They called it The Line. The city of the future. No laws, except for the law of money. A godless place, drenched in neon but in desperate need of guiding light.
It was on this basis that our son, Riley, received funding for his 'missionary work' out there, teaching english and the good book. Sunday service always had a gather round for extra money to send his way, though he always managed to spend it, always needed more.
And then he went off the grid. After months without contact we sent a private investigator to uncover the truth.
He hasn't been building schools and digging wells. He's been living a life of sin. The only 'Line' the church's funds have been spent on are the lines of cocaine snorted off hookers. He'd even partaken in the bodily augmentations growing in popularity over there, defiling the human form with machinery.
We thought cutting off the cashflow would force him home in time. It didn't. He merely cut off contact.
My plane lands at Neom International. The Line is precisely as I imagined it - a hundred-mile-long gutter in the sand. Women with skin pierced by glowing circuitry try to sell me everything from narcotics to new organs, or just themselves. A peddled opens his coat to show his wares - hundreds of graftable penises of all sizes, races, and species.
"You want balls with that?" he asks. "Four? Six? No refractory period, guaranteed! I can get them for you. A good price." I push him away. "Ahh, you want female parts then?" he calls after me.
I see the homeless too, the wretches too poor to stay ahead of their withdrawals or pay for the upkeep on their cybernetic bodies. They fill the streets. For those with wealth, the city had everything. Those without it had nothing. Not even their own bodies.
I find 'her' at the House of Blue Lights. Her flesh is riddled with augmentations. She's a meat puppet now. A chip at the nape of the neck allows anyone to control her movements, posing her however they will. Men approach, hand her credits for 5 or 20 minutes. She synchs herself to their apps - with a tap of a button on their phone, she stiffens and walks robot-like with them to the back alley where the transaction is performed. One client adjusts a setting on the app, leering down as her pneumatic breasts bloat to melons three times their size.
This is how Riley is making his money now. More of a doll than a person after willingly selling away the greatest gift of all, free will.
An 'autobooth' in the street provides me with a new appearance, taking less than an hour to peel away my old one like a fleshy rag and stitch a new one in its place.
I approach Riley's booth in the House of Blue Lights. "How much for an hour?"
Close-up, he is barely recognisable. Is there even enough left here worth saving? His plumped lips curl into a suggestive smile as he sizes me up. He doesn't recognise me. "Four hundred credits."
A simple exchange of credits and app authentication, and then he's mine. His body stiffens, only his eyes and mouth still his own as I pilot him towards the front door, his feminized hips sashaying obscenely. "Huh?! Don't you want to fuck me, baby? Where are we going?!"
"The airport." I tell him, my tone dropping back into the voice of paternal authority. I tap at the sliders on my app in an attempt to force him into a less-lurid gait, though only succeed in enlarging his augmented ass until it bounces and sloshes with every step. "I'm taking you back to your mother. And you can show the congregation exactly what you've spent their money on, young man."