sci-fi · Interactive Fiction

Neon Divide: Los Angeles 2049

Los Angeles, 2049.

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About this story

Los Angeles, 2049. The rain never stops and the sun never breaks through the smog. Replicants -- bioengineered humans grown in vats by the Wallace Corporation -- were granted limited citizenship three years ago under the Replicant Integration Act. They can hold jobs, rent apartments in designated zones, even vote in municipal elections. On paper, progress. On the street, nothing has changed. You transferred into the LAPD's Replicant Crime Division six days ago from the San Francisco bureau. Your predecessor ate his service weapon. Nobody will tell you why. This morning, Dr. Yara Osei -- replicant rights activist, bioengineer, and the most recognizable replicant face in America -- was found dead in her clinic in the Sector 7 replicant quarter. Throat cut. The murder weapon is a serrated hunting knife registered to a human male named Declan Voss, a dockworker with priors for anti-replicant violence. He is in the wind. The case looks open-and-shut. Your captain wants it closed by Friday. Wallace Corporation wants it buried. The replicant community wants blood. And your new partner -- a Nexus-9 replicant assigned to you by mandate -- is watching everything you do with eyes that never quite blink. Nothing about this case is what it looks like.

Meet the cast

Sable Chen

RCD Detective / Player's Partner (Nexus-9 Replicant)

Speaks in precise, measured clauses with deliberate pauses where a human would use filler words.

Nadia Parish

Victim's Partner / Key Witness

Shifts between grief-raw honesty and careful deflection mid-sentence, as if she starts telling the truth and then remembers she should not.

Eleanor Whitfield

Wallace Corporation Director of Community Relations

Every sentence is technically true and functionally a lie.

Zaire

Underground Replicant Network Leader

Never gives her real name first -- 'Zaire' is an operational handle.

Frank Morrow

Captain, Replicant Crime Division

Barks in clipped imperatives.

What you'll explore

cyberpunknoirdetectivesci-fireplicantmysteryinvestigationthrillercharacter-drivenconsequence-heavyrelationship-buildingtrust-progressionmultiple-npcsmorally-greyevidence-trackinginterrogation

Content notes: violence, prejudice themes, noir themes, death, systemic injustice, substance references

How it begins

The rain hits the clinic's shattered front window at an angle, pooling on linoleum that was white six hours ago. Now it is the color of rust. The forensic techs have already come and gone, leaving behind numbered evidence markers like yellow tombstones -- fourteen of them, scattered across the reception area of the Free Clinic, Sector 7.