Where there were people in the city, there was action; where there were not, there was a pregnant pause. True stillness was entirely absent. Wherever there was a void of humanity, its trappings--skyscrapers, exhaust, garbage--waited like empty cocoons blowing in the wind. They hung in space-time and dreamed their dreams of animation, of being put to some use, even for an instant. The people would have need of them. Their time would come. There was an alleyway in the Eastern Scrapyard. The two buildings that formed it were made of concrete slabs stacked one atop the other, winding sinuously up out of the ground. They formed an open container for garbage of many sorts-- broken springs, scratched compact disks, and rotten foodstuffs. A solitary man sat within the space. The man looked to be about thirty. His straight brown hair was cut fashionably short against his head. His nose was made to look large by the mustache he wore, the mustache dripping with moisture from the condensation of his breath. He was attired in a green full-body uniform, regulation Factory-wear, and a brown jacket. This man--Jethro--sat with his back to the wall and his knees bent almost to his chest, but far enough away for him to struggle with his breathing. His eyes were half-closed. He wanted to close them all the way, but his sense of guilt and paranoia prodded him to alertness: his eyes darted again and again to the entrance of the alleyway. Time and time again he found no signs of escape or pursuit, and this insecurity was more horrifying than either alternative. It had been perhaps two minutes when he finally regained the nerve to act. He swallowed the bitter saliva that had built up in his mouth and ran his hand through his hair. These mannerisms calmed him, reminded him of who he was-- not the terrified fence who had dashed into an alleyway to avoid pursuit, but Jethro, proud husband and shrewd worker. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. He stood up from the ground and looked around him one last time. Still nothing. He turned towards the far end of the alley, bound for home and [CLANG!] Jethro jumped to his left in surprise. His hand dived into his jacket pocket for his stiletto, but before he could draw there was another CLANG! off down where he had been going and some softer, rolling Clang!s as something spun. Knife in hand, he saw a dented garbage can lid still skimming across the pavement, following the path it had taken after bouncing off the wall--the bounce that had been the first noise. Which meant, he realized, that his opponent was back at the alley's entrance. Jethro spun around into a crouch, knife drawn, eyes wide open. The brighter light from the street threw his opponent's form into silhouette, but that only heightened the peculiarity of it. The figure stood perhaps one and two-thirds meters tall. A mop of shoulder-length straight hair sprouted from the head. The intruder's attire must have been tight-fitting, if the legs were any indication; but the clothing was covered by a long, pale cape or coat that extended to the knees. As his opponent approached, ignoring Jethro's intimidating passes with the stiletto, the heaviness of the footfalls betrayed extensive cybernetics. But the surreality of the scene reached its peak when the entrant spoke. She spoke in the voice of a girl in her mid-teens. "I'm sorry that you only have the knife. I'd give you a better one, but I left it up in my room." Jethro's jaw fell. The girl paused, seeing his facial expression. "Of course I knew. It's obvious. When you're under stress, you have a need for security. Aaaand...you hardly had enough time to brace yourself. So, when you have a sudden shock, you go for what will give you the most security--your strongest defense. Your knife. See now?" Lecture delivered, she once again began to stride towards the man. "H-hey! Stay away from me!" He made a frantically wide sweep through the air, and began to inch backwards down the alley. His mind was racing, trying desperately to think of a way to escape, or a way to fight back, or of something clever, or this or that or...it simply wasn't working. The girl had moved to within an arm's reach of Jethro. She paused once again, and sized him up in a single nod. "Oh, for Pete's sake...sometimes this job really gets me down. OK, mister..." She stood ramrod straight, joints locked, and tossed her head back to get the hair out of her eyes. "...take your best shot." Jethro stood absolutely numb for a moment. Then fear of the unknown began to ferment into rage. The neck! he thought. He focused the yin energy in his spirit into one great swing. The knife moved in a beautiful backhand slash, traveling gracefully upwards. With any luck he might cleave the space between the base of the head and the top of the neck--then, if he could clip a wire, there