Neon City Parasites

    Nightfall has begun, cool air in this bustling metropolis. The streets are packed with cars, and pedestrians litter the sidewalks beneath the neon lights of the towering metal monoliths. Advertisements, signs, hell, neon lights for the sake of having them light the city up. The city is alive. And yet, the city is in fear. And it seems I’m not quite alone at figuring this out. They call them “Parasites”, but the name is quite insulting. It is because people fear these “parasites”. Rumors are that one of the corporations inject a chip in you, and eventually you’ll turn into a parasite. A cybernetic disease. However, I’ve slowly been leading an investigation into these mysterious cases. See parasites aren’t perfect and fail quite quickly. And it is a mess when they fail. I’m investigating a case of a parasite, but something isn’t quite right about this case. Everyone’s accounts of how parasites work is that a chip turns you into one of these malfunctioning cybernetic machines, and yet, today, well, something strange turned up.

    The police are about useless in these parts and chalked it up to a homicide. But something is fishy. I was able to reach out to the lead detective to investigate the crime scene before their team comes out to clean up the mess. The man’s apartment is depressing. It is a mess, he seemed to work to live, or wasn’t cut out socially for the busy society life. He had trash from food around, and piled up garbage bags littering the room. Didn’t clean much did he? What makes it more interesting to me though is the crime scene itself. The stories I heard is that you become a parasite and then malfunction with a bastardized skeleton and organs, partially organic, partially in-organic. Cybernetics run through your mangled corpse. But this was different. There was a body. A bloodied, messy body. Knowing the mess and not wanting to get implicated I put on a hazard suit and gloves with a rebreather and goggles so I don’t contaminate the scene and began to inspect the body.

    Sure enough he had a microchip injected into him, usually you can’t discern these things but a medical report indicated he got a shot from the Herz Bletz Medical Clinic and the first startling twist in the case : the chip was carved out of his arm. At that time a partner of mine walks in. He is young, impressionable, but has always had his doubts about the parasites. And now is a good enough time to have someone to bounce ideas off of.

“Liam, are you in your hazard suit?” I ask, my tone being direct and professional.

“Yeah, what is up?” He responds to me, with that signature level of insecurity to his voice.

“The back of his skull was opened up, see if you can find any indications of a neural connection.” The man’s face was horribly mutilated, and identification was impossible. However, there was a photo sitting on a shelf. A man, with spiky black hair, in his mid-twenties, with defined cheekbones and green eyes. Our victim als had spiky black hair, but It almost looked like someone carved his face off. I take note of this, jotting down the possible ways he was killed and what a motive might’ve been.

    My partner analyzes the back of the skull with a magnifying glass, looking for signs of something plugging into his brain. Any marks are all we need. Some of the corporations have fiddled with tapping into the human brain, a scary practice but one that has helped us learn so much about our minds. 

 “Yeah I got something, they’re small, and look like an organized cluster of pins directly where the spine meets skull.” He says to me confidently, letting me observe with the magnifying glass. Sure enough, he isn’t lying, about fifteen organized pin marks in a circular formation can be observed right at the base of the skull, though we cannot open up the skull to see, I’m almost certain they went directly into this poor man’s brain. Carefully making sure not to step in the pool of blood, we get up and walk away from the corpse.

    The police say the victim is Steven Huai, a twenty-four-year-old college student. But we cannot confirm this, and without a face we cannot match him to anyone. We’ll leave the identification up to the police. However, one thing we did see on him was a rose tattoo on his left shoulder. So, we shifted gears and began to observe other details. The door wasn’t forced open, and according to the police was unlocked when they got there. We search the apartment for more clues, with Liam going into the bedroom. As I recall he found something, well, the lack of something, and I began to search as well. See we all have biometric devices that help with our health and lives. We call them Life Cards. These wrist mounted micro-computers also contain personal information. Our identification, our banking information, and a lot more. His was missing (assuming the victim in the room lived here). Scouring the house, we couldn’t find it. If the victim lived here, then his was missing.

    I look to my partner as we get out of our hazard suits.

“I have a theory, but it is out there. Maybe we’re all wrong? What if the chips don’t turn you into the parasite, but the parasite finds you and attempts to integrate with your body. We’ve seen that parasites aren’t perfect, so maybe there is a flaw in how they function? Some of them fail to properly integrate with a host—or dispose of the body.” My partner nodded but had his doubts.

