“So this is the place, I think,” Daniel said, looking up at the apartment block, not knowing what to think. It wasn’t a building in any style he’d ever encountered, although that was because he hadn’t been paying full attention as they’d walked through the city. In fact, there had been a few buildings along the way, but there had been too much to see and smell and hear for him to have really absorbed the different architectural styles that made up the city proper. Not that anyone could blame him for this of course. 

Brutalism, after all, is one of those styles of building designed to be both eye-catching, an eye-sore and easily shuffled into the background. Brutalist architecture is, at its blandest, the untextured geometry of the three-dimensional cityscape. In a streetview of highly detailed buildings with storefronts, flags hanging out of the windows and balconies where the laundry hangs out to dry, the brutalist building sticks out like a block of wood with not much more to show for its inclusion than a monolithic present-ness. “I am here,” Brutalism says. 

“Okay, yes, and?” an onlooker might ask.

“That was it,” Brutalism responds, and goes back to sleep, dotting the landscape as schools and government facilities. Brutalism is oppressive in the blandest way a building can be, eschewing buttresses and gargoyles for flat concrete. And now that Daniel was standing in front of the apartment building, which seemed to have a bit cut diagonally off the top for no reason and about two thirds fewer windows than he’d expect for a building this size, he wasn’t sure he especially liked it. 

“I like it,” Eliza said. “It’s ugly.” Daniel craned his neck to look at her, and then back at the building. He craned his neck a lot these days, another one of the annoyances of his new situation, and another way for people to not take him seriously. He had to sidestep people on the sidewalk a lot. Eliza mistook his pained expression for misunderstanding. “It’s deliberate, see? It’s supposed to make you feel uneasy, but like, without being manipulative. It’s so honest about what it is. This isn’t… how do I put this…” She put her hands on her hips. “Some buildings are like a veiled threat. Some buildings tell you that, if you misbehave, there will be a hand in the night or even an official looking man at your door the next day, and you’ll lose something important. But the façade is regal. This isn’t… that. This is a man with a sledgehammer at the front door telling you he’s going to hit you with his sledgehammer unless you do as you’re told.”

“I suppose,” Daniel said, “that’s probably why I hate it.”

“You prefer the more subtle threats?” Eliza asked, one eyebrow and the corners of her mouth slowly going up. 

“I prefer no threats at all,” he grumbled, and he approached the building with a degree of apprehension. Maybe the building wouldn’t be as aggressively raw on the inside as much as the outside. Behind him, he heard Eliza chuckle softly. There was a man standing by the front door. He was holding a briefcase, an item Daniel had never seen before, and nonetheless immediately knew the meaning of. A man with a briefcase conjures up a feeling that transcends dimensions. ‘I have,’ a briefcase seems to say, ‘papers.’

“Hello,” the man said. “You must be Miss Sa--” he began. 

“Yes,” Daniel cut him off, not in the mood to hear the name several nurses in the hospital had repeatedly used to refer to him even after his repeated asking them not to. “That’s me. Who are you?”

“My name is Robert Lawton. I’m here on behalf of the Edison Corporation. I was told you would both be coming here. Could we speak inside, please?” Robert’s voice was hoarse and low, and yet somehow grating. If the feeling of someone grinding their teeth was a voice, Robert had it. The squirrely little man, Daniel decided, was not a threat. Even if he meant harm -- and Daniel was fairly convinced this man couldn’t mean harm if he tried -- Daniel was sure that, even in this body, he could overpower him and probably snap him like a twig. He was about to say something when Eliza stepped up next to him. 

“You’re sure this is the place?”

“Not sure of anything,” Daniel said, and the man winced.

“Oh dear,” Richard mumbled. “This is… oh dear.”

“Yes, Mister Lawton, we can talk inside,” Daniel said as he rummaged around in the satchel -- the hand-bag, as it had been referred to by the nurse who handed it to him -- and fished out the keys. 

