It took Max  few minutes to wake up. At first his mind processed it all as a dream. He hadn't slept so well in what felt like forever. So deeply. Then he felt her kiss him.  Nuzzle into him. He sleepily returned the kiss with a small murr of someone just waking up. His arms went around her waist and he pulled her close. The record had stopped hours ago.<br/><br/>He vaguely remembered somewhere In the night a slightly burnt pizza had been consumed. He could feel her warmth. The bio - engineered skin soft against his own. Reality began to filter in. He'd shared himself with someone. Fully.  For maybe the first time. He planted a soft kiss on her lips and whispered<br/>"if this is where we are then we need to work this out. First. You need to know where Maxamillion Wright came from. For starters he's a figment of my imaginationn. A pen name. Nom De plume. My real name is Jerusalem. Jerusalem Winters.  And Max was born the way so many other people are. Someone had to die." He sat up. "I was ten when I watched my best friend get black bagged. Here in the lower districts getting food isn't easy. Aiden and his dad were just trying to survive. They'd organized a group of concerned citizens. Including my parents.  They had a plan. They hacked onto the rationing system and made fake citizens for the upper districts. Stole clothing and had the proper identification and that was it.  Food for the neighborhood.  As usually happens though. Some bean counter figured it out. Most of the kids from the neighborhood were just taken to the labor camps with their parents. I had learned how to hide. How to erase myself from the system. So. Legally Jerusalem Winters doesn't exist. According to the system this apartment is rented by a 78 year old man named Ben Locke. He pays his rent on time, his rations are delivered every week and he doesn't make trouble.  He is likewise a figment of my imagination. Second cousin to Harvey the rabbit. In short. He's not real.<br/><br/>My father used to say that doing the right thing sometimes meant doing the wrong thing. But Max Wright wasn't born until I saw what the upper district lived like. People need day jobs too. Mine at the time was tending a bar. Sometimes we'd get extra money as wait staff at upper district functions.<br/>Max Wright was born from watching an upper district type rape and then murder a synthetic humanoid. She was begging him to stop. And I couldn't do anything about it. That wasn't all he'd done but it was the catalyst for me to take action.<br/><br/>Despite synthetics having no rights there are certain standards that are expected.  To at least publicly be upheld. And that man had violated that. Where he'd broken the law directly was much worse. There were slaves. And he the same night beat one nearly to death. He was unhinged. All because the synthetic woman had tried to stop him. She paid for a slaves life with her own. I knew what had to be done.<br/><br/>All over the city wide news feed the next day the banner ran: Iian Bradley, factory manager beats slave, kills synthetic who tried to stop him. There Were Pictures posted. The police didn't have a choice. They arrested him. Nothing happened in the court system but his reputation was ruined. His contacts dried up.  So did the money eventually. A year later as they were reposessing the last of his things he killed himself.<br/><br/>See. Jerusalem couldn't do anyrhing. But Maxamillion Wright could. He could be anyone. Everyone. He became the bogeyman of the upper districts." He looked at her "It's not much. And as much as I hate the term social justice that's what it was. Calling out the terrible. Laying out their crimes for the world to see. Forcing a corrupt legal system to take action."<br/><br/>He nuzzled into her. "Maxamillion Wright was how I found you. So. I regret nothing, Cara."