Lukas in Kolkata

Lukas watched wisps of blue smoke from his cigarette ascend and then dissolve in the slowly turning ceiling fan. Life was leisurely in this long, narrow, dimly lit room. The New Cathay Bar and Restaurant seemed stuck in a 30’s time warp—the 1930’s. The world transformed into an old-fashioned black and white flatFlick every time he walked in. He imagined himself as Bogart, and Peter Lorre, trying to look inconspicuous behind a cigarette and a newspaper (a real newspaper), glared at him from one of the murky booths along the wall. In Real two Bengali regulars sat at a table drinking tea and discussing poetry. Over at the bar a bearded European’s face was lit up by a ghostly holoVid floating above his app. Otherwise, the place was empty.

The New Cathay was Lukas’ hangout. Here he always turned his app off— in the smoky gloom digital felt out of place. He came to think, to daydream, to get his shit together. It was early, not even noon, but screw it, it was sweltering outside, and a beer would hit the spot. He ordered a Kingfisher and lit another Panama. The waiter brought the beer. At least it was cold this time. He took a drag and chased it down with the Kingfisher.

Damn, this town was starting to depress him. It was always hot, always muggy. His shirt was never dry. The power was always cutting out, so it was either a generator (if you could afford to run it) or no AC. Black mold encrusted everything, every building, every sidewalk, every billboard. Even his brain felt mold encrusted. His dreams were full of suffocating claustrophobic nightmares. Then there were the actual nightmares, the ones in Real. Lepers, beggars, cripples, mutilated scavs, always following him, always in his face, constantly pleading, hoping for a scrap of anything that might let them survive another day. Many didn’t. Rats the size of cats fed on their putrid corpses reeking in the sun. They’d barely been alive, so what the fuck. Welcome to Kolkata—a vast sprawl full of ‘hoods even Lukas avoided. Okay, there were combatZones and shit ‘hoods everywhere. Kolkata wasn’t so different from other sprawls. Just hotter and smellier and filthier. A stinking zKuntin cesspool. Not for the first time he wondered what the fuck he was doing here. Running from himself? Can’t do that. It doesn’t work. Wherever you go, whatever you do, there you are. Still you.

Funny thing was, when he’d first arrived, he liked Kolkata. Its combustible fusion of upperReaches and ragTown, of ritz rubbing elbows with skint on jam-packed sidewalks created a dangerous crazy energy, an electric current that sizzled and flashed. But now the honeymoon was over. The shimmering seductive veil had fallen exposing a decadent sordid reality. Yeah, the novelty had worn off.

Screaming Bengali obscenities snapped his mind back to Real. The New Cathay’s bamboo-staff wielding Sikh doorman was unceremoniously ejecting a spitting cursing beggar. A few bruising blows reminded the scav he wasn’t welcome. Yeah, so maybe the doorman had bare feet like the beggar, and a patched-up old coat and a shabby turban were all he could afford, but he was no zKuntin bottom feeder. No way. He had a job, and he sure as hell was going to keep it that way. Busting nuts kept the filth away, which was good for business, which meant he kept his job.

The excitement over, Lukas took another drag on his cigarette. The New Cathay was slowly filling up. He scrutinized the new arrivals and then checked the ancient analogue wall clock. Twelve thirty. He had that three o’clock ‘business’ appointment. He signaled his waiter, a Bengali in a worn white coat and a worn white cap, also barefooted. He ordered the usual—dragon chicken with a side of curry lo-mein. And another beer.

His three o’clock ‘business’ appointment was the daily check-in with HQ. Operating Procedure required that this be done only from the company office. No sooner had Lukas transferred from the Unit to the Service, he was assigned this deep cover job in Kolkata. On paper he represented a tea export company, Assam & Darjeeling Ltd. His ‘job’ was dealing with bad for business inconveniences, meaning he greased palms with untraceable creditChips. In due course he’d met an assemblage of shady shifty crooked lowlifes: gangers running protection rackets, enforcers for Chinese triads, Thuggee showRunners, goonda gofers for politicians on the take, you name it—if corruption was involved, chances were good that Lukas had dealt with them. But beyond that, as in ‘why the fuck am I really doing this,’ well, he had no zKuntin idea. No idea why the hell he was in Kolkata. No need to know yet, according to HQ.

It was two o’clock. He had plenty of time. Lukas stepped out of the New Cathay, lit another Panama and turned right up Chowringhee Road. Chowringhee Road fascinated him. It was always crowded, always bustling, always crazy—a non-stop carnival that cut a swath through the city’s social fabric. It was a microcosm of that chaotic Kolkata brew—volatile, always on the edge of anarchy—that had originally attracted him. The classy joints that lined the street—banks, boutiques, jewelry stores—packed serious security behind elegant doors. Outside, it was all ragTown. Derelicts bathed in gutters. Gangers oozed aggro. SprawlTrash high on necroDust stared with dangerous dead eyes. Hawkers peddled pirated killaChips, fake apps, fake opium, real opium, black market lottery tickets, real lottery tickets, cheap plastic housewares, cheap clothes, Campa Cola, samosas, chaat. Everything and anything you might ever want was available.

