The Trouble With Being Dead

By theidiotmachine

Jeremiah was hungover the morning after he'd died.

His phone was refusing to unlock for him and nearly out of batteries, but it was a nice day, so he didn't mind not listening to music on his headphones. Instead, he strolled through the balmy February London heat, enjoyed the way the sunrise stained the concrete ochre and the leaves shivered in the morning breeze. Global warming, he thought: not all bad, eh?

His head throbbed gently from drinking last night. He'd been, where? Some Slovakian-themed dive. With lots of weird-flavoured spirits.

Oh yeah, he thought. I was with... those people. From that lawtech firm, I think. The ones who sit next to me in the co-working space. What was her name? Anita? Anna? I wonder if any of them will be in today.

The tube station smelled of piss, as always; the cops had cleared the tramps out, but they'd be back later. Two police officers were standing in the corner, drinking takeaway coffee and laughing, their black body armour shiny in the flickering lights. Commuters shuffled in a line through the gates, coughing and sighing, sweat beading on their forehead in the early morning heat. It was going to be another brutal late-February day.

Jeremiah tapped his ring on the ticket barrier. It made a noise he'd never heard before, an angry grating bark. He tried again with the same result. The guy behind him passive-aggressively fidgeted.

One of the cops strolled over, which was weird. He wasn't smiling any more.

'Hey, you. Come over here. Let's take a look at that.'

Jeremiah extracted himself from the queue and joined the cops.

'Uh, hello, officer. Yeah, I have had a couple of problems...'

'Stand there, please.'

The guy was young and bored. The other cop was a woman, who stared into some ruggedised device.

'Sure,' said Jeremiah.

The male cop pulled out a thing, which he pointed at Jeremiah. It flashed a red light and then beeped twice. The female cop frowned. She showed the guy her display.

'You need to get down,' he said. 'On your knees, hands flat on the ground in front of you.'

'No, bruv, I'm sure there's some kind of mistake...'

The blow took him by surprise. His vision filled with sparks and his jaw lit up with pain. He reeled backwards, stabilised by unkind hands on his arms, zip-tying them together. He was too surprised to say anything. The commuters shuffled on, not looking, staying in their own bubbles. He landed on his side on the tiled, piss-stinking floor, blood seeping in a line from his mouth.

'You're under arrest,' said the cop. 'You're being recorded, and that recording will be admissible in court. You do not have the right to be silent, but you do have the right to a lawyer. If you resist I may use further force to subdue you. Do you understand?'

Jeremiah blinked, tears stinging his eyes. 'There's been a mistake... I'm not a bad person...'

'Do you understand?' asked the cop, sounding as bored as if he'd been asked to count to a trillion.

'Yes, I do.'

#

Jeremiah had heard the old joke about a conservative being a liberal who had been burgled and a liberal being a conservative who'd been arrested; but he hadn't realised exactly why that was until he was pushed into the back of the police car, the stares of bored commuters drilling into the back of his head while he slumped, zip-tied, on the hard seat. He'd been searched for weapons and had his phone, ring and wallet taken from him.

'What am I being arrested for?' he asked.

'Impersonation,' said the woman cop as she sat down in front of him. 'And data theft. Don't worry; you can tell us all about it at the station.'

She started the car, and it hummed out into traffic, pushing into the swarm of bikes and scooters. The other road users let it out, nervous of its cameras.

At least it was cool. The sun had fully risen above the buildings, and it was yellow and baleful in a cloudless blue sky; but the air-con in the car was on so high that he shivered, his sweat cold on his skin.

'I...' he started, but one of the cops threw a switch on the dash which filled the car with the sound of police work, all acronyms and summons and reports. He slumped back and watched the buildings as they rolled past.

And of course we're going in exactly the opposite direction to my work, he thought. On top of it all I'm going to be so late. What the fuck is happening?

They weren't far from the station, so after only a few minutes of driving they pulled into a concrete garage, although to Jeremiah the seconds stretched out like old chewing gum. The garage walls were bare concrete, striped with flickering shadows from old lights. The ceiling was low and water-stained. They parked next to another car, opened the back door, and Jeremiah stood, uncertain.

'This way,' the male cop said.

