The Hollow Kings was a more powerful group than I had suspected. Unlike other groups on Itokawa, they operated in hiding, refusing to flaunt their power, meaning few knew much about them. The Extronet had barely anything for me to go on, although I did learn that their emblem was a skeleton king (supposedly). I didn't see any skeleton kings on display in the Hollow Kings abode, nor on their people.

  A random thug led me down a dark hallway, with the vamp walking by my side and thunderous James behind me. I was feeling a bit better now that I wasn't bound to a chair, and my head was starting to clear from the vampy's truth bite. I glanced over at her and was happy to see that her face was not horrifyingly distorted any more.

  "You will never see me nude," the vampire said, responding to my glance.

  "I’m really sorry about that," I replied. "It was the truth serum."

  But I realized that was a lame apology, so I tried again. "Look. Truth serum or not, it was inappropriate. I have a vague recollection of what I said, and if I said it, I'm thinking it."

  "I can play it back for you if you'd like."

  "No," I interjected. "I reviewed it and filed it to my gray matter, where I put my shameful deeds."

  The gray matter is what I call the foggy part of storage. Having a hybrid organic and digitized brain is tricky. The organic is constantly being digitized. I can remember everything, but the organic part feels more … real in some ways, so most of us try to lean on that for sake of Ashfield's Law of Authenticity.

  "So you're like, all gray matter then?" she joked.

  "I'd be ashamed to admit that," I quipped.

  I raised my right hand to my chest, briefly touching my sternum, and extended it outward toward the vampire like I was presenting a gift, daring to look her in the eyes. She was a vampire after all. "I apologize."

  She took her measure of me. "Forget about it."

  That was a powerful phrase. It implied that she would be fine if I completely erased the event from my memory. But I noticed she didn't say I was forgiven. That was fair. I'd have to earn forgiveness.

  "I'm @kittyboy, by the way," I said, extending my hand for a handshake.

  "I know," she said. She looked at my hand. "Don't do that."

  "Don't shake hands?" I clarified, raising an eyebrow. I mean, yes, that was a way to inject poisons, electrodes, you name it. That was why a handshake had more meaning these days. It showed both friendship and trust.

  "Yes. Not everyone is into shaking hands, making physical contact. It's too presumptuous."

  She was a bit snarky but didn't seem overly upset. Besides, she had a good point. I noted that. I don't get as much interaction with people as everyone else. All those years of mining crews and Wavepilot missions hadn't done my social skills any favors.

  "But biting is okay?" I laughed, teasing her.

  She smiled, showing her fangs. "I don't ask for permission. I bite what I like."

  "So you're a hypocrite."

  "Hardly," she snorted. "I show manners when it's appropriate to show manners. But I don't show manners when I don't want to show manners. That's not presumptuous. That's power and ego. I'm sure you can relate."

  I liked this vampire, I decided. She could bite me again if she wanted. I rubbed my neck where she had chomped down on me. The spot was sore and it stung. Or maybe not.

  We took a left, down another dark hall, finally entering a room kitted out for medical treatments. I saw my leather jacket crinkled in a bunch on one of the side tables. This must have been where they had treated my injuries. They sat me down on a rolling patient's bed, encompassed on the sides by the blinky machines that medical people use and an assortment of gadgets. A feeling was creeping up inside me, and I realized I was nervous. I wasn't used to medical treatment. I usually just got a brand new body.

  A dark-haired man entered the room, wearing dusty brown clothes like everyone else, but he had a long apron on with pockets in the front. He wore goggles, not like the cool ones that @shadowhacker wore, but they were nifty with glass ovals attached to a leather strap around his head. I had no doubt he could see heat signatures, flows of electricity, and organic material down through to my bones.

  I was feeling pretty good all things considered. I had bloody bite marks on my neck. I had a scabbing slash across my face from @horsehead. And I had my much destroyed back that the Hollow Kings had already bandaged. I didn't expect them to give me a new body, but I wasn't really sure what they could do for me. What I really needed, I thought, was a nap.

  "How do you feel about your arms?" James asked.

  That was an ominous question.

  "I like my arms," I said. "Very much."

  "Do you have any implants?" the doctor asked.

  The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  "Yes."

  "Let's see them. Take off your hoodie and shirt."

  I carefully stripped down to my waist. The doctor flicked a little disc on his goggles, holding my left arm out, as I recited my implant list. Pretty basic stuff. A display. A memoryshard slot. A gas emitter. A hacking qwire port. A holo projector.

  "Starmada tech," the doctor noted. "Vanquisher, right?"

  I nodded.

  "Good, but we've got better." He slid back in his rolly chair, reaching for the table behind him. He held up a mechanical cylinder with a hinge down the length so it opened up at the sides.

  "Pick an arm," the doctor instructed.

  I looked at James, who stood calmly to the side with a little smirk. I was worried because I hadn't seen him smirk like that.

  "Pick an arm," James echoed.

  I didn't know what to do, but I didn't feel like I had a choice. Maybe my mind was still a little fuzzy from the truth bite after all. I tried to be logical about it. I was right handed.

  "Left?" I said.

  And then that bastard doctor slapped the wristy thing on me.

  "Motherfucker!" I shouted.

  The device wrapped around my forearm, digging in deep. I could feel it, like the bite, but thousands of needles diving deep into my skin, sharp pain shooting out everywhere. I continued screaming as it worked its way down and pushed through into the bone.

  James likes to remind me of that all the time, that fucker. You have low pain tolerance, he says.

