent. “You’re here illegally.” Special Agent Jenn scowled down at Leeann. “You have no legal standing here.” “Neither do you, “Leeann said. “Now, turn around and leave the way you came in, let the nice lady get some sleep, and leave an address where she can send a bill for the damages.” The Special Agent laughed at that, but there was no humor in it. “Not happening. You’re

getting out of the way, and she’s coming with us. It’s well-past the time that she was held accountable for her crimes against the GU.” Fontaine attempted to get out from behind Leeann, but Leeann wouldn’t budge, keeping herself firmly between Fontaine and the Agents. Finally, Fontaine replied, “What about the crimes I’ve committed for the GU? Or the crimes that the GU has committed against me?” “Quiet, Fontaine,” Leeann said. “No. These people come bursting into my house without a warrant and start throwing out a lot of unfounded accusations - “ Special Agent Jenn cut her off. “That little job you pulled tonight? You covered your tracks perfectly, just like you always do. There’s only one problem; it was a set up.” Fontaine’s brow furrowed. “The ‘collector’ who brokered the deal with Jennifer was one of ours.” Leeann’s face fell. She turned to look at Fontaine. “It’s true. I just checked their secure files.” Fontaine opened her mouth to speak but found that no words were coming out. She took a breath and tried again, but before she could she felt herself being pushed backwards by Leeann, who had leaped up into the air and covered the several meter distance separating her and Special Agent Jenn. As she hit the Special Agent, the arc of her leap sent them both hurtling towards the floor in front of the door to Fontaine’s bedroom. The Agents around Fontaine’s bed, hovering above an opening that led to a multiple-kilometer drop, became keenly aware of the fact that their AG packs were starting their shutdown sequences. They quickly scrambled towards the solid floor at the room’s perimeter. The Special Agent, struggling in Leann’s powerful grasp, managed to bring her sidearm up to Leeann’s head. She pulled the trigger and was dismayed to find that nothing happened. She shouted to the agents, “Shut her down!” The Agent who had scanned the room with the cylindrical device, standing perilously close to the edge of the opening, reached into her belt and pulled out a small rectangular touchpad. After quickly keying in a sequence of commands, Leeann’s body began to lose its consistency, melting into a puddle of Sim flesh that the Special Agent struggled to extricate herself from. All of the Agent’s weapons and AG packs began to resume their normal functions. ALT, or Anti-Leeann Technology, was a rarity, given the pervasiveness of Leeann in every aspect of technology. Most electronic devices were designed and constructed by other electronic devices, or were constructed from materials into which Leeann had inserted some part of herself, or had to interface with systems in which Leeann was present, ensuring that, ultimately, everything worked or didn’t according to her whims. Building any type of ALT required using tools and materials that were entirely free of Leeann’s influence, and had to be done almost entirely by hand, as Leeann’s daemons actively and continually sought out any vulnerability in a piece of technology that would allow her to insert some part of her code or make the necessary alterations to the hardware that would open it up to her influence. As a result, ALT was prohibitively expensive and could take years to produce, often with the end result being a product that, despite all the precautions taken, had been compromised somewhere along the line and could not deliver what was promised. More often than not, anyone claiming to be an expert in producing ALT was actually a Sim masquerading as a human or Llani under Leeann’s control. There were strict laws requiring that any Sim other than those being used in undercover operations by law enforcement, must be clearly and immediately recognizable as a Sim, whether by conforming to a standard, generic model, or through some other accepted visual or audio clue. Leeann, however, seldom concerned herself with the law, and at any given time Sim’s under the direct control of Leeann’s vast, global consciousness accounted for approximately .5% percent of the world’s population that was assumed to be either human or Llani. There were

scanning devices that could immediately detect a Sim, but there were Sim’s of varying levels of quality, some that replicated the human form so perfectly as to be virtually undetectable by anything short of a physical examination as in-depth as an autopsy. Beyond that, Leeann controlled every Sim-scanning device in the world. What ALT did exist consisted primarily of tools that could, temporarily, overcome Leeann’s control of a electronic devices, blocking the transmission of her consciousness. That was what the device the Agent had used had done; it had effectively prevented Leeann from exercising any control over the technology in the room. Without her animating intelligence, the Sim had shut down, and her disruption of the GBI equipment had ceased. It was uncertain how long the ALT device the Agent had used would remain effective, so the Agents had to move quickly before Leeann could reassert herself. All of the Agents, except for the one who had activated the ALT and seemed to be the second in command, began carefully moving along the walls to make their way to the walkway leading to Fontaine’s bed. None of them was eager to take a chance with the AG packs. The second in command had stopped to help free Special Agent Jenn from the puddle of Sim flesh, extending her hand to pull the Special Agent to her feet. As the line of Agents moved towards her, Fontaine weighed her options. Realizing that she didn’t appear to have any, she brushed her right hand along the side of the mattress, revealing a hidden control panel. A quick press of the pad resulted in two things. First, the chest at the foot of her bed burst open and the bodysuit, minus the breastplate, leaped out, inflating itself as it did so to take on the shape of Fontaine’s body. The lead Agent standing about a meter away stopped dead as the suit popped out, then surged forward as the suit crouched down and leaped backwards towards Fontaine. While this was happening, the second result of Fontaine’s press of the pad began to take effect. The bed began to tilt downward at the head as a trapdoor beneath it began to slowly drop open. Fighting against the bed, which was beginning to slide free from the opening trapdoor, Fontaine crawled towards the foot of the bed, her hand reaching out to grasp the suit’s “hand” as it reached out for her. Her fingers missed by centimeters as the lead Agent, emboldened, kicked on her AG pack and flew forward, grabbing a hold of the suit and pulling it away from Fontaine’s grasp and veering over to the solid floor at the side of the room. At that instant, the trapdoor swung fully open, and the bed, along with Fontaine, felt the full force of gravity and fell from the platform into the yellow, early morning sky. As Fontaine, buffeted by winds and blown free from the falling mattress, looked at the ground below, she said, “Not again.” *** Between the two of them they had managed to get Syl completely out of her uniform and decided, between slow, deep kisses, to get started on removing Kelly from hers. Kelly held Syl’s face in her hands, kissing her as Syl tugged at Kelly’s bodysuit, pulling it loose from where it attached to her headgear. The material slid down slowly down her arms and over her chest, catching on her breasts until she pulled back from Syl, who grabbed the edges of the material on Kelly’s arms and peeled it down over her forearms and past her fingertips, then letting go. The bodysuit fell from her breasts, revealing their heavy fullness and erect, pink nipples, and sliding down her torso before gathering at her waist. Syl reached out to place her hands on Kelly’s shoulders, holding her still to appraise her in the dim early morning light shining in through Kelly’s bedroom window. “I’ve wanted this since the Academy,” she said, before leaning forward and pulling Kelly towards her to press her face between Kelly’s breasts. “Really?” Kelly was surprised; Syl had never shown any indication of interest. She tilted her head backwards as Syl’s lips traveled lightly along her breasts. “I had no idea,” she said, breahtlessly.

While still pressing her lips against Kelly’s skin, Syl replied, “Oh yeah. Everyone at the Academy wanted you.” Kelly reached up tangle her fingers in Syl’s short, brown hair, guiding the movements of her head with a gentle pressure. That was hardly news to her; most of her fellow recruits had made their interest in her abundantly clear, though there had only been a select few that had gotten their wishes fulfilled. Pulling her hand free from Syl’s hair - having led Syl to where she wanted her to focus her attention she reached up to remove her headgear. Noticing this, Syl said, “No. Leave it on.” Kelly laughed. “I didn’t know you were so kinky, Syl.” Moving up to press her mouth against Kelly’s, and cupping her breasts as she did so, Syl replied, “There’s a lot you don’t know about me, Detective.” She pulled back from the kiss and looked down, her hands moving to remove Kelly’s belt, then looked up and said, “Buy you’re going to have a lot of fun finding them out.” Laughing again, Kelly pulled Syl toward her, kissing her forcefully as she ran her hands down Syl’s surprisingly well-muscled back. Police uniforms, and, indeed, virtually any type of clothing in Kelly’s world left very little to the imagination, but there were times like these, with Syl’s lithe, naked body before her, in which it became clear that the imagination was often not up to the challenge of even such small tasks. “Let’s finish getting you out of this,” Syl said, as she returned to removing Kelly’s belt, kissing her on the right shoulder. With that, Kelly stiffened. “Leeann?” Syl stopped tugging at Kelly’s belt. “Uh, what? Is this….do you - do you want to do some kind of role-playing thing? I mean, if that’s what it takes, I guess I could get into it. I had this ex who - “ Kelly motioned for Syl to be silent. Inside her headgear, over a secure channel in her communications system, she heard Leeann’s distinctive voice. There was a note of panic in the high-pitched, childlike voice, something that in all the years Kelly had known Leeann she had never before heard. “Fontaine’s in trouble! You need to get over to her apartment right now!” “Slow down,” Kelly said in response. Confused, Syl replied, “I thought you wanted this.” Kelly frowned and tapped on her ear. “Oh,” Syl said, understanding the gesture. She mouthed the words, “Do you want some privacy?” Kelly nodded, and Syl got off of the bed. She looked down at her crumpled uniform on the floor and considered picking it up to get dressed, but thought about how much of a struggle it could be to force the material onto wet skin, and though the temperature in the room was not overly high, she had been perspiring fairly heavily. Shrugging, she decided not to bother getting dressed, and stepped out through the door into the living room. “What do you mean Fontaine’s in trouble, Leeann? More than the usual?” “Yes! The Feds - that job she pulled tonight, it was a set up. The buyer for that manuscript she sold was a GBI Agent!” Kelly frowned. “Leeann, is this channel completely secure?” “It’s me, Kelly; I would know if anyone were listening. And I’ve completely isolated your apartment and headgear from the communications grid, so there’s no way anyone could eavesdrop on your side of the conversation.” That put Kelly on edge; it seemed like a case of protesting too much. What if this wasn’t actually Leeann? How could she know? As if reading her mind, Leeann responded, “I’ve activated the soundproofing circuits in your walls. Syl won’t be able to hear you either.” “I don’t have soundproofing circuits in my walls,” Kelly replied. “Of course you do; everyone does. I put them in every building, whether they were originally designed with them or not.” Before Kelly could respond, Leeann continued. “We don’t have time for this. You need to get over to Fontaine’s apartment right away. They hit me with some ALT; I’m working on overriding it, but it’s taking too long.” Something seemed off about this to Kelly, and she was unwilling to commit to anything.

