My name is Donovan Maxwell Kenter. I work out of an office on the third floor of a non-assuming business facility in the midtown of the Rails, District 14 of New Columbia, in New America. Living in a world of genetic manipulation and cybernetic augmentation, I have taken great pride in keeping all of my genes and digits intact. It’s proved to be a much larger problem than I would prefer. Color me paranoid, but I am hardly the most trusting individual when it comes to physically altering myself. Of my thirty-five years on the planet, I have spent four of those years occupying myself as one of several private detectives for the area. Definitely not as easy nor glamorous as I had thought the job would be as a kid.
I scratched my beard as I flipped through a folder of my case file number thirty-two, labeled “Kaldwin, Bennett”. It was not for the sake of an itch, but a simple habit. There was a soothing feeling of running my fingers through my facial hair that helped me focus while performing generally tedious tasks. Despite the case being closed successfully, it bothered me that there was a consistent nagging feeling regarding a loose end that had not been addressed. The case in its entirety took the better part of a week to close. It was one of the more complicated cases I had taken under my belt, and the success merited a much needed economic stimulus to my personal wealth, however temporary it may be.
I had received a simple tip from a contact that led to connections with a relatively influential crime syndicate within the Rails of New Columbia. I grimaced as I flipped through the reported contacts, each tagged with a status ranging from “SIA (Still in Action)” to “CD (Confirmed Dead)”. It bothered me that some of the names of the syndicate were not documented in my files. That unfortunately was the price to pay for getting involved that deep. There were men and women that “need not be named”, which should have been a part of the file. It just served to remind me that ethics and morality really were grey areas when it comes to serving the greater good.
The reward for my efforts included a few broken ribs, a broken hand, a few exit wounds, and a need for a few synthetic muscle replacements in my right leg. At least the muscles were temporary until my graft replacements could cultivate properly. It had been a week since I had recovered from my injuries. My partner Baxter got off far easier than I did. All it took was a few stitches and a sling, before he was right and ready to lounge about the office like always. The thought of Baxter reminded me that he had been gone for a while.
I checked my mediband. The small rectangular LED screen was under my wrist, and it showed my heart rate. Pressing the button on the right of the screen shifted the display to the right revealing a clock icon, calendar icon and a cloud with a sun. Tapping the clock revealed the time to be 13:23. Baxter had been gone for well over twenty minutes and had not checked in. His collar still hung on the rack next to the exit of the office. I mumbled to myself, “Damn dog… He knows he isn’t supposed to leave the office without that thing.”
Giving the folder an agitated clap, I closed the hardened faux skin sleeves together with a pop. The drawer of the cabinet in front of me opened easily with a slight tug of the notch on its door. It slid out to reveal many similar folders, all organized by case number. I begrudgingly slid my thirty second file into the most recent slot and lightly pushed the cabinet closed again. With a knock on the top of the cabinet and a forceful push against the drawer, the entire piece of furniture glided into place within the wall.
Checking my band again, I clicked the button until the screen showed a broadcast signal icon.
I tapped the screen twice and spoke, intending to emphasize my frustration, “Baxter.”
I rubbed my temples impatiently as I waited for the damn thing to call him. The chirping sound of a broadcasting signal waved in and out through the earpiece in my right ear a few times before connecting.
“Bax, where the hell are…”
My words were cut off before I could finish as the door to my office was kicked inward off its hinges. I was taken aback; it was a new door. A man the size of a barge entered the office. He had no shirt, his torso was covered in scars of all shapes, sizes and depths. Where scars didn’t cover, beat up and scarred cybernetic augmentations made up the rest. The man no longer had his original arms, and his chest was more machine than organic. He had a large rounded head that seemed to melt into his shoulders like an overzealous bodybuilder. He hunched as he entered the office from the hall. It didn’t take him long to see me, and I recognized him almost immediately. It was Tuekoe, a mountain of Syndicate muscle, and a guy I would have rather not seen again.
The earpiece made a wavy bloop signal and Baxter’s baritone voice, with a thick tongued accent, spoke, “You need something, Don?”
On the off chance that Tuekoe was here to talk, I waited for him to say something. A quick review of my office left me with little options to defend myself from a cybernetic terminator that could easily overpower me. Hell, he had already done so once before. I reached for my hand cannon at my hip, only to find that I had left it on my desk by the window. I am terrible.
Tuekoe glared with his small beady eyes and spoke with a harsh gravelly rumble, “Where’s your furry sidekick, Kenter?”
I gave a nervous shrug, doing my best to look confident, “On his way back. Should be here soon.”
Baxter questioned, “Pardon? You OK, Don?”
I grit my teeth together as I gave a passive aggressive smile toward Tuekoe, “Baxter will be back sooner than later,” with emphasis on “sooner”.
