Chapter 1: I, Boomer?
by Maxwell Sinclair

"In the latter half of the twentieth century, rapid advancements in technology at last resulted in the development of artificial substitutes for human beings. A synthesis of mechatronics, artificial intelligence, and biotechnology, they freed people from all kinds of menial labor. People called these symbols of the era, "Boomers, assemblers of prosperity."

It was a Friday evening and I was wandering the streets of what I had known as Tachikawa, but it looked now like it could be Shibuya. The glow of neon signs and virtual idols illuminated trendy stores and a coffee shop where the waitresses dressed and acted like maids, accompanied by the rhythm and thunder of pachinko parlors and arcades.

Around me walked young kids adorned in tattoos, piercings, and more hair colors than I could count interspersed by the occasional salarymen. They left an envelope of emptiness around me. This may be due to the fact that I was an almost two-meter tall man with shoulder length blonde hair, or it could simply be due to the fact that I haven't bathed in over a week (at least).

It seemed most of the special wards had been eliminated in the earthquake. So much for magic potions and too many books, I had simply woken up in the now ruins of old central Tokyo.

Currently, I found myself wearing a blank, moronic expression staring at a poster on a nearby pole. Yep, my suspicions were correct.

'Priss and the Replicants.
CJ's.
Doors open at 7.
18+'

The show was tonight. There were other details on the poster, but I got the gist.

This means I must be in at least the latter half of the 2020's, if not into the 2030's. Several questions other than what year it was ran through my head: What happened to my friends? How could I have been left lying underground abandoned for so long? Did my family give up on me? What has happened in the world? Most importantly, where can I find a bath and a good stiff drink?

The building behind me erupted in gunfire as a tall (to me!), muscular man ran out.

Instead of hands, his forearms ended in what looked to me like M61-Vulcan cannons and he fired continuously as he backpedaled away from the building. A bag hung off his shoulder full to the brim with jewelry and bills.

"Now, whatever happened to give me all the money or I'll shoot? This dumb robot seems to think it is give me all the money and I'll shoot." I looked around hoping the Knight Sabers would show up.

As I heard more screams of pain from customer and pedestrian alike, I decided I'd have to act.


Leon McNichol was walking through the streets of lower Genom city after his shift had ended. It had been over a year since him and Daley had narrowly avoided being eye-witness to the destruction of the harbor city nuclear plant. Since then, boomer violence had steadily declined and no one had heard any mention of 'the boomer revolution'. Leon sighed and laced his hands behind his head. This meant life had been extremely boring. The Knight Sabers had all but vanished and his trigger finger itched.

Leon's bored musings were interrupted by a large crash and bullets being fired extremely rapidly. He rushed to the end of the block and pulled out his trusty Mateba. Others on the force had converted to newer guns, but when it came to sheer stopping power without the risk of jamming you couldn't beat it. It wouldn't pierce the armor of new military boomers, but he knew from experience a revolver wasn't going to effectively stop a military boomer no matter how powerful the gun was.

Looking around the corner, he saw a boomer backpedaling away from a jewelry store with a backpack and two arms that ended in machineguns. The rapid fire of its arms gunned down security guard and bystander alike.

What was a boomer like that doing here, and why rob a store? This was clearly a combat model, it looked almost two and a quarter meters tall. The only excuse for it being here was some sort of sick Genom test. Of course, he would never be able to prove that but combat boomers didn't just rob jewelry stores.

He watched a tall Caucasian man with shoulder-length, blonde hair and extremely tattered clothes approaching the boomer from behind. It seemed the boomer didn't notice him, or more likely didn't care. As the man was almost right behind the boomer, it swung its arm around to fire on him.

In surprise, Leon watched the blonde swing his left arm up suddenly like a windshield wiper and catch the gun-arm. The man's hips pivoted with his right arm and side swinging in and the hand struck the boomer's elbow bending it in reverse. Simultaneously, the blonde stepped forward with his right leg lowering his stance as if he was mounting a motorcycle. His right arm swung sideways grabbing the boomer's chin and his body swung around along with his left leg stepping into the boomer.

