Pop 'Em One: Bubbles in Space, #3

By S.C. Jensen

You win some, you lose some. And sometimes, you lose everything...

Bubbles Marlowe gave up the only life she knew in order to protect her best friend. But when her plan goes horribly wrong, the cyborg detective makes a gut-wrenching realization.

She will never save Rae. Not by herself.

Two power-hungry organizations battle for control of Rae's mind – and the critical secrets locked inside. They don't care that extracting those secrets will kill her.

In league with a rogue android, a cyber-witch, and a professional killer, Bubbles and her team must rise up against the giants in a daring attempt to seize control from the monstrous corporations that rule their world.

But as she explores the darkest recesses of a city she thought she knew, she uncovers something so twisted and corrupt than she wonders if their world is worth saving at all...


Blade Runner meets The Fifth Element in this eccentric cyber-noir thriller series about a bleak world ravaged by corrupt leaders, mega-corporations, and crime lords… and the washed-up detective who might be the only one crazy enough to take them on.

Bubbles Marlowe IS BACK in an exciting new installment of the cyber-noir technothriller series, Bubbles in Space. Delve into the secrets of this gritty future world, and buckle up for an adventure full of unusual characters, dark humour, and non-stop action.

• Language: English
• Publisher: S.C. Jensen
• Release date: Jun 30, 2021
• ISBN: 9798215408230

Book preview

Chapter One

I pressed my face against the glass of the observation room and stared at my best friend’s writhing body. Her long, brown limbs lashed out from the medical bed, swiping at anyone who came close to her. The disposable examination gown twisted up around her body in pale-yellow cords. A guttural scream tore from her throat and she arched her back like she was being electrocuted.

That scream—filtered out into the hallway over the crackling comm system—lifted every hair on my body and washed my flesh in ice-cold dread.

Help her! I slammed my fists against the glass. She’s in pain.

Beside me, Madame Molly turned her face away from the window, her skin ashen beneath her heavy makeup. She blinked at me as if through a mask and said, It’s not Rae.

Of course it’s Rae. I whirled on the woman. Look at her. You worked with her for years.

A doctor in a white coat motioned for two bruisers in scrubs to hold Rae down on the bed. In one hand he held a long syringe filled with a pale pink serum. A little jewel of liquid glinted at the tip of the needle beneath the exam room’s bright overhead lights. Rae twisted on the bed like a crocodile rolling in the scummy waters beneath HoloCity—inhumanly fast and powerful. She bit into the doctor with eyes like daggers and growled.

Get away from me. The voice rumbled out of her chest as if from the bowels of the earth. It shook my bones.

Bile burned the back of my throat as understanding dawned. Holy Origin.

The orderlies approached Rae slowly, hands up, as if they were reaching for a wild animal. She curled her legs beneath her and crouched on the bed. Her head rocked back and forth as she tried to keep her eyes on all threats at once. Silver coils of hair hung around her face, wild and bedraggled.

It wasn’t Rae. Somehow, the thing that had woken up from the coma wasn’t my best friend at all. It was something else.

In the corner of the room, Rae’s boyfriend, Jimi Ng, sat stricken in his wheelchair as if frozen by the same realization. His injured leg stuck out awkwardly to one side, and he leaned forward in his chair with bloodless knuckles knotted around the armrests. His wide-set, black eyes were locked on Rae. Looking at his face, I felt something cold and sharp twisting in my guts. Sweat beaded Jimi’s forehead, and his jaw worked back and forth like he wanted to say something.

But the only sound coming from the room was Rae’s screaming.

Her scream, not the deep bellowing voice from before. It was a high-pitched, trembling wail like I’d only heard once before—the day we’d been told Jimi was dead. But Jimi wasn’t dead, and I wasn’t going to lose Rae before she had a chance to be reunited with him.

I dug my fingers into the edge of the window and heard the frame crack and splinter beneath my metal hand. How could everything have gone so wrong?

I hammered the glass with both my fists, as if I could interrupt the horror unfolding before me. As if I could stop it if only Rae would look at me. But my fists bounced off ineffectually. No one in the room acknowledged my pounding, least of all Rae. I slumped against the glass. My brain still reeled from the shock of the message I had received from Libra only moments before. I couldn’t make sense of what was happening.

