"It feels like a dream. You'll probably forget most of this when you wake up. But I wanted to get in touch with you again. Did they show you the photo of me?"
"Yes." Anger turns my face hot. "I thought you were dead. I told myself you must have died — that was the only way you wouldn't come for us. I told myself you'd never leave us behind. But that was all a lie, wasn't it?"
If she's taken aback it doesn't show. "What's the first thing I ever taught you, Enigma? Way back when you were just a gutter girl in the pits?"
"Survival is all there is."
"That's right. We do anything to survive. Whatever it takes. Even if it means leaving a partner behind when everything is lost. I did what I had to do that night. Just as you would have. I won’t apologize for it."
I feel my jaw clench. "Why did you bring me here?"
"To let you know that not all is lost. I know what Cyber Corp did to you. Reconstructed your body, implanted a bomb in your head to ensure your loyalty. They are confident in their ability to force their will upon you, turn an enemy into a resource. Their arrogance is their Achilles heel. In time, it will undo them."
"I don't have time for empty rhetoric, Dabria. You might be enjoying a flight in a luxury floater, but I'm a Scyther for Cyber Corp. Can you disarm the bomb or not?"
"No. Tampering with it will activate the detonation."
"Then what's the play here?"
"It's ironic. In a way, your position is better than we could have ever anticipated. As a sleeper in the ranks of Cyber Corp, you can be of much greater service than a mere soldier on the ground."
"Are you kidding me? You have no idea what Cyber Corp has done to me. What Kage does to me all the time. And it wasn't just my crew that got slaughtered in the ambush. They were my family. I thought you were too."
She remains unruffled as ever, ignoring the barb. "Why is it that we focus on our pain as if it's something rare and precious, uncommon to everyone else on the planet? You’re not the first to suffer a terrible loss, Enigma. You won’t be the last. The question is: what are you willing to do to survive it?
My fingers clench into fists. "Whatever it takes."
She nods. "Good. Then keep working with your captors. Finding Specter is essential. He is the key."
"To what?"
"To everything."
I wake up to darkness, clarity immediately replacing the haziness of the lucid dream with Dabria. Even as the experience fades, I remember her voice, her presence. It's enough to strengthen my resolve, and I sit up in my bed with a newfound sense of determination.
It's still nighttime, but the city never sleeps. Neither do I. Neon and phosphorus pulse through the window in alternating colors, bathing the room in swirling iridescent patterns. I hop out of bed and take a seat by the window.
"Holo, send a message to Nox. We need to meet."
My hologram sends the transmission. A response pulses on the screen a few seconds later.
In the Lair. Look forward to seeing you, White Rabbit. A leering emoticon follows the statement.
I roll my eyes and shut the screen off. Rummaging through my go-bag, I pull out my v-drive, inserting it into the port behind my ear. In a flash, my hotel surroundings vanish. I'm in the loading program, where nothing is visible. An endless view of white that tricks the eye. I don't know if it's infinite or just beyond my outstretched reach. I don't pay it any attention anymore.
My appearance has altered as well. My proxy is a cyborg, synthetic parts changed to gleaming alloy imprinted with geometric patterns, and the remaining flesh is white as polished bone. My hair is longer, a gleaming silver mane that flows down my back. A crimson stripe runs from my eye to my chin like a bloody teardrop.
Tapping the cy-gear strapped to my wrist, I load the program. The world swirls like spilled paint around me as it amalgamates and takes shape. Towering buildings spring up from the ground, crowds of people appear from thin air. I'm in Requiem, one of the massive supercities in Elysia.
The skyline is nearly alien; buildings constructed in ways that natural law could never maintain, as if designed by a master architect touched by madness. Glass and alloy twist and turn, branching off into other outlandish constructions, all of it stretching so high into the atmosphere that it gets lost to sight. People soar across the heavens; some wearing tech, others gliding on feathered and artificial wings. Their flight patterns intersect with the endless lanes of flying vehicles that zip back and forth, somehow not crashing into one another in spite of the chaotic patterns.
I have to step to the side as a gigantic, gleaming mech robot plods down the street, shaking the ground with every step. Further down the avenue, a reptilian giant with leathery wings roars out an ear-ringing challenge. The robot increases speed, stomping vehicles flat as it runs toward the monster. Helicopters and jets follow in its wake like a flock of mechanized birds. On the ground, people leap out of the way or cheer as they follow the imminent carnage.
I shake my head. Just my luck that I'd arrive in the middle of a deathmatch monster tournament. I used to love those back in the day. But I don't have time for games anymore. I let the crowds stream past. Dressed in every conceivable outfit from movies, games, and books, they are lost in joyful euphoria, oblivious to anything but the thrill of the chase. It leaves a bitter taste in my mouth. This isn't my world. Most are here part-time, on vacations or breaks from real life, content to pop in and out via their Immerser kits. But some of the inhabitants are Sleepers. Locked away in hibernation, living their lives in a virtual playground. They've given up on reality, content to ignore life and consequences while they engage in all the sex, violence, adventure, and alternative existence they can conceive. A part of me despises them for that choice.
And as much as I hate to admit it, a part of me envies them. Their unbridled ignorance, free to exist beyond the pains of reality.
But my envy is pitiful in the face of what I know. That the dependence on Immersion is placing humanity in incredible peril. Hundreds of millions of people surrendering their independence, their finances, their very human rights to both corporations and the artificial intelligence that operates the system. In a way, the Sleepers are slaves like I am. Worse, even. Because unlike me, the Sleepers volunteer for their enslavement, eagerly offering their minds to platforms that keep them entertainingly imprisoned. Purgatory is now a digital wonderland where throngs pound at the gates to enter instead of escape. And so long as their payments are punctual, they get all the thrills they can imagine.
A massive explosion erupts, shattering thousands of windows and buckling buildings from the force. Cars and bodies fly through the air as flame and smoke pour between the buildings and alleys like fingers of carnage. The ground crumbles and splits under my feet as glass showers on my head and shoulders. The battle has begun, and I have to get out of here. I have more important things to do.
I whirl the dial on my cy-gear. The world spins around me, buildings and people whirring and altering, rearranging in kaleidoscopic fashion until everything slows and finally comes to a standstill. When it does, I'm in a completely different part of the city.
Things haven't improved.
I walk on streets lit by garish red lights, every sign and billboard openly advertising raw sexual activity. There are no restrictions, no shame, or any attempt at class or taste. Male and female bodies display like trophies; every one perfectly contoured in every conceivable size and shape. A throbbing beat pulses softly in the background, accompanied by moans and screams of pleasure in place of lyrics.
Men and women loiter and lounge on the streets in various stages of undress, watching with voyeuristic delight as couples and groups openly engage their lusts on benches, on manicured squares, grinding up against building walls. The proxies are a wild assortment: some styled as regular humans, others as animals and aliens. Somehow, they're still perfect: gleaming skin, mesmerizing eyes, voluptuous and well-muscled figures. My cyborg look catches attention, and it doesn't take long before the offers start coming in.