The danger of living too many times:
you forget to fear death.
We dismiss the Grim Reaper as a quaint metaphor.
But fearing death...
it's good for you.
Just stop complaining.
Take off that necklace. I told you to throw it away.
No. It's Mom's.
You're just like her.
Disobedient, ungrateful... bitch.
Tak?
I'll tell them it wasn't your fault.
I'll say the truth. They have to listen.
Do you trust me, Rei?
Every way there is.
Why did you kill your father?
You're just a kid and you blew his stack out.
He deserved it.
Because he beat up your sister?
He wasn't going to stop. He killed my mother.
- Cops say your mom ran away. - Cops are stupid.
I told them what happened.
He dumped her in a coolant pool. There was no body.
Nothing left.
So they didn't believe me.
I believe you.
The Settled Worlds are full of lawlessness.
Killers, rapists, slavers, gangs.
They leave behind victims. Innocents.
We travel between planets, protect our citizens.
Mister, I've got nothing left for you to take.
They took my body, probably sold it off already. What do you want?
To recruit you. Colonial Tactical Assault Corps.
You're CTAC?
Looking at you, I see potential.
I can make something out of you, son.
What about my sister?
I did what I did because of Rei.
I want her safe.
You've never been able to trust anyone, have you?
Son, we are the Protectorate.
We protect.
I'll see to it she's placed in a good family,
that she gets a good life with people who will love her and treat her well.
You have my word.
What happens next? Will I get my body back?
I'll requisition it for the Corps. You can use it if you ever come back.
- Where am I going? - You're casting off this planet with me.
Train on different worlds, in different sleeves.
This time tomorrow, you'll be in a man's body.
And no one will ever hurt you or yours again.
Off-planet? What about Rei?
You disconnect from this life.
Anyone who knows what you are will be in danger.
I have to tell her.
If you want her to be safe,
you're never going to be able to see her again.
Trust me.
Tak?
Rei?
Welcome back.
You're gonna die.
You're bleeding internally, holed all over,
and you picked up a blood infection in that slaughterhouse.
I tried, but I can't save this sleeve.
I know I shouldn't have bothered,
but I wanted to hurry up the family reunion.
It looks like it's gonna have to wait until we can get you resleeved.
Wait... Ortega?
She's fine. I knocked her out. I'm sorry. I was in a rush.
Relax.
You're gonna wake up in a new body, something more durable
and a little less gaijin and with better hair.
You have to save this sleeve.
Don't be such a baby.
You used to switch sleeves like changing socks.
No!
- Tak, you're beat to shit, septic... - No.
...and the Reaper in your system is fighting the blood scrubbers.
Probably tripping balls right now.
If I don't kill you, the fever and organ failure likely will.
Promise.
Jesus, why?
Fine, Tak.
If that's what you want.
I owe you that much.
Here...
You're not here. You died.
Didn't take.
You know me better than that, big brother.
- We always come back for each other. - No matter how long it takes.
250 years.
You've really let yourself go.
How?
How did you survive Stronghold?
Quick version, then you shut up and rest.
They blew our shuttle.
Next thing I knew, I woke up in some low-rent virtual
with some pencil-neck archaeology student working on his dissertation.
He stumbled on my stack in the wreckage, along with some genetic material.
Total freak chance, one in a billion.
He resleeved me in a synth and...
Well, you were on ice and everyone else was dead.
I told him I was an innocent bystander killed by heartless Envoys.
First chance I got, I booked with my DNA.
Made a lot of money, grew a few clones.
I've been on my own ever since.
Not anymore.
This sleeve is shit.
Sleeve's not the problem. Gotta pay the transfer fee, man.
Hate the fucking reacclimation cocktail. Headaches for days.
Listen up!
This team has been thrown together from who's available on cast.
ReAc for a half day, then we stand up at 0300.
Kovacs, how does it feel to be back in your original skin?
A lot more mileage than I expected.
Reflex still good.
Thank the Corps for keeping it in shape.
Who the fuck is this guy, he gets a retread?
It's my home world.
First time I've been back since I joined up.
Target is a yakuza kumicho...
...by the name of Gottfrid Saito.
Domestic terror, murder, prostitution. And he doesn't pay his taxes.
Whoops.
They need to be taught a very public lesson.
The must-kill is Saito. Slag his stack.
Everyone else is kill as kill can.
Most kills...
...most days off, most bonus money.
