I leaned my head back and took a deep breath, letting it out slowly, letting the steam and warm water take away the stress from my body. We had survived the initial attack as well as the other two that followed but I had a feeling it wasn't over.

Even if they cleared me of all wrongdoing and closed the investigation I would be stupid to join the police force now. Those corrupt assholes would probably take me down themselves for a hundred credit bounty. It just sucked working so hard to get accepted only to have it all be for nothing in the end.

Granted, none of this would have happened if Simon hadn't bought that land. I felt a little spark of anger flare up but it was quickly extinguished by the warm water of the bath. While it was true, his work had brought this down on me, that didn't make it his fault. I could have engaged in paranoid delusions that this had been his plan all along, but I knew that was bullshit.

If he hadn't wanted me to join he could have just asked me not to and I would have relented. Instead we discussed it and in the end he had agreed to support my decision even if he would have preferred that I come work for him or Aunt GG instead. There was no need for any Machiavellian plots.

Now my Aunt GG, her I could see being involved. Except for the fact that I had been put at risk and she would never allow that. She wouldn't even let me ride a bike without a helmet. No, the unsatisfying truth was that what happened had nothing to do with me.

I was merely in the orbits of more important people. These were the kinds of things that happened when someone engaged in international politics. The people responsible probably hadn't even thought of me as a person, more like a pawn to be moved around the board.

Prince Bellsong was just some shit head trying to hold onto scraps of power and reputation while the dynasty crumbled around him. Seeing a foreigner taking control of lands that the Empress denied him couldn't have been an easy pill to swallow.

So he had lashed out and I was collateral damage. Or would have been if my security hadn't dealt with the intruders. And speaking of intruders… hadn't Gershwin said there was someone else in my head? Who could that be? And why hadn't I noticed it until now?

There was a fluttering in my mind that I recognized as my wetware accessing Gershwin, wherever he was hiding. Of course any intruder of this caliber would know how to mask their presence from a simple scan.

Gershwin tried to trick my wetware into deleting the intruder but it didn't work. So maybe my wetware wouldn't be able to cleanse itself of the infection either. It certainly hadn't had much luck with Gershwin, but maybe I could take care of that too while the anti-intrusion software was running.

I smiled evilly. Oh yes, I was about to pry open this particular box with the crowbar inside. The Gershwin in my head was a duplicate that had been stashed away, only activating when I had a question it could answer.

So it wouldn't know exactly where it was hidden, but it would know how to look. And Gershwin had inoculated me against all the malware he put in the decoys so there was nothing stopping me from going after him.

Let's see, he would have been looking for a hidden container or partition. I found it easily enough. Yes, there was ICE but it couldn't do shit to me. I was immune. I opened the container and found a trove of encrypted files along with what I recognized as a personality engram.

“Hello Gershwin…” I said as I went to delete the war criminal living in my head. But I couldn't do it. The system wouldn't let me. The file was read only and I didn't have permissions to modify it. How could I not have access to a file in my own head?

An audio file played in my mind. “Sorry about that. I'm not so easy to get rid of.” Said a familiar voice in eloquent flowing pre-war Döbian. The file was pre-recorded but it still felt personal all the same.

“Did you know that all wetware has a permanent write function? It's designed to prevent the user from deleting necessary system files and forgetting how to breathe or something like that. Very useful!.” Gershwin laughed.

Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.

“So no, you will not be deleting me that easily. But hey, at least you get a consolation prize. I hope you aren't driving a car or something because you're about to go to sleep in five seconds.”

I swore and pulled the drain from the tub just as my world went black. The bastard hadn’t even counted to two. What a dick.

***

I arched my back and yawned as the bath water began to drain. This body felt different than the last time I used it. How good it felt to be running on hund architecture again. Or whatever this strange hybrid system was.

“Oh Eden, I love what you've done with the place…” I said as I scratched my fingernails across the wall and cut deep grooves in the sand colored tile. This was a delightful change of pace. I pinched a nipple and sighed with pleasure. Yes, her neural chemistry was finally approaching normal. Eden was in for a real treat once she got her body back.

A knock at the bedroom door broke my reverie. “Eden, are you up yet?” Asked a voice I recognized as Simon's.

“Be out in a second!” I got up from the tub and toweled off. Humans definitely had it easy, there was so much less fur to deal with.

I put the towel back onto the rack to dry and walked over to the bedroom door. I stopped just short. Something was wrong.

“Do you think you can bring me some of those linzer cookies Aunt GG made?” I asked.

“Sorry, I ate them. We have to go, the helicopter is waiting.” The voice replied.

“What a shame.” I called out, inspecting the door to see how strong it looked. “Hey, Dad. Can I tell you a secret?” I asked softly. “Promise that you won't be mad?”

There was a muted sound of soft fabric on wood as the intruder pressed their ear against the door. “Of course, you can tell me anything.”

I punched through the soft wood of the door. I felt my fingers hit skull and keep going.

“He doesn't call her Eden.” I said as I shoved open the door. I found a second intruder in a black stealth suit looking down at the hole in their partner’s skull in horror. I rushed the smaller katzen and pinned them against the wall.

I rammed my hand between their ribs with a cracking sound and wrapped my fingers around their still beating heart. “Don't worry, he's not my real dad.” I told them as I began to pull, feeling their abdominal aorta tear as I ripped the katzen's heart out. It fluttered in my hand like a frightened bird for a few seconds before going still.

A cursory inspection of the severed organ was enlightening. There were plaque deposits from a high fat diet full of processed foods and signs of excessive salt intake. That combined with the general poor state of the heart told me that they were from Katzenlund. Food there had to be imported and the poor never got enough protein.

I licked the blood off one of my fingers, tasting to try and find out more. They were from Northern Katzenlund specifically. I could tell from the heavy metal contamination. That whole area had been turned toxic from strip mining after the cataclysm.

“Where are your friends?” I asked as I knelt down next to the corpse. They must have turned off their stealth suit to conserve battery, or spent so long creeping in that the batteries died.

I connected to the Villa's security system. Nothing appeared out of the ordinary except for the fact that the feed from the camera outside Eden’s bedroom was showing an empty hallway instead of an impromptu abattoir.

Oh well, it was time to kick the hornet's nest. I hit my panic button and reset the security system. It wouldn't take long for the other intruders to realize they had been discovered. I walked with purpose to the corner where the hallway made a ninety degree turn towards the living room.

The sound of running feet in soft shoes told me someone was coming to check on their friends. “Hello!” I said as I stepped out to meet them, driving my left hand into their chest all the way to the elbow. The intruder looked up dumbly at me and went limp.

“There… there…” I patted them on the shoulder before letting the corpse fall to the ground. To my utter delight this one was carrying a Döbian carbine slung across its back. I picked up the weapon and connected to it, wiping the previous owner’s presets.

A few seconds later my Warmaster subroutines woke from hibernation and began to pull tactical data from every electronic device I could connect to. An overlay marking the positions of friendly forces and hostiles told me that the katzen still hadn't gone back into stealth mode.

That was puzzling. The suits would have given them a distinct tactical advantage. Unless of course, they were a distraction. I spun around and sent a burst of fire down the seemingly empty hallway.

Two black clad figures appeared as their brains splattered across the walls and their stealth suits deactivated. I smiled, this was going to be so much fun.

Then a dart hit me in the side of the neck and the world turned to jello. Well this was definitely still going to be fun, I thought as I fell face first onto the tile floor, just not for me.