“Why haven’t we found any bodies? Everyone has the perfect DNA of the person that their Life Card says they are. They have everything to a tee.” Liam’s point is fair, and I take note of it. Whatever happened here could be an anomaly, or a different type of parasite.

“We need to find out where the parasite went. My assumption is that it is taking over the body of the victimis ; we find the parasite, we get answers.”

    However, things would shift in another direction. As we were leaving the building we got a call, an old client.

“Hello? Harris is that you?” She asks in a panicked tone of voice. Fear is gripping her. Something isn’t right.

“What is going on Hira? Are you okay?” I try to remain professional. But by her tone, something is happening.

“I just got home from getting a shot from the Herz Blitz clinic, and my arm is in pain. I don’t want to call the clinic, I’m too afraid to. What do I do?” Connections. Our supposed Steven Huai was at the Herz Blitz clinic and so was Hira. I look at Liam as he rushes out of the building to our car, starting it up.

“We’re on our way. Lock your door, barricade yourself if you have to. We’ll be there in fifteen minutes.” I say to her, though it feels like those fifteen minutes are going to be the longest fifteen minutes of my life.

    We stop at the block Hira lives at, floor thirty-three. What makes this so intriguing is that Hira’s husband, Anthony, was a parasite and died. I was investigating his death as the police refused to look into it and only found straws. But the coroner had a different take on the death. Ruling it wasn’t a parasite at all. But something is clicking between the two cases as we run up the stairs. But I put that information to the back of my head for a moment, focusing on the case. We reach her room, and begin to bang at the door.

“Hira! It is Harris, are you there?!” I shout out waiting for a response. But something mechanical is inside. I hear…motors. Something otherworldly. Yeah, we’re going to get in trouble for breaking into her apartment, but with how the police handle crime it’ll just be a fine. I took out a revolver, a Mateba Unica 6, loaded with .44 Magnum, and attempted to kick the door in. I get some resistance, and hear a woman scream inside. I…I’m frustrated. I’m angry. I’m scared. And so, I put all two-hundred-and-twenty-five pounds of body weight into it and ram into the door, busting it open. And to my horror, what I saw? What I saw…it wasn’t something I ever want to see again.

    Hira lay on the ground, convulsing, writhing, and a faint distant sound of mechanical whirling, then it stopped. Whatever organic bones are in her body were about to snap through her skin, with a bone in her right forearm piercing the skin, bleeding out helplessly. Her eyes twitch and she is unable to scream. I rush over and see a bandage on her arm, possibly after getting a shot. And without hesitation, I put another theory to the test. I set the revolver on the floor, and took out a pocket knife, removing the bandage and carving the chip out of her arm. Sure enough, there it was, attaching itself to nerves and blood vessels. It was messy, hella bloody, and as the chip was severed Hira let out a horrifying scream of agony, but the writhing began to subside, and she began to calm down. Police arrived as I was attending aid to her, and they too had questions. But those questions would have to wait. Hira survived, and paramedics arrived soon enough to take her to a hospital, where I hope she doesn’t go through this suffering again.

    Hell, she might refuse any and all operations knowing that the Herz Blitz clinic, a medical clinic of all things, put that chip in her. But things were not adding up, and as the police left, it was just me and my partner Liam.

“Good thinking boss. I hope she is okay.”

“Thanks Liam. But I’ve got other questions. She didn’t have her Life Card on her. And according to her ‘she just got home’. The clinics advise you keep your Life Card on to monitor your body’s activity after the injection. So why is her Life Card missing? And the mechanical whirring, those motor sounds, they stopped when we entered the room.” I decided to verify point one by searching the house. Hoping to find some evidence—any evidence—of my theory. However, me and Liam, we turn up empty. Her Life Card is missing. And as we began to look into it, more things begin to not add up.

    Liam is the first to point out but her window is broken, yet the glass shards are gone, no trace of entry. The only sign of this was the wind blowing in and you would just assume it was because a window was open. Furthermore, there were a set of footprints in the blood pool on the ground. They looked human, and those footprints lead to the window that was busted open. Liam gives me that look of self-doubt. I can see it in his eyes. He sees the same thing I do.

    Our next stop was supposed to be the Herz Blitz clinic, however, the police detective who has been aiding us asked for a favor. Our leads in exchange for another victim. Easy enough.

“Detective, our last two victims were at the Herz Blitz clinic. They both got shots from there. See if you can get some more information. If they have an injection x-ray them and see if there is a chip in the injection site, then remove the chip.” I state.