The cyborg returned my smile, revealing many missing teeth, “Good. He won’t stop me from killing you, and I will kill him when he gets back.”
It was all the confirmation I needed to express an emergency; I waved my hands and sounded angry to hide my fear and shock, “Whoa!” I pointed an accusing finger at Tuekoe to drive my point, “I cleared the air with Temple. We had an agreement to let go. I do not have any records on file, in hand or anywhere regarding the people he wanted scrubbed from my case! Even you! I had a deal with your boss, Taco!”
The cyborg squinted his beady eyes. He emphasized his name, “Name’s Tuekoe, and I am no longer employed by Temple. I have you and your dog to blame.”
The hope that he may have not been informed of my deal with Temple evaporated instantly, and I needed to at least buy time for Baxter to get his furry butt back in the office. I gave a laugh that sounded more nervous than I would have liked, “How the hell could I have possibly convinced Temple to let you go.” I eyed my cannon for a brief moment to gauge how far I would have to run to get to it. Hoping he wouldn’t notice, I made a distracting wave gesture as I spoke, “You were his… err… strong arm, or something. His best go-to guy!”
Tuekoe stood with a wicked, toothy grin on his face. You could see how much he was going to enjoy ripping me apart. “I was a lot of things before I met you and your dog.”
Talking didn’t work last time, and I was certain it wouldn’t work again. I made a chopping motion as if to present a point, “Look, Taco…” before making a dash across the room to claim my weapon.
Tuekoe was quicker. The giant burst into a quick sprint and the power and weight of his legs cracked the floor with each step. He caught me with his arm before I was even close to the desk. The hit threw me into the air and I crashed against the wall, collision of which signaled the filing cabinets to slide out of their compartments. Using only his right hand, he clasped his metal fingers around my throat and picked me up, sliding my back up the wall as my head almost hit the ceiling.
The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.
I couldn’t breathe and floundered around, legs pumping as I did. My left arm thrummed with a numbed pain at the shoulder, and I had trouble lifting it, so I fought and struggled to break his iron grip with my right hand.
I tried to talk, but it was more of a desperate croak that escaped in gasps, “Taco! Pwease talk about this!”
He smiled, “Long passed talking, detective.”
No one wants to die, and I was no exception. When begging does not work, desperate improvisations are necessary. I was fading, and felt my chest and head hurt as I was denied an opportunity to catch my breath. I scrambled for anything that could come to mind, and the only solution available was how Baxter had stopped the guy in our last encounter. By delivering a solid kick with his power greaves to Tuekoe’s “two koes”, Baxter managed to rupture both of Tuekoe’s testicles, totally incapacitating the mammoth cyborg. It was worth a shot.
I kicked as hard as I could, and busted my shin on a solid metal plate that sent searing pain down to my foot and up to my hip. My eyes rolled into the back of my head, and I croaked in pain. Tuekoe’s expression grew serious and angry.
He growled, “Nice try, but I had to replace those because of your dog, and when he shows up; I’m going to feed him his balls before I kill him.” He sneered at me, “Any last words, Detective?” He oozed vitriol in the way he said my title. When misdirection, pleading, and desperation didn’t work, it only made sense to fall back to misdirection.
I croaked with the last of my breath, “Hi… Baxter…”
I barely had time to enjoy the look on his face as he threw me across the room, turning to greet what he felt would be a surprise attack. Fortunately, Baxter’s sofa gave me a safe space to land. Amidst deep heaving breaths, “Baxter! I need you here! Now!”
Tuekoe looked angry, probably more at me than at himself for falling for my deception. He shouted as his left arm twitched and fidgeted, “No more games. I don’t need to keep you intact to get money off your parts.”
"You have got to be kidding me,” was the only thought I could manage as I tried to catch my breath, and ignore my shoulder and leg. My body was stiff, as I lay on the couch. A high pitched wheezing whine of gears screamed as Tuekoe’s forearm opened and shifted revealing the barrel of an arm mounted gun. There were a few clacks and cracks along with snapping sounds that told me that his arm may not be in good repair. I had dealt with enough cyber modifications to know that they are not supposed to sound that off.
I scrambled against my own body to throw myself over the back of the couch, as Tuekoe pulled an ammo bar from a sheath at his hip. The bar looked like it could probably contain thirty-five shots assuming it was full, and all I could do was hope that the metal that made up the base of the sofa would be enough to shield me. I didn’t have many options, and considering my five step plan for dealing with cyborgs had gotten me this far, I figured it would be best to start the process over again.
I hoped that the couch might mislead Tuekoe’s rig (the sub computer in his brain running his cybernetics). With no detectable movement, a healthy assumption that he may have not had the money to purchase any augmentations for his eyes, it was the best shot that some of his bullets would miss. Tuekoe opened fire, and shards peppered the walls, the couch and the floor around me. I begged like any man would do in this sort of situation.
