chapter 1

Tonight, like all other nights Ishtar had endured in this horrid city, Neo Vegas was alive.

The city lived in the same way she did- not by thriving, but by surviving. It held onto life not with ambivalent lack of care others could- no, it held on by tooth and nail, with the ferocity of an animal too often wounded. No. Not today. I will not go gentle into this good night.

Neo Vegas lived through the stench of smoke and mechanical noise. It lived through vapid desert heat in the day and the artificial glow of LEDs in the night. It lived through the debauchery and sin that had become its reputation- through risky bets placed with money that wasn’t real and the ingestion of illicit substances and whispers of sweet nothings to the wrong people, hidden away in alleyways. It lived through the dirt and grime that caked under all the glitz and glam and beauty it pretended to be.

Ishtar tore through the city at breakneck speed, pressing her body close to that of her hoverbike. She only dared to hold her head only high enough that she could see over her handlebar- any higher, and she’d risk flinging herself into the street. If she was lucky, she’d hit the asphalt with enough time to duck underneath any incoming hovers. If she wasn’t lucky, her body would collide with the aluminum shell of an incoming vehicle, moving so fast it’d crush her instantly.

She wove carefully, and illegally, through the traffic of larger, slower vehicles. Though it would be far safer to follow the flow of traffic, especially as she entered the inner districts of the city, where SIN surveillance drones would be on high alert, the risk was worth it for the speed she gained by breaking the law. Taha would kill her if she was late, or at least berate her for an hour or two.

As Ishtar descended the frighteningly high overpass and entered the city’s heart, she slowed her bike and merged with the incoming traffic. Overhead, surveillance drones buzzed, their laser optics scanning the crowd for anything- or anyone- being smuggled into the city. Ishtar kept her head down- while she had nothing that would get her in trouble, it wouldn’t be her first encounter with the SIN drones, and she could live without being stopped by them again.

The drones were owned, operated, and manufactured by the SIN conglomerate- a robotics cooperation that among other things, produced the surveillance technology that controlled Neo Vegas. Their name, which Ishtar always thought was a little on the nose, stood for Security Information Networks, though the weight those three letters carried was far more potent when they stood on their own. They stood like that- bleak and cold, spelled out right in front of everyone- plastered on the bodies of the surveillance drones. SIN.

Traffic lulled, and eventually stalled, under the watchful mechanical eye of the SIN drones. Even while stationary, Ishtar kept her body pressed close to her bike. If the drones caught sight of her face, they would be able to identify her, and even possibly link her to past altercations she’d had with the drones. She kept her head down and her breath bated, waiting for this moment to pass.

In a minute that passed like an hour, the silver-blue laser passed over Ishtar’s body and her vehicle, inducing a static tingling in her ears and fingers. Finally, as the surveillance drone moved its gaze to the cargo hover behind her, she could breathe. The traffic in front of her was moving again, though only at a fraction of the speed it had before. Ishtar took a second to check the cargo in the back of her bike was still there and unharmed. Then, she followed the traffic into the heart of the city.

Ishtar descended into the grisly den of the heart of Neo Vegas, keeping her body close to her hoverbike’s. Traffic slowed the further she traveled into the tangle of side streets and alleyways, and while Ishtar could easily slip between the bulky hovers on her bike, the buzz of SIN drones above was reason enough not to. They were on higher surveillance tonight, and Ishtar wondered if something had happened. She resolved to ask Taha if he’d heard of anything.

Much like the traffic, and the density of buildings, the air grew thicker as Ishtar neared the city center. It was nasty and putrid and smoke-like, and even through her heavy-duty respiration mask, Ishtar could still taste it crawling up her tongue.

Though the city was often awash with desert sun gold in the day, at night it bathed in the neon tones of a thousand LED advertisements. Ishtar rarely paid them any mind- she had little patience for the beauty modifications being advertised to her on giant holoscreens, nor much use for the greasy, ready-to-eat meals that always made her nauseous, even if they were only ‘399 CREDITS A BOX!’ Though, as traffic lulled to a stop in front of a horrific hover wreck, Ishtar’s attention and gaze were torn from the street, to one of the beaming advertisements.

