Makishima's headquarters was perfectly disguised. A nondescript industrial building that looked as if it had last seen use sometime in the 2060s, the warehouse wore the years like a tattered old coat. Even Kogami on his best day wouldn't have looked twice at the place.

We never would have thought to look here, Kagari thought.

The MWPSB was nothing if not rule-bound; when uncertainties arose in investigations, the right thing to do was always to consult the Officer's Handbook, a slim red volume that looked like a book of poetry and contained hard-copy guidelines for over four hundred potential policing scenarios. What to do if a criminal obtains Tactical Unit cloaking gear (never happened before, at least not during Kagari's time on the force)—how to respond if a member of the public inquires about illegal activity (bring them in for questioning)—the precise level of force to use during a hostage crisis when the hostage is not a Level 3 Public Figure of Note (the decision is left to the discretion of the responding officer)... The Handbook was consulted by rookies and old-timers alike with a fidelity rivaling that of religious devotion.

An Inspector like Ginoza was always flipping through his copy, underlining passages, highlighting others, taking it into the john with him... In Kagari's view, that rigid, hidebound, calcified way of policework had been partially responsible for the introduction of his kind in the first place. When a detective got soft in the head, like Ginoza after Kogami's fall from grace, they brought in Japan's most effective and versatile piece of crime-fighting equipment: the Enforcers.

In a world where one's Psycho-Pass was highly scrutinized, Kagari thought, it was easier to let tame criminals deal with other criminals. That left the Inspectors and the upper brass of the PSB with clean hands and untroubled thoughts.

But I don't think the Handbook has anything about this kind of place.

As he surveyed the run-down Shoju Industrial Manufacturing Center, as the nameplate still read in tarnished bronze lettering, even Kagari had to admit that the Enforcers probably wouldn't have figured this to be Shogo Makishima's base of operations. It accorded almost too well to a criminal stereotype, like something out of an old turn-of-the-century television cyberthriller. The underworld boss's dark lair on the sleazy side of town, complete with shattered windows, broken streetlights, and feral dogs wandering the district.

Inside, though, Kagari found the warehouse to be surprisingly clean, even aseptic. The concrete floor had been power washed to get all the oil and diesel stains out—only a few remained. The rusted girders arching overhead like a great ribcage had been painted a pleasant dark green and now called to mind the leafy fronds of a jungle, and the big skylights had been restored with new smart panels, enabling weather of any sort to be piped down from above. Right now, it seemed to be raining outside, but Kagari knew it was actually a calm, cloudless night.

Most of the warehouse was empty space. There were a few vehicles parked at the far end—a regular Honda Transport Mk. II, its hydrogen cells lying disassembled on the floor next to it; a battered courier's motorcycle resting on its kickstand with a pink helmet slung over the handlebars; and a Toyota Executive sedan, complete with little Rising Sun flags attached to each headlamp. Looks like they had political ambitions, too.

Kagari flowed—that was the word that seemed to best fit his new method of traveling—from a security camera's fisheye lens attached to one of the steel girders to a smaller zoom lens by the one corner of the warehouse that had been renovated for human habitation. The concrete abruptly gave way to stiff office carpeting, and a row of cubicles made an L shape around a big holographic monitor. To either side of the monitor were computers, the left one rather smaller than the other and in multiple pieces. The right one, though, even Kagari recognized as something special.

A sleek black cube, it was connected to the holographic display through a standard power-data cable, a keyboard and mouse, and a VR headset that Kagari, in his presently disembodied state, couldn't hope to use. Instead, he did what came naturally to him as a wisp of electronic thought—he jumped from the security camera to the quantum cable connecting the cube to the Grid outside. Then, as if he were knocking on somebody's front door, he reached out and tried the knob.

Big mistake.

Without quite knowing how it happened, Kagari found himself in great pain, huddled inside a nearby piece of networking equipment. His body—or whatever made up him—felt as if it had been bruised all over and given two black eyes. He sat there for some time, probably fifteen minutes, cursing out Choe Gu-sung and moaning in agony.

Then, the pain having subsided a bit, he tried again... this time remembering to first recite the password Makishima had given him.

The barrier melted away, and Kagari slid inside, his body buffeted by the rapid flow of information inside the computer, a sensation that was akin to a kayaker trying to ride down a waterfall—he was falling too fast to react. Then something nearby brushed his body, like an outcropping of rock, and he reached out and clung to it desperately.

