Shuqba and three android officers arrived at one of the LeaderCorp Hubs in the Demi-Settlements first thing in the morning. She hadn’t told anyone in the barracks about her posting (mostly because the other Neo SFOs wouldn’t talk to her); still, word had got around. They’d whispered and glanced at her all morning as she prepared for her shift. She overheard one of them say the Demis would eat her alive.
Shuqba took her position at the rations gate. A line had already formed outside. The sun was rising over a guard tower in the city wall and shone right into her eyes. She ignored the sweat building up under her collar. Feeling comfortable was not an SFO priority.
The streets outside the wall were chaotic. Her throat constricted at the odour of toilet waste mixed with body odour and acrid smoke from fuel lamps and barrel fires. People were everywhere. Shuqba struggled to concentrate and not flinch at every movement in her peripheral vision. A canine ran up to sniff at her leg. At least they had something like wildlife out here. The canine growled and the android guard rolled over to give it a belt with an electropacifier. Shuqba didn’t even have a weapon. If there was any kind of incident she would have to rely on her own strength and hand-to-hand combat skills and the assistance of the androids.
As the crowd caught sight of Shuqba’s Neandertal features the insults and laughter began. They didn’t lower their voices or whisper. They didn’t care if she heard. Behaviour wasn’t controlled in the Demi-Settlements in the same way it was in the city. The Demis didn’t have as far to fall as Citizens did. They thought their quips were so original. They obviously didn’t realise she’d been told every day in the cloning orphanage and at the SF academy that she was a member of an inferior, uglier species, only fit to do the jobs Citizens didn’t want.
She silently ran through facts about the Demi-Settlements. Water is provided to Demi-Citizens from the recycling of their own wastes. There is one LeaderCorp Hub per approximately five thousand Demi-Citizens. There are ten hubs in total. Weapons made from metal scavenged from the suburbs are common in the Demi-Settlements. Nano-printed weapons, though uncommon, have been seen in the Demi-Settlements. The last facts didn’t help with her growing sense of physical vulnerability.
She fell into a rhythm scanning wrist chips. The line was already long, twisting through the disordered streets. No ruler-straight planned grid system out here. The Demi-Settlements had grown organically, uncontrolled. She glanced down the line, avoiding eye contact. Eye contact could lead to confrontation. Demis were such an angry group. Shuqba was starting to understand why. The deformities and diseases she saw; the blackened teeth, ulcerated skin and twisted limbs. The dirty, dusty streets. The odour of death and excrement. The ramshackle shelters with very little protection from the elements. The way they lived out here wouldn’t be believed by Citizens jacked in to their cosy realities behind the city wall.
A young female, skinny and short as most of them were in the Demi-Settlements, with curly black hair tumbling messily under the hood of a SunSuit, moved sideways out of the line and smiled.
Shuqba huffed. She hadn’t meant to engage and the last thing she’d expected was a smile. The female approached, her posture relaxed and no sign of weapons on her person.
‘Can I help you, ma’am?’
‘I just wanted to welcome you to the neighbourhood.’ She stuck her hand out.
Shuqba looked at the hand.
‘Hey, I’m waiting here,’ grumbled a bent-over man at the front of the line.
Shuqba turned and continued scanning wrist chips. ‘Thank you for the welcome, ma’am, however, I have a job to do. You’ll have to step back into line.’
The female held up her hands. ‘No worries. Just wanted to let you know we aren’t all savages out here. My name’s Alida, by the way.’
Shuqba tried to keep her expression serious, authoritative; still, one side of her mouth bent upwards. It was the friendliest anyone had been to her since her arrival in the city. She glanced up from the wrist she was scanning to watch Alida resume her position in line.
Soon Alida and the small girl clinging to her legs reached the hub gate.
‘Will you be here regular?’ Alida asked.
‘I go where I’m sent.’
‘This is my little sister, Graycie.’ The child smiled shyly from behind Alida’s hip. They collected their rations and waved to Shuqba as they walked away.
Shuqba scanned wrist after wrist. She had been trained to be hyper-alert to her surroundings, but the sensory information in the Demi-Settlements was overwhelming.
Two motor scooters hooned past the hub. Shuqba glanced up to see one of the riders launch a projectile. Something wet, brown and fetid splattered against her chest before she got her shield up. Further brown splatters coated the shield. The people at the front of the line moved back into a cluster, some of them hurling additional faecal bombs at her and the android.
The android guard followed the motor scooters, electropacifier extended, for a metre or two calling, ‘Halt!’
The attackers fled, lost in the labyrinth of cardboard, canvas and metal. The android returned to its post, programmed against being lured away.
Faeces dripped from the wire diamonds of the fence. Shuqba expected she was the target, as most of the excrement was on her shield or the ground around her. They couldn’t possibly have known that she, a Neo-Neandertal clone, was going to be on duty at the hub that day.
‘Reports of attacks on the other hubs are coming in,’ the android said.
‘Other attacks?’
‘Yes. Attacks have now been registered at ten out of ten hubs. Rotten produce, rocks and faecal matter have been employed as projectiles. One Sapien Security Force Officer has suffered a head wound and two androids have suffered minor cosmetic damage to their outer shells.’
Shuqba stepped back from the gate, shook her shield and leaned it against the fence. An organised, coordinated attack on LeaderCorp’s presence in the Demi-Settlements was likely to be motivated by more than the Demis’ hatred of Neos. Although it didn’t seem as though the attacks had achieved more than creating a nuisance. Unless it was a distraction. She looked down at the brown smear on her shirt, right over her heart. The knowledge that her shirt was bulletproof was only a small consolation.
‘Headquarters has ordered a retreat to the hub until we can safely evacuate,’ the android said.
Shuqba nodded and took a look around for further danger. Alida, the young female who had spoken to her before, came rushing forward.
‘Are you okay?’
‘Step away from the Security Force Officer,’ the android commanded.
Alida raised her hands and fell back. ‘Do you have something to clean that ick off with? I can find you some rags.’
The android moved between them and locked the gate. ‘We must retreat to the hub and await further instruction from headquarters. Please move away from the LeaderCorp Hub, Demi-Citizen.’
‘Yep, sure. I don’t want any hassle.’ Alida crouched to let her little sister climb onto her back.
An explosion vibrated through Shuqba’s body. Her insides turned to water and her ears rang. A wave of heat rolled in from the road behind them.
‘Take cover.’ The android grabbed hold of Shuqba’s collar and dragged her towards the hub.
Outside the fence Alida grabbed the child from her back and shielded her with her body. The android keyed in the security code and opened the door.
‘What’s happening?’
‘Six explosions have been reported in the Demi-Settlements. I am awaiting further information.’ The android locked the door behind them and activated a sonic weapon.
On the live-feed screen Shuqba watched Alida, the little girl, and any Demi within a one hundred metre radius of the hub stagger away with their hands over their ears. Three separate columns of smoke were visible from Shuqba’s vantage point.
Shuqba chewed her lip. All of LeaderCorp’s wars were being fought on distant shores. The attack could have come from a domestic terrorist group such as the Sapien Enhancement Movement transhumanists, a Neo rights group or one of the militant anti-tekker cults such as the Rewilders. Commander Rayne had said the Demi-Settlements were a powder keg and they had ignited on the day of Shuqba’s first shift.