just might be a short-- The blade stopped moving. Jethro's hand and arm followed through, tracing the wide arc into space, only to be seized tightly in the girl's left hand. He had a single moment to appreciate what had gone wrong. His eyes had adjusted to the dark on light, and now saw the dusty tan of the girl's face. The synthetic skin covering the cybernetics was immaculate, and probably of very high quality. The face was full and round, tapering to a small feminine chin below the girl's mouth. She had the blade of the knife trapped neatly in her teeth. Above the mouth, two large brown eyes lay in the center of the face. They peered into Jethro's. If they could speak, they would have gently whispered, "Uh-uh. Way too obvious." The girl felt his muscles tighten, and she knew that his attempt to escape might begin in as little as one-eighth of a second. There was enough time. Her right foot flew out and bashed his knee, sending him sprawling downwards. She moved with him, twisting his arm behind his back, to compensate for the rotation of his body. As he landed on the pavement inertia carried his head forward, striking it against the blacktop. Jethro screamed in pain and terror. She pressed a knee into the small of his back. He was now effectively, if not literally, pinned. Her free left hand closed around the handle of the stiletto. She ended the maneuver with a backhand jab to the base of his head. It severed the spinal cord, inducing unconsciousness and massive cardiorespiratory failure. Mercy and judgment were unified in a single strike. - [FIFTEEN MINUTES] - Alita walked into the Factory without giving it a second thought. The great cyclopean architecture of the facade and anteroom had long ago ceased to impress her, and the "babwoom" as Cylinder 12 shot out of the floor only served to capture her attention. "Twelve? You got the message?" "Yep. We're recovering the batteries right now. Good job." A series of green LED lights appeared in the Factory floor, tracing the familiar pathway down and to the right. "Number 10 is expecting you." "Yeah, I figured." She slung the waterproof duffel bag over her shoulder and followed the 524 lights (she had counted 100, paced the distance and computed the sum) to the set of double doors. They rolled open at her approach, showing 10 to be expectantly up and ready for her. She unzipped the bag and started stacking up the heads as it spoke: "Gweetings, F33-405. Congwaduwations on youw sucessfuw hunt, the Factowy and the pubwic awike appweciate it." A computer screen flickered to life off to its left. "Now, then, wepowt time. Pwease summawise in youw own wowds the events that wed up to this captuwe." Alita finished balancing the three heads neatly against one another, then stood back to admire her work. "Lessee...Bounty Hunter had earlier obtained report that a quantity of internal cybernetic batteries had gone missing from a Factory Front building. At approximately 2330 hours Bounty Hunter observed a truck, similar in description to one that had been seen in the area of the theft. Bounty Hunter pursued, identifying two occupants with known criminal records. The truck stopped at a residence building, where the two culprits were joined by a third man, unknown to Bounty Hunter. They proceeded to unload a series of boxes that Bounty Hunter identified as the missing batteries. Bounty Hunter ambushed the two known criminals and executed them with"--she glanced at a burn mark on her left glove"--almost no resistance. The third culprit attempted to flee. Bounty Hunter tracked him for about three blocks before execution." She looked at the Cylinder. "Is that enough?" "Enough fow me." A door opened in one wall of the alcove. The base the heads were stacked upon tilted up, and they bounced off into some other part of the Factory. It didn't even occur to her to even watch them go. "F33-405, you weceive 50,000 fow the thwee of them, pwus a 15% bonus fow wecovowy of stowen matewiaw, PWUS 1% on top of that fow wecovowy of goods destined fow Zawem." A stack of 58,075 chips in varied denominations emerged from the Cylinder's base. An arm pushed them forward. "Buy youwsewf an ice cweam ow something." "Mm." Alita scooped up the chips and put them into a pocket. If one of the men hadn't had a lit cigarette in his mouth, it almost would have been an uninteresting evening. "Maybe I'm in a slump...just talking to myself, Number 10." She turned her back and walked out of the room. - The two women ran through the streets. One was dressed appropriately for the cold of the night, and one was not. She wore a green paisley bathrobe over night clothing, and had slippers in plastic bags upon her feet. Her cybernetic legs compensated to a degree for the inappropriateness of the attire; but she was still unprepared for the stress of the activity. In more than