Agent Sellen pulled out the microvac from his jacket pocket and rapidly ran it over his sleeve. The motion was mostly to calm his nerves, although there was a wrapper stuck to it from the ride here. Ever since his department retired their fleet of vehicles, he loathed his forays into the field even more. The auto-taxis in zone 7 were rarely cleaned, which did not mix well with the agency’s strict uniform policy.
“Do you think they’ll ever lighten up the dress code? I hate having to do the wash every single time I get sent out.” He knew the answer, but making empty conversation helped to take his mind off things.
“Not a chance.” His partner spoke tersely, as if each word was deducting credits from his account. Great for getting information, terrible for easing tensions. “You know how the Consortium is. With how much the city changes, some things needs to be stable. The white means collections, always has. Now stop preening yourself. We have a job to do.”
Sellen cursed under his breath, shoved the microvac back into his pocket, and picked up his briefcase from the sidewalk. At his side, Agent Carleth set forward without waiting. The man wore the iconic white collections suit better than any other agent he knew; if the agency ever needed recruitment ads, Carleth would be on them. Tall and imposing, slim like a specter right from those old folktales. Sellen could almost count the sharp angles in his near-skeletal face if it did not mean eventually locking with his cold, uncaring eyes. The no-peripheral policy was supposed to make interactions with agents more “personal”, after all.
Struggling to keep up with Carleth’s long strides, Sellen picked up his pace. The address that had shown up in his inbox was for an unglamorous apartment building tucked away in one of zone 7’s countless nondescript alleyways. The pair reached the unlabeled door and chipped in; access was automatically granted for scheduled visitations from collections. Inside, the lobby was indistinguishable from any other in the zone – including the one in Sellen’s building. Rows of delivery vents lined the walls of the narrow hallway that led to the elevators and the standard (faulty) residential lighting buzzed overhead. The handful of field assignments he had been sent on tended to blend together, but the tense feeling in his gut suggested that this one would not.
After chipping into the elevator, Sellen accidentally bumped his blocky briefcase into Carleth’s as they squeezed in. The senior agent breathed in sharply, but let it pass as he fished out a written note from his pocket. “2185”, he muttered as he punched the numbers into the elevator’s input panel. The elevator shuttered and groaned – almost complaining that it had to do its job for yet another cycle more than what it was designed for – before shooting up.
“Give me the briefing,” Carleth stated. Of course they had both read and signed off on it 3 cycles ago per protocol, but Sellen was relieved to accept an offering to break up the uncomfortably silent elevator ride.
“Esma Yan,” Sellen squeaked. “Female. Defaulted on longevity tax 235 cycles ago. Contracted historian for the Central Archives. Married to Garen Yan, banker. They had a shared account, and Garen was reported for fraud. He surrendered for humane extraction 10 cycles ago, but Esma has not responded to any contact. On-site extraction has been ordered and approved.”
“And your first on-site,” Carleth replied. “I keep an eye on staff records, more than middle management at least. Need to know who I’m working with. Even for someone this new, the agency should have thrown you two or three by now. Especially with the rate of defaults lately.”
Carleth’s reputation for being blunt and direct preceded him, but Sellen had not been prepared to be outright challenged. He stuttered a few words before Carleth cut him off. “I don’t need to know what strings you’re pulling, who happens to owe you a favor. This isn’t a cushy job and it’s going to catch up to you sooner or later. We get paid what we do because nobody else wants the blood on their hands. Remember that.”
Sellen averted his eyes to the input panel, completely at a loss for words. He only wanted an easy life, maybe get a few thousand more cycles than the average guy. The listing at the agency seemed too good to be true, and with a little bit of schedule tinkering he had been able to avoid any on-sites. Until now. He shrunk into a corner of the elevator, gripping his briefcase with all of his strength until the *bing* sounded and the door opened.
Carleth strode down the hallway, Sellen sheepishly following behind him like a shadow. Minutes crawled by as they passed identical doorways until they finally reached 2185. Carleth did not even bother knocking, he just chipped the panel by the door and opened it. The lights were out inside. “Collections,” Carleth shouted into the dark apartment. No response. Three seconds of silence before he entered and Sellen did the same.
The inside of the apartment was a mess: dirty wrappers and empty boxes haphazardly scattered across every corner. Not that it worked particularly well, but supposedly defaulters tried to keep a low profile by getting deliveries and never venturing outside. The entryway split in two directions: a modest bathroom and a slightly-less-modest bedroom. Standard layout for an affordable apartment even in zone 7. Besides the crinkling of wrappers underneath Carleth’s foot, the only other sound was the furious tapping coming from the bedroom they were walking toward.
The silhouette of Esma Yan sat hunched over the terminal in the corner of the bedroom. Papers were scattered across the bed and floor: primitive novelties for most people, but a vaguely effective method of recording information off the network. A stack of them was piled up on the desk beside her. She grabbed the one on top, rested it against her monitor, and went back to her frenzied typing without even acknowledging the two men who had entered.
“Esma Yan,” Carleth recited monotonously, “resident of apartment 2185, building 48-C-531, zone 7. You have defaulted on your longevity tax and failed to report for humane extraction after 5 consecutive notices. Pursuant to Collections statutes, you have forfeited your portion of the shared account with the late Garen Yan. Your assets have been frozen for review, and an on-site extraction has been ordered. Any noncompliance will result in further sanctions on your account.”