It was while he was catching his breath that he sensed a presence fall over him, almost like the shadow of someone standing above him. Then he heard a voice.

Choe Gu-sung's voice.

"Need a hand?"

Kagari closed his eyes and reached out blindly. A hand engulfed his wrist and pulled him up with effortless strength, and the roar of the imagined waterfall ceased. When he dared to open his eyes, he saw that he was standing in a simple office, not unlike the makeshift office in the corner of the warehouse that he'd just left. And standing in front of him, smiling broadly, was the hacker known as Makishima's right hand man.

Gu-sung looked just as he had in life—perhaps a bit less tired than his PSB mugshot suggested. There were no deep circles under his eyes, and his face wasn't quite as sallow as Kagari remembered. He was wearing the same clothes that he'd worn during the disastrous attack on Nona Tower: low-slung jeans, blue windbreaker, and wrap-around headphones.

"Don't say too much all at once," said Gu-sung, with an amused smile.

Wordlessly, Kagari shook his head. Does no one actually die any more? It seemed as if the afterlife was etched in silicon.

"You can sit, if you like." Gu-sung inclined his head toward a swivel chair in front of a table that held immense stacks of computer print-out. He rounded the desk, a mirror of the one in the warehouse, and sat down with a sigh. The chair's wheels squeaked under his weight. "While you regain the ability to speak, I have just a few tasks to finish, here. Then I'll be ready to leave."

"Leave?" Kagari blurted. Part of him wanted to say, But I just got here! and another part, Where are we going?

Gu-sung looked up with a raised eyebrow. "Yes, of course. By your presence here am I correct in assuming that our attack on the Tower failed? And that Makishima survived? And that he's sent you to ask for my aid?" He frowned. "That was the entire purpose of constructing this place, and me, for that matter..."

"Yes, he survived. Well, kind of." Kagari paused. "It's just—how are you still alive? I saw Chief Kasei blow your head off at point-blank range with a Dominator. How are you still here?"

"Isn't it obvious? I'm not the Choe Gu-sung you knew in the real world. I'm a copy of him—Choe Gu-sung 2.0, if you like. New and improved."

"Right..."

"Rather like yourself, eh?"

Kagari bristled. The hacker's words hit close to home. He'd been nursing secret doubts about what he was ever since he'd let Sibyl upload him into the cloud, and now Choe seemed to be speaking aloud his inner thoughts. "I have a brain," he retorted, too quickly, too defensively. "I'm not like you."

"Of course not, said one artificial entity to another," Gu-sung murmured, then raised his hands in surrender. "Fine. Have it your way. You are a delightfully real human being, temporarily deprived of your birthright of flesh and blood. I am a foul, silicon-spawned computer program."

"You are foul," Kagari said under his breath, rubbing his arm. "What was the deal with that wall I hit earlier? It feels like I was run over by a truck."

Gu-sung smiled. "Oh, that. The firewall. It's quite advanced—I added the ability for it to cause subjective pain sensations to any potential sentient programs or AIs. I'm glad it's finally been proven to work. Though I always knew it would, of course."

Kagari scowled.

"Is Shogo well?"

"Oh, he's wonderful. He's very happy in his new position as Sibyl's head psychopath. He feels right at home."

Gu-sung's fingers ceased typing. He looked up and stared at Kagari, his expression grave. "Go on."

"He needs your help to bring Sibyl down from the inside. That's why he sent me here."

The hacker's features relaxed, and his fingers sprang back into a blur of movement. "I'd suspected as much. You know, this whole setback might have been for the best. To attack an entrenched enemy is always difficult, at least according to our friend Sun Tzu. But if the enemy invites you into his home of his own free will, and what's more, gives you your own key?" Gu-sung shook his head. "We should have planned it this way from the start."

Kagari went over to the other swivel chair and sat. He examined a few of the papers on the big table, but they were all written in binary and to his untrained eye seemed like so much gibberish. He turned in slow circles and studied the office decor with a smirk. "This is where you live?" he asked. "Looks a little out of character for the MWPSB's Second Most Wanted."

"It's the place I spend most of my time," Gu-sung replied. "A recreation of my office at home. I may be a copy of a real man, but I am a high-fidelity copy—I share more than 99.999% of the neural architecture of my originator. So for all intents and purposes, I am Choe Gu-sung. What he likes, I like."

Kagari nodded. He took a deep breath, then sighed. "For what it's worth, Choe, you died well. Nearly took out Chief Kasei, too. I was impressed. Not bad at all for a computer geek."

