These headlines left Germaine pensive. “I remember the rush towards Kuiper, like—tales of gold clouds over the Cliff. Blood snow on Sedna…”

  “Mermaids on Makemake,” I ironically added.

  The tenant frowned, switching to another channel for her daily Dinner at Julia’s. “There were.” I snorted before finishing my carp. Retired sailors always came up with the craziest stories. “Darn cat! ’was there!” she insisted, hitting the bar with the remote’s tip. “I’ve seen what I’ve se—”

  “Excuse me, dear Madam.”

  One of the restaurant’s customers, a bald guy with wired glasses, just interrupted us. In his hands trembled F.A.B., for once mute. The poor fellow had his antenna all twisted and seemed terrified.

  “Goddamn! Can’t watch the telly in peace!” Germaine complained. She thanked her patron with a free plate of greasy cumin chapatis she picked up in the small fridge beneath the TV set, and turned to me: “What happened to yar flying tin can?”

  “Let me ask it.”

  Fortunately, F.A.B. pulled itself together and swiftly resumed its usual, infuriating self. “Annyeonghaseyo! Nigel Hemingwest, Auxiliary #MA-1-20XX-11—”

  “Hemingwest!” I immediately shouted as I pivoted around to glance at the still quiet room despite the sputtering AC.

  Germaine wiped her hands on her greasy apron. “Friend of yars?”

  “A scum of the worst kind,” I replied on the lookout.

  “I’d take dat as a yes.”

  I trusted Germaine with F.A.B. mostly as a pledge in advance of payment. I then headed straight to the terrace overlooking the water market, a swarming anarchic labyrinth. At my height, released from a hovering Techno-Police van, a howling cubic drone skimmed over the stalls and cloudy aquariums—a bad omen. When the winged spy rang over a mobile canteen, I witnessed a dozen federal agents in black armor suddenly coming out of the truck. Acting like one, they proceeded to arrest the defendant violently. Despite the fine-particle mask covering his long nose, I could recognize the deleterious bounty hunter Ali and I had expelled from Yggdrasil.

  “Here you are, Hemingwest. Let’s picture what those Techno-fascists are capturing you for!” Crawling on the red neon mermaid of Germaine’s restaurant, I managed to leap discreetly on the thrusters of the flying van. I climbed the side beacons to reach the rooftop as the vehicle subsequently began its descent into the market. Glancing through the roof grate before the police escorted Hemingwest to the backdoors, guess who I found inside? “Ali! What on Mars are you doing here? Wait… are those handcuffs?”

  My turbulent partner—in leather boxer shorts and shackled from head to toe—was sitting alone on one of the van’s side benches. Her face and breasts were covered with shiny glitter. “Sup, Lee?” she said, high as a weather drone. “The cuffs? No, I had them before the pigs came at me… I guess.”

  “What would your father—No. Wait! There are more important things!” I shouted from beyond the bars. “Hemingwest has also been apprehended by the feds!”

  She burped. “Lemming-wha—Oh! The hunter with the dick nose? Shit!” worried my human. “Do you think the feds know about Yggdrasil and Marcellàn? We’re like, over-mega fucked!”

  I shook my head. It was unlikely that anyone on the green station could have leaked the incident. Moreover, it was in Hemingwest’s own interest to keep his lips sealed.

  A couple of seconds later, the cops tossed the bounty hunter on the bench in front of Ali. He didn’t stop shouting at them: “Blue bastards! You should be locking up this unqualified street vendor! I almost scalded myself with his lassi at room temperature! Don’t your bureaucrats have some pompous regulation to cover that as well?” Discovering he wasn’t alone inside the vehicle, he remained silent for a moment. But, when he recognized my partner, both unleashed a flurry of insults. An officer finally quelled them with ranged tasers.

  The van noiselessly raced up the water market and its lighting blue lanterns which announced the upcoming night cycle. We then flew over the flamboyant Mandir Park, reaching the smoggy heart of the Central East District and its busy inner boulevard. Overhanging drab-colored ornamental pools, the huge Techno-Police department looked like an intimidating gopuram as it once existed on Earth.

