The Foreigner’s rental hover—a decade-dated VPA Nimbus sedan with a triple-patched inflatable bag and half-rusted V4 engine that wheezed worse than a triple-cloned pug—finally gave out along the side of a highway crossing the fallout-scrubbed wastes of what was once known as the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Coasting slowly onto the shoulder, the hover came down with a soft thud on a bed of frozen gravel, just a few dozen meters from the nearest exit ramp.

          Back at the rental desk in the Venture Partners Automotive × Penal Solutions Incorporated Port Authority Regional Office in Montreal, the agent had assured the Foreigner that the hover sedan was the way to go, over waiting for a short fall from orbit aboard a venturerocket, paying for an airbus ticket or fare for the nouveaukansen, or bothering with a classic road-wheeler. The agent—bedecked in a branded sweater vest embroidered with the Venture logo, a red-tipped rocket trailing a gray stream of smoke—failed to disclose the gas mileage, or how much additional juice would be sucked up by the heating systems in the bitter Hydro Division winter. The gas indicator hovered at 2 percent for almost an hour before finally failing in a coughing plume.

          Fortunately, the Foreigner had, a couple of hours back, passed the border of the Hydro and Automotive Divisions. Thus, the breakdown happened in VPA’s backyard. Surely some gas (and maybe even a tune- or trade-up) would be easy to find.

          Burning gas was such a crude means of propellant, the Foreigner mused, clambering down the half-deflated airbag cushioning the hover from the frozen gravel of the shoulder. Back home in the Coalition of Independent Nordic States, both their domestic transportation crafts and imported VPA or Sino-Soviet models were solar powered. But there was little sun here in the western hemisphere. For all the good the National Sterility fallout scrubbers did, the sky was nevertheless cursed a murky green overcast. Light penetrated, but not anywhere near enough to power a hover. So the Foreigner had no real choice but to trek to the closest gas station, fill up, and haul the dank, planet-killing liquid back to the highway.

***

Just at the end of the off-ramp, a squat building sprouted in a field of asphalt like a radioactive mushroom. It was bathed under green neon signage announcing the corporate collab that had birthed it: Best Bodega Company (a subsidiary of Lincoln’s Pantry) × Lemieux–Prometheus. Under the mushroom cap of the bodega’s plascrete awning, several chrome and rubber pumps stood unattended. A couple Horsepower Coursers leaned on their kickstands, flanked by a VPA Classic Coupe on one side and a VPA Classic Pickup on the other. All were matted in thick films of dust. They bore broken glass, mirrors, signals, windows, befitting abandon. Gas pooled at their tires. Such a waste.

          Beside the sliding acrylic plastic door, a cracked viewall fractaled a mandala of indecipherable ads for Pantry candies, Truleather boots, Old Head smokes. The Foreigner confidently strode past the advertising, only to bump into the foggy door. After a delay, it creaked open as a synth toned “We’ve got what you need!”

          The interior shone in unearthly, harsh fluorescent white, and smelled just as sterile, save for the underlying stale cigarette stink. Tinny SMILE Top 40 creaked out of Midimariachi (a Don Santiago Heavy Industries × El Rey Records collab) speakers. In one corner, a few street-level scrubs sat smoking and drinking, chatting dritt and flicking laminated plastic cards across a poker table atop spindly folding legs. A bored teenager leaned over the counter and watched the loiterers with blank disregard through a smudged pair of Angelware AR-lenses, his face a collage of acne scarring, dry lips, and stringy sweat-lank hair the color of an oil slick. Young, and from the fallout boonies—there was no chance this kid had any augmentations, chrome or silicon. The same could not be said for the gang of gamblers, so the Foreigner stepped lightly.

          “One gas can, please,” said the Foreigner, in a bit of a hush. “And I would like to fill it, of course.”

          “Your vocoder tweaked?” the teen asked, without looking up from the card game in the corner. “Why d’you talk funny?”

