Husk (2 page)

I dry off and apply lotions to skin, ointments to injuries. A third of my room consists of a walk-in closet with every outfit I own on display. I take time to consider what clothes might impress the client who will be renting
my services. I decide to dress up for the occasion, suit and tie, adorn myself with subtle silver and gold, spray myself with cologne so expensive it acts more like a pheromone. The shoes alone are worth over a grand.

‘Oh, I think one of your co-workers called here while you were away,’ Craig calls from the living room. ‘Guy named Miller, said he was looking for you.’

Scrolling through my messages,
I find two from the man that frequented my most recent dreams. They are both from a couple days ago and aren’t marked urgent. Anything not urgent can wait in my world, but still I’m curious. I play the first video back on my Liaison screen. Miller’s handsome, grinning face is always easy on the eyes.

‘I was hoping you were available for a drink or two
tonight. Shit, you’re probably already unconscious,
you popular bastard … give me a call when you get this and you’ve got a little free time on your hands.’

I sigh, wishing I’d been available. Scheduling my social life has become increasingly difficult with demand for my services going up so much in recent months. I play Miller’s second message. He’s smiling in this one too, although it doesn’t look sincere. Voice seems more serious. He’s all
business, and I can’t help but think it has unsettling undertones.

‘Hey, Rhodes, I’m just letting you know that I’ll be covering one of your regulars for a few days. A last-minute request came in for you, but you’re already booked.’ He forces a laugh. ‘I’m not encroaching on your territory or anything, buddy. Baxter’s orders, that’s all. The client is awfully adamant that they have a rental this
weekend.’

Miller hesitates, opens his mouth as if wanting to say something else, rethinks whatever’s on his mind and shrugs it off.

‘Take care, stay safe, we’ll talk soon,’ he says instead and hangs up.

I appreciate Miller’s honesty, though he of all people should know me better than that. A lot of Husks can get territorial with their clients, but I’d like to think I’m not one of them. My Liaison
tells me my next appointment is fast approaching. Don’t have time to call my friend back. I leave Craig in the apartment to play with the new HG, making my way to a five-star restaurant where I plan to eat an authentic and thoroughly nourishing meal before upload. Steak and vitaminized potatoes are my go-to
meal, with whatever vegetables are in season, if Canada or Mexico is feeling kind enough
to ship them our way at inflated costs. I eat real beef too, not the lab-grown shit. It’s expensive, but the benefits to my body are undeniable. Meal supplements and nutrition spread aren’t consumed by the likes of my clients. The gap between what I am and what they once were must be closed as much as possible. It helps ensure quick rehiring. Healthy eating, clean living, maintaining peak physical
condition: a Husk’s recipe for success. The damage is done only by those who pay for the privilege. Lately, I’ve had trouble sticking to the rules.

Husking isn’t an exact science. There are more than a few outfits trying to make a go of it these days. At best it’s a pharmaceutically controlled time-share split personality of sorts. At worst it’s a rough descent into a drug-addled kind of dissociative
disorder. Thankfully, I’m employed by Solace Strategies, working with the best, for the best.

I catch a cab to JFK International less than forty-five minutes before my flight. It takes me only minutes to get through an airport. Manufactured credentials allow me to bypass biometric, backscatter and retina scanners. Security personnel are only permitted
to x-ray luggage and put me through a metal detector. I’m not obliged to answer any of the TSA’s questions. If they persist, the same people who influence the departments that create my identification can not only have them fired, but ruined in the process. All evidence seems to suggest diplomatic immunity, but that’s not what it is, at least not the diplomat part. For all intents and purposes,
I’m almost bulletproof when it comes to law enforcement.

The direct flight from New York to Las Vegas is only four hours. Regardless, I fly premium first class. The clients wouldn’t have it any other way. They want the merchandise kept comfortable. I pass on the champagne and Panamanian cigars, even turn down the offer of a mile-high-club membership from one of the finer-looking stewardesses.
I have to keep myself in check, be on my best behaviour. To make that easier, I sleep most of the journey and wake up refreshed upon landing.