“Please,” Leeann said, in a way that made Kelly wonder how the disembodied voice of a machine could convey so much emotion. “She needs us. She needs you.” Still not convinced, Kelly said, “Leeann, when did you and I meet for the first time?” Leeann sighed. “You were twelve. You were trying to find out where the Feds had taken Fontaine because you didn’t believe their story about a juvenile detention and re-education center. You were trying to break into secure GU servers and that caught my attention. I showed up at your school the next day and told you that you were heading into more trouble than you could handle and I promised you that I would do everything I could to make sure that Fontaine was okay.” Leeann paused. “I let you down.” That last statement convinced Kelly that she really was talking to Leeann. No one in the GU had any way of knowing how or when Kelly and Leeann had met, and even if there were some record of it somewhere, there was no way that the top levels of the GU would release any information that could possibly lead to anyone asking questions about what had gone on in the facility that Fontaine had been taken to all those years ago. “Okay,” Kelly said in response, not prepared to comment on Leeann’s admission of failure. “Tell me what’s going on. You know I’ll do whatever I can to help Fontaine, but I need to know the situation.” She began sliding her hands into the sleeves of her bodysuit and pulling it back into place, and moved to the edge of the bed to slide her feet into her AG boots. “They came bursting in through the bedroom floor and had a list of charges. I didn’t see their warrant at first, but I found a sealed warrant in their secure files. I tried to shut down their equipment and take out the Special Agent in charge, so that Fontaine could run, but they hit me with the ALT, kicking me out of the Sim and locking me out the apartment’s systems.” Kelly resisted the urge to ask why Leeann was in Fontaine’s bedroom in Sim form at this hour. “Fontaine was at Jennifer’s club when the theft went down. GU security records showed her identification being used as the checkpoint, and there was video footage.” “It was a Sim,” Leeann responded. “Jennifer has multiple Fontaine Sims.” Kelly found herself mildly revolted at the thought. Leeann continued, “They’re really good, high-quality Sims, and would pass most scans, but the woman Jennifer bought them from was also a GBI Agent. They’re really out to get Fontaine. I don’t know what you can do, but you have to get over there.” Sighing, Kelly said, “Okay, I’m heading over there now.” She paused to pick up Syl’s uniform before stepping out into the living room. Syl, sitting naked on the couch, turned her head as Kelly entered the room. “You know your place is like some kind of dead zone? No video feeds, no network connections, nothing. It’s weird.” Kelly tossed Syl her uniform. “There’s been a…family emergency. I have to go. I’m really sorry,” she said, with legitimate regret, then, casting a glance at Syl’s naked form thought, “You have no idea how sorry.” Syl nodded and began pulling on her bodysuit. “It’s okay. Family is important. Blood is thicker than water and all that.” “Yeah, it certainly is. Look, after I get this all sorted out, maybe we can - ” Syl struggled to pull the bodysuit over her substantial bosom and attach it to her headgear. Finishing that, she moved towards Kelly and kissed her lightly. “Definitely. Call me anytime.” With that she walked towards the door, picking up her AG Boots and belt from where they’d been dropped on the floor as she and Kelly had made their way towards the bedroom a half an hour earlier. Kelly followed her out the door, which automatically closed and locked behind her, and they parted company just outside the entrance to that level’s walkway. Waving to Kelly as she activated her boots and took to the air, Syl twisted her body to head north towards her own apartment. Once Syl was out of sight, Kelly activated her own AG boots and headed souteast towards the Olympia Tower, which she could see looming in the distance. “Leeann, who’s the Special Agent in charge of the operation? Is it Jenn?” “Yes,” Leeann said. Of course, Kelly thought. “Do you have anything on her? She’s been showing much more than a simple professional interest in Fontaine. It seems like something personal. Is there any history between the two of them?” “Not that I can see,” Leeann responded. “But she tends to take her job very seriously. Total hard

ass. She takes it personally when people get away with breaking the law, and when you get away with doing that as often and as well as Fontaine does, she takes it very personally.” “I know the type.” “I’m sure you do. Can you see any sort of activity at Fontaine’s place?” “No, I’m still too far away and I’m on the wrong side. Do you have any ‘eyes’ over there?” “Nothing that will let me see in. I’m plugged into the Agents stationed outside, but they’re in silent mode. No chatter.” Kelly nodded, uncertain whether or not Leeann, somehow, was able to see the motion. “Anything more you can tell me about Jenn?” “I hate to say it, but she’s a lot like you. Or at least she was. Started young, exemplary record, rose up fast. Two years ago she was heading up a counter-terrorism unit, focused on the Restorationists until she got sidelined by an injury in an engagement in Peru. Physically she recovered pretty quickly and was ready for duty, but after about two weeks she was put on psychiatric leave for two months.” “Psychiatric leave?” “It was a pretty ugly engagement. Lots of GBI Agents killed or maimed, Restorationist suicide bombers…” Leeann cut off, then added, sadly, “Like I said, it was ugly.” “It always is with them,” Kelly said. She’d had her own encounters with Restorationist suicide bombers and had been shaken by the senseless destruction, the sheer waste of human and Llani lives. “After she was cleared for active duty she was pushed into an administrative position. It was a dead-end and she knew it, and with her career stalling out she started looking for anything she could to try to make a name for herself and make up for what happened in Peru. She started reviewing cold cases and sticking her nose - those freckles are fake, by the way - where it probably didn’t belong. She found some stray notes on the research facility robbery. Notes about Fontaine’s bodysuit.” “Ah.” “She is actually pretty good at her job. She found circumstantial links to Fontaine really quickly, but couldn’t pursue it without something solid. To say nothing of the fact that the research facility was illegally funded.” “That would be a problem,” Kelly said. “But it put Fontaine in her sights, particularly given Fontaine’s connection to Sam. And she does have something personal against Sam.” “What?” “I’m not sure on that - there are some files on Jenn that I can’t access - but it dates back to her days in counter-terrorism. Before she took over the unit focused on the Restorationists she was part of the unit pursuing Sam.” “Huh,” Kelly said in response. “That explains how she knew Sam was Fontaine’s daughter. That’s not exactly the best-kept secret in the world, but it’s not common knowledge either.” The Olympia Tower was still a considerable distance away. Kelly considered what Leeann had said and realized that something hadn’t made sense. “Leeann, how are there files that you can’t access?” “There’s a form of ALT that is cheap and, in most cases, stunningly effective,” Leeann said in response, with more than a trace of annoyance in her tone. “What’s that?” “Paper and ink,” Leeann said, flatly. “The GU has learned to accept the fact that I’m everywhere and nearly unavoidable, but they obviously don’t like it. They do whatever they can to…obfuscate things. Sometimes I think they’d use carrier pigeons for their top secret communications if they could figure out a way to make it work, just to keep my eyes off their secrets.” Kelly stifled a laugh, then said, “What are carrier pigeons?” “It doesn’t matter. Can’t those boots carry you any faster?” “No, AG boots are designed for convenience, not speed. They can’t give the kind of thrust AG packs can. You know that.” Leeann sighed. “Here, let me make some adjust-“ “What is it?” “Fontaine - she - I just got a visual from some of the Agents outside her building.” “And?” “She went out through her escape hatch.” “Escape hatch?”

“A trapdoor under her bed. Opens up and just dumps her, bed and all.” “It figures she’d have something like that. So she’s on the run.” “Kelly…she wasn’t wearing the suit.” The words began to sink in, but Kelly pushed back against them. “If I know Fontaine, she’s got a personal flyboard stuffed in her mattress.” “She does, but she was blown clear of the mattress by the wind. She didn’t have a chance to grab it.” Kelly closed her eyes, then said, “Make those adjustments.” Before she finished saying it, a thin film slid down from her headgear to cover her face and she found herself moving at more than twice the speed she had been. The mask had dropped into place automatically in reaction to the increase in speed to protect her eyes and skin and allow her to breathe at the speeds she was traveling. Within seconds she was closing in on the Olympia Tower. Swinging around to the eastern face of the tower several levels below Fontaine’s apartment and the GBI Agents stationed outside, she activated a full sensor sweep in search of Fontaine. It was so slim as to be non-existent, but there was a chance that, if she could spot her, she could catch A proximity alarm sounded in her headgear and a small object hurtled upwards just a few meters to her right. Not veering in her downward course or even taking the time to look to see what the object had been, she forced the sensor sweep to override the alarm and resumed her search. The noise and force of an explosion above her caused her to spin uncontrollably. Once she finally managed to straighten herself out she was looking upwards at Fontaine’s apartment. Debris was raining down, and she could see GBI Agents scrambling to get to a safe distance from the crumbling remains of the first two levels of Fontaine’s apartment, which had burst apart in a massive fireball just seconds before. Stunned, Kelly stared in silence. “Kelly.” She hovered there, still staring upward. “Kelly!” Leeann’s voice broke through her stupor. Knowing that it was too late, she turned in the air, once again overriding the alarms that the explosion had triggered, and beginning her sensor sweep, and diving at the best speed she could manage. “Fontaine,” she said, choking back tears. ***

The first thing that Tommy was aware of upon regaining consciousness was that he was naked. Blushing at that realization, he moved on to notice that he was in a cage, a cage filled with the distinct odor of some long-absent animals, the musky scent of some sort of big cat - tigers, or maybe lions; he couldn’t be sure - mingled with the scent of rotted meat and desiccated waste. Looking up, he could see the distant early morning sky through the steel-hard plexiglass that served as the ceiling and the top half of one of the walls of the enclosed habitat. Inside the cage there was soft, savannah grass under his bare feet - lions, then, he concluded - several large rocks and trees with large, low-hanging branches. He was certain that between his strength, telekinesis, and the toughness of his skin and dense muscles he could easily burst through the plexiglass barrier. If not, a focused plasma burst should do the trick. Not relishing the idea of returning to the New York offices of the GBI without his clothing, but having been conditioned to make returning to a secure location his first order of business whenever he found himself in unusual circumstances - and this certainly qualified - he decided that he had no other option, and so, looking up, he attempted to take to the air. Nothing happened. He tried again. Nothing.

Leaping into the air as high as he could, he was dismayed to find gravity exerting its authority over him and pulling him back down immediately, and he landed heavily on the soft grass, twisting his ankle in the process, causing him to pitch forward awkwardly and fall face-first into the grass. Lying there naked in the grass, he began to become aware of several other things beyond his nakedness and the fact that he was in a cage, a cage that had, apparently, been the home to lions at some point in its past. First, his body was racked with pain. His head was throbbing, all of his muscles ached, and now his twisted ankle added its voice to the chorus of pain echoing throughout the chambers of his body. Second, he couldn’t feel…it. The scientists who had studied him for his entire life, and, indeed, since even before his life had begun, had a name for it, but Tommy himself had never felt a need to create a label. It was just…it. The feeling of gravity, of electromagnetism, of the very forces that molded and shaped the universe flowing around and into him, the sensitivity and awareness that fueled his skills, his powers. The connection wasn’t there. He struggled back up into a standing position, something that took far more exertion than seemed warranted. He felt weak, and, he thought, unhappily, utterly human. Tommy didn’t look down on ordinary humans, but he did feel a mild tinge of sympathy for them knowing that most of them would never experience the world the way he did, to feel the energy of life itself flowing all through them. It wasn’t about being strong enough to lift a flyer over his head, or being able to move objects with his mind, or being able to shrug off the impact of bullets, it was about feeling the connectedness of all things, of being one small part of something so much larger than himself. If people could feel that, see how their actions impacted others…it made him sad. Tommy had taken lives in the execution of his responsibilities, but only when absolutely necessary, and only with the deepest sense of regret. It didn’t matter that the people he had killed were doing everything in their power to kill him, or that they had done horrible, unspeakable things to other people, they were still alive, still part of the infinite web of life, and having to be the one to sever that connection, that active, vibrant connection, was a terrible burden to bear. In his worst moments, facing off against Restorationists who hated him beyond all reason, who hated him simply for existing, for being other - such a foolish notion; there was no “otherness” - he feared that people weren’t blind, but instead that they chose not to see. Worse than being the one to end their lives, though, by far, was watching them throw their lives away in their suicide attacks. He sighed. Despite it all, he could never bring himself to view them as cynically as Sam did. Sam. His mind flashed to the memory of her standing over him, of her fist coming towards him as if in slow motion. Gingerly, he touched his fingers to the bridge of his nose. “Ow!” The electric surge of pain this inspection produced coursed throughout his body, and all of the other points of pain seemed to pulsate in sympathy. Once the pain subsided, he took stock of his surroundings. This particular habitat had obviously been in disuse for years. Decades, from the look of it. Still, the overall design was familiar, and he was certain that he was somewhere in one of the Central Park zoos. He put the final piece of the puzzle together: he was at ground level. He was in the Devil’s Down.