Even you guys could figure out how that works.
Put up your hands! Put up your hands!
Kovacs, you're on Saito.
Put the gun down
before I drill a hole right through your stack, gaijin motherfucker.
You're gonna call your friends on comm,
tell them you've taken down Saito, to come in here weapons down.
Where did you get that necklace?
That was my mother's.
Tak?
Kill him, you worthless whore!
Kill him now!
Where the fuck have you been?
- No! - Kovacs, take him out!
Kovacs, what are you doing?
Let's go.
This way.
Tak, come on.
A good family?
That's what he promised me.
Well, technically, it's true.
I was sold to the yakuza as kobun.
A perfect little foot soldier, loyal to my oyabun, Saito.
And why wouldn't I be? I didn't have anyone else.
He said you'd be safe.
And you believed him?
I remember you being smarter.
Protectorate, Jaeger, he will come after us.
He's not gonna stop until he finds me.
The yakuza and the Protectorate both want our heads.
I don't know which is worse.
Any ideas that don't involve dying a slow and terrible death?
I don't know. We gotta get off-planet. I'm not sure how.
Jaeger's gonna block the ports and the casting stations.
Slow and terrible death it is.
I'll take a few more with me.
In the forest...
did you ever tell anyone what we found when we were kids?
Not a soul.
You trust me?
Not even a little.
Why?
I used to think the Patchwork Man lived here.
Guess we'll find out.
Are you sure you remember where it is?
Maybe.
"Maybe"?
Definitely.
This was a lot easier when I was eight.
We follow this east, it'll take us to the caves.
Not till tomorrow. It's getting dark.
Look at the way the Songspire threads through the boulders.
You ever wonder if the Elder civilization designed it to do that?
Create structures underground with the branches as some kind of scaffold?
Those are the most words you've said to me in hours
and they're about fucking rocks.
It's fine. It's in the past. Let's keep moving.
No. We can camp here for the night.
We're deep enough in the forest.
So, tomorrow we go underground and what? Hide like the animals?
You got a better plan?
I'd say we should find some potential allies,
but we just killed everyone we know, so...
I missed you so much.
I'm sorry, Rei.
Why did you...
Death isn't only about the destruction of the body.
Sometimes, just like that, you extinguish one self
and another is born.
But every birth is violent
and there's no death without pain.
Looking for these?
Fuck them up, Tak. I don't care if I live or die!
But he does.
He doesn't wanna lose you.
I vote we kill him.
It's not a democracy, de Soto.
Then I respectfully request we kill him.
Request duly noted, Envoy.
Dismissed.
Where's my sister?
They're getting her something to eat.
She's fine.
I know who you are.
I'd be disappointed if you didn't.
Your faces are all over the wanted beacons.
The bounty's a fortune.
- You've pissed someone off. - I have a gift.
- I believe that. - We'll be all right.
I believe that, too.
You're CTAC SpecOps. Protectorate through and through.
Rumor is you took out an entire squad of Praetorians.
CTAC's trying to keep it quiet.
Looks bad, one of their own biting the hand that feeds.
I think I chewed off the whole arm.
They pissed me off.
Your sister mowed through some of the best the yakuza had to offer.
They pissed her off.
The two of you know the secret workings of both crime and government,
which are more or less the same.
- Not interested. - I haven't offered you anything yet.
Don't bother. Just let us go.
On some level, you know we're on the same side.
The enemy of my enemy...
Is just one more person who might knife me in my sleep.
You're a little cynical, Takeshi Kovacs.
I'm tied up. I'd say I have reason to be.
Join us. Make a difference.
Nothing makes a difference.
I'm done fighting in this war.
War is like any other bad relationship.
You want out, but at what price?
If they knew an Uprising base was on Harlan's World,
they'd tear apart this planet to find you.
Aren't you worried I'll tell 'em?
No.
If I killed you... the Protectorate would forgive everything.
Do you want their forgiveness?
The innocent, the person you were before all this, he's still there.
I see the boy inside the man.
Tell me something, Takeshi Kovacs: What did the Protectorate take from you?
Everything.
What would you do for revenge?
Anything.
That's a good start.
You don't want me.
Don't you understand what CTAC does to make someone like me?
They burn out every evolved violence-limitation instinct
in the human psyche.
And they replace it with the conscious will to do harm.
And yet you haven't hurt me.
I might still.
No. You won't, Kovacs.
You're only pretending to be one of the monsters.