The advertisement itself was a ginormous holoscreen spread, taking up the good part of a skyscraper’s facade. It dwarfed the surrounding screens and drenched a block or two of the street in shimmering, blue light. It took Ishtar a moment to actually realize what was being advertised. The majority of the screen was taken up by the image of an alluring woman- with milky skin, ice-blonde hair, and eyes so artificially violet they seemed to pierce through the night, looking straight into Ishar’s own dark ones. She wore only a two-piece lingerie set, one strap precariously draped over her shoulder, the other held carefully by a perfectly poised hand. Nearly all the advertisements in this neighborhood used sexually provocative imagery as part of their marketing- though this example was rather egregious, it wasn’t out of place among the sexy ladies selling alcohol and chemical skincare products. But the woman on the blue holoscreen didn’t look like she was advertising something- she wasn’t featuring any product. It almost looked like the product being advertised was the woman herself.

When Ishtar read the name of the company, printed in pale text close to the woman’s face, she realized her assumption had been correct.

SIN Pleasure Labs presents: The LoveLike model 7.1

LoveLikes. Of course, it was an advertisement for LoveLikes. In addition to the surveillance drones that patrolled the city, the SIN Conglomerate operated what they called ‘Pleasure Labs’- robotics teams that catered not to the prying interests of the government, but to capitalize off the human taste. The principal product of those labs were LoveLikes- androids designed only for the purpose of imitating human life. They were supposed to be companions- for the most lonely and depraved, who couldn’t get affection from others and thus had to buy it. They were supposed to be a fantasy- customizable from the thickness of their acrylic hair follicles to the length of their artificial toenails. They were supposed to be human, but better.

Ishtar found them utterly revolting. She gazed up into the advertisement, into the artificial woman’s artificial eyes, with newfound resentment- with newfound fear. This was not the image of a woman she was beholding- not flesh and blood and feelings, but wires and programming and artifice. The woman in the advertisement, despite how beautiful she was, was no more human than the heating units and cleaning modules Ishtar fixed up for Taha.

The traffic was starting up again. Ishtar gave the artificial woman one last glance, and followed it.

Ishtar parked her hoverbike in the great, sprawling underground garage underneath Nova Estrellas Shopping Mall, on the lower level reserved for employees of the mall’s various outlets. She scanned her wrist, and its embedded ID chip, at the turnstiles, and was correctly identified as a mall employee. She got on the lift to work, and ascended.

Taha’s mechanic shop- named, creatively ‘Electronic Repair Plus’- was on the third and highest floor of the mall, in the furthest corner from lift from the garage. Ishtar spent an eternity in the still, buzzing elevation of the lift, and another wading through the crowds of customers as she made her way to the shop. The mall owners blared trashy, repetitive pop music throughout all hours of the day, which mingled awkwardly with the music vendors played in their own shops. Though Ishtar kept her ventilation mask on as she traveled indoors, she could smell the rubbery plasticity of the cheaply manufactured electronics and the sweet, savory smell of the open food court. It was when she could smell the stench of welded metal and grease did she know she’d made it to Taha’s shop.

Instead of going through the spotless, bright customer entrance, Ishtar slipped through a side door labeled ‘employees only’, going straight to her workshop in the back. Taha was assisting customers in the front, what looked to be a teen girl and her father, and she didn’t want to get in the way. For the three years she’d been an employee of Taha’s, this had been their arrangement- he dealt with all the rowdy, frustrated customers and the intricacies of their wants and budgets, and she dealt with the far simpler technical and mechanical repairs their electronics needed. Why anyone ever thought people were easier to understand than machines, Ishtar would never understand.

In the privacy of her workshop, Ishtar finally pulled off her respirator mask, placing it safely in her bag and exchanging it for a black apron that hid its grease stains in its dark color. She shed her biking jacket and replaced her road gloves with hardier, dirtier work ones. She pushed her hair out of her face. She deposited the delivery with a pile of other boxes Taha hadn’t bothered to yell at her for yet.

“Please, Papa, I need it for the trip to San Angelo!” The customer girl was pleading to her father. “I can’t be the only girl on the trip without a Stanley Fridglet! And Bessica already got the Summer Vibes collection!”

Taha let out an exasperated sigh. “Ma’am, I’m sure we’ll be able to fix it in time for your vaca-”

“Darling, calm down.” The father interrupted. He turned back to Taha. “You will have this fixed in time for my daughter’s spring break. Otherwise, I expect a full refund.”

