9:30am, Thursday the 9th October, 2132.

Detective Sergeant Kato Akihiko stared out of the front window of his car, forced to watch the endless morning traffic and the run-down buildings of the old Tokyo Bay. Most of the buildings there were a hundred or more years old; towers, offices and apartment blocks built when Tokyo had still been its own city, when the colossal megastructures of modern architecture were still nothing more than a distant dream. Unfortunately, it was no less densely populated, and the lack of funding for improved infrastructure or high-density zoning had left what had once been the largest and wealthiest metropolitan area in the world a crime-infested slum.

“Coffee?” Asked Laura Greaves, as she poured two flasks full and handed one over to him.

“Thanks,” he replied, taking a sip and groaning as he shifted back in his seat, fighting to stay awake. “Maybe I should drive manually for a while. Might wake me up.”

“Interesting idea. Here’s another one: definitely don’t do that, or you’ll fall asleep and we’ll crash,” said Laura. “Just let the computer do it.”

“You know, I actually kind of miss driving manually. Now everything’s so automated it makes me wonder why we even have steering wheels in the first place,” Kato mumbled.

Laura shrugged between sips from her flask. “This car’s so out of date I’m surprised it even can be automated. What old-ass OS does it run again? Windows?”

“Careful, Greaves. This is a ’97 Raijin, a certified Hiraishin Motors classic. You know how many paychecks I spent on this beauty?”

“At least one more than you should have spent, which is zero. You know, you could have got a nice, modern car for considerably less. And you could have spent the rest on a woman, and then you’d have a nice little wife to go with your nice little car and be at least fifty percent less depressed.”

“Hm, that’s strange. I don’t recall your life being made considerably better when you got married, Greaves.”

Greaves turned to stare at him, then rolled her eyes. “Considering how charming your personality is, I’m not surprised you never get to a second date.”

“What can I say?” Kato replied. “Modern women simply aren’t as intrigued as I am by the gory and disgusting details of homicide investigation.”

Greaves raised an eyebrow. “Oh honey, you’d be extremely surprised. There are some crazy bitches out there, absolutely perfect for you. You just need a wingman… Or woman, in this case.”

Kato sighed, but he was saved from continuing the conversation when the traffic began to move again. The car continued down towards the bay, the detectives sitting in silence, until finally they turned down a side-road and followed it towards a steel-wire gate that blocked off a parking lot. The lot was mostly empty except for a few illicit looking trucks, but an uncomfortable number of dangerous-looking men were hanging around them, clearly expecting trouble at their approach.

As Kato’s car slowed down for the gate, Greaves shuffled in her seat. “I don’t like this,” she said, matching the stares that were now on them. “We have no backup here, and these guys look mean.”

Kato silently checked his gun, though he didn’t expect to have to use it. “Don’t worry. We’re only here to ask questions, and no-one who’s smart enough to run a place like this could be stupid enough to harm us. HQ knows where we are, and they’d have a battalion surrounding this place within an hour if they did.”

Greaves glanced at him. “In an hour, there wouldn’t even be evidence of us left to find. But I’m with you. I don’t exactly feel like waiting outside with those upstanding-looking gentlemen.”

Eventually, after what Kato was sure was just the amount of time needed to scan his vehicle and their identities, the steel-wire gate opened and his car drove them inside. The entire place was set up like a fortified compound – one entrance, with the central parking lot surrounded by a five-storey high apartment building. No-one could get in or out without alerting the occupants, and even the local precinct would lack the power to get in there without some serious backup firepower. It was an urban fortress and a gangster’s wet dream.

The car pulled itself into one of the empty spaces, then Kato turned the engine off with a swipe of his finger on the dashboard screen. The doors opened, then Kato and Greaves climbed out into the morning sunlight.

It didn’t take long for several of the gangsters to approach them, the first wearing an open leather jacket and nothing but body tattoos beneath. Almost immediately, he began to ask questions.

“Nandeshou? Anata wa koko de nani o shite iru no?”

“And of course he’s speaking Japanese,” Greaves grumbled quietly to Kato. “What’s he saying?”

“He wants to know what we’re doing here,” Kato replied, then raised his hand to the man in a peaceful gesture. “We’re here to ask your boss some questions.”

