In the final days of the twenty-first century, the experiment that was democracy had failed. Riven by internal disputes, the great states were dying, their cries going unheard as their leaders, their enemies, and their poor stupid citizens all struggled to have the last word.
As collapse of society threatened their investments, the wealthiest corporations stepped in. There would be stability, they said. There would be commerce. There would be peace. And having saved the world, they resumed their quest to pillage it for every dollar, dinar and Bitcoin, with no one to stop them.
There are no more nations. Strongmen and bandits hold wide swathes of dry, blasted land for as long as they pay tribute to the corpos. Peacekeeper drones rule the blackened skies, their judgments swift and absolute. Generations have been born and died having never seen sunlight.
This is the world into which Rachel has been cast. Or Kobalt, as she is now known, for using one’s real name is dangerous. A matrix of tattoos is etched upon her face to baffle the peacekeepers, and a spiderweb of scars reaches down the back of her neck, past the oversized Nu-vinyl jacket, to her arms and legs.
Kobalt is a Slider. Black-market gene docs boast that the corpos will crack the secrets of time travel any day, but those who have the means can afford a taste for no more than ten minutes at a time. She can’t remember a life before Chronal Blue first rushed into her veins, stretching seconds into hours, and hours back into seconds.
The same doctors have warned her that she should not Slide to excess, that the Blue takes a toll on the body with each use. Rumours persist of Sliders who, out of terror or bliss would glitch, caught in a moment until they burn out. Kobalt has not experienced a glitch before. She thinks of them as no more than an urban legend.
Hungry times have brought augments like her together, so that they may escape the eyes of the Peacekeepers. The leader of this Collective, Tremens, is a Ghost – this means he can cast his mind into the world of machines and move among them. His body is thin and atrophied, but his mind is sharp.
A Slider is useful to him, because if the worst happens, Kobalt can Reset. It is her most demanding feat, but with it she can return her party to the moment before disaster. Tremens’ plan is dangerous, but he is trusting Kobalt’s presence to draw other augments to his side.
For now, they gather in the alley behind a falsely-named watering hole (Falsely as here water can be sold only to an address, not a person). Tremens, Kobalt, and a Peeper named EyeintheSky who has agreed to join them. They need only one more.
Kobalt receives a notice through their local network. They have another request.
She gazes upon the most breathtaking woman she’s ever seen.
***
Rachel cleared her eyes. She’d been playing this game for more hours than she had counted, and her vision had started to blur from the laptop’s glow-in-the-dark apartment.
The new player’s avatar was striking – either painstaking designed in character creation, or at the cost of expensive downloadable content, she couldn’t tell. The giantess, nearly twice Kobalt’s height, waited, her muscular arms tensing beyond her sleeveless trench coat. A shock of chestnut hair, shaved on the sides, framed her long, broad-jawed face.
As she approached the party, her gait reveals what Rachel assumed to be high-heeled boots were in fact prosthetic legs ending in hooves to provide speed, strength… and incidentally, height.
She was definitely a Tactile, the game’s melee combat class. Her name was… Rachel snickered…
… SwoleCalibur.
Rachel had started playing this game a week before, taking advantage of a free trial membership. Let the masses have their zombies, Rachel had said to herself, cyberpunk had been her favourite apocalypse setting since she’d seen eXistenZ at an impressionable age (It had come out the same year as The Matrix and was sadly underrated).
A message popped up among Kobalt’s group: SwoleCalibur requests to join your Collective. Open Neuralink to SwoleCalibur?
EyeintheSky: could use a tank for this map
EyeintheSky: yes from mw
EyeintheSky: *me
Tremens04: i’ve tried pinging SC to open chat no reply
Rachel frowned. The Neuralink was the in-game chat function that party members could use among themselves only, but the open chat could be used by anyone. A new player might have some problems distinguishing the two – Rachel certainly had.
SLKobalt: noob?
Tremens04: maybe
Tremens04: could be a Whitehat
SLKobalt: ???
Tremens04: rumor from in-game lore
Tremens04: npc disguised as pc
Tremens04: Do not trust
She hadn’t heard of this game mechanic, and it fascinated her. Only in a cyberpunk world did you need to wonder if your fellow players were real, or just characters created by the game’s AI.
EyeintheSky: lol dumb
EyeintheSky: how do I even know if you’re reak
EyeintheSky: *real shit
EyeintheSky: yes, then VK this bitch
SLKobalt: yes
EyeintheSky was being coarse – and was clearly having trouble with his keyboard – but there were in-game methods for detecting programs disguised as characters. The Voight-Kamff test was the tried and true one – but it required all members of a Collective to admit the test subject first.
Tremens04: if this goes bad I’m blaming you
SLKobalt: be real what kind of ai comes up with swolecalibur?
