Neil raised his hands, too. “My kid and I thought you came to rob us.”

The police officer snarled at Neil, “I’m going to need that watch back. And that money you pocketed tonight.”

They both stared at him, realizing they’d been right: he had come to rob them. Neither of them had expected the leecher to hire an actual cop to do his dirty work.

Neil gave a derisive laugh. “Private detail duty, eh, Officer?”

Like most everyone else nowadays, cops couldn’t really live on their salaries, especially now as automated machines replaced them in standard patrolling and crowd control. An unscrupulous few of them took side jobs like this, acting as badge-carrying servants to the same men who’d given themselves bonuses with what used to be the cops’ pensions.

This cop holstered his gun, satisfied he’d established his legal right to steal Neil’s winnings. “We all do what we gotta do. Now hand it over.”

“You don’t seem to get how this works,” Neil spat, his hands curling into shaking claws. “Your patron wagered and he lost. He lost to me fair and square. Maybe he’s never gotten the memo, but when you gamble and you lose, you actually lose. It’s a bargain you make for the money you get if you win. He can’t just send a pet cop to take it back because the game didn’t go his way!”

The cop was unmoved. “Do you want to give me a problem tonight, sir? Do you want this to turn ugly? Because I’ve got no issue with that. Just from the look of you, I’m betting you have prior offenses. That’ll be helpful later when I say you were resisting arrest, or maybe that you were aggressive and left me no choice but to defend myself with force. And maybe your kid came after me, which will be good reason to lock him up, too.” He smirked at Tom. “I don’t think you want this nice-looking boy of yours in there with that bunch. I think you should play nice and give me what I was sent here for, and we’ll all walk away.”

Every muscle in Neil’s body tightened.

Anger simmered in Tom’s gut, too, but he knew there was no standing up to a cop. This guy could beat them both up and charge them with the felony. His word would always be taken above theirs in a court. For that matter, even if Tom hooked into a census device and uploaded this memory to the Spire’s systems so someone could view it, and he could prove the cop was in the wrong, he and Neil would still end up the ones in trouble for illegally recording a police officer.

Tom reached out and nudged his dad. “Just give it to him.”

With a noise of disgust, Neil delved into the pockets of his worn suit and hurled down the watch and a wad of cash, letting it all litter across the broken concrete of the alleyway. “You’re no better than a common hoodlum.”

The officer swooped down and snatched the roll of bills. “We’ve all gotta feed our own.”

Neil gazed at the man with a burning rage in his eyes, and Tom knew this bomb would explode if he didn’t intervene now. He reached forward and grasped Neil’s rigid arm, then jerked his dad back toward the street with him. But Neil couldn’t resist a parting shot.

“You’re next, you know!”

The cop swung back up to his feet. “Are you threatening me?”

Oh no. Tom tightened his grip on Neil. “Dad . . .”

But Neil had that reckless light in his eyes, a crazed grin twisting his leathery face, and Tom knew this was a lost cause. “My boy and me, yeah, the corporate overlords already see us as surplus people breathing their air, living on their planet, but you know what? You’re a worthless cockroach to them, too, buddy. They used to need you to keep your boot on our necks while they emptied our pockets. . . .”

“Dad, let’s just go!”

Neil forged on. “But I hope the next time you look up at a drone in your sky or a patrol unit on your street, you’ll realize you’re nothing to them, too, and if you don’t like it, they’ve got an automated boot to shove up your—”

The cop crossed the distance between them in two strides, and cracked the butt of his gun across Neil’s face, slamming him to the ground. Neil started laughing, raising himself up on his elbows, blood dripping from his nose in dark globs.

“Too close to the truth, Officer?”

The cop ripped forward for another blow, and Tom didn’t even think about it—he shoved the man back. He knew a moment later that he’d made a mistake, and the cop’s Taser jammed into his side, sending an electric jolt tearing through his muscles, locking them up, hurtling a mass of stars before his eyes. The entire world became a vibrating mass of prickling needles, and his body slipped out of his own control, thrashing to the ground. . . .

Tom came to sprawled on the ground, his palms stinging, his knees burning. He became aware of Neil shaking him persistently.

“Tommy . . . Tommy! You’re starting to scare me. Come on. Wake up, kid. Wake up.”

Tom forced his eyes open, a groan escaping his lips. “Dad?”

“Oh, thank God. I don’t know what that was you just had.” Neil’s face was washed of color, a stark gray. “A seizure or something.”

“I’m okay.” His voice rang strangely in his own head. Everything seemed very far away.

“Well, you sent the banker’s pet running.” Neil hoisted him to his unsteady feet. “I guess he didn’t want to get blamed for killing a kid.”

They began the slow, difficult journey back to the hotel, Tom half draped over his dad’s shoulder. His nose was buried against Neil’s jacket, the smell of stale smoke and alcohol filling his nostrils. Numbers danced meaninglessly over his vision.

Tom woozily tried to sort out what had happened. He’d definitely lost a few minutes, or maybe his chronometer was messed up.

He’d been tased before, back when he was a lot younger and had started gambling in VR parlors. He lost to this grown man, and he didn’t have the money he’d bet against the guy, so he tried to run away. He wasn’t fast enough. The man caught him, hauled him into this empty bathroom, and tased him over and over again until he was sure Tom had lied about having money. Then he tased Tom for losing a bet with money he didn’t have. He said it was to “teach him a lesson.”

Tom had learned his lesson: he stopped losing.

He’d also learned what a Taser felt like, so he knew it wasn’t normal feeling this weak, feeling the strange buzzing in his skull, seeing the strange numbers dancing over his vision. It had to be the computer in his head, registering its objection to that electric jolt. He hoped he hadn’t messed it up too much.

The neural processor didn’t calm its strange seizure of flashing numbers until Tom was lying on his bed in their hotel room, the AC pumping a jet of icy air at him, the television buzzing. Tom could hear Neil muttering where he sat, drinking on the other bed.

Tom lifted his head blearily to see the screen was graced by the newly public Camelot Company Combatants. The Indo-Americans and the Russo-Chinese had worked out a temporary cease-fire, allowing the CamCos to go on publicity tours, where they touted their efforts in the war and their sponsors from the Coalition of Multinational Corporations. The military was also taking advantage of the absence of the younger trainees to open up certain areas of the Spire for a bunch of media events.