Nicholas arrived in Cold Haven about 40 years ago when he was in his early thirties. He had taken numeros jobs beforehand as a security or a bodyguard. As a physical esper, he was very suited for such jobs and he indeed excelled at it because he displayed good maturity even in his early age. Ever since he turned eighteen years old, he had taken such jobs until he arrived in Cold Haven. His parents, in his memories at least, were unremarkable. His father was a mercenary like himself and his mother was an accountant which was a very common job within the colony. If he recalled correctly, she never worked for anyone else but for his father. Therefore, she was mostly a stay-at-home mom who barely did anything mother-worthy in his memories. She was always out with her friends, enjoying herself with alcohol, chemicals, and whatnot. Interestingly, as much as he disliked how she was a loose cannon, she always acted her part in front of her husband. It was only him, her son, who frequently witnessed her rather dirty side. He didn’t like the family dynamic, which made it easier for him to leave the household as soon as he could earn credits. His parents didn’t mind him leaving in fact. But they also stated that they didn’t mind him staying for a bit. Either way, he left as soon as he could.

  He opened his eyes from a short nap. Staring vacantly at the dark ceiling of his apartment.

  “Well, it’s been a while since I had a dream about my old folks.”

  He never contacted them once he left. They didn’t have his contact info, but he did.

  “Whatever.”

  Throwing the unpleasant dream away over his shoulders, he tried to recall what he was supposed to do. He figured that it was the right time to call the mercenary.

  “.........”

  He recalled what he witnessed a day ago at the alley. Could he have been able to deflect the shot if it was made in such a short distance? He doubted it. He was a class B esper, meaning the woman was a least class A or perhaps she was a class B with vast experience.

  “Well, let’s get this over with.”

  Making a call was as easy as thinking about it and executing a command in his head. He had a communication implant under his left ear after all. And the call was answered almost immediately. It was never easy to pick the right time to call strangers since he wouldn’t know their schedules. With very little concept of night and day, pretty much everyone worked at different hours.

  "Yes?"

  Clearing his throat, he said, "Hello, you may not remember me but -"

  "I do remember your voice," She replied promptly. "I've received the payment. Is there something wrong?"

  "Actually, I'd like to offer you a contract if you are interested?"

  There was a momentary pause before she replied.

  "A job? What kind? I do not take sexual contracts."

  At this point, he had a decision to make. It was whether to come clean. Viviant's story about "Project Moonlight" wasn't something anyone would simply believe right out of the box. That was because humanity had been working on transferring consciousnesses to chips for thousands of years. There had been hundreds, if not thousands, of such projects with no results. No one had been successful, yet. Such projects had contributed heavily in developing human-like artificial intelligence and that was pretty much it. In the end, he decided to tell her the truth and he expected her to laugh off. However, she didn't. Instead, she let out some interesting bits of info.

  "The android, Viviant, you spoke of. She is wanted in another sector," She stated.

  He was surprised. "What? Since when androids get wanted tags?"

  "A group claimed that the android had murdered one of their guys. They want exact revenge. I do not believe they know that she is an android."

  He gave it a thought and said, "Could be a person with the same name."

  "Perhaps, but the name, Viviant, is rare. I don't have the access level to check it in the database but the name is rare. It is more likely that the android you spoke of was involved in the incident than not."

  She made sense. He couldn't argue it since he felt the android sounded sketchy. He never really trusted her to begin with. Whatever it was, he felt there was money in it. But there was a question in his mind.

  “How did you recognize the android? You’ve never seen it.”

  “I saw it when I ran into you in that alley.”

  You’ve got to be kidding me, he thought because she was there for less than ten seconds max and she was kind of fighting him at that time. There was also the fact that it was dark. She may have seen it indeed but she wouldn’t or shouldn’t have known the android’s hair color and such. He was suspicious but he wasn’t going to argue at this point.

  "As far as offering me a contract, I can do 50k a day as long as it's not a sexual contract."

  50k a day was high. In fact, very high. Obviously, there was another option of hiring someone cheaper, but he saw what she was capable of. Even so, there wasn't any credit. He had to turn her down. Technically, he could hire her but only for two days and then his savings would run dry. Obviously, he wasn’t going to do that.

  “Sorry, it’s too much,” he said.

  “I understand, but my price is firm.”

  “Yeah, well, I simply cannot afford the contract.”

  And their conversation was soon over.