Tremens04: yes
The risk was accepted, the new player jacked in. Every action taken in this setting sounded like a silly double entendre.
So how was she still getting wet?
***
SwoleCalibur strode toward the group, a cocky smile illuminating her face. From her high perch, she studied her new companions. Her eye drifted toward Kobalt.
“Hey, sugar.”
Kobalt twitched. It was uncommon for people to continue talking once they’d committed to a Neuralink. It was redundant – and for a people who’d grown up in a world shaped by corporate personhood and social media, it was a bit obscene.
She looked to her companions for guidance, unsure what warranted the special attention from the new member. Rachel’s screen didn’t do Swole’s presence justice, nor could it really impart the nearly tangible sense of confidence projected from within that massive frame.
Kobalt’s teeth chattered, clearly amusing the new member. Swole grinned easily, exposing a mouth of wide teeth.
“Nothing to say, little filly?” She pressed her thumb against Kobalt’s chin and moved it experimentally. Her touch was light, but the strength behind it was unmistakable.
SLKobalt: Hot
SLKobalt: Share your crafting with me?
Swole didn’t react to the Neuralink.
SLKobalt: Share your inventory with me?
SLKobalt: Share your spit with me?
EyeintheSky: gay
Maybe a little, Kobalt admitted. And so what if she had a crush? Most inhabitants of this world only came from simulations or stimulants.
Swole tapped the side of her head. “I figure you’re trying to get in here, but this is a closed box. No Neuralink installed. I can’t tell what you’re saying.” She turned to Kobalt, “Except you, because it’s written all over your face.”
Kobalt blushed and turned around – and the moment she did, a huge hand swung around and smashed into the seat of her pants, nearly toppling her over.
Swole winked.
***
A dozen questions flooded Rachel’s mind. Who was this player? Why were they playing without the Neuralink enabled? How were they playing without the Neuralink enabled? But most of all…
“Wait, you can spank people in this game?”
***
The heist, as Tremens described it, sounded easy enough, but it required precise timing. The security at the facility they had chosen to liberate was a mix of drones and organic corpo staff, determined at random by an algorithm. A team of Tactiles would have to barge in and accept the consequences, but this Collective had other, more subtle options.
EyeintheSky would scout ahead, marking where patrols were taking place. At the same time, Tremens would deactivate or redirect the drones to clear a path for the “speed team” of Kobalt and Swole to swoop in and grab the target before the security could react.
It was a good plan. It also meant that Kobalt and Swole were left waiting outside by themselves while their teammates executed the more delicate aspects.
Tremens04: sky will upload the map once the floor is clear
Tremens04: kobalt relay to SC plz
Tremens04: keep your head in the game
Tremens04: you can ride SC later 😉
SLKobalt: of course of course
Kobalt paced in the rain-soaked streets outside the building. In the largest of the acid puddles, she could see Swole, singly focused, lean into a sprinter’s crouch. The large woman’s muscles tightened, her veins running with adrenaline the way Kobalt’s were thick with Blue.
Minutes passed.
“Race you to the target,” offered Swole, breaking the silence.
Kobalt laughed louder than she should. “You’d lose that one.”
She brushed her choppy hair aside to reveal the feed tube behind her right ear. Swole’s smile faded.
“Oh. You’re one of those.”
Kobalt blanched. Without a Neuralink, Swole hadn’t been able to see her Augment profile; she only knew that Kobalt was fast, not that she was a Slider. And she clearly didn’t have a high opinion of Sliders.
Maybe Kobalt could change that.
“I’ll take that bet,” she said, leaning in toward her hunched partner. “Giddyup.”
With as much force as she dared, she slapped Swole in the haunches. It was like striking iron. Swole didn’t even react. Kobalt’s palm stung, but she didn’t like being ignored. She drew back again—
Before she knew what had happened, Swole had grabbed her wrist and pulled her against Swole’s own giant frame. Kobalt twisted, but she was pinned tight between the Tactile’s chest and arm. And Swole still had one arm free.
Kobalt felt Swole’s fingertips slither across her thigh. It tickled. Kobalt gasped.
“Nod if you want me to keep going.”
She did, and Swole’s touch drifted teasingly upward. Though each phalange was nearly as thick and calloused as Kobalt’s entire arm, her touch was gentle. The tingle she felt was… incomparable. Not even Blue could make her feel like that.
Those same fingers drew their way to where Kobalt’s legs met. The crotch of her pants was damp, and Swole pressed a hand into that dampness, a single digit tracing the folds of Kobalt’s nether regions.
“We’re on a mission,” Kobalt panted.
“Do you want me to stop?”
“No…”
“Too bad. I don’t stick it in junkies.”
Swole released her suddenly, and Kobalt landed in a heap on the pavement. The hunger she’d felt a moment ago mixed with pain and humiliation, and became something for which there was only one cure.
