"The bruja were katzen survivors who hunted down Howlers after the war. " Knight explained. "They liked to wear stealth suits and kill with their claws or strands of monomolecular wire. I worked with them for a few decades after the war, hunting down the people who made me or were responsible for the genocide. That's how I got my citizenship here in Espa."

"As did I." Rook said. "We used to work in teams with the brujas to infiltrate Howler strongholds. I would go in pretending to be the son or grandson of some Howler that lost his life during the war. They didn't look much past my high cut ears or the coloration of my fur. Once the time was right we would lead them into an ambush or let the brujas in."

"Then rinse, wash, and repeat." Knight confirmed. "Eventually they got better at screening their recruits but by then most of the people we were after had died of old age or been killed by the brujas."

"What about Kerner Braverhund?" I asked. "Did you go after him?"

"No, Gershwin's son was off limits." Knight shook his head. "His father kept him in the dark about what was going on until the end of the war."

"Plus he kept a low profile." Rook added. "We didn't find out he was still around until we ran into some copies a few decades later. They were all living pretty boring lives."

"Copies?" I asked, confused about how someone could copy themselves. "Do you mean like clones?"

"No, not exactly." Knight scratched the back of his head awkwardly. "Kerner could overwrite other people's wetware and make them think they were him. Scary stuff. KBs we called them."

"How?" I asked, realizing what they were saying matched what I had seen in my dream. If it really had been a dream. I was becoming less and less sure. Could Gershwin still be alive somewhere?

"Nobody knows how but Kerner could hollow your mind out and crawl inside as easily as putting on a new set of clothes." Knight said.

"That's why I called him a body snatcher." Rook explained. "We haven't seen any KBs in decades so I'm pretty sure he's gone."

"Doubtful." Knight said. "With the way hund lifespans are growing there would probably be at least a few around still."

"Or maybe he patched himself out with the OTA update that went live when Haven fell." Rook replied. "I went through the change log. It closed up a lot of vulnerabilities and you remember who signed it at the bottom."

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

"KB, GB, and TGK. The unholy trinity." Knight shuddered. "That was a nasty thing to find waiting for me when I woke up the next morning."

When he saw the look of confusion on my face he explained. "Wetware updates usually have change logs attached to say what was fixed and who coded the update. We can manually install them but this one chose to install itself without asking first."

"Fuck me." I said, imagining waking up to find that someone had been inside my head making changes.

"Yeah. Anyone who knew about those exploits could have taken over the world, plain and simple. Every piece of wetware was vulnerable, almost like the flaws had been created intentionally. But for reasons I will never understand, instead of turning us into puppets like most people would have done, they chose to patch out those vulnerabilities instead.” Knight shook his head. “It makes no sense.”

"Maybe they were just doing the right thing." I said, realizing that I probably knew who had done it if not why.

"Doubtful." Knight said. "Nobody gives up that kind of power. The only reason I can think of would be if they were trying to stop someone else from using it."

I zeroed in on something. “I can guess who KB and GB are. Who’s initials are TGK?”

The two hunds shared a look like they had just handed a live hand grenade to a baby. Knight was the first one to speak. “Eden, do not say another word until I finish what I am about to tell you because if you say the wrong thing all of us could be in danger.”

“This is not a joke, or a superstition. This is life and death. Do not under any circumstances speak those initials out loud ever again. There is an entity that we do not speak of who has those initials. I messed up and said them because I wasn’t thinking. But I need you to understand that this is not a joke, even seeing the name written out can mean death under the wrong circumstances.”

“You can’t be serious.” I said, wondering what weird hund superstition I had just stumbled onto. “Speaking a few letters or seeing a name can’t hurt you. That’s ridiculous. What’s it even gonna do?”

Suddenly I smelled burning tin like someone was soldering a circuit and felt intense heat radiating against the back of my skull as my scarab started to go critical. I ripped it off and threw it onto the ground just in time to watch the whole thing burst into flames. There was a loud pop as the battery exploded making the device jump to the side like a spider that had been thrown into a campfire.

None of us made a move to put out the flames. We just watched it burn. “It must have been defective or something.” I said, not sure if I even believed what I was saying.

“No, the scarab did exactly what it was designed to do and sacrificed itself to save your wetware.” Knight said, still watching the flames. He continued to speak, not looking away from the burning scarab. “If I can give you a piece of advice. In the future when someone tells you an entity is dangerous, do not immediately taunt that entity.”

My whole body froze. I lost control of my motor functions and warnings started to go off in my wetware. I was still breathing but something else was controlling my lungs.

I felt my mouth move against my will as a voice not my own began to speak. It was cold and mechanical with a harshness that made my throat feel like I was gargling gravel. “BECAUSE IF YOU DO TAUNT THEM, THEY MAY DECIDE TO TAKE INTEREST.” The voice said.