          “I am something of a tourist, from the COINS. So about that gas—”

          “Aren’t you a little dark for a penny? Or your cosmedocs down with a bit of brownface?”

          The Foreigner put on a practiced grin. It wasn’t the first time that question had been posed. Whether at home or abroad, the Foreigner was always a foreigner.

          “Not traditionally Nordic, no. I’m from Greenland, the Refugee Resettlement Program, which I have no doubt you have heard of.”

          “Sure, sure, whatever. Didn’t ask for your life story. Now, how can I help you?”

          “My rental ran out of gas by the exit ramp, and I would like to purchase a refill.”

          “Tank’ll run you ’bout 20 kaps, plus another 80 for l’essence actual.”

          “Of course,” the Foreigner said, pulling a pen and thin paper bankbook from an inner jacket pocket. “I can pay in krone-to-credit cheque.”

          The teen’s eyes finally moved behind the gray filmy lenses, dancing with the perpetual ticker of dull color and duller webchats. He sucked his teeth—black little nubs that looked closer to crumbling than so much wet sand.

          “This branch can’t accept paper money. National credits only. Kaps, migo. Corporate mandate. You can try the GRT if you want. It’s just over there,” he said, waggling with his weak chin to the back of the bodega, beyond the card game.

          “Might I speak to a manager?” the Foreigner inquired, hoping to appeal to a higher power.

          “I am the manager,” replied the teen, flashing black teeth and blacker gums. “GRT’s in the back.”

          The card players were sweaty and smoke yellowed. They wore once-white tanks, bulky unwashed jeans, cracked Truleather boots with dirty soles. A couple had bulky gogglesets grafted over their eyes, the lenses smudged with greasy black fingerprints. One, the biggest by far, had three-pronged rotating wrenches in place of hands. When the last in the circle laughed, an ethereal vocode synth chirped from behind rows of chrome teeth. As the Foreigner tried to pass, the wrench-handed man kicked out a thick leg, abruptly blocking the path.

          “You playing?” asked the crackling synth. “Buy-in’s 50 kaps.”

          “Just walking by,” the Foreigner replied calmly, unshaken by these fallout-rusted trolls. Greenland’s housing projects had plenty of would-be street-level punks, though they usually lacked cyber augmentations. Receiving no rise or reaction, the players went back to their game.

          The Gold Road Teller stood sentinel, seemingly forgotten under the flicker of half-dead LEDs. A hulking black box trimmed in gilding, it was bolted to the floor, ceiling, and wall, and each bolt showed signs of tampering. The black screen flashed to life as the Foreigner approached.

          WELCOME TO GOLD ROAD. TAP TO CONTINUE.

          The Foreigner tapped as instructed. The sans-serif text flickered, replaced by a spinning spiderweb icon.

          ESTABLISHING WEBCONNECT, ONE MOMENT…

          Then, the icon snapped apart.

          FAILED TO ESTABLISH WEBCONNECT. PLEASE RENEW ANGELWARE SUBSCRIPTION.

          Back at the counter, the teenage employee deadpanned: “You need to update your halo.”

          “My what?”

          “Foreigners . . .” the teen muttered, then spoke louder. “Porto webcon router, personalized private handle. GRT connects to it and badda pings your kap account. Only secure way to transfer credit dox without multifactor and biometric, which corporate won’t insure out here. You wanna load a chip with credits to buy gas, you’re gonna need a halo.”

          “Can I just borrow yours to connect to the web?”

          “Not in my scope of work, migo. There’s a Harp & Halo Outlet down the road a blip. Can’t miss it. Hear they accept old school, too.”

***

Unlike the squat, lonely mushroom that was the BestBoCo × Lemi–Pro gas station, the Harp & Halo Outlet was a glistening white fortress jutting out of a near-destitute strip mall where weeds punched through plascrete and asphalt, graffiti-marred windows and logos. Despite the surroundings, the white webware storefront was pristine.

