I was halfway through my second glass of battery-acid whiskey, at least this whiskey is the same horrible in two dimensions—very comforting and a close reminder I'm still on Earth. Then the heavy steel door of The Catharsis Lounge groaned open.
A gust of damp alley air swept into the dim, ozone-scented room. I didn't look up. I was busy enjoying the utter silence from the bruised ego of my subconscious Alter.
But then a voice—a very familiar, nervously polite voice—spoke to the scarred bartender. "Excuse me. Do you have... um. Do you serve chamomile tea? Or maybe a mild stout?"
I froze, the shot glass halfway to my lips.
*Oh, the irony,* my Alter whispered, his voice dripping with sudden, resurrected delight. *You can hide from interdimensional monsters, but you cannot hide from bad networking.*
I slowly turned my head, keeping my chin tucked into the collar of my suit jacket.
"Maybe you're right, for once since your tormenting existence" I groaned looking to my left.
Standing three stools down, looking completely out of place in a bar full of glowing, weeping psychic time bombs, was Arthur. He was wearing the same grey middle-management suit from my ruined office. But he looked different. The twitch was gone. The heavy, suffocating bags under his eyes had lightened. For a man who had nearly exploded into a dual-fractured psychic nuke a few hours ago, he looked annoyingly well-rested.
I immediately slouched forward, staring intently at the bottom of my glass, projecting as much apathy as humanly possible.
*It won't work,* my Alter pointed out helpfully. *Your camouflage hides your emotional frequency from Egos. It does not make you literally invisible to a middle-aged man with 20/20 vision looking for a place to sit.*
Arthur turned his head. His eyes swept over the bar, landed on my rumpled grey suit, and widened to the size of dinner plates.
"Doctor?" Arthur gasped, practically knocking over a stool to get to me. "Doctor! It's you!"
"I don't know who you are," I said flatly, not looking up from my drink. "I am a figment of your imagination. Go away."
"I woke up in a pile of drywall," Arthur babbled, grabbing the edge of the bar next to me, completely ignoring my denial. "The anomaly task force was everywhere. I slipped out the back staircase. But Doctor... they're quiet."
I sighed, finally turning to look at him. "Who is quiet, Arthur?"
"The voices," he whispered, pressing a hand to his chest, tears welling in his eyes. "The Apex of Rage. The coward. For three years, they've been screaming in my head, fighting for control, burning my synapses. But ever since you... ever since you said those completely devastating, emotionally ruinous things to me... they're asleep. They merged. I feel... normal."
"Good for you," I said, tapping the bar for the bartender to bring the bottle back. "Consider it a pro-bono miracle. Now, please, leave me alone."
"But you don't understand!" Arthur insisted, leaning in closer. "Do you know what people would pay for this? The Guilds, the Corporate Warlords, the Elites—they spend millions on suppression drugs that barely work! You actually *fixed* me! You could be the richest man in Sector Four!"
I paused. My finger stopped tapping the wood.
*He has a point,* my Alter noted smoothly. *Monetizing their mental instability is a highly viable survival strategy.*
"Shut up and keep shut!" I yelled at my Alter.
I looked at Arthur. Then I looked at the crumpled five-dollar bill sitting next to my whiskey glass.
"Arthur," I said, my voice dropping into its smooth, clinical cadence. "I am not a miracle worker. I am a private contractor. And right now, my practice is closed. However, seeing as I completely rewired your shattered psyche and saved you from being eaten by a Freak or dissected by the government... I believe you owe me a co-pay."
Arthur blinked, then aggressively patted down his suit pockets. He pulled out a sleek, black metallic card and slapped it onto the sticky wood. "It's an un-traceable cred-stick. There's about five thousand units on there. It's all I have on me."
I smoothly slid the card off the bar and into my breast pocket, barely breaking eye contact.
"Your account is settled," I said, standing up and throwing the five-dollar bill at the bartender. "Do not follow me. Do not tell anyone what I look like. If you refer a friend to me, I will find your repressed mommy issues and drag them back out into the light. Are we clear?"
Arthur swallowed hard and nodded vigorously. "Crystal clear, Doctor."
I turned my collar up and walked toward the exit, pushing the heavy steel door open and stepping back out into the damp, grey afternoon. The transaction was perfect. I had capital. I had housing. I had a working theory on the monsters.
Things were finally looking up.
I turned down the alleyway, heading back toward the main avenue to find a place to spend Arthur's money.
But as I passed a row of rusted dumpsters, the hairs on the back of my neck stood up.
*Clack.*
A faint footstep echoed against the wet pavement.
I stopped. The alley went completely silent.
I started walking again, my cheap leather shoes scuffing the concrete.
*Clack.* It was perfectly in rhythm with my own stride, intentionally masked, but just heavy enough to betray the weight of whoever was making it.
*Someone is behind us,* my Alter whispered, his voice suddenly stripped of all its smugness. *And they aren't radiating an Ego. They are completely cold.*
"Talk about my shit hole luck" I said my mind as still as a murky, dirty bath water at a sleazy cheap motel.
I kept my eyes forward, my heart rate steady, refusing to break my apathy camouflage. If they weren't radiating an Ego, they weren't a typical citizen.
They were a professional.
I reached the end of the alley, turning the corner onto the crowded sidewalk, blending into the mass of suppression-heavy citizens. I glanced at the reflection in a darkened storefront window.
For a split second, I saw a tall, gaunt figure in a crisp black trench coat stepping out of The alleyway behind me, his rogue shadow stretching unnaturally long across the pavement.
The bloodhound from the café.
He hadn't been fooled. He had tracked the ghost.