He had walked about two blocks, his mind lost in the hustle and bustle, when a beat-up old black Ambassador sedan startled him as it came careening down the street. It skidded burning rubber and came to a sudden stop just in front of Lukas. He heard the firecracker burst of gunfire. Three men in black balaclavas armed with govMil issue Steyr bullpup assault rifles were backing out of an All-India State Bank spraying bullets. Through the closing glass door Lukas glimpsed blood splatter and someone tumbling backwards. Up at the corner two low level corpSec rent-a-cops with quick reflexes leveled their ancient Enfield rifles. One of them had a fleeting clear shot between bystanders, took the chance, and pulled the trigger. A masked gunman spun and tumbled, and with a heavy thud he hit the sidewalk next to the Ambassador, his upper arm a bloody mangled mess. Ancient, perhaps, but Enfields packed a punch.

Lukas’ senses immediately sharpened crystal clear and time suspended. He felt naked, exposed and unarmed. He had to get the fuck out of the line of fire, but in the infinitesimal instant between the brain’s command and the muscle’s response one of the masked gunmen slammed the short barrel of a bullpup into Lukas’ ribs and grabbed him by the shirt. Another gunman screamed in Bengali and fired a high burst in the direction of the rent-a-cops, sending them and all the bystanders scrambling for cover. He picked up his wounded companion, heaved him into the shotgun seat of the car and slammed the door. He fired another burst and dove into the back seat.

The sidewalk was dead still. Whimpers, crying, and the sound of traffic created a surreal soundtrack. The rent-a-cops, now hiding behind an arcade pier, stood frozen, indecisive. Lukas thanked God they weren’t trigger-happy.

“Get in!” The gunman yelled at Lukas in English and thrust him into the back of the car, jumped in after him, and slammed the door. The Ambassador’s ancient souped-up petrol engine roared as the driver slammed it into first and floored the pedal.

Tyres spun and smoked and the Ambassador took off. The rent-a-cops rushed into the street and fired. The rear window exploded into a million bits of crystal. Fuck them, thought Lukas, those cocksuckers are going to hit me! Clearly they weren’t aiming for the tyres. He then noticed something warm on his right cheek and turned to see the gunman’s body twitch a few times and then slump. Half his head was missing in a tangle of mask, hair, brains and shattered bone.

Lukas heard the crack of two more rifle shots as the Ambassador merged into traffic. The driver took the next corner, sharp and sudden, and Chowringhee Road disappeared in the rear-view mirror. Avoiding startled pedestrians, rickshaws, cows, potholes, the driver hit the gas, slammed the brakes, leaned on the horn, zigged, zagged. Soon they were tearing down relatively quiet streets. The driver slowed down.

Inside the Ambassador humid heat mixed with a toxic blend of raw fear and anger. The driver and the gunman to Lukas’ left pulled off their balaclavas. The wounded one, sitting in the shotgun seat, held his torn arm and moaned. He was losing a lot of blood. Lukas took a sideways glance at the man to his left. He was big, burly with a thick moustache, a twisted smile, eyes crazed. His sweat stank. He kept the barrel of his Steyr shoved into Lukas.

“Where the hell did the pigs come from!” the driver screamed in Bengali. “The block was supposed to be clear! I swear, if Samir screwed up...!” Lukas thought he caught the gist. He’d had a deep immersion in Bengali, but language was never his strong suit.

“If he did, Reddy will deal with him,” snarled the burly smelly one.

“I’ll gut him myself!” the driver growled, “did you get the flash drives?”

“Yes,” burly-smelly patted his pocket, “and a pile of cashChips…”

“Rasu said only the hard drives!”

“Screw Rasu. I gotta make a living!”

The driver glanced in the rear-view mirror just as Lukas did. Their eyes locked. Lukas’ brain clicked. Did they mean Rasu Reddy? Police Inspector General Rasu Reddy? Lukas had met the Inspector General once, and he suspected he had greased his gofers’ palms more than once. That was just business. But this…? Definitely not just business. Why was the Police Inspector General involved in a bank robbery? On the other hand, there must be other Rasu Redddies in town…maybe he was just being paranoid.

For a moment Lukas held the viper eyes staring at him in the rear-view mirror.

“Lukas Franks!” the driver abruptly exclaimed.

Fuck me! Recognition hit Lukas at the same instant. It was Atvar Singh, the Inspector General’s bodyguard. And Atvar’s stony eyes told him that he’d seen way too much. He wondered if he was now a dead man.

The car swerved around another corner. At the end of the street, about five hundred meters ahead, stood a Chinese QiantuH hydrogen-powered luxury sedan, six men, and three elektroBike crotch-rockets. Fuck me fuck me fuck me! It didn’t take a genius to figure out that they were going to be changing vehicles, and that Lukas might not be invited along. Chances of getting out of this alive were fast plummeting to zero. The visceral reality of the situation slammed him like a sledgehammer. His heart pounded. He was aware of hot humid air, of blood drying on his right cheek, of the business end of the Steyr pressed into his other cheek.

Lukas quickly assessed the situation. The man in the shotgun seat was half-dead. No threat there. Atvar was driving, and therefore it would take him a few seconds to react. There was a corpse with only half a head to his right. That left burly-smelly.

