ã€ŠShadow Runner [LitRPG]ã€‹


 Chapter 1: Take Me Out

    No matter how many deep breaths I took, I couldn¡¯t stop my hands from shaking. I tried tightening my grip on my little pea-shooter, but the slippery grip betrayed me yet again. The Cadmus E-20 was a notoriously finicky shooter, but it was also the only shooter available for thirty creds if a person knew the right dealer. And in a world where having a shooter was better than no shooter, this hunk of metal was my life insurance.

    It wasn¡¯t hard to figure out why I was suffering from a potentially terminal bout of nerves. The alley pressed into me from all sides, the smell and garbage doing nothing to help my mental state, or that of the twelve other miserable wretches waiting here. Jason had a sick sense of humor. Thirteen? This whole thing was gonna go swimmingly, in the most drowning sense of the word.

    Funny thing, number thirteen. The universe had gone to shit and back, and yet old Terran legends still stuck around.

    ¡°So Jace, after this job, you think I can get a piece like yours? You said we¡¯ll be hitting that fucker at five. It¡¯s been forever and he¡¯s not fucking showing,¡± Hein complained. How many piercings was too many? I didn¡¯t have an exact number to give, but looking at Hein¡¯s cheeks covered by pointy studs, I could confidently say he¡¯d found the answer.

    Half of Jason¡¯s little hit squad looked like they were starving spirits of the dead who had crawled out of a sewer. The other half had carefully slicked hair, artfully ripped clothing, and more ¡®bling¡¯ than was healthy for them. Hein belonged in the second half. Me? The first half.

    ¡°I told you to shut it and wait, didn¡¯t I?¡± Jason stepped into Hein¡¯s face. ¡°I don¡¯t need you bitching at me, I need you to do the job and do it right.¡±

    Jason didn¡¯t belong in either half. His firm face meant he¡¯d never had to go hungry for a single meal. And his clothes were from the middle district, where people didn¡¯t have to deal with the grime and the stench and whatever diseases were in season along the outskirt slums.

    No, Jason was there for the thrill and the street rep.

    ¡°Is your information good?¡± I asked. I could practically taste the bitter desperation lining my cheeks. This wasn¡¯t a job that I normally did. Too dangerous, too many variables. But when Jason cornered me and told me about his plan, I couldn¡¯t back out. I don¡¯t know how he knew, but he did.

    ¡°I¡¯ve already told you, Gato¡¯s good for the info,¡± Jason spat.

    Technically, it wasn¡¯t Gato¡¯s tip. It was his sister, who had the dubious fortune of being a Reaper higher-up¡¯s regular hookup, and the idiot had bragged about how his mighty gang had made a deal with some shady corp for prototype cybernetics.

    Now, did that mean the cybernetics were any good? That was debatable at best. Most probably, the gangers were being used as a test study on what the cybernetics actually did to a body. But was the chrome going to be more expensive than anything most of us could ever dream of laying our eyes on? Also yes.

    When Jason told me his plan, there was a little belittling smirk on his lips. Like he knew he was making an offer that couldn¡¯t be refused. It didn¡¯t matter. I could take the humiliation as long as the creds were good.

    ¡°But what if the intel isn¡¯t worth the hassle? We gonna wait here for no one to show up?¡± I pushed. I kept my voice even and tried to keep my stance loose and relaxed, even if I was pretty sure I was almost as twitchy as the rail-thin gleamer Jason kept in his group just for quick access to recreational substances when the mood hit him.

    Technically, it wasn¡¯t smart to challenge Jason so openly in front of a crowd. His temper got the best of him nine times out of ten. Predictably, the ponce¡¯s eyes got narrow and he exaggeratedly spun on his heel to send his dramatically cut trench coat billowing behind him. Considering how often he did that, he probably thought it made him look intimidating. The article of clothing might have been impressive on its own, but it was both painted in bright neon reds and greens and it hung off the frame of a brat more concerned with being worshiped than doing any sort of exercise.

    ¡°We have a problem, boy?¡±

    Jason stalked closer to me with each word until we were standing nose to nose. Frankly, I was surprised he hadn¡¯t tried to swing at my face. It was only when his eyes flicked to my hip that I knew for sure what was giving him pause. Out of all thirteen of us, only he and I had a shooter to our names. His was a large chrome monstrosity he could barely hold properly. Mine might have been a Cadmus E-20, but even they didn¡¯t miss when the target was only a couple inches away.

    ¡°Jason, I¡¯m here to do the job you invited me to, not cause trouble or whatever. I¡¯m just asking if I still have a job or not, that¡¯s all. I¡¯m sure the others are wondering the same thing,¡± I breathed back.

    Now that he was close, I got a good look into his eyes, and they were flinty with anger. But more important than that, I caught the hint of small cog-like symbols all around the outer side of his iris. I recognized them instantly from hours of scrolling through ads. Machina made some excellent eyes, and even better cybernetic limbs. Not top of the line, but they were up there.

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    Jason paused and swept his gaze over the gallery that was eagerly watching our little spat. He stewed in his thoughts just long enough for some of the aggression to bleed off. Instead of another curse, his pointer finger rose up to his eye.

    ¡°Gato¡¯s good for it. They know better than to fuck with me. And one bonus tip, Gato said that the mule is gonna carry some cybernetic eyes. Good ones that don¡¯t go out on you.¡±

    A cold sweat broke over my back. Did Jason know about my condition? Or was he just bragging about his new toy eyes?

    But the thought that dominated my mind was the fact that there might be a set of eyes at the end of this job. I used to think being poor was scary. No, losing my sight bit by bit with an onslaught of headaches, nausea, and dizzy spells was much worse. So if there was a set of eyes in the mule¡¯s package, I was taking it. It didn¡¯t matter if the whole gang turned on me or if I had to shove them into my skull myself afterwards. I would do it.

    ¡°Lost your tongue?¡± Jason taunted. His eyes flicked again to my waist before he stalked off. ¡°Just don¡¯t lose your nerve when it¡¯s time to do the job.¡±

    I kept my mouth shut this time as our glorious leader stalked away, sticking his left hip forward a little to show off the monstrosity he called a shooter. In the trickle-down economy of this world, the better heat a person was packing, the higher their standing. When someone kills a gang boss? They grab the now owner-less shooters first.

    Luckily, a minute or so later, our glorious leader¡¯s eyes started to glow with that tell-tale sign of an ocular call, and a smile began to take over his normally dour countenance.

    ¡°That was one of my guys,¡± Jason said when his eyes dimmed. ¡°The mule¡¯s on the way, so everyone get ready and try not ruin this for me.¡± The latter half of the order was aimed at me, but I nodded along just like the rest of them.

    It wasn¡¯t hard to find cover as our little group scattered. Jason¡¯s intel said that the mules would head down this grimy alley. As much as I doubted anyone would intentionally come into this dumpster and that we¡¯d have a much better ambush spot if we found a choke point among the garbage, it wasn¡¯t exactly the time for strategy.

    After settling behind a rusted slab of metal, I fumbled with my gun one last time, trying to do a professional job of giving it a look over. My old Cadmus E-20 was, from personal experience, a rugged piece of machinery. The only problem was that I had exactly two magazines for it. Fifteen shots in one, and seven in the other.

    Rowdy laughter sounded at the entrance of the alley, effortlessly cutting through the subdued quiet of the near-abandoned block and instantly cutting a frown into my face.

    We were on the lookout for a mule. Mules didn¡¯t laugh. They moved quickly and efficiently, and most importantly, they moved alone.

    Not for the first time, I cursed my poor eyesight when two blurry figures finally entered view at the mouth of our chosen alley, two giants of muscle and fat engaged in jolly conversation. The bottom of my stomach fell out when I realized both had gym bags casually dangling from their shoulders, and I had to hold back an urge to curse loudly.

    I was going to skin Gato if we survived because he wasn¡¯t good for shit. It wasn¡¯t one mule the Reapers had sent. It was a pair of them, and that complicated things.

    I wish I could say that the immediate ring of Jason¡¯s shooter echoing through the alley was unexpected. Almost instinctively, I raised my gun and pulled the trigger once, twice, five times in total, no thought spared to saving the bullets.

    My eyesight being what it was, my shots were just sent in the general direction of the mules with little aim. But luck was on our side. A spray of red plumed through the air, and one of the two mules slumped down to the ground.

    That¡¯s also where our luck promptly ran out.

    In a move smoother than anything I could ever have managed, the second mule turned and raised a hand directly towards the street kids who were starting to leave cover to rush them. The motion confused me until I caught a glint of metal, unmistakable even to my damaged eyes.

    A shot louder than Jason¡¯s erupted into the air, and one of the street kids at the front of the charge was reduced to a shower of blood that just about completely chunked the middle of his body. A head and shoulders slopped to the ground with a squelching noise, and my hands began to shake as I swung my shooter towards what was apparently the greater threat.

    Jason got the memo too, because his shooter barked again even as I unleashed bullets of my own. His shot made the mule groan and stagger back, a small patch of red slowly spreading through his shirt. On the other hand, my two shots plinked against the man with the sound of bullets impacting metal.

    Subdermal? The thought ran through my mind as the man¡¯s shooter fired once more, and another street rat was reduced to near nothing. As much as hot adrenaline was elevating my heart rate, an equally cold calm was coursing through my veins. He should be going for me or Jason, the ones with shooters. But he¡¯s taking out the close targets. That makes no sense unless¡­ he has a mid to short range weapon of incredible destructive potential, but low kill potential longer range.

    My feet began moving on their own as I backpedaled while squeezing the trigger again and again.

    Twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen¡­ I clicked once more on reflex, but my shooter refused to spew any more attempted murder until I fed it again. If I was being generous, I had landed eight hits. It didn¡¯t matter. Neither Jason nor my shooter could penetrate the mule¡¯s subdermal beyond just small splotches of blood.

    In the meantime, the mule had taken out most of Jason¡¯s gang who had rushed him. But there were still a couple who somehow kept advancing when most of their comrades had been blown to bits. With a quick motion, the mule tossed his bag aside and wrenched his left arm to the side in a move that looked both unnatural and uncomfortable. Maybe it would have even looked funny, if it hadn¡¯t caused a long, deadly blade to spring forth from his limb with the sound of ripping fabric.

    The blade sailed straight through one of the street rats and proved its sharpness when it sliced its target in two. Blood splattered everywhere as the alley¡¯s fight slowed for a moment, just long enough for a single thought to run through my mind.

    We¡¯re dead. We¡¯re all so very dead.