“What?” The gangster asked him, his accent thick. “You don’t speak Japanese? You a gaijinlover?”

“Kanojo ga shinai,” Kato replied, before switching back to English. “So out of courtesy, we should speak the language we all understand.”

The gangster didn’t reply at first, he merely spat on the ground then looked up to another man who stood watch on a third-floor balcony. “Alright, what is it you want to know?” He eventually asked.

“We want to speak to the boss,” said Greaves.

The man laughed at her harshly. “No way. You can speak to me.”

“We didn’t drive almost two hours down here to speak to some low-level guy who doesn’t know anything,” snapped Kato. “We want your boss.”

The gangster stared at them with fierce eyes. “Do you even know what you’re asking?”

“Upper left arm. Ultraviolet light,” Kato said. “A leopard’s head, with an R in the mouth.”

The gangster shrugged. “What?”

“You mean to tell us you don’t have one?” Greaves asked.

The gangster shook his head. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Kato sighed, then opened his trench coat and pulled out his badge. “See this?” He asked, showing his card so the man could see it. “Kanto Megapolis Police Department, Serious Crimes Division. I don’t know if the cops you usually have down here in the bay are willing to look the other way for the sake of peace, or maybe even money, but we’re not a small-time beat patrol here to check your damn parking tickets. We know that the Runners operate out of here, and we need to speak with their leader.”

For a moment, the gangster hesitated. Then he crossed his arms in defiance. “I don’t know anything about any Runners.”

Kato sighed, stepping closer. “Both you and I know that affiliation to a known criminal group is against the law, and while the Runners might not be one of the big players, I’m sure I can persuade some of my associates in Organized Crime to make you and your friend’s lives a living hell if I don’t get what I came for. The way I see it, you all have a choice. Either your boss spares ten minutes to speak with us, or for the next six months you won’t even get to take a dump without being watched, and you certainly won’t get to make any money.”

The gangster paused again and turned to the man on the balcony, who offered a small nod. Then the gangster sighed, and gave Kato and Greaves a frustrated glare. “Fine, you can go in,” he said, and gestured to where a man with a metal arm was opening a bullet-proof door. “Don’t cause trouble.”

Kato nodded and began to walk towards it, while Greaves grinned. “See, that wasn’t so hard, was it?” She asked, before jogging to catch up to her partner. “Damn, Kato, I’m impressed,” she said quietly. “You actually put the guy on edge.”

“Try not to rile them up,” Kato replied. “We’re not looking for a fight. Though still, we should probably keep our eyes peeled.”

“Don’t worry about me, I can see just fine. Have you noticed how many of these guys have augs?”

“Yeah. They aren’t cheap ones, either. Some serious money is coming through this place.”

“What are you thinking? Coincidence, or gangland slaying?”

Kato only shrugged. It was far too soon to answer that question.

Soon they reached the complex door and stepped inside. Despite its shoddy, downtrodden look from the outside, the inside was nothing less than immaculate. It had bright, white walls and lights, and there were colourful flowers bunched into table-mounted vases. There were even landscape paintings of Japan’s countryside from when that countryside was still there, and Kato noticed their frames had been cleaned and dusted. It was nothing like the outside, and it didn’t make sense for street-level thugs to take such great care in the appearance of something so hidden from view.

“This way,” said a man at the end of the hall. He was gesturing up a flight of stairs through the sleeve of a red jacket that hung low past his hands, and he had wires that ran through his forehead to a steel eye with three distinct pupils.

The detectives followed the gesture and climbed, then climbed again when the entrance to the second floor was blocked by a scowling woman. When they reached the third floor, they stepped through a door to find that the heavily augmented gangsters had been replaced by men in red suits, and that they stood waiting for something with combed hair and touchpads in their hands. Whatever that thing was, Kato immediately knew that he and Greaves weren’t it. The men paid them no attention, not even when they walked past them down the corridor and Kato saw the signs of weapons hidden beneath their clothes.

All of a sudden, as they passed through a second door at the end of the hallway, they came face to face with a child.