Ishtar knew Taha only took a rather measly security deposit before repairs, and only received payment once repairs had been completed and the device had been returned, as Neo Vegas laws strictly outlined. “Of course,” The shopkeeper replied mechanically. He glanced behind his shoulder, finally noticing Ishtar’s arrival. “Like I said before, my mechanic is very good. Speaking of, I think she’s finally arrived.

Before either customer could reply, Taha swiftly closed the shop’s privacy screen, shielding the customers from the conversation inside the workshop. It covered the vendor window in a glossy transparent blue- a holograph made to look gelatinous second and obscure sightlines first. Taha spun on his heel, and faced Ishtar with a stern expression.

“You’re twenty minutes late.”

Taha was a gruff man- with tan-brown skin and dark wavy hair. He stood just a few inches below Ishtar, and had a portly, built figure. He put more effort into his appearance than anyone else she knew, though she didn’t quite understand the look he was going for. Taha exclusively wore three-piece suits in glistening, glittering jewel tones, and clipped back his dreadlocks with a solid-gold clip. He wore costume-jewelry earrings, faux-leather dress shoes, and a bright smile (at least when facing his customers), all things that seemed ill-suited for the business he operated.

Ishtar rolled her eyes, and gestured to the crate she’d just deposited with the other deliveries. “Well, I would’ve been here if you hadn’t sent me all the way to Sentena for mag-belts.” Mag-belts they didn’t even need for any current repairs.

“You know we can’t afford delivery!” Was Taha’s protest. He supplemented it with, “And cover your arm! No one needs to see your wiring!”

Though Ishtar could’ve easily protested that the cost of delivery could easily be offset by the productivity they’d gain by having her around more, she knew that would only set Taha off more, especially since he had a customer waiting. Instead, she tugged her right-hand glove to better cover her cybernetic hand. Though the discriminations she faced as a cyborg weren’t as bad as others had faced forty years ago, public perceptions were slow to change. Taha was of the belief that having a visible cyborg on staff, as his chief (and only) mechanic no less, would dissuade customers. So Ishtar hid her prosthetic leg, and the cybernetic arm that was far more difficult to disguise, and pretended to be someone she wasn’t. As if that hadn’t been the story of her life. “My bad.” She muttered, gazing at the floor.

Taha glanced her over once more, though Ishtar intentionally avoided his stern gaze, and scoffed. He gestured to the rack of crates that held all the still-uncompleted repairs. “You have work to get to. And I have customers.”

Her only acknowledgement a nod, Ishtar watched Taha return to the two customers he’d left waiting, and left to her own work. She pulled one of the crates from the repair rack- one that held someone’s broken AC module, and deposited it on her workbench.

Secluded from the sounds of Taha’s bargaining and the raucous noise of the mall, Ishtar could finally focus. She could abandon all pretense of identity, all expectations placed upon her. Machines didn’t care that she was a cyborg, or trans, or anything like that. She didn’t have to pretend. Like none other, she could get lost in the solace of gears and wiring and programming. In chips and motherboards.

She only wished people were as easy to figure out as the machines she repaired.

chapter 2

Ishtar worked silently for hours, her shift at Taha’s shop passing in the minutia of her work- loosen a screw, rewire a control panel, grease a rusted joint, replace a faulty part, tighten a screw. She focused so deeply on her work, the nerves and fear previously plaguing her seemed to melt into repetitive motion, repetitive thought.

Though Taha continued assisting customers, Ishtar was able to ignore his boisterous bargaining, only ever looking up to her manager when he deposited another project needing her attention by her desk.

She did not mind the constant drone of Taha’s negotiations, or the buzzing of the air conditioning unit that hummed too close to her workspace and always made the entire workshop colder than the desert night. She did not mind the fluorescent light beaming down on her, washing out her tan skin in an ugly greenish-blue. She did not mind the long hours or the night shifts.