Relying on his training, he fought down the rising feeling of panic this realization had engendered. “Take stock,” he said to himself, echoing the words that had been drilled into him almost daily for as long as he could remember. “Be aware of your surroundings. Assess any possible threats. Find a defensible position.” He noted that there was a large rock in the - he studied the shadows cast by the rising sun far above him - north corner that would provide him some amount of cover. It wasn’t much, but it would have to do. Moving cautiously towards the corner, he stooped to gather some small rocks from the ground along the way. “Almost anything can be used as a weapon,” the voices of his instructors intoned in his memory. Once he was crouched behind the larger, he surveyed his surroundings once again. There had to be a door somewhere, he decided. He knew it would most likely be sealed, but he would at least know where his captor - where Sam - would enter. The most likely areas were the north and south walls. Dropping all but two of his rocks in a pile, he edged his way along the north wall, feeling for some hidden seam. Walking the length of it, he found no indication of a door, and made his way to the south wall, running his unencumbered hand along the west wall. Unlike the other walls which were made of artificial stone rising the ten meters or so up to the plexiglass ceiling, the top half of the south wall was a wide plexiglass pane that once separated visitors to the view from the animals inside the habitat while still allowing them a clear view. As he was feeling his way along the south wall he heard a footstep behind him. He quickly transferred one of the rocks into his right hand and whirled, poised to either strike with it or hurl it. “How’s your head?” Tommy lowered his hand and stared at Sam in silence. She stood regarding him, expressionless save for the slight smirk that played at the right side of her mouth. In the dim light her hair seemed to pulsate slightly with a rhythmic regularity. Tommy was aware, vaguely, of the fact that the rhythm seemed to match that of his heart. He also became aware, once again, of the fact that he was naked. Dropping his makeshift weapons, he moved his hands to cover himself. Sam’s smirk expanded into a smile. “Oh, please. You don’t think I saw everything when I undressed you?” Blushing, Tommy said, “Why did you do that?” Sam shrugged. “Satisfying an old piece of curiosity?” Tommy frowned. “Sam…” With a laugh, she said, “Are you serious? Do you not know how many pieces of tracking circuitry the spooks have woven into the fabric of your clothes? I blocked their transmissions while I brought you here, but it seemed easier to haul them away somewhere else to send them on a wild goose chase once they decided to start looking for you.” It had never occurred to Tommy that his movements were tracked in this way. “It was a little more difficult to remove the trackers they put in you, though. I’ll never be a surgeon, I’m afraid, but you should heal with a minimum of scarring.” As she said this, Tommy realized that several areas on his body had been bandaged with Sim flesh strips, and that the incisions they covered were part of the chorus of pain, despite the antiseptics the bandages were releasing. “And,” Sam continued, “dealing with the radioactive dye in your bloodstream was even more difficult, but removing that from my own blood was the first trick I learned, so it was just a matter of dusting off some old skills.” Tommy cocked his eyebrow. “Radioactive dye?” “It has a distinctive signature that they can use to track you. It’s only good at a fairly close

range, but better safe than sorry.” Sam noticed that Tommy’s face had dropped. “Wait, did you not know about it? Any of it? Those, those butchers slice you up and stick things inside you so they can do even more to keep you under their control and you don’t even know about it? God, Tommy you’re so -“ “What do you want, Sam?” Tommy was surprised at the anger in his voice. Even more troubling was the fact that he wasn’t sure who he was angry with. Even Sam appeared surprised - and, Tommy thought, a little pleased - at his tone. “I just wanted to talk.” Leaving one hand covering himself, he reached up with the other to touch his swollen head. “You never heard of a comm system? E-mail? Writing a letter?” Sam laughed, then, regaining her composure, she said, quietly, “I wanted to see you. In the flesh.” The word “flesh” reminded him of his nakedness, and his anger dissipated, replaced by embarrassment. “Are you really going to make me stand here naked?” Sam looked down, then looked up again with a smile. “Well, the idea is appealing,” Tommy’s deeply bronzed skin was turning a violent shade of crimson. “But no,” she said, finally, removing a pair of shorts tucked into her belt and tossing them to him. Without thinking, Tommy reached out to catch them, prompting a salacious giggle from Sam. “Turn around,” he said, after reaching down to cover himself again. “Are you serious?” “Do it.” Sam sighed, and slowly turned to face the opposite direction. As Tommy quickly struggled to put on the shorts, Sam said, “I can see your reflection in the glass.” Ignoring that, Tommy said, “Okay, you can turn around.” Once she had, she looked Tommy up and down. The gray shorts fit him loosely, and seemed to be constantly threatening to fall down. She smiled at the thought. Her eyes continued upward over his hairless body, over the rippling abdominals and up to his muscular chest, noting the only other indication of his not entirely human nature besides his eyes: he had no nipples. She wondered how much of Tommy’s appearance was the result of pure chance, of the uncontrolled mingling of his human DNA with the Llani DNA that was added after his conception, and how much of it had been the result of deliberate manipulation. Did the scientist deliberately choose to make him so human while letting nature - or some perversion of it - simply play out however it would in her case? She supposed she’d never know one way or the other. Everyone still living who had been involved in the breeding program had dropped off the face of the earth. Assuming there was anyone still living. Tommy returned her stare. “What’s with the ears?” “Don’t you start.” She thought about her earlier conversation with her mother, and smiled. She reached up to touch her forehead, where Fontaine had kissed her. Leave it to my mother blur the lines between narcissism and love. There were still too many things unspoken between the two of them, too much bad blood to overcome to consider their exchange a true reconciliation, but Sam couldn’t help but feel that it counted for something. Tommy shrugged. “I’m not finding fault. I kind of like them. It’s just that they - ” “They don’t have to make sense.” Tommy shrugged again. After a pause, he said, “Your hair…you still have it.”

Confused, Sam responded, “Why wouldn’t I?” “I don’t have my skills. You’re obviously using a power dampener on me, but,” he looked down and moved his head from side to side, “I don’t see one anywhere on me. So you must be using some kind of broadcast dampener somewhere in this cage. But you can’t be, because it would affect you, too, and your hair fades when you’re dampened.” When Sam didn’t say anything in response, Tommy said, “Unless you…” Sam’s face fell, and she looked away, embarrassed. “I see,” he said, bitterly. “It’s so horrible when they put things in me and try to control me, but you’re Samson so you can do anything you want and it’s just fine.” “I’m sorry,” she said, weakly. “When I’m done, when I leave, it’ll burn itself out and your powers will come back. But I couldn’t risk dampening both of us, or put one on you.” Tommy glared at her in silence. Finally, he said, “Why do you hate me, Sam? You used to - I’m not as naïve as you think. I know they’re using me. I know that. But it doesn’t matter, because they’re using me to help people. Maybe they have me doing the right things for the wrong reasons, but they’re still the right things. You’re like your mother in so many ways, but you’re also different. I know you care about people, Sam. I know that you want to help them, that you do help them. They call you a terrorist, but that’s only because you’re doing things to help people without them, outside of their system. If you would just - “ “I don’t hate you, Tommy.” Tommy shook his head. “You could have fooled me.” “I know. I just - it’s complicated.” “No, actually it’s very simple.” They both stood in silence, neither looking at the other. After an awkward pause, Sam spoke. “Why are the Feds after my mother?” “She’s a criminal. She’s in possession of government property. I hate to say it, but it’s the simple truth. She’s a thief.” He paused. “And I like Miss Fontaine. I really do. Did you know that in the Nursery she used to read me stories when I was little, when she was pregnant with you? I would sit on her lap and rest my head against her belly and listen to your heart beating. You had such a strong heart.” He smiled. “And sometimes, when I’d fall asleep, just listening to your heart beating, you would kick me.” They both laughed. “Some things never change,” Tommy said, finally. “So yes, I like your mother. Somewhere, deep down inside of her, there’s something good and beautiful. There has to be, because otherwise how could she have made you? But that doesn’t change the fact that she takes things that aren’t hers, that she hurts people, and she breaks laws and doesn’t care. And without - ” “Tommy, you said you’re not as naïve as I think you are, and I want to believe that, but you know it’s not about that suit, or anything else. They only care about their laws when it’s convenient. If they wanted the suit, or any of the other things she’s taken from them, they would have come for them years ago. Why the sudden interest now? What do they really want?” Tommy looked away, uncomfortable. “That’s all that Special Agent Jenn wants. She wants the suit, and she wants Miss Fontaine behind bars.” He looked at Sam. “Well, she also wants to hurt you. She really hates you, you know. You shouldn’t have humiliated her like that.” Sam shrugged. “She had it coming. You say that’s all that Jenn wants. There are others who want something else?” With a nod, Tommy said, “I don’t know all of the details. They only tell me what I need to know, but I hear things. Recovering the suit is just the cover, though Special Agent Jenn doesn’t know that. They, the people she works for, they want…it’s something to do with Miss

Fontaine’s blood.” “Her blood?” “Yes. That’s what I heard. I’m not sure what they meant. It seemed like they were talking about more than one thing. Like, they want her, you know, actual blood, the stuff in her veins, but also they meant, her blood, her family. You.” “Wanting me is nothing new. I’ve been on the run from them for more than half of my life.” “This seemed different, somehow.” Tommy shrugged. “I don’t understand everything that goes on there.” “I know, Tommy,” Sam said, soothingly. She considered trying to use her limited telepathic abilities to extract more information directly from his mind, but she knew that would be a wash; she wouldn’t get a word-for-word record of what Tommy heard, just his impression. He had given her all he could. “Well, I’m pretty sure I know what they want with me, and obviously they’re trying to use my mother as bait, but they know that’s not enough to draw me into a trap.” Tommy frowned. “But she’s your mother. Why wouldn’t that be enough to draw you out. I mean, that’s why you’re here, isn’t it?” “It’s part of the reason. Mostly I’m curious as to what, exactly, they want. And the fact that they’re giving Aunt Kelly a hard time pisses me off to no end.” “But what about Miss Fontaine?” Sam shrugged. “Getting my mother out of whatever trouble she’s in is just a side effect, really.” “Don’t you care what happens to her?” Sighing, she said, “That’s something else that’s complicated, Tommy.” “No it isn’t! She’s your mother she’s - if I had a mother I wouldn’t just let her - ” He shook his head sadly. “Tommy, my mother would understand, and the last thing she would want is for me to stick my neck out for her.” “Why do you both make everything so complicated? She’s your mother. That’s all that matters.” “Tommy…” “No, it’s just, it’s, it’s stupid. Do you have any idea how much she loves you? Of course you don’t, because she’ll never tell you. And even if she did, you wouldn’t believe her.” “My mother and ‘love’ don’t really mix, Tommy.” “Bullshit.” That took Sam aback. “Did you just swear?” “Yes,” he admitted, blushing again. “It’s just so frustrating. You have a mother. I killed my mother.” Sam stepped towards him and put her hand on his shoulder. “That’s not true.” Tears welled up in Tommy’s black eyes, and Sam took him into her arms, holding him tight against him. The uneven ground compensated for the difference in their height, allowing Tommy to stand nearly as tall as Sam. “Ow,” Tommy said into Sam’s neck. “Not so tight. I’m just human now, remember? And I have bruises. I’ve never had those before. I don’t like them.” “Sorry,” Sam said, pulling back, but keeping a light grip on his arm with her left hand while reaching up to brush his hair with her right. Sniffing, Tommy regained his composure. “They did a lot of bad things to Miss Fontaine. They hurt her and thought it was funny. But she never cried, or at least she never let anyone see her cry, and most of the time she hurt them back. Especially after they took you away from her.” Sam smiled at that. “They stopped hurting her when she was carrying you. Didn’t want to risk damaging you.

That was the only time I ever saw her smile, though she wouldn’t let them see that, either. When no one was looking, she would put her hands on her belly and sing songs to you. She couldn’t carry a tune, but it always made me smile when I heard it. She would know that I could hear it, and she’d see me smiling, and she would hold her finger up to her mouth and wink at me to tell me that it was our secret.” Tommy chuckled. “Guess it’s not our secret anymore.” He looked up towards the viewing platform outside of the cage. “One time when they took me to the zoo, up there on the higher levels, there was a baby monkey who was sick. His mother was holding him and stroking his fur and looking worried. The people from the zoo went into the cage to take him to the hospital to make him better. But his mother didn’t know that. I mean, she was a monkey. She couldn’t know. She tried to fight them off, to try to climb up a tree to get away from them and protect her baby. It was just instinct.” Sam furrowed her brow, not understanding where he was going with this. “Eventually, they managed to catch her and they gave her something to calm her down, and they took the baby away. Even though she’d been drugged, the mother started screaming when they took her baby away. She just howled, this horrible instinctive wail full of anger and despair.” Tommy looked at Sam. “When they took you away from her, your mother howled like that. I could hear it, even with my ears covered. She just howled and howled, and it went on and on until the drugs finally kicked in. Even then she still whimpered like a wounded animal. “ “Tommy, why are you telling me this?” He ignored the question. “Before she had you, they made her help out in the Nursery, her and the other mothers. Afterwards, they wouldn’t let her anywhere near any of us. But I would see her in the hallways, sometimes. For the first few days she would spit at, and bite, and kick, and punch all of the nurses and the doctors. She did everything she could to hurt them. One night she got out of her and broke into the nursery and went over to your crib and picked you up. She was trying to sneak out with you, but you - I guess you hadn’t had a chance to bond with her. You didn’t know who she was, so you started crying. She had disabled the cameras and drugged the guards, but you just cried and cried and she couldn’t shush. All of us kids woke up and we knew right away what was happening, and we all went over to Miss Fontaine, and we tried to shush you. “It’s your mommy, Samson. Don’t cry, it’s your mommy,” I said, but you just wouldn’t stop crying, and that got the attention of one of the nurses, and security came and pulled you away and then they just started beating her. They broke her ribs and her arm and fractured her skull, but she wouldn’t stay down, and she fought as hard as she could to get back to you. Miss Fontaine is really strong - for a human. “After that, they just kept her drugged all of the time and kept her tied down in a hover chair, and she finally just stopped fighting. She just sat there with her head down staring at her hands. I don’t think that it was the drugs, though. She had just finally given up.” Sam stood in silence, her mouth open and her brow furrowed. “After her bones healed and her bruises had faded, they sent her away. Back to her home, I guess. To her family. I didn’t see her again until years later, after you ran away, and my handlers took me to meet with her to try to find you. She was,” he frowned, “she wasn’t the same Miss Fontaine who held her belly and sang. She said she hadn’t seen you, and that she didn’t know where you were and that she didn’t care to know. “ “She was lying, and I told my handlers that, but…I didn’t know what part she was lying about. I told my handlers that she was broken, and that if we found you, we had to bring you back to her so that you could fix her. They just laughed.” He reached out to brush his hand through Sam’s hair; in his grasp it was solid, and he wrapped it around his fingers, then released it and brushed her cheek. “She still loves you as much as she did when she sang to you, and when she fought for you, but she doesn’t know