As loud as I could, I shouted, hoping that Baxter would hear not only the gun fire, but my voice, “Baxter, damn it!” Maybe he would finally pick up the pace.
To my surprise a loud “kachunk” sound interrupted the deafening cracks of Tuekoe’s machine gun. Tuekoe gave a gasp of pain, and I could see through one of the new holes in the back of the couch that his arm was fidgeting against his control. He cursed loudly for a few moments trying to secure his arm. It was clearly time for me to attempt a desperate escape out of my office. I could not believe I was not hit by a single shard from his gun. My leg hurt, and I kept it stiff and straight to mitigate the pain. I picked myself up with my good arm supporting me on the couch. It took a lot longer than I would have liked.
I confidently quipped, “Maybe it would have been a good idea to invest in some maintenance than a metal scrotum! You need to work on your priorities, Taco.”
Tuekoe shouted as I left the cover of the couch limping toward the exit of my office, “Die, Kenter!”
Tuekoe pulled a stapler sized rocket from another sheath on his pants, and quickly inserted it into a chamber on his arm. Explosives in a confined space were a terrible idea, but at that point I don’t think Tuekoe cared. There was no way I would have been able to avoid it, but instead of diving to the ground like a smart person, I raised my arms to shield myself. Tuekoe took aim and fired.
The rocket never left the chamber in his gun. It blew up with a force heavy enough to toss me and the couch back against the wall. The explosion wrecked the filing cabinets against the wall, blew out my new windows and destroyed my desk, as well as bringing portions of the ceiling down around us. It also knocked Tuekoe back against what was left of my filing cabinets. A high pitched whine rang in my ears. I felt like I was moving in slow motion as I pulled a portion of the ceiling sheet off of me. My vision had an after trail as I looked left and right that made my head hurt.
I was alive, for the most part, or at least I was running on fumes. Shouting Baxter’s name sounded more like a muffled groan. I did my best to stand, but fell against the metal frame of the couch. It took me a few moments to get enough support to pull myself up. Would it have been so much to ask that Tuekoe killed himself? Apparently so, as he too was gathering his bearings.
His entire right arm was blown to shrapnel, pieces dangling in sparks and spilling a clear, glossy, oily fluid from several of the tubes and connectors that dangled from the top of his shoulder to his ribcage. He was missing a portion of his face, and much of the skin on his chest had also been destroyed. The guy was a Frankenstein’s monster of cybernetic parts and ghoulish tattered flesh. It did, however, look like his vitals were in fact cybernetic, which left me with the problem of trying to escape something that would easily be able to overtake me after it got its bearings. I noticed my hand cannon lying on the floor by the window and quickly committed to a hard mental battle to get my body moving.
I limped as fast as I could toward what was left of my desk. My right leg was stiff, and I must have looked ridiculous throwing my weight forward in an exaggerated hobble. Tuekoe pulled a syringe from a sheath on his back. The thing was roughly the size of a one-ounce water bottle. He roared an unintelligible slur of words, and injected the stuff into the side of his neck. No good cyborg travels without a chem booster handy. I wished he didn’t have one available.
It is a funny thing to remember laws and regulations at a time like that. You see, legally, in order to maintain a carry permit one is required to keep the gun holstered at all times until use, and guns not carried are to be locked up with ammunition stored separately, unless that gun is empty and not a threat. A mind pumped up on adrenaline and any other form of brain induced chemistry can process so many thoughts at one time that it is amazing we even needed computers to assist.
As I approached my gun, Tuekoe collected himself to his feet, screaming like a juiced up lunatic. I snapped the gun up and aimed it at his chest as he began charging me. With a pull of the trigger, my world froze with the realization that the canisters were empty. Had I thought about it beforehand, I would have attempted to make my way out of the office, but a gun in the hands of a regular human gives a sense of security and power when faced with things that are so much more physically capable than you are. I didn’t have time to think any further. I didn’t have any time to react.
Tuekoe slammed into me with the force of a metro train and he took me out the window with him. We fell three stories down, and in the fall, we bounced off a tier two rail cable. Bouncing off that he released me and I continued to fall as he was clipped by a speeding rail car. I fell through a cloth water catch alongside the street, and shattered the hood of a parked tri-cycle before coming to rest with my cheek on the hard rubber sidewalk.
Tuekoe’s upper half crashed to the ground in front of me. He moved himself around with his only arm, and eventually came to view me. I couldn’t move, I just lay where I was and watched the inevitable happen. He grunted, moaned, and tried to say something but had a mechanical whining robot sound of his damaged voice box. His body cracked and popped as he moved. One grip after another he pulled himself closer to me, until he finally collapsed. It wasn’t long after that that my vision faded. There was nothing I could do to prevent falling unconscious.