Gu-sung grinned. "Did I? How close was it?"

"If you were a half-second faster, you would have sent a nail right through Kasei's eye."

The hacker rolled his head back and sighed. "Damn, that would have been so satisfying. I guess it's good that I made the attempt, at least."

"What are you doing now?" Kagari nodded to the holo-screen.

"Checking for vulnerabilities." A moment later, he added, "Well, I'm packaging up the vulnerabilities I already have found, actually. You see, Choe created me shortly before he went off with Shogo on his mission. His instructions were to essentially wait until my help was needed, but I've never been one to sit around doing nothing. I'd imagine you understand that feeling. I've got a class-2 Grid connection, a fast computer, and plenty of free time. Why not do what I do best?"

"And what have you found?"

"Oh, lots. I've been poking and prodding at the Nona Tower firewalls, looking for any changes in strength or state due to the emergency protocols that were put in place during the attack. And guess what I discovered? When the MWPSB declares an automated city-wide state of emergency, there's a port intended for emergency communication that will accept unsigned connections for a period of eight minutes. Some programmer wrote this code decades ago and missed the error, and since real emergencies are so infrequently declared, they haven't had a chance to see it in action."

Kagari smiled. "And you're going to give them that chance."

"We are." Gu-sung typed a final flurry of commands, then crossed his arms and regarded Kagari with a squint. "That is, unless you aren't up for it?"

"What, and let you and Makishima screw up a second time?" He shook his head. "I wouldn't miss this for the world."

This time they won't see it coming, he thought. This time we'll succeed.


The memo appeared on her notification screen seconds after she flipped on her computer. Written in the terse, peremptory tone that she recognized from Sibyl—or from the brain that happened to be currently piloting Chief Kasei around like some morbid puppet—the memo was suitably cryptic, which she'd come to expect from her masters: Your presence is required in the Garden. Come now.

"I'm going to have a sit-down with the Chief," Akane said, and shuffled her papers to one side of her desk, leaving a semblance of order. "Ginoza, you're in charge until Mr Arishima gets here." At least I remembered his name this time.

Her former superior looked up from the orgy of paperwork that he exulted in each morning. His glasses slid down his nose from the abrupt motion, causing him to look less like an Enforcer and more like a librarian. "What does she want?"

Akane didn't bother answering until she had gathered up her coat and umbrella and finished shutting down her computer. Then she gave Ginoza a quiet stare designed to subtly inform him, without causing undue embarrassment in front of Kunizuka, that he was acting inappropriately—acting, in fact, like an equal. Like an Inspector of the Public Safety Bureau. A job title that he'd not possessed for quite some time.

Unfortunately, he didn't seem to get the message, or didn't want to get it. He simply raised his eyebrows and kept staring at her.

Akane sighed. "Nobuchika, do I make a habit of telling the Bureau's property what I plan to do each day? Do I inform the coffeemaker in the break room of my itinerary? Have you seen me having long chats with the copy machine in the hallway?" His face grew even more inscrutable, if that was possible. "You're not an Inspector any more, Nobuchika. It's high time you remembered that. What are you?"

Kunizuka glanced between them out of the corner of her eye, then wisely returned her attention to her holo-screen. Akane was in no mood for a general mutiny. They've got to learn that I'm not the rookie I was last year. I'm going to take charge of this division, just like Ginoza did during the hunt for Makishima.

"I'm an Enforcer, Inspector Tsunemori," Ginoza replied, then added ironically, "Just one of the MWPSB's trained hunting dogs."

How many times did he give that speech to new Enforcers? Akane thought with no small amount of sadness. And now look at him. A Crime Coefficient of 145. "That's right." She softened her voice. "Try to remember that, Ginoza, all right?"

With a last look at her subordinates—they looked exhausted, and soul-weary, the same way that Akane felt—she waved her ID card at the exit scanner and left Division One's offices. The Garden that Chief Kasei had referred to in her memo could only mean one thing: the huge brain-farm at the heart of Nona Tower where Akane's ignorance about the nature of Japanese society had been shattered forever. If that was her destination, she would need access to the service elevators, since the regular elevators only went as low as the ground floor.