 Chapter 2: Wild

    I stuffed down my fear as I fumbled for the reserve magazine and let the spent one clank to the ground with the press of a button.

    There was another whistle of the blade, another splash of blood, and another body that hit the ground. My arms were shaking too much to click the magazine into place in a single motion. That cost me a couple of precious seconds, enough time for the mule-turned-murder-machine to come into focus.

    He was bleeding in multiple places, but the biggest wound by far was a shot to the left pectoral, where there was an actual hole. I could just barely make out a glimpse of grisly stuff and twitching muscle. It wasn¡¯t subdermal that stopped Jason¡¯s shot, it was muscle.

    Synth muscle. It had to be. Nothing else would make sense, but the realization only drove a new wave of despair into my heart. What was someone who could afford those kinds of enhancements doing with a gang like the Reapers?

    Still, the key to this fight was Jason. His chrome monstrosity hadn¡¯t done much, but it had done something.

    Jason fired and almost clipped Hein while missing the mule by a mile. Worse, he let out a high-pitched squeal when the retort of the shooter grew almost too much for him. The chrome monstrosity wasn¡¯t lacking in kill capacity, that much was apparent.

    No, the issue is that the little shit couldn¡¯t even handle the shooter he decided to tote around. What good is the highest caliber weapon in the world if it breaks your wrist like a twig when you shoot it?

    The mule made short work of Jason¡¯s gang. Even Kaze, one of the rare exotics unfortunate enough to share our social station, was a pile of purple flesh. His half karu heritage of formidable muscle and ridged, stone-like skin had served him as badly as our human bodies were serving us. The only one left was Hein, who was furiously backpedaling.

    That left just me and Jason still in the fight. He was fumbling with his shooter, desperation in his eyes. I wasn¡¯t any better. Even as I finally managed to click the half-full magazine into place, I could barely bring myself to use the Cadmus. The mule¡¯s eyes swept past me like a predator, and some primitive part of me simply froze up.

    Never before in my life had I seen death draw so close to me. Even when I¡¯d been forced to use my gun before, it was to fend off the desperate who backed off after a shot or two. None of them compared to what I now knew had to be a professional killer through and through.

    Then the murder machine finally took his eyes away from us to spin around, and the sound of two blades clashing rang out in the alley.

    I could just make out the fact that someone had snuck up on the mule, and that the two were now exchanging blows with the speed and alacrity that didn¡¯t seem quite possible to match within human standards.

    Jason, for all that I thought him an idiot, proved he didn¡¯t lack courage when he raised his shooter and fired one more time. He dropped the weapon right after with a whimper, but the bullet hit the mark and buried itself into our attacker¡¯s back, which gave the mystery fighter enough of an opening to send a spray of blood splashing onto the grimy floor of the alley.

    Neither attack proved to be lethal, but they did make the mule suddenly back off in a surprising burst of speed.

    ¡°Who are you?¡± the mule growled before his voice relaxed. ¡°If someone paid you to mess with my delivery, my boss will double the creds.¡±

    The mystery man didn¡¯t reply immediately. Instead, with what I was fairly certain was a bored expression on his face, he surged forward. His own weapon, almost identical to the mule¡¯s, lashed out and extracted another spray of blood.

    My heart all but climbed out of my chest when I realized his target was Hein and not the mule. For this botched job, Jason¡¯s faithful follower had been rewarded with death instead of a shooter.

    The mule stood in a ready position as he backed up a couple steps more. ¡°Even without witnesses, my boss will find you. I¡¯m not sure you want the kind of heat that this brings.¡±

    ¡°Idiot,¡± the mystery man cursed. ¡°I¡¯m not here because I want to. I¡¯m just cleaning up after a brat who should know better.¡±

    The man¡¯s eyes were fixed on Jason with a glower, and if looks could kill, the former gang leader would¡¯ve painted the walls of the alley red. Instead, Jason just stared as he gripped his wrist with his shooter sprawled on the ground.

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    ¡°So you¡¯re telling me that you¡¯re babysitting some random brat? Here? In the outskirt slums? The same brat who decided to fuck with people he shouldn¡¯t?¡± I couldn¡¯t blame the mule for the disbelief in his voice. The way I was staring at Jason myself shifted at the implication. He wasn¡¯t supposed to be worth that much, not from what I had seen.

    ¡°What can I say? He¡¯s apparently still blood. You served, right? Gonna be a damn shame.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re here to protect the boy,¡± the mule argued. ¡°I¡¯ll head my way, we don¡¯t have to do this.¡±

    The man paused as he considered the suggestion. He looked¡­ well, unkempt. His hair was long and oily, his clothes tattered and dirty, and the less said about the thing he called a beard the better, because something must have crawled in there and died.

    ¡°No. Sorry, can¡¯t do that. Too many variables that can go wrong. It¡¯s my head if you decide you want revenge.¡±

    ¡°Fuck,¡± the mule cursed. ¡°I fucking told them to give me more men, more weapons, more something, but no, they wanted it all hush hush. Fuck, I hate this city.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s life away from the front,¡± Jason¡¯s bodyguard quipped.

    The mule took a deep breath, squared his shoulders, and exchanged nods with the bodyguard.

    What followed was quite unlike anything else I¡¯d experienced. There was a¡­ shift, in the way they carried themselves, and I felt the air be driven from my lungs as a wave of pressure washed over me. Then they were moving, and it was at speeds that were definitely inhuman. Compared to their earlier fight, this was on a different level. This was something I had never seen before. It shouldn¡¯t have been possible for humans to move this fast.

    I¡¯d collapsed to my knees at some point, and Jason was no better. In spite of that, the look on the little shit¡¯s face was excited. With the stranger¡¯s revelation, it was like all fear had fled from him, and he was now almost buzzing in place. Really, if he broke into excited cheering for his guardian angel, I wouldn¡¯t be surprised.

    I didn¡¯t have such luxuries. Instead, I slowly began to drag myself forward with my eyes half-fixed on the battle. After what felt like an eternity, my fingers bumped up against something hard and cold.

    Jason¡¯s bodyguard was winning. The mule was good, but as soon as the clash resumed, the bodyguard flicked his formerly plain left hand and released a second blade to pair with the one he was pressing against the mule already. In theory, at the speeds that they were moving at, it shouldn¡¯t have mattered if there was one or two blades in play.

    But it did.

    With two blades, the bodyguard was drawing scores of blood on the other man¡¯s body, steadily pressing him through the garbage and trying to distance the fight from Jason. The mule wasn¡¯t having it, and took several punishing blows that sparked through his skin just to stay within striking range of Jason.

    That was what decided the battle, in the end.

    The mule pushed back the bodyguard and raised his right hand directly at Jason. In less than a second, the limb split apart, revealing a hollow chamber hidden in the man¡¯s wrist that began to spark.

    The bodyguard all but teleported between the two and even struck the arm aside, but the shot still rang out and tore right through the bodyguard¡¯s left shoulder. The mule had likely counted on that to give him an opening. But Jason¡¯s bodyguard seemed entirely unfazed that he was missing an entire shoulder. With a flick of his right wrist, the bodyguard shoved his weapon up through the mule¡¯s jaw. Disbelief filled the mule¡¯s eyes before they ever so slowly flickered out.

    The bodyguard sighed in a way that suggested annoyance rather than pain as he started to turn, eyes already searching for Jason.

    My turn.

    I raised the oversized shooter I had snuck over to, fixed it on my target with both hands, and fired.

    I can¡¯t rightly attribute the shot that hit the bodyguard square in the face to skill. Part of it came down to the fact that we were less than five steps apart and my eyes were still relatively good at that distance. Part of it was likely down to him relaxing when the obvious threat was out of the picture. However, it was most probably luck that guided my aim that day.

    It was also luck that Jason¡¯s chrome shooter was powerful enough to blow through a man who, moments prior, had shown superhuman abilities and held my destiny in his grasp.

    ¡°That fuck did you do? THE FUCK DID YOU DO?!¡± Jason was screaming his lungs out and already trying to scramble towards me, but I simply reoriented the shooter with trembling hands. I recognized the exact moment he realized he was far too close to me and entirely unarmed. ¡°Wai-¡±

    The shooter screamed again, and it made a sizable hole straight through the idiot who got us all into this mess to begin with. I wasn¡¯t a great shot by any means, but at that distance, even I could guarantee a headshot.

    Then, just to prove that I was an idiot, I stared.

    I didn¡¯t like him. I couldn¡¯t even stand him. Yet, the sight of Jason¡¯s utterly ruined face almost made me throw up. It probably would have, had this been the first time I killed. Unfortunately, that distinction went to something far more mundane.

    Instead, I numbly stumbled over the bodies and ignored the likely priceless augments that were just waiting to be scavenged. I would have killed for Jason¡¯s eyes just a moment ago. Now, I knew that they were too hot for someone like me to touch. Jason¡¯s family would be on the lookout and might have put tracking implants in them.

    All I could do was grab their credit chips. No way to reliably track those, at least as far as I knew, and I just threw them into my pockets without bothering to check what they were worth.

    No, my real target was something else. It took everything I had to drag my tired body forward. The dead bodies seemed to track my progress over to the first mule dead at the entrance to the alley.

    Two bags. Two shots.

    This has to be worth it. It must be.

    If it wasn¡¯t, the best I could do was add my corpse to the collection cooling in the alley and be done with it all.

 Chapter 3: Risky Business

    Life hadn¡¯t always been like this for me. I remember my childhood as this precious thing where my biggest worry was making sure mold didn¡¯t grow on my sheets.

    All that changed with The Protest.

    Protests of any kind were a rare species on a world like Kadar, let alone in Zanos city. It wasn¡¯t because there weren¡¯t things to protest about. Quite the contrary, in fact. It mostly came down to the fact that people couldn¡¯t bring themselves to give enough of a shit to work towards some nebulous ¡®better future.¡¯

    Oh, and the shooters. Lots and lots of shooters that the local police can bring to bear against any disgruntled mob.

    In recent history, at least in the last several hundred years, you could only find a single example of a large-scale protest that had swept through the slums. It had happened four years ago, and had been named as just ¡°The Protest.¡±

    After all, it wasn¡¯t every day that the general populace found out a food production corp was purposefully poisoning their products shipped to poorer areas. Well, poisoning is a bit of a harsh word. Bad for PR, and definitely liable to get a person either sued into poverty or quickly shanked.

