<span class="SFPTagline"> From SCIFIPEDIA </span>

Spoiler Warning: Plot details and/or information about the ending follow. If you wish to enjoy the work first, stop reading here and return at another time.

Sew Sew stands on the street below their window, staring up into the rain. He turns around and walks away.

That night, Charlie has a long night of the soul. He imagines that he's talking to Blues Paddock. Charlie is troubled by the burden of trying to save Beta, and also by the knowledge that this isn't home anymore. Too much has happened to him. Too much has changed. He tries to make sense of it by telling Blues a story of his days as a detective, four years ago.

He spins a yarn about a woman named Tara Threnody, who hired him to find her husband. Then her husband wound up dead. As he investigated, Charlie discovered the husband was ready to divorce his loving wife. And he was on the edge of inventing something. Something big. Something big enough that other companies are willing to rough him up to get it. He runs into a Vexcor operative, who wants the technology Threnody's husband was working on. That's what Tara wants too. But first she has to frame him for the murder of her husband. The investigation brings Charlie into contact with an honest cop named Sew Sew Tukarrs. Charlie eventually proves his innocence, and finds the technology Threnody was working on. The wife, Tara, doesn't pay for the crime: she takes the tech, claims it as her own and gets a big promotion.

Blues thinks that's a horrible story, but Charlie's point is that he could have told a hundred stories like it. The point is that at the time, the injustice of what she did, nothing about it bothered him. So long as he was paid. "And now?" Blues asks. Now it does. Now everything about this world bothers him. Which is why he can't sleep. The sun is rising, and Jasmine tells him to go back to bed. He looks to where he was just talking to Blues. Charlie still has a lot to consider.

Brion Boxer's body is discovered, and a grief-stricken Essa knows 01 is responsible. But there's no evidence of that. When the will is read, everyone discovers that Brion left controlling interest in Vexcor to his son. Essa is enraged, and wants 01 jailed - even if it's on her say so.

01 finds out from a bot that he's inherited Vexcor. He laughs, incredulous at the change in events. "Please hold," he says. "Your death is important to us." A hunter-seeker ectoskin shoots him, and 01 collapses.

He wakes up in a cell. Essa Rompkin brings him all the artifacts of his mother. She calmly sets them down and pours lighter fluid over them. They burn. 01 is crestfallen.

With Sew Sew's help, Charlie talks to 01. Sew Sew sets up a transmitter that projects Charlie into 01's cell. 01 is not particularly surprised to see Charlie there. He wants to know how he got here. "Still? Or Sparkling?" They all know that 01 will inherit Vexcor if he doesn't go down for his father's murder (which he denies committing, of course.) 01 insists that with him in charge, he'll be consistent and keep the link from going up. They conclude that they have to get something on Essa. Sew Sew explains about the Vexcor execs who disappeared, and the one exec who came to him insisting that the company was about to kill him. 01 knows what happened: they rounded up everyone who went through the link to try and keep Brion Boxer alive.

"Travelling changes you. You know that tingle you feel? That's you, dying little by little. It changes you on a molecular level. My father needed that. He'd do anything to get it."

What they need is proof. For that, they need the technician. But he's on the run. For Charlie and Sew Sew, it's a race against time. They have to find the technician before Essa does.

But that's not going to be easy. The executive has switched chips with his boyfriend, and gone on the run. Charlie spends time tracking the wrong guy. When he finally locates the technician, Larkin, he's only one step ahead of the Vexcor death squad. Larkin dies too.

Meanwhile, in Cape Town, Blues Paddock discovers Reena with Lubinsky, and there's a tense standoff. But Reena has knowledge of a couple of charred bodies in the morgue. She asks if anything was found with them. Blues starts. There was something…some kind of device.

Side by side in the morgue, Charlie looks at the bodies of Larkin and his lover, and mourns a world that grinds people down like this. But an errant scanner suggests that the body of Larkin isn't all that meets the eye. In his wrist, they find a third chip implanted: it's a chip of the biometric data of one of the dead Vexcor execs, along with a confession from Larkin that implicates Essa.

Essa is jailed. Boxer is freed. The board fires Essa and installs 01 in his place. 01, as promised, stops the link from going up. Charlie returns home and has a heart to heart discussion with Jasmine. He tells her everything. "So," she says. "You're a hero." But that doesn't help either of them. She needs someone who will be there; who won't leave, and they both know that Charlie isn't that guy. They say a tearful goodbye. "Where will you go?" asks Jasmine. "Home." Charlie answers. Jasmine calls Sew Sew and tells him to come home.

In Cape Town, Blues Paddock opens her door. Charlie's there. She invites him inside.

On the couch at Lubinsky's, Reena activates the device: it shows her images of everything she's done…and something else. She understands, now, finally what she's supposed to do. "I have become shiva," she says, "destroyer of worlds."

The link is seemingly down, and Charlie is with Blues. But all is not well. He's troubled by dreams that don't make sense…jumbles of memories and snatches of voices.