He followed them through a shabby plastic door, up some equally shabby metal stairs, and emerged in an even more shabby office area, all beige plastic and posters about knife crime. A balding desk sergeant looked up from behind a cheap monitor.

'Morning, George,' the male cop said. 'We've got a section fifty two here.' He passed over the ziplock bag with Jeremiah's possessions; then he turned to Jeremiah. 'You: sit there. You'll be processed in due course.'

'A section fifty two, huh?' George said, not looking up. 'Had to happen one day. I'll be right with you.'

'What's a section fifty two?' Jeremiah asked, but the two cops who'd brought him in turned and left, ignoring him. So he sat on one of the plastic chairs, wondering when this nightmare would end.

'Name and address?' George asked.

'Jeremiah Tang. Flat 2, 24 Dorden Grove, SE17 3TR.'

'Jeremiah Tang, eh?' George tapped his keyboard and then stood. 'Now, let's scan you with this.'

He held up a device like the one the other cop had used. It flashed red a couple of times. He frowned, and tried it again, with the same result. Then he nodded.

'Yep. Right. Are you sure that's your name?'

Jeremiah stared at him, bewildered. 'Yes!'

'In that case, Mr Tang, or whatever your real name is, you're being detained under section fifty-two of the Data Security Act. Anything you say can be used to incriminate you. Did you consume drugs or alcohol in the last twenty four hours?'

'Yeah, I was drinking last night.'

'Fine. We'll delay the interview to give you time to sober up. You can be detained for up to forty-eight hours. Do you have a solicitor?'

'What? What do you mean?'

The cop looked up. There was no malice on his face, but there was not a shred of friendliness there, either. He stared at Jeremiah, taking his measure.

'Do you have a solicitor?' he repeated. 'If you don't, you'll be assigned one.'

'No, I don't. But what does this all mean?'

'Follow me. You can sit in here while you wait for your solicitor to call.'

'I... I haven't done anything wrong! I don't know what section fifty-two is, or what anything means! I'm not...'

The cop turned. 'We can do this two ways. They both end up with you in a cell, but in one of them you get some more bruises and a charge of resisting detainment. What's it going to be?'

'...'

'Don't make me do it, kid.' 

Jeremiah sagged and followed him.

#

The desk cop searched him again, clipped off the zip ties, and showed him through a battered plastic door into the cell. It was quiet and cool. It was less dramatic than Jeremiah had been expecting: a white tiled room with no windows, an uncomfortable bed, and a tiny toilet and sink in the corner. There were no bars or terrifying cellmates; it was just like being in the worst possible hospital waiting room, which smelled of disinfectant and a very faint tang of vomit. There was even a pile of ancient magazines and a bottle of water on a shelf above the bed.

He washed the dried blood from his face. Because he was hung-over and exhausted, he rolled onto the bed, and stared at the wall, massaging his wrists where the zip ties had been.

What the hell is happening to me?

He racked his brain about this section fifty-two. Had the lawtech people being talking about it last night? I have no idea what is happening. Did he say I didn't exist? I don't understand.

What the hell is happening to me?

His mind whirled as he lay there, and he felt as if a fever was burning through him: all of his thoughts were fragments, incomplete and chaotic. He drifted in and out of sleep, and his nightmares merged with reality and they always ended with him waking up in a cell, frightened and alone.

After what seemed like a lifetime of this, he decided that he'd had enough. He swung around his legs, and sat on the hard blue bed. He couldn't tell if he'd been lying for seconds or for hours, but hunger rumbled in him which made him think that it must be around midday.

I need to talk to someone. Who?

He had no brothers or sisters. His parents... Well, maybe I can call them, he thought. We're not on the best terms, but perhaps they can help. But then he thought of their steely disapproval and he shuddered. Friends? I must have a friend that I can call.

Lisa. She works for a law firm. Worked? Oh, Christ. My ex or my parents. Why does everyone useful hate me?

He sat with his head in his hands, running through lists of names â€" college friends, school mates, people he'd worked with, people he'd met on nights out. Everyone was a no for some reason, some of them multiple reasons.

How did I get to this point in my life where I don't have any proper friends? Okay. Lisa. She said that we'd be friends. ... I can do this.

