Vulture

If the chip comes out of my spine, I die. We were all taught this from the moment we could listen. If you take your chip out, you die. It’s simple. It’s for the survival of the human race. No one wants another pandemic, no one is going to take their chip out.

I sit on a real leather couch naked except for a gold heart-shaped locket resting between my collar bones. At my feet is the spandex suit that I had peeled off myself. I stare ahead towards a drone hovering in the air that is recording everything. My body shivers and my mind screams for me to wake up, for this to be a bad dream.

Behind the drone, I can just make out the silhouettes of three men. I can’t see their faces but I know one of them has to be the man that raped me moments ago while I was blindfolded.

“Please, begin,” says a deep croaky voice. I recognize the voice, but I don’t have time to figure out from where.

Don’t move, I tell myself.

I raise the scalpel I clutch in my hand up and over my head. I place the blade against the nape of my neck and freeze.

“Do it,” says the voice.

I apply pressure to the scalpel and feel it sink into my skin. I close my eyes trying to imagine being anywhere but here.

I open my eyes and it is morning again and I am lying in my sister’s bed in her apartment. I slowly shift my weight and look over my shoulder. Sleeping next to me naked is a beautiful woman. She is Theresa, the Slicker private detective that my mother and I hired to find my missing sister. I place my face into my sister’s pillow and groan.

I am a fucking horrible person.

“I think we are starting a tradition here,” says a silky voice.

I roll my head to the side and look into Theresa’s warm brown eyes.

“A very fucked up tradition where I call you drunk on the eve of the anniversary of Kira’s disappearance and then we have sex all night in her bed?”

Theresa frowns.

“It doesn’t have to be a tradition,” she says and places a hand on my hip, “it could…just be.”

To save me from responding, the room flickers. It flickers like my grandpa used to tell me that lights would flicker before the scorching. My sister’s king bed with a thick down blanket, Egyptian cotton sheets, and silk pillows turn into a green thin pad with a scratchy hole filled wool blanket and small brown stained pillows with no covers. The sunlit windows overlooking AR Central Park disappear leaving us in semi-darkness.

“Jesus,” says Theresa, “your sister really does live in a shit hole.”

There is a knock at the steel door. I roll out of the bed, stand, and look down at the green spandex bodysuit I wear which minutes before had been my curvy but toned avatar dressed in my sister’s silk pajamas.

“Not all of us have the luxury of living above ground, Slicker,” I say as I walk to the door.

“You do, lotto winner. You could live with me in the real world instead of this augmented underground.”

The room flickers again and as I reach for the door handle, the door transforms into a wood door and my feet feel the cold concrete turn into polished wood. There is no one outside the door. Lying on the ground is a small package.

The package says nothing except my name. I pick it up and quickly rip it open to find a piece of paper and a necklace box. I unfold the paper and gasp, immediately recognizing the handwriting.

“What is it?” Asks Theresa walking up behind me naked.

“It’s something from Kylie,” I say.

I hear an intake of breath and then Theresa grabs my arm and pulls me back into the room. She then steps around me and slams the door shut.

“Are you fucking crazy standing outside with something like that? A fucking Hunter is probably monitoring that hallway.”

“How did she get this to me?” I ask, still stunned by my friend’s handwriting.

Theresa rolls her eyes.

“It’s Kylie. She is a Trickster and her other Trickster friends probably hacked some poor Hunter prison guard’s chip to get this here.”

I roll my eyes back at Theresa.

“She isn’t a Trickster.”

“She was tried by Judge Smith for Christ’s sake. That man is a saint. There are half the prostitutes on the AR street as there were two years ago and most of those have jobs now because of him. You know how bad Kylie wanted to win the Arena. She would have done anything to win, just like your sister.”

I cringe.

“Sorry,” she says and takes a step towards me. I take a step back. “Kylie and Kira would have done anything to see the real New York and I may not completely understand, being a Slicker and all, but what Kylie got herself into…hacking chips…Jesus Saoirse, it almost sounds like a reason for the AI to scorch the earth again.”

I roll my eyes again.

“The AI would only do that if a pandemic reached the cities.”

“And maybe a person with a hacked chip could bring a virus to the city?”

“Well, good thing I am a Grounder.”

“Jesus, really Saoirse?”

I ignore her and read the letter.

