Cyberpunk

sister.
    Still, they’d been close once. Almost a gang, the three of them. She was older and smarter and sassier than they were—not their leader, not exactly, but were she to lead they’d follow. Suto because she was his sister and she’d led the two of them through a history of rough times that Pico didn’t know the half of. Pico followed because Mouse was the most interesting thing he’d ever come across.
    Pico swallowed a foul-tasting half-sob and looked toward her downed body. He got up and paced between Mouse and the nacker, wishing he were on his way home, that he was at his parents’. He pulled on Mouse’s arms and dragged her a short way but she was too heavy and too much a deadweight to carry more than a few yards. Besides, he wanted that nacker. He’d hide it away until he got it right this time.
    At Mouse’s side he stroked her black hair in the half-light and wondered if she’d be more comfortable in another position. He turned her on her side and then he saw the scar at the back of her neck. A thin, white line in the shape of a comic smile. Mouse had a wi.n, he realized. Implanted in her neck. Had to be. Only rich people had these. Chinga , there were probably two circuits spouting diagnostics into the net, the nacker’s and Mouse’s. Then he remembered he’d been jamming the GPS, at least. What was the chica doing with her own wi.n? He felt a quick stab of jealousy. He didn’t have even one single mod.
    He looked around and above and wondered if they were being watched. From what he knew, wi.ns beaconed when there was trouble. It wasn’t just an access node. He stood up and looked at Mouse from head to toe. The wi.n made him unsure if he knew her at all.
    Darkness was coming on fast and he shook Mouse.
    Oh, she said, a distant, quiet sound, as if from a voice box deep in her lungs.
    You’re awake! he said. A nacker got you, but I got the nacker. I killed it! I’ve been waiting here with you all day.
    Mouse coughed and said nothing.
    You got to wake up. Come on!
    Pico? she said.
    Yes, it’s me, Pico, güey . It’s getting dark! If you get up right now we can still go back.
    You’re on my arm.
    Chinga ! he leapt off her arm and for a brief moment was overcome with self-hate.
    Mouse moved her arm to her chest. I don’t feel good, she said.
    I took it apart. After he said this he felt sick to his stomach. I mean disabled it.
    She opened her eyes and looked at him and he had no idea what she might say next. He held his breath and stared back, more in love than he thought possible, more ready to be crushed by what she had to say. She was older than he was, nineteen to his seventeen, and as the look went on he realized he didn’t stand a chance with her. They stayed like that for a few moments, and he didn’t dare avert his eyes.
    I can’t see, she said finally.
    Pico looked away and into the last of the reddened sky and had a terrible feeling. They would not make it out of the dump and back to the pepenadores tonight. If he ran, he could make it back now, but he could not leave her.
    He found her hand and squeezed it and she held onto it tightly.
    I’m scared, she said.
    It’s going to be alright, he said, though he did not believe it. Your eyes will come back.
    Listen, Mouse said.
    Pico listened and could hear the faraway howls of the dogs. He shuddered. The sun was gone and the light was being sucked from the sky fast. It’d be dark by the time Mouse could walk.
    Dogs, she said.
    I know, Pico said.
    You shouldn’t have stayed, Mouse said. Why are you even here?
    He didn’t know what she meant. He was so used to hearing get lost that he assumed it was that, and felt sorry for himself.
    But you would have died, he said.
    Now we’ll both die.
    Pico heard the rapid approach of a nacker close by, the skittering hydraulics in high gear, retreating toward where they lived at night, some recharging bunker at the far edge. The nacker wouldn’t stop for them now. The dogs, better equipped to adapt with a higher proportion of biological material, had taken over the night. Grudges and spite were natural to native brains, and though both were created by Basucorp, the dogs held a species-wide grudge against the nackers. Found at night, a pack of dogs would tear a nacker limb from limb.
    A moment later, the dump was immersed in darkness.
    You move?
    Mouse slowly sat up and rubbed the back of her neck. I feel rotten. The whole back of my head tingles. I can only see a dim light.
    That’s