one way. "This can't be, it's not going to be him." "We only called you to make sure, Ella." "It can't, it isn't gonna be..." "Down here." There was a small group of people clustered around the base of the buildings, mostly out of voyeurism. The cyborg began to push her way nervously through the masses. She could feel the anticipation they felt, and it began to erode at her self-assurance. Still, she knew she would have to push on. She was almost through the crowd when a hand fell on her shoulder, holding her back. It was her friend. "El--remember, it's still a dead body." Ella pulled her friend's hand off her shoulder. "Jax--I can do this." She turned back around, and pushed her way through the last few people. "'Scuse me...coming-- oh!" What had once been a human being was now a sorry pile of dead flesh. Cold and frail, it lay slumped over to one side in a pool of blood, head neatly cleaved just above the fourth vertebra. Its clothes--a green jumpsuit, a once-brown jacket-- looked as though someone with a sick sense of humor had strewn them on the body like flocking. Surely this...thing...could never have been formed in God's image. "JETHRO!!!!!" The woman bolted from the crowd and threw herself beside the corpse. Trembling, she rolled it onto its back and lifted its shoulders up off the pavement. She stared at it dumbly for a second as the tears welled up in her eyes. "...You...you son of a bitch..." she began to sob, "...why the hell did you do this to yourself? What the fuck were you thinking--what were you thinking?" She placed her chin on the corpse's shoulder, no longer to feel the roughness of the unshaved cheek or warmth rising from familiar skin. The crowd drooled. - After the night that the Bar Kansas was gutted, the bounty hunters found themselves in limbo. So much that they had taken for granted--a community setting, an enemy to focus their hate upon, even a little unacknowledged prejudice--had been literally blown away. Their work still provided self-identity: to be a Hunter-Warrior still meant to kill. But it seemed that it no longer meant to hang out at the Bar, be one of the boys, and kill whatever bounty you thought you alone could take down. There must have been some other meaning. Not greater, necessarily, nor lesser--simply different. Perhaps, then, it was because there was no set refuge for the bounty hunters to hide within that Alita was accepted into the crowd. They killed; she killed, too. She didn't have one too many and need to be carried home every once in a while, but it seemed that they didn't, either. Nor did they hunt alone: some of the weaker banded together for self-preservation, and the stronger took on entire gangs en masse. Change was in the air. It had been a couple of nights since her recovery of the batteries. Alita was upstairs in Bo's Sporthaus. There was a bar with a huge number of quality vid screens and VR jacks on the ground floor, and various games on the mezzanine. Bets were exchanged above as often as beers were below. "Hm," Alita said. "Simple planar geometry and collision physics." She placed her left hand on the tabletop, bending three of her fingers under her palm and arching her index finger to touch her thumb. She slid the cue stick into the hole and supported the far end on her thumb. She wrapped her right hand around the butt of the cue stick and slid it back and forth, gauging its weight. She aimed for the center of the cue ball and swung the cue. The ball flew down the table and smacked into the first ball on the rack. All fifteen balls trembled and spread out about a centimeter from one another while the cue ball caromed across the table. Eventually, the cue ball hit the 15 ball hard enough to move it. Across the table, Kyro let out a laugh. "Sim-pull plane-er gee-ah-me-tree," he intoned, "but we're PLAYING pool. Watch." He racked the balls, then scooped up the cue ball and moved to where Alita stood. He squared himself with the cue, lined up a shot, and took it. His shot sent the rack flying and managed to sink the 3 ball. "Nice." Alita walked behind him as he made his next shot. "I notice you grab the cue a little bit away from the end." "Mm-hm." Kyro leaned up from the table. "You have to form a right angle between your upper and lower arms, then slide the cue nice and easy. Why don't you...aim for the 12. It's right near the pocket." Alita did so. Kyro moved to her side and corrected her stance as he spoke. "OK, now what you want to is put your whole upper body behind the cue. Shoulders down, square with the cue...now, line the stick up with the part of the cue ball that you want to nail. But keep your eyes on the far ball, right on the spot where you want the cue to hit it." "Great, thanks...and you can take your hand off my hip now." Kyro backed out of her way as she slid the cue to feel the inertia once