Esma did not budge as she stayed plastered to her terminal. Her fingers flew across the panel: perhaps a final manifesto, perhaps a sad plea, perhaps nonsensical ramblings. Carleth sighed as he set his briefcase down and crossed the room. With a vice-like grip, he grabbed her shoulders and forcefully swiveled her chair around to face Sellen. He had passed by enough dark den stimmers on the street to recognize the effects of their products. Her eyes rapidly darted across the room as her hands crawled up and down her arms. Between the unwashed hair and constant jitters, it was clear she had been up for several cycles straight. Sellen tried to console himself with the fact that she would not be completely aware of her final moments.
“Get your extractor,” Carleth said. Ripped from his thoughts, Sellen’s mind froze. Why did he have to do it? Carleth had done it hundreds of times by now, what was one more? This was his job though, the responsibility that padded his savings account for his pending taxes – and with a comfortable margin left over. A single word of defiance or hesitancy could be reported for avoidance of duty. Sellen robotically reached down and scanned the biometric panel on his briefcase before undoing the latch. He had not held an extractor since his mandated agency training course, and now it felt heavier in his hand than he remembered.
As he lifted it to access its input panel, the light from the terminal reflected from its sharpened prongs. Esma’s eyes darted to it and focused, an unfortunate moment of clarity as she bucked in her chair against Carleth’s grip.
“You would be a tool of their oppression?” Her muscles strained as she screamed, but Carleth held her tightly to the chair. “We could be so much more, you could be so much more! Why, why, why?”
“Shut it,” Carleth barked. “Do it Sellen. Stop stalling.”
Esma’s struggling grew more intense as her screams turned into desperate cries. “We are the children of gods! They moved mountains and challenged the sun while we wallow in the muck of this city and fight for scraps! We could be infinite, unending! Why don’t they want that? Why don’t we deserve that?”
Sellen’s finger rested on the input panel, refusing to activate the extractor. Why was he doing this? He did not have to, nobody did. So why?
“For fuck’s sake, Sellen.” Carleth released the woman and stormed over to his own briefcase, unlocking it and undoing the latch with a practiced motion. As he lifted the extractor up and tapped on its input panel, Esma fell out of the chair and scrambled toward the door on her hands and knees. The extractor chirped as its panel lit up and wispy sparks jolted from its prongs. He descended on Esma, pinning her firmly to the floor and jabbing the prongs into the back of her neck. Her bloodcurdling scream was abruptly stopped as her eyes rolled back and her body went limp.
Carleth shook his hand holding the extractor and grimaced. “Stings like a bitch every time,” he groaned. Unceremoniously standing up and stepping over the body, he returned the extractor to his briefcase and packed up. Without skipping a beat, he briskly walked out of the apartment. “Leave it,” he called back, “that’s for building management to deal with. Clock’s ticking.”
Glancing back at Esma Yan’s lifeless body, Sellen forced his feet to move to catch up with his partner. He ran down the hallway, his weighty briefcase jostling in his grip, and barely slid into the elevator before the doors closed. The tiny chamber shuttered before it started plummeting toward the ground.
“Put it away,” Carleth scolded him. “You forgot to pack up. Don’t want a scene outside.” Sellen took a moment for his thoughts to catch up before realizing he never returned his extractor to the briefcase. As he awkwardly fumbled with the latch, Carleth leaned in and spoke quietly.
“That was embarrassing. You knew what you were signing up for, Sellen. I’ve seen rookies freeze up, eye the trigger for a little bit, but nothing like that shitshow. You get one more shot; next time you do it or that comfy chair back at HQ won’t be waiting for you.”
Muttering something to himself, Carleth reached into one of his pockets and produced a thin, unmarked metallic cylinder. He pulled back the collar of his suit, aligned one end of it with the skin of his neck, and pressed the other with his thumb. His eyelids fluttered briefly before he looked down to notice Sellen staring up at him.
“Don’t judge,” he growled. “We all have to take the edge off somehow. Here we are.”
The elevator *bing*ed and the doors rattled open. The hallway was uncomfortably dark and quiet; the buzzing lights overhead having given up for the time being. They marched out of the apartment, the noise of the city flooding back in the moment Carleth opened the front door. It was the final minutes of the current day cycle, the warm orange hues slowly fading from the dome’s surface. Sellen often tried to take this time off to watch the cycle turn from his favorite café tucked in a faraway alley on the other end of zone 7.
“How do they come up with the tax numbers?” he asked. Partially to break the silence, partially as a genuine question. “They’re awfully specific. The exponents aren’t random but I can’t make any sense of it.”
“Not my job to know,” Carleth said. “Not yours, either. The orders come in and we do them. Maybe take a nice little trip to zone 2 every now and then. That’s all you can really hope for.”
The pair had reached the auto-taxi that was still waiting for them. Carleth gently placed his briefcase on the seat before looking back at his partner. “After we get back to HQ and drop it off, you’re taking me to a nice dinner.”
“There’s…” Sellen trailed off as he broke eye contact. Carleth’s expression had relaxed; he looked tired. “There’s a new noodle joint two blocks down from HQ. The guys in logistics recommended it.”
Carleth grunted as he hopped into the auto-taxi. “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah…noodles is fine.”