I step inside Foggarty's and see Will speaking to a rough-looking collection of men and women, most of whom are older than him, closer to my age. Presumably, it's this motley crew who are the source of Will's parents' concern, and judging from the look of them, it's not hard to see why.
Will is speaking to a thin man with dark bags beneath his eyes, who sits nursing a collection of empty pint glasses. Dressed in what look like combat fatigues, the man sits next to a woman with black braids tied up into a bun, and she sips from a frothy stein that appears larger than her head. She must be nearly twice the boy's age.
I'd let my eyes settle on them longer, try to make a note of the serial number on their IDs, but they all look upset and in deep conversation about something. And they've noticed me.
A massive mountain of a man sits with them, similar in size to Manni, but angrier and a bit older, more hunched in posture and roughly drawn. He also wears these thick-rimmed AR glasses that make his pupils look oversized. I study his ID tag and read his name as Det. He puts his drink down and makes eye contact.
Shit.
I shift my gaze, look around for something else to take my attention, but my gut screams at me to run.
Foggarty's is a true den of iniquity. Like your local dive bar on Earth, everyone here is looking for cheap sex and booze. Or drugs, or illegal stims, whatever they can get. And from the looks of things, they can usually get it.
The air feels supercharged with the recent memory of violence, and there is a distinct scent of lemon bleach, which comes from the cleaning droid mopping up a pool of blood to my right. From Det's expression, I sense it'll be my blood mopped up next.
It's galling. Still, it's always better to walk away and live to drink another day. Or something. Not wanting to return home, I aimlessly check the cafes and restaurants for something else to do instead.
Foggarty's entrance sits at the head of a concourse lined with dead trees and chain restaurants, plus the occasional boutique parlour selling mid-price nanocosmetics.
None of the food here is real, not in its true sense, and the body mods on offer are ludicrously overpriced. Still, in the end, I stumble upon a small but friendly restaurant run by a family of North African descent, a stone's throw from the Machine maglev station and on the outer edge of The Cut.
An older woman shows me to a lonely table, where I wolf down toasted flatbreads with mint yoghurt, lamb kebabs, and barbecued vegetables, then round it off with a small plate of baklava, all the while checking the apps on my phone in case I miss Manni's call.
Of course, this is futile. Manni will call when he wants, like he always does.
Still, some inherent flaw keeps compelling me to check.
The wind blows as I clear my plate, then take time to congratulate the owners on a fine meal.
Feeling refreshed and well fed, there is another bar up ahead. Small and enticing, intriguingly called the Bay of Pigs, it reminds me of what I originally wanted to do in the first place, apart from meeting Will's gang.
It doesn't take too much self-persuasion to go inside. And so I enter through the front door, telling myself, 'Just one bottle for the road,' and to my delight, it's largely empty inside. Better yet, the barman looks friendly, and there's an information exchange with glowing tablets mounted on the wall.
Such amenities mean I can search the neural net from the bar's location for free, just as long as I buy a drink at the bar. Therefore, this is the perfect time to run Elise's coordinates, so I order a beer and whiskey chaser and ask the barman about the security settings of the exchange when he brings them over.
It looks like a slow night, so the barman looks pleased for the business as he fetches my drinks. He's about to tell me the bill when Det, the glowering colossus from Foggarty's, storms into the bar and walks right up to me.
'What did you do to Elise?' he says as I take a step back, immediately intimidated and looking for the exit.
There's a heavy smell of liqueur on his breath, and his eyes are screwed up behind his thick-framed glasses.
'I ask you again,' he says, and the fumes on his breath could strip paint. 'What did you do to Elise?'
'I...' I falter. 'I don't know what you're talking about.'
'Liar,' he shouts, the man's shove feeling like a tap from a hydraulic ram.
'Hey,' shouts the barman uselessly as I crash back into the table. 'No trouble, alright? Do you hear?' But neither Det nor the people he's with seem to care or notice.
'I recognise the name,' I say, trying to gather myself and calm down. 'But I've been in my apartment all evening. I have not seen or done anything to Elise.'
'You lie,' Det spits, pulling me close, and he's about to punch me to the floor when one of his friends steps in.