Outside the arrivals terminal of McCarran International Airport a limousine awaits. The driver opens the
door and I slip inside and sink into soft leather seats. A welcome note on the minibar encourages me to enjoy the few hours left before the session.
Beside it is a plain white envelope containing a thousand in cash, my per diem. The limo takes me to the Strip and I ask the driver to let me out at the MGM. Inside, the oxygen pumped into the air of the lavish casino gives me a buzz. I walk around the blackjack tables until I see a high-stakes game with only three players. Actually, it’s the sultry blonde dealer who grabs my attention, the kind
of girl I can manipulate in my game. Gambling is as much about energy as it is about numbers. I lay my greenbacks on the table, soaking up the old-school feel. Cash for chips, something solid and plentiful in your hands, not pin numbers and plastic. With my first hand I split eights and watch the dealer bust on a five-card draw. I’m dealt blackjack for the next two hands. She smiles warmly at me.
I like where this is going.

Within an hour I’ve almost doubled the per diem and had an offer to meet the dealer after her shift for a drink. I decline, because I won’t be conscious by then. I deposit my winnings into my account and head over to the Emerald City, the newest, most expensive condominium on the Las Vegas Strip. Outside the building, I look one last time up and down the boulevard
at the casinos, crowds and shit ton of neon lights everywhere, feeling the sensory overload of it all. I won’t be seeing any more of it for the next two days.

That sensory overload is what makes Las Vegas popular for Husks. Bigger, brighter, stronger, faster; all of it
appeals to my clients. The Strip hasn’t changed much in years, serving as a reminder of better times for the people who come
to lose the remainder of their money in acts of desperation. All the mainstay casinos are firmly in place, although some of them are struggling more than others. Some of the smaller casinos have changed names and ownership, mostly sold to rich Asians who live in the Emerald City. As I arrive a doorman draped in a Wizard of Oz getup that must be hell in the Nevada heat opens the front doors. Inside,
security clears me for Mr Navarette and calls up to notify his assistant of my arrival. A security guard packing a Vector SMG rides the elevator with me all the way to the nineteenth floor and walks me to a door adorned with solid gold trim. Navarette is a new client, the kind I call
baby-billion
, one who crosses the finishing line well behind the others, but still makes it to the podium. This
internet mogul has just enough net worth to buy into the market that Husks are groomed for, what we call top tier, the one per cent of the one-percenters. I check some notes on my Liaison and see that Mr Navarette has been deceased for almost a year now.

A middle-aged man, who has aged quite well, greets me at the door and leads me inside the exquisite 3,000-square-foot condo. Before he introduces
himself, I already know his name is Dante, the client’s attaché. He shakes my hand and adjusts his suit while offering me his credentials. It isn’t long before he gets to the point.

‘Shall we get started?’

‘Let’s have a quick chat first,’ I say. ‘Since you’re his handler and all.’

‘Certainly,’ Dante says and sits down on a leather couch, motioning for me to do the same. I remain standing.

‘This,’ I say, pointing to my face. ‘Doesn’t get damaged, okay?’

He nods. ‘All right.’

‘Your boss can push the rest of me to the limits, but all this flesh has to heal quickly and fully. Absolutely no broken bones, no broken skin requiring stitches. Anything more than the superficial and I file a complaint.’

‘Okay.’ Dante’s nod is slower this time. ‘Anything else?’

I look around the large room
adorned with antiquities and velvet, Ming vases and one small Picasso. A lamp casts soft light on another painting of a girl in a blue dress staring into a looking glass, the most mesmerizing piece in the room. Nearby, I notice an original
Labyrinth
movie poster in a polished frame, David Bowie’s signature scrawled in silver marker at the bottom. Cameras cover every square inch of the place. I
can only assume Navarette is watching as we speak.

‘I have a couple rules,’ I say, speaking to the cameras as much as Dante.

‘I thought Husks didn’t have rules?’

‘I have a couple rules,’ I repeat.

‘Such as?’

‘No paedophilia for starters.’

Dante’s eyes widen. ‘I beg your pardon?’

‘You heard me. Nothing involving children. No role-playing priest to the altar boys.’

Dante adjusts his shirt
collar and swallows in a way I don’t like. I’m glad he’s not the client.