The journey isn't over. And the stage is set for the final confrontation between Charlie and 01 Boxer - in a mysterious place called LiSew Sew stands on the street below their window, staring up into the rain. He turns around and walks away.

That night, Charlie has a long night of the soul. He imagines that he's talking to Blues Paddock. Charlie is troubled by the burden of trying to save Beta, and also by the knowledge that this isn't home anymore. Too much has happened to him. Too much has changed. He tries to make sense of it by telling Blues a story of his days as a detective, four years ago.

He spins a yarn about a woman named Tara Threnody, who hired him to find her husband. Then her husband wound up dead. As he investigated, Charlie discovered the husband was ready to divorce his loving wife. And he was on the edge of inventing something. Something big. Something big enough that other companies are willing to rough him up to get it. He runs into a Vexcor operative, who wants the technology Threnody's husband was working on. That's what Tara wants too. But first she has to frame him for the murder of her husband. The investigation brings Charlie into contact with an honest cop named Sew Sew Tukarrs. Charlie eventually proves his innocence, and finds the technology Threnody was working on. The wife, Tara, doesn't pay for the crime: she takes the tech, claims it as her own and gets a big promotion.

Blues thinks that's a horrible story, but Charlie's point is that he could have told a hundred stories like it. The point is that at the time, the injustice of what she did, nothing about it bothered him. So long as he was paid. "And now?" Blues asks. Now it does. Now everything about this world bothers him. Which is why he can't sleep. The sun is rising, and Jasmine tells him to go back to bed. He looks to where he was just talking to Blues. Charlie still has a lot to consider.

Brion Boxer's body is discovered, and a grief-stricken Essa knows 01 is responsible. But there's no evidence of that. When the will is read, everyone discovers that Brion left controlling interest in Vexcor to his son. Essa is enraged, and wants 01 jailed - even if it's on her say so.

01 finds out from a bot that he's inherited Vexcor. He laughs, incredulous at the change in events. "Please hold," he says. "Your death is important to us." A hunter-seeker ectoskin shoots him, and 01 collapses.

He wakes up in a cell. Essa Rompkin brings him all the artifacts of his mother. She calmly sets them down and pours lighter fluid over them. They burn. 01 is crestfallen.

With Sew Sew's help, Charlie talks to 01. Sew Sew sets up a transmitter that projects Charlie into 01's cell. 01 is not particularly surprised to see Charlie there. He wants to know how he got here. "Still? Or Sparkling?" They all know that 01 will inherit Vexcor if he doesn't go down for his father's murder (which he denies committing, of course.) 01 insists that with him in charge, he'll be consistent and keep the link from going up. They conclude that they have to get something on Essa. Sew Sew explains about the Vexcor execs who disappeared, and the one exec who came to him insisting that the company was about to kill him. 01 knows what happened: they rounded up everyone who went through the link to try and keep Brion Boxer alive.

"Travelling changes you. You know that tingle you feel? That's you, dying little by little. It changes you on a molecular level. My father needed that. He'd do anything to get it."

What they need is proof. For that, they need the technician. But he's on the run. For Charlie and Sew Sew, it's a race against time. They have to find the technician before Essa does.

But that's not going to be easy. The executive has switched chips with his boyfriend, and gone on the run. Charlie spends time tracking the wrong guy. When he finally locates the technician, Larkin, he's only one step ahead of the Vexcor death squad. Larkin dies too.

Meanwhile, in Cape Town, Blues Paddock discovers Reena with Lubinsky, and there's a tense standoff. But Reena has knowledge of a couple of charred bodies in the morgue. She asks if anything was found with them. Blues starts. There was something…some kind of device.

Side by side in the morgue, Charlie looks at the bodies of Larkin and his lover, and mourns a world that grinds people down like this. But an errant scanner suggests that the body of Larkin isn't all that meets the eye. In his wrist, they find a third chip implanted: it's a chip of the biometric data of one of the dead Vexcor execs, along with a confession from Larkin that implicates Essa.

Essa is jailed. Boxer is freed. The board fires Essa and installs 01 in his place. 01, as promised, stops the link from going up. Charlie returns home and has a heart to heart discussion with Jasmine. He tells her everything. "So," she says. "You're a hero." But that doesn't help either of them. She needs someone who will be there; who won't leave, and they both know that Charlie isn't that guy. They say a tearful goodbye. "Where will you go?" asks Jasmine. "Home." Charlie answers. Jasmine calls Sew Sew and tells him to come home.

In Cape Town, Blues Paddock opens her door. Charlie's there. She invites him inside.

On the couch at Lubinsky's, Reena activates the device: it shows her images of everything she's done…and something else. She understands, now, finally what she's supposed to do. "I have become shiva," she says, "destroyer of worlds."

The link is seemingly down, and Charlie is with Blues. But all is not well. He's troubled by dreams that don't make sense…jumbles of memories and snatches of voices.

The journey isn't over. And the stage is set for the final confrontation between Charlie and 01 Boxer - in a mysterious place called Linkspace.