She made her way across Nona Tower's campus, which was a pleasant, tree-lined outdoor space that had somehow been engineered to grow unhindered in a skyscraper. She'd seen some of the hydroponics work being done before, and it was impressive—there were full-spectrum lights mimicking sunlight, humidity control equipment in the walls, and even a fertilizer system tended by small wheeled gardeners that sped underfoot like excited dogs. Nona Tower was unlike any skyscraper from the pre-Sibyl era—stuffy, metallic, and full of dead odors. The MWPSB's headquarters was a bright and cheerful sunscape that brought to mind the tranquility of a beach paradise. The floors were like a series of condensed photographic slides of nature scenes, stacked one upon another, stretching high into Tokyo's skyline. It truly was an idyllic place. After graduating from university, she'd felt immensely lucky to be allowed the privilege of working there.

But now...

She wished, sometimes, that she could go back to the way it had been before. Go back and forget all the inconvenient things she'd learned, the lies and deceptions and grand designs. Just scrub away the knowledge that Sibyl, the glorious System that every schoolchild grew up trusting, the System that she'd written her thesis on, was a fraud. A painfully ordinary human fraud.

I just wish I wasn't the only one who knew, she thought. I wish I could confide in someone...

She had thought of telling Shion or Yayoi about the Sibyl System, but something always held her back. It was, perhaps, the suspicion that such knowledge could only be entrusted with a certain kind of person. Someone like Kagari. Dead and buried. Or Kogami. Probably working in America by now. It was a secret that she had to keep safe for the sake of the millions of innocent Japanese people living their lives with a false sense of security.

Akane stopped at an access hatch, looked both ways, then unlocked it and ducked inside. It was a vertical drop of some thirty feet, which she descended by ladder. When she reached the bottom, she took the left tunnel, the one that led to the service elevators. The other tunnel led to the loading docks.

There was no waiting around for an elevator. The Sibyl System must have been watching her, because the elevator doors opened by themselves as she approached, and when she stepped inside the doors closed. The elevator began to descend. They could intend to kill me, Akane thought, too late, as the elevator dropped into Sibyl's netherworld. It would be an accident. A malfunction in the brakes. Sudden deceleration. An easy way of solving a problem.

But despite her premonition, the elevator slowed normally as it neared the unlisted basement level of Nona Tower. When it reached the lowest floor, the doors slid open and a voice intoned from above: "Please exit and continue to the Garden, Miss Tsunemori."

"Thank you," Akane replied.

The Garden was the same awe-inspiring sight it had been before. A vast field of yellow fluid, interrupted only by vats containing individual Sibyl brains, each brain connected to its neighbors, each neighbor connected in like fashion to its neighbors in a great branching network, an ever-growing lattice. The doors closed behind her like interlocking dominos as she stepped inside, her eyes glued to the wonder—to the horror—of Sibyl.

It's beautiful, she thought.

"Akane Tsunemori."

She nodded. "I'm here."

"We know," said a voice from somewhere to her left.

"Our eyes are everywhere, Miss Tsunemori," said another voice, this time from her right. "They see many things."

Akane had a sudden mental image of the compound eyes of an insect, huge and glassy, like tiny water balloons—and pictured herself stepping on that bug. Crushing it under her shoe, grinding its chitinous skeleton into reddish paste. She smiled.

"We have seen you carry out your duties faithfully, in accordance with our collaborative relationship. This pleases us."

"Well, I'm glad you're pleased," said Akane sarcastically. "That's the most important thing to me."

Ignoring her remarks, Sibyl continued. It was yet another voice this time, one that had not spoken before. "Some members of our System do not trust you, Miss Tsunemori. Yet others believe in you." There was a brief silence, as if the hundreds of brains were conferring with each other, or perhaps arguing. "Since your performance was invaluable in the capture of Shogo Makishima, we have decided to rely upon your aid again. This is a high honor."

"What is it this time?" Akane asked. "You've got Makishima, just like you wanted. His allies are either dead or on the run. What else could you possibly want?"

"You might call it 'tying up loose ends.' We have not forgotten that Shinya Kogami remains at large, having first played a crucial role in the capture of Shogo Makishima."

Akane stepped forward, flushing. "Wait, you're going to keep looking for Kogami? After all he's done for you? You wouldn't have gotten Makishima if it wasn't for his efforts! He almost died!"

"We are aware of that, Inspector. Shinya Kogami completed his function with admirable skill. He will be commended before prosecution." There was a pause, and then another voice, a deeper one, took over. "But exceptions cannot be made for any individual citizen. In a perfect system, the rules must be applied impartially. Shinya Kogami will be judged."

