Big Apple, 3PM

[Jim Raynor]

As Ditto placed his hand on the handle, the door swung out, smacking him squarely in the chin. He stumbled backwards more from surprise than pain, putting a hand out to catch himself on the wall. A coppery taste rolled onto his tongue; he'd bitten his lip. Instantly souring, Ditto looked up as the door opened.

A well built man stared back at him with one organic eye and a red lens. His right arm had been replaced by a robotic prosthetic, though only decipherable from the light grey sheen and segment joints; it otherwise looked natural. His black hair was messy and uncombed, and his leather vest and tall combat boots made him look like a biker. He looked like someone Giovanni might have employed to carry out petty crimes, though not many criminals spent money on upgrading themselves.

His one natural eye was the only one that gave away any emotion, but it was plainly obvious to Ditto what that emotion was. "Blocking my door, are you?"

Ditto clenched his jaw. "That's some nerve, talking to your superiors without respect like that. I don't know what slum your wretched mother spawned you in, but obviously manners weren't a core component in the drug runner curriculum."

"Sounds like I upset you a little. What are you, his lawyer?"

A common thug, it seemed. Not much wit. Though his cybernetic implants warranted a step back from stereotyping him. Common criminals couldn't afford the metal enhancements he had made to himself, and even if they could, they would more often than not blow it on booze or drugs. He could be an independent bounty hunter, or more likely he was being financed by a wealthy individual to get a job done. It wouldn't be the first time Ditto had run into an anomaly like this.

"No, your parole officer sent me. He wanted me to make sure you hadn't stolen any little old lady's purse."

The cyborg grinned at that. "You're funny. Too funny to be a lawyer. But you're not dressed like a bounty hunter. And you think you're better than me. Wait ... you're here to talk to this guy, aren't you?"

Sharper than he looked. What else could Ditto pry out of this idiot? "Smart. I suppose your boss doesn't want any competition. Not good for profits."

"He might not, but I love it," the metal man replied. "It gives me a challenge. It makes hunts that little more exciting."

Ditto smirked. So he was hired by someone, not just a bounty hunter looking for favour with Coruscant's government. It made sense. When Enigma told Ditto the whole story, he knew there would be other unsavoury types out there salivating for the prize.

"Well then, best of luck to you, competitor," Ditto said, outstretching an open hand.

"Best of luck?" The cyborg snorted, and a small barrel extended out of his prosthetic forearm. He pointed it at Ditto's head. "I don't need luck when there's no one else to take the bounty from me."

Ditto scowled. Didn't see that one coming. "I thought you liked a challenge."

Cyborg shrugged. "There'll be others. Besides, I'm not in the mood for a challenge today."

Lights hitherto unnoticed flashed blood red, and a buzzing siren suffocated the hallway. Ditto thrust his hands to his ears, but it only dulled the searing cacophony. Cyborg turned away, doing his utmost to save his precious hearing. What did he care? He could just buy some metal ears.

The alarms faded and a column of blue light filled the space between Ditto and Cyborg. Sector's face materialised. "There is to be no fighting here. You will leave now or I shall escort you."

Cyborg waved dismissively at the AI projection. "Whatever. I was just going anyway." As the thug reached the reinforced doors, he shouted back, "see you round, lawyer." Halting guffawing echoed down the hallway until the doors slammed shut.

"Idiots. Idiots everywhere." Ditto brushed the front of his blazer with his fingers, trying to regain his composure, and walked into the fifth door on the right, this time hopefully without delays.

He stepped into a dusty, dark chamber. A transparent divider ran through the middle of the room. The lights on Ditto's side worked fine, although the bulbs did little to chase away the dark. On the other side of the partition, the lights flickered, staying strong for a moment and then struggling to stay that way. During those flickers, Ditto inspected the cell. The walls were grimy and stained ... blood, Ditto guessed, mired the condition of the room. A dinted bucket sat in the corner, another mystery liquid surrounding it in a pool. The other wall had a sheet of wood and a newspaper against it, ostensibly a bed. As Ditto's eyes crawled across the dank cell again, the light flickered and revealed the prisoner.

He sat atop his knees, head down. His hands and feet were behind him, perhaps bound, but Ditto couldn't see from his angle. An orange jumpsuit, still rather unblemished, covered his muscular body. His shaggy brown hair hid his face.

Ditto walked up to the partition and spoke through a small grate. "Hello."

The man didn't react. He shuffled on the spot, and Ditto heard chains clinking.

"I said hello," Ditto repeated, stressing his words. "I've come to talk to you."

"Yeah?" the voice came, although the prisoner didn't look up. "You've come to call me a piece of trash, a traitor, an enemy to Palpatine as well? Go ahead. I've got nothing but time."

"I don't intend to call you anything unless you provoke me," Ditto said, arms behind his back. "I'm here simply to talk about the circumstances of your arrest."

"Like where my buddy is? Where the missing tech is?" The prisoner's voice grew more frantic with each sentence. His head raised up with the speed of a viper, revealing a black eye and fat lip. "You can fuck off! I'm not telling you anything!"