  “50k, holy nebula, my word. That’s expensive!” he exclaimed as soon as the call was over. His latest job earned him around 30k with 20k being a bonus after managing to fool a man to pay up. For him to charge 50k a day was simply unthinkable. Objectively, he wasn’t good enough to charge such an amount.

  “I am just a class B esper after all,” he whispered to himself.

  Indeed, class B espers were aplenty. Many could do what he did. Therefore, he had to be willing to take dirtier jobs. He had thrown away moral standards many decades ago to make a smooth living. The decision was easier for him due to the fact that his father was a mercenary as well. His father had told him more than on one occasion that high moral standards were nothing more than idealists’ fake dreams. Of course, he became skeptical of his father’s personal teachings upon entering teenage hood. It was during that rebellious period he just happened to watch a live reaction of Asperger’s actions, where he was having an argument in the Ark, which was the parliament of the United Solar System Federation. At that time, he was a target of an internal inquisition after being accused of an assault against a journalist. “Being accused” was perhaps a wrong term to have been used at that time because he was filmed on a live TV where she slashed off a female reporter’s arm. Under normal circumstances, he would have been stripped of his seat and would have faced formal charges. There was just one problem, however. He was the Asperger. There was a reason why he had “the” in front of his name. When he was a rising star in politics, he made himself very constroval by claiming, “the laws don’t apply to me because I have powers to overcome the system.” As a class S esper who was considered to have been the most powerful in clusters, he wasn’t making an empty threat. During his exam to determine his esper class, he destroyed a rogue planet with a simple finger snap. No esper was known to be that powerful. In fact, his level of powers were known to be beyond any measurement. His sheer powers attracted a certain level of secret admirers. In addition, his controversial “I don’t give a shit” attitude made him either a “you love him or hate him” kind of person. When the Ark was trying to place him gently under a trial for his crime, he boldly claimed -

  “Put judges behind ESP lie detectors and see how many can pass about their recent cases.”

  Nicholas laughed holding his belly upon hearing that as a teenager. It was a poorly hidden secret that almost all judges were corrupted. Money spoke louder than actual laws.

  “Do not expect me to abide by rulings from such corrupt idiots,” the Asperger boldly declared before many cameras. “I harmed the reporter because she insulted my dignity. She had the right to speak her mind, and I had my right to retaliate. Do not push this case further unless you want me to outright murder the reporter.”

  It was at that moment he seized his laughter and stared at the holographic screen in the living room of his home. He stared vacantly at the Asperger for several minutes without blinking at all. Secretly, he admired his guts and boldness to come forth with whatever he truly felt.

  “I am a power that cannot be swayed,” the Asperger claimed. “Money and influence will do nothing to me.”

  The case, in the end, was dropped because the parliament feared that he might really kill the reporter. They couldn’t scoff at his threat because he had indeed murdered people before and got away scot free because, again, he could.

  “A power that cannot be swayed…,” Nicholas mumbled. An entity that could not be threatened by anything, not even the mighty United Sol. The media loved to poke fun at him initially, stating that he was a ruthless dictator and what not. Asperger retaliated, teleporting to such stations and recklessly murdering those responsible. Eventually, the media had to shut up, for their own sake. It took some years, but they eventually found out that, as long as they reported events truthfully without including any personal bias, he was fine with it. In other words, he never denied the truth. Nicholas had to grin at this point. His retaliations may have been extreme, but they wouldn’t have taken him seriously otherwise. He could have sued, then again, like he said, it was hard to trust judges. Besides, it would take many years, not to mention the likelihood of endless appeals to drag it even further.

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  “A power that cannot be swayed indeed…, so one has to pave his own path.”

  So, he did. Nicholas did. He found Cold Haven, a small community with virtually no written laws. He settled down here and created his own rules. It was a small place but, at the level of his powers, this was just about the only place he could become “a power that cannot be swayed”. It took some efforts to overcome his sense of justice to throw away the moral values which the civilization taught him during his childhood, but he eventually realized that the Asperger was right. He could not trust the system and he came to trust his own judgement. The legal routes took too long for any kind of resolution.

  “Anyway, I don’t trust that android.”

  Artificial intelligence software was developed enough to a point that it was hard to distinguish between a real or a fake persona. The only sure way was to scan one’s head to see whether an actual brain was there. Viviant did not have that brain. Therefore, in his mind, even if she was in fact what she claimed to be, she wasn’t one anymore. She said herself that she no longer felt human even. She may have been a human at one point but she wasn’t one anymore, at least in his mind.