He had maybe thirty seconds. It was now or never. Lukas suddenly felt very alive—a gambler’s rush, death if he lost. He grabbed the Steyr and shoved the barrel away from his face. Burly-smelly immediately pulled the trigger. Bullets missed Lukas’ nose by centimeters, blowing out the side widow. In that same instant Lukas yanked the bullpup. The gunman’s finger slipped off the trigger but he instinctively tugged back to keep hold of the gun. Exactly what Lukas had expected. As the gunman pulled Lukas rammed and the butt smashed into burly-smelly’s face. Dazed, he let go of the gun. Lukas smashed his face in again. Burly-smelly was out cold. At that instant Atvar did what Lukas had hoped for but hadn’t dared counting on: he slammed the brakes. They were still about two hundred meters away from the QiantuH and the elektroBike crotch-rockets. Lukas, the bullpup gripped tightly in his right hand, reached for the handle and pushed the door open. As it swung out, he pushed himself over unconscious burly-smelly, hit the pavement and rolled. Skidding, the Ambassador stopped. Atvar grabbed his handgun, spun around in his seat, but he was too late. Lukas was hidden by the rear fender of the car. Atvar fired a few shots out of sheer frustration, shattering another window, but then, realizing Lukas was now armed, threw the car into first and floored the pedal.

Lukas was on his knees, dazed and disoriented, but Atvar’s gunfire cleared his head fast. He sucked in exhaust and burnt rubber as the car roared off. He knew he had to get the fuck out of there before Atvar’s cronies realized what happened and came after him. He thanked God, Krishna, whoever was in charge, that he was in possession of a weapon.

Lukas cradled the Steyr bullpup. Top of the line. It felt good in his hands. He glanced forward. The Ambassador was rapidly approaching the QiantuH and the crotch-rockets. Atvar was shouting and gesturing frantically. Lukas quickly sprinted to the sidewalk and keeping as close as he could to the walls that fenced off the apartment buildings, dashed down the street, and then around a corner. He ran as fast as he could, reached another corner, ran up that street, and stopped for a moment to catch his breath. He stood flattened against a wall, partially concealed by a recess at a gate. His heart pounded and his lungs burned. Not for the first time he cursed himself for all those cigarettes he smoked. His shirt was soaked with sweat, his pants torn, his knees and left elbow bruised and bleeding, but there were no broken bones or major lacerations. He checked the bullpup. The magazine had maybe fifteen rounds. He removed the app wrapped around his wrist, smashed it with his heel, and threw it over the wall. An app is a tracking device.

Lukas looked around. He was in one of the many residential ‘hoods just west of Ballygunge Circle, maybe a mile from where he lived. The street was lined with four and five story apartment buildings—old, decaying, caked in black Kolkata rot. There were enough people around to make him uneasy. He must have looked a sight—a blood-caked apparition toting a bullpup assault rifle—but so far, other than an occasional sideways glance by terrified eyes, no one acknowledged him. Nobody wanted to get involved. But sooner or later someone would. And they’d call the cops. And given that Atvar and Reddy were cops, a cop was the last thing he wanted to see.

For a second or two Lukas toyed with the idea of acquiring a certain degree of anonymity by dumping the bullpup, but a burst of gunfire and ricocheting bullets put an end to that fantasy. He pressed his back further against the wall. A red Bajaj Pulsar electrobike driven by a Sikh with a glowing red cyber-eye hissed towards him. Behind the Sikh sat a slim Bengali in a dirty Hawaiian shirt holding a late model AK-102. Fucking sprawlTrash ronin. The driver skidded the crotch-rocket to a stop and the Bengali began firing. Lukas hit the pavement.

The Bengali’s burst kicked high and wide, raking the wall, splintering concrete. Now it was Lukas’ turn. He took a precious half-second to aim and pulled the trigger twice—he’d set the Steyr to semi-automatic. He aimed again and pulled twice. The Bengali, then the Sikh, jerked backwards and fell flatlined, each shot once through the head and once through the heart. The Bajaj crotch-rocket crashed to the ground with a loud metallic clatter. A woman in a yellow sari washing tin pots at a leaking hydrant screamed. Four or five half-naked street kids huddled and stared in a mixture of terror and excitement. Lukas noticed another crotch-rocket rounding the corner down at the end of the street. And then another. Time to split. He spotted an open gate. In seconds he was in a courtyard.

Lukas took a quick moment to gather his wits. There was an excited hubbub on the street outside pierced by occasional shouting. Fuck me! It hit him that maybe the courtyard wasn’t such a bright idea. There were only two ways out: the gate he’d just come through and the front door of the apartment building. He had stupidly gotten himself into a fix. There was only one option. He smashed the glass window next to the door and entered the building. Once inside, he headed for the stairway and ran up. The buildings in this ‘hood were all pretty much the same height and attached ,or very close to each other. He hoped he could make his way across the rooftops.

Lukas reached the roof and stopped to catch his breath. No one was about. Laundry was strung up on lines, struggling to dry in the humid afternoon. He heard shouts coming up the stairwell. Fuck me! He ran to the adjoining building and jumped over the parapet. He was halfway across the new roof when the first of the ronin dashed out of the stairwell. He heard a burst of automatic fire. Bullets whizzed by. He rushed to a bulkhead and flattened himself against the wall. He aimed, fired twice, and the ronin fell. Hoping that the rest of the sprawlTrash would now be less enthusiastic, he resumed his flight.