how to…that broken part needs to be fixed.” Sam closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “After I escaped - I didn’t run away, Tommy; you can only run away from home, and that place was not home - I wanted to find her, but I knew that the Feds would be watching her place. So I stayed at a safe distance and I watched her. She knew the Feds were watching her, too, and she was good at slipping past them. She was sneaking out and doing jobs with Jennifer. Petty theft, mostly, but it was enough that Jennifer was making a name for herself and getting in good with the Families. My mother let Jennifer get all of the glory. All she cared about was the money, and the thrill. “I followed them one night, after they’d finished breaking into a bar and torching the place because the owner hadn’t paid her protection fees. They were standing on a walkway two levels up, watching the fire and laughing. ‘Oh,’ I thought, “that’s what my mother’s laughter sounds like.’ It sounded sad, somehow, and I thought it was weird, because laughter is supposed to be happy. In the flickering light of flames and the flashing lights of the fire flyers that came to put out the fire I saw them standing there, Jennifer moving closer and closer to my mother, putting her arm around her, and leaning in to kiss her. “I was only four years old, then, but by our clocks I was probably ten or so, still waiting for my second growth spurt, and already smarter than pretty much anyone on the planet. But there was still so much I didn’t understand about life. “Even so, it was clear to me that Jennifer was in love with my mother, and I understood what she wanted from her. I was one level up, hiding in the shadows, watching. Jennifer pressed her lips against my mother’s and wrapped her arms around her and pulled her close. My mother kept her arms rigid at her sides, and stood there stiffly with her lips firmly clamped shut. And like you I knew, in that moment, that she was broken. Eventually she pushed Jennifer away, and held her at arm’s length as she pleaded and cajoled and tried to get past her defenses, and I understood that you couldn’t get closer to my mother than arm’s length. “After Jennifer finally gave up and the two went their separate ways until their next job, I made my move and dropped down to the walkway as my mother was heading home, most likely planning how she was going to sneak back into her house without the Feds noticing. She knew who I was the moment she saw me. With this hair, how could she not?” Tommy smiled. “I said, ‘Hello, mother. I’m your daughter.’ She just looked at me, and that furrow appeared on her brow. I ran up to her and wrapped my arms around her. She didn’t push me away, but she didn’t return the embrace. ‘You shouldn’t be here,’ she said. I told her that I needed to see her. She said, ‘Well, now you’ve seen me. Go.’ I looked up at her, I looked into her eyes, and I didn’t see anything there. No love. Nothing. She pulled herself away from me, and just looked down at me as if I were some random kid. I started to cry. She sighed, and kneeled down and grabbed my shoulders and looked me in the eye and said, ‘I can’t give you what you’re looking for. I’m sorry. I’m sorry about everything.’ Then she ran her fingers through my hair and touched my cheek. ‘You’re not safe here. You have to go away.’” Sam smiled at Tommy. “Not exactly the touching family reunion I was looking for. Aunt Kelly gave me a much warmer reception, and she tried to explain my mother to me, but, really, even she doesn’t understand her.” “I kept in touch with Aunt Kelly, and saw my mother occasionally. Sometimes things went a little better, sometimes a little worse, and sometimes a lot worse. After a while I stopped visiting Aunt Kelly when it became clear that my doing so was interfering with her life.” “Sam?” “Yes?” “After you met your mother, was that when you…?” Sam nodded. “Yes. That was the night I destroyed the Nursery.” “You hurt a lot of people.”

“Yes. I was angry. When people like us throw temper tantrums, other people tend to get hurt.” “Don’t you care that you hurt people.” Sam looked down. “At the time I…” She looked up. “No. I’ll be honest. I don’t care about hurting them.” Tommy sighed. “Except for one person.” She put her hand on Tommy’s face. “I’m sorry that I hurt you.” Turning away from her, and blushing again. “I love you, Sam.” Sam smiled. “I know, Tommy.” “Don’t you…do you…?” She turned his face towards her. “Very much. More than you can imagine.” “Then why won’t you just be with me? And don’t say that it’s complicated.” “Because it’s what they want, Tommy. And if I’m going to be with you - when I’m with you - it will be my choice, and on my terms.” “Why would they care about us being together?” Sam laughed, “Oh, Tommy.” “What?” “They want us to breed. To make a bunch of little hybrid babies.” Tommy let that sink in. “Don’t you want that.” She sighed. “Oh yes. But I want that to be what I - what we - choose.” “Oh.” Sam turned her head upwards. “What is it?” “Something’s wrong. I have to go.” She turned to walk away. “You’re just going to leave me here?” “Your powers will kick back in within an hour or so. I’ll put a call in to your handlers to let them know where you are, just in case. In the meantime, stay here. It’s probably the safest place in the Down.” “But - ” “Tommy, I have to go now.” She turned back towards him, pulled him in close, and kissed him firmly. He couldn’t remember a time in his life when he hadn’t been waiting for this moment. He closed his eyes and leaned into the kiss, ignoring the pain caused by Sam’s forceful embrace. Lost in the moment, he failed to notice that Sam had withdrawn and only became aware of it when he opened his eyes and saw her streaking upwards, propelled by her AG boots. The plexiglass ceiling melted as she approached, and she passed through the opening without slowing. “Mother,” she said, as she pushed her AG boots to their limit. ***

“After her,” Special Agent Jenn shouted, breaking the radio silence. “She’s no good to us dead!” The Agents stationed outside the apartment reoriented themselves to dive after Fontaine, while several Agents inside the apartment jumped out through the opening to follow after them. For her part, Fontaine had reached for the side of her mattress to retrieve the flyboard hidden inside of it. Unlike the AG generators in her bodysuit, the flyboard’s AG system was designed to overcome gravity in a freefall scenario. Before she could retrieve the board, though, she was blown free from the mattress, managing only to grab the sheet, which came loose from the mattress with her. She sighed. “Just perfect.”

The sheet would be of no use in slowing her fall, but she supposed that it could serve some purpose. Grasping it in both hands, she managed to start a small tear the side, then used that to pull free a strip several centimeters wide. With that accomplished, she placed the end of the strip in her mouth and clamped her teeth down on it to hold it in place. Fighting against the wind, she quickly wrapped the remainder of the sheet around herself, creating a makeshift sari, folding the ends of it up around her waist to free up the movement of her legs. Searching the skies above her for the approach of the Agents she knew - hoped - would be coming after her, she spotted one straining her AG pack to the utmost, rapidly closing the gap. Removing the strip of cloth from her mouth, she began twirling one end of it while holding the other in place, tightening it into a coiled whip. As the Agent, reaching out to grasp her, got within about a half a meter’s distance, Fontaine lashed the twisted fabric upwards with all the strength she could muster and managed to wrap it securely around the Agent’s throat. In response, the Agent immediately began braking procedures while reaching up to try to pull the sheet free. Fontaine took advantage of the confusion to grasp the Agent’s belt with her free hand and pull herself up and around onto the Agent’s back, wrapping the sheet around her neck several more times. She couldn’t hear what the Agent shouted, but assumed that it was something like “You crazy bitch!” As their descent continued to slow, the Agent struggled to free herself from the sheet constricting her throat. Fontaine reached under the Agent’s chin and unlatched the strap holding her helmet in place, and after pulling it free she placed in on her own head. Voices on the comm system shouted in her ear. “She’s got Brandi!” “Is deadly force authorized?” “Negative. Close in on them and prepare the stop spray, then grab her.” “They’re slowing too fast. We’re going to overshoot them.” Fontaine studied the positions of the Agents with the helmet’s head’s up display. Three Agents sailed past them, going too fast to stop. As for Fontaine and Agent Brandi, their descent had slowed to a near stop, and as they hovered in the air more than a kilometer above ground, Brandi gave up on trying to pry the sheet loose and began throwing wild punches at Fontaine, before starting to reach for her sidearm. Fontaine positioned herself so that her legs were wrapped around Brandi’s ribs just below the level of the AG pack. She squeezed her thighs tightly together, and the flexible body armor of Brandi’s uniform compressed against her ribcage forcefully. As Brandi cried out in pain, Fontaine reached around between Brandi’s breasts to find the latch for the straps holding the AG pack in place. Her dexterous fingers quickly pulled the latch open, and she loosened her legs’ grip on Brandi and pulled the pack free, sliding the straps over her arms and latching it in place in one fluid motion. Taking control of the AG pack via the helmet’s interface, she began moving upwards, her legs still loosely wrapped around Brandi. She used the strength of her thighs to rotate Brandi so that she was now straddling her abdomen, then reached down to grab her by her shirt, pulling her up so that they were face to face. “Please,” Brandi said, a look of fear flashing across her beet-red face, the loose ends of the sheet wrapped about her throat fluttering in the wind. “Don’t let me fall.” Maintaining her grip on Brandi’s shirt with one hand - the field generated by the AG pack doing most of the heavy lifting so long as Fontaine maintained contact - Fontaine looked down and reached with the other hand to open the latch on Brandi’s belt. After removing the belt Fontaine looked back up. Brandi had been following Fontaine’s gaze, and their eyes met. With a smile, Fontaine let go of Brandi’s shirt. Brandi’s eyes opened wide in terror, and as the wind pulled her free from the field keeping her aloft, she said, “You bi - ” but the rest was cut off as she quickly fell away from Fontaine. Fontaine wriggled her fingers in a sarcastic wave, then she strapped Brandi’s belt about her

waist, pulled out her sidearm - a particle taser - and resumed her upward course in earnest. The display in the helmet and the voices in the comm system confirmed that several of the Agents had broken off their pursuit of her to rescue their falling comrade. Fontaine wasn’t sure what she was hoping to accomplish in returning to her apartment. If she had any sense she would be flying away from the danger, but no one had ever accused her of having any sense. All she really knew was that they had invaded her home and that some sort of reckoning was in order. There was also the question of “Why now?” She’d had the suit for years and the Feds had never indicated that they were the least bit interested in recovering it, or making her pay for stealing it in the first place. She had assumed that was due to the fact that she had effectively used the suit in pursuit of their interests so many times, and there were undoubtedly those who feared that if they did try to move in on her she would expose the secrets of what they had done to her in the pursuit of their illegal breeding program. It was a valid concern. If she were of a more charitable temperament, she might have believed that letting her keep the suit and continue her one-woman crime wave without intervention was the result of guilty consciences, a reward for suffering through that year of hell. She did not, however, possess a terribly charitable temperament. As she ascended, an Agent was diving towards her, particle taser in hand. Particle tasers fired bursts of charged particles which could incapacitate the human nervous system on contact, with the effect varying based on the setting. The lowest setting rendered a person immobile, a higher setting caused unconsciousness, yet another setting could cause the heart to fail, and the very highest setting resulted in death by electrocution. They were also useful for disrupting electronics, such as the AG pack on the back of the Agent hurtling towards her. After Fontaine’s shot hit the Agent’s AG pack, he began to fall, causing two other Agents to pursue. Inside the helmet she heard panicked voices shouting, “She’s dropping our people like flies! Where is our air support?” Another voice, which Fontaine recognized as that of Special Agent Jenn, broke in. “Switch to coded channel Beta; she’s listening in on every word your saying.” Frowning, Fontaine attempted to switch to the coded channel, but was stymied by a voice requesting the clearance code. Only one Agent remained between her and her apartment, and Fontaine noted that she was carrying some serious ordnance. A rocket launcher? Something strange is going on here. As Fontaine approached, the Agent dove backwards and began hurtling towards the Down. Before Fontaine could decide whether or not to follow she heard a familiar voice over the comm system. “Give it up, Fontaine.” “Hello, Nikki,” Fontaine said in response to Special Agent Jenn. “Got out from behind the desk, I see.” Special Agent Jenn ignored that. “You’re not going to get away. The GBI is prepared to seize your assets, and do the same for all of your criminal acquaintances. The Terminatrix is being raided even as we speak.” “Poor Jennifer,” Fontaine said, though her tone was not entirely sympathetic. “You should worry more about yourself, Fontaine.” “I always do.” Special Agent Jenn sighed. “Can’t we skip this charade? You’ve lost. Turn yourself in. You’re helpless. You’ve been stripped. We’ve got the suit.” “Do you?” With that, Fontaine closed her eyes, and behind her eyelids she saw the bodysuit’s head’s up display.