  “Maybe, she was never a human to begin with.”

  Having a sigh, he contacted Cass soon afterwards, telling her the result.

  "It was 50k a day. It was too much. I had to turn her down."

  She sighed and said, "I know where this is going."

  "Well, you are the only one around me that I can count on."

  She sighed deeply in return and shrugged.

  "How about Jess? I know she's your ex but you two still get on well."

  Jessica, she was a bouncer at the brothel. She and he had been in a relationship for several years before they broke up amicably. They were still on friendly terms.

  "I really prefer an ESP over a gunner at this point unless he or she is really good. No offense to Jess, but she is just a gunner."

  She was really good with her dual pistols. As far as pure gunnery was concerned, she was better than him in his mind. However, her physique was rather small, and she wouldn’t hold up well in direct confrontation which he was likely going to face. Besides…, he and his drone would provide enough firepower. What he really wanted was protection via an esper’s shield. Having a support esper would also protect him from other espers as well. The party would be more balanced with Cass. But seeing that she was conflicted, he decided to change the subject.

  "How is the android doing?"

  She folded her arms and responded, "Recharging right now. She is drawing 15 Amps. Power bill is going to go up. I hope that the strike I got won’t have any impact later."

  He sensed an opportunity when she mentioned the power bill.

  "We could get really rich from this, you know. Probably not mega-rich but enough to last a decade perhaps?"

  He could imagine her ears twitching. The 250k she paid to the mercenary had to come out of her pocket since she said she was unable to contact the boss. There was also no guarantee that Miguel would pay that amount, either. Money was everything in this world. The basic level of happiness could only be achieved with money. Only then one could look further. Thus, in a nutshell, she was 250k credit unhappier at the moment. He didn't know how much of the savings she had but 250k would have made a dent. He could hear her faint groan over the communication. She was clearly conflicted over the money. The agency was as good as dead at the moment. Both of them would need a new job, and this was it.

  He patiently waited for her to make a reply. It took a while but she eventually succumbed to his request. She was clearly unpleasant however.

  "Fine, Nick. You win. I will partake in the adventure. But I want half of whatever we end up getting, we clear?"

  He had no problem with that but had to put up with a condition.

  "That's fine as long as there are just two of us. I propose an equal share. So, if there are three, it will be 33%. Do we agree on that?"

  "Fine," she replied eventually. There was a decent chance of them recruiting someone else along the way because he wasn’t confident enough to be able to fend off potential enemies with this group. After all, he was just a class B esper, and so was Cass. Should a couple of class A espers appear, they would be in deep trouble. Hell, even a single class A esper would spell trouble. Thankfully, class A espers were mostly hired by governments and whatnot. Therefore, the chance of them turning to small time jobs was slim.

  Rubbing hands, he smiled, "Attagirl," And he added, "Let's meet up tomorrow at 0500."

  "Fine, I will inform Viviant."

  "Yeah, do bring her. I've got some questions for her. By the way, do you trust her?”

  There was a moment of uneasy pause before she replied. “I don’t know. My esper powers can’t tell whether she is lying. But my intuition tells me that she is confused.”

  “Confused?”

  “You heard her. She feels no longer human after being transferred to a chip. I do feel that she is telling the truth about that at least.”

  He stroked his chin slowly in his bed.

  “Cass, answer me objectively. Do you trust her?”

  “You trust no one in Cold Haven,” she replied promptly. That was the motto of everyone here. Trust no one and look after oneself.

  “Atta girl.”

  “Though I do trust you.”

  He smiled although there was no way that she could see that.

  “I wonder why,” he replied jokingly. He wasn’t expecting a concise answer actually.

  “Well, you’ve had plenty of chances of rape me if you wanted,” she replied quite unexpectedly.

  “... What?” He felt dumbfounded by her answer.

  “Nick, I am not an idiot. I know that my appearance is above average. Me preferring a goth style adds an extra danger as well. Men love goth girls for some reasons.”

  He did feel that her appearance was indeed above average, but men had different tastes in women. She wasn’t his type to begin with. He preferred a woman with good assets, and she was a petite woman. Anyway, that did remind him …

  “Why do you stick to your goth style, especially when you know it brings you additional risks?”

  “I like black and white, just like how you prefer black clothes.”

  Actually, the reason he preferred the black color was that it was far easier to blend into the environment in combat.

  “I feel like there is more to that…,” he mumbled, again not expecting a concrete answer, and she didn’t answer.

