The Judas Cypher by Greg Dragon

Author:Greg Dragon [Dragon, Greg]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Thirsty Bird Productions
Published: 2017-03-23T04:00:00+00:00

‡Chapter 11‡

Painted Toes

The bar was a sparse one, but decorated well, with old car engines suspended from wires hanging from the ceiling. The windows were reinforced, as if the owner expected to protect her patrons from a drive-by or bomb. There were two levels of bars with augmented dancers on the top floor. On the bottom, the bartender—a synth—was dressed to impress in a vest with bowtie and shades to complete his ensemble.

Dhata was the only human present inside of Carmine’s. It was a forgotten hole in the bombed out area of 50th Street, but one he frequented when he grew tired of the Tavern. He was seated next to a couple of synths, a Yakuza and a Mary. The bartender was waxing on the upcoming election, and he was listening while he nursed a drink.

“So Frank is going to be the new Johnson,” the bartender said. “Frank is going to make jobs in the inner city to keep synths where they can keep tabs on us.”

“He hates us synths. Why would he give us jobs? That sounds counter to all the bigots who helped to put him in power,” a woman said.

A skinner grumbled under his breath and said, “Nothing new with this country. Bigotry is embedded in the roots.”

“Bigotry is in the roots, but money trumps all of that, and synth money is still money to the humes in power. I think that what’s gonna happen is that he will put synths to work. Then our people will be able to afford a lot of things, sold to us by humes.”

Humes. Dhata bristled. It was a derogatory term for a human being. Hearing it thrown around so easily by the synth made him feel like an outsider.

“His main thing is to return synths to the inner cities, to get them back in places like Ybor. He’s going to put money in synth businesses, and the inner city businesses will flourish. He’s going to do everything to keep us here, to keep us segregated from the humes,” the bartender said.

Dhata had to admit, the man was right. Humans hated the synths, but it was because they worried that they were too intermingled into society. If they could be segregated, they could know where they were, and if there was a way to keep them out of the human areas of the state, they would be all for it.

He wondered how they felt about him listening in on their conversation. But the only ones that gave him “the look” were the non-regulars. At Carmine’s, synths came in to escape the human world, typically the only humans who came in were there to try and pick up synth women. The non-regulars would stare at him and try to gather what he was about, but when he avoided their piercing looks they would go away eventually.

After his chat with Lur, he took a transport over, since the Buick was in the shop. He had already been there for an hour, absorbing the conversation which he found intriguing since it was so different.

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