“You the cops I heard about?” The child asked them. It was an androgynous thing with long, white hair, and no more than ten or twelve years old. Kato couldn’t tell whether it was a boy or a girl, and its child-like voice and traditional, black, robe-like garb certainly didn’t help matters.

Stolen novel; please report.

Greaves gave Kato a somewhat unsure glance, then answered. “Yes,” she said. “We’re here to see the boss. What’s your name?”

The child blinked at Greaves, as though her question had been beyond stupid. “You can’t seriously expect me to tell you my name?”

Greaves paused, taken aback. “I’m just trying to be friendly, kid. Aren’t you too young to be here?”

The child rolled its eyes and turned around. “Save being friendly for your friends. This is business, not a play-date. Come with me.”

The child led them into an area of the complex without any sign of guards or other inhabitants, and soon stopped at a door which required an old security keycard to open. When the child swiped what was evidently the correct one, they opened the door into a room with a central partition of clear glass. As Kato and Greaves stepped towards it, they realized the glass was not just a wall, but a window, and that the first half of the room they were in was viewing area for the second.

A hospice lay there, a cleanroom isolated by glass and completely sterilized from the outside. Within, a man older than any Kato had ever seen lay on a bed with cream sheets over him, a host of medical computers at his side and intravenous lines running into frail and wrinkled arms. The only other thing in the room was an ancient television set, over a hundred years old, that stood on a stand of solid oak.

Kato peered in cautiously. “Is that the boss?” He asked.

“Yep,” the child answered. “He’s dreaming.”

Greaves frowned at the sight. He must have been well over a hundred years old, and she was disturbed by the thought of what it took to keep him alive. “Can you wake him up?” She asked. “We were told we could speak with him.”

“He doesn’t like being woken,” said the child. “But you can go in to see him.”

“Go in?” Kato asked. “What do you mean?”

“He’s in a virtual reality,” the child replied. “A private, locally hosted Cyberreal server. Completely disconnected from the net.”

Kato sighed. “Shit. I hate those things,” he grumbled.

Greaves, on the other hand, looked in her element. “I’ll take this one, Kato. I spent half my teenage years in VR.”

The child shook its head at Greaves. “Nope, not you. Only him.”

“What? ” Kato asked, confused.

Greaves rolled her eyes. “Kid, we know what we’re doing. I’ll speak to him.”

“No you won’t,” the child replied, almost snapping. “The boss doesn’t like gaijin. Or women, come to think of it. It’s your partner or no-one.”

Greaves stared at the child, half in shock. “Are you seriously pulling some discrimination bullshit right now?”

The child only shrugged. “It’s not my decision.”

“Leave it, Laura,” said Kato. “I’ll do it. It’s probably better if I handle this personally anyway.”

As Greaves turned to grumble, the child gestured to a kind of office chair set against one of the room’s non-glass walls, connected to the building through a tight bundle of network cables. “Just sit down there,” the child said, gesturing. “I trust you have a CNS?”

“Yes,” Kato answered, moving to sit down. A central nervous system implant was basically a job requirement those days, and as a detective sergeant in the KMPD, Kato had quite a good one. Originally designed for the monitoring of central nervous system activity, it hadn’t taken long for scientists to realize its full potential. The right software could use the implant as a gateway, a direct interface between external technology and the human brain. VR took that one step further, using it to immerse the user in a simulation that hijacked the mind. It was legal, largely unregulated, and used for everything from online roleplaying games to advanced operating systems.

“Good. I’ll connect you,” the child said. As Kato sat down, the child moved around to lower the collar of his coat, revealing a layer of dark metal that ran up the base of his neck like a spine. There was a small cable slot there, and the child wasted no time in connecting him to the chair, much to Kato’s disapproval.

“Ow,” he complained.

“Don’t be a baby,” the child said, turning to a screen on the wall. “Are you ready?”

“Give me a second. Greaves, keep an eye out for me. I won’t be lo-“

Suddenly, everything was black. Kato found himself floating momentarily in an infinite nothingness until a cascade of smooth grey came towards him. He flinched and covered his face, hoping to protect himself, but he found that nothing happened, and opened his eyes again to see the building blocks of a battlefield fall into place beneath him.