Lukas ran roof to roof until he reached a chasm. The two buildings weren’t abutting. The gap was about three meters. Fuck me! He could try a leap and maybe miss and splatter himself all over the zKuntin concrete several floors down. Or he could fight it out with the bastards, selling his life as dearly as possible. He turned to see three ronin two roofs behind, closing in fast. Another burst of automatic fire tore into the parapet to his left. Inaccurate, but it would get deadlier as they closed in. It was an instantaneous decision. Screw it, who dares wins. He backed up for a running start, launched himself. He barely made it, slipped at the very edge, lost his balance, but his forward momentum carried him through. He rolled and was up on his feet running. More bruises, more scrapes, more gunfire, more bullets zipping by. There was a plus side to his crazy jump. He doubted the sprawlTrash would try it.

Lukas sprinted to the stairwell bulkhead. Plaster exploded all around him as he dove around the corner. This was the place to make a stand. Either they would not attempt to leap across the chasm, or, if they did, he could pick them off as they landed. He figured he had about eight or nine rounds left, so he had to make every shot count.

Two of the ronin stopped at the gap. The third was borg—he had a cyberLeg. It was old Russian army issue, basic but effective. He leapt and easily sailed across. Fucking jackrabbit! Lukas dropped to one knee and shot twice. First one missed. The second exploded cyberleg’s head. Bullets hit the wall just above Lukas. He hastily retreated behind the bulkhead.

Lukas knew what would happen next. The two ronin would pin him down while they called for reinforcements. They’d come up to the roof, here, or the next-door building, or both. Whatever way they came, he’d be screwed. The question was, how long before the reinforcements appeared? He was pretty sure there had been six men next to the QiantuH—two for each elektroBike. He’d flatlined four, and two were pinning him down now. That would account for all of Atvar’s sprawlTrash. Except there could have been someone in the sedan. And there was Atvar. And how long before half the cops in the local precinct showed up? Or a swarm of predator drones swooped in to hunt him down? Lukas scanned the sky and saw nothing, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t starring in a vid shot by a high-altitude reconDrone. In other words, time to vamoose.

Lukas said a prayer, slipped from behind the bulkhead, threw open the stairwell door, and dove in just as the zKunts began firing. Bullets ripped the door. He hoped they would think he was headed for the street. Through the narrow slit between the door and its frame he could see one of the ronin make a call on his app while the other one got up and ran for the stair. The scumbags fell for it.

Lukas waited. Not too long. Just long enough to check his clip (five rounds,) and long enough for the ronin still on the roof to think he must be well on his way down to street level. Soon enough, the fool put his AK down, reached into his pocket for a bidi, and lit it. It was time for Lukas to split. He considered offing zKunt but decided against it—difficult shot with a bullpup and five rounds meant he couldn’t afford to miss. Besides, his whereabouts would be less obvious if he held his fire.

Stealthily, using first the open door and then the stairwell to shield him from view, Lukas dashed to the next roof. It took him no more than a few seconds. It was an easy jump. No shooting meant he hadn’t been discovered. Crawling, crouching, keeping out of sight, he raced from roof to roof, until he reached the end of the line of buildings. No one followed him, no gunfire. And, with luck, no drones tracking him. Hopefully he had thrown-off the zKunts for now, but he knew he had to get the fuck off the roof and vanish.

Lukas opened the door and scanned the stairwell. Good—no CCTV cams. In these ‘hoods they were usually placed only at street level, but you never knew. Noiselessly he glided down the stairs. Soon he hit the ground floor. The ancient cam in the lobby was aimed at the street, but he couldn’t risk going out there anyway, not until after dark. In the back there was a courtyard. Unfortunately, it wasn’t empty. Two women were squatting next to a faucet washing rags. They wouldn’t try and stop him, of course, but that wasn’t the point. The idea was to disappear. Reluctantly he returned to the stairwell. It continued down into a cellar.

Lukas descended into darkness. A motion sensor turned the lights on. Fuck! Still, no one around. At the bottom of the flight, a corridor with doors. He prayed no cams were recording his presence. He didn’t see any. He chose a door at random, but it was locked. He tried another. Also locked. He pulled out a Swiss Army knife. Among the tools were lock-picks. It took a little fumbling, but the lock was simple, and he soon had it open. He stood in a dusty storeroom crammed with old boxes and old furniture. Two small grimy windows high up near the ceiling let in a little grey daylight. In a pinch, they’d serve as an emergency exit. He noiselessly shut the door behind him and locked it from the inside. He found a chair, creaky but it held his weight, and placed it below one of the windows, just in case. He then hid behind a pile of boxes. Nightfall would be in about four hours.

Waiting is a mind game. You can get all freaked out, or you use it as an opportunity to think. Or go Zen and get focused. Back when he was in the Unit Lukas had learned how to wait. He’d spent hours—sometimes days—hunkered down in injun country, hiding, waiting for the violence that could explode at any second. There was always an undercurrent of fear—tight stomach, cold sweat, clammy hands. Every muscle and joint would sooner or later beg to move, just a tiny bit. And it was always wet, cold, hot, drafty, suffocating, take your pick. And then there were the damned insects, whatever the fuck was in season: mosquitoes, deer fly, spiders and wasps if it wasn’t your day. Or snakes and scorpions if your day was really fucked. He had learned to ignore it all.