    The official and shank-free name for what they were doing was ¡®application of experimental drugs meant to bolster the general health and resiliency of poorer city residents.¡¯ Read: blatant human testing. I have no idea how they were planning to collect data on the subject, or how long they had been feeding people weird shit, but when some poor soul leaked the info, the city erupted into violence.

    The wave of emotions rolled through the entire outskirts and caught everyone up in it. Me, my friends, my family. I never saw most of them again after that day.

    That wasn¡¯t the only reason I¡¯d never forget the day, though.

    The Protest was also the last day my eyes worked properly.

    I wasn¡¯t even being stupid, or reckless, or righteously angry. I was just going home and dodging the shadier alleys, like I would every other day, when I got swept into an angry mob of disgruntled idiots who decided to charge the entry checkpoint into the outer city districts.

    And, of course, the police guarding the checkpoint decided the best way to deal with the issue was to release highly toxic and harmful crowd control gas. I was right in the thick of things when the green cloud descended and choked every living thing in its grasp. Technically, the gas did the job. It chased off the disgusting poor schmucks who threatened the public order. It also ruined my health forever.

    Just like the food, the gas had to be some kind of new experimental stuff. After a couple months wheezing for breath, I realized that the gas had done something to my eyes. It started off with my eyesight getting all slightly blurry at a distance, and things slowly deteriorated from there. My perfect vision got to a point where I could only see okay at about five to six feet of distance.

    Normally, that¡¯d be fixable by a pair of glasses. The problem was that my eyesight kept getting worse. By the time I had gone through three pairs of glasses, I realized that I was headed for total blindness. I found tiny scratches in my irises whenever I pressed my face against a mirror. And about two months ago, the headaches started. I would become nauseous and unsteady at random times during the day.

    For just about any normal household in the city, this was a horrible tragedy, but one that could be fixed as simply as grabbing a pair of cybernetic eyes from a shop and replacing the organs. Sadly, that was just not something I could afford.

    Even the simplest standard set of eyes cost four hundred credits, and it took at least an extra hundred to hire a ripper to put them in you. By the virtue of the ever graceful Catill, long may he run his shop, I earned a nice round forty creds a week.

    I know what you¡¯re going to say. Oh, Adrian, you can have those eyes in ten weeks! Less drama, more work, hop to it. If only I didn¡¯t need to eat. Or if I didn¡¯t need a place to sleep. Or clothes to wear. Or¡­ well, you get the picture.

    No eyes for me.

    So, there I was, stumbling over the corpses and happily liberating two gym bags from their previous owners. As soon as I could, I forced my shaky legs to carry me away from the scene as fast as they could.

    I didn¡¯t get far, winded and disoriented as I was, but I did take as circuitous a route as I could just in case someone tried to follow. I didn¡¯t think anyone would go towards the sound of shots getting fired, but people had done dumber things than try to benefit from random gunfights.

    It seemed that my luck was finally turning, because about an hour later, I dove into a familiar alley untouched. After that, it was just a matter of gritting my teeth to shove a couple grimy dumpsters aside, revealing a hole hidden behind one of them. The hidey hole was one that a friend had shown me ages ago and was significantly smaller than I remembered. But it was still big enough for me to squirm through with the bags and pull the dumpster back in place.

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    Technically, I was now trapped in what was a partially collapsed apartment room with no other way out, but at least anyone who wanted to get at me would have to chat with my shooter while they struggled through the hole themselves.

    I fumbled in the pitch dark until I finally managed to close my fingers around a backpack, and then hurriedly extracted my scroll from the pack. The sheet of steel, plastic, and glass was old and had a crack running through it, but it still worked when I turned it on, and the flashlight mode lit up the grimy space with enough intensity to blind me briefly.

    It was then, finally, that I allowed myself the luxury of unraveling the first gym bag.

    I tore open the zipper and was greeted by carefully wrapped packages. They came with no official logo or recognizable tags, but that did little to hide the gleam of the cyberware within and the obvious quality of the pieces.

    It also did little to reassure me, because everything I saw as I rummaged through the damn bag were limbs, plates and mesh of subdermal, and several injectors of¡­ something.

    They were worth something to someone, but with what I had just done, it was going to be a lot of heat to try and get rid of these. I pushed the first bag aside and pulled the second one to me, and my stomach only dropped further when I opened it. Wetware. Extremely high-quality wetware, if my limited knowledge on the subject was to be trusted. Enough of it that I could completely overhaul the old and out-of-date set I had installed as a kid.

    In spite of that, I carelessly shoved it all aside in my frantic search. It was only when hope was starting to die in my chest and sweat was beading down my face that I found my savior at the very bottom of the bag.

    The pair of eyes came in a tube-like sealed container with what must have been near unbreakable glass for them to trust it with the precious cargo. Floating innocently in the preservation liquid, the eyes almost looked like they were a natural set.

    Where most of the manufacturers seemed obsessed with putting their logo somewhere on the sclera, these eyes were clear of any such adornment. If it weren¡¯t for the unnatural gunmetal gray of the iris, or the clearly mechanical bits poking from the back of the eyeballs, I¡¯d be convinced they¡¯d just extracted some poor guy¡¯s organs.

    Not that I would have been likely to care if they did. A replacement was a replacement.

    I sobbed, then, as loudly as I dared to. Tears streamed down my face and poured out all the frustration and fear I¡¯d been bottling up for so long. Whatever came of the events I¡¯d just caused, I knew I couldn¡¯t bring myself to feel regret anymore.

    I would shoot Jason in the face another thousand times if this was what the act got me.

    It took a while before I managed to calm down, and even then my limbs felt like lead. I was on the verge of passing out then and there, and I felt like letting it happen. It was only caution that stopped me from doing something so stupid.

    The Reapers as a gang were neither very influential nor very well regarded, but they weren¡¯t stupid. If someone robbed them, they¡¯d be all over the place looking for the thief. Even if I were innocent, I wouldn¡¯t want to get caught up in that mess.

    On top of that, I had to worry about Jason¡¯s family, plus whoever had sold the items to the Reapers in the first place. No, it was better for me to be far away from the area by the time they came to sniff around.

    To that effect, I started stripping. My clothes were stained with blood and grime, and I had them off in record time. My scroll also let me check my face and hair for any traces of blood, but I failed to find any and moved on.

    From out of my backpack I fetched a fresh set of clothes, my finest, in fact. I wished I had another set of shoes, but the beat up military-style boots on my feet were the only pair I owned. I made up for that by wiping them down the best I could and even spraying them with a cleaning solution I¡¯d prepped for just this occasion. It was time to go.

    I shoved the eyes into my backpack and covered them up as well as I could, then hesitated and grabbed a set of the wetware. A bit of digging turned up another set of chips, which I packed into my backpack as well.

    I had no clue whether the eyes demanded any custom pieces of tech to work, and there¡¯d be no harm in installing whatever I could from the collection anyway. If the eyes turned out to be faulty or infected, then some wetware and chips would be the least of my problems.

    Wiggling my way out of my hidey-hole was just as unpleasant as entry had been, but I still reset the dumpster with extreme care. I was, presumably, the only person still alive who knew about the spot. If all went well, then the wealth of cyberware I had left in there would be waiting for me to reclaim it one day.

    I also chose to leave Jason¡¯s shooter behind, no matter how much the decision pained me. Gaudy as the weapon was, it had proven its effectiveness, and I already felt worse without its weight on me.

    As I hurried away from the spot, I reflected on the second reason I¡¯d chosen it: it was extremely close to the entry checkpoint to the outer districts. When I reached it, the checkpoint was about as deserted as it always was.

    The wall that separated the districts whined away with its electrical charge, and the narrow walkway of a kill box was unnervingly bright. Scanners constantly ran over it from every angle possible, even on the vigilant lookout for slum dwellers audacious enough to try and cross the divide between dirt poor and relatively well-to-do.

    Because of course Zanos had gleefully implemented a citizenship tier system the second the wider republic suggested it.

    Slum dwellers were E class citizens, poor and generally distrusted but still allowed within the city proper. Above them, in a divide almost impossible to breach, were the D class citizens of the outer districts, followed by the C class middle district citizens, B class inner city stretch, and A class core city dwellers.

    Technically, I had C class access. The final gift of the man I was meant to call father before he dumped us. I genuinely had no clue how my mother had managed to convince him to register me as even that much, but I had never dared to cross into the middle district.

    I didn¡¯t want to suddenly remind him I was a thing and end up stripped of the one lifeline I had. Without access to the outer districts, I never would have been able to reach Catill and beg for work.

    His shop wasn¡¯t my destination of the day, however. That dubious honor went to ripper Glim and his little shop of horrors. I genuinely wished I could say my trip would be less risky than the shootout and subsequent slaughter I¡¯d just fled, but I wasn¡¯t sure that would be true.

    Once more, I could only trust that things would work out.

 Chapter 4: Eyes

    The slums were a world of uninspired street planning and uninterrupted strings of buildings that all looked the same. You could pick which concrete and brick structure you wanted to live in, but they were all tall, decrepit, and filled with walk-in cabinets trying very hard to pretend to be full living spaces.

    I couldn¡¯t rightly say the outer districts were much better than that.

    The streets were still locked into the same perfect grid patterns, the buildings were still uninspired, and I was willing to bet that most of the apartments were similarly small.

    Where things changed, however, was the maintenance.

    All of the buildings were meticulously maintained. The streetlights worked. You could actually walk without constantly stumbling over garbage. Oh, the alleys were still absolutely filthy, but no one really expected a well-mannered citizen to venture into those.

    The alleys were for chucking garbage into from a distance.

    Likewise, there was the occasional shop that managed to break up the monotony a little, and even a single park! Sure, it was no bigger than an apartment building, but you could still see a bit of greenery.

    Sort of.

    Most of the grass was stomped into the ground, and the singular tree was kind of anemic, but it was a nice place to sit down at the end of a long day. Today, however, I merely eyed the many benches with considerable longing as I cut my way through the park.

    After all, I would either greet the day tomorrow with a new pair of eyes, or I wouldn¡¯t greet it at all.

    For all the dark thoughts that were swirling through my head, the street where ripper Glim was set up wasn¡¯t particularly foreboding, filthy, or even suspicious. Point of fact, his door was right across from an ice-cream parlor.

    Sure, it was a front for one of the gangs and never actually sold enough stuff to justify staying in the business, but they still sold some of the best (and obviously not organic) ice cream I¡¯d ever had.

    I gripped the strap of my backpack and eyed the group of people loitering in front of the establishment with considerable distrust. They were all tall, muscular, and had clearly taken enough steroids and supplements to permanently shut off their brains. They also proudly featured the tattoos that marked them as members of the Goliaths.

