‘Okay,’ the man said. ‘Yeah, okay. Thank you. Thanks very much.’ The smile returned. ‘I’m Sawyer, by the way.’

She gave him a polite nod. ‘I’m Eyas.’

‘Eyas. That suits you.’

‘No.’ She got to her feet and put her gloves back on. ‘It really doesn’t.’

Kip

‘Trust me,’ Ras said. ‘This is totally safe.’

Kip wasn’t so sure. His friend was smiling his usual smile, but he had a bunch of weird shit spread out on the floor between them – a patch scanner, some complicated cables, an info chip labelled ‘BIRTHDAY.’ All of it looked hand-hacked, and none of it was anything Ras had ever given any indication he knew how to use. ‘Where’d you get this stuff?’ Kip asked.

‘Mail drone. I had some creds saved up.’

‘Yeah, but from where?’

‘You remember that job I worked for M Aho—’

‘Not the creds. This . . . hackjob stuff.’

Ras lowered his voice, even though they were safe in his room. His mom had ears like you would not believe. ‘Have you heard of this feed called Picnic?’

‘No.’

‘It’s like . . . serious black market modder shit. Implants, code, ships even. You name it. Whatever you want, somebody there has it, or knows where to get it. And it’s totally off the map. You can’t find Picnic in public searches.’

Kip wasn’t super comfortable with the sound of that, but he didn’t want to look like a wuss. ‘So how’d you find it?’

‘Toby told me about it. It’s where his sister gets all the gear she needs to make smash.’

‘Wait, Una? She makes smash?’

‘Do you not know that? I thought everybody knew that. How do you think she bought her own skiff? Anyway, the supplier I got this from, xe told me—’

‘Who?’

‘What?’

‘Who’s the supplier?’

‘Just . . . you know, it’s anonymous, everybody’s got codenames and—’

Kip leaned forward. ‘Who?’

Ras cleared his throat. ‘Xe’s called fluffyfluffycake.’

‘Fluffyfluffycake.’

‘Xe really knows xyr shit, man, I’m telling you—’

‘You bought a hack kit from somebody called fluffyfluffycake.’

Ras rolled his eyes and pulled back his wristwrap, exposing the implant beneath. ‘Look, I already did me.’ He picked up the patch scanner – definitely hand-hacked, there were two different colours of casing fused together – and swiped it over his wrist. He turned the scanner screen toward Kip so he could read the ID data it had just pulled. ‘See?’

Kip read, blinked, raised his eyebrows. ‘Huh.’

‘Yeah, huh.’

‘And it’s . . . okay?’ Kip remembered the standard before, when the Newet had gone under quarantine because somebody came back from some neutral market with a bot virus – Marabunta, they called it. Hijacked your imubots and gave you seizures, then hopped to anybody you brushed your patch against, whether it was a hug or a handshake or a crowded transport car or whatever. Kip remembered seeing pictures of the victims on the news feeds – folks tied down in hospital beds, mouths strapped shut so they wouldn’t break their own teeth. Everybody’d been really freaked out. At school, they’d gotten a big long boring talk about how you should never, ever get unlicensed bots and you should never, ever go to an unlicensed clinic. He could hear that lecture playing dimly in the back of his head, but the reality of his friend sitting in front of him was much louder. ‘You feel okay?’ Kip asked.

‘Stars, I get us something awesome, and you turn into my mom. Yes, I feel fine. I did it yesterday before I asked you over. What, did you think I was gonna test it out on you first? C’mon, I’m not that much of an asshole.’

Kip’s pulse thudded in his ears. If Ras’d done it, and he was okay, and the hack hadn’t messed up his bots or anything, then . . . it was okay, right? He stared for a second, then pushed up his own wristwrap – blue and green triangle print, frayed around the edges. The one his dad had given him last Remembrance Day. ‘All right,’ he said.

Ras grinned. ‘Only takes a sec.’ He connected one end of the cable to Kip’s patch, then the other end to his scrib. He popped the info chip in an empty port and gestured at the screen. ‘You want to keep your actual birthday, yeah? Easier to remember.’

‘Yeah,’ Kip said. He shifted his weight as Ras worked. ‘What if somebody we know sees us?’

‘Well, if we’re not stupid about it, they won’t. We can go to one of the other districts and it’ll be fine.’ He waved his hand, and the scrib made a completed ding. ‘All right, let’s see what we got.’

‘That’s it?’ Kip asked.

‘That’s it,’ Ras said, picking up the scanner. ‘I told you, fluffycake knows xyr shit.’ He swiped the scanner over Kip’s wrist, gave a nod, then handed the scanner over.

Kip took it and looked down at the screen.

GC citizenship record:

ID #: 9836-745-112

GC designated name: Kristofer Madaki Emergency contact: Serafina Madaki, Alton Madaki Next of kin: Serafina Madaki, Alton Madaki Local name (if applicable): Kristofer (Kip) Madaki