Ren looked at the blinking cursor on his physical monitor, mirrored in his virtual vision. The prompt read: [Extract] / [Delete] . He took a deep breath and clicked.

The extraction didn't yield folders or documents. Instead, it launched a localized virtual reality environment. Ren pulled his neural interface visor over his eyes and was immediately pulled out of his cramped, rain-slicked apartment.

Ren looked at the digital ghost of the woman. She looked incredibly human, down to the slight tremor in her hands. "Why me?" Ren whispered. "I'm just a junk scavenger."

"The eighth what?" Ren asked, his heart hammering against his ribs.