He reached down to take his phone out of his pocket, and of course it wasn't there. Not having a phone was like an itch he couldn't scratch; a presence that he'd always experienced was missing. It was like losing a finger.

Shit. 

He stood and paced, and then realised that he hated pacing, because it was stupid and he didn't want to be the kind of person who paced around a cell. He picked up one of the magazines and stared at it, the words dancing on the page as his mind refused to comprehend the situation he was in.

#

The call came at the same time as lunch. George had left, replaced by a young cop called Jasyn, who unlocked the cell door and handed him a damp cheese sandwich, limp and thin. Then he passed him a tablet, some cheap model, smeared and battered from constant use. It had a video call running, with a middle-aged woman looking out at him.

Jeremiah took both, and set them down on a tiny shelf in the little room while the door rattled closed behind him. He picked up the sandwich and bit into it, grateful for even this bland sustenance. The woman on the screen waited for him to swallow, and then spoke. She looked harassed and tired.

'Hello. My name is Vedha Moturi. I need you to understand what I'm saying. Do you understand?'

'Yes, sure. I do.'

'Thank you. I'm your solicitor. In a few minutes you're going to give a statement to the police. You've being arrested under section fifty-two of the Data Security Act. That means that the police think that you've stolen someone else's identity. In this case, that of Jeremiah Tang, who died last night in a road traffic incident.'

'What...?'

'I'm sorry, did you not understand that?'

'No, I understood. Or at least, I understood the words. What I don't understand is how you think I'm dead.'

'No, the police don't think that you're dead. They think that you stole a dead man's identity. So does this mean that you maintain your innocence?'

'Yes. I'm Jeremiah Tang. I don't understand how I could be alive here and dead somewhere else.'

Vedha took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes. Then she put them back on. 'The body was identified as Jeremiah Tang using biometrics from one of the big tech company's databases. It's standard police procedure to ask Apple and Google and so on to use facial recognition to help identify any unknown fatalities if there's no other identifying information. In this case biometrics which were associated with you — or some other person with access to your account — matched the deceased. Then, any time that the police think that a death is suspicious, that person is put on a register of the recently deceased. In this case, this other Jeremiah Tang was high when he died in a car smash. The tech companies can download that register and lock the devices of anyone on it until next of kin contact them — and the police can access it too, and look for people who are using devices locked by this register. It's relatively new legislation, brought in as part of the Data Security Act last year. It's to discourage stabbing people for their phones, although I understand the tech companies like the fact that it makes it harder to buy second-hand stuff too.'

'I had no idea.'

'You signed up to this last time you upgraded your phone's operating system; there would have been a checkbox you ticked. My experience is that people rarely read those terms and conditions. Section fifty-two of the Act covers identity and device theft from the deceased. The police will have used a device to identify you. That's nothing more than the same camera you have on a phone, and it will have told them that your biometrics are on the register.'

'So... the police think that I died in a car accident? The police and the tech companies?'

'Jeremiah Tang is legally dead. I've accessed the death certificate. Can you tell me as much as you can about you, and your past few days, please?'

Jeremiah picked up the tablet and the sandwich, sat down on the bed, and told her everything he could think of.

His phone had been doing weird stuff yesterday, when he thought about it. It had locked him out in the early afternoon and he hadn't been able to get in. He'd had to rely on those law people to buy him drinks, which had been fine because he'd bought them enough over the last few months; and he'd shared an Uber with Anita and been disappointed when she'd waved goodbye from the car. So had someone had control of his online identity then?

'Maybe,' the solicitor said. 'Maybe someone had cloned your identity yesterday. They changed the biometrics associated with your accounts. Then when they died, those were the ones which got picked up, not yours. So you're maintaining that you're Jeremiah Tang?'

'Yes.'

'Okay. You need to call the duty officer so that they can interview you. Keep this tablet with you so that I can see and hear the interview. I advise you to tell the officer everything that you told me.'

'Okay.'

He stood, and stretched, and walked to the door; there was a little red button by it. He pressed it. Jasyn unlocked the cell. 'Ready to give a statement?'

'Yes.'

He followed the policeman out, through the cell complex and into another bare room. This had a plastic table, a pair of plastic chairs, and a tiny barred window. The cop sat on one of the chairs and Jeremiah sat on the other. He put the tablet down on the table, and Jasyn brought out a second tablet, tapped a few buttons on it, and put it with the other one.