Ishtar knew she was lucky to work for Taha. Despite his prejudices, he was better to her than others would be. He paid her a fair wage- something almost impossible to come by as a mechanic in Neo Vegas- and treated her with basic respect. He left her alone while she worked- she suspected out of fear his interference would make her less of a skilled mechanic- and only assigned her as much work as he knew she could handle. The conditions weren’t ideal- the hours were long, the work was never ending, and Taha was hardly the most easy-going man to work for, but it was a far better opportunity than others she could find. Working for Taha paid her rent, and that was really all she could ask for. She’d take what was offered to her. She’d work that grueling night shift, under burning fluorescent light, when the alternative was poverty.

Halfway into the night shift, when she’d since completed five separate repairs and already taken one of the two ten-minute breaks Taha allowed her per six-hour shift, Ishtar was working on repairing an electric toaster oven, that was allegedly having difficulty processing the owner’s verbal commands of how toasted they’d like that morning’s bagels. It was a simple fix- most likely an issue with the toaster’s microphone, and she likely wouldn’t have to send it to her software guy. Taha never liked it when she had to outsource repairs. He had been attempting to convince her to sharpen her coding skills since the moment he’d hired her.

As the evening waned into night, Taha’s stream of customers steadily depleted, and he eventually closed the storefront and left for the night, leaving Ishtar to complete her repairs on her own. The mall switched from its harsh, fluorescent day lights to the dimmer, neon-blue night lighting, and though the large halls venerating consumerism were desolate, they were far from empty. The dark halls were filled with everyone from junkies, to squatters, to especially daring, stupid teenagers. They didn’t bother Ishtar, though, and she didn’t bother them. Safe in her workshop, she could focus solely on her own work. The cover of night was the equalizer of them all. They all had the potential to be dangerous to each other, and so they were all wary.

The static consistency of the night was cut like a knife through butter by the unmistakable presence of an interloper. In the shelter of her workshop, Ishtar at first did not notice the strangers, but as soon as she did, she knew they didn’t belong.

It was a formation of four figures, walking in pairs of two. Even from a distance, they stood out among the regular night-dwellers of the mall. They wore crisp, uniform white coats that reached to their knees and reflected an oil-spill, holographic rainbow in the neon glow of the late-night mall. Though she couldn’t tell at first, as they neared Ishtar realized they were all wearing masks- not the partial-coverage respiratory masks that were essential for comfortable life in Neo Vegas’s smoggy streets, but full-face, pure white dome masks, covering the entire face in a cold sheen. Ishtar wondered how someone could see out of something like that, and realized too late they were approaching her shop.

Only when they entered the harsh white light, the cleanliness that so closely mirrored the state of their uniforms, did Ishtar begin to fear. She glanced over the figures for any recognizable symbol- a logo, a color, anything. There wasn’t much- these weren’t SIN police in their black-and-navy uniforms, with their halo badges. The only thing she could find was a simple insignia embroidered onto each figure’s breast pocket, in thread so light it was barely distinguishable from the slick, shiny material of the coats. The symbol was simple- sparse, even. It was a closed eye- little more than a horizontal, down-curving line.

In closer quarters, Ishtar realized why the figures had taken the formation they did. In between their ranks floated a long, black box- supported by hover-modules at each corner. The box was roughly the length and width of a person, almost like a coffin. Did it hold a body? Was the coffin for her? She hadn’t done anything to justify someone sending hired guns after her, at least that she could remember, but that didn’t eliminate the possibility. Wondering caused bile to rise in Ishtar’s throat. She met the steely gaze of the figures, but did not move from the security of her workspace.

Abruptly, one of the figures- the one on the front left- moved forward, pulling something out of their pocket. Reflexively, Ishtar reached for her wrench- maybe, she could use it as a weapon- but the masked figure only held a small holographic projection disk. Ishtar relaxed, but only slightly, as the disk flickered on and projected into existence the blue-tinted image of another masked figure. Though they wore the same white-dome mask as the figures physically in front of Ishtar, they lacked the hood the others had, revealing ears decorated in angular jewelry and coily hair cropped close to the skull. Above them floated the same closed eye insignia that the figures wore on their coat, now far easier to see.

“Ishtar Solus,” the holograph said, the masked person’s natural voice being filtered through a voice modulator that nearly made the words incomprehensible, “I am operative 4N63L, Sect 07 of the Institute of the EYE. Our institution is in need of your services. Approach.”