She hit the dispenser on her forearm for fifty mils. The Blue poured into her in an instant, lighting up the scars along her limbs with an azure glow. Swole’s movement slowed to a crawl as Kobalt’s senses kicked into overdrive.
She threw a punch to Swole’s neck, then to her collarbone, each time meeting resistance with no sign of injury. Undeterred, she rolled back and turned that momentum into a spinning kick—
A colossal hand snapped tight around her ankle. She hadn’t even seen Swole move.
Eighty mils. With the same speed as she’d been grabbed, she was freed from Swole’s grasp, the giant woman moving in reverse. A two-second rewind should do it. Kobalt threw the same two punches, avoided Swole’s counterstrike, and this time aimed her kick at Swole’s ankle.
For most organic combatants, it would have been a crippling move. But Swole’s prosthetics had been designed to move a hundred and fifty kilos at high speed without breaking – and they didn’t. Instead, Swole swung her leg out to the side, tripping Kobalt as her momentum was still carrying her.
Kobalt tumbled through the air in slow motion, gritting her teeth in anticipation of meeting the ground again. It never came.
She found herself dangling from the end of Swole’s beefy reach. The Tactile had literally caught her by the seat of her pants. She took a fruitless swing, accomplishing nothing save amusing her captor.
“Nice try. But I’m the stallion here.”
Swole dropped to one knee and tossed Kobalt over the other as if she weighed nothing. The fighter’s thigh was a girder, whether flesh or metal. Kobalt struggled for purchase, her hands and feet both dangling precious centimeters from the ground. All she needed to do was break free…
The thought left her as Swole’s hand met her backside with the force of a hurricane. The impact rocked her forward, but Swole’s unbreakable grip kept her from falling.
Rachel was no stranger to a spanking. But not was this Kobalt’s first experience, but it was coming at the hands of a three-meter, genetically enhanced Amazon. As Swole’s hand fell again upon the seat of her pants, Kobalt screamed.
Her hand reached out in reflex to her dispenser. A hundred mils. Rewind.
“Nice try. But I’m the stallion here.”
Swole dropped to one knee and tossed Kobalt over the other as if she weighed nothing. The fighter’s thigh was a girder, whether flesh or metal. Kobalt struggled for purchase, her hands and feet both dangling precious centimeters from the ground.
As Swole’s palm struck her again, Kobalt realized that her bottom was still on fire from the spanking she’d just escaped. The new slap only fed that blaze, and Kobalt’s attempt to break Swole’s grip descended into crying and futile kicking as the blows continued to rain down hard and fast.
Howling, Kobalt barely managed to reach her dispenser again. A hundred and fifty mils. Rewind.
“Nice try. But I’m the stallion here.”
Swole dropped to one knee and tossed Kobalt over the other as if she weighed nothing. The fighter’s thigh was a girder, whether flesh or metal.
Two hundred mils, damn the cost. Rewind.
“Nice try. But I’m the stallion here.”
EyeintheSky: ur vjear
EyeintheSky: *clear
Tremens04: kobalt need support now
Tremens04: help
SwoleCalibur: NOT YET WE’RE BUSY
Kobalt froze. Swole did too.
“Shit.”
It was just enough of an opening. Kobalt kicked again, this time not at Swole’s face but at the crook of her elbow. Swole grunted in pain and let go.
Kobalt rolled with the momentum, wincing as the ground pushed back against her braised backside. Now out of Swole’s grasp, she raised the arm with her dispenser. There wasn’t enough for a full Reset. Only one option remained.
Swole charged, and she hit the button.
***
Rachel snapped awake with a snort. Even though she was alone, she self-consciously pulled her hand out from under her waistband.
The map was clear. Kobalt stood idly by in the empty street, still outside the targeted corpo facility.
SLKobalt: went afk for a second
SLKobalt: where ru
No response came from the Neuralink. She noticed that SwoleCalibur was nowhere to be found, either. Had the other player left while Rachel was unresponsive? She pulled up the recent entries from the chat log.
Tremens04: kobalt need support now
Tremens04: help
EyeintheSky: wtf
EyeintheSky: SC just attached me
EyeintheSky: *attacjed
EyeintheSky: FUCK
EyeintheSky is offline
Tremens04: white hat
Tremens04: WHITE HAT
Tremens04: kobalt abort
Tremens04: where ru
Tremens04 is offline
The logs ended there. Kobalt had Slid past the end of the fight.
Rachel considered her options. She still had access to the game for another three days until the free period expired. She’d been enjoying it so far – she now felt she had a good grasp of the mechanics, she interacted well with (most) other players, and she’d hate to say goodbye to Kobalt.
And Tremens and Sky couldn’t stay mad at her forever. Right?
One thing was certain, Rachel decided. The next time she felt the “urge” – she was going to get off before she logged on.
