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    Chromed: Consensus: Future Forfeit City Stories, #1
    Chromed: Consensus: Future Forfeit City Stories, #1
    Chromed: Consensus: Future Forfeit City Stories, #1
    Ebook112 pages1 hourFuture Forfeit City Stories

    Chromed: Consensus: Future Forfeit City Stories, #1

    By Richard Parry

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    In 2150AD, humanity no longer makes its own decisions. The megacorps do.

    Austin Ainley was once Reed Interactive's golden boy, a prodigy with mind-influencing tech that could reshape the world. When the company deemed it too dangerous, they cut him loose but kept his invention.

    Austin isn't about to let that slide. He wants his tech back, and he's bringing hell with him.

    With a crew of off-grid mercs—including mil-spec cyborg Ruby Page—Austin plans a heist against a syndicate titan. If he succeeds, he'll have wealth, power, and vengeance. But if he fails?

    Humanity falls with him.

    Megacorps. Cyborgs. AI. Gene-spliced monsters. Syndicate enforcers. Off-grid illegals. Supersoldiers. Rock music. Violence. Einstein-Rosen bridges. Liquor. Enhanced reflexes. Power armor and energy weapons. Full-body replacements. Swearing. Mind control. Telekinetics. G-Men. Drugs. Neural links. Orbital cannons. 

    This is cyberpunk.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherRichard Parry
    Release dateNov 12, 2018
    ISBN9780995114807
    Chromed: Consensus: Future Forfeit City Stories, #1
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      Book preview

      Chromed - Richard Parry

      Chromed: Consensus

      CHROMED: CONSENSUS

      A CYBERPUNK CONTINGENCY STORY

      FUTURE FORFEIT CITY STORIES

      BOOK 1

      RICHARD PARRY

      Richard Parry

      CONTENTS

      Before you begin…

      Bare Survival

      Chapter 1

      Chapter 2

      Chapter 3

      Chromed: Delilah

      The Job Interview

      Some Jobs Pay in Blood.

      Glossary

      Acknowledgments

      About the Author

      Also by Richard Parry

      CHROMED: CONSENSUS copyright © 2018 Richard Parry.

      Cover design copyright © 2025 Richard Parry.

      All rights reserved.

      ISBN-13: 978-0-9951148-0-7

      Second printing.

      Future Forfeit Reading Order

      No parts of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any form without permission. Piracy, much as it sounds like a cool thing done at sea with a lot of, Me hearties! commentary, is a dick move. It gives nothing back to the people who made this book, so don’t do it. Support original works: purchase only authorised editions.

      No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner for the purpose of training artificial intelligence technologies or systems.

      While we’re here, what you’re holding is a work of fiction created by a professional liar. It is not done in an edgy documentary style with recovered footage. Pretty much everything in here was made up by the author so you could enjoy a story about the world being saved through action scenes and witty dialog. No people were used as templates, serial numbers filed off for anonymity. Any resemblance to humans you know (alive) or have known (dead) is coincidental.

      Find out more about Richard Parry at parrydox.com

      Published by Richard Parry, New Zealand.

      CHROMED: CONSENSUS

      In 2150AD, humanity no longer makes its own decisions. The megacorps do.

      Austin Ainley was once Reed Interactive’s golden boy, a prodigy with mind-influencing tech that could reshape the world. When the company deemed it too dangerous, they cut him loose but kept his invention.

      Austin isn’t about to let that slide. He wants his tech back, and he’s bringing hell with him.

      With a crew of off-grid mercs—including mil-spec cyborg Ruby Page—Austin plans a heist against a syndicate titan. If he succeeds, he’ll have wealth, power, and vengeance. But if he fails?

      Humanity falls with him.

      Megacorps. Cyborgs. AI. Gene-spliced monsters. Syndicate enforcers. Off-grid illegals. Supersoldiers. Rock music. Violence. Einstein-Rosen bridges. Liquor. Enhanced reflexes. Power armor and energy weapons. Full-body replacements. Swearing. Mind control. Telekinetics. G-Men. Drugs. Neural links. Orbital cannons.

      This is cyberpunk.

      For MDC, and the glorious opportunity of other worlds.