Ishtar kept her grip tight around her wrench, though it remained at her side. Operative? Institute? The words were spoken too quickly for her to really comprehend them, though she was sure she hadn’t ever heard of an ‘Institute of the EYE’ before. Tentatively, she backed further into the workshop. She kept her gaze on the figure with the hologram disk.“What’s going on? Who are you? What do you want from me?”

The holograph figure inclined their head slightly to the side, and muttered simply, tiredly, “Apprehend her.” That surprised Ishtar more than anything- she had thought the message was pre recorded. There was no transmission symbol like she’d seen on any other two-way broadcast. Whoever was behind that mask, was getting a live feed of her.

Before Ishtar could react- by shouting or running or fighting- the two cloaked figures on the right side of the floating coffin raced towards her, hurdling the dividing wall that in normal circumstances kept employees separate from customers. Ishtar screamed as they grabbed her by the shoulders, and tried to wrestle herself out of their grasp, but had no luck. They dragged her out of the employee entrance to the customer area, and held her in front of the holograph. Ishtar did not make eye contact with the floating image. She would not degrade herself in that way.

“It would do you well to comply with our requests, Ishtar Solus.”The holograph figure sneered. “We will not hesitate to show force if necessary. Though, if that is not enough of an incentive…”

The two figures still holding Ishtar by the shoulders abruptly spun her around, to where the forth was pulling a case out of their cloak. They opened it, and showed the inside to Ishtar.

Credits. Rows upon rows of them. Ishtar had never seen so much money- at least, not in cash, all lined up in a case like that. It would cover her rent for months- no, years. She would be able to replace her prosthesis. She would be able to leave Taha’s workshop. Hell, she might even be able to leave Neo Vegas entirely. When her captors spun her back to the holograph figure, she had a new question to demand of them.

“What do you want me to do?”

The holograph figure inclined their head slightly back, slightly to the right, and in the same motion the cloaked figure holding the holograph disk waved a free hand over the floating coffin, causing its dark exterior to fade into dim, transparent glass.

Beneath the glass was a woman- or, at least what Ishtar thought to be a woman. She had pointed features, eyes softly closed into sleeping crescents. Silver-platinum, silk-straight hair cascaded around her face, cropped to the shoulders and faded to blue at the tips. On each cheek were two moles, perfectly symmetrical to each other. Her skin was tan and olive toned, her nose a soft, subtle arch. Though only her face, neck, and shoulders were revealed to Ishtar, she could tell the woman wasn’t wearing much beneath the cover of the coffin lid- the gentle curve of her bosom cast delicate shadows across her chest in the low light. She was the most beautiful woman Ishtar had ever seen.

At least, that’s what she thought at first. What she thought until she realized how stupid she’d been.

It wasn’t a woman in that box. It was an android. It was a LoveLike.

All LoveLike units released after version 4.3 were marked with a simple, triangle shaped logo on the left side of their neck. This change had followed numerous lawsuits complaining that the androids were simply ‘too lifelike’, and their indistinction from humanity could get someone in serious trouble. The SIN conglomerate’s response was one simple marking- something discreet enough to be mistaken for a tattoo, yet recognizable enough it couldn’t be anything but a factory mark. Of course, it was a LoveLike. It was too perfect, too pristine. Ishtar cursed the flight of fancy that had overtaken her- she should’ve known better.

“This unit,” The holograph figure continued, “Is damaged beyond our repair capabilities at the EYE home base. We have come to enlist your services- and buy your silence- to repair it. The unit’s memory core has been compro-”

A scream pierced through both the holograph figure’s words and the bleak of the night. At first, Ishtar had thought in her panicked confusion that the voice had been hers, but it was too high, too shrill. No, the scream had come from the other side of the mall, from a pair of teens she had previously paid no mind to.

“Stop- get away from me- it’ll spread!” One was backing away from their shadowy alcove, into the neon blue light of the mall proper. She looked frantically around, but no one else was moving. “Help! Somebody help!”

Ishtar was frozen, with her captors around her. No one dared to move, but the girl stumbling away from her companion. Despite her efforts, her friend was following.

He stumbled into the blue light in a drunken haze- at least, from where Ishtar was, he seemed drunk. The blue light illuminated the dark circles under his eyes, the reflective quality of his leather vest, the dark sores on his forearms. Ishtar realized something terrible at the same time the girl announced it.

“Marcille-” The boy begged.

“He has the plague!”