          Aircon hit immediately beyond the sliding door, a warmth that grabbed and pulled the Foreigner in from the cold. The lighting was also warm, golden from antique-style halogens and neon wainscoting, quite unlike the cold, harsh white Nordic tech design of home. Imitation rosewood tables displayed the latest webdecks, tablets, visilenses, stark contrast of chrome and a rainbow of plastic. Black screens reflected twinkled light from above like the night sky at the crown of the world. Black chips with lacquered gold inlays sat on narrow glass pedestals. Panoramic viewalls shifted through semiholographic renditions of beautified memories of Americana, vistas now lost under the haze of monopolocracy. The Foreigner recognized some of the holograms, segments of half-remembered documentaries during slow days of global history class. Every few seconds, a digital influencer strode across the hologram field, showing off their Angelware devices on the go. Then price tags appeared per product, ranging from κ500 to κ50,000, with promises of payment plans for qualified buyers. Hidden vents pumped in subtle sweet perfume, and hidden speakers sung the twang of harps and the soft burble of running water. The employees wore neutral white jumpsuits and sensible white sneakers with neatly tied white laces. The golden wings of the Angelware logo were embroidered over their left breast pockets, and the tablets holstered at their hips were of a matching hue. Reclining back on Truleather sofas, their eyes flashed, countless tabs projected across their corneas, tracked by artificially dyed irises. After just a moment, one of the employees swiped out of AR and went to greet the Foreigner, tablet in hand and a smile painted on her face.

          “Welcome to the web,” she said, her voice only slightly autocoded to provide a pleasant resonance beneath her organic tone. “How may I help you?”

          “Thank you,” said the Foreigner, feeling some relief. “I need a halo, to make a connection.”

          “Did you lose your last one? We can easily replace it for you with your account number.”

          “This will be my first. I suppose I will need an account as well.”

          The employee pursed her plump lips, painted silver.

          “You don’t have an Angel account?”

          “No, I do not. Will that be a problem?”

          “Not at all,” she smiled. “I’m authorized to offer you the cherub package as part of a subsidized collaboration with SMILEco, which entitles you to up to three streaming apps of your choice on purchase. I’ll just need your SMILE subscription serial to link the two accounts and synchronize your pay periods.”

          Now the Foreigner began to feel a bit peeved.

          “If I do not have an Angel account, what makes you think I would have any SMILE subscriptions?”

          “What else would you need the web for? Perhaps you’re more of an avid web trader? Your Gold Road routing number would suffice to set up a trading account.”

          “I have krone-to-credit cheques—money is no issue. Just tell me how much a single halo with web connection capabilities will run me.”

          “I’m sorry, corporate policy dictates that paper monies can only be utilized as tender in exchange for tablets or webdecks. Visilenses, too, but only with a Maxton & Marsh cosigned prescription.”

          “Might I speak to a manager, please?”

          “I am the manager,” replied the employee, flashing chrome caps and crystal studs. “And I’m authorized to offer you a short-range harp in your plan when you sign on for a tablet and special one-time Celeste collab Truleather carrying case.”

          “And those can connect to the web, yes?” the Foreigner asked, beginning to sweat in the aggressive aircon balm.

          “Well certainly, while within 50 yards or so of this store. Any farther and you’ll need to restring your harp with a wired connection, or you can purchase a halo to connect on the go.”

          Quickly crunching numbers, the Foreigner converted yards to much more familiar meters. Little wiggle room, but the BestBoCo × Lemi–Pro would be just within range. Or, at the very least, the Gold Road Teller in its shadowy back nook certainly would be. It had to be.

          The Foreigner scrawled an exorbitant amount onto a crisp cheque, signed to authorize, and walked out of the heavenly oven with a new glass and plastic tablet snug in its brown leather case, already smudging in the grasp of sweaty fingers. The screen threw up blue light as it woke. Text faded into view.

          WELCOME TO THE WEB! ENTER A USER HANDLE AND SECURITY PIN TO CONTINUE.