Rae’s twisting body seemed to bleed into the raw image of Tom’s swollen, bloodied face from the video. Her screams layered over the harsh whisper of Tom’s chilling words, echoing in my mind ever since . . .

Let me die.

Libra. The ice-cold fear melted away beneath a wave a fury. Somehow it all came back to Libra.

I want the hard drive, the man in the video had said. And I want the plug, Patti Whyte. Find a way to get them back to me, and you can save your friend.

To save Tom, I needed the data from the hard drive. But the data was locked inside Rae’s head. And Rae was not Rae anymore.

I needed the data.

And I needed Patti.

At least that much I could deliver on.

Patti, the plug—the android who started all of this when she used me to expose Libra’s illegal use of AIs—observed Rae’s transformation with an expression of perfect neutrality. She might as well have been staring at a blank wall.

Patti stood behind Jimi with her hands on his shoulders. She was as still and lifeless as a plastic flower in a nature exhibit—perfectly smooth and symmetrical and utterly devoid of connection to its environment.

For the first time since I’d met her, I saw her for what she really was.

A machine.

A beautiful, nearly flawless machine, but a machine nonetheless.

And I hated her. I hated it. I hated that I had been fooled into believing in its humanity.

If Libra wanted its machine back, I would find a way to do it. What was it to me? I wanted my friends back. I wanted my life back. Never again would I allow myself to be a tool of corporate greed and government corruption.

Libra could have Patti.

I punched the glass again, hard enough that my upgrade tore at the flesh of my shoulder with the impact. This time, a crack splintered the window.

No one inside the exam room noticed.

Rae lashed out at the orderlies with her fingers hooked like claws. Patti watched impassively. Neat auburn waves fell around the android’s bronzed, artificial flesh. She cocked her head as if listening for some far-off sound.

Determination welled up inside my breast. I would find a way to get that data out of Rae’s head. I would save Tom and do everything I could to help Rae, even if I had to burn HoloCity to the ground to do it.

Patti’s eyes widened.

The android’s head snapped around and her gaze met mine. My heart hammered in my chest. Could she sense my thoughts? The illusion of plastic perfection slipped from Patti’s face, and she stared back at me with a look so painfully human that I instantly regretted considering selling her out to Libra. Feral panic glared out at me from those eyes, the survival instinct that had been keeping animals alive since the primordial soup. Patti’s hands tightened on Jimi’s shoulders and she opened her mouth as if to speak—

Another tremulous scream burst from Rae’s throat. It stuttered and deepened as the other voice took over. The words came out in a low, threatening roar. Stay back!

Rae’s long, lean body tensed and quivered on the bed, her eyes darting around the room. But her face seemed to flicker, like a bad feedreel connection, shifting between terror and rage.

She’s still in there, I shouted through the glass. Don’t hurt her!

One of the orderlies lunged. He threw his weight into it, diving toward Rae with open arms. His muscles bulged beneath the thick flesh of his pale, fat limbs, and he crushed them back toward his body as he made the snatch.

His small, pink-rimmed eyes blinked in surprise.

He gripped nothing but empty air. Rae had rolled off the bed and now, shrieking, she leaped on the man like a spider, wrapping her long arms and legs around his torso. He stumbled, off balance from the failed grab, and crashed against the bed.

I can’t look. Molly slid down the wall with her hands over her face. Her thin knees jutted out of her dark-green pantsuit as she crumpled into a ball at my feet. She groaned into her hands and said, This is all my fault.

A chill wormed its way into my bones. I could barely hear her voice over the ruckus in the other room. What did you say?

Molly’s shoulders shook and she cried into her hands.

Now! The doctor pranced around the edge of the room like the ref at a bare-knuckle boxing match, tense with the need to be close enough to see and the fear of getting hit himself. Ragged strands of his slick black hair fell in front of his eyes as he inched closer. The needle in his right hand was steady as a rock. He shouted, Hold her!

The other orderly, a stout brown woman with a face like a frying pan, swooped down on the grappling pair. She slipped her arms beneath Rae’s armpits and locked her fingers behind Rae’s neck, yanking her backward off her co-worker. Rae yowled and thrashed. She kicked wildly but her arms were pinned above her head. The pale orderly wrapped his thick arms around her knees and squeezed. Long red gashes dragged along his flesh where Rae had caught him with her fingernails.

