A doctor stumbles across the slick deck of the bridge. The passage between his ankle and the sole of his foot was severed, and he had to reach out and hold on to the dilapidated bridge railing. For a moment, I lost my way. His gaze slid outward from the wet face of the commuter flyover to the endless collection of metal, glass, and eternal lights in the Upper Central District.

He blinked, swept away the brilliance in front of him, and reattached the reinforced prosthetic foot. There is still a vague memory left in the cable, which was left by the previous user - how expensive......

And it's half the size—his consciousness replied maliciously. The original owner of this mod was a wealthy man from Uptown. He was too timid to pay the surgeon he found in the back alley credits that traced back to the source. So the doctor took it as a second-hand, despised thank-you gift.

Doctors have erased the processor five or six times since they arrived, but there are still some remnants hidden deep in the silicon wafer, like a fingerprint that cannot be erased. He grunted, shaking off his memories. It's an uncomfortable reminder of what happens when traditional anatomy is forced to intervene in more expensive technical areas.

A few drops of water slipped down the ends of his thinning hair and fell behind the micron lenses. The light at the far end of the bridge became a blur. However, there was no news of condensation in this morning's briefing. That feeling of helplessness came again, and today's accident made him still not come back to his senses. The doctor stroked the contents of his breast pocket. A biologically inert plastic sleeve. Weapons-grade. He thought about retiring before he turned twenty, and this order was enough.

The doctor stood alone on the bridge. The deck is made of thick metal sheets and carbon fiber-reinforced plastic, connecting the lower town to the mechanical lifts leading to the upper central district. The commuters who had come down with him had already hurried into the dark shacks and side alleys leading to the market. He grunted again, tried to pick up his pace, and continued to stagger across the bridge. The doctor raised his hand and wiped a stream of water from his face. He was old, but even at his age, he had never seen real rain. I just remember the sad aggregate of the respiratory cycles of hundreds of millions of organs stacked on top of each other.

Behind him, the lift's magnetic track slowed down. The doors are ready to open again, unleashing a new wave of harmony that enhances the human body and pours into the labyrinthine market. The doctor touched the retirement assurance on his chest again, risking a quick glance back.

The pneumatic door hissed open, revealing a large and unfamiliar face of indifference in the dark elevator. The doctor breathed a sigh of relief.

"Lead-in layer. Watch your step. A digitally synthesized announcement was heard on the radio.

The crowd put on sunscreens and pulled up synthetic flannel caps to cover their heads, both waterproof and sheltered from the compelling glow of the upper central district. Like a bunch of well-trained rats, they crowded onto the bridge deck.

At this moment, the doctor saw a metal figure staring at him, a head tall in the crowd.

His breathing was sparse, and a layer of fog was covering his lenses. Fear permeates like a progressive melody.

The figure stepped into the diffuse mist of light. The skinny silhouette is blackened throughout, and the carbon fiber wraps around the heavy servo motor to form a lean muscle. The glare that was cast down was completely absorbed by the cuirass on the sandblasted surface. The doctor made out the dull fur collar, which was wrapped like a bobcat around the black neck of anodized steel. But none of this is surprising, and what makes the doctor's bones tremble the most is the mask that the shadow wears. The mask itself was blurred, with only the outline reflected by the billowing water and the glow of the pulsating holographic sign.

Kada Ash.

The doctor tried to back off, but slipped on the metal bridge again. He also scraped off several joints as he grabbed the railing. Desperate to get away from the precipitation and the blinding light, the people pushed the doctor to the ground, unaware that he was being choked by the throat by fear.

The doctor crawled on his hands and feet and on the ground. Fleshy and metal feet crushed his fingers and stepped into the grates of the ground. He couldn't get up. However, the crowd begins to thin out and will soon expose him. His hands trembled as he wiped the water from his eyes. The lenses fell somewhere in the confusion. Blood mixed with tears. Suddenly, the scene before him became clear: a vapor changer not far away was spitting out a large cloud of gray gas, enveloping the damp and rotten smell of the lower city. It was his lifesaver.

As soon as he climbed behind the replacement machine, the tail of the crowd passed. He hunched over in a corner, his lips slightly open and gasping softly. The labyrinth leading to the market is only a few meters away. As long as he can sneak in, he can disappear completely, completely get rid of the haunting figure.

The heavy breathing of the displacer gradually slowed. The last commuter slipped into the market and closed the mirrored glass door of an abandoned stall. The Medic could see through the reflection on the door that the figure was holding a lanky pulse rifle over his shoulder. The illegible mask flashed with a pixelated blood-red glow.

The doctor raised his head in the light of the upper city—everything that had been out of sight began to refocus in his eyes. He narrowed his eyes and begged, but the neon-filled future turned a deaf ear. Not to mention his small, lonely creature.

Through the rain curtain, the doctor heard the click of metal. It's the safety bolt of the pulse rifle, and you can't make a mistake. His hand touched his heart, protecting his only treasure. Behind the plastic sleeve, he felt his own crazy heartbeat.

An unrivalled glare poured down from overhead, pouring into the doctor's animal-like head with his last thoughts before dying.

Everything is nothing but the bag of the future.

centre

"Pause the playback."

At the last conduct hearing against me, I asked the officer at the hearing what it would take to get to the center. One of them said that you have to be prepared to exchange a part of yourself for it. Level up and up the source system, but at the same time, you'll be able to grab your own self. I'm pretty honest with them, I don't think anyone in their right mind would be willing to pay that price for a small piece of shiny silicon or a dazzling sign.

They laughed en masse. Then I was promoted.

Now, the image in front of me is shaking slightly, and a banded distraction streaks run through it. A three-dimensional hologram of the doctor's last moment before his death is still in the air. His face was raised to the sky, his expression half fearful and half submissive. A few centimeters behind his head was a blood-red arc of light from the Pulse Rifle. Moments later, the highly condensed plasma would burn a hole in his head.

"Vi, you're pausing too fast. The rest is exciting. ”

This is my new partner, Moseley. He stretched and yawned. The muscles of his youth fought against gravity for many years, and finally he was defeated, and his pocket hung on his stomach. Keep fighting crime at his desk, and he won't miss a nutritious meal.

But he must be hungry now. The third time I noticed, Moseley's eyes simply couldn't get rid of my promotion block. This morning, my new captain slammed the thing on my desk, and with it a heartfelt congratulations from her to the new, round-eyed partner.

I looked at Moseley, who finally stopped resisting his greed. He grabbed the data block from the table and absentmindedly tossed it between a pair of limp hands.

"Haven't you installed these new subroutines yet?" He fidgeted, but he pretended to be casually inquiring.

I pinched the knuckles of my fingers so hard that they clicked.

There was also my Atlas fist on the table. This pair of heavy fists is typical of the Downtown sheriff style. Many recruits will give their two thin legs an upgrade so that they can keep a certain distance from the prisoner when they are ordered to attack. But I don't mind getting closer. The blunt gloves fit me perfectly, like a pair of gloves. Moreover, because there is no need for permanent implantation, there is no need to worry about other people's memories entrenched in the line. However, when I was training at the center, the pair did attract some strange eyes. But when my right hook pierced the titanium figure's chest, the ridicule on the report chief's face disappeared.

"You're just wasting your time." Moseley said. Unfortunately, when he saw that I didn't pay attention, he thought he could go on. "A wicked man deserves it. It's as simple as that. The captain wanted to know when we could get the lift back open. We can't afford to keep so many commuters waiting. ”

I ignored him. In this part of the city, an unregistered pulse rifle deionized a person's skull from a distance of 100 meters, which is not a common "deserved". This is what professional people do. I turned to the AI in the room and said.