Razor Kaine hunted a name he did not have. Steel ran up his right arm and ended in a folded blade. More metal filled his chest, his spine, his skull. Someone had built this body and sold his mind for parts. He meant to find that person and cut them open. But the implants carried no maker's mark, and a man cannot hunt a ghost. So he came to the records vault, where the city stored every hospital file ever logged. He climbed through a service hatch and dropped into a cold room full of dead machines. His blade whispered open the lock on a storage cabinet. Inside sat a diagnostic scanner, its screen still faintly alive. This was the machine that had read his wounds the night the ambulance brought him in. He pressed his metal palm to the scanner's port. The screen woke. An orange warning triangle flashed. Lines of text scrolled past: patient intake, implant readings, a flagged defect. Then a logo resolved in the corner. A sharp arrow inside a ring. The scanner named the manufacturer that had wired his skull. Razor leaned close and read it twice. A weight he had carried for months finally had an edge. Now he had a target. A low whine cut the silence. He turned. A dog stood in the doorway, but no living dog. Steel plating wrapped its ribs. Pink and blue light ran along its legs. Its eyes glowed behind a scanning visor. The thing lowered its head and growled, and the sound buzzed like a saw. On its shoulder plate glowed the same mark. The arrow inside the ring. The dog carried the signature of his own body. Razor drew the sidearm from his hip. Twin screens lit on the barrel, one for stun, one for lethal. He thumbed it to lethal. "You found me first," he said. "That tells me they know I'm looking." The dog lunged. Razor fired. The bolt struck its flank and sparked, but the beast did not fall. It slammed into him and drove him into a shelf. His blade came up and sheared through one metal leg. The dog twisted free and bolted back through the door, limping on three limbs. Razor stood in the wreckage and breathed. Above him, a thin screen pulsed red. The scanner was transmitting. A pane showed a drone rising somewhere in the city, long and sharp, painted with the same mark. It climbed toward his location. He wiped sparks from his blade. He had the name now. The arrow inside the ring. But the name had seen his face, and it was already sending more than dogs. He pulled the scanner free and ran for the hatch. The hunt had started. He was no longer the only hunter.

Razor Kaine crouched on a high balcony of a packed apartment tower. Glowing trim lit the night below. He pressed the stolen scanner against the rail and breathed. The vault was behind him, but the drone had still found his path twice. The scanner was dead now. So what kept leading them to him? He raised his metal hand and stared at his own fingers. The answer sat inside his skull. He pulled the scanner's cracked screen loose and jammed it against his chest port. The screen woke. Lines scrolled past. A small arrow inside a ring glowed in the corner. His implants were broadcasting. A steady pulse, the same as the trap in the vault. He was the transmitter. Every wall he hid behind, they heard him through it. He needed the signal gone. He could not cut out his own spine. But he could burn the chip that carried the pulse. He drew his sidearm and thumbed the dial to stun. The low screen lit blue. A hard stun burst to the base of his neck might fry the broadcast node without killing him. It might also drop him off this balcony. Footsteps rang on the stairwell behind him. A red figure stepped onto the balcony, white trim bright, a sword mark on his chest. Razor had never met him, but he knew the look of a corporate ranger. This was a man the company sent. Marcus Steele raised an open hand, not a weapon. "Stop," Steele said. "That'll kill you." "Your people built the leash," Razor said. He kept the gun at his neck. "They're not what you think." Steele took one step closer. "Come in. We can pull the node clean." Razor laughed, low and flat. "You tracked me here to help me." Steele's jaw tightened. He said nothing. That silence told Razor enough. Razor pulled the trigger. The stun bolt cracked into the base of his skull. White light swallowed the balcony. His knees buckled. He caught the rail with his blade arm and hung there, shaking. Smoke curled from his neck port. The chip inside crackled and died. The scanner screen went black. No more pulse. No more arrow in the corner. The broadcast was gone. Steele lunged to grab him. Razor swung his blade up between them. The edge stopped an inch from the red helmet. "You found me because I was loud," Razor said. "I'm quiet now." He shoved off the rail and dropped over the side. He caught a lower balcony, then another, and vanished into the lit stack of the tower. Above him, Steele leaned over the rail and watched him go. Razor hit the street and kept moving. His enemies had lost their signal. But now they had a face, a name, and a ranger who had stood close enough to touch him. The hunt was even. From here, he would have to find them before they rebuilt the leash.