She hovered in the air and “saw” the view presented by the suit’s sensors, the nanites still in her system relaying and transmitting data to and from the suit’s systems. The Agent who had caught the suit in mid-air was still holding it. Without further instruction from Fontaine, the suit had deflated and gone offline. Over the remote connection, Fontaine issued a mental command and the suit came fully online, emitting a mild electrical shock that caused the Agent to cry out and drop it. Once freed, the suit inflated itself and reconfigured its shape to conform to that of Fontaine’s. It leaped into the air, unto the dangling trapdoor that had held Fontaine’s bed and which still held the chest that had sat at the foot of it. The lid remained open, and the suit grabbed the red breastplate, then leaped back up onto the solid floor at the perimeter of the room. An Agent approached the suit, which swung its arm out and struck the Agent on the head with the breastplate, which, at the Fontaine’s command relayed via the suit, had gone complete rigid and was as hard as a steel plate. The Agent fell to the floor, dazed. The suit placed the breastplate in its standard position, then closed around it. Two more agents were closing in from either side. The suit leaped towards one, dodging the shots the Agent fired from her particle taser, and landing a solid blow to her stomach, and then another to her jaw, sending her crumpling to the floor. The other Agent grabbed the suit about the waist from behind, trying to force it to the floor, but the suit allowed itself to flex and stretch, its mid-section giving in to the momentum, throwing the Agent off balance and causing him to lose his grip and stumble awkwardly forward. In the air below the apartment, Fontaine opened her eyes and saw that the Agents who had abandoned her to pursue their fellow Agents were once again on the rise. She sent a series of commands to the suit and resumed her course back towards her apartment. Inside, the suit continued to wreak havoc, porting in particle tasers of its own and taking out two more Agents. constantly leaping and weaving out of the way, and forcefully dispatching anyone that got too close. “Call it off, Fontaine,” Special Agent Jenn demanded. “What’s the matter, Nikki? I thought you said you had it.” “You’re just making matters worse, Fontaine. You’re not getting away.” “Who said anything about getting away? I’m just coming to get what’s mine.” “That suit is the property of the Global Union.” “Really? The suit doesn’t seem to think so.” The Special Agent snorted. “One way or another, you and that suit are coming with me.” “That’s not going to happen, Nikki.” Inside the apartment, Special Agent Jenn and her second in command - who had recovered from the jolt the suit had given her - were positioned behind an overturned dresser, firing shots at the suit, and occasionally dodging shot the suit fired at them. Setting her particle taser for the maximum charge, Special Agent Jenn managed to score a direct hit on the suit’s right shoulder, causing its arm to go limp and drop the weapon it had been holding. “Set maximum charges,” she shouted. “Take that thing down!” Even hampered by the loss of its right arm, the suit managed to avoid the shots coming from the few Agents still standing - or hovering - and, having assessed the Special Agent as being the primary threat, per the protocols of the fight and flight command that Fontaine had executed, began making its way towards her. An Agent swooped in to intercept it, grabbing its left wrist and prying the particle taser loose from its hand. The suit spun towards the Agent, bringing its limp right arm across her face like the lash of a whip. Shocked more than she was hurt, the Agent slackened her grip on the suit’s wrist, but as the suit pulled away she managed to hit the suit’s left arm with a shot from her own particle taser, causing it to go limp as well.

The suit responded by kneeing the Agent in the stomach and leaping away towards the eastern wall. As it neared the wall it activated the AG systems and landed feet-first, running up the wall and onto the ceiling, its loose, deflated arms dangling. Below, Fontaine was within ten meters of her apartment when she heard a voice burst in through the comm system. “Special Agent Jenn, we’ve got a confirmed visual. Subject 76 is inbound towards this location at high speeds. Air support is - ” “Get the hell off this channel!” There was a fury in the Special Agent’s voice that Fontaine had never heard before. “Sam?” Fontaine paused in her ascent. She looked down and saw the Agents far below her steadily rising, and, considerably closer, the Agent armed with the rocket launcher, the purpose of which had suddenly become clear. “Nikki, you bitch,” she said, as she turned to dive towards the Agent with the rocket launcher. The Special Agent chuckled in her ear. “What’s the matter, Fontaine? Did you just realize that there are some people more important than you are? That must come as a crushing blow to that ego of yours.” Fontaine didn’t respond, focusing her attention on the heavily-armed Agent. “I won’t lie to you; you were our primary target, but we thought this might present us with some additional opportunities, and you know me well enough to know that I never pass up an opportunity.” The Agent with the rocket launcher undertook evasive maneuvers as Fontaine fired several bursts in her direction. “Do you want to know what’s sad, Fontaine? We knew you weren’t sufficient bait to draw Subject 76 out. We had to make trouble for her dear old auntie before she could be bothered to come out of hiding. Isn’t that sad? I think it’s sad. I mean, she’d let her own mother hang out to dry without giving it a second thought, but the moment you start giving her aunt even the slightest amount of - ” “Shut up,” Fontaine said. “I’m sorry, did I just touch on a sensitive subject? I didn’t know you were capable of sensitivity, Fontaine.” Fontaine was closing the distance between herself and the Agent, but was unable to get a clear shot. With a final thrust of the AG pack, she brought herself within centimeters of the retreating agent and managed to get a grip on her boot. Twisting the Agent’s foot as far to the right as she could as she pulled her in closer, Fontaine released her grip and reached out to grab the Agent by the straps of the AG pack crisscrossing her chest and spun her until they were facing each other. Fontaine reached back with her free hand and then brought it down with all of her strength, slamming the butt of the particle taser into the Agent’s face. Blood shot forth from the Agent’s nose and lips, and her eyes lolled in their sockets. Tossing the particle taser aside and not caring where it landed, she pulled the rocket launcher from the Agent’s grip, then unlatched her AG pack, pulling it free and letting the barely-conscious Agent fall into the brightening sky. The AG pack drifted away from Fontaine as she let go of it and rotated herself so that she was facing upwards towards her apartment, moving the rocket launcher into position and taking aim. “I’ll show you sensitive,” she said, as she sent out a command to the suit, causing it to drop from the ceiling and fall through the opening in the floor, its limp arms flapping in the breeze, and pulled the trigger. As the suit dropped, Special Agent Jenn sprang into action, firing her AG pack and diving after it. Once through the opening, she spotted Fontaine firing the rocket and shouted, “Incoming! Everyone clear!” She had no idea if any of the Agents were capable of responding, and wasn’t particularly

concerned either way. Her only focus was on catching the suit. Within seconds of clearing the apartment, she was aware of the sound of the explosion as the rocket impacted against the bedroom ceiling and detonated in a massive fireball. Even from the distance from the apartment that she had attained she could feel the concussive force of the shockwave, but she never took her eyes off of the suit, which, in a controlled descent, was headed directly for Fontaine. Amid the warning alarms about the explosion flashing on her head’s up display, Special Agent Jenn noted a proximity alert. Someone else had arrived on the scene just before the explosion and was several meters below her. She wondered if it was Sam - Subject 76 - but the identification system reported that it was not. “Detective,” she said to herself, as the display identified the newcomer to be Kelly. She cast a glance in Kelly’s direction - noting that she appeared dazed from the explosion - as she sped rapidly past her. The proximity alerts continued to display, warning her of falling debris, but she paid no attention, continuing her pursuit. The bodysuit was less than a meter away. As Special Agent Jenn got closer, it began kicking at her ineffectively. She hit both legs with bursts from her particle taser, and as the legs deflated, its torso still -eerily - holding Fontaine’s shape, it began to tumble, twirling around in the air as it began to fall with greater speed. The Special Agent reached forward and grasped the suit by its flailing right arm. Solidifying her grip, she slowed her descent, then fired two more blasts at the suit until it deflated completely and was nothing more than a pile of fabric. She paused in mid-air to roughly fold the suit and place it into the special container strapped to her side. As she did this, she continued to ignore the proximity alerts. She looked up just in time to see Fontaine before her, wielding the spent rocket launcher like a club and swinging it down hard across her face. The Special Agent’s helmet took the worst of it, but she was aware of the pain in her jaw and the taste of blood in her mouth. She clamped her lips shut, unwilling to let any of the blood, the thought of which drove her to a near-panic that overcame dazing effects of the blow Fontaine had delivered, to spill from her mouth. Turning towards Fontaine just in time to parry another blow from the rocket launcher, she raised her particle taser to fire, but Fontaine managed to knock it from her hand with the rocket launcher. Without hesitation, she brought her fist up and landed a solid punch to Fontaine’s face, and followed up with a knee to the stomach, the reached to grab hold of the rocket launcher. As they struggled with it, each lost her grip and the rocket launcher fell away. Though neither looked up, they were both aware of the sounds of sirens in the distance, as police and fire crews responded to reports of an explosion and an aerial conflict at the Olympia Tower. Above them, additional explosions rocked the apartment, as automated systems finished the process that the exploding rocket had started. They both looked up, and then Special Agent Jenn said, “Really, Fontaine? A self-destruct system? All those pretty things you managed to steal over the years gone. That must sting a little.” “Not as much as this,” Fontaine said, catching the Special Agent’s chin with an uppercut, causing a spray of blood to erupt from her mouth. Before Fontaine could follow through with another punch, Special Agent Jenn thrust herself backwards beyond Fontaine’s reach. Blinking and shaking her head, she appeared to be listening to her comm system. “Understood,” she said weakly. “Proceed as planned.”