Lukas considered his situation. He and Atvar had recognized each other. He knew Inspector General Rasu Reddy was involved in a bank robbery. Why? What was on those flash drives? Whatever it was, he bet it was important enough for the good Inspector General to want him silenced. When and how he’d get iced, well, who the fuck knew. Rasu Reddy could cook up some serious crap to smear him with and issue a shoot-to-kill order. But that was probably too obvious. It would more likely be a discreet professional hit—quiet and clean. Either way, he’d need to figure out how to deal with it. Right now, however, there were more immediate matters to consider. He’d missed his checked-in with HQ. Would they assume he was in trouble? Would they start looking for him? Who would be looking for him? Lukas had no idea what assets HQ had in Kolkata.

Next problem—how long before his whereabouts were discovered? There was no way of telling, so no point in worrying. What were his options? Was his flat safe? No one knew where he lived. All official documents listed the office of Assam & Darjeeling, Ltd. as his legal address. Soon some police eyeT would do some basic googling and find out where that was, and Inspector General Rasu Reddy’s would undoubtedly order a raid. And eventually he’d find out where his flat was. But odds were that it would take time—hours, days? So, could he chance going to his flat? If there was an APB on him, thousands of cops, drones, every zKuntin CCTV in Kolkata sprawl, would be looking for him. And if there was a contract out on him so would every ninja, droneJockey and gangbanger in search of a rep. He may as well smile and wave hello as he walked in. Still, he’d love to shower, bandage up, and re-arm. Another option was the safe house HQ maintained off Chandra Bose Road. It was meant for serious emergencies only. This probably qualified. But if anyone spotted him, it would blow more than just his cover. It could blow the safe house and the entire operation along with it.

Lukas’ scrapes and bruises throbbed as he sat in the cellar. The pain reminded him that he was alive. He allowed his mind to wander. How the hell had he gotten into this mess? It was a woman, of course. It was always a woman, wasn’t it? He got dumped by his true love. Years later he realized maybe she wasn’t really his true love, but it sure as hell felt that way when he got dumped. To forget he joined the Parachute Regiment. Yeah, maybe that was a stupid choice, but it seemed a good idea then, and in the total mental and physical exhaustion of basic training he did forget. So, he’d lost his woman and that’s why he was sitting, all scraped and bruised, here in this stupid cellar. Well, not quite. He was an adrenaline junky. Always had been. And serious challenges turned him on. That’s why he applied for the Unit and actually made it through selection. And after a few years in the Unit he joined the Service.

“There are no fookin’ coincidences,” a Unit instructor used to drum into his head, “so don’t fookin’ assume anything.” Getting accidentally involved in a bank robbery was unlikely enough, but getting involved in one perpetrated by people he was acquainted with? By the Police Inspector General? Okay, so a bunch of monkeys typing at random supposedly will eventually turn out Hamlet. Yeah, sure. Still…coincidence? Then again, shit happens.

The hours ticked by. The grimy windows in the cellar slowly darkened. The storeroom turned murky and then inky black. Roaches scurried around and he could see the shadowy shapes of sprawl rats poking about. No doubt there were scorpions mucking about as well. Eventually it was as dark as it was going to get. Lukas had no idea what time it was, but he figured sunset had been about an hour ago, which meant it must be about seven. He had one important decision to make before he abandoned the cellar. Should he take the bullpup (it still had five rounds), or should he dump it? The gun was much too large to hide (unless, he thought cynically, he had an overcoat, which in Kolkata would attract as much attention as the gun). He wished he could think it over a cigarette, but that of course was out of the question.

Lukas walked up the steps, radar on. The ground floor was empty. He glanced into the courtyard. Also empty. He pocketed the bullets and dumped the Steyr in a trash bin. A nice little present for a dumpster diving scav. He looked at his shredded trousers and wondered if they’d pass as fashionably distressed. You never knew these days. He found a faucet. The cold water felt good. Thirsty as he was, he didn’t drink—it could give you the shits. He rinsed his body, rinsed his clothes and walked out the front door. No sneaky beaky anymore and screw the CCTV. Half the cams in this zKuntin town didn’t work anyway.

Lukas lit a Panama and put on his best stoner face. He was going to hide in plain sight—just another western freak in India searching for nirvana. The evening air was still and hot, the humidity stifling. He hoped his soaked shirt looked like sweat and that his scrapes and bruises weren’t too obvious. The street was moderately crowded. At the end, at the corner, the police had set up a post. He wondered if it was on account of him. The two cops looked bored and tired. They’d obviously been there for hours. Second thoughts about having trashed the bullpup flashed through his mind. He dismissed them. Lukas walked on, channeling ganjaFreak chill. As he passed, one of the cops pulled out two bidis. They faced each other and lit up. Lukas turned the corner and he was on Ballygunge.

Ballygunge was busy, a bustling river of humanity. Lukas merged and disappeared into the ebbing and flowing stream—thousands of people going somewhere, going nowhere, going who the fuck knew where. He didn’t give a shit. He was glad he could blend in with the crowd.

