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“Yeeeeeeehaw!”

High-pitched and twangy, the tinny sound of the cowboy duet that served as Derrick’s phone alarm set every nerve in his body on end, so that he was more than happy to rip off the covers and start the day. God, I’m tired. What time is it even? He reached up toward the nightstand, waving his hand over its surface blindly, and squinted his eyes as the lamp activated, casting white light into the dark, small space that was his room. His phone read 7:30 am.

He sat up and stepped off his mattress onto the patch of carpet that had almost worn bare from his feet, exposing patches of subflooring underneath. It was warm and humid, as his room was basically an enclosed box in the interior of the building, with no vents or windows, and only the gap beneath the door for ventilation. It had originally been Tony’s room back when he was the apprentice mod-doctor for the original owner, or so he had told Derrick.

Turning on the small fan near the entrance, he unlocked and opened the door and felt the cool air of the shop flow in. Circulating some fresh air during the day helped him sleep better, and made his room feel like less of a closet when he got to bed.

Somehow, despite Derrick not having much to his name, his room actually did look like a closet when viewed from the outside. He never picked up his clothes, and kept wearing them until they were dirty enough to justify washing, so they littered the ground like hand-me-downs that someone had tossed in. He would never put them in the stackable plastic bins with his clean clothes, and he didn’t have any racks to hang them on, so they would have to stay on the floor.

His mattress was siting a bit slanted relative to his dresser, probably because he had been tossing and turning in his sleep again. He nudged it back into place with his foot, and kicked the covers back onto it. He would come back to make his bed later, after he washed and put his hand on.

His hand sat on the nightstand. It was by far the most important thing in his room. Oiled and clean, it sat, with fingers lightly curled, like a jewel on display.

Half buried in the layer of clothes was his tablet, which was loaded with gigabytes of pirated books on anatomy and surgical techniques, and mod maintenance manuals. It was also out of juice, so there was no point in keeping it in his room.

He grabbed the tablet, placed it on a table near the workbench and, since he didn’t want to bother putting his hand on before he washed up, pushed the tablet against the wall to hold it in place as he plugged a charger into it.

Derrick was glad he had dragged himself to his mattress last night instead of passing out on the bean bag again. It wasn’t a bad bean bag, but those types of things were meant for sitting, and not for sleeping. What had he been doing before he fell asleep? Oh yeah, looking through the monitoring logs for Xavier Williams’s penis mod.

That weird set of remote instructions from the Revolute Prosthetics server didn’t make any sense. How in the world would mood lighting have to do with the erection state of the prosthesis? And speaking of which, why had they been sent to Xavier Williams anyhow?

Derrick stared at the sink while he brushed his teeth and thought.

The instructions were likely part of some ‘smart home integration’ that most electronics shipped with. So it would link the mod, and all the ‘mood-lighting’ fixtures in the home that were also from Revolute Prosthetics. Ah, so maybe when you’re getting intimate with a lady, it helps you get hard as soon as you turned the mood-lighting on.

Derrick finished brushing and washing his face, and then hopped on the laptop.

Let’s see, what can we find on the Revolute website . . .

After scrolling past the inspirational video of happy amputees and their prostheses, Derrick found the search function. Bingo, they came up right away. Dozens of search results appeared for mood lighting that promised to integrate with your smart home. Supported integrations included closing the drapes, turning on music, and even having the auto-bartender refrigerator add-on prepare cold drinks. Revolute had a partnership with Better Butler, a home AI vendor, which would integrate all of these together with devices from other manufacturers.

Since the logs showed that these instructions were addressed to the account of a certain “tdavidson”, the mod was probably still linked to the account of the previous owner. The mod was, of course, most likely stolen, so Williams wouldn’t have the login details to the account linked to his mod, unless they were sold to him as well. In fact, he probably wasn’t even aware that there was an account.