    ¡°Oi, kid!¡± a voice snapped, and I slowly turned with one foot already on the first step to Glim¡¯s clinic.

    One of the gangers was moving towards me, arms crossed across his chest. I wet my dry lips as my heart pounded away. I knew it was a ridiculous thought, but a part of me whispered that they knew exactly what I had in my backpack.

    ¡°Y-Yes? What can I do for you?¡± I offered with much more confidence than I felt, and even tried to push my chest forward a little. Not in a challenging manner, just trying to come across as an eager youth ready to please the local hegemons.

    The man snorted, which was fair. I could charitably be described as scrawny.

    ¡°No clue what you heard about that place,¡± the stranger kicked off, inclining his head at the clinic, ¡°but you don¡¯t want to go down there. Trust me. The whole free treatment thing is bull. Chances are, you¡¯re not going to walk out at all.¡±

    That actually made me blink in surprise and look at the ganger again. He was fairly young. Fresh, some would say. Maybe a year or two older than me, though you wouldn¡¯t be able to tell with how little flesh I had on my bones.

    Regardless, I couldn¡¯t believe he was trying to warn me. That just wasn¡¯t something most gangers went out of their way to do.

    Having said that¡­

    ¡°Sorry, but I gotta. I¡­ don¡¯t really have the money to go elsewhere,¡± I admitted with a bitter grimace.

    Not that I would have opted to switch to another ripper even if I could afford them. I had no clue what ties a random ripper had or who paid them for info. There was every chance that news of exactly what I was installing would make their way to ¡®interested parties¡¯ the second it was in my head, and then I¡¯d lose my shiny new pair of eyes the next alley over.

    Or they¡¯d sell me out to the manufacturer I technically robbed, and I¡¯d be dead either way.

    The ganger grimaced right back, and actually opened his mouth to argue, but several hollers from his friends made him grumble and turn away from me.

    ¡°Whatever. I tried to warn you, kid. Whatever you do now is your business.¡± Posture stiff, he went to re-join the other Goliaths, and I watched him before I committed to my trip down the stairs.

    He wasn¡¯t wrong to warn me, of course. I knew all about Glim and his reputation. He was one of those few clinics allowed to continue operating in spite of the fact that they were as shady as a black cat, mostly because he kept his mouth shut, accepted all clientele, and even engaged in a bit of community service from time to time.

    The whole ¡®free checkups and treatment¡¯ thing was real. The catch was, you were rolling the dice every time you walked into his clinic. Get lucky, and as per the promotion, you walked away with a nice free checkup and some meds to make you feel better.

    Get unlucky, and people never saw you again.

    They might, however, catch sight of a familiar eyeball, piece of cyberware, or skin transplant package if they happened to frequent the right black market after one of Glim¡¯s ¡®acquisition sprees.¡¯

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    The thing was, I had something I was banking on.

    When we were still living in the outer district and I still had a mother, I vividly remembered her taking me to his clinic. The man had frozen up at the sight of her, his extra robotic limbs spasming like they¡¯d been shocked, and I was left to sit on his creepy surgery table while Mother and he talked in hushed whispers.

    Whatever was said that day, it worked. My mother told me that I should visit Glim whenever I needed a ripper and she wasn¡¯t around for some reason. He still charged me for everything, but he did good work, his meds weren¡¯t toxic bullshit, and he hadn¡¯t sliced me up for spare parts. Yet.

    I wasn¡¯t sure if whatever deal my mother had struck with him was still on or if I just wasn¡¯t a decent harvesting target, but the scav ripperdoc was still my best bet. Maybe it was kind of sad, but I even felt a little nostalgic whenever I saw him. He, along with my old Cadmus shooter, were the only things left of my mother.

    I knocked on the sturdy metal door as soon as I reached the bottom of the stairs, and it took less than a minute for several cameras in the various corners to focus on me before Glim ripped the door open, giving me the first glimpse of the ripper in a while.

    As always, he was a vision straight out of a kid¡¯s nightmares. Four mechanical limbs bobbed and weaved around him, holding surgery tools and a particularly large syringe. His breathing was an ominous hiss through that breath mask he always wore, and his eyes glowed with a sickly green light. Seeing as they barely peaked through a mass of shaggy brown hair, the creep factor was only enhanced.

    ¡°You. Thought you were dead.¡± That was his lovely greeting as Glim looked beyond me, then stepped aside barely enough to let me awkwardly squeeze by. As soon as I was past, he slammed the door close and it initiated a lengthy locking procedure that sent echoing clatters through the clinic of metal bars slamming into place.

    ¡°It¡¯s nice to see you too, Glim. Not dead yet. I do, however, need an eye replacement. I also got a bunch of better wetware and chips, so it would be nice if we could handle installing them as well.¡± I knew he wasn¡¯t a chatty individual, so I just dove straight in.

    ¡°Show me.¡±

    I did that. The dumbest thing in the world you could possibly do was lie to your ripperdoc. Didn¡¯t matter if it was the most legit of corpo rippers or a back alley butcher, that path only led to pain and a grisly death.

    ¡°Hmm.¡± Glim had one of his mechanical arms poke through the loot. ¡°Nonstandard. No notable markings. No logo. High quality, however. Where did you get this? No, wait, I don¡¯t care. Do you have my fee?¡±

    Good old Glim. I stared him in the eyes as I handed over a hundred credits on a chip, then had to fight down a shudder as zeroes and ones started flashing over his sclera, leaving only the green of his irises visible.

    Damn Cypher made extremely good military-grade cybernetics, but each and every one of their products was creepy to the max.

    ¡°Hm. Good. Lie down on the table,¡± Glim ordered with no preamble, in spite of the fact that I¡¯d only handed him a hundred creds, the first of several separate installations.

    He always made me pay, but I learned a long time ago he was surprisingly flexible about how much I paid him. It was definitely one of the reasons I kept showing up when I had to.

    Knowing what would be happening to me shortly, I stripped everything that went on the upper half of my body. Glim might do good work, but he wasn¡¯t shy about cutting apart whatever got in his way, and my best clothes would be liberally coated in blood if I didn¡¯t take them off.

    Funnily enough, he always did make sure to wipe down his patient¡¯s bodies after surgery. It was just the clothing he didn¡¯t care about.

    ¡°Would you like me to put you under for this operation, or will you stay conscious throughout?¡± Glim asked.

    I hesitated. ¡°What¡¯s the price difference? I¡¯m guessing there are painkillers involved for the second option?¡±

    ¡°Correct. The anesthesia that can dull the pain but keep you conscious is more expensive. You¡¯d need to pay me another hundred credits. General anesthesia that would put you under is considered part of the standard payment.¡±

    I¡¯d never done any wetware installations before, so this was news for me. Still, it wasn¡¯t exactly a difficult choice. ¡°Put me under.¡± Paying more for the grand privilege of watching him take me apart? Hard pass. If he wanted to kill me, he could do it whether I was under or not. Literally watching someone rip my eyes out of my skull wasn¡¯t on my bucket list.

    ¡°Very well.¡±

    Before I could say or do anything else, his syringe-wielding cyber limb shot forward and sank into my neck. Surprisingly enough, it was entirely painless. I was out like a light before I could even question that.

    ¡ª

    I groaned, somehow feeling both numb and like I¡¯d just been run over by a truck. My eyes were aching and kind of scratchy. This wasn¡¯t really a difference from before, even if it was somewhat exaggerated at the minute.

    When I went to raise my hand to brush sleep out of my eyes, the limb refused to cooperate. It felt like I was dragging it through water, which finally prompted me to blink my eyes open.

    For a second, I couldn¡¯t process what I was seeing. Then I froze because I could see everything around me in startling clarity. My natural eyes had been failing me for years, but even before then, what I defined as ¡®perfect¡¯ vision fell far short of what I was experiencing now.

    Every mote of dust that crossed through the light, every shadow, every scuff, I could see them perfectly. Having lived in a fuzzy sphere of colors melting into each other for so long, this was beyond exciting. It was like being born again.

    ¡°You¡¯re awake. Finally. It¡¯s a good thing you brought the wetware and those chips with you. The eyes are nonstandard. They would have fried your interface chip. I don¡¯t think they¡¯ll work with any other setup, either. The wetware might be able to support normal brands. Maybe. Should have charged you extra. Had to change everything.¡±

    I¡¯d never heard Glim talk so much all at once before, and I had to admit that what he was saying was a bit concerning. In spite of that, I did bring the wetware with me, so¡­ crisis averted? Besides, I honestly could not bring myself to care at the minute.

    I could see. I COULD SEE!

    Tears sprang to my eyes, and even though the water felt weird against the cybernetic replacements I¡¯d just had installed, I didn¡¯t care. The days of my vision failing on me were over.

    The ripper continued to speak. ¡°The eyes will feel off for a day or two. They¡¯re an advance model, though, so they should start to feel natural quickly. Won¡¯t notice the difference after the adaptation period. They don¡¯t have anything fancy, but they¡¯re high-quality optics. I think. Couldn¡¯t find any fancy options, at least. They can record, take calls, do the HUD display, etc. No malware. Maybe. The coding¡¯s weird.¡±

    ¡°They can really do all that?¡± I couldn¡¯t keep the excitement out of my voice. My scroll was great, but decent eyes were supposed to do everything it could and more.

    ¡°Yes. That¡¯s why the chips were needed. Had to pull your entire old setup, as I said. Including the wetware. All upgraded now.¡± Glim motioned towards the baggies I¡¯d brought him the stuff in, now full of the slightly bloody ports and chips I¡¯d carted around in my head for years.

    It felt odd to see those old parts there, blood stained and discarded, but Glim clearly hadn¡¯t found them worth better treatment. Which¡­ fair. They were as standard fare as standard got, just barely better than the stuff you¡¯d throw into the dumpster.

    And that no longer mattered, because I was beyond them now.

    A smile slowly stretched across my lips. With these eyes, I could hope for more, work towards more, maybe even dare to dream things would get better.

    I was just about to let the enthusiasm carry me away when a flash of pain shot through my head, and I hissed in a harsh breath. At the same time, my eyesight briefly glitched. I wasn¡¯t sure, but for just a second, I thought I caught sight of a shadow, and a toothy grin.

 Chapter 5: A Minor Glitch

    I jerked away from the shadowy figure and almost knocked straight into my unamused ripper when I slipped off the operating chair.