The blue plague. Accimalis. First recorded in rural Australian communities nearly twenty years ago, it had spread to nearly every reach of the world. Though Neo Vegas often purported its autonomous power within the American Confederation, their government could do little to stop the spread of the disease. The plague was airborne- highly contagious, it clung to one’s clothes, to their sweat. It was a death sentence. And the first symptoms to manifest were dark, bruise-like sores on the upper extremities.

Ishtar had been here before, if not in a few years. She knew too well what happened when there was a plague outbreak at the mall. The alarm would be rung. The paramedics would arrive, and escort the patient away. His companions would be, too- in separate ambulances. If they weren’t already infected, they’d want to keep them that way. The mall would be put on lockdown- no one would be let in, or out, til they had cleared every breathing body in the building for Accimalis negativity. Anyone with even the slightest possibility of having the disease would be sent to the quarantines. The last time this had happened, Ishtar and Taha had been stuck in the mall for over four hours.

But Taha wasn’t here this time. And Ishtar was among different company.

It took until the moment the shrill, droning fire alarm was rung for the white-cloaked figures to react to the cries of plague. The ones holding Ishtar released her- less letting her go, and more throwing her towards the hover-coffin. The hologram projection closed out, though not before one final message: “You have been instructed.” In a flash of white movement, the cloaked figures resumed their square formation and disappeared into the night, leaving Ishtar alone with only an android in a coffin, and a quest to fix it.

chapter 3

After the last time plague had broken out at the Nova Estrellas Shopping Mall, after she and Taha had spent four hours going through testing and lockdown procedures, Ishtar had devised never again to go through such procedures. On one of her off days, she drove her hoverbike up to the mall and spent hours wandering through the complex’s old underground maintenance tunnels, until she found a way out. She had never intended to actually use her subterranean escape route- it had been a way to relieve her anxieties, more than anything- but now, she was glad she had it.

Beyond the bright security of Taha’s shop, the alarm rang- a blaring, droning siren accompanied by swirling red lights that contrasted harshly with the cool blues of the mall’s regular nighttime lighting. Above the wailing siren, Ishtar could barely hear the wailing of the infected boy’s partner, and the panicked cries of the other mall goers. The white-cloaked figures that had arrived before her were nowhere to be seen- they’d disappeared into the night in a fraction of the time it’d taken them to appear. The only thing they’d left was the asset they’d delivered.

The coffin was about as long as Ishtar was tall, and could’ve easily held an average-sized person. It didn’t- the android it did hold was hidden under a layer of holo-glass, now dimmed out to hide the box’s occupant. It hovered at her waist height, and there were steel rails on the sides to assist in its movement. Tentatively, Ishtar took hold of the rail and found she had no trouble pushing and pulling the coffin- perhaps, the formation of four had been only for show.

The authorities would arrive at the mall in only a few minutes, and they wouldn’t let anyone out of the mall until they’d screened everyone for plague. They certainly wouldn’t let a rogue android out without asking a few questions, questions Ishtar couldn’t provide answers to. Whoever this ‘Institute of the EYE’ was, she got the feeling they didn’t want anyone knowing where their android was, much less the government. And Ishtar couldn’t wager their wrath- not delivering on her promise could easily cost her her life, whether it be through assasination or extortion.

She had to get out, she had to do it fast, and she had to do it without grabbing anyone’s attention. The last one was the hardest- with all the commotion of the white-cloaked figures, all eyes that weren’t on the plague victim were most definitely on her shop. Still, Ishtar shut off all the store’s lights, even the neon sign Taha insisted on leaving up even when the shop wasn’t open. Maybe, people would forget she’d even been there in the first place.

Ishtar wrapped both her hands around the coffin’s steel handles, and, in the pitch dark she’d cast herself into, began dragging it towards the shop’s employee entrance. There, she could access the backrooms of the mall, and a lift to the maintenance tunnels. That was her best shot of getting out- under the cover of night, in tunnels no one was supposed to be in at this time of night, she could make her escape. She wouldn’t be able to retrieve her hoverbike, but right now that didn’t matter. It would be safe in the garage, at least overnight. Her life was far more valuable.