  “Anyway, I am assuming here that we should keep close eyes on her?” She changed the subject.

  “We cannot trust her at this point.”

  What the mercenary told him, she had no reason to lie. Then the story Viviant told them had holes. According to her own story she told them, she was turned off and woke up. What was she involved in anything else? It simply didn’t make any sense at this point.

  “We do have the option of turning her in, Nick,” she suggested. “We would get money either way.”

  True although probably not as much.

  “No, we will observe her for the time being. Should we find her at fault…, then we will bring down our own justice upon her,” he replied in an ominous voice.

  “Oh, scary,” she replied with a casual whistle. “I hope, sincerely for her own sake, that she will never get to see your dark side.”

  “... Let’s meet up on time, yes?”

  “Of course, see you later, Nick.”

  Just as he concluded his conversation with Cass, a new one dinged in his head. It was from Dakarai.

  “Sup, dude, is it about the drone? It can’t be done already, can it?”

  “Nah, components are still on their way although I’ve started building it. The reason for this call is to ask you what kind of gun you want for the drone. I looked it up in the database and the one you chose last was a scatter gun.”

  A scatter gun was basically a shotgun. However, since a physical bullet was no longer a thing, it used heated plasma instead. It was a short range and crowd control gun, good at making a large number of enemies hesitant but bad at inflicting actual damage… unless someone was foolish enough to get close, in which case they would have many bunt holes on their bodies.

  “What are my options? I don’t believe I was asked for a choice back then.”

  “That’s because it was on clearance sale the last time. You purchased the drone as is. It is different now, though.”

  “I see. What other choices are there?”

  “Normally, the scatter gun is the most popular choice especially for civilians. It rarely harms anyone due to its utterly short range, which prevents unnecessary lawsuits should a mistake occur in self-defense. In your case, though, I would personally recommend something else with an actual substance.”

  The guy did have a point. Nicholas had used the drone for nearly a decade and had actually never seen anyone getting hurt by it. The gun was loud, so it did its job regardless as a sort of distraction.

  “Is it possible to make it snipe?”

  There was a short pause in Dakarai’s reply. “It’s best to keep the drone under 10kg, especially for 1.0G operation. Installing a sniper rifle is possible but it greatly depends on the range you want.”

  A plasma sniper rifle used plasma, just like almost all other guns, but it used frozen plasma instead of heated. That was due to the fact that a bullet needed to keep its form to travel a great distance. A heated plasma wasn’t going to fly far. Another option was a focused laser which was almost impossible to dodge since it traveled at the speed of light, but it was actually awful at killing humans at the power level it could be used on mobile.

  “A sniper drone isn’t going to need armor, so take it off and make its range as far as possible. Can you do that?”

  “Let me do a quick calculation here…” He continued after about ten seconds. He must have been running numbers. “I can do a 5 km range with a penetrating power of 100mm titanium.”

  “I assume more penetrating power if I shorten the range?”

  “Yeah.”

  He considered the size of Cold Haven. It wasn’t a big place. In fact, it was smaller than 5 km in any direction.

  “2 km is enough, given the size of Cold Haven. Make it hit as hard as possible with that range.”

  “Ah, right, you do have a point there.”

  With Cass as his support, he longer needed a support drone like he had before. Even if it could take down just one with an element of surprise, he wanted something meaningful. He could let the drone enter stealth mode and let it just sit somewhere within Cold Haven and use it to snipe someone in time of need. The only downsides were that it would be useful only outside and that it would work probably only once. In other words, the drone would be a glass cannon and a hidden card.

  “Can you make it before 0500 tomorrow?”

  “Bud, that’s a pretty tight deadline.”

  “Can you?”

  There was, again, a short pause.

  “I probably can. But, given the tight deadline, I will just release the drone. Since I am using the sync chip from your previous one, I don’t need your presence to establish the connection anyway.”

  This was precisely why he dragged the destroyed drone along. The sync chip had his brain wave information and it could be used for malicious purposes. It would never be life threatening but it could disturb him enough in tight situations.

  “Got it. Thanks.”

  “We will be even, yeah?”

  Nicholas beamed a grin. “Certainly.”

  “Good.” Then the communication was over. Taking a deep breath, he finally got himself off the bed. He was fully naked at this point, revealing his heavily toned body. Cracking fingers and massaging his shoulders, he walked toward a shower room slowly.

  “If that android is found having lied to me and Cass, I am just going to blow its head away,” he mumbled. “I am not wasting any more time on this if it’s going to be useless.”