Leon cringed as the left arm followed the momentum folding the arm completely in the wrong direction against the boomer's body. He knew it was just a boomer that probably couldn't feel the pain, but it sure looked painful. The blonde's left leg had stepped behind the boomer's leg and his body fell forward, with knees turned in, forcing the boomer to the ground. Leon continued to stare as the blonde-haired man pounded the boomer's face into the ground forming a small crater.

Finally, the boomer's body ceased to twitch as dark red oil continued to spray on the road from what had once been a head.

The tall Caucasian stood staring down at his hands.

Leon didn't know who this blonde was, but from what he had just witnessed, he'd guess it was a boomer. Better bring him in for questioning. "Freeze."

The blonde boomer(?) turned to look at him with a puzzled expression. Then it turned and ran, easily dodging the bullets from Leon's trusty autorevolver.

It quickly vanished amongst the crowds of Tachikawa. Leon didn't look forward to writing this report.


I rounded a corner after I was sure I had lost the officer firing shots at me and pressed my back against the alley wall. That was definitely Leon McNichol. I was sure of it. Looked like he was old enough he should have met Priss by now, I'd have to investigate a bit. Maybe there is a way I could use this to my advantage.

First though…I grinned as I pulled out a wad of cash from my pocket. No one had noticed me 'borrow' it from the money the boomer had stolen. It was high time I found a bath house and a change of clothes.

CJ's turned out to be a dark, smoky dive bar with a small stage and two lopsided billiard tables. My kind of place.

I sat at the bar, working on my third glass. I'd been surprised to find they had Bushmills and single malt. I prefer Scottish, but it would do. The band had just begun to set up on stage but there weren't many patrons yet.

With nothing to do but sip at my glass I let my mind roam. I had visited the library earlier after finding a bath house and clothing store. It was 2035. I had been declared deceased years ago; therefore, all of my assets had been transferred to my nieces per the instructions in my will. This meant there was no chance I could just sit back and relax off the growth of my investments.

The good news was this means Largo was most likely out of the way. If I am a boomer, I'm not so keen on someone deciding they are going to declare themselves the new boomer god. I don't feel any compulsions to serve humans, which I'm counting as a blessing, but I don't relish the idea of some other boomer ruling me as a human either.

I eyed the drink a bit bleary eyed. Guess I'll switch to beer after this. Seems I can still get drunk. These people have an odd way of making robots; I required food, water, sleep, and other indelicate human functions. I presumed I was a robot. Being a boomer would explain how I was so strong. I could be something else entirely. Waking up in a world that you used to watch in cartoons has a knack for helping you to believe most anything.

My investigations today hadn't helped to solve many questions. I still didn't know what I was or what I was capable of. I didn't know where my friend were, but the records stated they were dead as well. They may be walking around like me or actually dead. Then again, I may actually be dead or in a coma…

All questions aside, I had one priority. I needed to establish an income. I had only managed to grab fifty-thousand nuyen from the boomer earlier. Branch accepts boomers and may be fun. I could dig the detective shtick, but I'd probably have to be part of the AD Police first. That doesn't seem all that fun.

I could try the vigilante gig. Bet I'd be good at it. The fight earlier had been easy. But I didn't feel like horning in on the Knight Sabers' territory, and not everyone has Sylia's connections to fund something like that. I liked her idea, though she's misguided by her distaste for Genom and boomer technology.

In a world of megacorporations, there is room for a little corporate terrorism. If I set it up right, it could pay well. Simple enough, I just need connections and places to hide. I was supposedly dead; therefore, I had no ID. Wonder how much a fake one of those runs…

It looked like Priss and her band were about ready to start. I better start looking for a place to stay tonight. It shouldn't be too difficult. Now that I was clean and wearing new clothes, all I needed was to buy a few drinks and find a woman to go home with.