Piece by piece, a field of smoke and blood was pulled into sequence. A large, feudal castle of Japanese stone sat at the end of a world with an uncanny resemblance to the real one, flanked on one side by a river and a rolling plain. The castle was under siege, but outside its walls, two large armies were in the opening stages of a battle. On one side of the plain, wooden stockades were set up behind a small river, and behind them, rows of feudal conscripts wielding matchlock guns were being commanded by samurai. On the other, thousands of mounted warriors were preparing to charge.

Kato suddenly found himself with those mounted samurai, sitting on horseback at their rear in dark red armour, a three-pronged spear in his hand. “Um, what the hell?” He asked, looking around for someone to answer him. None of them did, of course. They weren’t real, and probably couldn’t understand him.

“Amazing, isn’t it? Modern technology?”

Kato turned around to see a large man in similar armour, riding a similar horse, and wielding a similar spear.

“We can recreate this single event in history, with a realism unmatched by anything else that’s ever been tried,” said his doppelganger. “And yet the moment someone shows up who wasn’t accounted for, the moment something goes against the system’s plan, it grows confused. It makes two of us when there should only ever be one.”

“Who are you?” Kato asked, turning his horse around to face the man proper. He didn’t know how to ride, he didn’t know anything about horses, and yet it responded to his silent command.

The second man smiled. “Right now? I am Takeda Katsuyori, and this is the year 1575. Do you know where we are?”

“Nagashino,” Kato replied. “That’s schoolboy knowledge. But Katsuyori lost this battle.”

“In one reality, yes. In this one, he may be about to win.”

“What’s the boss of the Runners doing playing war in virtual reality?” Kato asked, watching as everything around them seemed to slow to a crawl. Soldiers were still moving, the physical laws of the simulation were still working, and yet they were taking so long to do so that they were nearly at standstill. It was beyond slow motion, as though the passage of time was only a single degree from stopping completely.

“Have you not seen me up there?” The man asked. “I’m an old man. Bed-bound. I can’t even defecate without a machine to do it for me, but here I can be anything I want. An unstoppable warrior, an irresistible sex icon, a general about to win a lost battle.”

“But no matter what you are, it isn’t real,” Kato replied.

The man laughed. “Reality is relative now, or did you not know that? Even the physicists say so.”

Kato blinked. “The physicists say a lot of things that most of us will never understand.”

“Really? Because from my experience, most people understand more than you give them credit for.”

“And from mine, they understand less. Perhaps spending so much time in this simulation has warped your perception of what people are really like.”

The bed-bound samurai smirked at him. “Who’s to say this is a simulation at all? In my mind, it’s nothing more than another flavour of reality. People like you spend too much time worrying about what exists and what’s an illusion, and not enough time simply accepting what’s there.”

“If you care so much about this reality, why are we speaking English? I thought you disliked foreigners?”

“We’re not. We’re speaking Japanese,” the man explained. “At least to my ears. And I must say, Detective Kato, that I’m rather ashamed it’s not also to yours.”

Kato frowned. “I don’t remember introducing myself.”

“You didn’t, and yet I know who you are. Those without information are rendered half blind, and a man like me, who is blind, finds himself dependent on it. How else do you think I’ve managed to stay the boss of those men outside, Detective?”

Kato didn’t answer his question. “Then you know my name, but I don’t know yours.”

The man bowed his head. “Tamura Sanjiro, at your service. Why is it you have come?”

“I’m investigating the murder of two of the members of your… Organization,” Kato explained. “A Sebastian Cooper, and another we have yet to identify.”

“I don’t know anyone by that name,” Sanjiro said. “It’s an outsider’s name. As you recall, Detective, I dislike outsiders.”

“And yet he had your leopard head mark. In invisible ink, too. Only visible in ultraviolet light.”

“That mark is not as exclusive as you’d think,” Sanjiro explained. “He may have been an associate, a business partner to one of my men. It is a sign of friendship, a diversification of the scent to throw off those who would hunt us.”

“Bait?” Kato asked, to which Sanjiro nodded slyly. “Then who was the other?”

“I couldn’t be sure without seeing the body. Yet, one of my men, Fukase Keizo, went missing last night. My organization is a tight run ship, you see. I like to keep an eye on its members.”