Fuckers took my sword.
- What'd you say to her? - I told her I'd stay if you stayed.
Shit, Tak! You said yes.
- Well, you wanted a better plan. - I still do.
Maybe we help overthrow the Protectorate.
Maybe these people slit our throats.
Either way, from now on, we stick together.
Family, no matter what.
Family...
no matter what.
See de Soto to get your weapons back. You start training tomorrow.
We lived alongside them...
or somewhere near them, anyway.
We trained with them.
CTAC troops shoot themselves up with reacclimation drugs
to try to make the sleeve obey them.
But none of their techniques touch the pure mind
and that is what you must control.
Master yourself and you can ride any skin, anywhere in the galaxy,
at a moment's notice.
You must learn the weakness of weapons.
Easy to say with a Sunjet in your hand.
I'm unarmed.
Take me out.
Go for the stack.
What's wrong, Kovacs?
Think it's unfair?
Let's even the odds.
Both of you, bring me down.
I'd rather take him out. Is that an option?
- Anytime, anyplace, de Soto. - Now will do.
- You see me moving? - Take your shot.
This sleeve is a tool.
It does not control me. I control it.
This is the weakness of weapons.
They are tools to kill and destroy. They are not what gives you power.
You are the weapon.
You are the killer and destroyer.
You had the right idea,
but next time, if you wanna save someone you love,
move faster.
I'll remember that.
You have two weapons, yourselves and each other.
- You totally ignored the second. - 'Cause he's a CTAC dickhead.
In actual combat, you'd both be dead.
The true strength of the wolf isn't fangs, speed, and skill.
It's the pack.
Whatever world you needlecast into, build a pack.
Find ways to inspire loyalty in a few capable locals,
even if many of them will ultimately be expendable.
We are Envoys.
And we take what is offered.
When Quell felt we were ready,
we started running missions with them.
These are the access protocols on the CTAC barracks on Taurus 4.
The secure military R and D facility?
They leave the backdoor open on a squad of combat sleeves,
just in case the locals ever breach security and get inside.
It's a fail-safe.
So we're casting into Protectorate meat primed on the slab?
Or we're walking into a trap.
You trying to say something about my brother, de Soto?
You can't fucking trust him. How can you fucking trust him?
Because he gave us the intel that's getting us in.
We're going for the site database,
where we'll download the security specs on the facilities listed here.
Then we blow the database, make it look like simple sabotage.
They won't even know we took anything.
Punch it.
Target needlecast initiated.
DHF phase coherence established.
Transfer is a go. Commence engagement.
Engagement in progress.
DHF incoming.
Return needlecast confirmed.
- Motherfucking idiot! Do we have incoming? - What happened?
Pushed me out the transfer station.
- Fucking stayed behind, that asshole. - He's stuck back there?
You gotta get him out. There's gotta be a way.
You did this. You left him back there.
Calm the fuck down.
I tried to get him out. He didn't listen.
If you're lying to me, you're a dead man, de Soto.
Really? If I wanted him dead, I'd kill him to his face.
You've wanted him dead since the day
- he walked into this place. - Come on.
DHF phased successfully. Transfer complete. No casualties.
What?
You asshole.
You all right?
I can't remember all the things Quell taught me.
It was like oxygen soaking into me.
Fuck you, man.
I was making the exit.
I didn't need your help.
I'm never gonna need your help.
So don't get a big fucking head, you arrogant son of a bitch.
Are we clear?
Good talk.
She gave me the life I never had.
Can you pass me that?
I've lied to you.
We cannot win a conventional war against this enemy,
because it's not the Protectorate we're fighting.
It's immortality itself.
The creation of stacks was a miracle
and the beginning of the destruction of our species.
A hundred years from now, a thousand, I can see what we will become.
And it's not human.
A new class of people so wealthy and powerful,
they answer to no one and cannot die.
Death was the ultimate safeguard against the darkest angels of our nature.
Now the monsters among us will own everything,
- consume everything, control everything. - What?
They will make themselves gods and us slaves...
- Do you see what I see? - ...in all but name.
Pretty much never. I hate that intuition shit.
Civilization is at a tipping point.
- We are riding the fulcrum... - What do you see?
...between hope and oblivion.
Doubt.
If we do not stop the curse of eternal life in our realm...
our children will inherit despair.
The ebb and flow of life is what makes us all equal in the end.
The Uprising must end immortality.