Rae bucked her hips and arched her back, but she couldn’t break free of the orderlies’ grips. The doctor crept in, weaving back and forth with her movements as if timing a dive between rushing boiler cars on the grid. The strings of black hair in his eyes didn’t seem to bother him. He saw his moment. The doctor dove in, plunged the syringe into Rae’s neck, and flushed the pale pink serum into the bulging vein on her throat.

Rae kicked and twitched once more and then slumped into the female orderly’s arms.

Everyone in the room sagged with relief.

Everyone except Patti. The android wore a look of all-too-human shock.

I remember, she whispered, her voice quivering over the comm system. I remember everything.

Then Patti Whyte’s eyes rolled back in her head, and she collapsed in a heap onto the sterile, white tiles.

I stumbled back from the window like my limbs were made of lead. What’s wrong with her?

Molly sobbed into her hands, smearing makeup down her cheeks in thick black lines.

I’m so sorry. She fell against my legs, twisting her fingers into the fabric of my trousers. She stared up at me beseechingly and said, It’s all my fault.

Chapter Two

The doctor burst through the double doors of the observation room, whipped off his surgical gloves, tossed them into the tubular receptacle next to the door, and scowled at me.

The strands of black hair fell in front of his eyes again. He huffed and pressed them back into place with the palm of his hand. What exactly are you playing at, Ms. Marlowe?

Me? My mouth fell open. What—

When we agreed to take on Ms. Adesina as a LunAstro employee it was under the assumption that she was of sound mind. The doctor brought up a holodoc on his tattler and projected it against the crisp-white wall of the hallway. Rae’s medical and employment history scrolled by in a series of charts and graphs and percentage scores that meant nothing to me.

I’m sorry, Doctor . . .

Truest, he said. His eyes darted back and forth across the information. His lips flattened into a line so thin it could have been a surgical incision. I see nothing in her files to indicate a predilection for violent, erratic, or otherwise abnormal behaviour.

Well, Dr. Truest, I said, and crossed my arms over my chest. I’m no government lab monkey, but it sounds to me like there’s something else at play.

There is no evidence of physical trauma. He sighed and collapsed the holodoc. LunAstro cannot assume the medical responsibility of a person whose employment application was tampered with.

The only abnormal behaviour we experienced was at the hands of your so-called recruiter. My voice echoed down the empty, white corridor. If that psychotic slave trader broke Rae’s brain with her godsforsaken data stick, someone here better assume responsibility, I jabbed the doctor in the chest with my metal finger hard enough to make him wince, because if you don’t, I will, and I guarantee there will be no sound minds left in this building if I have to—

It wasn’t Captain Urqhart. Madame Molly scrambled to her feet, wiping at her eyes.

Tell him. I grasped her by the arm and hauled her up to our level, then pushed her toward Dr. Truest. You worked with her.

Rae Adesina is one of the best cybernetics engineers Libra has ever seen. Molly’s voice cracked as she stared through the window at the orderlies tending to Rae’s prone form. She rubbed at her face with the back of her hand and dried it on the leg of her deep-green pantsuit. Beneath the makeup, she looked old and worn. We never had any problems with her. But . . .

But nothing! I yelled. Rage boiled up inside me and burned the back of my throat like bile. I clenched and unclenched my fists—one of which I wouldn’t even have if it weren’t for Rae’s genius and generosity—and fought the rising urge to plant one right in the good doctor’s face. You should count your lucky stars she even considered coming to this dirty asteroid.

Then, how do you explain that? The doctor’s voice rose to a shrill pitch, and he stepped toward me, stabbing his finger at the observation room. A fine spray of spittle misted the air between us. Do you have any idea how much it costs to smuggle a competitor’s talent to LS-103? I signed off on her contract. It’ll be my butt getting keelhauled behind the next bangtail to Terra Firma when the board finds out she’s damaged goods.

She is not damaged goods. I gripped the doctor by the front of his lab coat, picked him up off the floor, and slammed him up against the wall beside the window. She is a brilliant scientist, and she is my best friend. And we are going to fix her. Do you understand me?