'Whoa, whoa,' says the dishevelled man from earlier, his accent vaguely British and similar to mine. His ID tag identifies him as Thom. 'We don't want the barman calling Kapo, so let's just chill, yeah?' Thom appears to be speaking to Det first, then he turns to me. 'Listen, Tilo. Cut the crap, yeah? We know who you're working for, so tell us your real name.'
They all watch as the blood drains out of me.
'Rene Esparza,' says Det, 'we already know.'
Thom groans as others in the group start jeering. The woman with the braids is now shouting in my face. Det, meanwhile, appears to be making a low growl.
'He's the man who did for Elise,' Det shouts. 'The man we were meant to protect.'
'My name's Tilo Mladic,' I shout back by way of protest.
'Stop lying,' says Det, swatting Thom aside and freeing himself to deal with me. 'If you keep lying, I won't be held responsible.'
'Now listen, mate,' I say, frantically freewheeling. 'Whatever you've...whatever you think about me. I can assure you, it's not the case.'
'Listen, man,' says Thom, wedging himself back between me and Det again. 'We all know who you're working for, so drop the act!'
More of the gang are around me now, and the barman has stopped the jazz background music.
'We need to know who you are,' Thom continues.
'I...' I'm at a loss for words.
If they're friendly, this is the wrong approach.
The situation hangs by a frayed thread.
I can feel the sweat dripping down my forehead.
Det draws back his fist.
'No!' comes a shout. 'Wait!'
And when I look back, it's Will, standing earnestly with a drink swaying in his right hand. 'His name is Tilo Mladic!' Will shouts like he's screaming into the abyss. 'And he lives in Teunning House, with me.' He's slurring his words, clearly already drunk from the group's modest session in Foggarty's. 'I mean, he may look a bit weird and everything, but man...he isn't responsible for what happened to Elise and the chapel.'
'What?' I say. 'The chapel?'
'Yeah, the Chapel of Ascension,' Det says. 'Don't pretend you don't know.'
'Know, know what?' I protest. My mind feels like it's inside a spin dryer.
'You see, guys,' says Will, as if my ignorance proves his argument. 'He's just a harmless old man.' He walks up to Det's side. 'He knows nothing about your wife.'
'Oh, he does,' says Det, pushing me back into a table and grinning as I finally fall over. 'And I know a liar when I see one!'
'Go on, Det!' shouts the woman. Her ID tag reads 'Cheyenne.'
My head smacks the floor, but I bounce back up immediately. Powered by adrenaline and something else, because I don't feel any pain.
Part of me wants to stay and talk this over, explain to them, but there's no time. Pure instinct overrides everything, and I make a mad dash for the exit.
If they weren't already half-cut, there's no way I'd make it. But they are, and so I'm able to dodge and weave, desperate and scrambling to get distance.
Ten impossibly long seconds later, I burst through the door, back out onto the street and searching around for transport.
An Amberlite waits across the street, near the North African restaurant. But I can smell Det and his crew behind me as I sprint across the street.
A kiosk selling sausage sticks blocks the pavement, so I use its weight and wheels to propel forward, swinging it back around behind me to block their path.
The air erupts with shouts and curses as Thom and Det crash into the kiosk and send the contents flying.
The last thing I see is them slipping and sliding into the sauce and sausage meat as the angry vendor gets in the way.
Good, I think, hurtling forward and crashing into the Amberlite's doors, shouting at the driver.
'Up, up!' I repeat, clambering inside as the vehicle starts to rise. 'Now!'
'I hear you, man,' says the driver as I look into the front seat and see he's a gene-hack, handily piloting the vehicle with what look like augmented tentacles for arms. 'But where do you want me to go?'
I look down at Det, screaming out in vengeance as he grows smaller in the window, and we reach the skyway.
'Aphex,' I say, 'I think.'
'You think?' The man shrugs. 'Because that's a long way to go if you're not sure.'
'I'm sure, I'm sure,' I say as I open the coordinates Elise sent over. 'Just take me to the Chapel of Ascension.'
Thanks for checking out Hard Lines. To track the whole story so far, please visit the Serials page on Beyond Colossus. New scenes drop each Wednesday.