F Wilson - Sims

“Good Christ!” he blurted. “What have you done to them?”

He did his best to hide his revulsion as Mona gave him a sharp look, but God it wasn’t easy. Sim whores…

She grinned again and gave him a knowing wink. “You don’t like them all dolled up? That’s all right. I think I know your type.”

“You do?” That possibility was almost as unsettling as the sight of these sim sex slaves.

She pointed to two unshaven, unenhanced females lounging nude on a couch.

“We’ve got Teen and Mone over there. They work in our special jungle room for clients who like their sims just the way you’d encounter them in the wild.”

“In the wild? They don’toccur in the wild! They’re…manufactured!”

“Hey,” Mona said, her smile fading. “Are you here to have fun or nitpick my ass?”

Patrick stared, he gawked, he gaped in shock at their surreal sicko getups. His stupefaction that anyone could find these pathetic creatures even remotely erotic quickly faded, replaced by a deeper revulsion as he noticed the bruises on their shaved limbs, their dead dull eyes. They looked like desiccated shells as they sat and smoked and stared at him.

Smoked…he’d never known a sim to smoke.

He had to get out of here. Now.

“I…I think I’ve changed my mind.”

“What’s the matter?” She looked genuinely offended. “We got the best in town.”

Patrick started backing toward the hallway. “I’m sure you do, it’s just that I…nothing personal, but I don’t think I’m ready yet.”

Glaring now, Mona said, “Then why’d you come?”

“A friend told me to.” God, he wanted to kill Romy. “Said I’d find it enlightening. But I don’t.”

He turned and headed for the door where the bouncer waited.

“Jerry!” Mona called out behind him. “Something’s not right with this guy.”

Jerry placed himself between Patrick and the door.

“You got a problem, pal?”

Oh, no, Patrick thought as his gut clenched. He’s going to beat the shit out of me.

“Yeah,” Patrick said, pressing one hand against his stomach and the other over his mouth. “I think I’m going to be sick.” He retched for effect.

“Don’t you even fuckin dream of it, asshole! You puke in here, you’re gonna clean it up—with your tongue!”

Patrick retched again, louder this time. “Oh, God!” He doubled over.

“Motherf—”

He felt the back of his coat bunch as Jerry grabbed a fistful of fabric, heard the door swing open, and then he was propelled into the stink of the alley. He stumbled, almost lost his footing, but managed to stay upright as he skidded to a halt against the brick wall on the far side.

Patrick didn’t stop to look back. He pushed off the wall and hurried from the alley at something just short of a trot. He found Romy waiting for him on the sidewalk.

“Well?” she said, raising her eyebrows.

“Damn it, Romy!”

He’d half expected some sort of ha-ha-the-joke’s-on-you attitude, but she was all business.

“I take it you ran into a few sims.”

“You know damn well I did!” God, he was pissed. He felt besmirched, belittled, diminished. If she’d been a guy he’d be taking a poke at her right now. “Why the hell—?”

She held up one hand to silence him and raised the other to her lips. He realized she was holding a PCA.

“My man inside confirms the sims are there. It’s a go.”

“What’s a go?” Patrick said.

“A raid,” she said. “Let’s get out of the way.”

She led him across the street. The first blue-and-white NYPD units were screeching to a halt in front of the alley by the time they reached the opposite curb. Patrick watched fascinated as a small horde of blue uniforms swarmed toward the dented door.

Patrick stared at Romy. “You’re a cop?”

“No. And this sort of work isn’t really a kosher part of my OPRR duties, but I’ve made it so. I snoop around. I talk to people, people talk to me. I’ve been watching this place for some time. Took me a while to find the rear exit. Once I had that, I brought in NYPD.”

“Then what did you need me for? Why’d you send me in there?”

Her gaze was focused on the alley, her dark eyes hard and bright as she watched the cops knock open the door with a short steel battering ram.

“To make sure the sims were inside. You never know who’s got a source in a precinct house. If they got wind of the raid they’d have the sims stashed out of town and I’d have egg on my face and the cops would be less cooperative next time I came to them.”

If she thought that was going to mollify him, she was dead wrong.

“You could have told me, damn it! Why’d you send me in there with no idea what I’d be getting into?”

“Would you have gone in if I had?”

“Well…” He let the word trail off but knew the answer would have been a definite no.

“I didn’t think so. But because you did, you played a meaningful part in reeling in some single-celled organisms posing as human beings,things ”—she managed to inject so much contempt into the word—“who make pond scum look tasty.” A wry smile. “Ain’t that cool?”

Patrick had to admit it was, but he wasn’t about to say so.

“What happens to them?”

“The humans won’t see daylight for a long, long time. Those sims in there have been either abducted or leased under false pretenses. The charges will range from grand theft to fraud to pandering to cruelty to animals to operating a criminal enterprise to promoting bestiality and whatever else the prosecutors can think of. You’re the lawyer. You can imagine.”

Patrick nodded, mentally adding a few more charges.

Romy kept talking. “And the perps—do I sound like a cop?—are guaranteed to get slammed with max sentences. SimGen, as you’ve learned firsthand, is relentless when it comes to anyone messing with their product. Their contacts in the judicial system, the ones who guarantee them favorable rulings whenever necessary, also see to it that anyone who transgresses against them lands lower-lip-deep in doo-doo. And after the criminal courts are through with the bastards, SimGen chases them down in civil court and gets dibs on everything they’ve ever owned in their life and everything they’ll earn till Resurrection Day.”

“Is that admiration I hear?”

Romy shook her head. “No. But you’ve got to respect SimGen’s efficiency. When their ends coincide with mine—as in rescuing sims from these oxygen wasters—I’m only too happy to take advantage of that efficiency. But we part on thewhy : My reasons are personal and ethical, theirs are purely business and public relations.”

“What happens to the sims?” he said, remembering the tarted-up females.

“Someone from SimGen will be by to pick up the poor things and take them to the Jersey campus where they’ll rehab the ones they can and retire the ones they can’t.”

“Doesn’t exactly sound like the Evil Empire to me.”

She turned and glared at him. “Oh, but they are, Patrick Sullivan. That sleazy little operation across the street couldn’t have existed without SimGen, because SimGen made the sims that were mistreated in there.”

“Hey, Ford makes cars and some people get drunk and kill people with them or use them to rob banks or rig them with dynamite.”

She rolled her eyes. “You don’t see the difference between a hunk of tin and those creatures you’re representing in court?”

“Of course I do. I just—”

“SimGen created a new species and enslaved it. Sims feel pain, they feel pleasure, they laugh, theythink , damn it! And they’re slaves. A sentient slave species…you don’t think that’s evil?”

“Well, when you put it that way…”