The coke drove a clear blue spike through the pall of smog, overlaying the world I knew with one where the edges were sharp, not worn. Where the clear pane of a glass window on a shop display wasn’t mired by years of pollution and decay. I walked, head high, my step light, moving through the street with the kind of confidence that only comes with a really good high.

There’s music, somewhere, a metallic series of chimes coming from deep within me, booming from the base of my spine and echoing through my ribs, in my skull, and I know it’s the chrome.

High-tech flesh, the best of the best, metal under my skin. My nerve-endings sang to the tuneless ensemble as I moved, lightly, a wolf among a million lambs.

I grinned, lips parting to pelt out a bark of laughter, attracted the wary glances of those faceless nobodies nearest to me. I gave them the finger and moved on, letting them fall behind.

The high and the music arcing through my body, I turned down a dark alley, my Zeiss-Ikon eyes whirred into lowlight.