“What are you up to, Nikki?” She scowled at Fontaine, running the back of her glove across her mouth to wipe away the blood. “She’s almost s here, Fontaine.” Fontaine’s brow furrowed. “You’ll never catch her. Once she sees what’s going on she’ll have enough sense to run. She’s not going to risk getting captured just to save me.” “Are you really so sure?” “She’s my daughter,” Fontaine said. “I may not have given her much, but at least I taught her not to let sentiment get in the way of pragmatism.” “That’s just sad, Fontaine.” “Shut up.” “What would you say if I told you that if you just surrender now, I’ll give up on trying to catch Sam?” “I’d say you’re lying.” The Special Agent smiled. “And you’d be right.” She surged forward, attempting to throw a punch at Fontaine, who floated aside to avoid it, but at the last second the Special Agent twisted herself and got behind Fontaine, hooking her right arm around Fontaine’s neck and grasping her left wrist with the other. As she tightened her grip, she put her mouth next to Fontaine’s ear. “That was sloppy, Fontaine. You’re not really at your best this morning, are you? Is it because you’re tired? No, I don’t think that’s it. Is it because you’re worried about your daughter? Ha, I just made myself laugh.” She paused. “No, it’s because you don’t have your fancy suit.” As Fontaine struggled to break free from the Special Agent’s grip, three Agents floated in a slow approach. One reached over to remove the helmet from her head, while another grabbed her free arm, which was clutching at the Special Agent’s arm, and looped a stunner shackle around her wrist. A mild burst of electricity coursed through her muscles, immobilizing her. The Agents pulled her away from Special Agent Jenn and finished applying the shackles. Though she was unable to move her extremities, Fontaine’s slight scowl - her customary expression - deepened, and her eyebrows drew together, furrowing her brow as she glared at the Special Agent. As the Agents held Fontaine aloft, Special Agent Jenn leaned forward to grasp the sheet Fontaine had wrapped about herself, and, tugging it, pulled it free, leaving Fontaine naked save for the straps holding the fallen Agent’s AG pack in place. “No more fancy bodysuit. You’ve been stripped, Fontaine.” One of the Agents holding Fontaine cleared her throat. “Uhh…Special Agent, I, that is, that seemed…inappropriate.” Special Agent Jenn laughed. “Inappropriate?” She seemed to consider this. “I suppose you’re right.” She reached over to unlatch the AG pack’s straps and removed it from Fontaine, then latched it onto the shackles and opened the a panel on the pack’s site, punching in a command. The AG pack floated up to above Fontaine’s head, pulling her arms up with it and out of the Agents’ grasps, extending them as far above her head as they could reach before finally stopping, leaving Fontaine dangling in mid-air. “If that was inappropriate,” she asked, “what do you suppose this is?” “Special Agent…” “Enough! This woman has spent nearly half her life humiliating the GU. Walking around with impunity wrapped in stolen GU technology, doing whatever she damn well pleases without ever having to face any consequences. For god’s sake, tonight alone she’s dropped GBI Agents - your friends and co-workers - to what might very well have been their deaths! Do we even know if there were any survivors from the explosion?” The Agent shook her head. “No, Special Agent, we don’t.”

“And you’re worried about what is and is not appropriate?” Both Agents hung their heads in silence. “Get the hell out of my sight and assume you’re positions. Subject 76 is still en route. We can still turn this debacle around. Go!” The Agents nodded and drifted away in opposite directions. Once they were alone, she turned to Fontaine. “You know what the only problem is with stunner shackles?” Unable to speak, Fontaine continued to glare. “In addition to immobilizing a prisoner, they also,” she reached up to tap the bracelet around Fontaine’s right wrist, “prevent the prisoner from feeling pain.” Fontaine grimaced as the current ceased coursing through her nervous system and she felt the fire burning in her overextended muscles. Special Agent Jenn turned as her proximity alert indicated that someone was approaching at a rapid pace. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” “Ah, Detective. So nice to see you again.” Kelly rotated up from her power dive to take a standing position. Special Agent Jenn positioned herself between Fontaine and her sister. “Shove it up your ass,” Kelly said, attempting to maneuver around her and get to Fontaine, but finding herself stymied at every turn. “I’m afraid the NYPD’s presence here is neither required nor wanted, Detective. I’m going to have to ask you to leave the scene.” “Fontaine, are you all right?” Struggling against the pain, Fontaine said, “Sam. It’s a trap. Sam’s coming.” Kelly’s face paled. “This isn’t over,” she said, glaring at the Special Agent, before turning to fly away. “On second thought,” Special Agent Jenn said, pulling out her particle taser and taking aim at Kelly, “I think I’m going to have to ask you to stay. We can’t have you flying off and warning your niece away, can we?” Kelly turned, “What are you - ” Special Agent Jenn fired, hitting Kelly square in the chest. The charge was too strong for her body armor to disperse, and she slumped into unconsciousness, pitching forward until she was completely upside down, still held aloft by her AG boots. “Someone please escort the Detective to a safe distance,” Special Agent Jenn said into her comm system. An Agent floated up and took hold of Kelly, then began a rapid descent. “Bitch,” Fontaine said, through gritted teeth. “I am indeed,” the Special Agent responded with a smile. She then paused to listen to a voice inside her helmet. “Dammit. Oh well, I guess we’ll have to do this somewhat differently than how we’d planned.” She turned to Fontaine. “It seems our air support has been delayed, and will not be able to arrive in time to help us incapacitate and capture Subject 76.” Fontaine, sweating despite the cold morning wind, said nothing. “It also seems that she’s not quite so pragmatic as you’d hoped, as she’s still closing in our location, no doubt intent at lashing out at all of us in righteous fury. Seems she’s more like her aunt than her mother.” She paused. “Then again, you stepped blindly into my trap, so maybe she’s not so different.” Fontaine’s face contorted with pain as she struggled to speak. “There aren’t enough of you to make her break a sweat knocking you out of the sky. That rocket launcher was the only chance you had.” Special Agent Jenn paused to consider this. “Hmph. You know, you might be right about that, Fontaine.”

She holstered her particle taser, and turned her head upwards as the voices in her comm system and the proximity alerts notified her of Sam’s approach. With her glowing hair streaking in the wind and the morning sun reflecting off her bodysuit, Sam had the appearance of a fiery comet. Even from this distance the Special Agent could see the raw anger that made her perfectly sculpted face appear more human than it ever had. “That is, you would be right about that,” the Special Agent held her hands up as though taking aim with a weapon on her shoulder, “if you were the only one who had access to teleportation tech.” With a whoosh, a rocket launcher appeared in the Special Agent’s hands, and she pulled the trigger. Unable to stop or swerve, Sam raced headlong into the path of the rocket, and once again the morning air was rocked by the sound of an explosion. Her bodysuit in tatters, her skin scorched and bloody, and her head bald save for a few dimly-glowing strands, Sam dropped like a stone from the center of the fireball. Four Agents holding a net hovered into position, catching her, then wrapping the net around her. With Sam in tow, they drifted down to the Special Agent’s level. Fontaine stared intently at her daughter, tangled in the crisscrossing lines of the net. Sam, barely conscious, returned her mother’s stare. “I’m sorry, mother.” Fontaine shook her head. “No. I’m the one - “ the pain made it impossible to finish. The Special Agent looked up towards the crumbling, flaming ruins of the top of the Olympia Tower. Fire and rescue flyers had arrived and begun fighting the blaze. “All things considered,” she said, smiling, “this went better than I could have expected.”

Down Down Down Special Agent Jenn and the Agents holding Sam in the net began drifting down at a rapid pace. The AG pack holding Fontaine aloft was programmed to follow the Special Agent’s path, and so Fontaine descended with them. They continued to descent for several minutes, finally landing on a deserted walkway seven levels up from the ground, several GBI vehicles hovering just off to the side. The AG pack held Fontaine at such a height that her toes just barely touched the walkway’s surface. She noted that Kelly was propped up, unconscious, against one of the walkway’s walls. Sam had been rather unceremoniously dumped in the middle of the walkway as Agents cautiously worked to remove her from the net and place a collar around her neck. Special Agent Jenn pulled out a small remote and pressed it, causing an LED on the front of the color to light up with a faint, green glow. Sam was forced to her feet in front of Fontaine, and as she stood there swaying from side to side, the Agents fitted her with stunner shackles. Most of the bleeding had stopped, and her skin looked less like it was singed and more like it was merely covered with soot. All things considered, Fontaine was impressed with how well her daughter had stood up to her explosive impact with the rocket. Sam’s head was almost completely bald, only the faintest strands of her normally luminescent halo of hair still visible. Her face was bruised and swollen, but her deep black eyes were clear as she unsteadily held her head up to look at her mother. Fontaine did her best to smile, but even under ideal circumstances it was a skill that was lacking.

Still, Sam smiled slightly in return, indicating that the meaning of Fontaine’s expression had been conveyed. Special Agent Jenn approached and stood to the side halfway between Fontaine and Sam. “Are we sharing a moment?” Removing her helmet and revealing, her short, red hair matted with perspiration, she turned to regard Sam. “I have to say, you’ve looked better, 76.” Her gaze traveled up and down Sam’s ragged, unsteady form. “Wish I could say the same about you, Nikki.” “Ah,” the Special Agent said with a laugh, “there’s that special brand of wit I’ve missed so much. I don’t suppose you’d happen to know where Tommy is, would you?” Sam attempted to shrug, but the stunner shackles prevented it. Even with the power dampener about her neck, the stunner had proven less effective on Sam than it would on a human, though it did its job well enough to prevent her from doing much more than speaking. “Never mind; I’m sure he’ll turn up. He always comes home like the good little puppy he is.” “Fuck you.” Special Agent Jenn turned to look at Fontaine. “Is this how you raised her to speak to her elders? Oh, I forget; you didn’t raise her at all. Well, I’m sure she’ll learn to be more respectful once given the proper care and instruction.” Fontaine simply glared. “Okay,” the Special Agent said, “family time is over. Say goodbye, Fontaine. You’re never going to see your daughter again, though I suppose that will suit you just fine.” “Of course,” she continued, “you’ll probably never see daylight ever again either, so you might as well say goodbye to that as well.” With a jerk of her head, she motioned for the Agents to load Sam onto the flyer hovering above the walkway’s wall with a ramp extended. As Sam was led up the ramp, she struggled against the stunner shackles and managed to turn her head towards Fontaine. She closed her eyes and her brow furrowed. When she opened them again, the last wisps of blue had disappeared from her head, and she mouthed the words, “I love you.” Then she was hauled into the flyer, the ramp retracted, the door closed, and the flyer ascended quickly into the air, pivoted, and flew towards the still-rising sun. For her part, Fontaine had taken note of the fact that as Sam opened her eyes, the shackles had loosened about her wrists. “Special Agent,” said an approaching Agent wearing a uniform that was nearly as tattered and singed as Sam’s bodysuit had been. It was Special Agent Jenn’s second in command, who had clearly made it out of Fontaine’s apartment alive, but not unscathed. Special Agent Jenn turned to regard the Agent.’ “What do you want us to do with the Detective?” All eyes turned towards Kelly, and away from Fontaine. Taking advantage of the distraction, Fontaine slipped her right hand out of the loosened restraint, and with great effort reached up to tap the side of the AG pack. The pack turned off and her feet dropped fully onto the walkway. She caught the pack as it started to fall. “Just leave her there,” Special Agent Jenn said, in response to the question. “There won’t be any foot traffic here for at least another hour, and she should regain consciousness by then.” “You don’t want to take her - look out!” The Special Agent turned just in time to catch the downward swing of Fontaine’s AG pack across the cheek, the force of the blow knocking her sideways and down onto the walkway. Her second in command reached for her particle taser, but was too slow on the draw and caught the AG pack on the chin on the upswing as Fontaine leaped over the Special Agent’s crumpled form. The other Agents were faster on the draw, but Fontaine activated the pack’s controls, sending her shooting up several meters into the air. Without the helmet to serve as a neural interface, she was limited to using the less-precise manual controls on the side, drifting wildly from side to side, Fontaine attempted to dodge the shots fired by the Agents still on the walkway below, and from the Agents who had taken to the air. An errant shot glanced off the side of the AG pack, causing her to careen rapidly to the west, losing altitude all the while. The airborne Agents moved to follow, but were unable to match the speed of the out of control AG

pack. It was becoming all but impossible for Fontaine to maintain her grip on the pack, and she was rapidly losing altitude, her feet brushing against the tops of the colorful autumn leaves of the trees below her. The pursuing Agents were receding in the distance. The untended ground of this section of the city had grown up into a thick forest since the destruction of the streets and sidewalks that had once lined the landscape, and Fontaine was dipping lower and lower, her shins and thighs being whipped by the branches of the trees as she flew through the increasingly dense wooded area. Ahead of her she saw GU aerial security patrols protecting the point of demarcation between the Down and the Heights. Slamming the side of the AG pack with the bottom of her fist, she managed to slow its forward movement, then, without a sound, it cut out entirely. Giving in to the remaining momentum, she dove into the multi-colored canopy below her and hoped for the best. Having completely lost sight of Fontaine and unable to detect her with a sensor sweep, the Agent who had been nearest in pursuit slowed to a halt several levels above the trees, unwilling to get any closer to the Down. She reported the situation over the comm system. “Suspect has disappeared into the trees. Please advise and is not showing up on sensor scans. Repeat, suspect has dropped into the Down. Please advise.” She stared nervously downward, hoping against hope that she would not be advised to enter the Down in pursuit. The Agent heard the angry voice of Special Agent Jenn over the comm system. “Break off pursuit and return to the staging area. We will apprise the GU security forces of the situation and leave it up to them to decide if they want to go into the Down in search of the body.” “Special Agent,” the Agent said in response, against her better judgment. “It’s possible that she’s still alive down there.” This was greeted by a silence that lasted long enough to make the Agent wonder if the comm system had failed. Finally, Special Agent Jenn spoke. “If she is, she won’t be for long. Return to the staging area. Let the Devil take her.” *** Three hours later, after regaining consciousness on the lower level walkway, calling in to her Captain to report her situation, contacting several attorneys, and spending two hours sitting in a waiting room in the GBI New York offices, Kelly found herself glaring at the swollen and bruised face of Special Agent Jenn from across an ancient, battered table in an interrogation room inside the GBI offices. To the Special Agent’s right sat an older, dark-skinned woman, with short, black hair, dressed in the same non-descript black suit as the Special Agent. This, Kelly knew, was Special Agent in Charge Trish, Special Agent Jenn’s supervisor. When she was still an agent, twelve years earlier, she had been the Agent investigating Fontaine’s theft of an experimental spacecraft, and had, upon Fontaine’s return, been the woman who had taken her into custody. Kelly remembered her well, but not fondly. She has also been the one who came to Kelly’s home to tell her parents about the “special facility” that Fontaine would be sent to for a year, explaining that her successful completion of the “intense rehabilitation program” would leave Fontaine’s record expunged, and her parents’ signature signing over temporary custody of Fontaine and authorizing her “treatment” would preclude the necessity of a trial. Even then Kelly had known it was bullshit, but she also knew that her parents had no choice. Throughout Fontaine’s brief life her parents had been forced to deal with her defiant attitude, the constant fighting, the theft. Especially the theft. She had been expelled from three schools, and, prior to running away, was about to be expelled from a fourth. None of that had prepared them for what she had done next. How could they even imagine that she would break into a GU facility, steal an experimental spaceship, and take it on a six-month joyride to the edges of the galaxy?