  I DO NOT!

  But damn that hurt. Once I was done screaming, I lifted my arm in front of me. It was almost like having a completely robotic arm, except it was just the forearm, and it was really just a mechanical overlay.

  "You'll be sore for about five weeks," the doctor said. "Here." He handed me an assortment of suckers. I picked the pineapple flavor. "See if you can unwrap it."

  What? See if I can unwrap it? What were they going to do if I couldn't? Cut my arm off?

  I gulped. Holding the pineapple sucker in my right hand, I carefully reached for the wrapper with my left and started to unwrap it. It seemed so foolish, but I was scared until I successfully removed the wrapper. It was clear that the only problem I had was that I was right-handed, not left.

  I popped it in my mouth with a satisfying sigh, trying to ignore the ongoing pain.

  "This is an Antebrachium Robotic Module," the doctor explained. "We've thought about fully robotic arms, but organic fingerprints are important. Besides, this isn't just mechanical. This is a synthetic hybrid of technology and biology, just like your body. The pain will subside soon. It needs access to your marrow and is configuring to your DNA."

  Antebrachium Robotic Module. ARM. Clever.

  "This is cool, but what happens if I die?" I asked.

  "Try not to die."

  I looked at James.

  "Try not to die," he repeated.

  I shrugged. "Okay, so what does it do?"

  "Don't ask me. Ask it. Once it's finished configuring, it will interface with the rest of your technology. Go ahead. Run a diagnostic when you're ready."

  I attempted one, but it was still configuring. I should have known that because the searing pain in my arm told me it was still hungry for my DNA. All I saw was the ARM as an added module where my old tech had been.

  "Why did you give me this? What's the catch?"

  James answered this time. "I don't necessarily buy that it's the Introverts, but based on what you told us, something new is coming. New is dangerous. In a contained place like Itokawa, a virus like that would wreak havoc. Look at what your little pillow fight did."

  He motioned, and a screen I hadn't noticed against the wall started showing the ongoing pillow fight. It had grown and was now out of the Garden District, sprawling into neighboring areas, a concentration forming around the technology districts of Tantalum and Gorilla.

  "People like pillow fights, I guess. Good for stress relief."

  "It's causing hundreds of thousands of qcoins in damage," James said. "Might look fun, but that'll cost us."

  He looked at the vampire. "You want to go, don't you?"

  "To the pillow fight?" she asked. "Of course."

  "See what I mean?" James said, and he turned to the vampire. "Go on. Get a few whacks in and then meet us at Port Iron."

  She smiled and disappeared down the dim hall. I barely caught a glimpse of her.

  "We have a lot of hiding places. If it reaches us," James continued, massaging his head again with that huge hand of his, "we'll know what to do. But if they're sourcing test subjects through our ports, which it sounds like is very much the case, then you better believe they'll want to come back here and clean up any trail they left."

  "Which means they may simply want to release the virus," I hypothesized, finishing his thought for him.

  "Exactly. And there are many ways to smuggle it onto Itokawa."

  I thought about that. Yes, everyone here needed to be ready. Itokawa would be a prime target and a perfect place to test the virus at scale. Most of the Extroverts and Introverts could care less about a neutral criminal world like this one. Itokawa was screwed unless we could stop the virus.

  "It will show up here," I said aloud.

  "We'll act accordingly," James declared.

  I spotted my new little kitten curling up on my leather jacket as I reflected on what was before us. Disaster. Chaos. No better words for it. Sparky, or Sango, which I was starting to prefer, looked comfortable and clearly oblivious to the (cue the music), duh duh duh, impending doooom that we were facing.

  I tested the ARM again. The diagnostic worked! My HUD went nuts, flooding me with configurations, settings, and interface options. I felt like I had a miniature m1 drone embedded in my skin. I could should missiles, lasers, gas, fire, qwires. I could hack at a farther range, with more power and memory. The ARM could synchronize with different gear and weapons too. My favorite though was the grappling hook. I inspected my wrist. It could shoot out from there so that I could easily grab it with my hand.

  James and the doctor noticed my fascination. "Good stuff, right?" the doctor said, beaming.

  "You better believe it." I started putting back on my tattered shirt, but James put a hand on my shoulder. Just the touch terrified me a little.

  "Get cleaned up next door," he commanded. "We'll take you to Port Iron. There's a freighter there with some of our people at the docks and a more in the crew. We've given instructions for it to change destinations and fly to Eros. You can meet up with your people there."

  I nodded, thinking about it. This was the best I could hope for, more than what I expected. The Hollow Kings were all right after all, and I needed an ally in the fight.

  "I'm grateful. With any luck, the whole world will be grateful." I paused, considering carefully what I was about to say. Yeah, I needed to say it. "And I owe you, James. If the Hollow Kings ever need me, I'll be here. I know I'm only one Vanquisher, but I'll be here, and I'll bring whatever resources I can with me."

  He seemed satisfied. "I expected no less from you, @kittyboy."

  The way he said it reminded me that they knew way too much about me. Hopefully not more than I knew about myself.

  "Call me the Great Pumpkin again, however," he added, in his deep and disconcerting voice, "and I will have you stamped from existence."

  I was so tempted to call him the Great Pumpkin then and there. On a typical day, the words would have been out of my mouth before I had the power to stop them. But I stopped them. The temptation still sat there in the back of my mind though. I'd like to see you try, I thought to myself. I decided I'd save that for another day.