Martin had never realized how world-weary he felt — how tired he was of living numb and jaded — until he heard Doctor Rin Porter ask him that question.

Because he knew the answer was 'no'. Just at a glance, he had a dozen different reasons to be certain that if he had met her before, he would have remembered. From her wild hair to midnight black artificial eye, past the dearth of people with PhDs in his life, to the fact she was five foot two at the most and didn't bother with heels to try and compensate for it, Martin knew if he had met Rin before today, he would have remembered.

Martin also knew, just as profoundly, that he wished he did know her.

"I wish I knew how you know me," Martin said, and meant it. He steppe towards her with his hand extended. "Martin Rawley, security consultant."

"I know. Believe it or not, we've met before," Rin said.

Her handshake was firm, as firm as he was used to from his coworkers back in Peace of Mind. It spoke of strength and confidence without showing off. And from her grip. Martin could feel the callouses on her fingertips — which spoke to either an extraordinary amount of typing, or holding hot things by the ends of her fingers.

"Impossible," Martin asserted. "There's no way I wouldn't remember you."

"No, you wouldn't remember," Rin disagreed, but that warm smile of hers slipped back on her face. And once again, her expression held all the warmth of the sun and the wonder of Neo Tokyo. "It hasn't happened yet."

Martin's collar suddenly felt stiflingly warm, and he tugged on it before rubbing the back of his head, nearly knocking BIRD off his shoulder.

"Rin, you're not confusing him with your theories on how time works, are you?" the captain asked.

Rin's smile vanished as her head turned, but there was a hungry, nearly manic look in her eyes. "Do you have it?" she asked.

"Safer than an encrypted hard drive in an air-gapped computer," Candice replied, and she pointed to the stairs. "It's in the vault room, two flights up."

Candice lead the way, with Rin following close behind. Bemused and not at all inclined to focus, Martin followed a fair ways back. As they started up the stairs, BIRD climbed close to Martin's ear and whispered, "I know you missed it, because your mouth hasn't closed since the girl first started talking to you, but did you catch the part where she said you haven't met her yet? And said it like it already happened?"

"Odd turn of phrase? They probably play fast and loose with the English language in a Cyberpunk commune," Martin said with a shrug.

"Right. Because a temporal continuity researcher deliberately mixing up past and future tense is definitely just using a figure-of-speech," BIRD said, covering its head with a metallic wing. Martin blinked, and very nearly grabbed the little computer when he realized it was facepalming. "That frightens me more than seeing a bomb technician sprinting. Do you even know what Doctor Porter's here to pick up?"

"No. I didn't need to know, and didn't ask. Like a professional security consultant," Martin said.

"Like someone who wants plausible deniability when things go sideways and the authorities are left trying to clean up their mess," BIRD sniped scathingly. "That's always the trouble with you mercenary types, you're always trying to deny that you have agency, even when you're the one holding the gun."

"Do your job. Get paid. It's the client who decides what goes down," Martin replied with a shrug.

"Pretty sure the only thing separating you from a nazi at the Nuremberg trials is no one's stitched a swastika on your shoulder," BIRD said. "Hope you have a change of heart, the day you're holding enough power to realize you've had it for years."

That last comment bit deeply, and Martin didn't even consider offering a retort. His years as a hired gun hadn't been as horrifying as they could have been; there was no shortage of monstrous people happy to hire someone willing to shoot. If anything had kept his conscious relatively clean, it was the influence of his former employer, Lanval Adams.

The troubling thing about what the little robot said, was trying to do this job while he didn't need the money. The reason he wanted it to be as uneventful as possible was so that he didn't have to think through the implications of his actions, and actually judge what he did. He didn't think he'd like that kind of self-reflection.

"So, what do you think Doctor Porter's picking up?" BIRD asked. "If you had to guess."

"Couldn't say," Martin said with a shrug.

"Really? You aren't curious?"

"Really. I'm not curious," Martin insisted, trying to put enough menace in his tone for even this irritating little robot to take a hint.

"It must be so peaceful in that tiny little mind of yours." BIRD hopped a little further down Martin's shoulder, apparently signifying an end to the conversation. Martin reached the top of the stairs a moment later, and rejoined the others just as the captain started explaining the biometric security.

