Standing tall against the glittering skyline of New Lyra, the city stretches dream-like under Cole Harker. While towers climb skyward like frozen lightning, neon veins pulse across the soaring transit systems. The hover platform under him vibrates gently as it floats just high enough to make the planet below seem far off, useless.
Everything about this moment is practiced—the glittering tower behind him, the soft drone of the flying cameras, even the timing of his smile. Cole moves with assurance like armour. He is the model of development in a society driven by synthetic excellence.
"Neurolease is the link between worlds," he says, voice rich and seductive. "That marks the direction of human development next. We are leasing empathy, understanding, opportunity not just bodies."
He gestures grandly toward the city, his palm catching the silver-blue radiance of a drone highlight.
Millions of lives below them go by without awareness of the performance happening overhead.
From opposite him, Vex Talin raises a brow. Trusted, vetted, yet just cynical enough to keep things interesting, she is beautiful, sharp, the only interviewer the board permits near him now.
Her lips twisting with challenge, she adds, "But isn't there a darker side to all of this?" Is Neurolease commercializing the human soul? When the body you are living in is not yours, what is the price of empathy?"
Cole laughs a little, brushing invisible lint from his lapel. "That is the reward as well as the expense. We are offering the disempowered agency and hence empowerment. In one lease cycle, some of our borrowers have gone from slums to payables. They are adventurers rather than victims."
She hunches forward, her eyes narrowing. "And the whispers? Bleed in identification? Ongoing psych fragmentation? Cole, some folks return different than others. Some hardly show up at all."
"Urban legends," he says, flowing naturally. "Every transfer is strictly under control. The most sophisticated awareness-mapping tool available on Earth is the neural cradle. You're more likely to lease than to glitch your personality binge-streaming."
Vex smiles tightly and ends the section with trained simplicity. "You have it, then. As always, from a revolutionary viewpoint."
The hover platform turns elegantly back toward the executive tower as the interview ends. Cole looks at the city turning. The glitter of the skyline dulls him momentarily, rather than excites him. The illusion seems to be thin.
Penthouse Ascent
The elevator to his penthouse rises silently. Cole looks at his reflection in the mirror-glass walls: neat suit, ideal posture, charismatic hard-coded into every movement. Underneath this, though, is a flutter—something like tiredness or anxiety.
The doors open to show a modern, automated haven. Angular furniture placed with surgical accuracy, stark whites and subdued colors. Lucid, his artificial intelligence helper, turns on with a subdued buzz.
"Welcome back home, Mr. Harker." The participation today had a 96% resonance with your target market. 'Empathy is evolution,' is the trending clip. Your approval among young sectors has risen 3.4%."
"Of course it has," Cole says silently.
"You have one highly important message from Sael Dren, a Board Member". Subject: Forecasts of Earnings—Projected Neural Subscription Tiers Expansion. flagged as urgently important."
Cole dismisses it, it can wait for later.
He approaches the wall-screen flitting through streams of political endorsements, NeuroLease subscription maps, revenue arcs.
Then a blinking message shows up—one not directed through the safe NeuroLease system. Unmarked. Unknown. Who were you before the mirrors? One sentence.
Cole freezes.
The screen jerks. Just for a heartbeat. The penthouse vibrates with a steady pulse that is subtle but definite. His security procedures are not lacking. That is not at all conceivable.
He deletes the note, but it lingers in the rear of his brain like a splinter. He turns away from the TV. The city seems less alive today, more manufactured, strange. And he?, like a good or commodity.
The womb
Cole then moves into the sanctum, a smaller, enclosed windowless area. Right in the middle is the neural cradle. A contoured chair humming like a sleeping heart surrounded by sensors and gel ports.
When the pressure gets too strong, he visits here. When he has to let go.
Resets are most often used as indulgences by most executives, fast trips into the life of athletes, artists, lovers. Cole has always, however, desired something unusual. lives buried beneath adversity. Gritty, raw, unprocessed. Though the reality is more complex, he convinces himself it is market research.
He did not load the typical well-chosen profile tonight.
He chooses something marked Tier 9 - Unmapped Pool instead. It belongs in the illegal category. Raw consciousnesses taken from dubious sources. Not under corporation approval. Not permitted.
He stops.
Lucid pings. "Mr. Harker, this profile is not approved. Moving forward could have unknown neurological consequences."
"I am aware," Cole adds gently.
He comes down into the cradle. The gel wraps around his scalp, and the hum of the cradle gets deep into a resonant throb. His consciousness distances from his identity as a strobe of light flashes behind his eyes.
He has no idea why he decided on this. Only that he must experience something not associated with the Cole Harker brand.
Blackness came next.
It is frigid when he wakes.
His body stalks. His hands are blackened from work. Dirt under his skin and blood on his fingernails. Lying in an alley covered in synthetic tarp. Hisses from the ground on the pavement. Somewhere in distance a siren calls.
He searches and notes he is still in New Lyra. Still not his New Lyra, though. Ground level is what this represents. The actual city is here The section he never visits.
He hears a name ring true. Not his.
Nico Varn:
Memories of menial employment, rejected applications, whispered rebellions in subterranean pubs start to rush in. An urgency. In peril. Nico is a part of something.
A motion. A opposition.
Cole—Nico—feels it like a second heartbeat.
Those who think NeuroLease isn't the direction of future. That it functions as a trap. A means of eradicating the impoverished and rebranding them for entertainment value.
He staggers to his feet, gripping a crumpled flyer from Nico's pocket.
"The Body is the Last Frontier, stop selling it." It said.
He gets a stinging shock on his temple. A neurological echo.
Then, his own, but distorted, voice like a tape underwater: "You're not supposed to be here."
He turns, yet nobody is present.
His thoughts sparkle on a glass pane with cracks. Nico's face is shown; yet, the eyes are Cole's.