    ¡°What? Did you see that?¡± I yelled. I tried to calm my racing heart, but in spite of how brief the glimpse of that figure was, its gleaming teeth were seared into my memory. They were crooked and jagged, yet slotted perfectly together into a macabre grin.

    ¡°See what? There¡¯s nothing there. I¡¯d like you to vacate my shop before hallucinating. I don¡¯t need another idiot doing damage to my equipment. You did not ingest any¡­ substances, before coming here? Some drugs react badly with anesthesia.¡±

    I swung around to look at Glim like he¡¯d installed an extra head instead of all his extra limbs. ¡°Of course not!¡±

    My mother quite literally beat the sense into me when I hinted that I might be following the example of my peers and letting drugs get a death grip on my psyche. She also had a lot of issues with swearing too, which was why I tended to try and avoid cursing aloud. She¡¯d been gone for a while, but the habit of wincing whenever a curse word left my lips still had not left me.

    ¡°Hm,¡± Glim snorted. I didn¡¯t like how judgmental and disbelieving that sound was. Out of the two of us, only one liked to harvest organs illegally and sell them on the black market, and it wasn¡¯t me! ¡°You¡¯re still getting used to the eyes, I suppose. Some minor glitches are not unexpected.¡±

    ¡°Define ¡®minor¡¯ glitches,¡± I demanded, suddenly feeling a lot less happy about my new eyes.

    The eyesight was amazing and freeing, but only if it didn¡¯t come at the cost of my sanity.

    ¡°I can¡¯t say. Unfamiliar with the hardware, and the software it''s running. Replaced all your wetware, too. It¡¯ll take time to settle. You¡¯re barely off the chopping block.¡±

    I shuddered at his casual use of an alternative title for his operating table and found myself edging a bit closer to the exit. Pointless, of course, since he needed to unlock it for me, but I still wanted some distance between us.

    ¡°Settle in. Right. Of course, cyberware needs time. I¡¯ll keep an eye out for that, then. Would you mind if I just¡­ go, now?¡± I rambled a little as my new eyes flitted all over the place, identifying where I¡¯d left my stuff.

    The second I spotted my backpack and clothes, I rushed to throw them all back on, then intended to march right up to the door to wait there until he let me out. Before I could, one of Glim¡¯s human hands landed on my shoulder and gripped it with surprising strength.

    ¡°Stop,¡± Glim commanded. I did. I just about froze in place, actually. When I creaked my neck around to give him a look, the ripper simply sighed and waved a baggy full of bloodied wetware at me. ¡°Do you want to keep these? Also, there¡¯s this.¡±

    He let go of me briefly to approach a shelf and extracted the same container that had held my new and improved eyes. He practically shoved it in my face. Floating around the solution like they were being pickled was a pair of human eyes, optic nerves stretching behind them like some weird bits of worms.

    I valiantly resisted the urge to puke.

    ¡°Ah, um, yeah, no¡­ Keep them? Or throw them out, I guess. I doubt they¡¯re very useful.¡±

    The ripper nodded and shrugged, then finally strolled over to the door so he could input several strings of passwords he blocked me from spying on. When the door swung open and he motioned for me to get out, the relief was immense.

    ¡°Thanks for the operation,¡± I mumbled, and then I was at the foot of the stairs in the chill air of the evening, neck craned as far back as it would go.

    Stars twinkled far above me in direct defiance of light pollution, so numerous and so luminous not even the city¡¯s best efforts could drown them out. There weren¡¯t a lot of benefits to living in this stretch of the galaxy, but the night sky was definitely one of them.

    For the longest time, I couldn¡¯t get a single glimpse of this stunning sight. My eyesight had failed me to the point where there was just a smear of stuff for me overhead, with pinpricks of light only somewhat visible during particularly bright nights.

    I was only half aware of the tears streaming down my face. I almost took a nosedive several times trying to climb the stairs, but I refused to divert my attention until I was on street level. At that point, basic self-preservation took over, and I looked around anxiously.

    The street wasn¡¯t deserted, and there were still gangers at the ice cream parlor, but no one was paying attention to the disheveled kid stumbling his way out of the ripper office, which was good. The gangs were not as violent or as overt with their behavior in the city proper as they were in the slums, but better safe than sorry.

    Not that I was in any condition to do my due diligence.

    My eyes flitted every which way. I practically flinched at every sign of motion I spotted at a distance, not because there was anything startling in it, but because I wasn¡¯t used to seeing so much. Everything was sharp, and detailed, and demanded that I look at it simply because I couldn¡¯t before.

    My mind was spinning already. I felt overwhelmed. Sensory overload was definitely a thing, and it was kicking my ass twelve ways to Sunday. It didn¡¯t help that my eyes were definitely above the human baseline, either.

    It felt like I¡¯d lived my whole life, before and after the accident that damaged my eyes, viewing the world at the lowest possible resolution. Now, I suddenly had a pair of premium eyes in my skull that ran at the highest resolution possible. The sheer amount of detail I could pick out from a dozen meters would have blown me away even if I hadn¡¯t started with failing eyesight.

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    In spite of that, I wouldn¡¯t trade my new eyes for the world. The thrill of just seeing things normally had put a big smile on my face, and my mood was so upbeat that I felt like nothing could bring it down. This was all the more true when I remembered what Glim had told me about the eyes¡¯ functionality.

    As stupid and reckless as it was, I pulled my scroll out of my backpack and quickly started looking up details on how to use advanced cyber eyes. As it turned out, on default settings, they were mostly operated through a series of blinks and eyes motions.

    I had no clue what that meant for my model, since the eyes didn¡¯t exactly come with a user manual, but I lucked out on the third set of instructions most manufacturers defaulted to. I squeezed my eyes shut and swiped them to the left, then up, down, and right. When I opened them, a collection of icons offered me various settings options for the eyes.

    The first thing I did was sync the eyes to myself properly, which allowed them to access my wetware even deeper and allowed me to ¡®click¡¯ on the icons with intent only instead of executing more weird eye motions. Syncing wasn¡¯t a standard feature, so I was once again thrilled with the eyes I¡¯d pilfered.

    From there, I customized my HUD and added several icons to the corner of my eyesight by default. They were minimized there and rather unobtrusive, but I could focus on them and bring them into focus if necessary. My chosen speed access icons were the default calls app, a rather basic browser I was determined to replace with one of my favorites later, a navigation app, and the settings access icon.

    I grinned vindictively when I finally granted my eyes access to my internet subscription using my old scroll, then finally stashed the ancient piece of tech away.

    I wouldn¡¯t need it ever again.

    Everything the scroll could do, my new eyes could do better, and they came with the added benefit of being built straight into my skull. No chance of losing them whatsoever! The thought of how exactly the eyes let me perceive sound from calls and whatever shows I might decide to watch freaked me out a little, true, but I got over that quickly.

    And there were other bonuses. For one, the navigation app was a marvel. When I set the route back home, a golden thread unfurled in my vision, stretching out of my chest and into the distance.

    I was mesmerized by the way it would shift whenever I moved, unerringly guiding me down the shortest path to my destination. With a grin on my face, I messed around with changing it to several different modes, including tacky glowing arrows, a ¡®wave¡¯ spreading out from and flowing down the right path, starry footprints that lit up the ground, and more. I ended up settling on the initial golden thread mode in the end, but the simple joy of experimenting was a treat.

    It was only when I found myself on the map that I realized I¡¯d been extraordinarily stupid. Instead of heading back home using one of the longer and more complex routes, I was now in sight distance of the checkpoint close to my home.

    I almost never used that checkpoint.

    It would have been more convenient, sure, but letting people know that I had access to the outer district when so few people other than high-up gangers had the same privilege was asking for trouble. Just the accusation of having a decent job in the outer district could get me mugged or knifed in an alley on principle.

    That¡¯s why I minimized my contact with everyone and always took the long way back home. I didn¡¯t care that people loved to theorize about why I could almost never be spotted out and about in the slums, or that Jason eagerly spread rumors that I spent most of my time on my back in some grimy hotel working as a joytoy.

    My luck had held out thus far, especially since I tried to time my daily commute for when I knew most people would be off the streets and in some grimy bar or in bed.

    It was too late to change paths, but I could make it harder to spot me. Grabbing my backpack, I made it into a kind of half mask that covered the lower half of my face and kept an eye out for anyone who looked like a spotter.

    It helped that there was so much less to see in the slums, or at least fewer things one might want to see. Straight junk dominated the scenery. More importantly, there seemed to be fewer people out and about. Was that because of Jason¡¯s stunt against the Reapers? Or what I had done to Jason and his bodyguard afterwards? Either way, it worked to my favor that there were fewer eyes to lock on me.

    Unfortunately, my need to pay attention soon started to work against me. Every shadow seemed a little too long, and every sound sent my raw nerves reeling. Even the weight of my backpack grew, dragging me down and slowing my steps.

    I didn¡¯t have all the expensive cybernetics in it, but I was becoming more and more painfully aware of the fact that I never even bothered to check how much the credit chips I¡¯d stolen off the bodies were worth.

    Somehow, my frazzled mind conjured up a conviction that anyone I came across would be able to smell the wealth on me, and that I¡¯d end up dead in some alley with my meager possessions stolen and my new eyes gouged out.

    A shadow flickered at the edge of my vision, and what sounded like a scrape of a foot shifted some of the garbage. My fingers tightened on my backpack. My heart hammered so loudly and with such power that I felt like I was going to puke.

    I tilted my head just a little to the side, not enough to take a proper look, but enough to see if someone was right on my tail. There was nothing, but before I could even feel relieved, another flicker in my peripheral vision only made my condition worse.

    Is there really someone? Or am I just seeing things? The meager working streetlights ahead of me flickered in an out, and my mind conjured faces laughing at me from the shadows.

    Another sound came, a bit further away this time, of shifting garbage.

    It¡¯s nothing. This is nothing. I¡¯m not being followed, and I¡¯m not going insane. If I repeated the words enough times, I might actually start to believe them.

    It was in this condition that I finally reached one of the tall, decrepit apartment buildings, and slipped inside with some measure of relief. I felt better with every moment that I drew closer to my own dreary cubicle that passed for a living space.

    Unfortunately, my body started to betray me right around then. My steps were slowing, lungs heaving, and both my eyes and the back of my head had started aching with a dull throb. I wasn¡¯t the strongest or the most athletic person ever, but years of pathetic meals and relatively tame work had done their damage.

    With stress added on top? I was barely putting one foot in front of the other by the time I climbed up six floors, and I was still two more floors away from my goal.