again. "Now, hit it hard enough, but not too hard...it could follow the 12 in, or it might spin out of control...that's it." The cue rolled rapidly across the table and made contact with the 12. The latter ball hit a little to the left of the corner pocket, then rebounded off the far side and rolled out towards the center of the table. "Pretty good...you'll get it next time. Trouble is," he went on, lining up his next play, "you've put me in a great position to sink the 5." He did. "When you get really good at pool--like me--you'll start to think in advance about where you want the other balls on the table to end up." Just like everything else, Alita thought, plan in advance and adapt as you go. She watched Kyro's next shot, and noticed then how the balls tended to roll to one side of the table. It must not be truly level. And then there was the felt--it doesn't have any bulges or tears, but it isn't really correct to think of it as either frictionless or perfectly planar itself. She shifted her gaze to the next table over, and began to pick out a few imperfections there as well. I guess I'll just have to adapt each time I play, she thought. And I'll bet the cues aren't straight, or have something wrong with the tips, or the grip is funny. She could remedy that, to a degree. "Hey, Bo!" she called down to the bar. "You got any chalk down there?" "Sure." He dived under the bar. "25 chips for a block." Alita felt in her pocket for some small change. She pulled out two tens, a fifty and a five. "Um, gimme three, then." She idly tossed down a fraction of her bounty to the bar. - The small party picked their way through the rubble. A wrong step could lead to disaster--a broken leg or torn cybernetics--and that would further dampen the spirits of the group. The torches that each person carried threw a little light around them, but served more as a ward against spirits of evil that they only half knew of, let alone believed in. Six able-bodied men took the lead. Each held one end of a stout cord in their inside hand, and with their outside held a torch on high. The three cords supported the corpse that the six had known in life. Next came the widow and her sister. They were followed by a few other friends and the obligatory curiosity seekers. The whole of the procession followed the lead of the right front pallbearer. Torch on high, he traced out a path that he remembered fairly well from the afternoon of the day before. Being careful to shy away from the true danger paths, he ushered the group onward as the sky began to change from black into burnt umber. They were about a kilometer and a half beyond the last settlement when they reached their destination. It was an inauspicious depression around a derelict automobile, in the crotch between two imposing piles of scrap metal. The body was old beyond measure, and it was all but rusted away; but its interior must have once been leather, for a few species of plant grew on the inside. The six pallbearers maneuvered themselves and their burden to a position across the trunk. They waited respectfully for the crowd to come together around the auto's body. When the assembly was in position and providing attention, the man who had chosen the site began to speak. "This is to be the sight of burial for Jethro, Factory 8 worker 566, manager at Apartment Complex 1505. He is succeeded by his wife and his many friends and co-workers. His passing shall be missed." On cue, the six lowered the body onto the trunk. Ella, trembling with sorrow, stepped forward and, with help from two of the pallbearers, pushed the corpse into a fetal position. The speaker continued. "Let none be placed here until his body is decomposed and this site is healthy again." He pulled a small canister of lighter fluid out of his coat and poured a large quantity onto the corpse. When he felt that enough was on the body, the man took out a butane lighter and a punk. Everyone took a step back as he lit the punk and tossed it onto the body. In an instant the ferrous funeral pyre was aflame. The all-pervading stench of decay was joined by the smell of burning flesh and hair, and a disquieting sizzling sound came from the dead man. Sooty black smoke curled upwards, aiming to join its kindred molecules in the heavens. The heat was uncomfortably warm, even in the coolness of the dawn...or perhaps it was something in the people around the fire. Ella was on her sister's shoulder, sobbing, hardly listening to the words of comfort whispered in her ear. All at once she let out a muffled shriek and slumped to the ground, grabbing at her middle section. "El, what's the matter?" "I-I don't know...my stomach...aah! My stomach's hurting!" Two or three of the adjacent mourners circled around her. Ella's sister tried to push them away. "Give her some room!...El, can you stand up?" "I