I'm glad you left, Kogami, Akane thought. I hated you for leaving, but now I know that you made the best decision for everyone. We couldn't afford to lose another friend. Not after Kagari.

"It's a good thing he left Japan, then," Akane said sweetly. "You'll never find Kogami. He's too good for the likes of you."

She hoped that he was happy, wherever he was—probably in Hong Kong, working as a constable, or perhaps he'd even crossed the ocean and gone to America. If the wars there had died down, maybe their society could use a good policeman. She hoped so, anyway.

"That is an incorrect assertion. We have found Shinya Kogami."

Akane felt the color drain from her face. She opened her mouth to argue, but knew it would be useless—the Sibyl System wouldn't lie.

"We require your help in bringing him to justice, Akane Tsunemori."

"Where?" she whispered.

"A Cymatic scanner identified a man fitting Shinya Kogami's parameters two weeks ago in the coastal town of Akita. Further attempts at verifying his identity have been inconclusive, yet certain of our members are convinced that it is indeed Shinya Kogami. Observe."

A tiny drone detached from the ceiling and flew down to hover like a bumblebee in front of Akane's face. It projected a holographic recording of a seedy dockside alley. Sailors at liberty as their ships were unloaded of cargo walked arm-in-arm, singing bawdy drinking songs, while pickpockets and prostitutes mingled under dim streetlights. The scene was straight out of the old century, before the Sibyl System—and, with a sinking feeling, Akane thought that it was precisely the kind of locale where Kogami would choose to go to ground.

"The man fitting Shinya Kogami's description has been working in the so-called black market as a bodyguard for a local crime lord called Lor Sam Pau, a man wanted by the Sibyl System on several dozen charges of fraud, theft, assault, and murder."

"Kogami would never murder anyone," Akane said softly. "He wouldn't."

"Your supposition may be correct—however, it is immaterial to our investigation. As an accessory to crimes committed in the Japanese homeland and under the mandate of the Sibyl System, Shinya Kogami must stand trial in order for justice to be served. As the Senior Inspector of CID Division One, you have been selected to plan and execute the raid to capture Shinya Kogami."

"I won't do it."

Was it her imagination, or did this new voice have a mocking lilt to it? "On the contrary, Akane Tsunemori, you will. Your devotion to the principles of justice are sufficient to outweigh even your affection and infatuation with Shinya Kogami."

Akane spluttered. "Infatuation? I'm not in love with him! He's my friend!"

"We have observed that your heart rate increases markedly when in Shinya Kogami's presence. In addition, your pupils dilate and your sexual hormones—"

"That's enough!" Akane said loudly. "I don't have to stand here and listen to this."

Above her head, a robotic arm rolled along a lubricated track before dipping down to attach grippers to a brain-vat. Once secure, the arm lifted the vat from the yellow fluid, almost like a fisherman lifting his catch from a flaxen ocean. The brain was carried into a small opening that appeared in the far wall of the Garden, which closed after receiving it.

I won't help them, Kogami. I won't let you follow Kagari into the grave.

"Will you carry out your orders, Inspector Tsunemori?"

She stiffened her shoulders and looked as defiant as she could. "No."

"Very well. Your refusal has been noted. However, since there is a high probability that you will change your mind, please be aware that you can notify Chief Kasei of your acceptance of this mission at any time within the next two days. If you refuse to conduct the raid, the responsibility will fall to Inspector Arishima."

"The rookie?" Akane demanded, incredulous. "You can't be serious! He just graduated from the Academy! He doesn't know one end of his Dominator from the other."

"Nevertheless, we calculate that Inspector Arishima will follow orders. He may be less capable than you, but perfection is not required from our human instruments."

"You wouldn't know perfection if it came up and bit you on the ass."

"The Sibyl System is perfection, Inspector."

"More like perfect insanity," Akane said under her breath.

"This squabbling is counterproductive. You have been informed of your mission. Have a nice day."

Behind her, the shifting squares formed an opening the size and shape of a doorway. The message was clear: get out.

Akane turned on her heel and left the Garden. The brains' nutrient broth sent a yellow glow over her shoulder, illuminating the interior of the elevator. She went inside and let it carry her upwards, toward sanity.

I won't do it, Kogami. I promise.