    I¡¯m going to complain. I don¡¯t care if it gets me shanked, but someone needs to do something about that deathtrap of an elevator because I don¡¯t want to walk every damn ¡ª

    My thoughts on the elevator, the last loss in a long string of decaying amenities, were roughly cut off when someone yanked on my shirt.

    I was thankfully only a few steps up from the landing, so when I collapsed onto my back with a whimper, I only lost most of my breath. My eyes, of course, were still performing their job perfectly. That meant I got to stare right into the maliciously grinning face of some grubby man I didn¡¯t recognize as he brought a knife up, ready to plunge it into me.

 Chapter 6: A Favor

    Tired or not, terrified or not, there are some instincts that make us all act the same. As it turned out, self-preservation qualified. Before I even consciously thought about it, I was driving my fist into my attacker¡¯s knee.

    His eyes widened, and he let out a shout as his stance crumbled. He almost collapsed on top of me, but at that point, I was already rolling away.

    I didn¡¯t quite pull off the maneuver. Just as I was about to get up, a foot kissed my midsection with a bit more force than was appropriate for a first date. I lost the air in my lungs. But even as I heaved for breath, I slipped my backpack off.

    I did that not a second too soon, giving me just enough time to shove the item between me and a knife. The weapon wasn¡¯t that great. Its blade failed to do much damage to my backpack, but my attacker wasn¡¯t deterred, raining down his second and third blow rapidly. Both were close enough to nick the skin on my fingers.

    With what breath I¡¯d finally managed to gather, I roared at the top of my lungs, then pressed forward with all my meager weight. If I¡¯d been fighting an adult on a steady diet and in good physical condition, my noodle frame wouldn¡¯t have had a snowflake¡¯s chance in hell of budging them.

    Fortunately for me, the asshole trying to kill me was just as underfed as I was, and his body was probably rotting away from a heady cocktail of drugs. When I applied all of my strength with desperation added on top, it was just enough to send him falling on his ass.

    I didn¡¯t hesitate or try to get a bit of payback in. I ran right past him and to the stairs, taking two at a time as my muscles burned with newfound strength.

    The lowlife cursed and screamed something after me, but I wasn¡¯t exactly paying attention. What I did hear was the thumping of his feet when he decided he wasn¡¯t going to leave me alone.

    My momentum carried me to the next landing and, with only slightly unsteady steps, up the final flight of stairs that heralded my arrival home. Already I was fumbling for my key inside my pants pocket, the search hindering the speed of my movement.

    ¡°I¡¯m gonna fucking catch you, you fancy rat! I saw where you were! Coming here where honest people try to make a living with your fucking¡ª¡±

    I cringed, and my feet all but glued themselves to the spot.

    This wasn¡¯t a random mugging. He knew. He¡¯d seen me. I wasn¡¯t imagining someone following me, I was just too stupid to understand the signs.

    I spun on my heel and rushed forward with my backpack once again playing the part of a shield. The druggie clearly wasn¡¯t expecting me to put up a fight, because he ate a face full of fabric just as he was rounding the top of the stairs.

    For a second, his body held, and then he was toppling over and banging down the steps in a flurry of curses and screams.

    I pursued, fresh desperation fueling me. Even if I escaped from the junkie and locked myself in my room, I¡¯d only be delaying the inevitable. Now that he¡¯d got it into his head that I had money, the druggie wasn¡¯t just going to shrug and move onto some other, more convenient victim.

    He might even call in some friends to try and force the door.

    It¡¯s me or him. I don¡¯t want to die now. I can finally see again. I can¡¯t die. I can¡¯t die. I can¡¯t die!

    He was disoriented and hurt, but I wasn¡¯t in the best headspace, either. So, the second I drew close enough to reach a piece of him, I stomped. My foot came down on his ankle with all the rage I could muster, and I was rewarded by a surprisingly loud crack.

    The druggie screamed again, this time at the top of his lungs and in a voice so high-pitched it hurt my ears.

    I stomped again, and the sound choked off.

    I probably should have picked a slightly more crucial bit of body to stomp, because this time, his hateful eyes focused on me. He lunged with shocking speed, and then I had a line of agony shooting through my thigh.

    It was me that screamed this time, and when he went for another slash, I slammed my backpack into the knife with everything I had. I lost my grip a second later and the fabric sack went over the railing, but his knife must have gotten stuck in the fabric, because it went along for the ride.

    For just a brief moment, a jolt of relief and hope swept through me. No knife meant no more lines of burning agony carved into my skin. It meant a fighting chance! Or it did, for all of the two seconds it took for the asshole to tackle me.

    My head hit the stairs with a loud thud. I could swear I saw the stars stretching above us through the concrete, yet their beauty fled me when the asshole clocked me in the jaw.

    There was another crack, and my stunned ass stared as the man howled in pain and cradled his hand for a second, several fingers hanging limp. A part of me was present enough to analyze what had happened.

    His fingers broke. His ankle snapped too easy as well. Brittle bones. Probably off his rocker on Booster.

    Unfortunately, the same drug fueled him enough to snap his other fist into my nose. Then he slapped me with his broken hand, and soon I was covering my head and trying to curl into a ball as hit after hit rained down on me.

    This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

    Even with adrenaline in my veins, I had no ability to strike back. My limbs felt like lead and strength had fled my frame. My head was spinning. I needed to throw up so badly that I couldn¡¯t even think straight. There would be no smart strategies or final desperate plays that would get me out of trouble this time.

    I should have gone for my shooter. He fell down the stairs. I had all the time in the world. Why didn¡¯t I go for my shooter?

    My dazed mind¡¯s only contribution was throwing more and more critique at my past self¡¯s actions, but that didn¡¯t change reality. And it definitely didn¡¯t change the fact that I was about to die.

    There was another crack, like a baseball bat hitting bone, and the sounds of violence briefly paused. They resumed a moment later, even more vigorously than before.

    It took me an embarrassing amount of time to realize I was no longer the target of said violence, and that there was a voice chattering at me.

    ¡°Kid? Kid? Come on, talk to me. Just look at me, at least. Need to know how bad you¡¯ve got it.¡±

    I managed to force my eyes open. While I expected my vision to be bleary and unsteady from the beating I¡¯d just taken, it was crystal clear instead. That was almost worse, since it forced my brain to process things at speeds it just wasn¡¯t ready for.

    I threw up right then and there, and would have started to choke on my own spit if the guy hovering over me didn¡¯t react quickly enough to pull me onto my side.

    ¡°Easy does it. Easy. Damn, harder to tell if you¡¯ve got a concussion with those eyes of yours¡­ Just breathe, kid.¡±

    I tried really hard to do what he was telling me, but it still took me several long moments of sputtering and awkwardly brushing sick off my lips before I got anywhere near a normal breathing rhythm.

    When he noticed I was mostly back to cognizant, my savior pulled me up to a sitting position, fingers already poking at bruises that were starting to form. One of my saviors, I corrected myself, because I realized that the sounds of violence were coming from a scowling red-headed woman who was wholeheartedly kicking the life out of my attacker.

    ¡°Attack kids, why dontcha? In my fucking building you asshole? IN MY BUILDING?¡± Her violence was glorious. The druggie was pretty much dead at that point. I really shouldn¡¯t have been blushing at the sight of her, but there we were.

    ¡°Jeez, kid, you¡¯re really out of it,¡± the third member of their little party drawled, and my eyes fell on a man casually leaning against the wall and watching me with a smirk. ¡°Don¡¯t let Mela see you looking at her like that. It¡¯s fifty-fifty on what she¡¯d do about it, and, eh, not sure you¡¯d enjoy even the ¡®good¡¯ ending of that scenario.¡±

    ¡°Fuck you talking about Lurch?¡± Mela, I presumed, glowered at her friend as she finally stepped away from the twitching druggie. The man was a corpse at that point, and that made me giggle for some fucked up reason.

    ¡°Can you two shut up? I think he might have a concussion,¡± the man helping me snapped, and I sent him the brightest smile I could.

    He was by far the oldest of the group, somewhere in his late thirties to the early twenties of the other two. His hair was speckled with gray that really stood out against the dark browns. He was looking at me with far too much concern for a complete stranger.

    ¡°I¡¯m fine!¡± I declared, still feeling woozy and off and like a part of my brain was just not working right.

    ¡°Sure you are. Whatcha got you smiling so much?¡± Mela demanded. Strolling forward, she elbowed the older guy out of her way and grabbed my chin to tilt my head up. ¡°Huh. Neat eyes.¡±

    ¡°Thanks? They¡¯re new!¡± I said brightly, then immediately felt my stomach curdle and a jolt of awareness slam back into me. What was I saying? What was I doing? Who even were they?

    My eyes swept over them one more time, and now that I was back into a more clear frame of mind, I picked up a rather crucial detail. All of them were wearing identical black biker jackets with the same mascot.

    A cute, purple kitten.

    The curdling dread simultaneously got worse and better. The Kittens weren¡¯t like the Reapers, or even the Goliaths. They were an actually influential gang, and they held sway over a good third of the slums and were always vying for more.

    The name was a misnomer, and only came about because one of their rivals tried to insult them. As the legends went, once they¡¯d beaten the offender half to death and tore out his entrails and hung him from them, the gang leader was so amused that they took on the moniker willingly.

    The story was probably exaggerated, but everyone agreed the previous name of Red Lions fit them better, considering how often they ended up covered in blood.

    The funny thing was, most civilians preferred them to just about any other gang. They wouldn¡¯t bother people for no reason. They might occasionally step in to prevent a crime if they were personally against what was happening. They also didn¡¯t care overmuch if you ¡®casually¡¯ joined one of the smaller gangs due to pressure or for protection.

    So long as you didn¡¯t cross them or try to fuck with their authority, the Kittens didn¡¯t much care about you.

    Mela scoffed, then gave me a wide grin that showed off far too many teeth. Credit where it was due, they were in surprisingly good condition. So, probably not a druggie then. ¡°Whatcha freeze up for, kid? Like what you see?¡±

    ¡°Um¡­¡±

    ¡°Heh. Course you do. Too bad you¡¯re a little too young for me. Fourteen? Thirteen?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m sixteen!¡± I squawked out of outrage, then blushed scarlet when she shot me a disbelieving look.

    ¡°Geesh, ya need to eat a bit more then. You sure don¡¯t look it. Still too young, though! We got some standards round here. Well, some of us do.¡± She shot a venomous look to the guy leaning against the wall, but he just rolled his eyes.

    It was then that I found my tongue again, and remembered something I likely shouldn¡¯t delay.