Lukas walked up Ballygunge, turned right on Sarat Bose Road, took a left on Chandra Bose Road, and then a right on Camac Street. The crowds thinned out a little. Cows lazily chewed cud and the occasional tram clattered by. Lukas slowly approached his block, two streets down from Camac. He shuffled by, trying to look anonymous. Avoiding streetlights, staying in the shadows, he casually circled the block twice, taking his time, observing. Everything looked normal but still felt wrong. To his right was a dirty dusty patch of ground that served as a tram stop. It was well lit. A gentleman in a rumpled linen suit, holding an old attaché case, waited in the queue. He’d been waiting the entire hour Lukas had been reconnoitering, going to the back of the line every time a tram stopped and opened its doors. And then there was the beggar. He’d been hanging around the queue, which wasn’t unusual, but he’d also been there for an hour, and he hadn’t made the slightest effort to beg. That bothered Lukas. And to top it off, there was the fruit stand. A small group of people stood around it, among them an old man with a walking cane slowly sipping juice. Half an hour ago he’d been leaning on a post reading a paper. Coincidences? Not likely. It felt wrong.

Lukas walked up the street to a coconut stand. A bony cow and some crows were scavenging through a pile of splintered rotting shells. He handed the coconut-wallah a few coins. In Kolkata sprawl bottomFeeders still used coins. The wallah hacked the top off the green shell and handed it to Lukas with a straw. Parched as he was, Lukas forced himself to drink slowly. He needed time to think. He hoped he wasn’t as obvious as the gentleman in the rumpled linen suit, the beggar who wasn’t begging, or the old man with the cane. He figured they must be keeping tabs on his place. Maybe they were on his side, but his gut didn’t buy it. He finished the juice and the wallah hacked the coconut open. Lukas ate the slimy meat off the shell slices and continued to ponder his situation. He threw his scraps to a crow and glanced at his suspects—all three of them still there. Not good. Sooner or later, they’d notice him.

Reluctantly, Lukas lit another Panama, walked away, turned up a side street and plunged into a dark warren of narrow lanes. Crap ‘hood, but no choice. He’d have to spend the night there.

After wandering around, Lukas found a dark corner in a dark alley. It was as good a place as any to crash. Propped up against a wall, he was, he hoped, indistinguishable from the sleeping slumRats that surrounded him. He couldn’t have been there more than ten or fifteen minutes, hadn’t closed his eyes yet, when he saw them. There they were, in front of him, three emaciated figures staring at him with hollow eyes. What the…? A minute ago, they hadn’t been there and now they were. Where the fuck had they come from? They stood a few meters away—a man, a woman and a child, a girl. They were crying. Or was it moaning? Or maybe begging? Whatever it was, it creeped him out. Then Lukas noticed the mob. He was sure they hadn’t been there a second ago. Just shapes in the dim light, emaciated shapes with glowing eyes, slowly approaching shapes uttering a preternatural low angry murmur. In a Slo-mo shuffle, step by step they advanced. Then Lukas noticed the crude weapons they held—chains, shivs, staffs. Was he dreaming? It was all too bizarre; he must be dreaming. But it sure as hell didn’t feel like a dream.

Slowly, relentlessly, the mob approached. But they weren’t interested in him. They stopped when they reached the beggar family, whose creepy crying now turned into a bone-chilling wail. Who were they? What did the mob want with them? What the zKunt was going on? Then it hit him—a realization from the dim murky depths of the Freud zone. The beggars were his parents! And his sister Astrid! But it can’t be! They’re dead! Years ago some fucking natzi gangers flying on cheap bathtub crap sliced up his parents and older sister. Just for yuks. Why not him? Yeah, he hadn’t been there, but still, he never managed to shake the guilt. But now he could help them! Yes, this time he could!

Lukas tried to get up. He couldn’t. He was paralyzed. The mob enveloped the family, his family. He couldn’t see them anymore. He heard horrible screams. He struggled to move. He couldn’t move, he couldn’t help them. NO!! It’s happening again!! They’re getting murdered and I’m helpless! Then the screams stopped. For a moment there was a dead silence. But just for a moment because then the howling began. It started off as one weird nightmarish cry, but soon the whole mob was screaming like banshees from hell. Having slaughtered the beggar family, the mob seethed with blood frenzy. They turned on Lukas. A rock flew and hit his shoulder. Pain. The pain cleared his head. Another rock. This time he managed to dodge it. He could move! He had to get the fuck out.

Lukas ran. Shrieking with rage, the mob set off after him. This time I was meant to die too! flashed through his mind as he ran, but hell if they’re going to get me! The banshee screams turned into a voodoo-chant. He was being hunted by hell-spawned zombie ghouls. He had to concentrate, to deal. He fell into a jogging pace, fast enough to stay ahead of the pack, but slow enough to sustain for however long it took. He plunged ever deeper into the depths of the ragTown maze. Soon the otherworldly howling and voodoo chanting became a background din. He slowed down to an easy jog and continued another half a kilometer or so before slowing down to a walk. He was drenched in sweat, sucking in air, completely winded. Not good. Gotta ease up on those Panamas.

Lukas traversed a few more alleys, made a few more random turns. Behind him, no more sounds. The freakish mob seemed to have lost him. He stopped and looked around. He was in a narrow lane full of rotting garbage. Indistinct shapes slept in piles of rags. Someone was squatting alongside a decaying brick wall—a public toilet. The stench was potent. To his left was an entrance to a crumbling never finished apartment building. Lukas quickly slipped through the doorway and hid in the shadows.