“If it is him, then were you aware that Fukase Keizo and Sebastian Cooper were illegally scavenging an abandoned district owned by Naka-Sura Multinational?”

“Is that who murdered them? Naka-Sura Multinational?” Sanjiro asked, avoiding Kato’s question. Kato found himself wishing that they weren’t in the simulation, that he could look upon Sanjiro’s real face and read his true reaction, but he was left wanting.

“We’re still investigating the exact circumstances,” Kato said, “but right now we have no reason to believe they were involved.”

“As much as I discourage it, some of my men work freelance jobs, or build their own private, secondary enterprises. I wasn’t aware that Keizo, if it is indeed him, had been scavenging from Naka-Sura. If you came here hoping that I could give you answers as to what they were looking for, or perhaps even who killed them, then I am afraid you must leave disappointed.”

“I see,” Kato replied, frowning. The Runner lead was quickly becoming a dead end, and he found himself running out of reasons to be there. Yet he still had one question that could potentially help him. “Mr. Tamura, you say you like to keep an eye on your men. Do you have them install surveillance implants? Is there anything we can use t-“

“Surveillance implants are illegal, Detective Kato.”

“Somehow, I doubt you care too much about following the law.”

“That may be so, but evidence attained via illegal means is in itself illegal, is it not? I thought you, as an officer of said law, would respect that.”

Kato sighed. “All I care about is catching whoever did this so they don’t do it again. So please, answer my question.”

“I’m afraid the time for questions is over, Detective. I’ve answered what I can and have no more knowledge that could aid you.”

“I see,” Kato replied. He pushed the tip of his spear down into the ground, leaving the ancient weapon standing by the side of his horse. He could protest, or persist in his questions, but in a virtual reality controlled by someone else, was there any point? The moment he outstayed his welcome, he would be forcefully removed. “Thank you for your time, Mr. Tamura. And good luck with your battle.”

Sanjiro looked at him and smiled. All of a sudden, the slow-motion of the simulation sped back up to real time, and the battle continued with all the grit and finesse of reality. Sanjiro turned off to give some order to a group of nearby officers, and the mounted samurai began to gather in a line for a charge. Kato watched for a while, then suddenly felt himself being lifted off his horse and into the air, where he flew straight up and pierced the sky like a star falling in reverse. Everything went black, and when his sight returned a few moments later, the androgynous child was staring at him in front of the glass wall.

“I hate those things,” Kato grumbled, pushing himself out of the chair.

“What’d you find out?” Greaves asked him.

Kato shook his head. “I’ll tell you in the car.”

Without another word, Kato led Greaves out of the room. They went back down to the ground floor, ignoring the stares of the Runners who watched them as they left. Barely a minute later, they were climbing inside Kato’s car and shutting the doors behind them.

“Well?” Greaves asked, after ensuring her door was locked.

“He claims he doesn’t know anything. Says the scavenging had nothing to do with him, and he has no idea who killed them.”

“You believe him?”

“Not completely,” Kato told her. “You saw how many of his guys have expensive augs, how much money is in that place. That’s not the kind of money a street-level gang their size can get just by slinging spice and shitty firearms. I think he knew about the scavenging, but I don’t think he knew who killed them. There’s another thing too: his guys might have surveillance implants.”

Greaves released an exasperated sigh. “Really? Shit. The answer could be right there and we can’t use it. I’ll tell the guys over at forensic pathology to keep an eye out anyway. If they find it, we could still get tech to take a look.”

“I don’t know if it would even be worth it,” Kato admitted. “Even if they tried to hack it, those things are often encrypted so heavily it could take weeks to see what’s inside.”

“Better they do that than sit around scratching their balls and playing video games. So, what now?” Greaves asked. “We still need to hit up those security guys.”

“You’re probably right,” Kato mumbled, not exactly relishing the idea of fighting tooth and nail through corporate lawyers just to get simple yes or no answers. Still, it wasn’t like they had any other options. “To be honest, Greaves, I think that’s the only thing we can do.”

He ran his fingers across his dashboard to turn on the car’s engine, then told the computer to take them to Naka-Sura Multinational.