          Slowly, with one hand, one erect finger, the Foreigner began tapping out a name. Factory settings had the brightness cranked to the max. Tears began to well in the Foreigner’s eyes, wallowing in the harsh blue following the soft yellow. Through the tears, the Foreigner didn’t see the oncoming headlights of the VPA Classic Pickup. Wrench Hands could barely steer through the augmentations and didn’t even bother honking. Maybe he couldn’t. Either way, he crashed right into the Foreigner, who spiraled under snapping bones. The Foreigner’s temple kissed the pavement, and all went heavenly white, then endless black, the night sky at the crown of the world.

***

Before the sterile One General (a Maxton & Marsh subsidiary) room, before the bumping, hazy ride in the back of a VPA × M&M ambulance, before the EM&MT administered any aid, a tablet with a scratched screen was thrust into the Foreigner’s face. Sprawled supine, the Foreigner flopped a throbbing finger, slapping out the newly registered security PIN. Via the PIN, the Foreigner was signed up for a trial Maxton & Marsh healthcare subscription leveraging the Angelware × Gold Road credit account that came as a sign-up bonus at POS for the harp.

          Despite the bland, Health+ Lincoln’s Pantry meals, the recovery room at One General was one of the nicest that the Foreigner had yet occupied in the Great Nation. It was graciously private, with a cloud-soft, if railed, bed. Up on a high floor in the One General Tower, the view overlooking Detroit Deux was a wash of crimson, something like the sunsets of home. The nursing staff was professional and dedicated, available at the press of a button. After a quick stint in surgery sutured the Foreigner’s punctured lung and reconstructed both crushed feet, all that remained to heal were some broken limb bones and internal bruising. Boring and bedridden, but simple enough. Fortunately, One General had a contract with SMILEco, providing free streaming for patients on the tenth floor and above. All things considered, the Foreigner could not complain. It was a comfortable recovery.

          That is, until the 15-day trial period ended.

          The nurses wheeled the Foreigner’s bed down to a communal dormitory, then stopped appearing entirely. As did the regular meals. There were no windows in the communal dorm, nor were there any screens to watch. Just withering, dying patients lying in pools of their own dritt for lack of diaper changes. When the patient in the next bed flatlined, the Foreigner desperately pinged the nurse button, hanging onto a fading hope that someone might come. No nurse arrived, but eventually a black-haired man with slight epicanthic folds walked into the den of death and dying.

          He was dressed in a closely tailored gray suit and sterling silver bolo tie, right out of the recent Celeste Q3 Catalog. Close behind the stylish man followed a pair of oversized thugs. Their simple black raincoats were emblazoned with “PSI-Operative” across their bulging chests and hid (poorly) the telltale dysmorphic limbs of heavy augmentation. Reflective silver lenses were grafted over their eyes, black chrome filtration units over their noses and mouths. No emotion could possibly be read on their faces. The stylish man took a seat on the next bed, ignoring the fresh cadaver still flatlining an unending drone.

          “So sorry for the delay—as you can see, things are busy. But your ticket just jumped up as the customer in line before you dropped out of the queue, so me voici. Ore wa Asano-Lambert desu. I’m here on behalf of Silver Star Incorporated to discuss your housing moving forward.”

          “I just need my room upstairs back,” said the Foreigner in a controlled voice, avoiding taking on a pleading tone at all costs. “Not long before I am all healed up. Then I can be on my way to your National Headquarters, where I am expected on business. Can you perhaps connect me with a hospital manager?”

          Asano-Lambert waggled his fingers, and the twinkles in his eyes began to shift and pixelate. He was taking notes on a screen only he could see.

          “No manager will be seeing you, as you don’t qualify for that service. Now, what business were you here on, exactly?” Asano-Lambert asked with a placating grin.

          “I am here as a land surveyor. There is a site by one Lake Calhoun that I have been brought on to survey prior to a new housing development being constructed.”

          “I’m well aware of the Lake Calhoun Project, it was posted on the Silver Star private web forum not even a quarter ago. And from that forum I know you are mistaken. Silver Star has no need for a land surveyor, let alone a foreign one. I apologize, but it seems you’re here for nothing.”