I sat in the window of the girl's tenth floor apartment. I think she said her name was Fuuka. She was sleeping about five feet away on a futon. I wasn't real concerned about her waking up any time soon, I had made sure of that.

Leaving the girls apartment, I headed to the roof. It had been some time since I had watched the sunrise over a city. It used to be a favorite past time. I wonder if those buildings even exist anymore.

The spectacle did not disappoint. It seems even as a boomer (or whatever I am), the beauty still brings a tear to my eye.

Looking at the adjacent roof, I started to wonder. I've already seen I'm strong...hmm...

I ran forward and leapt off the roof, if this didn't work it would probably hurt pretty badly. I easily cleared the gap and almost overshot the neighboring roof, falling into a backward roll to stop the momentum and at the same time not fall off.

"Dude. That was some matrix kind of shit." I could get to like this. Oooh, so much for no one ever makes the first jump.

That girl, Fuuka, may have been a one night stand, but I felt bad about just leaving without a single word. Besides, I may need a place to sleep again sometime. I jumped back to the roof of her building.

I had shut the door behind me when I left earlier, but getting back into her apartment wasn't that difficult since she had an old style tumbler lock. If it had been electronic I would have had to just go about my merry way. I'm definitely going to have to look into that. I can't go around kicking down every door I need opened and I doubt corporate buildings are going to have tumbler locks.

It was a simple apartment consisting of a main room, a kitchen and a small bathroom. Back in America, I probably would have considered this a studio. But being Japan, it's probably just a normal apartment.

The girl looked peaceful sleeping on the futon. I'm gonna need to move quietly. I spent a while on the roof. Slipping into the kitchen I made a quick omelet, buttered some toast and made a fresh pot of coffee. Placing all of this on the low table, along with a quick note, I grabbed a beer from her fridge and slipped out the door.

Just in the nick of time, she was already stirring from the smell. The note was quite simple:

"Morning, sunshine. Had to prepare for work. Look forward to seeing you again sometime.

-Max"

Technically, it wasn't a lie...

I traveled to a coffee shop working on perfecting my new found mode of travel.


A few nights later, I slunk across a rooftop in the early evening keeping my eye on the woman I had just seen talking to Nene. I wore a newly purchased outfit for sneaking through shadows: kung fu shoes (Silence is a larger concern than protection for me. I'm half-tempted to just wear socks.); light, black carpenter pants; a ski mask; gloves; and eye black around the exposed part of my face. It was the best I could do with the little funds I had. If I wiped off the eye black and raised the balaclava, I looked somewhat normal.

I tried a scarf last night and I kept feeling like it was going to come loose. A ski mask seemed wiser.

If Megatokyo was anything like Tokyo, then my image was probably captured numerous times during the store-robbing boomer incident, but hopefully I can prevent that mistake from happening again.

The woman I followed was an officer with the AD Police. I recognize the uniform. I can't keep going around without any weapons. Guns can be noisy, are easily traced, and can be turned against you in close combat. My best bet was going to be a knife, easily hidden and backed by my strength much deadlier than any gun. I knew the AD Police carry a knife that could hurt a boomer. Stealing one seems like an easier method than trying to find someone that sold one.

I wasn't going to steal from Nene, that could be risky, but this girl was fair game. I was about to fuck up her day. I feel bad, but she'll get over it.


Naoko Ayase had light brown hair in a short bob cut and lightly freckled cheeks. She was short, even by Japanese standards, but she was still taller than her friend Nene. They sat down together in the AD Police crime lab. When it came to analyzing video and audio they were two of the best.

"What do we got Naoko?"

She smiled at the cute woman with strawberry red hair. "Case zero-three-five-dash-zero-six-zero-three-zero-zero-two, the one from last night." She giggled at her friend's scrunched face and keyed up the video.

Three boomers stood in the remains of a building, cars littered the street, several on fire. The entire video was tinted orange from the flames. The three boomers were massive, at least two-to-three times the size of a human. Military boomers always gave her the chills. They were dark blue, had a face like a human skull, and appeared to be covered in sinewy muscles; albeit made of metallic alloys.