  I tightly held on with my claws despite the speed of the vehicle. This wasn’t the time to be raving about Ceres’s architecture blackened by pollution. I had to get my sister out of this mess. And what a mess!

  On the dark tarmac awaited the overweight Ceres’s Techno-Governor and a group of assault robots looking like strong-armed sloths with buzzing electric shields. But most important, at their side, straight as an arrow, camped our esteemed Captain Yossef Braun Kamirov.

  My human, the first to emerge from the patrol wagon—a taser dart stuck in the middle of her forehead—appeared as surprised as I was; so stunned she loudly threw up on the governor’s feet. “Sorry ’bout that… not,” she mumbled, on all fours. Classic Ali.

  “Now that the two most unpredictable free electrons in the area are out of the way, we can continue our operations,” Braun told the politician. The latter inspected Hemingwest from head to toe and seemed highly displeased.

  “Operations? What right do you have to shackle a decorated auxiliary like me?” Hemingwest complained. “This is a downright flagrant breach of the agreement with both the Alliance and the Outer Worlds League! You’ll answer for this bloody felony, mark my words!”

  Leaving my hiding place on the roof, I noiselessly slipped under the van.

  Meanwhile, the MP stared at Hemingwest before silently turning back to Ali. An officer threw a fluorescent green isothermal blanket on her shoulders. “I spoke too fast,” he pursued. “We’re missing a troublemaker…” I purred. I meant me. I was the troublemaker. “But it doesn’t matter. He’s not the most essential element.” Strange. Rasputin must have been talking about someone else. But who?

  “You’re both here for the Data Maiden, am I right?” the Techno-Governor asked, as far from my partner as she could.

  My brain froze. The Maiden in town? I could feel Ali’s blood boiling from here. Small puffs of steam would promptly escape from her green blanket. With all the synthetic drugs running in her veins, my associate could become a highly radioactive fire hazard.

  We had no clue the androgynous thief had landed on Ceres. Regardless, Braun wasn’t interested in hearing a word and decided to toss the two bounty hunters into solitary confinement until the threat was averted. “And if they try something, just buzz them again!” the Soviet concluded. The techno-statist rule of law, ladies and gentlemen…

  The van took off shortly after the officers manhandled Ali into the federal building. Hemingwest also earned an extra jostling with lathi after spitting on the governor’s floral Carona and vomit-covered shoes.

  Show time! As soon as I could, I slipped discreetly into the nearest gutter, crawling towards the coolant vats. I didn’t want to let them out of my sight, but following Ali was inconceivable. Luckily, the vehicle raised some dust, revealing a poorly closed air vent. “Agent Whiskers on duty!” I whispered while I started humming the theme tune of Mission Impossible.

  Alas… by being too cocky, I exposed myself. Quickly grabbed by a metal clip on my neck, I yowled. My snatcher—a MK-S assault robot—stared at me with its four rotating eyes. It emitted a shrill whistle as it brought me closer to the identification module on its chest.

  “Namaste?” I meowed, my ears pressed back.

  The next minute I ended up in a sinister cage with two raccoons. Our destination was unequivocal: the wet market stalls of the neighboring district.

  I didn’t see the artificial light until the following day, when a merchant with rooster sauce-stained hands tried to catch one of my unfortunate companions. I bit him hard enough to draw blood before being half knocked unconscious with a broomstick. Vengeful, my captor grabbed me instead. I had saved this charming couple of trash pandas, but that was the end for me.

  “Lee?”

  My vision blurred, I couldn’t make out the features of the face in front of me. An argument in a language I didn’t understand ensued, and I was sprayed with frozen water. The thermal shock brought me back to life. I straightened on my four legs, arched back with a puffed-up tail; ready to fight again. “Remember the Alamo!”

  I was stopped by a scratch behind my left ear. “I thought you looked familiar…” someone spoke. It was the melodic voice of what seemed to be a young human, with short white hair and an onyx-hued complexion.

  I didn’t know that fellow, but I recognized the voice! “Meera!” I shouted. “Or should I say Zéphyr!”

