Overview
Scenebux is a novel by Cairo Smith. It is set in a near-present version of 2025 and follows Ben Etxina, a former software engineer and erotic-fiction writer whose attempt to resolve a biker dispute draws him into a secretive patronage network involving technology money, extremist social circles, private intelligence, and genetic research.
The novel begins in San Francisco and moves through Little Saint Demeter, Berlin, New York, Dubai, Armenia, Hung Lo in Laos, and the California coast. Its fictional world closely overlaps with contemporary public culture, but its central organizations, schemes, and characters are fictional entities.
Scenebux is available through New Ritual Press.
Plot
Ben Etxina is living in San Francisco with Chloe while trying to maintain no-screen recovery after compulsive internet and VR pornography use. After meeting Lin Jiao, Ben becomes involved in a confrontation with Wigland, a biker associated with the East Bay Vintage German Motorcycle Enthusiast Association. The conflict leads Ben to Max Pacifica on Little Saint Demeter, where Max explains T4 Fund, Aeschylus puzzles, and preclassical AI before dying in a fall on volcanic rocks.
Ben travels with Jacaranda Rosenbaum-Josselewicz to Amsterdam and Berlin, where they encounter J.P. Makanga and Syndicate Deutschland, a hacker cell based at L-Base. Ben learns of Cryptographic User Makerspace and solves an Aeschylus puzzle, which sends him to a Young Realists party in New York and then to Gabriel Findhom in Dubai.
Findhom, an Enward Capital figure tied to T4, accuses Ben of destroying Monarcha, an East Berlin AI or server cluster associated with The Filter. Ben denies responsibility, but Findhom frames him with drugs at the Dubai airport. Jessie Belle and Avo Mardkara help Ben escape by private jet. Ben then follows Easton Cannonade’s lead to Hung Lo, where Mac Amoolish, a former insider, is killed before he can explain The Filter.
After returning to San Francisco, Ben learns from Merrick Glowee that the central T4 figure is Carl Froht rather than the billionaire he had suspected. Lin, now working on genomic analysis for Young Realists, brings Ben to Edgelands at Camp Wendago and then to Aigai House. Ben and Lin have sex at Edgelands, and Froht later reveals that genetic material from that encounter was used to sequence Ben’s DNA.
At Aigai House, Froht explains The Filter as a viral-editing project intended to cause sterility in populations outside his selected racial and ideological in-group. Ben pretends loyalty in order to leave alive. He later writes his account as an insurance measure, warns Glowee by mail that The Filter is a racially targeted virus in active development, and begins a phone-minimized hike along the California coast. His last known situation is on a coastal promontory as Wigland approaches him from a vintage motorcycle.
Setting
The story’s main San Francisco settings include Coconut Woman, Ben and Chloe’s neighborhood, M.B. Literary, and later Margot Buxam’s Parnassus Heights home. The middle of the novel expands to Little Saint Demeter, L-Base in East Berlin, the Bullman Building in New York, Dubai, Armenia, and Hung Lo. The final movement returns to California through Edgelands, Aigai House, and the Pacific coast.
Principal Figures
Ben Etxina is the narrator and central character. Chloe is his former partner and legal lifeline after the Dubai frame. Margot Buxam is his literary agent and host after he returns to San Francisco. Jacaranda Rosenbaum-Josselewicz connects him to J.P. Makanga and the Berlin hacker scene. Max Pacifica introduces Ben to T4 and the Aeschylus puzzles.
Gabriel Findhom connects Enward Capital, Dubai, and Monarcha. Merrick Glowee is a federal investigator who keeps pursuing The Filter after leaving field work. Easton and Dana Cannonade help Ben in Laos. Mac Amoolish is a former insider whose death prevents a fuller explanation of T4. Lin Jiao is a geneticist in the Young Realists circle. Carl Froht is the founder behind T4 and the designer of The Filter.
Publication
Scenebux was released by New Ritual Press on September 6, 2025. The paperback is listed at 192 pages with ISBN 9798292712008.