They raised their heads and roared at the sky arms held out as the AD Police opened fire. The AD Police had formed a semi-circle of thirty officers, a common formation for them. The formation widened allowing two K12s and three K11 suits to step into the center.

At one all three boomers charged forward, the bullets seemed ineffective. The preliminary report from Branch identified the boomers as prototype 5A's.

The K suits fired making a slight impact but not enough to stop them. The lead boomer's arm struck out grabbing the K12s on the left in the head. Its right arm ripped off the chest piece revealing a uniformed AD Police officer underneath. He continued to fire his rifle into the chest of the boomer regardless of the danger he now faced. The boomer's right arm reared back and shot forward like a missile...

..."There." Naoko pressed pause. A dark blur hung in the air above the boomer and K12s.

"Slow it down senpai," Nene asked her.

The blur descended, landing in between the K12s and the opposing boomer. It looked like a tall human, or humanoid, dressed in black. This was the reason they were analyzing this video.

"Umm is that a scarf on its face, Nene-kun?"

"I think it is. Wong-san said it was dressed like a ninja, but that looks like it just wrapped its head with a scarf shinobi style," giggled Nene. "It has some kind of paint or make-up on its face, too."

As Nene zoomed in on the figure's eyes, Naoko noticed she couldn't see its eyes. They were a blurry white. "Hmm…the equipment can't make out it eyes and there's a slight blur to its whole frame."

"Yep," Nene agreed. "Look if we switch to thermal we can't see it at all. I think it's putting out some sort of electromagnetic interference. I don't think it is a suit, either."

"No way it would look like that, unless they are selling them at thrift stores now. So, we can assume it isn't human." The taller, brown-haired woman let the video move forward again and the figure spoke. "What is he saying?" She rewound the video and played it at normal speed. This made the thing's movements almost too fast to see, but allowed sounds to be heard normally. However, even in real time the voice sounded garbled and distorted, like high-pitched static.

"The report from the officers state it said, 'Excuse me, I'll just be a second.' with an American accent. Its electromagnetic interference must disrupt audio recording as well."

This didn't surprise Naoko much, she had seen enough footage of the Knight Sabers to know that their equipment wasn't perfect. Nene looked worried though, knowing it was only her interference that left the AD Police unable to make out the voices of her friends. This was something more advanced than their hard suits.

"Let's continue Nene-kun."

The thing grabbed the boomer's punching fist with its left hand and appeared to pull back continuing the boomer's momentum. The boomer's hand was noticeably being crushed by the thing's hand. It fell back backwards with the punch and jumped off the ground with its left leg, kicking straight up into the boomer's chin with its right foot. The force of the blow crushed the front of the boomer's face and the boomer fell backwards. The thing somersaulted backwards in the air and landed lithely on its feet before the officer in the damaged K12s had even had time to respond.

Meanwhile, the boomer on the left had knocked the far left K11 suit on its back and, in a mounted position, began to pound the suit in the chest. The boomer to the right had grabbed the other K12s in the face and, similar to the lead, was about to rip its chest off.

The dark figure cartwheeled to the right. With its left arm on the ground it wrapped its right leg around the outside of the boomer's right arm and its left leg pushed up toward the armpit and braced against the inside. The fingers on its left hand dug into the road and the figure's body swung back to the right bringing the boomer through the air with it. The boomer flew free from the thing's legs when it was horizontal to the ground and struck the other boomer knocking it off the K11.

The black clad stranger landed in a crouch and somersaulted forward to land on its back. Its right leg came down with it finishing the damage it had started on the lead boomer's head and the left leg came down with enough force to put a dent halfway into the boomer's chest.

"Whatever it is, it's strong. Maybe it weighs a lot."

Nene nodded silently.

The figure kipped up and returned to a stance, its lower-left leg perpendicular to its thigh which was perpendicular to its body. The right leg was behind the right shoulder with a straight knee. Its left arm was parallel to the body fingers pointed to the sky with the palm turned in; the right hand against its back.