What the hell was going on? Was any of this real? It made no sense. The family, his family, murdered again? They died a long time ago. So who the fuck were they? Was he hallucinating? Going psycho? But then again, his shoulder was bruised, and it hurt. It had been a real rock. It wasn’t all a delusion.

The sky hinted at grey. It would soon be dawn. What the fuck…? How was that possible? How had so much time passed? It wasn’t too much after ten when Lukas drank that coconut, and, by his estimate, his ensuing adventure could not have lasted more than two hours. He was a good judge of elapsed time. No way five hours had passed. Unless he’d blanked out. The thought unsettled him. Was he losing his mind? But right now such speculation was counterproductive. He forced himself to focus on the present. Whoever had been shitting had gone back to sleep. Nothing stirred. Everything was quiet. If he had been followed by the mob, chances were that they would have showed up by now. Not too far in the distance Lukas could hear the rumbling of occasional traffic. Sticking to shadows, he headed in that direction.

Lukas turned a corner, then another and found himself on a broad street. Holy crap! He was on Chandra Bose Road, and he’d come out of the very same lane that he’d entered hours ago. The coconut stand was abandoned now except for the half-asleep cow. Here and there a sleepy pre-dawn person shuffled by. The streetlights were turning off. The trams were just beginning to run. A few cars and trucks rumbled by. Kolkata was coming alive. Lukas tried to clear his head. Was he really here? What was going on? The probability of ending up in the same exact spot after randomly running around that ragTown maze was remote, to say the least. More monkeys typing Hamlet? Then there was the matter of the missing time. And the strange things he’d just experienced. But now…now everything seemed reassuringly normal. Kolkata at dawn was behaving exactly as it should. Still, he thought wryly, that assumed a sane world. Instead the world felt scrambled, no longer rational. That kind of thought had never hit him before. The world had always been fundamentally rational. Fucked-up, maybe, but rational. He headed for the safe house.

The safe house was an average decaying mold-encrusted building. A tobacconist, Gupta’s Gold Flake, was located downstairs. The three floors above were, supposedly, a guesthouse. A sign next to Gupta’s advertised ‘Klean Kumfy Lodgings Available’, but anyone interested was regretfully informed that there were no vacancies. In the dawning light the traffic and the noise were beginning to pick up. Lukas did a stakeout until he convinced himself that he hadn’t been followed, and that no one was watching. He hoped there were no reconDrones up in the sky, but what the fuck. Lukas crossed the street and walked up to the door. His iris was scanned, and the safe house door clicked open.

He went up the stairs to the reception desk. No one was around, but he was aware of at least four cams pointed at him. He waved at one and sat down in a comfortable chair. Finally, he felt he could relax. But the events of the previous hours disturbed him. He turned them over and over in his head and concluded that at no point could he have done anything differently and still have survived. And he had to admit to himself that, other than the scrapes and bruises, he felt good. He felt more alive than he had in weeks. He’d used his wits to cheat death, and it’d given him a rush. Yeah, he was an adrenalin junky all right. Maybe this deep cover crap just wasn’t for him.

But then there was that weird shit…maybe it happened, maybe it didn’t. No way he could explain the time loss. Or seeming phantoms that throw real rocks. He was beginning to doubt himself. He was tired. No, exhausted. He settled deep into the chair and closed his eyes. As soon as he did, the world exploded in a flash of light. What the…?! A shot of adrenaline hit, his body primed for action, he looked around, and…where the fuck am I? He was still sitting. But not in the safe house. It took a moment before the world came into focus. He was sitting in a reclining chair in what looked like a cyberLab—vidScreens, holoScreens, all manner of electronics, wires all over the place. He was wearing a VR haptic jump-suit. Sitting on a stool next to him, holding a pair of VR goggles, was a striking long-legged woman in her late twenties, about his age. She wore severe minimal makeup and an austere black pantsuit that followed her curves very nicely.

“Quite a story....” She put the goggles down and regarded Lukas with cool blue eyes. Shit, she’s a stunner! He tried to remember if he knew her. “I’m Olivia, Olivia Dietze,” she said as she leaned in to remove the electrodes from his forehead. He noticed black nail polish and simple silver bracelets. Something about her long raven hair, tied up in restrained asymmetric chaos, aroused Lukas. She smelled of jasmine. She smiled at Lukas, but it wasn’t friendly, just business. “You met me very briefly, just before you slipped under. Do you remember?”

Slipped under? “Yeah, I think it’s coming back.” Lukas lied. You’d think I’d at least remember her. Where the hell was he? He’d been in Kolkata. Or had he been in Kolkata? He wasn’t sure.

“Tell me what you remember,” Olivia’s voice was cool, professional.

“Remember? What? When? Kolkata?”

“Before that.”

“…I was here…wasn’t I?” yes, vague images were now floating in and solidifying. “I came here for a…for a…” Lukas couldn’t remember why, but yes, he remembered coming to this lab for something. “…for a procedure?”

“Good. Yes, ‘procedure’ would cover it.” Olivia’s eyes looked straight into his, willing him to remember. Lukas found it intoxicating. He tried to suppress the feeling. “You came here for an implant.”

“An implant? Yeah…maybe…that sounds right.” It did sound right. Vaguely. “Where is it?”