Taking all of this in stock, the situation was clear. Someone had acquired Williams’s Better Butler account, and was using it to fuck with him. There were probably some settings on his mod that automatically made him soft whenever the matching mood-lighting instructions were received.

Now, this could have been a hacker, someone working at Better Butler or Revolute who had backdoor access this account, or even the original owner. But whoever it was, this was a good starting point.

He had recorded the part number and serial number of the mod from Williams’s last visit, but if he wanted to contact Revolute or Better Butler to try and reset the account access, they might ask for more information, or a hidden identifier. Better to have Williams in the office for that one.

It was time to get paid.

Derrick twisted on his hand and flexed his fingers a few times. He called up Williams, using the number he had saved, but the phone rang four times, and went to voicemail. Oh well; he could just leave a message and do some more dumpster diving until Williams got back. “Hello, Mr. Williams? This is Derrick from Hack Alley, calling to follow up on your recent visit. We suspect that your problem is related to a vendor-provided account that’s linked to your mod. We would like to schedule a follow-up visit to do some more examination, and get information that we can use to contact the vendor—”

Someone picked up, and there was jostling and cursing, before Williams started talking. “Shit, you’re that man from the mod shop, right? This is the best news of my day right here. I’ll be there at two, wait, three.”

“You’re coming at 3 pm? Okay, great. We’ll need payment in advance: I estimate around one hundred dollars.”

“One hundred dollars . . . man I ain’t even got money to pay for some fuckin’ instant noodles. Can I get a discount in here? I’m a repeat customer, know what I mean?”

“No discounts, we gotta eat too. Well, you can always come in later once you have the money. It’s not urgent, right?”

“Nah, fuck that. Shit, I’ll get your money, and this better be worth it. See you at three.”

With the appointment scheduled, Derrick went to check on Tony, before getting to his daily routine of organizing parts and dumpster diving. He knocked, receiving no response, and then tried the door. A nasty odor wafted out, but the room was empty.

Tony was up early? Was something wrong?

Derrick checked around the shop, until he saw on the kitchen counter, under a dirty cereal bowl, a note, scrawled in Tony’s messy handwriting.

‘Out this morning to prepare for contract work next week. Receiver’s fixed (I hope). Take fixed receiver and new one from workbench and sterilize.’

Fantastic, they wouldn’t have to buy a new cochlear implant receiver from the scalpers anymore. But sterilizing them meant there would be another long bus ride to the big city to ‘borrow’ the ethylene oxide sterilizer at Saint Marvin’s Hospital. That is, if the sterilizer technician Nathan was in a good mood. If only the old hospital hadn’t closed down a few months ago . . . they had an ethylene oxide sterilizer too, and it was only a 30 minute bus ride instead of a few hours. Life just harder in the most inconvenient ways.

Praying that Nathan wasn’t hungover, Derrick sent him a text hinting that they should meet at 9:30 am. He scrounged around in his sock drawer until he found enough cash to buy a can of a beer at a nearby bodega. It wasn’t much for a bribe, but it would have to do.

The fixed receiver and the ‘new’ one that they got secondhand were both sitting on the workbench, like Tony said, and were sitting in labeled antistatic bags. Derrick picked up the one labeled ‘fixed.’ There didn’t seem to be anything wrong with the receiver, so Tony must have done a good job.

Derrick zipped the receivers into the padded carrying case for delicate components, and nestled it into his backpack. The receivers had been placed in antistatic discharge bags for protection, but their thin electrodes wouldn’t survive a rough jostling if Derrick wasn’t vigilant.

The streets were quiet this early on a Sunday, and so was the shop. It almost felt a little peaceful, with the sunlight streaming through the blinds.

Since the bus was never on time, his habit was to get to the stop ten minutes before its scheduled arrival, and hope that he wouldn’t have to wait twenty minutes for the next bus if their timing was really out of whack. The hospital would open in half an hour, so he needed to get there ASAP before Nathan got too busy to sneak out.

Derrick locked the shop doors behind him, and set out towards the bus stop.