Dr. Truest kicked his heels against the wall and twisted in my grip. I don’t even know which one is her!

Is that supposed to be funny? I crushed my fist against his chest, pinning him against the wall. She’s the one you just jabbed with a bloody tranquilizer.

That’s just the body, the doctor said, wheezing against the pressure on his lungs.

A vignette of blackness closed in around the edges of my vision, and my heartbeat hammered behind my eyes. I sucked in a lungful of air and held it, trying to stave off the panic clawing behind my breasts. The other voice. It wasn’t her. I knew it hadn’t been, but it didn’t make any sense. Tears stung my eyes and the doctor’s pale, frightened face swam before me.

Molly put a long-fingered hand on my flesh shoulder. Bubbles, please. This isn’t helping.

No. I exhaled shakily through my teeth. It’s not.

I dropped Dr. Truest to the floor and turned away from the observation window, flexing my fingers and gasping in sharp staccato breaths. I was supposed to help Rae escape from Libra. It was my job to save her. My muscles tensed. I wanted to run. To scream. To fight. I swung my fist into the glaringly white plaster wall of the hallway.

And screamed.

Wrong fist.

I had gotten so used to pummelling with my upgrade that I forgot how much it hurts to hit something with flesh and bone. But the shock of the impact shot up my arm and cleared the fog in my brain. I rubbed my bruised knuckles against the side of my leg and turned back to face the problem.

Molly unfolded her limbs and stood before the man. Her impressive height was accentuated by the unusual colour of her suit, but the smeared makeup made her appear thin and fragile. Her deep voice wavered when she said, Doctor, do you know who I am?

Dr. Truest tugged on the collar of his lab coat and scowled at me from beneath wiry black eyebrows. He didn’t meet Molly’s eyes. He said, I haven’t been here that long.

My name is Mol Elless. An edge crept into her voice that said she didn’t get nasty too often, but she was liable to enjoy it when she did. Elless as in LS-103.

The doctor’s Adam’s apple bobbed up and down as he swallowed.

You may call me Madame.

Yes, Madame, he muttered, still not meeting her gaze.

Before I founded this town for LunAstro, I worked for Libra. Molly’s back straightened until she looked down on the top of the doctor’s black, slicked-back hair. And I can assure you that Rae Adesina is exactly what we need here.

Maybe she is. Dr. Truest looked over his shoulder through the window where Rae slept peacefully. Jimi had wheeled himself next to her bed and rested his head on her shoulder. The orderlies worked to pick Patti Whyte up off the ground, struggling against the weight of her synthetic frame. But I don’t know how to bring her out. She’s clearly suffering from some kind of dissociative identity disorder, possibly the result of past trauma. But there’s no record of it in her files. What else am I supposed to think? Either the records have been falsified, or . . .

My hand throbbed to fill the silence. I snapped my fingers in front of his face. Or what?

The doctor laughed nervously. He eyed me the like I might still try to knock his head through the wall. I hadn’t ruled it out. He said, You didn’t hear her when she first woke up.

Look, I said. My hand already hurts. So if I have to hit you I’m going to be really annoyed.

He cleared his throat and took a step back, staring at the floor. A trickle of sweat ran from his greasy hairline and down along his jaw. The jaw flexed like he was grinding his teeth against the words he had to say next. Or she’s been possessed.

I waited for him to crack a smile or something. He didn’t smile. He didn’t even look up from the floor. I laughed like I thought I could knock him over with it. Now can I hit him?

Nobody’s hitting anybody. Molly sighed and stepped up to the window. I know what is wrong with Rae. The doctor’s suggestion isn’t as far-fetched as it sounds.

I groaned and pulled my fingers through my hair. Let me get this straight. Tom’s been kidnapped. Rae’s possessed. And I’m stuck on an asteroid with a bunch of whack jobs who believe in . . . what? Space gremlins? Cosmic demons?

Who’s Tom? Dr. Truest scrunched his forehead at me.

Maybe you should worry about who or what is inside my friend’s head. I whirled on him. Does LunAstro employ exorcists? Or are we going to have to smuggle some more off-world talent to fix her?

It was the hard drive. Molly wrapped her arms around her body and leaned her forehead against the glass, staring at Rae. She used a neural control interface to store those files in her brain. It was the only way to keep Captain Urqhart from stealing it and selling it to the highest bidder.