You're talking about bringing back real death.
What about you?
I'm prepared to die to reset the balance. That's my decision.
You have to decide for yourselves.
I've created a program called Acheron that downloads into DHF and rewrites it,
giving every mind exactly 100 years.
No matter how rich and powerful you are, death will no longer be optional.
But how is that even possible?
You'd have to download the program
into every stack on all the Settled Worlds at the same time.
I'll run a DA Mission into the on-planet Protectorate garrison here,
steal the casting source codes for the Central Core.
Once we bring back the codes...
You'll use the codes to cast into the Central Core.
Full mobilization.
The Uprising will fight our way in and spike the Core with Acheron.
It will spread into every DHF in every system.
Nobody's ever come back from the Central Core.
I'm not planning on coming back.
You're asking us to die.
I'm asking you to embrace being human.
We aren't meant to live forever. It corrupts even the best of us.
Leave, if you choose. I will not stop you. But those of us who stay...
together we will save humanity.
Are you with me?
I need a team of five to attack the garrison.
- Tak? What are you doing? - I'm trying to make a difference.
Quell! Move, move, move!
Move, move, move!
- Fuck! Fuck! - Drop your weapon.
I want him alive.
I'm a nostalgic guy.
Twenty-eight years and you haven't even repainted.
You know, you should really, uh, just spruce up the place.
My people have your DHF and birth sleeve.
I'm inbound on a suborb from Newpest.
Let's chat.
They tell me there was a woman with you, by the way.
Was it your sister?
It was your mother. She said to say hi.
Whoever she was, she left you behind. So did all your friends.
They were late for dinner.
What do you want?
Just a little catch-up time with an old friend.
But you're right...
what's the point of virtual if you can't redecorate?
Try a new look.
Let's see what your face looks like with your nose cut off.
Don't you touch him.
They've got you drugged, Kovacs. Do you understand?
We don't know what they gave you. We can't pull you out.
You have to wake yourself up.
Security, we have a breach in Interrogation.
Your security is for shit.
I don't understand. You can't hurt me in here.
Kovacs, pull yourself out of the construct.
Tak, come with me. Please.
Wake up!
- We're on the move. - Here we go.
Think you can keep up this time?
Can't believe you still wanna go along with this mission
after Jaeger almost got you.
We should leave.
They came back for me.
They came back because she ordered them to.
So Jaeger wouldn't interrogate you, find out what she's planning.
Not a single thing she does that isn't calculated.
It's all move, countermove.
You're exaggerating.
And you're naive.
We've both seen enough death.
- We can't just abandon them. - What if Quell's wrong?
What if they find a workaround for her program?
We've lost so much time.
These last few years, we finally got each other back.
I don't wanna die.
I wanna live.
I want us to see a million tomorrows.
I'm not leaving.
No matter how many tomorrows we're talking about.
What are we, Rei?
We're family.
We're Envoys and we have a job to do.
I just... I don't want tomorrow to be our last day.
It won't be, all right?
We won't let it be.
- You saved me. - Why wouldn't I?
No one ever has before.
That our secret battle plan?
It's filled with things I should have learned by now.
Including the names and stories of the fallen in this war.
Tomorrow, we attack the Central Core.
Someone else will be writing down the names of the dead.
Jaeger was hunting me.
Now he knows you're on Harlan's World.
I'm sorry.
Do you feel guilty? About the Protectorate?
- It was because of me that... - No, it's because of me. All of it.
Everyone died in that book was someone the Protectorate killed, not you.
It's because of me, because I created stacks.
No, the woman who created stacks was Nadia Makita.
Nadia went on the run.
And she changed her name so that no one would ever know.
You're... You're Nadia...
I wanted to be an explorer.
See other worlds with my own eyes, but...
one life wasn't enough time to see the stars, so...
I found a way to transfer the human consciousness
between bodies and, in that creation, soar.
Suddenly, anyone could travel distances beyond imagination faster than light,
and no one would ever be limited by one lifetime again.
That's... That's beautiful.
Rome was a town of refugee cattle herders,
but it became the most powerful empire of ancient Earth.
Do you know how?
Roads.
Roads were the technology that let them send their armies all over the world.
I thought I was freeing the human spirit, but I was building the roads for Rome.
Eternal life for those who can afford it
means eternal control over those who can't.
That is the gift I gave humanity.
And that is the reason we are all going to die.
So stop looking at me like I'm a hero, because I am not.