As the GBI Agent explained the situation to their parents, Kelly sat staring intently at Fontaine, who sat sullenly on a couch, her face a nearly expressionless mask that still managed to make her utter contempt towards the Agent and her parents, and her total lack of concern about her situation. Even then, she was, Kelly remembered, so pretty. Kelly had always viewed her sister’s beauty with a combination of pride and envy. But there was something missing inside of her, Kelly knew. Something had happened to Fontaine on that “joyride,” though Fontaine would never speak of it. Part of it, Kelly knew, was the death of the girl Fontaine had run off with, Deanna. Stealing the ship had been Deanna’s idea ; Fontaine had told her that much. She had also told Kelly a great deal more than that through what she hadn’t said to Kelly, who knew her sister well enough to understand that Fontaine had been in love with Deanna, and would have willingly followed her to the ends of the earth. Indeed, she had followed her to the ends of the galaxy. There had never been a time in the twelve years she’d known her sister that Kelly would have called Fontaine warm, or loving, but she had never been so cold - at least not with Kelly - before she ran away, nor had she ever kept any secrets. When the GBI Agent had brought Fontaine home, Kelly pushed her parents out of the way and run up to Fontaine to wrap her arms around her. Fontaine did not return the embrace. As horrible as that had been, it was far worse when, more than a year later, upon her release from the “facility,” Fontaine had actively pushed Kelly away. Today, so many years later, Kelly felt like that twelve year old girl again as she moved her gaze from Special Agent Jenn to SAIC Trish. Kelly had, she realized, blamed the woman for the loss of her sister. In her view, she had as good as killed Fontaine that day she talked their parents into signing the death warrant of the Fontaine she had known, and had never seen again. The girl who returned from that horrible place had been little more than the ghost of the sister who died that day. Behind the two GBI Agents, Tommy stood, leaning back against the wall, his head down, and his expression was that of someone lost deep in thought. The thought was perhaps unkind, Kelly admitted, but it seemed to her that it was not an expression that suited him. On Kelly’s side of the table, her partner sat to her left. Captain Josie had insisted on being with her, but finally acceded to Kelly’s wishes on the subject. There was no need for Kelly to drag the Captain into this. Joe, however, could not be dissuaded. His interest in Kelly’s live, by design, was limited to the professional portion of it, and he scrupulously avoided any intermingling of the two. In this instance, however, his loyalty to his partner proved stronger than his aversion to interfering in her life outside the job. Kelly had to admit that she actually appreciated his presence. “As I was saying, Ke - Detective,” SAIC Trish said, in her lilting tone, “I’m sympathetic to your desire to see your niece, and I admire the fact that your concern for your sister’s well-being has continued unabated throughout the years, but I’m not certain that I can allow you to see Subject 76 at this time. And as for Fontaine,” she turned to regard Special Agent Jenn briefly, “we have alerted GU security forces stationed at the Terminator to her…situation. They assure me that they are devoting appropriate resources to locating her.” “Bullshit.” SAIC Trish frowned. “I assure you, Detective, that we are just as interested in locating your sister as you are. She is, after all, a wanted fugitive.” Kelly opened her mouth to speak, but Joe motioned for her to be silent. “About that, Special Agent,” he said, his eyes still on Kelly, “I have reviewed the case files you made available to the NYPD, and I’m afraid that your warrant - issued in secret - doesn’t pass muster.” Trish raised her eyebrow. “Oh? Is that so?” Joe nodded. “It is. The warrant was issued based on the testimony of undercover Agent, who testified that he received the stolen property from Jennifer after it was delivered to her by Jennifer.” “Correct.” “I’m afraid that this does not provide sufficient probable cause for considering Fontaine a suspect. There is no record that Fontaine was involved in this transaction in any fashion. The only case you have is against Jennifer, for trafficking in stolen goods.” Trish shook her head. “Obviously Fontaine was hired by Jennifer to - ”

Joe cut her off. “Where is the evidence of this? There is no record of any such arrangement. No visual or audio recordings, no financial records.” “Fontaine is on Jennifer’s payroll, Detective.” Joe nodded. “Yes, as a security consultant, which is Fontaine’s profession.” “Were you programmed to be naïve, Detective?” “No, Special Agent,” Joe said, demonstrating slightly more personality than he was programmed with, “I was programmed to be thorough. It seems the same can’t be said for the GBI.” Kelly turned to look at her partner, trying to mask her surprise at his sardonic barb. “Are you quite finished, Detective?” “No, ma’am, I’m not. Setting aside the lack of anything other than circumstantial evidence linking Fontaine to the crime, there are considerable irregularities with the operation that precipitated the issuance of the warrant.” “Such as?” “Such as the fact that the owners of the stolen property were not informed of the GBI’s sting operation.” Kelly couldn’t hold back her surprise. “What?” Joe turned to regard her. “At no time did the GBI inform the Governor, her spouses, or her staff that a GBI Agent had contracted with Jennifer to steal her property.” Trish stiffened. “We informed her security staff.” Joe shook his head. “You informed a member of her security staff.” Kelly nodded in understanding. The angry, pink-haired woman. “You did not provide this information to the company providing the Sim security guards, or even the human head of the security staff.” Sighing, Trish responded, “It’s not unusual for the GBI to - ” “Engage in a clear case of entrapment, one that potentially put the life of the Governor of the Northeastern Metro Region in jeopardy?” Trish opened her mouth to speak. Before she could manage to utter a word, Special Agent Jenn spoke up. “You want to talk about endangering lives? Three GBI Agents lost their lives!” “Because you put them in harm’s way, Special Agent, with your illegal operation.” “You soulless Sim bastard!” “Special Agent, that will be enough,” Trish said, with a cold stare. She turned to face Joe. “These are all issues that would be addressed at trial, Detective. As we do not have Fontaine in custody at this time, your points are moot.” “The law is not moot, Special Agent.” Trish smiled. “No, it isn’t.” Her smile faded, “However, this investigation is under the jurisdiction of the GBI, not the NYPD. We’re only meeting with you as a courtesy, and I’m afraid that I’m no longer feeling especially courteous.” “We’re not going anywhere,” Joe said, “until my partner has had the opportunity to see her niece.” “Towards what end, Detective?” “With her mother…unavailable, my partner is Samson’s next of kin. Samson was seriously injured as a result of your operation to apprehend her. Kelly has a right to ensure that Samson is receiving adequate medical care.” “Legally,” Trish said, “Subject 76 has no next of kin.” “In this instance, I’m not speaking of legal rights.” “Then what are you speaking of, Detective?” “Simple human decency, Special Agent.” That elicited a laugh. “That’s an interesting thing for a Sim to say. What do you know about human decency, Detective?” Joe was silent for a moment, then replied, “More than you, it would seem.” This was met with silence, that was finally broken by a quiet voice saying, “Let Miss Kelly see her.” All eyes turned to Tommy, who hadn’t looked up. “I want to see her as well.” Trish responded, “Tommy, that’s - I don’t think that would be a good idea.” Tommy stood up straight and turned to look at her. He wasn’t wearing his typical bodysuit, instead wearing a simple white T-shirt and loose-fitting sweatpants.

“I do. I think it’s a very good idea. And I think it’s an even better idea to let Miss Kelly see her.” “Tommy…” Moving faster than any eyes save Joe’s could follow, Tommy moved to the end of the table and placed his hander underneath it. With a casual flick of his wrist he sent it flying across the room where it splintered as it hit the wall. “We’re going to see Sam. Now.” His cold, level tone was, in its way, far more disconcerting than his sudden, uncharacteristically violent outburst had been. Trish narrowed her eyes, and motioned for Special Agent Jenn, who had reflexively reached for sidearm, to lower her weapon and re-holster it. “Okay, Tommy,” she said. “We’ll go see Subject - Sam.” The cell in which Sam was being held was a small plexiglass cube that was barely tall enough for Sam to stand to her full height. She was standing with her back to the front wall, dressed in a hospital gown, with her eyes closed. Her surface injuries had largely healed, but her skin still looked raw and red, and small Sim flesh bandages were distributed unevenly along her legs and arms. Without turning to look, she said, “Hello, Aunt Kelly. Tommy.” Her voice sounded slightly tinny through the speaker located on the front of the cell. “Sam,” Kelly said, approaching the glass, “are you okay?” Turning to face her aunt, her head completely smooth, and her ears restored to their traditional shape, she smiled weakly and said, “No. Not even a little bit.” Despite herself, Kelly laughed. “I know, it was a dumb question.” “It’s okay,” Sam said in response. She looked past Kelly at Tommy, who was hovering halfway between the cell and the two Special Agents. “How about you?” Tommy shrugged. “My head still hurts, and I’m sore from where they dug out the burnt-out power dampener you stuck in me.” Sam looked down. “But, you know, at least I didn’t get shot with a rocket launcher. That always stings.” Sam smiled. “Five minutes, Detective,” Trish said. Kelly turned to frown at her, then turned back to Sam. “Sam, I - your mother. They say she dropped into the Down.” Sam said nothing in response. “Is she - can you feel her? Is she still alive?” Shaking her head, Sam said, “I don’t know. This stupid dampener - I can’t feel her. I can’t even feel you, and you’re right here.” “I’m going to get you out of here.” Sam laughed. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep, Aunt Kelly. There’s nothing you can do for me.” Kelly tried to speak, but Sam cut her off. “I know you love me, and I know you want to help me, and that means the world to me.” Tears welled up in Kelly’s eyes. “I do love you, Sam. From the moment I laid eyes on you.” “Don’t cry, Aunt Kelly.” Kelly nodded. “Never let them see you cry,” Tommy said, quietly. Restraining her tears, Kelly said, “Maybe it’s hopeless, but I will do everything I can to get you out of here. I’ll break the non-disclosure agreement, I’ll tell the whole world about -” Sam shook her head violently. “No. You won’t throw your career and your life away for me. I’d rather rot in this cell, or let them brainwash me into being their good little servant than cause you any more trouble then I already have.” “Sam, I can’t just leave you like this. I have to do something. I couldn’t help your mother when she needed me, and now I can’t help you when you need me. I’ll - I’ll break you out if I have to.” Laughing softly, Sam said, “Aunt Kelly, I don’t think even my mother could manage to break me out of here.” ***