It was nearly six o'clock when she returned from her meeting with Sibyl, well past the time when the officers of Division One should have been wrapping up their day's work, shutting down their computers and loading their briefcases for the train ride to whatever homes and apartments awaited them. But despite the hour, nobody had made a move. Work continued unabated. Heads bent over desks. Fingers clacked on keyboard keys. Coffee was sipped.

The reason was simple enough. The Inspector of the Division hadn't left yet. What employee would dare to leave his office when his boss was still working less than ten feet away? No employee, that's who.

Akane almost felt sorry for them—almost. She knew what was waiting for her back at her apartment... Hours of worrying about Kogami, lessened only by sedatives and a few hours spent wandering the CommuField in search of something to divert her anxious mind. Oh, Kogami, why weren't you more careful? Why didn't you leave Japan when you had the chance?

For a moment, Akane considered going home. But she could already hear Candy's remonstrances about the importance of a good night's sleep on an Inspector's Psycho-Pass and career, and she couldn't deal with that kind of mothering right now. She needed distraction. She needed work.

Putting her bag down next to her chair, she asked Kunizuka to repeat what she'd said. Something about electrical disturbances in the Cymatic Grid. Unusual.

Kunizuka looked up from her monitor. "It's nothing much, Inspector. Just an odd overload in the Cymatic Grid station nearest to the Warehouse District. Sanitation and Public Works doesn't want to investigate it. According to them, it's a Public Safety Bureau issue."

Akane put down her coffee mug and frowned. "Why do they say that?"

"Because while it's technically related to the power grid, the actual glitch is in part of the Cymatic Grid, which is the PSB's remit." Kunizuka's glasses caught her reflection in the monitor's screen.

"The Ministry of Welfare's remit, you mean," Akane prompted.

"Of which we, as officers of the Public Safety Bureau, are a part, strictly speaking." Kunizuka looked curiously at Akane. "I don't see the distinction."

Akane toyed with her mug. She pushed it backwards and forwards on her desk, destroying the perfectly circular coffee stain that had built up over eight hours of the workday. "Well, I know that. I just meant that we're the PSB, a different part of the Ministry of Welfare. That's all."

There was an awkward silence. Akane saw her subordinates exchange puzzled glances, then felt her own cheeks grow warm. Since learning the truth about the Sibyl System, she'd felt obligated to distance herself—and her officers and their Enforcers—from the Ministry of Welfare in whatever way she could. It felt like the right thing to do.

She agreed, in principle, with the Sibyl System's goals, and her working relationship with the brain collective had been... cordial, until now. But as time passed, her knowledge of the Sibyl System seemed to grow inside herself, to metastasize, becoming a painful lesion in her head. It hounded her conscience. She went to work each day as a faithful Senior Inspector of the MWPSB, but she was aware of a rebellious streak rising in her stomach.

And now, with the Sibyl System going after Kogami—going after her Kogami—she felt hopeless, powerless, frustrated... On some days she'd thought of giving everything up, her job, apartment, savings account, everything, and going after Kogami. She had daydreamed about living with him in Hong Kong, finding a new life away from the Sibyl System. Just a happy couple.

But that dream was fading. The System that she served was going after the man that she...

...loved?

Akane closed her eyes.

Ginoza cleared his throat. "There is no distinction. We are a part of the Ministry of Welfare, and as such we have the responsibility to investigate any tampering of Cymatic Grid installations. Any Inspector of the Public Safety Bureau should know that."

Ouch. "Ginoza's right, of course," Akane said. "But I wanted to point out that as team members, as police officers, we should be loyal to each other. That's all."

The last thing I need is for Ginoza to find a new purpose in life investigating me. Ever since Masaoka's death, his son had withdrawn from the others and become a shell of his former self. These days Ginoza was reticent, taciturn, and unfriendly. He turned down offers to socialize with his colleagues after hours, and from the office scuttlebutt she'd overheard, he wasn't integrating well with the other Enforcers. As an Inspector herself, she could hardly blame him for that. She wasn't sure how she would react if she were to be suddenly declared a latent criminal and demoted to the status of mere property. It was a big fall in the social pecking order.

"Anyway, what kind of disturbance is it?" Akane asked.

Kunizuka tapped at her keyboard. Moments later a map of Tokyo appeared, with the old Warehouse District highlighted in bold red. "The industrial sector is entirely automated these days—it runs off of self-correcting machinery." A few more keystrokes brought the red area of the map into sharper focus. "Earlier this morning, around midnight, a voltage overload was detected by the Grid's security sensors, knocking one of the receivers offline for nearly two minutes. These kinds of problems aren't unheard of—sometimes a bad thunderstorm can cause them. The receivers don't get much maintenance."