"So no one's been in there since the object was placed inside?" Rin asked.

"Nope. The vault was keyed to your biometrics and your encryption keys. If you didn't turn up, it would sit there until you did, or we'd have to cut through my ship's hull to get it out," the captain explained happily, the way most captains enjoyed bragging about their ships. Like they lived vicariously through the overpriced metal tubes they owned.

"Good," Rin said, as she stepped up to the biometric scanner and waited for the prompts. "This cargo is extremely dangerous."

The captain's eyes widened, and her hair turned a very dark shade of red. "How dangerous?" she asked.

"It might be the most dangerous thing in the universe."

Rin gave them that last, ominous statement as if she was explaining the basics of astronomy to a bunch of humanities students. Or the way Martin used to have to explain to clients why they had to stay in the armoured vehicle until the room had been cleared.

The vault's security beeped to life, and prompted for a saliva sample by dispensing a cotton swab. Rin rolled it on the inside of her cheek, and dropped it back into the tube. The next prompt was for a password, and Rin leaned towards the microphone.

"Fundamental Line of Origin Within Each Reality," Rin said.

"FLOWER," BIRD remarked from Martin's shoulder.

"Flower? What are you talking about?" Martin asked.

"Her password, it makes up an acronym. And it has that distinctive sound of someone trying to shoehorn the phrase into shape because they really wanted it spell 'flower'. Which means it isn't just a password. Wanna take a bet about that phrase becoming important later?"

Martin shrugged, which had the pleasing side-effect of nearly knocking BIRD off its perch.

The vault doors slid open like a department store welcoming a billionaire's credit card.

There was only one thing inside. Set on the top of a short stand and strapped down by thick steel arms, the only thing this vault held was a meal suitcase. Martin recognized the case; he lost count of the number of times drugs, money, heiress's jewelry, or historically important art exchanged nefarious hands in one of those cases.

Rin crouched in front of the case, popped the latches, and opened it just a few inches. Pale green light poured out, and the room held its breath as Rin stared at whatever lay inside.

The captain gasped in awe, and her hair turned white. Rin's expression bore a striking resemblance to the way bartenders looked at Martin's credit cards lately. Martin, oddly, found himself inexplicably frightened, his hand instinctively reaching for his sidearm.

And BIRD had its wing over it's face, shaking its head. "Fuck," it said. "One of those goddam things again."

"You know something about that?" Martin asked. Despite BIRD speaking loud enough for everyone in the room to hear, neither Rin nor the captain heard it.

BIRD's head sagged. "Yep."

"Care to share with the class?"

"Nope."

"This is it," Rin whispered, and she started to reach inside.

Martin stepped up next to her, and shut the case. She whirled to face him, eyes wild and brow furrowed, raising her hand as if she was to going to hit him.

The instinct faded, however, when she had to take step backwards in order look high enough to meet his eyes. "Whatever's inside, you said it was dangerous," Martin said. He tapped on the case, and found himself smiling. He held his free hand up placatingly, despite his professional instincts telling him to say cold and firm. "Best to leave it alone until you make it to your lab."

Rin held her hand just above his for a moment, fingers spread wide. Martin tensed, worrying she would try to get past him, and hoping she'd take his hand in hers. But the moment passed, and she stepped back to give him a bit of space. "You're the expert in this situation, Martin."

Martin latched the case shut, and picked it up. "Where are we headed, Doctor Porter?"

"My lab. Physics Department, Wiki College, in the IPv4 district," Rin said. "It's a forty-minute ride if we take the Information Highway."

Forty minutes. Something inside Martin squeezed at his stomach, and his lips twisted. He turned away, and realized he wanted something he didn't know how to being trying to get.

It wasn't that he wanted her. Not in that small, pedantic way teenaged boys will profess their affections. But part of him was already trying to stretch the trip out a little; justify taking a longer route by saying they should avoid the obvious places for an ambush. Recommend he survey things first in order to keep them from their destination longer.

But having spent so long following orders, Martin couldn't quite bring himself to act on something so selfish. "Forty minutes," he said. "And you'll have this safely at your lab."

"Oh look, someone tied some foreshadowing to a sledgehammer and hit the reader in the face," BIRD said, shaking its head.