Cincy opened the door and held it for us. Marine went out first and I followed. There was a limo waiting for us inside of a long, single car-width garage. I might have stared at it like a moron for too long because Cincy passed me and suggested that I please enter the vehicle. I’d never been in or near anything worth as much money as a limousine. There were old junker ones, but the self-drivers ran in the hundreds of thousands. The doors sat open, waiting for me to enter and so I finally did.
The inside was unnecessary in its detail. Purple velour with black trim and silver adornments lined the entire inside of the seating area. The seats themselves were leather. Not the stiff sort. Insanely soft stuff, but still thick enough to be obvious underneath the weight of my body. The interior was rimmed at head level with screens that played much the same sort of simulated scenery as you’d expect from a CleanlyCar, but at much higher resolution.
Cincy had made her way to the far end of the cab, well away from the doors. Marine had sat just inside the door, opposite Cincy, so I sat next to her.
“Drive.”
Cincy spoke and the car smoothly rolled out, waiting for the garage door to open and then pulling out into an alley. The screens turned themselves clear when she spoke and then back to scenery in a wave as we came clear of the building.
Graver’s… whatever she was turned her attention to a screen projecting itself onto the air in front of her. Small lights emitted from the sides of the vehicle showed the source to be a holographic projector. The usable ones were insanely expensive, but compact to an insane degree. The cost was largely poured into atmospheric sensors to detect air composition and density and the like so the projectors could be calibrated to catch the air to form the image. I turned to Marine, pointing subtly with my mouth open. She did not share my enthusiasm.
The screen was slid away with a gesture and Cincy addressed Marine.
“We have a software problem. To put it bluntly, there is a firm who has rolled out tracking software to people we would rather not have it. Very sophisticated software. It uses thermals and electrical field cams on the drones to form a trackable database of people, particularly people with unregistered augmentations, naked and skinned. You understand how this could prove a considerable problem to our operation.”
“Graver’s what? Eighty percent metal at this point? I get it.”
“You’ll refrain from offering information on Graver to people who did not previously have it.” She meant me. “But yes. Along with our considerable assets which stand to be tracked by the software otherwise. We had intended to pay you double your normal rate since the work required access to the target physically, but I understand you have an agreement with Graver. We have confirmation that the only operable version of the hardware package is being tested as a pre-sale demonstration at the location.”
Marine crossed her arms. “So, what do you have for me? Cleaning company? Office hours? Names? Phone numbers?”
Cincy pushed her fake glasses up her nose and turned her head to the side, looking at the window-screens. The car began to slow and maneuver itself. “I’m afraid you lack the time to make use of that. Which is just as well, as I doubt it would have done much good.”
“So you’re fucking sending me in—”
“We are.” The door beside me was the only one that popped open. “I’m sure you’ll manage.”
I stepped out of the car and stood there staring up, not at all happy with this turn of events. Marine joined me on the sidewalk, looking up as well. We found ourselves, me with an exposed robot arm, standing in front of a police station in broad daylight. The limo pulled away behind us. Marine said what we were both thinking.
“Well, shit.”
Chapter
FOURTEEN
I thought maybe we were going to go around the back side of the building or something so I was taken somewhat by surprise when Marine grabbed me by the arm and dragged me through the front door of the police station. At the far end of the spartan entry hall were a few alcoves cut into the wall. Once we were inside, Marine turned to face me. She pointed aggressively across the hall at the alcoves.
“Grab my tits.”
“Uh…”
She stomped her foot and pointed at the alcoves again, the female officer seated at the middle one was definitely watching us.
“Grab my tits, you fucking asshole. Now.” She got louder, shouting the second half of the sentence.
I hesitantly reached my hands up and she leaned forward into them, grabbing my wrists and jamming my hands against her body as she started to struggle around like my hands had magic sexual powers that drove her wild with gyrating pleasure. As a quick aside, her boobs felt just tops. Just… just real great. Super plush. Whoever put her together did a bang up job on those.
So, this is the shit part. She screamed.
“Raaaape! Help! Rape! Rape!”
Oh boy. I get what’s going on here.
“Hahaha! You think you can just have tits around here, stupid… stupid uh… bitch? Yeah, these titties are mine for the grabbin’!”
Probably not my best work, but I figured I might as well play along.
“Hey motherfucker! What do you think you’re doing?”
I heard the loud thump of boots against the floor and immediately turned to put my hands up.
“I don’t know what came over me I—”
I got a fucking shoulder to the stomach is what I got. At the very least my nugget didn’t bounce off the polished concrete that the rest of me landed on. Now, I’m not an interior decorator or whatever, and I get that carpet isn’t really “in” as such, but is polished concrete really the best we can do? Sure, I appear
