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Véra was actually in her early forties but she had the appearance of a life-experienced woman in her mid-sixties. Years of living underneath overpasses and scrabbling around for food and the necessities of life had left their mark on her.
Her ordeals had also toughened her up and she shrugged off the biting cold, as she trudged through the streets towards one of the few conversion stations that were still open. In response to the false-flag sophont atrocities and flexing his DSA directorship muscles, Candidate Zlikovac, using his ministerial influence, had closed down sixty per cent of the public charging stations. His logic was simple – if the sophonts had nowhere to recharge, they would eventually deactivate, making their collection by his DSA units no more difficult that scooping up a supermarket spill.
There was a rumour going around about a group of sophonts, led by an android named Sylas, who were different from the majority. These sophonts were said to act autonomously and were waging a nonviolent struggle against anti-sophont discrimination and abuse. She didn’t know if the rumours that she had heard were true, but seeking out this group was better than standing around in the cold doing nothing.
If Zlikovac could have had his way, he would have closed down all recharge stations but he knew that to do so would alienate many of his more affluent sponsors who still relied upon sophont servitude and were willing to take the risk that their androids wouldn’t go rogue – he needed their financial support if he were to become president. The wealthy were always loath to give up their luxuries and giving up their sophonts could potentially create a problem for him at the ballot box. Zlikovac was leading in the Presidential election polls but he wasn’t willing to ruffle the feathers of his campaign donors too much – not until he had won the election anyway. Once he was installed as President, he could do as he wished – it would be too late to stop him. Sophonts would, in time, be outlawed but until then he would have to be content with reducing their numbers.
Eventually, Véra found a long line of sophonts waiting for their turn to recharge their batteries; she had no idea of what this special android looked like, but hoped that one of the sophonts waiting in line may be able to help her. She made her way slowly to the front of the queue and started to work her way backwards, questioning each sophont.
She asked a dozen of the queuing androids if they knew anything about a sophont named Sylas, but was met with blank stares. However, she had walked thirteen kilometres in the freezing cold to get there so she wasn’t in the mood to give up that easily.
Suddenly she felt a hand grasp her arm and she was forced – albeit gently – to accompany a man and a woman away from the line. She tensed up a little, fearing that they may be some of Zlikovac’s goons – especially when they led her into an alleyway where they crouched under a fire escape and checked that there were no CCTV cameras around.
The man spoke first.
“Who are you?”
Véra’s trepidation evaporated. She and her brother had been streetwise since they were in their mid-teens and it took a lot to scare her. She sensed that this couple meant her no harm.
“I could ask you the same question, young man.”
The man asked again.
“Who are you, and why were you asking questions about Sylas?”
Véra liked this question much better. Whoever this was – she guessed that he was a sophont – he’d just confirmed Sylas’s existence.
“So Sylas is real then?”
The man looked Véra over. She didn’t look like a DSA spy.
“What do you know about Sylas?”
“Not a lot. I just thought that he could help my friends.”
The gynoid interrupted.
“What friends?”
Véra addressed the female android.
“Jethro and his people. Sophonts. Like you. They got picked up by a DSA unit. Taken off to God knows where.”
The couple needed more information. The male android continued.
“You still haven’t told us your name, and where you’re from.”
“My name is Véra Parks and I live under the overpass where highways four and twelve meet.”
The female sophont knew the place.
“You’re a transient?”
Véra was pleased to hear the term used by the female android.
“Thank you. Transient sounds so much better than vagrant or even street-person. Gives us a whiff of hope, like it’s not a permanent state of being.”
The sophonts knew of such communities. Indeed some of the SFM’s most recent members had come from similar groups. They also knew that these humans and sophonts lived together in harmony.
The male sophont wanted to know more. He’d heard through the grapevine that there were DSA units raiding the underpass neighbourhoods but he hadn’t been able to find out where the confiscated sophonts were taken.
“Do you know where they take these sophonts? What happens to them?”
Véra shook her head.
“No, I don’t know. But give me a couple of hours and I’m sure I can find out. My brother may know. He’s very alert.”
It was easy for Véra and her people to move between boroughs. Nobody took any real notice of them as they crisscrossed the city. In fact, people would cross the road to avoid them, rather than be faced with the stark reality of life in the raw.
The male android glanced around to make sure that nobody else could hear him.
“My name is Philip and my friend is Serena. You say you need two hours. I’ll give you an hour extra – meet us back here in three hours.”
Véra nodded her agreement and scuttled off into the distance.
Three hours later, Philip and Serena watched from a nearby roof as Véra appeared in the alley below. She had certainly sounded genuine but it did no harm to make sure that she hadn’t been followed.
Once satisfied that it was safe, they scampered down from their rooftop refuge, exiting the building behind Véra, startling her.
“I thought you two weren’t coming for a moment.”
Serena smiled, not wanting to make the transient nervous.
“We just had to make sure you were alone.”
Véra sniffed, the cold air getting to her sinuses.
“Makes sense, I suppose. Seems like you can’t trust nobody these days.”
Philip checked his wristwatch. Just like any other sophont, he had an inbuilt chronometer and didn’t really need a wristwatch to know what the time was, but it was little details like this which helped the free sophonts to pass among humans unnoticed.
“Did you find anything out, Véra?”
The transient was feeling pleased with herself.
“I did, actually. Apparently, there’s a processing plant on the outskirts of the city. The collected sophonts are taken there to be decommissioned.”
‘Decommissioned’ seemed such an innocuous word, but it was actually a euphemism for being deactivated, dismantled, and processed for recycling.
‘On the outskirts of the city’ was also too vague. NewMet City was a hyper-city and that meant that the perimeter covered many kilometres. Philip hoped that Véra knew more than she had let on. She didn’t let him down.
“I’ve got some coordinates for you. Let me think. 42.589 north and 33.437 west. Or was it east? It’s so easy to get them two mixed up. No, it was definitely west.”
Philip hoped that she was right.
“Are you absolutely sure? Which is it?”
Véra laughed.
“It’s alright, love. I was only messing with you. My memory’s crisp as a battered cod.”
Philip and Serena hoped that the expression meant that she had remembered correctly.
Serena glanced at Philip, who had come to a decision. He spoke to Véra in a hushed voice.
“I think you should meet Sylas.”