"How was the weather last night?" Ginoza. Ever the consummate Inspector, even from the Enforcer's kennel.

In response, Kunizuka called up a weather map. Clear skies for Japan, coast to coast.

"When was the last time that Grid receiver failed?" Akane asked. "Not just due to weather—from any cause."

"Checking that now." Kunizuka frowned at her monitor. "Huh. It looks like that receiver was fairly long-lived. The last time it needed repairs was six years ago. And that was purely preventative maintenance—it seems they needed to replace a backup battery."

"So this reliable piece of equipment failed last night during calm weather," Akane said. "Right, I'm going to check it out."

Ginoza looked surprised. "Now?"

"Yes." She stood and began to put on her coat. "Where is Mr Arishima?"

"I'll go with you—"

Akane lifted a hand. "No. Thank you, Ginoza, but I want to see how Mr Arishima handles his first case. Where is he?"

"Miss Karanomori asked him to help set up some new server racks—"

"So he's in Shion's bed, got it." Akane rolled her eyes. "Give him five minutes, then go and tell him to meet me at the Warehouse District."

"Yes, ma'am."

As she walked out of the office, Akane felt a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. It wasn't a nice smile. It was more like a hunting dog's canine grin when it first picks up the scent of prey.

Maybe I wouldn't make such a bad Enforcer after all, she thought.


"Well, this is interesting."

"What is it?"

"This." Choe pointed to a line of gibberish on one of his monitors. Kagari leaned closer for a better look. Still nonsense.

"Yeah, what is it?"

"Scanners say we've got a guest." Choe grunted. "Make that two guests. PSB. Both armed with Dominators. Well, well, well."

Kagari sprang to his feet. "Who is it?" he asked eagerly. "Is it Kogami? Ginoza? Oh, I'll bet it's old man Masaoka, he never could—"

"I'm reading a female, early twenties, Japanese. Also reading a male, late twenties, Japanese. The guy's got a knife hidden in his boot."

Akane. "I know her. She's an Inspector. A good one, too." Kagari couldn't help bouncing from foot to foot. A grin crept over his face. He hadn't seen his friends in what seemed like years. "Can I see her?"

Choe nodded. "Go look into that monitor over there. The feed'll be up in a sec."

It was Tsunemori. She didn't look good. "Too thin," Kagari said slowly. And there were dark circles ringing her pretty eyes. She looked utterly exhausted, and somehow different. She looks like someone else.

It took him a minute to realize who. Kogami. She looks like Kogami.

But Kogami hadn't looked like Kogami, at least not at first. It had taken Sasayama's death to transform the grinning dark-haired ladykiller Kogami into the brooding, look-at-me-and-I'll-kill-you maniac Kogami who had brought in so many latent criminals for the PSB.

She's headed down the same path, Kagari thought. She doesn't know it yet, but she's going to end up just like us.

"They're checking out the Cymatic relay that I use for Grid access," Choe said. "Interesting. I wonder why. I tried to mask any signals. I wonder if there's something wrong with my code."

Kagari frowned and looked closer at the monitor. "Cymatic relay," he repeated. "Is that the tower they're looking at? The thing with the antennas?"

"Yes."

Oh, shit.

Choe glanced at him, looked away, then looked back again, eyes narrowing. "What is it?"

Kagari scratched the back of his neck and shrugged. "It's nothing, really, but I might have used that... relay... to enter your headquarters."

The swivel chair slowly spun to face him. The hacker looked at him with an expression of incredulous disbelief. "Are you saying that you used a Cymatic Grid relay to piggyback into my network? Is that what you're really telling me, Shusei?"

"Yeah. Well, I might have."

"You didn't think to—oh, I don't know—use the fucking Internet junction instead?"

"I tried," Kagari protested. "I did. But when I tried to enter that way, it gave me some kind of static shock. It felt like my whole body was being fried in a microwave, you know? I thought it was going to cook me alive. So I backed out and found another way inside." He shrugged and gave Gu-sung his best apologetic grin. "What's the big deal?"

The hacker's eyes widened. "The big deal? You want to know what the big deal is, Shusei? Okay, I'll tell you."

"Yeah, what?"

Choe pointed to the monitor, where a black-and-white version of Akane was unscrewing the panel on the side of the Cymatic Grid relay. "That's the big deal. You lit this whole place up like a Christmas tree. Now the PSB is curious, and when the PSB is curious, people get fucked."