Great, I said. Fine. Wetware storage. That’s not dangerous at all without proper tools and training.

I showed Rae how to do it, Molly said. It should have been perfectly safe.

Except for the part where Captain Urqhart would have killed her to get it. I was shouting, I couldn’t help it. But it’s the thought that counts, right?

Captain Urqhart was only part of the problem. She shivered and turned to face me with tears in her black-rimmed eyes. I didn’t realize what else was on the hard drive.

Dr. Truest’s hands fell to his sides and he stared at Molly with his mouth agape. You don’t mean . . .

The black box. Molly nodded. The android, Patricia Whyte, must have hidden the program before she left Libra. Somehow it ended up on the hard drive with Jimi’s files from the failed project. It should have been sealed, but—

The overhead lights flickered and dimmed, flooding the white corridor in a dusky hue. Molly and Dr. Truest looked up and around with wide eyes. A red emergency light glowed at each end of the hall, marking the exits. From somewhere far off in the building a klaxon wailed.

What’s happening? I said.

The lights inside the operating room sputtered on and off. Rae sat up on the bed, staring straight ahead, the fingers of one hand digging into Jimi’s throat. Jimi thrashed against the bed like a stop-motion animation beneath the blinking lights. The confused orderlies rushed across the room, one of them tugging at Rae’s fingers to free Jimi. The other stood in the middle of the room, head whipping back and forth as if searching for a poisonous snake that had slithered beneath the equipment. But she was gone.

Patti Whyte was gone.

Chapter Three

Get everyone out of there. Molly swung her head around wildly, sweeping the dim corridor. Shut down the exits.

Where’s Patti? I blinked. Is she dangerous?

There are many things in this research facility that could be dangerous if something is interfering with the power, Molly said. Her wig sat askew, drooping over one eye. The android is only one of them.

I’ll need help. The doctor looked over his shoulder at me and rushed back into the operating room.

I cursed and followed him.

The shadowy light of the hallway gave way to pitch black as I stepped inside the medical room. From inside the room, the observation window appeared as a black wall—some kind of one-way glass, I guessed. But then, how had Patti seen me? The doors swung shut behind me, dulling the noise of the klaxon enough that I could hear the ragged breathing of the orderlies and Jimi’s strangled gasps filling the darkness. I waited for my eyes to adjust.

Instead, the lights blazed on again and blinded me. I blinked rapidly to clear the halos.

Rae stared at me from the bed with that blank, mask-like face. Her pupils dilated until only the barest trace of white was visible around the edges. Jimi’s twisted and purple face seemed to sit in her lap. She gripped him by the throat with her right hand, seemingly oblivious to the fact that she was killing him. His wheelchair had been kicked backward and his legs thumped weakly against the metal frame of the bed.

A pile of clothes lay strewn on the floor behind him. Patti’s? Had she been vaporized? I couldn’t make sense of it, and I didn’t have time to puzzle it out. Whatever was happening to Rae, it was bad. The male orderly, the one who had been trying to free Jimi, twitched in a pool of blood on the floor. Rae clutched a scalpel in her left hand.

The lights went out again.

The voice that wasn’t Rae’s hissed through the darkness. Stay back.

I shifted my weight carefully as I moved a little closer to the bed. My mouth felt like it was full of asteroid dust, and my tongue stuck to the top of my mouth. I didn’t want to have to fight Rae—or the thing inside her—but I had to help Jimi.

We need to get these people out of here, the doctor said, his voice remarkably steady. What kind of paramilitary training did these R&D protégés get? He kept his voice low and calm. Please put the scalpel down.

I want to get out of here too, the thing inside Rae said. There was a thump and a wet gasp as Jimi sucked air into his lungs. The lights flickered on and off. Rae crouched on the bed again, facing the doctor, and waved the knife in front of her teasingly. Who’s going to stop me?

Rae, I said. If you’re in there, I need to you to listen. We don’t want to hurt you. We want to help. Please put the scalpel down.

The mask of Rae’s face fell slack and re-formed itself into wild-eyed panic. Bubbles?

Relief flooded through me at the sound of her normal voice, trembling and fearful, but