Saoirse,

I cannot even begin to describe the prisoner I had to screw to get this necklace to you, so, you’re welcome. The necklace is the reason I am in prison. It’s proof of what happened to Kira. Remember the Tech client Kira told me she was meeting the night she disappeared? But then, trying to find that Tech was a dead end? Well, this Trickster client of mine he was in some kind of trouble with a Tech guy, he came to me one day in a panic saying he was a dead man. He begged me to hide something for him. That if I did, he could get me any swag I wanted. Of course I agreed.

I am not sorry that I took the necklace from him. Even if Judge Smith set me up to look like I was a Trickster myself. He fucking placed those dead girl’s chips in my apartment. I would do it all over again because I love Kira and I love you.

Love,

Kylie

Blood trickles down my neck as I pull the scalpel slowly upwards. Then, I yank the scalpel out of my neck and drop it.

“Now, take your chip out.”

Tears stream down my face.

“Please,” I whisper.

My arm reaches back behind my head. With two fingers I widen the cut on my neck and I can feel blood begin to gush down my back. With my other hand, I reach around my neck and feel within the cut. I gasp. There it is. Lodged in a metal slot in my spine is a chip. I pinch the chip between my thumb and forefinger.

Stop! I shout to my body but it doesn’t listen.

I yank the chip out of my spine and immediately all goes black.

What is death? To me, it seems like a replay of the most important moments of your life.

My sister and I laughing so hard as we come off the Snow White ride at AR-Disneyland. My sister racing me to the AR souvenir shop after the ride and begging my mother for the secret diary heart locket.

Me standing in the back of the courthouse as a deep croaky voice sentences my best friend to life in prison for confiscating and manipulating chips from the deceased.

Me tearing through Kira’s room looking for the metal dagger that fits into the heart of the locket Kylie mailed me. Me finding the dagger and placing it into the locket. Me watching as the heart projects a video from Kira’s point of view. She is at a party in a dimly lit bar. In the middle of the room is a platform where men sit around it drinking. On the platform stands a woman, her arms shake.

“Watch this,” says a man and he taps a computer pad. Immediately the woman begins to take her dress off.

The men shout and whistle at the woman.

“I will be right outside,” says a man’s voice to Kira. She turns to look at a balding man with two rotting front teeth.

“Remember, just do as your told and they will give you the best swag on the market.”

“Okay,” says Kira, her voice shaking.

“Have her cut her wrist,” says a deep croaky voice from outside the view of the camera. Kira turns back towards the platform and the heavy Judge Smith hands the naked woman a knife.

My eyes open before I relive the worst part of that video. Wait, my eyes fucking opened. I pulled my chip out and I am still alive. I lie on a bed with silk sheets. I have to be back somewhere in AR-New York, this is too luxurious to be the real bar where the party had been. I sit up and look around me. Hanging above the bed are leather ropes, harnesses, and handcuffs. I do not see a door. From somewhere outside the room, I can hear voices talking.

“Do you remember what happened last time a video of this got out?” Asks a hoarse voice. “I don’t think you are going to be able to frame a fucking hooker again to cover it up.”

“The video will only be for our most trusted clients,” responds a deep croaky voice, “and besides the loose end of that last hiccup is dead here in my room with the locket. I don’t make mistakes twice, I promise. Plus, I want to teach this girl a lesson.”

“She is dead.”

“So?”

Panic floods my body. Even though I have no chip in my head for them to manipulate, my hands begin to shake. As if willing me to live, my mind brings up another memory.

“Kira is the coolest,” eight-year-old Kira whispers as she holds the gold heart to her lips. There is the sound of a click and the heart opens.

Kira grins.

“See,” she says, “not only is it a recorder but it's a secret hiding place!”

I yank the locket off my neck, breaking the clasp, and bring the golden heart to my lips.

“Kira is the coolest,” I whisper. The heart clicks and then opens.

Tears fall down my cheeks because inside the heart is my sister. I gently clasp the small chip with my thumb and forefinger and pull it from the locket. A hidden door in the far wall begins to open. I quickly bring the chip to the cut at the base of my neck which is still dripping with blood and insert the chip into my spine.

Through the door walks Judge Smith, a greasy smile upon his face. When his eyes lock onto mine, his smile disappears.

“Christ,” he whispers, “I thought I killed you years ago.”

He doesn’t see me, Saoirse, but instead my sister’s avatar. On the left side of my vision is an image of a trunk. In my mind, I click on this and a list of all of Kira’s swag pops up. I click on the first thing I see. I am suddenly enveloped in large black vulture wings that move at my mind's command. The wings flap twice and I am hovering in the air above the bed.

“What do you want?” Judge Smith asks.

“Your life,” I say and then I dive for my sister’s killer.