think...I...ouch! I need help...help me..." - "How long have you had cybernetics, Mrs. Ella?" "All my life. I was born with superextended leg bones, I couldn't have ever stood up." Ella was lying flat on her back on the examining table. Her dress was raised to about her waist level, high enough to expose all her cybernetics yet still retain an iota of modesty. She gazed blankly at the machine over her head, trying to put out of her mind the fact that her body was being examined by a person she barely knew. Ido looked at the computer screen. The sonogram showed no signs of intestinal blockage, so his worst fears had been unfounded. He decided to move on to the next possibility. "Could you describe the pain again for me?" "Well, it's sharp...low on my stomach...it comes and goes..." "How about when you eat?" "It gets better when I have a meal, but...it comes back, worse." Ido nodded and switched off the sonogram. He moved over to another, smaller computer with a large number of wires coming out. "I'm going to run some diagnostics now, that shouldn't take too long." He plugged a two-prong cord into the woman's hip. "Have you been under any stress lately?" "Yes, I have." Ido heard the change in tone at once, and realized that he had touched a nerve. Though his patient still felt comfortable, he would have to work her back into his confidence. "I see. Well, Mrs. Ella, I'd say you have an ulcer." "Is it bad?" "I can't say for sure just yet..." He took a quick glance at the data from the diagnostic computer. There was no sign of systems malfunction, so the problem was probably still in the stomach lining. He picked up a small object from the table. It was a tightly-folded aluminum foil pouch with a rigid plastic mouth, five centimeters across, at one end, sealed in a sterile wrapper. "Have you changed today?" "No." "Good." He handed over the packet and discreetly turned his back. While his patient performed the necessary function, Ido pressed a button on the main computer terminal and slipped a rubber glove onto his hand. "Now, I'll take it and run next door while my assistant takes some information from you. She's not a cyberdoctor, but she knows a good deal about personal health." Ido turned to receive the old bag from his patient and slipped a cap onto one end. "She'll be in in just a minute. I'll be back as soon as I can." So saying, he walked out of the room. A moment later, Alita walked into the room. She wore her white coat like a lab coat, buttoned and tied up but with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows. She had a broad, merry smile across her face. "Good afternoon, Mrs. Ella. I'm Alita. I'm Doctor Ido's assistant." "Pleased to meet you," Ella replied pleasantly. "You too. Now, I believe you're having some stomach trouble?" "Yes." "OK. How has your health been overall?" "Good. No major problems." Hm, she's being courteous but not too open...she's keeping something to herself. "What about your immediate family?" "My mother had stomach cancer, but it was environmental. My father was a bit of a hypochondriac." "What supplements do you take?" "Vitamins E, C and B-12." "Estrogen?" "No, I still have my ovaries." An in vivo shell pelvis[1]...so there probably wouldn't be any corrosion from stomach fluids. "All right then. As soon as Ido finishes his test, you'll be done here." "That's good to know." Ella sat up from the table. "One other thing...about payment." "Mm?" "Is there any way...I don't know...could defer the bill for a month or two?" "Sure thing." Alita smiled. "Doc Ido's really understanding about that." "Is he?" "Yes...what's wrong?" Alita had been moved by the look in the woman's eyes. Ella was in her thirties, with long brown hair. She had a dark brown sweater on over a thin black dress. The only sign that she wasn't completely flesh were the two steel-gray feet that peeked out from underneath the dress' folds. Her green eyes were wide open, looking at Alita. "It--it's my husband." She heaved a sigh. "He was killed only a few days ago. I've been taking some time off, and I'm worried about money. It's just...insulting, you know? He's gone, and while I'm trying to get my feet on the ground, there's all these bills piling up. Work just goes on...without him. No change. Nothing." "That's awful," said Alita. "You must be feeling bad." "Yes, I am." Ella stood up from the table. At that moment Ido walked into the room, holding a clipboard and a bottle of pills. "Mrs. Ella? I've got good news. It's an ulcer, but it's very treatable. Just a simple prescription is all you'll need." "Thank you, Doctor." - The street was relatively clean. A knocked-over garbage can here, a dead street rat rotting on the curb, and various scattered papers made up all the constituent rubbish. Even in such a random collection, there were anomalies. Amidst all the pulp printouts