          “That cannot be,” the Foreigner argued. “I have written correspondence from one Antonin Sordini explicitly summoning me for this purpose. Sordini paid for my passage from Greenland and provided me with cheques to pay my way when I arrived.”

          “Ah!” exclaimed Asano-Lambert, some shock of understanding. “That makes perfect sense.”

          “Good, so you see I am here on business, no doubt business pertinent to your firm. Let us work together, then, to get me where I need to be.”

          “No, no,” Asano-Lambert corrected. “Your situation makes perfect sense, not your half-cakked understanding of the situation, pardon my français. Sordini failed a PIP quarters ago and has since been laid off. Whatever correspondence you received must have been sent prior to his dismissal, or perhaps as an unfortunate joke played by some wannabe webjockey who scraped his clearance and PIN. Simply put, there was never any need for a land surveyor, and you frankly do not belong here. C’est la vie. Anyway, let’s find you a room to rent, shall we? I’m sure whatever credit you have scrounged up can, at the very least, get you out of . . . here. And if not, my PSI operative friends can provide you free housing and three squares a day up in the Cold Sprawl of Security Division.”

***

There was a low collateral apartment for lease available in SS-AutoTower #7. The neighborhood available via skyway and lift was nothing special. One of the windows had a decent view of Lake Venture, which was nice during the day. In the night, though, a rolling sequence of ads for VPA’s latest models, Entreprise La Vie’s bottled water, Aegis Industries’ concealed sidearms, and SMILEco’s streams featuring emptily smiling influencers were displayed from hidden Angelware holojectors, the blocky pixels rippling on the faint rocking waves. At first, the Foreigner found the nightly bombardment of light from the lake distracting, but quickly came to find it almost comforting.

          Thanks to some finessing by Asano-Lambert, the Foreigner’s lease agreement specifically included several appreciated amenities, including an ELV water subscription, Pantry meal plan, and a seven-day trial box of Celeste’s new Q1 Catalog which provided fresh clothes after the Foreigner’s old set had to be cut away prior to surgery. Those clothes, and the krone-to-credit cheques inside the jacket, had been incinerated at One General Tower. Fortunately, the lease came with a small GR × SS credit account to temporarily make up for the lost currency. The line of credit could only be stretched so far, but stretching was far better than living in squalor. At least while the Foreigner recovered, before being able to book travel back home to the COINS.

          The recovery period would have been quite lonely had Asano-Lambert not regularly visited. At first, the unannounced calls peeved the Foreigner a bit. Even if Asano-Lambert was, technically, on the lease as a co-signer, he was acting like he owned the place. The Foreigner’s feelings quickly changed after a seven-day period without a visit from the exec. The endless streaming on screens and ads pulsing through the windows numbed the Foreigner’s mind, and the solitude became a palpable ooze that weighed and drowned.

          Together, the Foreigner and Asano-Lambert enjoyed stinging Old Head blues, watery synthetic reds by Entreprise de Joie (an ELV subsidiary), microinfluencer dating streams, and Pantry ReadyMeals blitzed up in the Don Santiago microwave, standard in every unit of SS-AT #7. All the while, they chatted. Mostly about work. The Foreigner quickly realized that, though proactive, the young exec knew precious little about the hard facts pertaining to the surveying, construction, and maintenance of real estate properties. Often he would complain about this project or that, rattling off keywords and KPIs half-remembered and even less understood. This turned out to be a boon for them both; Asano-Lambert needed assistance and coaching if he was to continue his slow climb up the Silver Star org chart, and the Foreigner needed something, anything, to think about that wasn’t streams or ads. The Foreigner’s education and training as a land surveyor proved invaluable. Though Asano-Lambert didn’t understand half of the jargon the Foreigner rattled off, he was more than happy to allow the Foreigner to fill out text docs and forms and proposals, designing decks for presentations and submitting inquiries for collab opportunities. After a few weeks of their clandestine operation, Asano-Lambert’s mood brightened significantly. Instead of Old Head blues, he brought Virrey golds. Instead of EdJ reds, he brought sparkling whites that tasted like riches and came in diamond-studded custom Celeste collab bottles. Instead of Pantry ReadyMeals, they got takeout from Greengrass Star restaurants, only available to high-level execs or higher-level credit accounts. And, of course, the ultrapure uncut Maxton & Marsh prescription cocaine.