It stood calmly as the two boomers moved to flank it. The AD Police moved into a circle around the boomers and stranger awaiting orders. The damaged K12s was evacuated allowing the pilot to join the ranks.

Naoko inched forward in her seat. It was kind of exciting to watch.

The boomers struck together, the left one punching with its right arm and the right boomer punching with its left arm. They thought to pulverize the smaller figure, and having witnessed their strength they could probably do so to a small tank.

When they had almost made contact the strange thing spun clockwise, its left arm pushing against the inside of the left's wrist and its right arm pushing against the outside of the right boomer's wrist. It rose into the air continuing the spin as a crater formed from the force of its jump. The left boomer's fist punched into the ground while the right's punch demolished its head.

The thing swung around the outside of the arm holding with its right hand. Its legs closed on the boomer's head like scissors and the thing swung around and down the boomers back. The weight of its body diving back-to-back pulled the boomer down backwards. As its hands struck the ground both legs kicked forward swinging the entire boomer over it.

It landed with its back to the airborne boomer and spun clockwise bringing the right fist up and downward into the boomer slamming it into the ground forming an impact crater the size of a city bus. The figure completed another full rotation, the left leg swinging around and landed standing on the boomer. With a twist of its entire body, its right foot crushed the boomers mid section.

Whether this thing was truly a threat or not, like the Knight Sabers the official AD Police answer was to take it down and let Branch investigate later.

They opened fire and Nene and I both stared as the figure jumped at least ten flights into the air against a nearby building, jumped off the building wall, struck another building another ten stories up, and used that wall to propel itself to the roof of another nearby building. From there the camera lost it.

"Well, it isn't human. And what bothers me the most is I think that was an easy fight for it. They didn't even hit it." The brown-haired girl's stomach turned. "That may have been a new Genom weapons test that we stumbled on. But why would they dress it like that? Do you think it is another vigilante like the Knight Sabers?"

"Ano..." Nene's rubbed her index fingers together.

"Hmm?"

She pointed at the clock. "Can we finish the report tomorrow?" It was five already.

Yawning, Naoko stretched her arms out. "Yeah, that's a good idea. Sleep on it and maybe we'll have something to report, other than Genom possibly having a new boomer that could take out our entire force."

Nene's apartment was on the way to Naoko's. Being friends as well as partners, they often walked home together. Today, they walked in silence and neither mentioned grabbing ice cream or stopping off to shop. Naoko assumed Nene was worried about this new boomer (Actually, she was thinking about the encounter the Knight Sabers had had with it after the video). She didn't blame her for being worried, she kind of was, but there was no sense in taking work home with you. "Cheer up. The AD Police always come out on top!"

They were at Nene's building entrance. With a quick hug and goodbye, Naoko headed onwards to her own apartment.

After about five minutes lost in thought, she was almost to her building.

Thud. There was a noise from the alley.

She loosened her holster and slowly entered the alley keeping her hand on her gun. "AD Police. Do you need assistance?"

The evening shadows cast the alley in darkness. She inched forward another step. An arm reached out and grabbed her throat, pulling her into the darkness and slamming her back against the alley wall with enough force to knock the wind out of her lungs. A hand was closed over her hand and gun preventing her from drawing. She reached for her knife with her other hand...

"I wouldn't." The voice was American and male. The hand on her throat began to close accompanied by an audible snapping sound. She began to feel weak from the lack of oxygen. As her eyes grew accustomed to the darkness she saw it was the thing from the video. If she could have breathed, she would have gasped.

Its eyes were green.

The world went dark...

TBC...

Next time:

AN: It seems I'm continuing it a bit serious of a direction. Roach and Mike will probably change that. Pardon my self-indulgence. I would definitely appreciate any criticism on my fight sequences. Not sure how well the scenes are unfolding. Also, I realize that my main work uses the Japanese name order and this one uses the American order. I apologize for any confusion.