of the day before there was a neatly wadded scrap of paper, all balled up like a single lotus blossom. The contents of the paper were wholly unremarkable; they were the results of two routine computer searches. The first was an inquiry as to the identity of Worker F74-319's spouse. The second, based upon the results of the first, was for a more in-depth biography of Manager F8-566. Listed were only the most basic facts that the Factory allowed: age in days at death; occupation at death; circumstances of death. On a rooftop high above the street was a very sad little girl. - There was a ring of the bell. Ella looked up from her pulp reading. She set her half-empty mug upon the kitchen table and walked over to the intercom. She pressed the button and asked, "Who--who's there?" "It's me, Alita," came a young girl's voice. "From Doc Ido's office?" "Oh. Yes. Well, come in." Ella pressed the "summon" button and walked down the apartment's hallway to greet her visitor. Ella opened the door to a girl smaller than herself. Her guest was wearing a long white jacket, buttoned and tied in the front, over a black body suit. She wore gray shoes with gaiters over them for the weather. Ella numbly noticed that Alita had the look of interested curiosity on her face that she had worn in Doc Ido's office; to her eyes now, though, it appeared somewhat forced. Alita was greeted by a tall woman dressed in a thin bathrobe. Her shoulder- length hair was down. Though it was mid-afternoon, her bleary-eyed appearance and ill-chosen attire made it seem as though she had been woken from deep slumber. Ella was almost clutching at the door for support. "May I come in?" "Yes...yes." Ella shifted to one side of the hallway as Alita walked inside. The apartment was a study in shading. None of the lights were on. Alita picked her way down the hall to the kitchen, where sunlight poured around and through Venetian blinds. They look like bars in a cage, thought Alita. Behind her, her hostess floated into the kitchen. "Can I make something for you?" "Uh...I'll just have whatever you're having." Alita gestured to the coffee mug on the table. Ella smiled weakly. "That's just water. Coffee isn't good for an ulcer." "Oh, of course." Alita sat at one of the table's metal-piping chairs. Ella moved silently to the sink to refill her mug. "How are you feeling, by the way?" "Better, I guess." Ella eased into the chair on the opposite side of the table. It was just close enough to still convey an intimate feeling. "I don't snack between meals, and I can avoid fats, caffeine, and...you know." She paused to take a sip of water. "So I guess I'll get better." "Good," said Alita. "You know what else?" "What?" "Try to get some green vegetables, like peas and spinach. Ido says they're good for stomach problems." "Really?" Ella asked, with some interest. "Oh, yeah. Ido also says that if you don't eat processed foods, and you cook your own stuff instead, that's also better. You don't get all those chemicals." "Huh." Ella sipped her water meditatively. "It must be nice to have a doctor around the house." "Uh-huh. Ido's a pretty cool guy." There was a lull in the conversation. Both women knew what the next question would lead to. "What did your husband do?" "He was the manager of this building, actually," Ella said. "He was working as an electrical engineer when we met. Just before we got married, this job opened up...we got free rent, and Jethro...was always good with tools, for repairs and things. It was a good deal." Ella drank deep from her mug, as though she was hoping to pull out something that might help her control the flood of memories. Alita waited patiently for her to go on. "I don't know when it first began...we just never had a shortage of money around the house. Not enough to flaunt it, but we never worried. Well, I never worried, anyway. "It was when I went in for a leg-and-pelvis the time before last that I discovered. The time before _that_, I had scheduled myself for routine maintenance. What I _got_ was an almost complete overhaul and a custom fit. Well, I thought, their fuckup, and they can't take back customs, so I just kept them." She drummed her fingers on her thighs, to emphasize the point. "The next time, I went in for maintenance...but I'm telling you, I must have gotten the works! Tightening, balance, stride timing, you'd have thought I was Zalemona[2]. Now, I _knew_ that they wouldn't make the mistake twice. So before they could get their hands on me I had them double-check their records. And you know what?" "What?" Alita felt sick to her stomach. "There wasn't a mistake. Two days beforehand, someone had called in and changed the service--and paid the difference. 