Before Elias' brain could poll over Administrator's strangely empathetic statement, Tinka flicked a switch on the console in the corner of the room.
Suddenly, Elias felt his body slightly seize up; electricity permeating each muscle fiber and pore of skin all over his body. For some reason, despite it's abrupt forthcoming, it didn't feel horrible. If anything, vaguely familiar - like his body had adapted to this treatment already.
Perhaps long ago.
"Alrighty, now for th' results." Tinka fell backwards into an office chair and pushed off against the console's table, rolling across the room over to a desk. Anders stepped over behind him.
A bar flickered onto the screen - "Loading DATA. . . ". Eventually, an xray radiogram of Elias' silhouette appeared - showing the average human skeleton.
Exasperated, Tinka looked over to Anders, "Well he wasn't lyin, братан. No augments - n'even an uplink port."
"Who doesn't even have a U-port these days." Anders huffed.
"An uplink port is a cybernetic augment that allows the user to connect their cerebral cortex to many modern interfaces."
"Pro'ly better off without one anyways." Tinka admitted, "Nothin' like havin' the Corpos in your head." He tapped the back of his neck - where a small metallic circle seemed to be implanted.
"Speakin' of..." Anders grabbed a mouse on the table, scrolling over to a tab on the green-lit screen called 'Civilian Profile.'
With a click, the two leaned in, and the room fell silent.
...
"Did the machine glitch?" Anders looked to Tinka.
"I err... I don't think so?"
"Turn it off and on again."
"Y-yeah-yes. понятно... Чёрт." Tinka rattled on - something had clearly caught him off-guard, and his expression had become something between serious and scared.
" 'Ponyatno' is russian for 'understood, and 'Chyort' means; damn or devil - an expression of surprise."
"What's happening?" Elias looked between the two. He managed to catch a large 'error' flashing on the screen next to a sidebar titled 'ID,' before Ander's frame blocked his view.
"Nothin'. Just stay put." Anders towered over him, adjusting the arm.
"Huh???-"
Tinka ran the machine again, the same unpleasant and unexpected tingling running laps around his body, bouncing around his insides.
"Ok - FUCK! Can you guys at least tell me what's going on???" Elias sat up - nearly tearing the electrodes off or out of their connectors.
"This what I think it is?" Anders looked over to Tinka.
"I think so." Tinka nervously bit his fingernails.
"... He's a deviant."
Tinka's hand slapped onto the console screen, his head jerking to Anders. "This ain't no part of the deal! I didn't sign up f-for this!!?"
Elias caught the hint of a subtly excitable smile cross Ander's face, before he switched to a stone-cold frown, "Hey, y'really think I was tryin' to find a Null? I wasn't expecting this either-"
"Чёрт возьми, Anders! Ye', actually, YEAH I FUCKIN' DO! Where the FUCK did you two meet? How t'fuck'd'you two meet???"
"I found him near the Eastwall Scrapheap, where else would I be lurkin' but th' Unders?!?"
Elias swung his legs over the side of the operating table, interrupted by Anders ducking a hand into his jacket, quick drawing his pistol with a flick and pointing it right against Elias' forehead,"Who in the fucking wide world are you? Who do you work for!?!"
Elias quickly put his hands up, standing and inadvertently pushing the rolling operating table away in the process. Something didn't feel right, though, Anders wasn't holding the pistol with the same stalwart intent as last time.
He didn't get the feeling he was going to shoot.
... Only for Anders to step forward and push it up against him again, "Ok, what the fuck??? I thought we were cool! Seriously, I don't know shit about what you're talking about!"
"Ё-моё братан." Tinka sounded exhausted and withdrawn, "Enough of this Itia бред! - I thought you gave up on all that!" Tinka called out from behind him.
'What the fuck is a deviant???'
"I did..! For a while a'least, b'you expected me to just sit still when I heard one of their corpos was scroungin' 'round a couple blocks away? You think I'd let that opportunity slip???" Anders looked back over to Tinka with a snarl.
"A 'Deviant,' also referred to as a 'Null,' or a 'Nonentity,' is an individual who is un-monitored by Anomina SSC."
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Tinka was visibly shaken - red with rage and exhaustion. He was like someone who'd been reeled into an addict's mishaps. "You fuckin' OAF!" He screamed, "Get him outta my shop before the fuckin' SSC arrive!Y'know what they'll do t'me?!? I'm already on thin ice!"
'People who are 'unmonitored'? I thought The Unders, was separate from all that. Also what's the hell's the 'SSC' '
Anders dropped his arm to his side, finally caving to whatever intrusive thoughts had been bugging him before; "Tinka! Just think 'bout what we could do with'im on our side though! He's untraceable!"
"In 2062, world government officials initiated the 'Security Sector Controllers' programme, and the obligatory certification of citizenship through Nanites, passed through gametes."
"Have you gone fuckin' senile? I get it! They killed her! But this is just fucking stupid! That was yonks ago! Don't pull me into your mess!"
"All offspring of an individual who has been injected with these nanites exist on the SSC database, which records all interactions with the Anomina network that occur on affiliated accounts."
Elias frowned at the implications of Tinka's statement, soaking in two important conversations at the same time - lowering his arms.
"The only individuals in the year 2115 who are not 'tagged', are direct descendants of individuals in power, or a child of an illegally unregistered individual who has likely been sold to a company to act as a spy."
Anders turned back and shoved Elias with an arm - sending him onto his backside. "You. Stay Put." He looked back to Tinka, furious. "Don't you fuckin' DARE bring that up, James!" Anders took a step towards Tinka, pressing his gun under the wily man's chin, who clicked his tongue.