“This is an awfully big residence for a g--” Eliza started and then caught Daniel’s gaze. She’d clearly almost referred to Sally in the third person, and Daniel didn’t want to give away their identity, or lack thereof, just yet. “For someone as young as you,” she finished with a curt smile. 

“Don’t be silly,” Daniel said as he opened the door and held it for her and Robert.  “I only have some rooms within the building. There are many tenants.” Sally had explained to him something about the prevalence of apartment life when she’d given him the address. Robert looked at them both like they were speaking another language, and Daniel shot him an apologetic smile as he led the way to the stairs. He’d been told about the elevator and he didn’t care that it was eight floors up, he was not getting in a small metal box to be pulled up by rope. “I apologize, Mister Lawton. Private joke.” 

“Ah,” Robert said. “Haha.”

The climb was fairly quiet until, with the three of them all out of breath -- Daniel and Eliza both pretending not to be -- Daniel opened the apartment door. He didn’t know what he’d expected. Sally was young, so he hadn’t expected it to be tidy. The building was ugly and flat, so he hadn’t expected it to be ornate. But what was there was… nice. 

Sally’s apartment was small. It had a central living room with a large and a small couch, and a small coffee table. Against the back of the biggest couch was a small dinner table with three chairs. There was a station in the corner that Daniel would’ve assumed was a desk of some kind, but it was full of electric things which he recognized by the cables. 

Something about the way the room was decorated screamed to Daniel that Sally wasn’t all that well off, but that she’d done her best to make it work for her regardless, with no two pieces of furniture matching and everything having a second-hand feel to it. He could relate. He’d grown up in places not unlike it. Some better-off tenant had, at some point, installed wooden flooring, which went a long way in making the place a lot cozier. There were a lot of plants all over, where there was room. A few bookcases here and there. One of the walls had been left bare, with no decoration other than a sheet of white cloth nailed to a wooden board, opposite an installation of electric things. If he saw Sally again, he’d have to ask about that, too. 

“Come in,” Daniel said, realizing he was staring. Robert also looked around, and did his best not to touch anything. Daniel couldn’t tell if that was out of courtesy or because he didn’t want to get common citizenry on his fancy suit. 

“This is cute,” Eliza said, and Daniel was about to shoot her another look when it became clear to him that her expression had been genuine. 

“It’s clear to me,” Robert said, “that the situation for the two of you is… less than ideal.” Daniel had no idea what the man was referring to -- or rather, which part he was referring to -- and decided to let him do the talking. Robert put the briefcase on the table and opened it, retrieving a stack of papers.

“Unofficially, the Edison Corporation deeply regrets what happened to both of you,” he said rapidly, “and wishes to assure you that accidents like this are exceedingly rare when our self-driving vehicles are involved. The Event…” Robert cleared his throat, clearly uncomfortable. “It was all incredibly regrettable. That is, between us, our stance on what happened.”

“And officially?” Eliza asked, crossing her arms and leaning on one leg. She could clearly still be imposing if she wanted to be, Daniel noted, and it was easy to mentally replace the masculine appearance with who she really was underneath.

“Officially, this never happened,” Robert said drily. “Or we would like for it to be that way.” He pulled a pen out of his pocket and put it on top of the papers that were on the table. “If you sign here, your medical costs will be taken care of, with something extra to ensure your… cooperation. In return, you do not press charges, don’t talk to the press, and any mentions of brain-trauma or head-injury are due to an unrelated accident caused by your own selves.”

Daniel and Eliza both looked at him. If the medical costs really were as high as Sally feared, this was a generous offer. The papers, stark and white, glared at him from the table. He hated this kind of thing. It felt like lying. He walked over and picked up the pen. There was a dotted line, because there is always a dotted line. He almost put pen to paper when--

“Hold on,” Eliza said. Daniel and Robert both looked at her, the latter seeming especially annoyed at the interruption. “How much extra?” she asked. 

“Well, we wished to ensure your full cooperation, so we feel a donation of fifty thousand dollars will be more than satisfactory,” Robert said, licking his lips nervously. 