          In their lap of luxury, it was no surprise to either when they began sleeping together. Such celebration felt natural, well earned. They fell into each other (specifically Asano-Lambert fell into the Foreigner, proudly jockeying with his 12-inch chrome-plated phallus graft) and even stayed wrapped in each other’s arms after completion, lying in bed under neon holographics reflected up from Lake Venture, until the dull gray-green dawn and the inevitable coming workday. The Foreigner wouldn’t describe it as älska med varandra, making love, but as far as fucking went, it was pretty nice. Certainly nice. A solid 3.5 stars, if it were to be rated.

***

“Accept the offer—what d’you have to lose?” Asano-Lambert asked, his sweating chest heaving. That cheeky smile, the one he always wore postclimax, stained his handsome-enough face. Just before completion, Asano-Lambert had offered the Foreigner a gig. Entry level at the Silver Star Detroit Deux regional branch, in the Department of Property Development.

          “Well, it would be a perfect fit, given my résumé and experience,” the Foreigner conceded. “But it feels counterproductive to take a job here if my aim is to return home.”

          “I got a perfect fit for you,” said Asano-Lambert in a low growl, followed by a wink. “But seriously, reboot a bit. How do you plan on booking travel without income? International fare ain’t cheap, by design. John Venture’s gotta make his bottom line, évidemment.”

          “Simpler to buy on credit via my Angelware account. It does not matter to me if I go in the red here—I can pay off the difference when I am home and have access to my regular bank account once again. I have already done the math: By the time my recovery is entirely complete, I will have just enough to afford a bus ticket back to the rental, gas to fill the tank for the drive back to Montreal, and fare for the ride across the Labrador Sea.”

          “You’d be content just leaving me like that, baby?” Asano-Lambert curled his head into the crook of the Foreigner’s neck.

          “Your company has been . . . enjoyable. But we both know this relationship is just a pleasant distraction for both of us.”

          Asano-Lambert recoiled. He scuttled to the edge of the bed, fumbled in the side table until he could find the prescription baggie and chrome straw. A quick bump straight from the bag, followed by sparking a Virrey.

          “Cold as Nordic winter, chikushō. Well gak on me I guess. But if you won’t stay for me, at least think about the Lake Calhoun Project. Polish your chrome a bit at entry level. You’ll be stuck here, regional, sure, but within a few quarters you could def be fast-tracked for executive status. Give it a year, and with your je ne sais quoi I’m sure they’d kick you up the ladder, ship you out to National Headquarters to work on the LCP. You and your entire team, I’m sure. And when it comes time to select that team, I hope you remember who got you the gig in the first place.”

          “I see,” the Foreigner sighed, shifting over to the other side of the bed, away from Asano-Lambert. “You really are just using me to further your own career. I always knew, but the confirmation still stings.”

          “Of course I am. I’d be noRAM not to. And you’d be noRAM not to profit off your own hype. Sordini brought you here by mistake, or by spite, which is worse is up to you, but you can still shove it in their faces by executing the job flawlessly. They cakked in your lunch but you can cak back. Those baka imbéciles in NHQ will look like street-level kids next to you. You could be management, baby. Think about what we could have then! Land-survey the cak outta them. Then, once the LCP is done, we can go on vacation to the COINS or the Iberian Republic or Rio if we’re feeling de fête, whatever you like.”