    ¡°Thank you. Really. Thank you for saving my life,¡± I rushed to say, earning myself another crooked grin.

    That was good. Smiles were good. Reminding them they saved me was good. They were less likely to take my life, if just to avoid wasting their own effort.

    ¡°We sure did save your ass, huh? You owe the Kittens a favor now. Do remember that,¡± Mela all but purred, then drew away from me and stretched like the animal the gang was named after. ¡°Well, let¡¯s clean out. Might want to drag that asshole out as well. Don¡¯t wanna stink this place up more.¡±

    ¡°Like it could get any worse. No idea why you insist on living away from the HQ. The boss offered to let you stay,¡± the cool wall-lean guy complained, but he grabbed one of the druggie¡¯s legs and started dragging him down the stairs.

    I don¡¯t know what prompted me to do what I did next, but I shouted after them, and then rushed to justify it. ¡°Wait! What are your names? I need to know who saved me, right?¡±

    I got several odd looks, but eventually the wall guy spoke up.

    ¡°Name¡¯s Lurch. That¡¯s Mela. The old guy¡¯s Mighty Mike. We¡¯ll call in that favor eventually kid, so try not to croak,¡± he shot in parting, then continued dragging off the corpse.

    ¡°Oh get off it, the favor¡¯s mine, I saved his ass!¡± Mela groused.

    She started to follow him, then bent down for a second. When she rose into view again, she was holding my backpack. To my shock, she actually threw it at me and I fumbled the catch, letting it slam into my face.

    ¡°Heh. Get better at that! Also, hey, look, you got a knife out of this!¡± she cheerfully declared, then dropped a grimy knife onto the steps next to me.

    I just stared at the disgusting, crusty weapon in disbelief as they walked off.

 Chapter 7: A Job To Do

    I didn¡¯t keep the knife. Shocking, I know, but just looking at it made me vaguely ill. I honestly wasn¡¯t sure what all the layers of brown and black on its blade were. I sincerely prayed it was blood, because the alternatives could have been so much worse.

    I had more important things to worry about in the short term. There was just about enough time to examine my backpack and feel relieved that the damage to it wasn¡¯t all that bad before I started to feel weak and dizzy.

    Whatever had carried me through the altercation and the short encounter with the Kittens was fading, and it was fading fast.

    I also found out, to my unbridled joy, that attempting to stand on my cut up leg sent shivers of pain and numbness racing through it. I just about collapsed on the spot, but the concrete railing of the stairwell saved me from a painful tumble.

    If my home wasn¡¯t just a few meters away, I don¡¯t think I would have made it. I almost felt thankful that I didn¡¯t live in one of the megabuildings. I wouldn¡¯t have survived the trip through their ecosystem of endless fucking hallways and what felt like miniature markets in some of the larger corridors.

    I¡¯d spent part of my childhood in one of those, and while they were not as smelly as you might expect, the memories still left me feeling claustrophobic and on edge. Part of that came from how I was used to the sparser streets and polite distances kept in the slums. Still, even as a child, I disliked so much bustle.

    The memories were a welcome reprieve from reality, though, which was probably another reason I made it to my door. I waved my hand, the chip implant in my wrist registered, and my path to relative safety was secured.

    When I finally stumbled into my private space, the relief I experienced as shoddy lights blinked awake and the heavy metal door closed with a hiss behind me was immense.

    In all honesty, my place was kind of a dump. Not a huge shock considering it lived up to the exacting standards of the slum lifestyle, but it merited a mention nonetheless. Especially since the apartment consisted of a single room and a small alcove that served as a bathroom, without a door of its own.

    Directly to my left was a wardrobe that held the entirety of my clothes and had a small cubby meant to be filled with shoes. To my right was a double bed that took up entirely too much space, but was also the most luxurious item I owned. A holdover from when my mother was still around.

    On the far left of the room was a small desk, and on the right the aforementioned alcove with a shower, a toilet, a bathroom sink, and a mirror that stayed grimy no matter how often or how hard I scrubbed it down. At that point, I¡¯d just accepted that the plaque was a permanent fixture and moved on. I didn¡¯t really want or need to see my face that often anyway.

    The only hint of separation or privacy was the shower curtain you could pull out of the right-hand side of the bathroom alcove, and which followed a set of rails set into the floor to lock into the opposite side. It made the shower cramped and uncomfortable, but it was better than letting water freely spray all over the place. The drain was actually half decent, so mold didn¡¯t really spread past the corner.

    I headed straight for that shower, shedding clothes as I limped. I fumbled a little with the curtain, but when the first drops of hot water hit my skin, it was pure bliss. That was one of the reasons my mother eventually opted for the apartment: hot water. By some miracle, the building¡¯s boiler room still worked.

    I even broke out my good shampoo and soap for the occasion! They were from a slightly nicer brand and smelled like some indeterminable kind of flowers rather than pure, nauseating chemicals. I figured I got to treat myself a little with all that I had managed to survive.

    The cut on my thigh wasn¡¯t as bad as I initially feared. It was still an angry red line that went all the way from near my knee up to uncomfortably close to my crotch, but it was relatively shallow. It didn¡¯t even look all that inflamed, which I earnestly hoped meant I wouldn¡¯t catch some deathly infection.

    I would let Glim cut my leg off if I had to, but it was kind of sad that amputation was the cheaper option when compared to trying to beat an infection nowadays. The cheap infection medicine was risky and at least mildly addictive, and the good medicine cost¡­ well, an arm and a leg.

    I kept a small first aid kit next to the foot of my bed and close to the shower. So once I was all clean and toweled off, I grabbed it and applied generous amounts of rubbing alcohol to the wound before calling it a day.

    My face ached, my body ached, my mind ached. I barely forced myself to figure out how to set an alarm on my new eyes before I passed out.

    ¡ª

    I woke up to an alarm going off inside my skull. It felt a bit like my brain was vibrating while a cheerful tune played in the background, which¡­ let¡¯s just say it did a good job. I got up quickly just so the sensation would stop.

    It was a good thing that whatever sensors the eyes used cut off the alarm, because I honestly had no clue if I could figure out how to turn it off on my own.

    That couldn¡¯t entirely be blamed on morning blues. I felt like a particularly juicy piece of steak that had been pounded to oblivion so sauces and spices could be properly worked into it. My left eye ached something fierce whenever I blinked or my eyelid so much as twitched. Pain was blooming from all over my front. The cut on my thigh had started to tingle and itch. I was fairly sure one of my arms had a cracked bone or something, because moving it was agony.

    For several long moments, I just lay on my back and stared at the ceiling. I had to say, it didn¡¯t look all that appealing. For some fucked up reason, spiders, flies, and small insects just up and followed humanity wherever we went in the whole wide cosmos, so I had several thick cobwebs hanging above my head.

    This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

    I needed to get rid of them at some point. I¡¯d never noticed them before because I literally couldn¡¯t see that well, but now that I did, I felt vaguely ill at the thought of the mess detaching and falling on top of me while I slept. I was willing to tolerate spiders for the good service they provided by exterminating all other insects, but having them hang above my head was a step too far, even for me.

    It¡¯s a good thing I set that alarm for an hour earlier than I normally do.

    An extra hour of sleep would have been a treat, but I needed to get myself moving, and I didn¡¯t think I¡¯d be able to do that as quickly as usual.

    This suspicion was proven correct when I stumbled off my bed. The pain I was in only got worse, and I almost threw up due to nausea that swept through me. A part of me rankled at my recklessness to just collapse into sleep when I knew I could have a concussion, but the rest of me was aware of the fact that I¡¯d had little choice in the matter. There was absolutely no way I could have stayed awake after a robbery, surgery, and then a near lethal mugging.

    Damn it, the mugging. I felt so ill with rage when I remembered I¡¯d almost been killed by some drugged up asshole with a knife, after everything else I¡¯d been through that day.

    It would have been a bitterly ironic way to go.

    I tried to distract myself by quickly locating some underwear and a shirt before snatching up my backpack and spilling its contents over my bed. The credit chips landed on the sheets with disappointingly little fanfare. I almost expected a little jingle to sound from thin air to celebrate my acquisition of meager wealth.

    Well, I assumed it was meager. Mules were on the lowest rungs of the gang power ladder, so they didn¡¯t typically have much money to their names. Granted, I didn¡¯t think that the murder machine was a typical mule, and there was also the fact that I¡¯d robbed Jason and his bodyguard too.

    I could have slotted the chips directly into my port and used my new eyes to check their value and transfer the credits to my bank account, but I chose to do it through my ancient scroll instead. It didn¡¯t happen often, since any attempt to create forged credit chips was met with extreme violence by the megacorps, but gangs did sometimes make decoys filled with nasty viruses as a final ¡®fuck you¡¯ to whoever managed to steal their shit.

    To my relief, none of the chips melted my scroll and reduced it to a worthless block of plastic and metal. To my consternation, the amount of money the chips contained was not meager. Three thousand, seven hundred and fifty-one credits. That¡¯s how much the entire batch of stolen chips was worth in the end.

    My tongue went dry, my mind spun, and my heart just about stopped. Then it started again, panic driving the beat way faster than normal.

    I had no clue how the credits were split between my four victims, but even if they were evenly divided, someone would take exception to the fact that I¡¯d stolen so much money. That wasn¡¯t even counting the high-grade cybernetics which I¡¯d stashed away in my hidey hole.

    All of a sudden, I was distinctly and beyond any doubt aware that there would be retribution for what I¡¯d done. The owner of all the goods would try to get them back, and Jason¡¯s family was just as likely to come after my ass.

    The one bright spot in the fucked up mess I¡¯d made for myself was the fact that I didn¡¯t think anyone had lived to note my participation in the robbery. Jason had approached me through his usual cloak-and-dagger bullshit, probably to spare himself the indignity of dealing directly with a guy he mocked for being a joytoy. That meant as long as I managed to keep my head down, the shit storm coming to the slums might just pass me over.

    Still¡­

    Nearly four thousand credits. That was the kind of money that could last me several years, or afford me some nicer amenities for a while. I might even be able to pay for a few nice programs or online courses.

    The problem was, I couldn¡¯t exactly register the credits to my bank. Such a sudden influx of credits to an account that was barely staying open would likely trigger all sorts of red flags. If any of my would-be pursuers had a way of monitoring such things, I¡¯d stand out like a sore thumb.

    Maybe it was pure paranoia speaking, but I preferred to stick to a safer approach now that most of my pressing needs were met.