'That's recording now,' Jasyn said. 'Do you need an interpreter or any other assistance?'

'No,' Jeremiah replied.

'And to confirm, you have a solicitor present who you've spoken to prior to this interview?'

'Yes,' Vedha said. 'My name is Vedha Moturi.'

'Thank you. You've been arrested under section fifty-two of the Data Security Act. We have reason to believe that you've stolen the identity of a deceased individual. I'm going to take a statement now. This statement is admissible evidence and may be used in a court of law. I will ask clarifying questions; you have the right to be heard but you also have the right to be silent, so to make that clear on the recording please say "no comment" if you don't wish to reply to a question. Do you understand?'

'Yes.'

Jeremiah gave the clearest account he could of the last day. The cop nodded and took notes on his tablet; then he asked a few more questions. Finally he nodded and looked up.

'Thank you. Jeremiah Tang, as you wish to be known, I'm charging you under section fifty-two of the Data Security Act, for impersonating Jeremiah Tang.'

'What...?'

'I'm doing this because I have no evidence either for or against you being the real Jeremiah Tang, so I have to assume that there's a chance that you're impersonating a dead person.'

'What does this mean for my client's rights?' Vedha asked. 'When can he be released?'

The cop leaned back in his seat. 'That's difficult, because the person you claim to be is legally dead, and I don't know what rights you have then; you may be like an illegal alien, in which case I can detain you until we send you to a holding centre.'

'That's ridiculous. Of course he's not legally dead,' Vedha said. 'He's right here, talking to you.'

'And yet, a death certificate has been issued to someone with his name, from his address, matching his description.'

'No, not his description. His biometrics. Those are different things. And the name and address both came from those biometrics. We believe that his account was compromised and his biometrics were stolen...'

'Under the Data Security Act, those are equivalent. Biometrics are considered a digital description, and I can take them into account when charging, which I have done. As far as the law is concerned, Jeremiah Tang is dead.'

Jeremiah put his head in hands. 'This is insane. I've done nothing wrong.'

'That has been entered on the record,' the cop said.

#

In the end, they released him with an electronic tag around his ankle and conditions to check into his local police station twice a day. But everything was far from over, because that was the beginning of a waking nightmare of a day: as far as everything was concerned, he was dead.

His account was closed and in a state where he couldn't reactivate it. He walked into the bank, but they couldn't verify his identity: nothing would check out. His phone wouldn't unlock. He got letters from his landlord telling him that his vacant room would be cleared at the end of the month. He couldn't even get into the co-working space where he worked; as a free-lancer he didn't have a permanent employer, but the gig he'd been doing ended as soon as they thought he was dead.

He had no job and no money and no phone and, soon, would have no home. He almost wished they'd sent him to that detention centre for illegal aliens. He sat in his kitchen and drank coffee, knowing that there would be no more once it was gone.

Vedha drove down to his house and gave him a basic phone, with a cheap pre-paid contract.

'This is government provided. It's so that you can communicate with me, and the police, and anyone else you need to speak to. It's recorded, so be careful what you say.'

She was shorter than he'd been expecting, with a warmth that he hadn't seen in the police interview. He wanted to beg her to make it all better, but all he did was smile. 'Thank you,' he said.

'No problem. What are you going to do?'

'I don't know. Go live with my parents in Durham, I think. It's the only alternative to homelessness. Can I do that?'

'So long as you tell the police and agree that you can check into a police station near where they live, yes. You'll need to come to London for the first hearing in a magistrate's court, though.'

'This is insane. Have you ever seen anything like this before?'

She shook her head. 'No. Your case is very unique. I'm going to consult with some friends.'

'The thing is, it's just such a crazy coincidence. If this guy hadn't died it would be identity theft, and I guess there's ways of dealing with that. But because he died, he effectively took my identity and then erased it. It's like a Mandela effect for computers; they all think I'm dead, except I'm not. I can't believe it.' He sipped his coffee. 'Oh, I have one last question. How come, if my biometrics match some dead guy, they checked out on those bleepy boxes the cops had?'