“As you come back to Real your memory will improve. You were told we were going to implant a neural link. But that wasn’t exactly true. You see, instead, you have taken part in an experiment in simulated reality. SIM.” Olivia regarded Lukas for a moment, trying to gauge his reaction. “We didn’t tell you beforehand because it was imperative that you not know you were in SIM.”

“So, you’re telling me everything that happened took place in virtual?” That was fucking intense for virtual. Lukas shook his head. He was still confused. The virtual still seemed more real than Real. How long had he been there? How much of his recent life had been virtual? Hours? Days? Months?

“SIM is a quantum jump beyond virtual,” Olivia said, “but yes, that’s what it was. It will take a few more minutes for your mind to settle down, but it will, so just relax. What you’ve experienced is experimental software. It places you in SIM, in a time and place, but then you write the story—the simulation storyline isn’t pre-programmed. It only sets up a starting point, in this case your deep cover assignment in Kolkata, and the bank robbery. After that, the SIM interacts with your responses and the action develops accordingly, and completely unpredictably. The vectors it follows all depend on you.”

“So I was never in Kolkata?”

“You were never in Kolkata. You’ve been here, in Base Alpha all along.” Base Alpha was near Brussels. It was where the Unit was headquartered.

“Wait a minute, you’re telling me I was in SIM for a month?”

“No, just a little less than twenty-four hours. The simulation started when you woke up yesterday morning. The memory of being in Kolkata for before that was implanted by the program.”

“You’re telling me that I’ve been implanted with month’s worth of fake memories?”

“Yes, but don’t worry, they will all dissipate, like a dream, but not as fast. It will take a few hours. And, unlike most dreams, you will not entirely forget the memories of the experience, but you will not mistake them for Real. It will feel more like you’ve seen a good holoFlick. Or played a good VR game.”

“So what’s the point of messing with my mind?” Lukas was starting to get a bit pissed off. He felt like he’d been violated. “It’s not as if anyone asked my permission.”

“The point, Lieutenant,” another female voice, even, measured, but with an edge, spoke from behind Lukas, “is that this is an evaluation.” A slim forty-something woman walked into Lukas’ field of vision. She had a weather-beaten face, short-cropped greying hair, wore combat fatigues with no identifying insignias, and exuded no bullshit hard-ass. Her hazel eyes bore into Lukas. “A highly classified evaluation, classified way above your paygrade. Is that clear?”

“Yes...”

“It’s Colonel.”

“Colonel…?”

“Just Colonel. That’s because you never met me, or Olivia. None of us were ever here. Understand?”

“Yes, Colonel.” Lukas got the point. This was secret shit. In the Unit, keeping your mouth shut about secret shit was par for the course.

“In case you didn’t read the fine print,” the Colonel’s eyes hadn’t left Lukas’, “when you were accepted into the Unit you agreed to unannounced exercises and evaluations. This has been both, an experimental surprise exercise and an experimental evaluation. You’re sitting here because the Service was interested in you for a deep cover assignment, and to make sure you were the right choice, HQ decided to test you with this experimental software.”

“Excuse me, Colonel, but you’re saying I was selected for deep cover?”

“No, lieutenant. That was just the premise of the exercise. But you deserve congratulations. You have the honour of being the very first guinea pig. Your experiences were recorded and will be evaluated.”

“Recorded? Are you telling me you can record my experiences in virtual?”

“Yes, we can,” Olivia said with a half-smile that Lukas found hard to resist. “At least we think we can. Seeing on vid what’s in the mind is part of what we’re working on here. We followed your adventures in real time, but of course we don’t know for sure if what we saw is the same as what you experienced. That’s why you need to be thoroughly debriefed.”

“We need to completely understand the interface between mind and program,” the Colonel said. “You’re a pioneer in a new form of warfare—SIM’s going to be a new battlefield. But before we debrief you, I’m curious about something. The SIM followed a logical path until you met that strange mob. Then the storyline veered off into what seemed like a dream, or a hallucination, which lead to your entering the safe house without the normal protocol, which may have exposed you, and ruined the operation. In SIM, of course.”

Lukas shrugged. “Virtual is a kind of hallucination anyway, isn’t it?”

“Not in this case,” Olivia said. “This simulation software is designed to replicate reality. It follows logical paths grounded in Real. So, for example, if within the SIM protocol you dream, the program knows it’s a dream, and it will only be a dream as far as the storyline goes. Nothing extramundane is supposed to happen. That’s why we need to understand the experience you had. There may be a bug in the software, or there may be something about you that triggered a glitch.”

“Any thoughts, lieutenant?” the Colonel asked.

“No, I’m not sure I can explain what happened. When I was experiencing the events, they felt real, strange, but real. Afterwards, at the safe house, I ran it all through my mind, trying to understand, but, no, I have no explanation.”

“Were you on any drugs?” Olivia asked.

“What?”

“Did you take any drugs in the simulation?”

“Do you mean, did I get high in virtual?”

“Yes. If the program follows a storyline where you take a drug in virtual, you might experience hallucinations.”

“The answer is no; I didn’t do drugs in virtual.”

“Very well, Lieutenant,” the Colonel said, “change out of the haptic suit and report to conference room C in fifteen minutes for you debriefing. Your things are in the prep room across the hall.”