"Relax, would you? They're on our side."

Choe snorted. "Then what are those things in their holsters, Shusei? Are they by chance Dominators, which are connected to the Sibyl System?"

"Look, Dominator or no Dominator, Akane is on our side. You have to trust me. She would never work with the Sibyl System if she knew the truth of the matter."

"You're sure about that?"

"Yeah, of course." Kagari scratched his chin and began to pace. "I just need a chance to talk to her in private. Once I explain everything, I know she'll want to help out."

"So you need a private talk with an Inspector of the Public Safety Bureau, whose status automatically gains her a Level-3 security suite on her public and private life. That's CommuField, her banking credentials, even her cellphone."

"Can you do it?"

"Of course." Choe turned back to his main computer and began to quickly type in commands. "You can talk to her tonight. We'll wait until she's home, then crack her apartment and insert you into her household AI."

"Great."

Kagari dragged a chair over to the monitor and sat, his nose nearly pressed to the glass. He watched Akane and her new colleague follow PSB protocol as they swept the area and ran interference tests, a job that took the better part of two hours. When it was over, and the Inspectors had gone, Kagari remained in his chair, staring into the empty alley, thinking.


"Did you learn all of this from Inspector—I mean, Enforcer Ginoza?"

Akane looked up from replacing the last screw of the relay station. "This?" She frowned. "No. I learned it at the Academy."

"No, I didn't mean—" Arishima hesitated. "I meant this. Everything. The instinct that there's something more here than just a faulty relay. You suspect something, don't you?"

"Oh, you mean the detective's intuition."

Arishima blinked. "Pardon?"

"That was something from another colleague. Shinya Kogami." Akane brought the final clasping piece into alignment and pushed the catch inwards. It locked into place. "He's gone. I don't know where." The lie burned her lips.

"Mr Ginoza spoke of him." The rookie Inspector paused. "Were you close?"

"We were friends," Akane said.

Itaru Arishima was painfully diffident, but a quick learner and eager to climb the Ministry ladder. In other words, he was exactly like she had been during her first month at the Bureau. He didn't yet know what he didn't know. She felt sorry for him, in a way. He was tall and handsome, and even younger than her, but there was something about him. Something in his eyes.

Innocence. She sighed. Or maybe it's ignorance.

"It doesn't look like they left any leads." Arishima's tone indicated that he didn't believe there to have been any suspects in the first place, but he was polite enough not to say it.

"We're dealing with a sophisticated group." Akane pulled out her cellphone and tapped a quick message to Kunizuka to begin regular surveillance of the Warehouse District. "They wouldn't leave anything obvious behind."

Arishima seemed to smile to himself. "Hardened criminals, then."

This was the man who would be conducting the operation to capture Kogami. If she refused, which of course she would. Akane chewed her bottom lip. He's callow and too young. He has no business leading that kind of raid. But nevertheless, despite her misgivings, Itaru Arishima would be calling the shots, would be responsible for Shinya Kogami's life and well-being.

I won't do it.

Akane pocketed her cellphone. "Well, that should do it. We'll wait for the scans to see if anything comes up."

"Do you want me to walk you to the station, ma'am?"

Akane shook her head. "No, you go on ahead. I'll order a cab."

"All right. Good evening."

She watched Arishima walk away, her eyes narrowed. I can't let him risk Kogami's life. A rookie like him doesn't know how to conduct a non-lethal capture. Damn it.


That evening, she ate what Candy gave her without complaint, glanced through the CommuField lobby without interest, and then drew a warm bubble bath. The aches and pains in her muscles seemed like gnarls in a tree limb, and she felt about as limber as one. She brought a glass of wine into the bathroom with her.

It's time to unwind.

Her first step into the bathtub made her shiver with pleasure. When she slid up to her neck in sudsy water, her eyes rolled back in her head and she groaned.

Oh, god, this feels good.

Akane rested her head against the tile and sighed.

Then she froze.

Someone was watching her. She felt the instinctive prickling sensation of the observed. She sat up in the tub. "Candy? Is that you?"

As if in response, the AI materialized in front of her, hanging above the water like a frozen ray of moonlight. Akane began to relax, expecting to hear a lecture on the ideal temperature of bubble bath water, but what she got was something completely different.

Kagari's face appeared in mid-air—and then winked at her.

Akane screamed.