Meanwhile, District 1 — Unknown Location
Sweet Elvis — or at least his upper synthetic body — lay limp on a steel operations table, surrounded by buzzing blades and cold lights.
He whimpered hysterically, twitching as the machines around him powered up for slicing.
Across the room, Plukett moved without a care, scanning through Elvis's internal systems, ignoring his pitiful cries.
Elvis had done a good job wiping everything — almost too good.
"I swear!" Elvis sobbed. "I'm clean! I got nothing, I swear on my--!"
"Shut up, Sweet Elvis," Plukett cut in, voice sharp as a blade.
"I am still mad at you over my car,"
She didn't even glance at him.
Her fingers flicked across a screen, analyzing data.
"I know you were in contact with the scientist's wife," Plukett said coolly.
"I know she reached out before someone made her hot — and not the good kind of hot."
Her eyes flared red — literal warning lasers forming over her pupils.
"Talk. Now."
Elvis sobbed harder, squirming under the restraints.
"I swear, It wasn't me, I didn't know anything! Someone contacted me over a month ago, okay?! Called himself Purple Flower. Wanted me to keep an eye on the scientist's wife... and an ear on the black market."
Plukett's interest sharpened.
"Purple Flower...Black market for what?"
"Didn't say," Elvis gasped. "Just... anything expensive."
"How expensive?"
"Real expensive. Like... 80 to 200 million credits or more? I don't know, nothing came up."
Plukett narrowed her eyes.
Now it was getting interesting.
"Since when did you add stalking to your profile?" She asked.
"Are you kidding me, you guys and Bineth have been making it hard for modders like us to get a worthy gig these days especially with those new pleassure bots release, what a damn thing to release I was even going to get one myself!" He caused.
"Steven Baflin's wife... how does she fit into this? Buying? Selling?"
"Neither!" Elvis shook his head frantically. "I thought so too at first, but I checked — woman's broke. Not a credit to her name. I guess everyone has a fetish so I just stalked her."
Plukett frowned.
That didn't make sense.
She had checked the wife's accounts earlier. There was money there. A lot of it.Twenty five thousand.
"That's BS. You're lying, Sweet Elvis."
"I'm serious! I've been on her for forever but I never made an attempt to reach out to her, that's not professional, come on! She's got nothing! Really except a thing for cat shows!"
Something wasn't adding up.
Either Elvis was a phenomenal liar… or someone else was moving pieces behind the scenes.
Plukett stopped the machines, letting the buzz of the blades fade down.
Elvis sagged in relief, still strapped helplessly to the table.
Without a word, Plukett grabbed Elvis's severed mechanical lower half and dragged it across the room.
"This one, I will be taking to the exchange, better hope it's worth a car,"
"You can't just leave me here! Hey! Hey, don't go, you low-life messed-up swiny!" Elvis screamed after her.
Plukett didn't even turn back.
"Be seeing you around, Sweet Elvis, don't do anything I wouldnt do!" she said, locking the door behind her.
Outside in the hallway, the stale neon lights buzzed.
Plukett stood for a moment, thinking. Elvis had been stalking her but now it seemed he hadn't made the call. Although her comm had been tampered with, Elvis net signature had been encrypted deep into the calls, a fine job to get Elvis suspected. Her mystery caller was certainly not Elvis.
Then she pulled up a hologram — Steven Baflin's full profile flashed in the air before her, spinning slowly.
Next, she overlaid the crash incident report.
"Steven Baflin..." she muttered thoughtfully.
There was something bigger brewing here.
She could feel it.
And Sweet Elvis had just given her the first real thread.