  The androgynous thief put two hot fingers on my snout. I was tempted to bite them had they not been made of metal. “Be quiet, will you!” the Data Maiden uttered discreetly. “It’s a good thing I was in the neighborhood. What are you doing here?”

  I first pleaded for the release of my two companions, and we all jumped into a taxicab. Once inside, I advised the Maiden about the events that had almost seen me turn into a curry. I told her everything from Hemingwest to the hunt set up by Braun and the Techno-Police.

  “I understand,” she said, slamming the door of the taxicab that had just dropped us off downtown. “The Corps didn’t appreciate my break-in into Camp MacArthur’s archives.”

  “What did you steal from them to send Van Damme after you?”

  “Information!” she sang. “Lots of intelligence worth a lot of dollar-credits! But it’s already sold to a data broker in Callisto City and, therefore, ancient history. Besides—”

  “Data Maiden.”

  “Yes?”

  “I need you.” It felt like a wound made of words.

  I saw her lost in her thoughts. “Alright. Follow me.”

  She invited me to her hideout, a luxurious suite overhanging the Belt Exhibition Center, the Angkor Wat of Ceres City. From the patio, I overlooked the Techno-Police station, a real beehive of black vehicles coming and going, an architectural personification of the Martian Leviathan! Braun, that traitorous Soviet, had mobilized all the town’s forces to arrest the brokers’ agent and anyone who got in his way.

  “What brings you to Tianzhu? What did the belt have to offer you?” I asked, a cashmere paper cigarette on my lips.

  The Maiden had taken off her street clothes and set a Japanese silk robe over her shoulders. She was a beautiful enhanced human being for sure. Her full-metal epidermis should have cost more than a million dollar-credits. Strange thing. Under the lights, she appeared hazy

  The thief then joined me, a plate of masaladosa in hand. Turning her head, the cyborg pointed to the huge hazel pyramid-shaped cultural complex on the other side. “I came here for a specific auction… an interesting and precious trinket will be put up for sale in three days.” The epicene smiled at me and scratched my back, her white stare following the tops of buildings hidden in the smog. This latter formed a round-shaped cloud, trapped by the rotary ring offering artificial gravity to Ceres City. She finally said before withdrawing: “You should understand I have no intention of surrendering to the feds or the army, yeah?”

  I had drifted into silent reverie, lost in the gaze of this brown-tinged world. My thoughts tangled, torn between longing and disillusion. This chaotic, smog-choked station, teeming with life, felt more suffocating than even Titan ever could. I yearned for the vast emptiness of space… and for my partner. “I guess so. Then, what do we—” When I looked back at the cyborg, a different person had replaced her: a man with albino fur sparsely clad with silica implants. “—do?”

  The edgerunner smiled at me, revealing spiky yellow teeth before this new body steamed away, like a mirage. In his place stood a beautiful caramel-skinned woman with a gold ring at the columella. The black Sanskrit tattoos covering her skin converged between her meaty thighs. Soon after, a luxurious vermilion sari with orange embroidery was modeled around her naked waist and left shoulder.

  “Impressive holosuit…” I conceded. Holosuits were cutting-edge, R&D-level military-grade equipment. How did the Maiden get her hands on one? Was the Data Brokers’ Guild that powerful? “The smell might give you away. Even though you’re a cyborg.”

  “Remarkable device indeed, with a fair amount of perfume,” continued the androgynous cyborg while taking back her proper—yet still holographic—appearance. She grabbed her kimono on the floor. “But it consumes as much as a space destroyer. Its IR imprint radiates like a supernova.”

  “It’s odd to use it and display your original appearance.”

  “I agree. I need to get used to it. But I like the way I look—I mean, my original body. Besides, nobody knows me physically anyway. I can keep my original appearance as holo-default.”

  “Is it possible to configure it for invisibility?”

  “Theoretically, yes. But the process would require megabytes of information. I’ll fry on the spot.” Removing her mirror headgear, the cyborg settled on the comfy bed next to the two sleeping raccoons. The holosuit’s sleeve cautiously rolled up, she quietly plugged a portable projector into her hidden wrist computer. “I have a proposition for you,” she said. Her ivory eyes flicked, and a miniature reproduction of the auction hall appeared all around us in the room.