I can't stop looking at you.
I won't.
We can't.
Forget heroes and monsters.
You're the woman who set me free.
I'll talk to her.
We're casting to the Core in less than five hours, Tak.
I'll see you at camp.
All right.
It wasn't a mistake.
I know.
Rei! Rei!
Let's talk about this!
Rei!
What?
Rei!
Where are you?
Feeling better?
I saved the sleeve.
You're gonna have to jolt if you wanna get back to fighting speed.
Goliath. It's a CTAC stim.
Works great, if it doesn't make you stroke out.
- I'm... I'm good, thanks. - Your call.
You should eat something at least.
Been on my own here, staying out of sight, but it's a little bit of everything.
I couldn't believe it when I heard the rumors.
Fucking Envoy in Bay City?
Sounded impossible.
I had to check.
What have you been doing all this time?
I went back to Harlan's World.
You should see it.
I don't know what I thought I'd find.
But nothing I remembered survived.
It's all gone.
That's the hardest thing to get used to.
Nothing survives.
Nothing but us.
Quell? Quellcrist! Do you read?
Reileen, do you copy?
Monsters. Monsters.
Monsters... everywhere.
Vidaura. Vidaura.
Who did this? Who did this?
- Look at me. Where's the enemy? - Monsters. Came from above.
- Who did this? - Everywhere. Everywhere.
The monsters!
- Monsters! - Vidaura! Vidaura!
Stop!
Get back to the real.
Gimme the gun. Okay, look at me. Gimme the gun.
- I have to kill the monster. - No. No, no, no! No!
It was us.
The enemy was us.
- Tak! Where are you? - Rei, Rei, is that you?
- Are you okay? - Yes.
What the fuck is happening?
Get to the shuttle bay. You hear me? Get to the shuttle bay!
Quellcrist Falconer! Long live the Uprising!
De Soto! Listen, look at me! Look at me!
- Tak, is that you? - It's me, it's me.
I did this to myself. I can't remember why.
I gonna get you out of here. Listen to me, I'm gonna get you out...
No.
- Tak? Tak? - Reileen? Reileen?
Just go, I'll meet you there.
Quell says gotta get to the next screen!
Help me get to the next screen!
- It's in my brain, it's in my brain! - De Soto.
- I've tried, Tak. - I know.
It's not a construct.
I've tried.
It won't let me.
Tak, help me.
- Help me, brother. - Okay. All right, buddy.
Good talk.
Quell! Falcon One, do you copy?
Go for Falcon One!
- Tak, what the fuck happened? - Stronghold is down!
Stronghold is down. I repeat, Stronghold has fallen.
- What's your position? - Echo Bridge, north side.
- What the hell happened? - CTAC in the caves.
Viral strike, direct stack download.
- How many of our people? - All of them.
They went crazy. They killed each other.
It's Rawling virus. We must've been out of range...
- the three of us. - Where is he?
- Tak, where are you? - Rei! Rei!
I'm not coming. Get to the shuttle together.
- Forget it. - Not gonna happen!
I'm gonna lead them off. If you don't get airborne now,
they're gonna shoot you out of the sky before you get clear.
Don't ask me to do this.
Get your ass up here right now!
Get to the Core and deploy Acheron!
You still can do it. You can change everything.
But not if you die on this rock!
Go!
Run now!
Survive.
That's an order.
Do you understand?
I do.
Go!
You didn't get her, Jaeger.
You'll never get her.
Tak...
I won't pick anything up with all this ash.
Find him. God damn it, fucking find him.
Kovacs!
I'm coming for you, you hear me?
Doesn't matter how far you run!
Apparently, he was a real pain in the ass. Nobody liked him.
I heard you decapitated him.
I mean, a head's portable, I guess...
You were with Quell in the shuttle when it got hit.
How did she die?
It was all so fast.
Honestly, I can't remember.
Gonna splash my face with some water.
Sure.
Hallucination, displacement, retreat.
You have to fight the despair.
Laws don't apply to people like us.
Takeshi, is that you?
Mom said grudges are stupid.
She said you had to let them go or else it would kill your soul.
What do you think?
That's not the evac route.
Why?
They gave me life.
Tak...
There's only one reason why you wouldn't remember what happened.
You were backed up before the explosion.
I never could lie to you.
Why would you do that?
That's what she asked me.
I told her it was because they gave me life.
But the truth is, big brother, I did it all for you.