'Because they look for any previous values, not just the current, in case the phone has been sold on and had the new owner has changed the facial recognition again. So they identified you as someone previously associated with that identity.'

Jeremiah sighed. 'I see. Thank you for all your help, Vedha.'

'No problem. Just doing my job.'

#

His parents had to drive down to pick him up. He couldn't buy a train ticket electronically and no trains took cash any more: even the tramps had contactless devices that they wore around their necks. He had seriously considered applying for one from the nearby homeless shelter.

Sitting in the back of their car as it hurtled up the M1, he felt like a broken thing: he had failed at being a human in such a complete way that he needed to be returned to his parents, regressed to a state of childhood dependency, and then left to be forgotten. The tag around his ankle was a constant reminder of this new state of the world, at how he must report to the grown-ups and do as he was told, just in case.

His mother wept silently in the front passenger seat.

Over the next few weeks, the nightmare played around him. His parents were his next of kin, and so were able to access his account and get at his meagre savings. He was warm and safe and fed, but the money situation worried him: the lawyers were eye-wateringly expensive, and even if he was exonerated he would never see that money back. The legal system ground on, through a blazing summer, a wet autumn, and a warm winter. He could still read physical books, so he did that a lot; he sat at a window overlooking the tiny garden and he listened to the birds who'd decided that it was warm enough that there was no point flying south and they would stay in Britain forever. It reminded himself of his own predicament, unable to leave because the world had changed around him in radical ways that he didn't understand.

Then, in early January, nearly a year after he'd been arrested, he travelled down to London for his trial in Southwark Crown Court, wearing a suit his parents had bought for him.

A friend called Cerys drove him down, in her battered old Tesla. He'd met her through a support group of people in similar situations: her house had been sold by a thief who'd stolen her identity. She was Welsh and loud and had a bleak sense of humour which had helped Jeremiah through some of the darkest days. The support group was a literal lifeline to people like him, lost between the identity cracks of the pavement of their digital society. However, he was by far their strangest member: no one else was officially dead. He'd become something of a celebrity in a very niche part of the internet.

'I'll drop you off here, and find somewhere to park,' she said. 'Looks like there's a bit of a crowd ahead.'

'Thanks, Cerys. I really appreciate it.'

'No problems! I'll be in the viewing gallery. Good luck! But don't get caught up in whatever that is.'

He had to push the passenger door hard to open it, which creaked like a crypt; then he was out on the street, the thin January rain mild on his umbrella. He had his attention on a loaned tablet with details of the trial, so he wasn't really taking much notice of the scrum of people. It was only when he was mostly through them that someone noticed him, and shouted.

'Mr Tang! Mr Tang! Can you comment on how you think today will go?'

And then he was surrounded by cameras.

'Mr Tang! You maintain that you're innocent, yes?'

He froze, terrified; but then an angry Vedha Moturi pushed her way through the throng towards him, bellowing at the top of her lungs.

'Mr Tang will not be making any comments before the trial!' she yelled.

She grabbed him by the elbow and hustled him towards the steps and into the blocky brick building.

'Who the hell are all those people?' he asked as he was jostled and shouted at.

'Last week someone else found herself in the same position you're in. She weren't as fortunate as you: she killed herself within twenty four hours. Some journalist found this trial and joined the dots last night. You're at peek news cycle. This isn't going to get any easier, I'm afraid. I'm going to get your barrister to ask for some kind of police protection.'

Jeremiah remembered being forced to his knees, that day in a police cell, and the hard eyes of the duty officer as he interviewed him. The bland wood and brick of the court building reminded him of institutions and fear. He shivered.

'I'm not sure I want that,' he said.

An usher turned to them. 'Mr Tang and Ms Moturi? This way, please.'

She turned and walked down one of the tiled corridors, her shoes clacking as she strode. Jeremiah and Vedha hurried after her.

'How are you holding up?' Vedha asked.

'Honestly, I'm just putting one foot in front of another. If I stop and actually think it'll be the end of me.'

She glanced up at him. 'Don't say that. It won't be. Now, CPS is looking to prosecute for political reasons. They've been pressured into doing this to prove that they're being tough on identity theft. However, Afshin our barrister has been negotiating with them. It might be that they can agree to drop the case because of some technical thing, like the police getting something wrong. That way they don't look stupid and you don't get tried for something you obviously didn't do.'