  A shiver ran down my spine, ignited by her idea. For the next two days, we meticulously planned our little show.

  “Will the limousine be waiting for us so we can leave directly for the police station? If only we could avoid a disaster like what happened in A Cat’s Afternoon.” I asked while the Maiden was getting ready in the bathroom.

  The thief came out wearing a flip lacquered haircut, heavy brown eyeliner and a rainbow leopard dress. The cyborg possessed the sassy attitude, fine features and voluptuous curves of a certain Ms. Virginia Griffith, a dubious Jovian hedge fund’s CEO. The real Griffith had been put into an artificial wired-sleep in an opium den as soon as her FID replicated.

  “After the robbery, I will opt for a more common appearance. And we will grab a taxicab,” she answered while regulating the last small bugs of the holographic costume. “Nobody would come to a police station in a limo. That would betray us.” So far, the disguise had a third flaw. The Maiden’s voice remained identical and bore no resemblance to the smoky timbre of Ms. Griffith. Her voice program didn’t run properly. She noticed this too but wanted to reassure me: “I’ll work on that. This virago doesn’t talk much anyway. And where we’re heading, it won’t be necessary to engage in conversation. The bourgeois judge each other from a distance so as not to transmit germs. The AIDS pandemic, you know…”

  Once we arrived at the Exhibit Center, everything went according to plan. In the arms of the cyborg, I could go through all the security checks with her. The holographic costume, much too rare to be detected, and the reproduction of the FID worked terrifically.

  The auction house was a modern amphitheater with pastoral tapestries. No rows of seats, but a succession of small lounges. Between them slowly strolled waiter-bots with a tray on the top of their metal skull, while dancers with glowering hair entertained the visitors during the different interludes.

  “It’s almost too easy!” the Maiden moaned, overlooking the place from a gallery.

  But she talked too fast. Shielded robots from the federal authorities were observing us. A second later, a human officer with a mullet, enormous Ray-Ban sunglasses and a black leather jacket was closing in.

  “Maiden?” I meowed.

  The data thief glanced at them. Carefully jacking in the closest outlet, her eyes sparkled again beyond her illusionary veil, signs that she was browsing an invisible interface and possibly hacking her way through the premise’s data core. Cameras, scanbots, police lines, candy vending machines… everything probably fell under her control.

  The sloth-like robots suddenly whistled. The cop stopped yet kept staring at us through the room’s cigarette smoke while taking out a bubblegum from his jacket’s left pocket. His mechanical guards chirped again, and he headed back to them.

  “Close call,” whispered the Maiden, heaving a sigh of relief.

  “What happened? Y—you did this?” I stuttered. “You’re scary!”

  “Keep your eyes peeled for now. We’ve been lucky so far, but in this city, fortune runs out fast. The Techno-Police is no joke.”

  After this little adrenaline rush, we headed to the ground level where several members of the Techno-Parliament greeted us from afar once. Just after, a gentleman wearing a green turban smiled at us before handing over his chair as close to the podium as possible where we found ourselves lost amid the crème de la crème of the welfare state’s mandarins. There, the art pieces were paraded in the arms of human lackeys. All we had to do was to wait until the Maiden’s objective was displayed before moving on to the next phase.

  “I did wonder if you would show up,” someone said behind us.

  The surprise guest took the chair to our right. What an unpleasant thrill to discover Linus Lao, his jade-eared partner in crime and his despicable little toilet paper dispensing pug.

  “Mr. Lao? Is the Emporium interested in old Soviet artifacts? You’ll be saddened to hear we got no cosmodons on sale anymore.” The Maiden’s jokes about giant Soviet robots fell flat while her acting left much to be desired. And for good reasons! They knew each other!

  “The data collected on the Danaë has been tempered. The security protocols were bypassed,” the Chinese man went on, furious.

  “Took you long enough to figure it out.”

  “You took a quiet peek, didn’t you? My contacts on Venus now question the veracity of the data.”

  “Your old Communist friends were born even before we invented the first processing unit. What do they know about security protocols?” the Maiden chuckled.

  “You have blundered. And I have come to warn you that I will not tolerate the slightest deviation this time.”