He came out of the late afternoon fog, a big man with wide shoulders, lean hips, skin even darker than my own, dressed in a heavy overcoat and a waterproof cowl. Hands in his pockets, he moved slowly, all the while giving the impression that he might explode into action at any second. Part of that was in the hazy nimbus of colors through which I viewed him. I’ve never encountered a more confused spectrum around a human being. Cobalt blue served as a foundation for his soul, but it was shot through with jagged scarlet streaks indicating the violence so close to his surface, poisonous green for the fear that rode his shoulders like a monkey, indigo denoting a keen intelligence, sunny yellow splotches for humor, and permeating everything else, the steel-gray lambency of the mechanically augmented. Usually the half-dead machine men of this era don’t have much in the way of auric power, but this man’s lifeforce blazed so strongly that he stood out against the dirty murk of the fog like a flashing rainbow lantern. Feeling an attraction to him that was as strong as it was inexplicable. I decided to Speak.