April 09, 2076. 09:46 hours.

 Static. There was that static again, like an ancient analog television tuned to a long dead channel. For a while it was all I could sense. Was I dead? No. Not quite. I felt the life returning to my body, twitching the tips of my fingers and putting the spark back in my muscles. My left arm felt a bit alien for some reason, something not quite right, but I couldn't focus on it just yet. That static...

I tried the neural channel, checking if  anyone was online. "I can't see anything. Somebody, anybody, report."

"Good to see the sedation is finally wearing off Luce'," Cutter said. He was in the room, standing off somewhere to my right. I started to become aware of my position relative to the Earth, the gentle tug of gravity pulling at my chest, not my back. I was suspended facing the floor. Arms to my sides, head in some kind of clamp. I could feel my toes now. Good.

The static started to fade, and my vision recalibrated. At least, that's the word I'd use. Colors came back to life slowly but surely; I was staring at the floor. Sterile white tiling.  

"Cutter?"

"Yeah I'm here. You gave us all quite a scare back there, the docs pretty much had to rebuild your cybernetics. Some of your organs are artifical now too. And your left arm..."

I tried to move it. It seemed to be working, but what was this sensation of otherness?

"It's a prosthetic isn't it? Biosynthetic skin and pure machinery underneath, hardwired right into my nervous system." I said.

"Nothing gets past you." Cutter replied.

"How's it look?"

"Like your old arm. Amazing what they can do these days."

I tried to move, but Cutter cautioned me.

"Stay put for now. The docs still need to unhook you. You know you were severely malnourished? Said it looked like you hadn't eaten in two days when we brought you in. You really can't do that with the kind of enhancements you have..."

I chuckled. "I guess with all the excitement I never really got the chance. Did they have to crack my skull and replace my neural interface components?"

"Nah, no brain surgery."

"Well, at least that survived intact." I didn't mention the static, it seemed to be gone now, and in any case I'd never heard of a NI failure causing that. Maybe it was my own brain playing tricks on me.

"How's our patient? She awake?" I recognized the voice as chief Wade's.

"Yeah, we're just waiting on the doc now," Cutter said.

The doctor came in a few minutes later, and started to unhook the surgical rig positioned around my body. First the clamp came off, so I could move my head. I looked to Cutter and Wade. "I'm really sorry about that. I made a rookie mistake and nearly got us both killed."

"There was no way you could have known," Wade said. "We're just happy to have you back in one piece."

"How long have I been out?"

"About a week," Cutter said. "Docs had to keep you sedated while the rapid regeneration nanite solution repaired all the shrapnel and surgical wounds. Sure enough though, you look like your old self again."

I stared at Cutter for a moment. "Harlan."

"Yeah?"

"Thank you. For saving me back there, I mean."

In a few hours we were out of the maintenance hospital and back on our way to HQ. I played with my new arm, twisting and turning it this way and that, and getting a feel for how hard I'd need to pressure things. It seemed perfectly suited to me, the doctors had done a fine job.

"So, update me on the case." I said, eyeing the bright buildings sliding past the car window.

"It's closed." Cutter said. "After that suicide bombing, we came to the conclusion that this was a group of radical anti corporate individualists upset over the last election. The entire theft was probably just a ploy to lure out investigators so they could target us. We figure the parts are rotting somewhere in an Oldtown dumpster."

I turned back to Cutter with a snap. "What? Terrorists? Is that really what we're chalking this up to? Why would anti corporate individualists be upset over the election anyway? Clay won the presidency."

"Afraid that's all we're ever going to get."

"Did you ever manage to catch the second perpetrator? We could still be in danger. Aaron and Eva... Aaron and Eva! How are they?"

Cutter gave me a grim look, the kind of look that suggested bad news. "Eva will live. She's fine, actually, recovered completely. Aaron died on the table. There was nothing they could do, he went too quick."

I slammed my fist into the cars dashboard. "Damnit!"

"Luce' there was really nothing we could do."

"What about the other perp? Did you find him?"

"Never. Like Dunlap said, the guy is a ghost. There was nothing on the NSA database, nothing in Hexadyn's records. Nothing at all. He doesn't exist."

"This isn't right." I said. "What about the assassin that tried to take a hit out on me? What about the man following me? What was even in that head?" I looked to Wade, pleading with my eyes.

"I got permission to give you what I know about the contents of the head," Wade said. "But the case is still closed."

I stared at him, unblinking, curiosity nipping at the back of my mind.

Wade coughed, then explained. "The head contained a prototype NI chip, an AI assist model with far more capabilities than the standard SR-2 model that most people have wired to the back of their brains now. It's value is estimated in the millions, if not billions of dollars."

"Why the hell was it in Oldtown?"

"I wish I knew." Wade said. "It isn't our job to ask those kind of questions."

"The hell it isn't!"

"Luce'," Cutter interjected. "It's over. Now it's time to grieve. Aaron's funeral is tomorrow. Eva... she's really messed up over it. She needs us now."

I eased back down into my seat, fuming. Was this really it? Was I really followed, shot, and blown up for nothing? I calmed myself with slow, steady breaths. Eva would need us now. She'd need me. As we pulled into the garage below headquarters, I resolved to help her as best I could. But I resolved something else, too. I wasn't about to drop this case. I'd figure out what happened, even if I had to go it alone.