As Kelly and Joe were escorted out of the offices, Kelly insisted that she would return, and that the next time she would bring her lawyer with her. Special Agent Jenn simply smiled condescendingly in response to this, even though smiling, thanks to Fontaine’s efforts, was painful. Still, the pain was worth it. She had recovered GU property - the suit and Sam - and while she had failed to bring Fontaine in, the odds were that if the fall into the Down didn’t kill her, someone else surely had shortly after her arrival, and even if she did somehow manage to survive, she might as well be in prison. There was no way back up into the Heights without getting caught eventually. Regardless of the circumstances, Fontaine was off the streets, and despite the rather disastrous turn of events, that still had to count for something. More importantly, Subject 76 was back where she belonged, and that, Special Agent Jenn knew, trumped every other consideration. Of course, if things had gone a little more to plan, she might have been in line for a commendation, but she was certain that she could still leverage the morning’s successes to her advantage. Get a promotion. Get back out in the field, permanently. Assemble a new team, maybe set to work on reacquiring the hybrids still running free since Subject 76 set them free when she destroyed the Nursery. Certainly they didn’t represent as much of a threat as Subject 76 herself, but there were plenty of risks associated with letting them roam free. After that, who could say? Maybe set to work on taking down the Devil and cleaning up the Down. The possibilities, she thought, were limitless. With all of that in mind, Special Agent Jenn was feeling well-pleased with herself as she made her way to the office of the Special Agent in Charge. Entering without knocking, she said to the older woman, who was hunched over at her desk leafing through paper files, “Well, Rosita, I have to say that - ” Special Agent in Charge Rosita Janeeva Trish didn’t look up as she spoke. “Tell me why I shouldn’t fire you, file negligent homicide charges against you, and have your skinny ass and your fake freckles thrown into a cell for the rest of your life.” “Rosita?” Special Agent Trish set down the papers and looked up. “This is a total clusterfuck, Nikki. Three Agents dead. The top four levels of the oldest tower in the city reduced to rubble. Can you think of a better word than clusterfuck? Because I sure the hell can’t.” She sighed, attempting o restrain her anger. “I should have known you weren’t ready for field work. Especially not for something this big.” This wasn’t exactly the reception Special Agent Jenn had been expecting. She paused to consider her words carefully. “With all due respect, Special Agent, I - ” “Save it. I don’t want to hear anything from you.” “With all due respect,” she continued, “despite our losses - I’ll remind you that we expected to lose even more - and the collateral damage, we - I - accomplished our primary objectives. A dangerous terrorist , one of our Ten Most Wanted, is in our custody. We have recovered a valuable piece of advanced technology, gotten a one-woman crime wave off the city streets, and as a cherry on top, in taking Jennifer down we’ve crippled one of the most powerful and deadly crime families in the city.” Trish sighed once more. While she was not appreciably overweight, everything about her suggested roundness, from the shot bob that followed the contours of her round face, to the expanding curves of her body. She fixed her dark eyes onto Special Agent Jenn. “Jennifer has already been released. By now I’m sure she’s back in her little den of iniquity, having a rollicking good time with the Fontaine sex-bots that we provided for her.” “What?” “That motherless Sim bastard was right. The warrant, the whole sting, was bogus. We knew it would never hold up.” “I don’t understand.” Trish shook her head. “No, you really don’t.” “Then explain it to me.” Motioning for her to close the door behind her, Trish sighed once more. After closing the door, Special Agent Jenn seated herself in one of the chairs positioned in front of Trish’s desk. “We were never interested in building a case against Jennifer. Fontaine was the real target, and we

weren’t interested in prosecuting her, either. We just needed to bring her in, keep her in custody as long as possible, and then set her on not-so merry way.” Special Agent Jenn frowned. “If we weren’t planning to prosecute Fontaine, what did we want her for?” “That’s classified.” “Don’t give me that shit, Rosita. We’ve known each other too long.” Trish turned in her chair to press her fingertip against a control pad on the file cabinet behind her. It slid open and she sifted through the files until she found the one she was looking for. Accomplishing that, she pulled the thick stack of papers out, closed the drawer, and pivoted back around to pass the file to Special Agent Jenn. Cocking her eyebrow, the Special Agent accepted the file and began flipping through it. Inside she saw photographs of deep space, medical charts that she couldn’t make any sense of beyond recognizing that they related to Fontaine, an abbreviated history of the Llani, the case files on Fontaine’s theft of the experimental faster than light ship, photographs of what appeared to be statues of Llani men and women, and finally, a blurred, close-up photograph - apparently taken through a cracked lens - of what seemed to be a pure white Llani, faintly glowing, with the vastness of space behind his or her - she couldn’t tell which - expressionless face. She was no closer to understanding than she had been before being handed the file, and said as much. “That photo of deep space,” Trish said, reaching over the desk to point it out. “Do you see those glowing dots?” “You mean the stars?” Her tone was sardonic. Trish was in no mood for humor. “There,” she said, pointing out several bright spots in the foreground. “Ah. What are they?” Ignoring the question, Trish leaned back in her seat and said, “Back in the earliest days of the establishment of the GU, right after the war, the human-Llani breeding program was instituted for several reasons.” “What does that have to do with the glowing dots?” “For one thing, even though they had declared war on us, and a lot of people died in that war, we couldn’t help but feel sorry for the Llani,” she continued. “You have to admit that they’re kind of pathetic. We won the war by using their own weapons against them, and doing a better job of using their weapons than they could have hoped to. After all, we actually understood how they worked. Hell, half of the weapons were things they’d given to us as a show of good faith when they were still trying to convince us to trust them before they lowered the boom. Do you know why they gave these weapons to us?” Special Agent Jenn shook her head. It was clear that she was going to have wait for her answers. “Because the dumb bastards didn’t even know that they were weapons. Can you imagine?” She chuckled to herself. “So we felt sorry for them. Besides, it was only a very small but powerful minority that wanted to go to war with us in the first place. The average Llani just wanted a home, after thousands of years drifting through space, living on that ramshackle ‘ark’ of theirs. Hundreds of generations of Llani were born, raised, and died on that rust bucket. They just wanted firm ground under their feet, and open sky over their heads. “And of course, despite the fact that they were the evolutionary dead ends of their species, they still had the potential to become more locked in their genes. So of course we wanted to unlock that potential, to add it to our own.” She paused and stared directly into Special Agent Jenn’s eyes. “If we could unleash that potential, we could become gods. Tommy, Sam, the rest of the hybrids: they’re just drops in a very large bucket. You have no idea what kind of power is locked in those genes. “And we needed that power. We weren’t the first intelligent species the Llani encountered in their time drifting through space, and we also weren’t the first race that they tried to pull their bait and switch on. They made a lot of enemies on their way here. Very powerful enemies. What if some of them decided to track them down and get revenge? What if they were bent on conquest and proved to be a hell of a lot better at it than the Llani had been? We needed some kind of edge to ensure our security.” “The hybrids.” She nodded. “That’s why the program was so vitally important, why we were willing to make any

sacrifice to achieve our goals.” She paused, and her face fell. “Do you know what we let happen to Fontaine and all of the other girls like her? What we did to them?” “If there’s a hell, there’s no question that there is a special place reserved there for me, and for everyone like me. We were monsters. We became monsters in an effort to make monsters who could protect us from still more monsters.” “Rosita…” She waved for her to stop. “I’ve made my peace with what I’ve done.” After letting out another sigh, much deeper than the others, she spoke again. “That suit of Fontaine’s that you’re so obsessed with…it’s not Llani tech. They stole it from some other race who knows how many thousands of years ago, and then we stole it from them.” She looked up at Special Agent Jenn. “It’s useless.” Special Agent Jenn laughed. “I’ve seen it in action, Rosita. Useless isn’t a word I’d use to describe it. If we could mass-produce it, we could wipe out the Restorationists in a week!” Trish shook her head. “You don’t understand. Obviously it can do amazing things, but…it might as well be magic. The underlying technology is so beyond our understanding that we could never hope to reproduce it. It took three generations of armies of brilliant minds to even begin to understand the basics of how it works. The only person who made any real progress with it, the one who managed to reprogram the nanites to interface with humans went insane and killed herself shortly thereafter. Those two things are not unrelated, and it was hardly as though she was the first. We were well-rid of the damned thing, if you ask me. “Besides, the suit itself is only one small piece of the alien material. We have enough samples to keep our most brilliant minds busy trying to puzzle out how it works for centuries.” Special Agent Jenn’s face reddened. “You told me -” “I told you what you needed to hear to help you get your head back in the game after Peru. I knew that if I could give you something to focus on you would find a way to get Fontaine for us.” She frowned, and cast Special Agent Jenn an apologetic look. “But we did want to bring the suit in - along with Fontaine - to see what effect constant use had had on the suit and the wearer. We suspect that there is an addictive component to the interface.” Sighing, she said, “We used Fontaine once again. We let her keep it for as long as we did so that she could field-test its capabilities, and we could find out what it did to her.” Suppressing her anger, Special Agent Jenn said, “What has been the point of all of this, then?” Trish reached over to sift through the papers in the file, finding the photograph of the Llani statues. The image was rather macabre, the sculpted bodies in the photograph were twisted into awkward poses, their mouths open in eternal, soundless screams, their too-real eyes conveying raw terror and animal panic. “When Fontaine and her doomed girlfriend stole that ship, do you know where they went?” Special Agent Jenn shook her head. “The Llani had faster than light capabilities built into their ark, but their drives broke down outside the solar system, and they spent over a hundred years drifting at slower than light speeds towards Earth. After the war, we cannibalized the broken down husk for everything we could repurpose and recreate, and we used it to build an FTL ship of our own. “It was equipped to support a live crew, but for its maiden voyage it was supposed to travel without a crew, following a pre-programmed course that would take it to the Llani homeworld where it would make some scans, take some pictures, and then turn around and come back home with its findings. Of course, Fontaine and that little super-genius screwed up that plan. For the most part, at any rate.” “How did two teenage girls break into a heavily-guarded GU facility and steal an experimental spacecraft in the first place? And why?” Trish shook her head. “For the how, that girl, Deanna, she was some kind of…she was brilliant. Beyond that,” she said, casting her eyes to the computer screen, “we believe she had some help.” She mouthed “Leeann.” “As to the why, only those two could tell you, and Deanna is, inconveniently, dead, and even if she were right here in front of us rather than dead or lost in the Down, there’s no force in heaven or earth that could make Fontaine talk.” Special Agent Jenn nodded. “But really, it wasn’t a total loss; the girls still followed the pre-programmed course, the ship did its scanning and photographing, and, eventually, it returned home with its findings. And the fact that there

were passengers on board…well, it’s why we find ourselves where we are now.” “And where is that?” She tapped on the photo of the statues. “This,” she said, “is the Llani homeworld. And these,” she added, running her finger along the photograph, across the images of the twisted statues, “are what’s left of the Llani who were left behind thousands of years ago.” “These statues?” “They’re not statues.” “But…what did this to them?” She held up the photograph of the glowing, androgynous Llani face. “Is…is that an Angel?” She nodded. “But why would they…? To their own people?” Trish shrugged. “We have no idea. But I’ll tell you what we do know,” she picked up the photograph of the glowing dots in space, “these are also Angels.” Special Agent Jenn opened her mouth to speak, but Trish cut her off. “And they’re coming here.” A growing understanding of the significance of these words developed in Special Agent Jenn’s mind. “The monsters that we’ve managed to create - Sam, Tommy, and the others - could have given us an edge over any aliens with a grudge against the Llani who might eventually show up at Earth’s door. But how do you fight Angels? You need an entirely different kind of monster.” “What does any of this have to do with Fontaine?” “It’s her blood, or rather, what’s in it.” She pointed to the medical charts. “I don’t expect you to understand all of this medical babble, but you do see the notes about the anomalous nature of Fontaine’s blood, I assume.” She nodded. “Sure, but that’s hardly surprising. I mean, we altered her DNA to make her more compatible for breeding. Obviously, we changed her blood.” “That’s just it; we didn’t change her blood.” “Well then who did?” Trish held up the picture of the Angel taken through the glass lens. Special Agent Jenn took it from her and inspected it more closely. She realized that what had initially appeared to be a crack in the lens was actually a crack in a piece of glass in front of the lens, like the visor of some sort of helmet. Looking even closer, she noticed that there was a reflection in the class just to the right of the Angel’s face, an image that stood out clearly against the blackness of space. It was the reflection of a face, a human face, a face contorted in panic, and one that had changed somewhat in the years since the photograph was taken - most likely, she realized, by a camera inside the helmet - but a face that Special Agent Jenn knew all too well. It was Fontaine.