'Okay. By the way, I always mean to say this, but I never remember: thank you for believing in me, Vedha.'

'Don't be silly. If you get through this, buy me a box of Turkish delight.'

He smiled. 'That will be the first thing I've bought in nearly a year. If I get through this, I'll buy you a wheelbarrow full.'

#

The usher took them to an anonymous door. 'You're up in court two in an hour. I'll come and get you ten minutes before then.'

'Thank you,' Jeremiah said, before going in.

It was a tiny, anonymous room, with a cheap table and four chairs. It was only slightly less Spartan than the police interview room: at least it had a little window and a painting on the wall. A man in an expensive suit sat at the table, scanning his phone. He stood up and shook both of their hands when they came in.

'Jeremiah: it's lovely to finally meet you,' he said, in a broad Glaswegian accent. 'My name's Afshin. I'll be representing you in court as your barrsiter. Vedha, it's good to see you again. Now, are you up to speed?'

Jeremiah sat on one of the chairs. He took out his tablet.

'I think so. I've been reading this, like Vedha told me to. Vedha said you might be trying to get the CPS to drop the case?'

'I've had no luck with that, I'm afraid. We'll just have to assume that the trial's going ahead. Now, today, we're going to be doing some preliminaries. We'll submit evidence and make a plea. You probably won't need to speak. So... I take it you're maintaining your innocence?'

'Yes.'

Afshin made a note on his phone.

'Great, thank you. In that case, we'll submit that. Now, I'm going to go through some wee procedural stuff with you...'

Afshin talked and Jeremiah did his best to listen. He was very aware that, although Afshin and Vedha were on his side, if this went badly, they'd still go home and sleep in their own beds. The only person in this entire process who had anything to lose was him.

At the end Afshin nodded, and tapped his phone. 'I think you've got a good case, laddie, but nothing's ever certain. Now, the usher's going to come back in a few minutes, and she's going to knock on the door. She's going to take us in to court. As I said, today you probably won't need to say anything. Ready?'

'As I'll ever be.'

'That's the spirit. Let's go.'

Afshin and Vedha stood. Jeremiah did too, his shirt feeling tight around his neck. Afshin opened the door, and lead them out to where the usher was waiting.

'We're in court three,' she said. 'Be aware that you'll be filmed; the judge has granted permission because this is in the public interest. You can contest that.'

'Does that mean there'll be a film crew?' Jeremiah asked.

'No. It's all just automated cameras. You won't notice anything different.'

'Should we contest it?' he asked Afshin.

'It's up to you. Personally I wouldn't: this is a landmark case and not filming it won't reduce the public scrutiny. If anything, it might increase it.'

The courtroom was smaller and less remarkable than he'd been expecting, bland wood desks, institutional colours, and strip lights. He was to sit in the dock, with Afshin and Vedha nearby. As he had no history of violence, there was no bars or glass; he just had a particular seat he had to be in. Vedha and Afshin both got out laptops and plugged them in. Jeremiah had a laptop, but he didn't feel that it was worth it; so instead, he sat and watched as everyone else filed in and took their places. Cerys waved at him from the public gallery, and he smiled back, although he couldn't hold her gaze.

The next three days were a strange blend of boring and terrifying. It appeared that court cases, like war, were long periods of boredom punctuated by moments of terror. When the cop that arrested him took to the witness stand, he could barely concentrate. The memory of being forced down to his knees in a tube station flooded him, made him tremble.

No, he thought. This isn't my fault. I'm not going to let this man dominate me.

He forced himself to look up, and stare down the policeman while Afshin cross-examined him.

Ashfin had called an expert witnesses, who stammered her way through jargon-filled testimony so dense that even the judge yawned. Then, at the end of the second day, Ashfin brought his star witness to the stand.

She was young, maybe nineteen. Her face was tattooed with flowers from the bridge of her nose to her right ear. Her irises were stained bright yellow. She fidgeted while she was sworn in.

'Ms Ella Jenkins. You came to Vedha Moturi a week ago, didn't you?' Ashfin asked.

'Yeah. I did.'

'And you came to her with an amazing story. I'd like you to tell the court the story you told her and me.'