‘And the other rule?’ he asks.

‘Whatever he does, he doesn’t make a spectacle out of it. I don’t want my face splashed over the news or some funny viral video of the week. Discretion is important. I have other clients.’

Dante points to my cheek and curls his lip. ‘You’re already scuffed.’

‘Your rate doesn’t cover perfection.
It covers the basics. You’re renting me on my days off, my R&R time.’

Without hesitation I take off my jacket and remove my shirt. Flexing everything at once, I hold out my arms and rotate to show the bruises and scratches on my trim, but muscular figure. Regardless of the blemishes, I can tell Dante likes what he sees by the way he licks his lips. Before he can reply, a smooth voice with a metallic
tinge speaks from another room.

‘Bring him to me, Dante. It is time we met.’

Dante rises from the couch and ushers me to the room where the voice emanated from. Shirtless, I enter, finding myself in a low-lit study with shelves of classic fiction and fantasy on every wall. The door closes behind me.

‘Please have a seat,’ the voice says. ‘Let me have a closer look at you.’

In the middle of
the room is a desk made of metal and glass. A leather armchair sits before it. Standing on the desk is an oval flat-screen resembling an antique mirror, thirty inches tall and twenty inches wide, its circumference an intricately carved silver frame. Beside the screen sits a gold-plated data port. I sit in the chair and wait a moment. Green eyes with slit pupils suddenly appear on
screen, a Cheshire
Cat grin splitting the space beneath them. I’m used to a lot of strangeness, but I find this unnerving.

‘Well, hello, young man,’ the voice purrs.

Seeing the Cheshire Cat, I get it all at once. The Emerald City,
Labyrinth
, the
Alice in Wonderland
shit. Navarette likes his fantasy lands no doubt, growing more and more accustomed to living in the best unreality money can buy, whatever his downloaded
consciousness desires. The eyes morph from cat to human and I watch as Navarette’s head and torso materialize on the screen in a texture and colour scheme resembling the Picasso in his living room. It’s creepy, but I still like this presentation more than the way some of my other clients greet me pre-session.

‘Mr Navarette,’ I say. ‘It’s a pleasure.’

‘Hmmm, yes,’ he says, looking me up and down
through the two-way screen. ‘It certainly will be.’

‘You’ve got me for forty-eight hours. I assume you know the ropes?’

‘I’m well-versed. You’re not my first Husk.’

‘May I ask your intentions?’

‘You may.’

‘What do you have in mind for us?’

‘Well, we are in Las Vegas.’

I chuckle and roll my eyes. ‘What happens in Vegas …’

‘… will be a lot of gambling, followed by sex with multiple partners
and constant recreational drug use.’

‘Fair enough,’ I say. ‘I only request the proper detox medication post-session.’

‘But of course.’

I sit quiet for a moment, wondering if he’s as good as his word. It’s pointless. You can never really trust a client. Sometimes they become evasive when met with uncomfortable silence, a sure sign of guilt. Navarette’s demeanour does not change. When I feel
somewhat satisfied I retrieve my Liaison and pull out two thin retractable cables. Hard-lines are needed for the next step. The amount of data being transferred is massive. Safety and security are paramount. The first cable plugs into the gold data port, Navarette smiling on screen as it clicks into place. The second has a syringe-like proboscis. I use my fingertips to find the small digital interface
surgically implanted under the skin behind my right ear, a device affectionately known as the ‘Ouija’. When I feel the indent, I guide the proboscis into my head until I hear the little gristly crunch through tissue that signals connection to my cortex. My Liaison begins the Husk sequence automatically. I fish a pillbox from my pocket and open it. Inside are rows of red, yellow and green; little
traffic lights of gel caps, each colour coordinating to a different session duration. I select an amber one for forty-eight hours. As I swallow it I can’t help but think of the David Bowie song and Dorothy in her red shoes.

‘Let’s dance,’ I say.

Within moments I feel myself falling backwards into a dark hole woven from sleep. Another entity passes me as I plummet, travelling in the opposite
direction, up toward the light. Before the all-consuming blackness envelops me I see the Cheshire Cat grinning from high above, one green eye closed in a wink.