Dragon Liquid Cool (The Cyberpunk Detective Series)

1. Auflage 2016
ISBN: 978-0-9909315-7-7
Verlag: Well-Tailored Books
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)

E-Book, Englisch, 492 Seiten

Reihe: Liquid Cool

Liquid Cool is the action-packed and funny, debut cyberpunk detective series! 
It's cyberpunk reimagined-science fiction meets the detective thriller in an ever-rainy world of colossal skyscrapers. Hovercars fly above in the dark, bustling skies and gray people walk below on the grimy, flashy streets of this 'neon jungle.' Metropolis isn't a bad place, but it isn't a good one either. Uber-governments and megacorporations fight for control of the super-city, but so does crime.
We were introduced to Liquid Cool, in the prequel short, These Mean Streets, Darkly. We met an average woman, Carol-hardworking and decent in every way-only to have her daughter kidnapped by the psycho cyborg Red Rabbit. Can Police Central find the girl in time-alive? And is it really another senseless act of random violence in the fifty-million-plus supercity? 
This story continues...and there are so many more. For the first time, we meet Cruz, our private eye (and unlikely hero), in a supercity with a million victims and perpetrators. Welcome to the high-tech, low-life world of Liquid Cool. 
But watch out for tech-tricksters, analog hustlers, and digital gangsters-psychos, samurais, and cyborgs aplenty-they may want your money, or your life, more than you do.
Get Your Copy of LIQUID COOL Right Now and Prepare to be Thrilled with Mystery, Action, and Laughs! And don't get shot by a laser-pistol-packing cyber-punk on your way to the digital store.
FIVE STAR REVIEWS
'Lots of shooting, lots of crazy maniacs, lots of action and fun!'
'I loved this book. It takes place in the future, and what a weird future.'
'A funny, intelligent (and sometimes crazy) main character...playing detective'
'Cool and Smooth.'
'I had a hard time putting this book down to do things like sleeping and eating.'
Enjoy!

Autoren/Hrsg.

