City is a Science Fiction cum Investigative Procedural vid set in a single sprawling, high-tech city, which seems to be even bigger than Settlement on Zargonia (the largest city in the Dominion).

 

The eponymous City is apparently home to both Humans and Naki, though they have clearly defined areas within the City where they mainly live, they apparently co-exist peacefully.  City tells the story of Human and Naki investigators teamed together to solve a series of sabotage incidents that are affecting both species.  The City is shown to be ruled by an artificial intelligence, the City AI, who briefs the Naki and the Human on their mission.  They travel to a machine in the Naki sector which has been intentionally damaged, which in turn has caused Naki residential areas to flood.  A subsequent visit to a human area shows sabotage has affected the human food supply.

 

The visits yield a number of clues, and the two investigators split up, each agreeing to follow the clues that are more relevant to their own species.  The human follows a trail that leads eventually to a human revolutionary group that seem intent on using a group of Naki as scapegoats for their own activities, which seem designed to free people (it’s unclear if they include the Naki in this definition) from the yoke of the City AI.  The Naki trail leads to a Naki crime gang who have discovered that a by-product of a food manufacturing process in the human supply chain is highly intoxicating to the Naki and so they are running a drug ring.

 

A string of coincidences lead the two investigators separately to a part of the under-city sewers (an incredible set, storeys high, with waterfalls and giant fans) where a firefight erupts between the Naki and the Humans; in the confusion the Naki investigator shoots their human counterpart.

 

The Naki takes the human to a medical centre and leaving them in care, returns to the investigation.  

 

Examining the effects of some of those killed in the firefight, the Naki investigator goes to a house in the human sector and discovers evidence the human revolutionaries are being given orders by a shady controller.

 

The Naki Investigator returns to the City AI, to see if the communications can be traced.  The AI behaves strangely during the meeting and the Naki Investigator leaves without a clear answer.  The City AI asks the investigator to return to the original sabotage sites and report back.

 

The investigator passes by the medical centre to visit their human partner and fill them in on progress and then goes to the sites as instructed, finding that the sites are slowly returning to normal function.  However, before the Naki Investigator can report, the Naki is suddenly and unexpectedly killed along with many others when an automated train crashes into another.

 

Later, the Human Investigator is released from medical care and summoned to the City AI.  The AI says that according to its data feeds, neither of the sabotaged facilities are online.  The human returns to the Naki pumping station and follows the station manager to a far part of the city, into a huge non-descript building.  The human reports back to the City AI by phone.  The City AI instructs the human to leave their communicator on and go into the facility, as the AI cannot detect it.  The AI says that somehow, another AI has spawned within the City AI’s network and is trying to take over the city.  The human follows the AI’s instructions but is killed when the City AI launches a massive multiple drone strike against the new AI’s data centre.   

 

At the end, the camera pulls back to show the vast city continuing, the smoking ruin of the data centre insignificant to its size.  

 

Argyle writes:  Great and yet subtle special effects; the Naki are superbly acted and believable, with the audience able to find real empathy for the Naki Investigator.  However, I don’t know who this vid ever got made.  No-one could seriously imagine this ever being approved for release.