Electric Soul: A Near-Future Cyberpunk Adventure by Elliot Kincaid

Author:Elliot Kincaid [Kincaid, Elliot]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: anonymous
Published: 2024-02-13T00:00:00+00:00

XXXII

HEAVEN ON EARTH

Meadview, Arizona

January 29, 3257

Konpeke arrives at the gates of Sanctuary with his hands raised high above his head. It takes little to convince the guards to open the gate, but the security detail that emerges is well armed with javelins and blades manufactured from old cars or rails or buildings. Before allowing him entry, they strip him of his weapons – two pistols and a knife – and then usher him inside with two synthetics up in front, and two following closely at the rear.

His entry is marked with unwanted attention from a sea of synthetics, each with blue eyes that stare menacingly back at him.

And among the crowd is a human.

She does not return the slight smile he offers her on approach. But to his relief, she allows the security detail some respite and he’s allowed to approach her.

“He’s not here,” Maya says to him. “Assuming that’s who you’ve come for.”

“Where is he?”

“He’s working,” she says, then smirks. “What, you think we just sit around all day?”

“Then shouldn’t you be working?”

“My job is to sit around all day,” she says, with a smile that suggests an attempt at humour. He notices as she says it, she looks past him. When he turns, he sees a young human girl being helped by a synthetic in the distance.

When he turns back to her, he finds her smiling at his expression of obvious shock.

“It’s his,” she says before he manages to speak. “You know, in case you were wondering.”

“I didn’t know–"

“Yeah, neither did he. Not until he came down. I’d have told him but I didn’t even know myself until I was down here.”

“He never said why you left. Only that you were running from something.”

“Suprifists,” she says plainly, backtracking slightly a second later, “I think… at least that’s who I think it was. Same people who killed my friend though. Figure they didn’t want me digging where she’d already been.”

“We could have helped you.”

She shakes her head. “I’m done trying to talk myself into all the reasons I should have and could have stayed. It’s been long enough. I made my choice because at the time I thought it was the right one. And I keep telling myself maybe I could have stayed, but I’m not convinced.” She pauses. “Really I just didn’t expect to be down here as long as I have been. Thought maybe I’d disappear for a little while, come back, and we’d be able to pick up where we left off, but” – she sighs, looking past him again at her daughter – “once I knew she was on the way, everything kinda changed overnight. But he loves her. It’s as though he’s been here her whole life, you know?”

There’s a pause. The smile that she offers him now Konpeke knows is not really for him. It’s full of a happiness he cannot place nor recognise in anyone he knows on The Ring.

“I’m glad you’re here,” she adds, much to Konpeke’s surprise. “I’ve wondered if I’d ever get the chance to thank you.

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