Dragon, Austin

Leseproben

METROPOLIS. Everything that was seen or heard, every smell, and almost every feeling belonged to it. Skyscraper monoliths with their side lights rose into the near-perpetual overcast sky one way, blink-blink, and the lukewarm downpour fell onto the neon urban jungle the other, drip-drip. From the ground, looking up, on those days that were as clear as it could ever get, buildings seemed to have their own halos, courtesy of the rooftop lights. On "normal" rainy days, that same illumination gave the sky a faint glow. Also from the vantage of the streets, the city's lighted buildings pulsated in all the many psychologically-tested and focus-group-researched colors to mitigate the street's base griminess, despite the ever-rain. The flashing neon signs screamed every second of every day; their soft-sell, quasi-hypnotic consumerist cons of Big Bad Business and government public service "aggravations" (PSAs) of Big Bad Government. But people were numb to it all, no matter how outrageous or provocative. The crowds on the streets moving about were like a collective life form. Everyone clad in their gray-toned or black slickers, and for those carrying them, umbrellas with glowing colored handles. Most had their ears covered with headphones, their heads covered with hoods, and everyone had their eyes covered with glowing colored glasses. The masses were in the world, but mentally someplace else—away from it, never a part of it, unless there was a reason, and there rarely was a reason. Tech-tricksters, analog hustlers, and digital gangsters, at least, had purpose. The masses had only one concern—to exist, get to the end of the day unscathed, and then do it all over again the next day. Maybe smile a real smile a time or two in life. Escape was only possible if you could buy or trick your way Up-Top or, of course, when the Grim Reaper came a-knocking. 'Til then, for most, there was plugging the ears into the music, and the eyes (and brain) into the virtual television. For too many others, it was also about jacking the body into the drugs or the mind into the cyber-games. Everything in an attempt to stave off the dark emotions and conventional madness that accompanied the daily grind of life in the 50 million-plus, supercity of Metropolis, and the many, many other metropolises exactly like it, though smaller, on Earth. "Yo, yo, yo. Easy Chair Charlie! What's the street talk, E.C.?" a voice called out. If it were not for their glowing colored glasses, the three street kids would have been invisible through the drizzle of the night. Easy Chair Charlie stopped his musically-influenced stroll through the streets, pulling his headphones down around his neck. He wore his favorite embroidered, black slicker that flowed behind his tall, lanky frame. He also had the attached clear hood pulled over his bleached-white spiky hair and wore glowing, dark blue-black shades, but looked out from the top as if they were bifocals. A neon sign flashed, and he could see the kids clearly—flapper hats and chia-pet bubble-coats—squatting on the corner. "What you playin'?" he asked. The boys looked like gorillas with the heads of old World War I fighter pilots. The water-resistant, faux-fur of their coats kept them toasty warm in the rain. "Just a game of street jacks to pass the time, Easy," answered the same boy. "Easy, what's the street talk? You always know the low-down. If we get something, we'll give you a cut like always." Easy Chair Charlie was a hustler of some distinction. His racket was the numbers, and he had the inside scoop on every professional and amateur, major league and minor league sports game, hovercar race, horse race, dog race, boxing match, or martial arts match there was and every illegal and back-alley one, too. But he was branching out from his old racket, though he still had the touch and threw a tip here and there to the street kids he liked. "No action now. But I may have something for you later," he said. "Righteous, Easy. You always come through for us." "You always come through for me. The street looks out for self." "You know it, Easy." "Catch me later." "You got it, Easy," they said in unison. Easy Chair Charlie returned his headphones to his ears and strutted away to his tunes. He gave them the thumbs-up as he disappeared into the rain. Downtown loved to tout the ethnic diversity that was the melting pot of Metropolis. It was true; everyone felt equally miserable, and that they were being melted into a pot—a big wet one. With so many millions in the supercity, there were more ethnicities, nationalities, and languages spoken here than any other place in the world. In the old days, groups fervently protected their neighborhoods, but legacy housing changed all that, some say, ending the traditional ethnic communities forever. There were still the ethnic enclaves of old, but often, they were not run by the nationalities that originally created them, back when Metropolis was just a city, let alone a mega-city or the supercity center it was today. The suave, hipster Old Harlem, with more historical landmarks than any other part of the city, was run not by Blacks anymore, but Italians. Most of its buildings were not as tall or as massive, but many argued it had the best clubs and restaurants in the city. It was also the center of the cigar aficionado world, one place in particular. Joe Blows was where Easy Chair Charlie was going—the world famous Joe Blows Smoking Emporium on Sweet Street. He was out of smokes and needed to replenish his stash. It was a lucrative storefront, but also an official historic landmark of the city. In the old days, movie celebrities and megacorporate playboys made up its famous clientele, but though it no longer featured in the papers and trades like back then, everyone knew it as the establishment for all cancer-stick connoisseurs, and people came far and wide for a stash. There wasn't an exotic, classic, or premium cigarette or cigar in the world that they didn't carry. But no narcotics. If you wanted that, any corner dope daddy or drugstore cowboy on speed-dial could get you that. Joe Blows was for those who loved smoke—the taste and feel through the lungs, nose, and mouth. For the true connoisseur, that was the high. It had its main store, but the real action was the adjoining smoking rooms, where old-time smokers sat around chatting it up for hours and doing deals as they smoked and joked over drinks, dinner, poker, or a game of pool with beautiful waitresses around. Joe's was strictly a straight joint—male chauvinists and babes only, though nowadays, a quarter of its clientele were female smokers. "This is a public service announcement to remind you that the Metropolis Surgeon General says you can double your life expectancy by ceasing the use of all tobacco products," said one of the baby-faced agents in a suit, but without a lick of style. The government's "cigarette police" would stop by every month or two to pass out anti-smoking flyers, but were met with howling laughter and men stuffing the flyers—in front of the agents—into their butt cracks or in the front of their jock straps. However, today was one of those bad days, and Easy Chair Charlie entered the smoking room as the two meek college kid agents—paid government volunteers—were practically running out as smoking room customers threatened them with obscene gestures, jeers, and curses. The entire establishment was yelling at them to leave. Easy Chair Charlie chuckled, carrying his two just-purchased boxes—his stash of exotic cigars for the month—from the main store to the sitting rooms. "Easy Chair Charlie!" a booming voice called out. Fat Nat, a large pot-bellied man, waved to him as he stood up from a card table of other men. Easy waved back with a smile and then gave him a salute. He walked to the table and set both boxes in the center, on top of the men's cards. The men grinned at the words on the boxes. "Havanas, Easy?" a seated man asked. "How the hell can you afford a box of those? One of those is worth a king's ransom, and you got two boxes." "This is Easy Chair Charlie. He knows how to get things, so he can sit back easy-like in his chair," Fat Nat said. They listened keenly to the sounds. Easy carefully cut the outer plastic wrapping from one cigar box with his switchblade and asked, "May I perchance offer my good comrades a genuine Havana?" The men stood from their chairs as Easy lifted the lid and then slit the inner plastic covering to allow the aroma of the cigars to rise from the box. Each man pulled a glove from a pants pocket and put it on their right hand. One by one, the four men grabbed a cigar and inhaled deeply as they were passed under their nostrils. "This, Easy...is what heaven smells like," Fat Nat said. Easy took one himself. One of the men pulled another chair from a nearby table for him. "Easy, set yourself down in an easy chair." Easy smiled as he and the five men sat. Fat Nat pulled a box of old slow-matches from his chest pocket and struck one. He lit Easy's first and then each friend's cigar with its steady, slow-burning, tiny flame. He left his for last. "The first puff of the cigar." Easy leaned back in his chair to savor it. "Easy is like no other." Fat Nat lifted his Japanese whiskey glass. "Here's to Easy and easy living in this wet, rainy, modern, miserable world." The men drank. Easy Chair Charlie stifled a slight burp. "Gentlemen, I may have something for you." The street knew Easy for his...