The Cyberkink Sideshow Read Online Free PDF Page A

Sylvia’s breast pocket and took her pen. “Victor R. Maynard,” he muttered, as he scrawled on the card before handing back both it and the pen. “That may be worth something on eBay in a hundred years’ time. If eBay still exists in a hundred years.”
    Sylvia turned the card over. It showed a holographic image of Victor R. Maynard in a rather less than dignified state of attire and posture. She quickly turned it back and pocketed it. Time to get out of here and clear her head, at last.
     

 
    Chapter 2
     
    Sylvia faced Superintendent Pikesley in his office the following morning. He tidied his laptop and whatever he was working on to one side before addressing her. “So, Price, what did you find?”
    “Sir, I don’t think there is anything illicit going on there. There wasn’t anything to suggest it.”
    Pikesley stiffened in his chair. “We’ve had numerous complaints! If you’ve not found evidence, you need to look harder.”
    A large Bible with gilt-edged pages in pristine condition lay in an obtrusive position on the outside corner on Pikesley’s desk. On the other corner, facing outward, stood a picture of Pikesley with his wife and two boys. Behind the desk hung a tacky gold crucifix with a miserable-looking Caucasian chap in a baggy loincloth nailed to it. He was painted in lurid, fleshy colors, making Sylvia think of one of the performers in the Cyberkink Sideshow.
    Pikesley was overtly a Christian, and he overtly was married and had children. He went to great effort that other people would be able to see immediately that was the stereotype to which he conformed. That was what he wanted to portray as his identity. Not that Sylvia expected he went to a church or read the book on the desk, or that driving slowly around Highfields every Friday night looking for hookers as he pretended he didn’t counted as an act of worship.
    “With all due respect, sir, if they’re just complaints with no evidence then I’d be skeptical. The thing seems to be the source of a whole load of controversy, and people might just be trying to stir stuff up because the sideshow doesn’t sit well with their personal moral codes.”
    Pikesley yanked open a drawer by his knee and threw something in a plastic evidence bag down on the imitation obsidian surface of his desk. “Do you know what this is, Price?”
    Sylvia studied the black square within the bag, about the same size as two ordinary mug coasters stacked. “It’s a memory bank, sir.”
    “Correct, Price. And do you know what’s stored on it?”
    “No, sir, it would be impossible to tell without interfacing to it.”
    “Correct again. And because whatever’s stored on it might be dangerous, that’s why we use dogs and secure computers to check these things and protect ourselves. Would you like to know what is on the memory bank?” Pikesley raised his eyebrows.
    Sylvia always had an irritated urge to reply “no” whenever Pikesley asked one of his rhetorical questions in this patronizing, sarcastic way. She said nothing, waiting for him to provide the answer.
    “It’s an imprint from a twisted mind. Someone has sat, interfaced to this thing, and recorded lustful feelings on to it, day after day, until it becomes an autonomously functioning unit capable of interacting with anyone else who interfaces with it. It’s a fragment of some sick pervert’s soul.” Pikesley’s eyes narrowed melodramatically. “It’s the closest real-life approximation there is to a demon , and it’s banned internationally. A dog handler found it on a pedestrian in the city last night. After questioning, he revealed he bought it at the sideshow. Now what do you think of that?”
    “I don’t know, sir,” said Sylvia.
    “What d’you mean, you don’t know? You don’t know what you think ? What do you think the public think?”
    Sylvia twisted her fingers together behind her back. “I don’t know, sir. I think maybe the public think that’s making a mountain out of a