The neo-nuclear post-oil-crash age was a disaster for Cryonics Inc. The lack of faith in the future, more than the lack of cold cash – too little custom, no investment. And there hadn’t been any positive results – cryopreservation did not prevent information-theoretic death, so no Lazarus as yet. The bad news was frozen, along with the those that had paid. Time translation asymmetry was a problem – consciousness can’t survive the cooler. But those results weren’t public – hell no.

The illegality of the hot-brain coma wasn’t an insignificant issue. No problem finding surgeons – middle eastern economies had nose dived, and with them, the oil funded health care; the once wealthy blades had a lifestyle to maintain, and there were no qualms about beheading the kafir. They came, did their job, and were gone – they were expensive.

One fucked up business with too many secrets. Ok, so a head had gone missing, tough shit for him. We weren’t going to mention it to anyone; and he couldn’t tell anyone; could he?