          Whatever I like? thought the Foreigner. That was, unofficially at least, the Great National slogan. A sort of promise, like a long-bastardized dream. You can do or be whatever you like, but nothing in this Great Nation is free. You have to work for the cost of freedom. But what a freedom that could be! After a year, five, a decade. The monopolocratic dream. To pay with time to climb the corporate ladder, and from the top look down and know true liberty: the opportunity for fame, power, wealth.

          The Lake Calhoun Project, whether accidental or not, was what brought the Foreigner to this strange land. It was also the project that could make the Foreigner’s career, something bigger and better than any opportunity available in the COINS, or anywhere in the eastern hemisphere. If the Foreigner could claim the LCP, the Foreigner could claim the world. No corporate policy or inept manager or arcane subscription tier could ever say “no” again. Gas would never run dry, the tank never empty. Perhaps that could be worth the cost. Perhaps home could wait, just long enough to complete the project. A few months, or quarters as Great Nationals used, at most. Greenland would not go anywhere. It seemed the Foreigner still had a job to do.

          “I’m in,” the Foreigner said, reaching for the bag, the straw, and the pack of Virreys.

***

“But you do not seem to understand,” the Iberian pleaded. “I was invited here to support this project.”

          After years of steady progress, the Lake Calhoun Project had reached a standstill. Silver Star’s CEO Sebastian Septimus X, conservative as he was, was tamping down on budgets, much to the chagrin of Our Fearless Leader and the other CEOs. They squabbled that the project needed to reach completion by the end of the fiscal year. Each had various five-year plans, and next steps hinged on completion of the project. Thus, to maintain the budget and optimize downstream profits while keeping the Board happy, corners needed to be cut, and certain roles needed to be outsourced. The Iberian was one such example, though this one was clearly redundant.

          “I don’t know who in Recruiting headhunted you, but I can assure you that your services are not and have never been required. You may go.”

          “I am sorry, but I cannot accept this,” the Iberian whined, tears glistening in unaugmented eyes. “I sold most of my worldly possessions to afford my ticket here, on the promise I would be employed and compensated on my arrival. Travel from Iberia is not cheap. I cannot possibly make it back. Can you not make an exception? Can you not help a poor foreigner now lost on your shores?”

          “Not in my scope of work, migo. You could take it up with HR if you really think you have a case, but to be honest? They’d see you as a sunk cost. Of course, if you’re desperate, you could always throw a punch at one of our security staff downstairs. That would buy you free housing and three squares a day up in the Cold Sprawl of Security Division.”

          The Iberian wiped away tears, putting on a desperately resolute face. “I would like to speak to a manager.”

          “I am the Manager,” replied the former Foreigner, flashing a smile devoid of any feeling whatsoever. “Now get out of my office.”

          Security staff on loan from PSI escorted the screaming Iberian away. Foreigners always make such a racket, the Manager mused.

          The Manager walked to the large window overlooking Lake Calhoun. The lake was ringed on all sides by cranes, scaffolding, and other heavy machinery provided by Don Santiago, now idly spewing gas plumes vacantly into the air, staying warm but otherwise inert. The project would proceed eventually, the Manager had no doubts. But in the meantime, other work needed to be done. On the Manager’s desk, a tablet with a cracked screen pinged a notification. A request for approval. Some lease was broken and next steps needed sign-off. A BestBoCo × Lemi–Pro gas station in Automotive Division by the border with Hydro Division had foreclosed. It wasn’t prime real estate, but it could be developed into something, some day. The Manager drafted the order: raze the property via Aegis orbital dropbombs; no need to clear out the current staff; their remains could be easily swept away when the National Sterility crew cleaned up. Once the property was a vacant lot again, maybe something useful could be built there, like a Gold Road bank or a holojector station to provide cleaner advertising to the area.

          Down below the office window, the gas tank of an idling crane blew, black chromatic ooze creeping toward the lake. Down below the foreclosed BestBoCo × Lemi–Pro station, gas seeped into the sick soil. A small waste, but all systems had some amount of runoff. That’s what it took to keep the Great National economy moving, and the Manager was proud to be part of that machine.