The maintenance tunnels were far better lit than the upper levels of the mall- cast in fluorescent white instead of neon blues and reds. The harsh light illuminated their grime- the rough concrete walls, the location indicators in need of a fresh paint job, the layer of muck permanently caked into the tunnels’ matted carpet floor. But they were far emptier than the surface, and the emergency responders wouldn’t think to look through them. Barely anyone knew that they were there, unless they needed to know.

Ishtar moved diligently and deliberately through the tunnels, trying to stay light on her fight while also avoiding stalling. The coffin made her trip all that more difficult- though its hovertreads made it somewhat easy to move, it was still cumbersome and awkward, clearly not meant to be delicately maneuvered.

She had to carefully check every corner, every hall she turned into, for the dark, prying eye of the security cameras. While she was certain no one was watching them now- any camera-watching security officer was surely quarantined with the rest of the midnight mall goers, she couldn’t risk the footage being examined again later. It was standard protocol when moving through the tunnels, android coffin or not. If you were somewhere you weren’t supposed to be, you avoided those watching you.

The tunnels were deadly silent- the only sounds filling the air were the whirring of the decaying fluorescents, the humming of the coffin’s hovertreads, and the soft padding of Ishtar’s bootsteps on the carpeted floor. The unsilent silence, coupled with the sickly yellow tone of the aging lights, threatened to drive her mad. She trudged along with the coffin, wondering if maybe she should’ve remained at the surface with everyone else, if all her worries would have been for nothing. She thought of three excuses to why a mysterious LoveLike was in her possession (‘The dance club on the second floor was having me run maintenance on their bots’, ‘I’m installing mods for a client of mine’, and, of course, ‘I’m a mechanic, dealing with androids is my job’)

When Ishtar was about to give up and turn back, when she was certain she had made a wrong turn and her mouth was dry and her body weary, she paused, standing aside the coffin, one hand still on its handle.

She had heard a voice.

The portion of the tunnel she had stopped in was a long corridor, lined with doors. The rooms the doors led to, remnants of a past where these tunnels had been a survival bunker, had all been closed off years ago, when the new government had taken charge. Some of the gray-metal doors still held remnants of their original identifying signs, and some of those signs were still partially legible, but many were left bare, as empty as the cells they guarded.

The voice hadn’t come from the hall- there was no one but Ishtar and her coffin for as far as she could see, and she had quite a while to go till the next fork in her path. No, it had to have come from one of the doors. Ishtar couldn’t tell which- though she could still hear the inaudible, unmistakable droning of a human voice, it was too soft and too masked by the other hummings and whirrings that filled the hall. She couldn’t even tell if the voice was natural, or a recording or transmission.

The one thing she did know, though, was that she couldn’t stay put any longer. Not here, not with someone else potentially only steps from her. She might not be arrested for possession of covert spyware, or whatever the LoveLike’s purpose was, but she’d definitely be arrested for trespassing. She reworked her exit route in her brain, planted both hands on the coffin’s rail, and backtracked to where she could get back on route.

As Ishtar dragged the coffin along, she passed a nondescript door, differentiated only from its peers by the ghost of a sign reading ‘generator room’. She heard the voice again, in more clarity than before, and realized that this was here the voice was coming from.

“... the ADAH project. The chip has been implanted in the memory core of a LoveLike model…”

Ishtar only remained in place long enough to hear the slightest snippet of a conversation. She ran down the hall as quickly as she could without making too much noise. Whoever was having a conversation deep in the tunnels wouldn’t want to be interrupted by a stray mechanic, and they might even react worse than the police would. She couldn’t help but feel caught- the voice had mentioned a LoveLike, but surely, that had to be a coincidence! There were tens of thousands of LoveLikes in the city of Neo Vegas alone, and the chance that the unit the voice was talking about and the android in the hover-coffin by her side were the same were slim to none. Yet, it was a strange coincidence. An unnerving one. In all her life, Ishtar had never once even heard of LoveLike androids being used for any kind of covert purpose. And yet, tonight, she had heard of two.

Ishtar buried her doubts. Whatever the voice in the generator room was speaking of, it wasn’t her problem. Whatever the Institute of the Eye was doing with a LoveLike in a coffin, it wasn’t her problem. She would get home, she would do her job, and she’d be done with it all. She didn’t have the luxury of wonder. She didn’t need to know what was going on. Right now, all she needed was to get out of the tunnels.