'Uh, sure. Like, how?'

'Let's just start from the beginning.'

She shifted where she sat, and, without warning, turned to stare at Jeremiah. She met his gaze and then looked down.

'Okay. My boyfriend, Liam, he'd been doing some stuff. He'd been dealing a bit, here and there. But he got involved in Trade Route, and he started buying eyes...'

'Just for our jury, let's explain some of these things, shall we?' Ashfin interrupted. 'What's Trade Route?'

'Uh, okay. It's like a website on the dark web? Where you can get drugs and stuff. But I haven't...'

'That's fine,' Ashfin said. 'And "eyes" are stolen biometrics, aren't they?'

'Yeah. They're an account, and how you can access it.'

'Thank you. So how many accounts had Liam bought from Trade Route?'

'I think four. He'd logged into one, and changed some passwords.'

'And made some payments, too, I think?'

Ella nodded, and stared at her lap. 'Yeah. He'd bought some little things. It helps to own the account.'

'Did you see pictures of the person who Liam stole the account from?'

'We looked at them, yeah. Liam had to change them, so he saw the original guy.'

'Mr Tang — the real Mr Tang, that is — would you stand, please?'

Feeling stupid, aware that every eye in the court was boring into him, he stood. Every eye, that is, except for Ashfins'. He kept his gaze on Ella.

'This is him, isn't it? The man who's account your late boyfriend stole, nearly a year ago?'

'Yeah.'

'Thank you, Mr Tang. You can sit again.'

He sat.

He couldn't concentrate from then on. He had known that this was coming, but he'd never met this young woman, never seen her before. She hadn't destroyed his life, not exactly...

But I blame her, he thought. Oh God, I just want this to all be over.

#

And at the end of the day it was.

'They're withdrawing their case. The CPS acknowledge that there isn't enough evidence to prosecute. You're innocent. Congratulations.' Ashfin held out his hand; Jeremiah took it.

They were in the same little anteroom that they'd started in on the first day of the trial; same cheap furniture and tiny window, not that the rest of the court was any more glamorous.

'Thanks.'

He felt a strange mixture of emptiness and stress. His animal hindbrain had no comprehension of court cases and burden of proof, and just saw the same wooden environment as before and screamed at him; his forebrain was just studied indifference, what he'd drilled into himself over the long months to this point.

I wonder when I feel happiness, he thought.

Ashfin picked up his tablet and put it into his bag. He made sure that it was secure, and then looked up.

'It'll take a while to sink in. Tomorrow, I'm afraid, very little will change. However, Vedha can write some extremely scary letters to the tech companies, and you might find that things start working. I have no experience of these things, but I would give it a month. If not, I would be delighted to represent you again. Call me.'

He got up.

'Enjoy being alive, Mr Tang. Vedha, a pleasure as always.'

'I'm sure we'll speak again, Ashfin,' she said.

He nodded, then he headed out. Vedha smiled, and then turned her attention to Jeremiah.

'You're not done yet, I'm afraid. We'll have to give a statement to the press,' she said. 'I can do it if you like. I have a draft here.'

'I... yeah. Actually I'd like to do it. I guess I was all psyched up for my day on the stand and it never happened.'

'Honestly, this is the best way. Take a look at this, and let's do a quick rehearsal...'

#

Two hours later, he was in a pub in Waterloo with Cerys, drinking cider at a sticky table, while tourists laughed around them, unknowing and uncaring. She handed him a box, wrapped with Christmas wrapping paper.

'Sorry about the paper. They didn't do "congratulations on your recent aquittal" in the card shop,' she said.

He put his drink down and picked it up.

'Wow, thank you. What is it?'

'Open it and find out.'

He tore the paper off, and found a cheap phone.

'It's for you,' she said. 'You can now do things like buy for the next round. Welcome back to the living, Jeremiah Tang.'

He laughed, and looked at it. The box was heavy and alien in his hands. Then he looked up and caught her eye.

'I'm afraid that, before I buy you a drink, I need to but a wheelbarrow. And a lot of Turkish Delight.'

She laughed, and then touched his hand. 'Fine. But don't forget that drink. A girl can only take out someone for so long.'

He smiled.

'You know what? Let's try now.'