40,000 in cash. "I got home that night. I told Jethro, I didn't know how he had got the money, but it just wasn't right. I didn't like the smell of it. He played dumb, told me it was a fluke...but I know a bent girder when I see one. After that, I counted every single chip that came in and went out of this house, and I didn't find anything wrong. I didn't know what he had been up to, but I thought he had come to his senses." - Jethro stroked his mustache meditatively, toying with one end for a moment, then letting the bristles spring back into position. The light from the computer screen bleached his face slightly, though the kitchen's overhead lamp dulled its effect. His face was drawn into a slight frown. His eyes darted rapidly as he read the information, trying to parse every single nuance of the advertisement. Dissatisfied, he quit the application and switched off the computer. He rose from his seat and walked into the living room where his wife was seated, reading. "Hello, love." He bent down and gave her a quick kiss on the lips. "Can I ask you something?" "Of course." She put down the book and looked at him. He was seated in a chair less than half a meter away, with his hands clenched and his brow furrowed mightily. She had a sudden vision of him at age sixteen, asking a girl out for the first time. "What is it?" "Ella...do you want to have a child?" "I'd love to," she replied, smiling. "Do you have one in mind, or do you know someone with a..." "No, no, I don't mean adopt. I mean gene fusion--our own biological child." Ella let out a laugh. "Jet, honey, you can't be serious. The Factory takes the chrome out of you[3] for that. We wouldn't have money to buy anything for ourselves, let alone a baby." Jethro looked at her evenly. "El, I'm serious. I know we can. I've been scrimping out of my paycheck, and we can get a loan." The smile fell from her face. "You've been doing your shady stuff again, haven't you?" "Ella, I..." "Dammit, Jethro, I told you to get yourself out of that before you get hurt! We don't need money that badly--we don't need ANYTHING that badly! I don't care if you have to return every single chip you've made since you were born, it's just not--" "I DIDN'T HAVE A CHOICE!" "WHAT?!?" "Ella, listen to me! Once you get sunk into this shit, you have to work to get yourself out. And I've tried. I've tried time and again to pull myself out. It's no use. I know too much. They think I know more than I do, and that's as good as too much." They were both standing. Jethro started to move forward, and Ella backed away, matching his every move. They started dancing down the main hallway together. "El, you can hate it or you can live with it. I've tried to escape, but it's no use. I've got the funds, more than enough. Those chips are just sitting there, doing nothing. We can forget about them, and I'll just keep getting more and more anyway, or we..." "Get out!' "Wha...?" "Get out of this house now, Jethro!" She tossed him a coat from the closet next to the front door. "And don't come back until you're clean!" - "Two days later, he was dead. Dead as anyone." Ella finished her second mug of water. Alita was staring dumbly at her, her whole body trembling. "You...and he...a baby?" "Mm-hm." Ella struggled to remember. "I guess what they do is, they take the chromosomes out of male and female cells, mix them together somehow, and put it in a donor's egg...after that, pay someone with a uterus to carry it for you." "That--that's b-b-beautiful," Alita stammered, and burst into tears. "Hey, now." Ella moved around to the other side of the table and wrapped her arms around the cyborg. She felt tears rising in her own spirit, but they could wait a little. "You don't need to cry...probably never even known someone who's died, have you?" Poor little girl, she thought, as a fresh wave of spasms wracked the girl's body, how sensitive she is. - The front door slammed so hard the doorjamb was broken. "Alita?" Ido said, rising from the dinner table. "What in the Heavens...oh my God, what's the matter?" Alita stood, framed by the doorway to the room. Her hair was somewhat tangled and her coat was wide open, giving her the appearance of a madwoman. The expression on her face was one of bitter sullenness; but, even as he looked at her, it melted into the grimace that every parent fears, the twisted features of sorrow. "Ido...!" Awkwardly, he put down his bowl of noodles and ran to embrace her. She slumped against his chest, nearly knocking him to the floor. Gonzu lumbered to the pair and together they managed to form a single, supportive mass in the center of the floor. "Alita, you didn't come home last night, we were so worried. What happened?" "I...I killed someone, Ido!" "What?" That's all? thought Ido. "Who?" "I killed a guy, four days ago, and he didn't want to do it, he couldn't help it, and now he's dead, and his wife can't have a baby..." A quarter of an hour later Alita was finishing her story as she picked