“Harris, our victim’s name is Hiramoto Tanaka. He is on the fifteenth floor of the Lotus Apartments, apartment eighty. The scene is closed off, but you still got that key I gave you? It has been about a week ; the body is still there though.”

“Yeah I got it, detective. Thanks for the help. We’re coming to some conclusions but everything just seems off.” The detective says to me, “Alright then.” And hangs up, hopefully he’ll follow up on the Herz Blitz clinic situation.

“Reading on these files, it looks like there are some details we overlooked.” Liam says to me as I drive through the crowded streets carefully.

“What do you mean?” I ask, with him flipping through multiple case files.

“There is a pattern here. All of them had their faces partially deformed, however, none of them had their chips removed. All of them were missing their Life Card. But, none of their banking or personal security information was used or detected to be used.”

“That means Steven and Hira were different. What if Steven attempted to remove the chip from his arm? Just like I did with Hira. When we’re done, I’m going to see if I can get this sly ass coroner to give up some details on the autopsies. He refuses to release the autopsy reports and I want to know if they really were cybernetic or if it is all hysteria.”

“We heard mechanical noises coming from Hira?” Liam asks nervously.

“No, something else was there. And us attempting to intervene scared whoever—or whatever—off.” Liam nodded in slight agreement, processing it.

We reached our next crime scene. An apartment building called the Lotus, next to it on the right was an outdoor street food market.

“What floor?” I ask Liam as he looks at the notes on his phone. Sometimes I get focused on other things, putting some details to the side. Thank God I have Liam.

“Floor fifteen, room eighty. Best way is the third elevator, which should be on the right at the far end when you enter.” With that we enter the building, admire the lavishness of it, and are on our way. Third elevator to the right, floor fifteen, room eighty, at the end of the hall on the right. We travel up, and upon arriving we began to walk down the hall finding the eightieth room. With the key the detective gave me a few weeks ago, I enter the room that is caution taped off. As far as I know the crime scene detectives are busy, and sometimes they just get a few pictures of the crime scene and run off. We know the body will still be here, and possibly it has begun to decay. Entering the room there is a foul stench, clearly this scene hasn’t been touched in a while, however, the corpse is gone. But I noticed something. On the right side of the room is a window, and just like Hira there is a trail of footsteps leading outside. Liam takes out a camera and begins to photograph the footsteps.

“Detective said the body was still here.” I murmur to myself, looking over the pool of blood.

“Look at the footsteps, they’re recent.” I point out to Liam who agrees.

“The blood is being imprinted since it is dry and somewhat waxy.”

    It is frustrating, especially because this has never happened before. The bodies have never moved. Why was this scenario different? We had clues, we had dots on a board and yet the lines made no sense. We were missing something. But as I thought about it more and more, I started making connections. I don’t know how valid they are, but I was attempting to piece something together, even if I was grasping at straws.

“Liam, what if we’re looking at this the wrong way? What if the people who we think are parasites aren’t? Steven and Hira are our biggest leads to this. What if the real parasites come later. What if they use the Life Cards and whatever information they can pluck from the brain to get information and make a replicated person, using someone else’s identity as the baseline, and modifying it in their own ways.”

“That would explain the coroner never releasing autopsies if the coroner is a replicant harvesting the bodies of victims. But pressure from not releasing autopsies has led to the replicants finding their way to the victims, the first two being Steve and Hira, and maybe a change in plans with Hiramoto.”

“Let’s talk this over lunch.” I say to my partner, as the two of us leave the crime scene and lock the door.

    We leave the Lotus Apartments and approach the street filled with street food vendors. All sorts of local delicacies can be found here. Taking in the orchestra of scents, we start walking the rows, looking for something to eat. Liam points out a stall with what looked like kebabs made of some kinda meat. However, someone caught my eye. In the crowd I see a man with a tattoo of a rose on his left shoulder. Spikey-black hair, and defined cheekbones. His skin color matched the victim at Steven Huai’s house. I stop Liam and point to the man. We pause for a moment, unsure of what to do. What can we do? And in that moment, we decide to approach him, navigating through the street vendors, ignoring solicitations as everything goes numb, deaf. This man, who is he and why is he here?

“Hey! You!” I shout out as I’m merely fifteen feet away. He turns to me, confused.

“What is your name!” I shout out, as the man looks at me even more confused.

“I’m Steven Huai?”