“If you’re offering us that amount… going by the fact that you’re even here…” Eliza was clearly doing math in her head. Daniel could see the gears turning as she analyzed the little man and everything he’d said. “You could afford to give us twice that…” she said, and Daniel looked at Robert’s expression, who seemed to put up a mask of solemn resignation. Eliza had clearly picked up on it too. ”And you’re okay with us asking for that much more. So you can afford a lot more.” Robert’s face shifted from that of a man who thought he was about to get away with something to a deer in headlights that most definitely wasn’t. 

“No, I--”

“You can afford to give us ten times that and nobody in your company would ever feel it,” she said, staring daggers at Robert. “Hells, twenty times. Am I right?”

“We-- Well-- I-- I--” Robert stammered, and Eliza took a step towards him. Daniel wanted to interrupt what was clearly veering into intimidation, but he also couldn’t help but be impressed at the way she was playing the situation like an instrument. “Look, we can’t just give you a million--”

“You’re offering us a large amount of money,” she continued, “because an experiment -- done by you -- caused harm. That means you want this to go away fast, because this experiment is going to make you a lot more. You can’t afford to leave us as a loose end.”

Robert took a step forward, clearly trying to push back. “That doesn’t mean you can just demand more. Besides, we could always look into other aven--” 

“But,” Eliza interrupted, “you’re also worried that doing something more insidious or backhanded would get more eyes on your experiment, and you don’t want that either, because you need this to be a success. You need our cooperation. So you give us… twenty times the amount you had in your head, on that line you hadn’t filled out yet,” she pointed at a line on the paper Daniel hadn’t even noticed, “or we talk to the… uh…” she snapped her fingers a few times. 

“The press,” Daniel offered. He was sure this bluff wouldn’t work. Eliza had no idea how business here worked, or even what self-driving cars were, because he had no idea. But Robert seemed to deflate. 

“I can’t... “

“Yes,” Eliza said, “you can. You almost got two people killed and that matters, doesn’t it, Robert? That doesn’t just go away unless the two of us do.”

“That is,” he said, with a voice like someone slowly trying to deflate a novelty badger, “the upper limit of what I have been informed I am allowed to offer you.” He took the pen and wrote down a number with a lot of zeroes on the page, after which Daniel and Eliza both signed names that were alien to them. With a curt nod and a mumbled farewell that bordered heavily on the impolite, he left. 

“Damn,” Eliza said, “could’ve gotten more.”

“Wh-- what?” Daniel blurted out incredulously. “No matter how much this currency is worth -- and you don't even know how much that is -- this is clearly an insane amount of money. You have to see that!”

“Oh, I assume so, blight upon my existence,” she said, looking at her copy of the contract, “but if he said it was the upper limit, that means there was more.”

“If you say so, evil demon queen.” He looked around the place, and saw two doors. Through one was what he assumed was a kitchen. It was tiled, which would make spillage easier, for one. There was also a sink, another universal feature of household design. Through the other door was a modest little bedroom. One modest little bedroom. With one bed. Daniel and Eliza looked at each other. It was getting late. “I’ll take the couch,” Daniel said, refusing to play the game the universe had clearly set up as a hilarious little prank. 

“No, you won’t,” Eliza said. “Don’t patronize me, Daniel.” She huffed and sat down on the largest couch. “I won’t have you try and play the gentleman with me. I’m not some waif to be pampered, and you’d do best not to treat me like it. I know what I look like, but don’t you dare oversteer in the other direction.”

“Very well,” Daniel said, shrugging, “I’ll take the bed then.”

“No!” Eliza coughed and cleared her throat daintily. “No, that would also be unfair.” She smirked. “You can take the other couch, until we find a way to determine who gets the bed.” Daniel blinked at her a few times. 

“This is ridiculous.”

“You’re ridiculous,” Eliza said. “Now help me find some blankets, I have the feeling this place gets cold at night.”

With a sigh, Daniel gave up. “Very well,” he said, and went looking. But not because she’d told him so.