Defiance by Susan Kaye Quinn

Author:Susan Kaye Quinn [Quinn, Susan Kaye]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: cyberpunk, robots, science fiction, singularity
Published: 2015-12-03T00:00:00+00:00

It’s getting late in the afternoon as I hike out to the rendezvous point with Riley’s contact. Seattle’s got water to the east and west, and a connecting waterway to the north—which means going south is the only reasonable way to get out of the city without getting bottle-necked by a bot-patrolled bridge. The tramline connects the city to the ascender housing at the perimeter, but there aren’t many of the shiny pants who hang around Seattle—just the ones who like to study us. Or take us as pets. The police bots actively patrol a narrow-band zone around the tramline, the ascender housing, and the city itself. Riley was right that getting past them wasn’t hard on the way out—the jammer mapped them out for me, and I just had to wait until they were out of visual range.

The rendezvous is miles away, and I’m on foot, so it takes a while. Plus I’m carrying two big bags of stuff for trade—some gray market goods, some stuff that looks like it came straight from someone’s grocery allotment, and Mrs. B’s hairbrush. Which is the only part that matters to me. I’m supposed to exchange all of it for some new bodyhack tech that Riley’s interested in.

The southern suburbs of the city were abandoned by the ascenders after the Singularity, and the landscape just gets uglier the farther south I go. Most of the pre-Singularity infrastructure has fallen to ruin in the last hundred years, but it’s one thing to know that, and another to walk the crumbling pavement and hear the wind whistling through caved-in roofs and empty swing sets.

It’s honestly giving me the creeps. Plus, I’ve heard the stories about human nomads who roam the edges of the cities, waiting to pick off legacies stupid enough to get themselves banished. Or idiot enough to wander outside voluntarily to rendezvous with smugglers, like me.

When I reach the coordinates, the meetup is an ancient public transportation stop in the middle of nowhere. The walls are long-ago busted out, and the wooden bench is rotting, but I set down the bags and sit anyway—I’m beat. And I have no idea when this person is going to show. Riley just said to go and wait. Eventually the dude would appear.

I don’t know where he’s coming from, either. I’ve heard there are dissenter reservations in Oregon, but that’s a long way to travel. I don’t think there are any settlements within walking distance. Maybe there’s a network of smugglers hiding out in the abandoned houses surrounding me? They could be watching me, and I’d never know.

An eerie sound, like a bird call, comes from one of the buildings. I’m twitching with nerves as I scan the darkened windows and half-open doors of the decaying buildings, but I can’t see anything. I’m sitting here, out in the open, like a fresh legacy target from the city.

I reach inside my jacket, pull out Riley’s gun, and sweep the barrel toward the empty doorways. Maybe that will make whoever’s watching me think twice.

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