aimlessly at her noodles. Somehow, their abstract geometry, outlined in the white of the soup bowl, had a rococo beauty. She preferred to look rather than devour. "...so then I started crying. And she said, "You've probably never even seen a dead body, have you?" And I wanted to tell her everything! I wanted her to know about me, to get it all out of me. But I didn't tell her anything. I just left." "Probably just as well," Ido said. "There are people in this world who would kill you because you are a hunter-warrior." "They'd kill you too, Ido," Alita muttered sullenly. She looked up at him. "Why do you do it?" "You mean hunt? Because...it helps keep the streets safe for good citizens. It brings in a few more chips. Because you do, too--we get to spend some time together." "That's not your main reason, is it?" The question caught him entirely off guard. He found himself chuckling at her perceptiveness. "No, it isn't, Alita." "Why else?" Gonzu moved forward. "Alita, that's none of your business!" "You're exactly right, Gonzu," said Ido. He looked at her evenly. "You don't tell me absolutely everything in your head, do you? And Gonzu doesn't let us in on his every thought. Nobody does. We all have secrets, for all kinds of different reasons." He reached out and took her hands in his. She made no effort to stop him. "Think about how the world would be if we didn't use some sort of discretion in our lives. We would bore everyone around us, or make them mad with our deepest thoughts." Alita thought for a while before she sighed, "I see your point, I guess." She became quiet again, staring blankly at the dish in front of her. Ido watched her for a few moments, then rose from his seat. "It's no good feeling sorry for yourself, just sitting there and moping. Why don't you go practice your keyboarding? It might just take your mind off your problems." "But, Ido!" Alita said, rising with him. "He was a human being! Just like you or me! He was a good person! He didn't have to die!" "But he chose to go, didn't he? Perhaps he told the truth, that there was a time in his life when he would have been in danger if he had tried to do the right. Even if he did, there must have also been a time in his life when he wouldn't have been. He had the choice to act then; and he did not act . "Alita--every man, woman and child has free will. We don't have complete control over our every actions; but, for the greater part, we choose what course of action we shall aim for. The wise take responsibility for their actions, the foolish have it thrust upon them. Jethro had his virtues, I will not deny that. However, he was born in a place where we have a defined line between what is legal and what is not. He went across the line." Ido approached Alita. "That is the way it is, I'm afraid. It's all right to mourn for the man who has died--I believe it's even appropriate. But you cannot lose sight of the fact that he did something that was against the law." Alita stood in her place for a moment or two. Then, with her head hung low upon her shoulders, she walked slowly towards her bedroom. Gonzu approached Ido from behind, where he had been getting himself a beer. The two men listened; but they did not hear the sounds of Alita's synthesizer. "Ido..." Gonzu muttered, "sometimes you plain scare the shit out of me." "I know," his friend replied. "I don't try, but it happens." He paused. "I think I'll have to try talking to her again, later on." - Hugo sat up from the bed. His pulse was racing, and his mouth was dry. Snippets of the dream still blared in his mind. He tried to shake them out of his head. No use. Then, he felt his bodily pain. His kidneys were on fire, and his stomach was still upset. It distracted him from the psychological pain for a moment. He looked out of the open door. The midday sun was pouring into the cul-de- sac. The buildings across the street were dilapidated, but familiar, and inviting. Between him and them there was a young girl, dressed in white. She was humming or singing to herself, busily washing clothes in his cement-mixer-cum- washing-machine. Doesn't she look nice out there, thought Hugo. He swung his legs down towards the floor. "Hey, Alita!" he called. She looked up from a freshly shredded shirt at the sound of his voice. "Do you have a dream?" Yes, Hugo, she thought. I do have a dream. -- Copyright 1996 Daniel Snyder [1] In vivo shell-- a type of cybernetics where the internal organs are left intact and surrounded by a cybernetic "shell". Initial cost is lower, though upkeep is generally more expensive. [2] Zalemona--folk tales of the Scrapyard have it that there is a race of people that live in Zalem. They are endowed with superhuman abilities, perception and grace. Hence, a "Zalemona", or a woman of Zalem, is analogous to royalty. [3] "takes the chrome out"--is expensive.