Ditto exhaled sharply through his nostrils. This wasn't going to be easy. Although he had already picked up some key points; this man likely knew the answer to both questions he just posed. In the condition he was in, he was at his wit's end. If he didn't know anything, he would have denied knowing anything. Instead, he refused to say what he knew. So this wasn't a wild goose chase, at least.

"My only interest is why you were at the F-Zero track," Ditto lied. "It seems like a strange place for a fugitive to go. Packed stadium, a televised event ... any number of people could have spotted you, and they did. Why would you do it? Why not stay incognito? What was at the track that was so important that you risked your life for it?"

The prisoner eyed Ditto for a moment, but then turned away. "Why would you care? You just want the bounty."

True, but I'm not going to say it to your face. "You must understand. If you did this, then another of your squadron may do something similar. If I know your reasoning, I might be able to protect them."

The prisoner furrowed his brow, a layer of dirt cracking on his forehead. "Protect them? I was the last one. They're all arrested now. Like me."

This was going nowhere. This soldier obviously didn't relent to the empathetic angle. Yet he was guarded, aggressively refuting any direct attacks. Ditto couldn't just insult him or threaten him, and he half expected Sector would appear out of the ether to tell him off anyway.

Ditto thought back to what he already knew. "So he's in the Dataverse. I know that much. But apparently it's easy to hide there, since the Empire can't find him. And you must know where he is."

The prisoner bared his teeth. "You won't find him."

The wheels started turning. "Yet you didn't go to him, did you? You were in hiding separately from him. If you were in the same spot as this AWOL soldier, surely that would be the safest place from the Empire." Ditto peered through the clear divider. "So that leads to a very pointed question; why weren't you in the Dataverse with your friend?"

The prisoner's face froze, eyes wide, mouth ajar. "Because ... because if we were found, we would have all been captured. We split up."

Ditto had him. He was spilling information, doing his best to cover up the secret Ditto had stumbled upon. "While that may be true, I doubt it. The Empire is having a bear of a time finding your compatriot, and the Empire is not short on resources. Oh no. And since your friend was part of an R&D experiment, he would've known a few things about what the Empire can do. So if he knew where in the Dataverse the Empire would search ... why, he'd just have to hide somewhere else then, wouldn't he? And if he really was such a good man that his entire squadron would go to jail in order to protect him, then why wouldn't he want his friends with him in the safest place in the Omniverse?"

Silence.

"You don't know where he is, do you?"

The prisoner hung his head. "No."

"Then why?" Ditto said, lifting his arms up. "Why are you lying? Why are you suffering for no reason?"

"Because if the Empire is too busy with me, with our squadron, trying to pry information out of us that we just don't have, then that's more time that -" Ditto sensed the name almost came out, but the soldier caught himself in time "- my friend has to avoid them."

Stupid. Humans and their blasted loyalty. The most stubborn and pointless of moral codes. "Fine. So you're a decoy. But ultimately you didn't plan on getting captured. So now we're back at square one. Why would you go to the F-Zero track?"

"To enjoy the race." The soldier spat on the ground.

Ditto sighed. "Sarcasm just makes this painful ordeal stretch out all the more. Looks like I'll just have to do some more old fashioned thinking out loud." Ditto paced his side of the room, taking his eyes away from the cell and the headache inducing light flicker. "You know your friend is hiding from the Empire but not where, you know the Empire has a bounty out on your head, and yet you wander into a sporting event filled with people, cameras and stormtroopers. Fugitives don't make mistakes; the only reason you were captured was because something happened that you weren't expecting."

"Piss off."

"Oh I'm sorry, I don't mean to be coy. I know the event that surprised you. The explosion."

The soldier looked up at him, eyes questioning. "How do you know I didn't do it?"

"Because I happened to employ the numbskull who was responsible for the explosion," Ditto said. "Well, I hired him after the fact, but he did it. He bungled what sounded like an easy job, and the aftermath resulted in the big bang that drew attention to the F-Zero track and unfortunately, you."

The soldier sighed. "So what?"

"The reason that drew you to that bustling track must've been important. Important enough to risk capture or death. And in your situation, I can only think of one reason that fits the bill."

"You're real clever, aren't you."

"Who knows about the soldier?" Ditto said. "You were going to meet with someone. An informant. Who was it?"

"You'll never guess," the soldier said, sneering. "There were thousands of people there."

"Yes, but thousands of people wouldn't have known anything. There must have been someone specific who could help you. Someone who could have the connections to-"

The soldier looked up. "What?"

Ditto rubbed a hand down his face. "A girl. Black clothes, a hoodie. Knew exactly where to meet so that no one would see you, even in the most crowded place? Appeared and disappeared like a shadow?"

The soldier arched an eyebrow. "How ... how could you know?"

"Because it was staring me in the face the whole time," Ditto seethed through gritted teeth. Dammit! Enigma knew all along and she sent him on a witch hunt! What was she planning? Oh no. The warehouse!

"Thanks for the chat. It was perfectly lovely," Ditto drawled, running out of the room.