"Put simply..."
The room fell silent, Elias on the floor, and Tinka with his hands up.
"You do not exist."
Ding~.
Anders' head swung back around to look at the entry, which opened slowly...
"James Kozlovsky, nice to see you aga-" A strong feminine voice came from the entryway - a woman standing with her arms crossed, surveying the situation. Delicate but stern fingers guided neck-length silky blonde hair behind her ear as she turned her view to Elias, remniscient of clouds parting golden rays of sunlight. Her skin was pale and smooth like porcelain, broken up by faint freckles that gave her soft face a semblance of warmth to it's cheeks. Merely her prescence, almost angelic, raised the attractiveness of Tinka's shop; which to be fair wasn't a low bar to clear - although this divine impression ended at her physical appearance. "...Am I perhaps interrupting something?"
She carried herself with a powerful confidence that immediately overtook the room; a black leather jacket pinned with an 'S.S.C' badge, and dark-brown leather pants already a statement that set her apart from the scraggly slum dwellers. Elias caught the subtle yet unmistakable shape of musculature beneath the material which covered her legs, hinting at strength which clearly existed beyond. This woman meant business, and she knew what she was worth, he thought.
Tinka leaned on the desk looking off to the side at the screen - the previous picture gone - and Anders having already concealed his gun, crossing his arms and looking off to the side as well. It was... pretty suspicious, albeit an impressive switchup from the prior clusterfuck. This left Elias. With his hands up. On his knees.
Elias quickly pushed himself up and wiped his hands on his pants, attempting to look as inconspicuous as possible.
"Who's the pretty face?" The woman asked, smiling, as she walked up to the group.
"I'm-" Elias spoke up-
"Ah!" Tinka stood up with a smile, "His name's Tony, he's a friend of Anders, I'm sure you two've met before, right?" Tinka looked between Anders and the lady.
Anders cleared his throat, before putting out a steady hand for a shake, "Miss Celia, it's err... nice to see you again."
The atmosphere of the room was tense, Elias had never seen Anders this perturbed before, and the woman's awareness of this was clearly reflected by the bemusement on her face. Regardless, she returned his less than heartfelt greeting. "Yes! Mr Anders! How have you been doing."
"... Fine."
Celia gave a pensive sigh, before turning to Elias and stepping closer than one might deem comfortable. Her warm breath tickled the base of his neck, her lips at the height of his Adam's Apple. "I do hope Anders and James here haven't been getting you into any trouble," she toiled with the strings on his hoodie, quickly wrapping them around her hand and pulling him down to her height.
Elias's black eyes locked with hers; like prismatic emeralds that reflected his own image, the colour only made deeper by her pale skin.
He eventually broke contact, catching the intentful gazes of the others in the room - Anders with a stern and inquisitive glare and Tinka with bewilderment.
"Do I know you from somewhere..?"
"Don't think so. W-Well... You're hardly a forgettable face." Elias summoned the greatest hit or miss he could've fathomed.
Tinka's jaw dropped.
Celia blinked, clearing her throat
"... Anyways, James, I'm sure you know what this is?" She broke her hold on Elias' strings, withdrawing from him and facing away from the group.
"Uh-Erm-ah..." Tinka dialed back in, "Y-Yes, yes, Телка-" The jittery mechanic caught his tongue as the woman shot a glare at him, "Miss Celia..." He gave a sheepish chuckle. "I thought the routine investigation wasn't supposed to be until a week from now?"
"Correct... but that would ruin the point of it being an investigation wouldn't it?" She smiled, clicking her fingers.
Suddenly, a group of five heavily armed guards stepped through the door, assault rifles in hand. Despite the heavy armor, they moved almost silently. "You know the jist of it boys! Pat the place down. Try not to wreck it too much for the sake of ol' James, here."
The soldiers picked apart the workshop like roaches, pulling open draws, sorting through scrap and emptying boxes. Elias saw one recoil upon approaching the tub in the corner, wafting the smell away from their face.
Another approached the computer, grabbing the mouse. Anders twitched, his head ever so slightly looking to the side as the guard moved towards the 'scans' folder.
"-Uhh~ Nope!" Tinka nervously grabbed the guards hand, earning him swift smack to the cheek with the stock of a rifle and a keen view of the gun's barrel. Like a betrayed child, he looked to Celia, then back at the guard, "Remember!? - n-no snooping through client information... - Confidentiality! That was the deal!" He argued, rubbing his cheek.
"He's right." Celia motioned for the unit to be at ease, giving an amused huff at the concept. Despite its verbal silence, Elias could detect the guards begrudging demeanour as it moved on.
A moment that felt like a century came to pass, before all the crooks returned to the center of the room.
"No contraband found." A guard with a red stripe down the center of their mechanical helmet nodded to Celia with a compressed, scrambled voice.
"Alright, looks like we're done here. I trust you'll continue to be on good behaviour, James." Celia nodded to Tinka, then Anders, before smiling at Elias. She opened her mouth as if to say something, before shaking her head at the thought, amused, exiting the building.
The three sat in silence for an awkward minute, before Elias raised a hand and attempted to speak up, "So.."
"-Out."
"Huh?" Elias looked to Tinka.
"Both of you, out, right now." the Slavic man hovered over his desk - stern, yet exhausted.
"But-"
Anders sighed and grabbed Elias by the arm, pulling him out of the shop and into the cold alley. Celia's group was nowhere to be seen.
"You... Have a lot of explaining to do." Anders prodded Elias' chest with a finger.
Elias hovered on those words for a moment, before giving a moping "Yes..."