“Open your mouth and show me your hand.” The dealer shone a light at Welga. “You look clean enough. The cards and a hand job, that’s my deal.”

The words no way in hell died before they reached Welga’s lips. Whatever it takes. Olafson had said it, and years before, Jack Travis had shown her what it meant, but she wasn’t working under orders now. She could refuse.

What if others had nothing to sell, or asked worse of her?

Welga took a deep breath, looked the dealer in the eyes, and nodded.

They pulled Welga inside a dark, sweltering shop and locked the door. Then they grabbed Welga’s hand, doused it with disinfectant, and pulled down their pants.

“You make me come or the deal’s off.”

In the blackout, no microcams swarmed.

No one could watch. Nothing would hear.

With the energy of her last duo-zip buzzing in her muscles, Welga grabbed the dealer’s balls and yanked. Her knee came up, into their solar plexus. Just enough force to send their diaphragm into spasm. The box of pills flew across the room.

As they lay on the shop floor, gasping for air, she walked to the case.

“You shouldn’t take advantage of sick people,” she said.

She took what she needed, kept her microcards, and left them writhing on the floor.

WELGA

24. Humankind cannot expect to compete with intelligent machines forever, and the longer we attempt to do so, the further we drift from actual humanity. Our empathy for each other fades, dulled by the requirement to ignore our natural feelings for the machines in our lives.

—The Machinehood Manifesto, March 20, 2095

Welga resisted the urge to rip off her hand and wiped it on her tunic as she walked back to the truck. She took a quad-zip as soon as she was clear of the dealer’s street. Rage and revulsion provided plenty of saliva to dissolve it. Christ, she could use a drink of water.

What had she done wrong to end up in this mess? For all the years spent being so damn careful to avoid flow, she had ended up almost exactly where Mama had, with a body destroyed by pills that she needed for her work. Maybe the machine rights people had the truth of it: humans couldn’t compete with WAIs and bots and whatever the hell the Machinehood were. They would destroy themselves by trying. Better to give up and let the AIs rule. Maybe the Machinehood’s actions would save humankind from itself. Maybe some elements of humanity didn’t deserve to exist anyway.