      BEFORE YOU BEGIN…

      This story was originally published as part of Pew! Pew! Bad versus Worse . Since Bad versus Worse is no longer available digitally, Chromed: Consensus is presented — for you! — as a standalone story.

      Prepare to meet Austin Ainley.

      — R. P.

      June 2018, Wellington

      BARE SURVIVAL

      T he problem with trying to change the world is that you need to work twice as hard for half the pay, said Austin, and not without feeling.

      No, said Kerry. She had her face down in the silicon, hair cascading about her head as she worked. Her voice was distracted, like she was only giving him half the cycles he deserved. That felt like the status quo these days. That’s women. That’s what women have to do. You’re just a, a, and here, she raised a hand without looking up, waving it through the air, a common criminal.

      They were in the lab they shared, crates of packaged dreams around them. The crews had scored big last night. They’d hit an automated Reed Interactive truck taking the latest batch of memory-based entertainment out for distribution. Reed had always been a little old school, fabricating silicon instead of distribution over the link. It made compromising the memories a little harder; you needed a tech good with silicon, equally good with crypto. Kerry was that tech, and it’s why Austin kept her around. This latest haul? A mix of the usual: my-first-date, wedding-night, race-driver-victory, secret-agent-fantasies, and so on. If you were the kind of asshole who couldn’t get yourself a date? No problem. Drop some credit down on the counter of your local convenience store and you could live someone else’s better, shinier encounters.

      Is there something you want to tell me? he said. Austin stretched, his back popping. When he had a little more cash, he’d replace his spine with something more durable, but since those fuckers at Reed had tossed him out on the street — him! On the street! — times were a little tough. Kerry was good at what she did. One of the best. Her talents were wasted here cutting black market porn crystal, but — like him — her options were limited. His eyes strayed from the top of her head, currently sporting ruby-red hair that wasn’t at all natural (but still in style, after all these months of not-enough-cash to get the latest color growths at a clinic). Austin surveyed the heart of his empire. Empire. Hah. Synthesizers for chip production. A decent deck for editing out a few of Reed’s more obvious watermarks, like the blonde-blue-eyes thing. It’s like the entire syndicate was trapped in a time warp back to 1940. It’s a wonder their share price hadn’t tanked prior to the brutal beating it saw after that Seattle business. Spirits. Mind control. Gates to other worlds.

      Bullshit, A-grade, but bullshit regardless. People wanted mind control? He’d give ‘em mind control.

      The rest of the equipment was in various states of repair. There was an older deck with its innards exposed to the air and poor lighting in equal measure, components being harvested like organs to breathe life into some other project of Kerry’s. Nothing here was new. Not a single scrap of it was shiny.

      His comment caused her to look up, meeting his gaze. Those expensive Nikon eyes, a brilliant green, looked out at him under the cascade of red hair. She’d never have the cash to get work done like that, not again, unless they were successful. I don’t know. Is there something you want to hear?

      C’mon, Kerry. You know we’re on the right trail. A little more time in the oven, that’s all it needs. Austin stroked his beard. He kept it close enough for a job interview without being an asshole about it. People who had the time for close trimming and beard oils were people without enough real work to do. Not that he wanted a job interview. The time for slaving over other people’s dreams was done.

      Like you know how to cook.

      Sure I know how to cook, he said, taken aback. I take the food out of the packet and put it in the oven. She stared at him. Or, he offered, you put the food in the oven.

      There’s poor work distribution going on around here, she said. Anyway. You said that back at Reed. You said⁠—

      I know, he said.

      You said, and here she deepened her voice, but also tossed a little nasality in there for good measure, ‘Kerry Forsdyke, we’re on the brink of⁠—’

      I know, he said again. Also, I don’t talk like that.

      And I said, ‘Boss? Mr. Ainley, sir? We’re messing with people’s minds. Someone from HR or PR will come down here.’

      Austin sighed. Those fuckers, he said. Fucking PR.

      At least it wasn’t HR, said Kerry. They’d have sent you in for reprograming.

      PR just wanted to steal my tech, said Austin.

      Kerry looked bored, like they’d had this conversation a hundred times before. Which they had. All the good it did them. The tech doesn’t work!

      "The tech works," said Austin. He realized he’d clenched his fists. He made himself relax. The thing about being in charge was you needed to look like nothing got in

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