    I had a place to stay, on account of my mother dropping our residence in the outer district and using all of her savings to outright purchase an apartment in the slums. I could see again, which stayed my inevitable date of execution by way of starvation. Just as importantly, I still had my job, which could at least cover the cheapest food and other essentials.

    I was in a better place than I¡¯d been at for years. So, it was rather an odd reaction when I burst into tears and unashamedly sobbed into my sheets for nearly long enough to make me late to my job.

    I couldn¡¯t help it. The relief, the stress, the sheer stupidity of what I¡¯d done, it was all crashing down on me. I had made so, so many dumb decisions! Signing up to ambush a gang mule was definitely one of them, but then I went and stole the cyberware, instead of thinking to check if the credit chips could cover the purchase of a regular pair of eyes. Sure, they wouldn¡¯t have been as good, but they also wouldn¡¯t be a major discovery risk.

    The credits at least couldn¡¯t be tracked, as long as I was cautious with my spending. The corpos jointly produced and backed those on a galactic level, and each chip was a blackbox with a certain value assigned to it on production. They could never be refilled, only gradually spent, until the credit counter hit zero and the slip of plastic and circuitry fried itself into uselessness.

    They tried adding series numbers and stuff to make each individual chip traceable at the start of the venture, but quickly gave up when they realized the scope of what they were doing and that they might like to have untraceable funds on hand if the need struck. So there we were. The chips now only contained some secret code thing that made it allegedly impossible to hack and which served as proof of authenticity at the same time.

    I distracted myself from having to decide what to do with the chips by scrubbing a bit of the gunk off my mirror and looking myself in the eyes. I was thin, thinner than the last time I¡¯d cared to look. Bruises bloomed all over my face, the most notable gracing my left eye, along with a shallow cut just above it. My black hair fell around my gaunt, pale face in waves, framing it and making it look even more skeletal.

    It was my eyes I was really interested in, though. I had to fight down a wince when I was a met with a pair of ruby-red irises that all but shone with an inner light. Yeah, definitely not subtle. Funnily enough, the eyes almost looked organic otherwise. There was no series code, no manufacturer mark, nothing. Just the creepy red glow. Overall, I looked like some vampiric corpse that had crawled out of a meat shredder.

    I sighed and looked away, finally deciding that I¡¯d leave most of the chips behind, hidden in my first aid kit. I¡¯d take the one chip that had around four hundred creds with me just for emergencies, but my heart couldn¡¯t take carrying around the full volume of my newfound wealth, especially not after my painfully recent mugging.

    This is not going to be a fun day. Catill is going to have so many questions. I just hope he¡¯s not going to fire me on the spot when he sees my face.

    Catill was many things, but he had a strict ¡®no trouble¡¯ policy that he stuck to religiously. Honestly, most days, I was surprised he¡¯d even hired me in the first place.

    So, the least I could do was try and minimize the chance of him getting swept up into my mess. Unfortunately, that meant taking the long way round to my workplace. And in my condition¡­

    It¡¯s a good thing I woke up early, I groused as I finished dressing, hoisted my backpack, and headed out the door.

    Each step was pain, but I¡¯d be damned if I failed to show up for work.

 Chapter 8: Gaming It Up

    If there was a god out there, like the old Terran legends liked to claim, then he was a sadist who hated my guts. There was no other way to explain the nonsense I¡¯d been through! I mean, who survives the clash of two inhuman murder machines and pulls off an amazing robbery, just to get nearly shanked in his own apartment building¡¯s stairwell?

    Goddamn building and its goddamn malfunctioning elevator. If I could have used it, the creeper wouldn¡¯t have been able to follow me, and I¡¯d have gotten off scot-free.

    Why was I on a fresh spree of complaints? Well, it was kind of hard to keep them in by the time I made it to Catill¡¯s rundown little shop. My entire being was on fire from the sheer effort of remaining in motion.

    It didn¡¯t help that he looked wholly unimpressed to see me upon my glorious entrance. And no, I did not almost trip over my own feet and faceplant.

    If Catill says otherwise, he¡¯s a dirty lying liar who lies.

    ¡°Wa happened to you?¡± my employer immediately asked, face scrunching up in distaste as he took in my bruises. The expression did not do good things for his features. ¡°I swear your kind¡¯s not supposed to change color like that.¡±

    ¡°Decided to redecorate a little. You know, a little extra color never hurt anyone.¡±

    ¡°Answer my question or walk, human.¡±

    I sighed, but I knew he was serious. Catill wasn¡¯t one to budge when pressed, so I could choose between justifying myself and losing my job.

    ¡°Listen, it wasn¡¯t my fault. I was tired and just trying to get home, okay? How was I supposed to know some random druggie was scoping out the area for victims? He almost killed me meters from my front door. If a couple kind souls didn¡¯t happen along, you¡¯d be down an employee right now. Still left me with plenty to remember him by, though.¡±

    Catill squinted at me. His eyes were dark yellow, a shade that could charitably be compared to amber. When I wasn¡¯t feeling so kind, like right in that moment, I called them piss-colored.

    A few seconds later, he nodded. ¡°You can get to work now.¡±

    Technically, I had around twenty minutes before my shift started. I also knew I had a snowflake¡¯s chance in hell of extracting more money from my boss for the additional labor, but¡­

    I just sighed again and did as I was told. He had literally saved my life when he hired me. If he wanted to take a little advantage of me, then let him.

    As always, I started my day at work in the most exciting way possible: going over the previous day¡¯s books and making sure everything was properly squared away. Few people were as anal about taxes as various merchant emporiums, and Catill wasn¡¯t exactly a whizz with the numbers.

    To be honest, neither was I. But I didn¡¯t have a rage boner against all things technological like Catill did, which meant I could check my work over using my scroll. My employer always scowled at this, but since he insisted on keeping actual log books in an age of space travel (restricted though it may be), he had only himself to blame.

    The entire store was a testament to Catill¡¯s oddity. The space bristled with shelves containing every imaginable knickknack that had nothing to do with technology. We sold paperweights, artwork, baubles of every shape and size, lots of tools, and other oddments. There was also an assortment of knives that could be passed off as something meant for a kitchen, but would most likely see use in dark street corners.

    Catill¡¯s Shop of Curiosities lived up to its title. Still, nothing was more curious than the fact that the place was still up and running, despite the fact that I had seen a customer enter the premises exactly five times in recent recorded history. I¡¯d also witnessed only one successful sale.

    After this mysterious staying power, the store¡¯s other chief curiosity was Mr. Catill himself. The man, and I was fairly sure he was a man, wasn¡¯t human. He was from some fringe alien race I didn¡¯t know the name of. No amount of searching the net had yielded the answer, and I¡¯d have more luck trying to pull it out of thin air than I would asking him about it upfront.

    He was extremely cagey about everything. One time, he utterly refused to share with me what he brought along for lunch. Even later, when I saw him slurp down the disgusting slop some vending machines called ¡®Highly nutritious paste! One tube will keep you fed for a full day!¡¯, he stayed tightlipped.

    His coloring was best described as puke green. I¡¯ve already waxed eloquent about his lovely eyes. His entire body was folds and folds of leathery skin that fell over each other. His face was humanoid but rather unique, with his squished nose and wide, bulbous lips that parted to reveal needlepoint teeth.

    Overall, Mr. Catill was a real beaut, on top of being a little looney.

    Really, he went to insane lengths to avoid using advanced tech. Even our cash register was subjected to hours of glaring when I finally talked him into getting one. Maybe he was doing some major money laundering for every gang in the city and needed to keep off the grid, but I tended to think he was just plain crazy.

    Yet, in spite of all his flaws, I would willingly take a bullet for the man. A small caliber bullet, and only to one of my limbs, but still. That was rare loyalty right there.

    One of his tamer quirks was an obsession with optimizing the layout of his store. So, once I finished the books (which took way less time with eyes that could track and autocorrect everything for me), I got to turn my brain off and just shuffle things around for hours at his exacting orders.

    Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.

    Was it fun, with the condition my body was in? Nope. But at least it wasn¡¯t too physically demanding, and I wasn¡¯t a joytoy like most of my peers in the slums assumed I was.

    Besides, now that I had my new eyes, I got to cheat. Catill didn¡¯t like it when I spent too much time on my scroll, even during my breaks, but what was he going to do about the feed I had built directly into my head now?

    I got to watch several inane shows, browse some semi-reliable news portals for things to look out for on the way back home, and even listened to music for a while. It was still tripping me up that the eyes somehow let me hear things, but I was just glad they worked.

    I was also thankful they had an automatic noise calibration system for when someone tried to talk to you while you were blasting music. That saved my bacon once or twice.

    The longer the day stretched on, and the longer I worked in relative calm and quiet, the better I felt. It wasn¡¯t just physically that I was improving, either. Sure, my muscles apparently enjoyed the chance to limber up and engage in some honest work, but what I valued more was my peace of mind.

    Cloistered inside my apartment, all alone with the stolen goods, it was easy for the demons in my head to convince me people were about to bust down my door, snatch me up, and then inflict horrible suffering on me until I screamed for death.

    At my workplace, though? In the company of Catill¡¯s regular surly self? Whatever part of me had clenched up and stayed that way ever since the shooting started was slowly relaxing. In that dusty little shop with my nagging boss, the notion of people hunting me down seemed ridiculous.

    How could they possibly manage such a feat, anyway? I was a street kid. I hadn¡¯t checked in with a proper health provider in over a decade. I didn¡¯t have any friends or acquaintances who knew what I¡¯d been up to. In fact, I was a stranger to just about every inhabitant of the slums.

    There wasn¡¯t even a way for anyone to track the cyberware I¡¯d stolen. Unless the pieces magically activated themselves and released some kind of a tracking beacon, no one would find them behind that dumpster.

    If someone, somehow, did do that, then good for them! The cyberware became their problem to deal with, and I could happily wash my hands of the whole mess. I didn¡¯t worry about the eyes so much. Glim had declared them free of most obvious issues, and I believed him at least capable of detecting trackers. He wouldn¡¯t have lasted so long as a scav scam of a ripper otherwise.

    No, the longer I spent working through a well-established routine in a familiar environment, the easier it got to talk myself into believing I was safe.

    And with that revelation, I felt like the world opened up before me. It bore mentioning again, but I had a brand new set of eyes and more money than I ever thought I¡¯d lay my hands on. A very limited piece of the world was my oyster!

    The first thing I did on my break was slot that credit chip I¡¯d brought along into my brand new wetware neuroport. Then I logged onto the most lauded and supposedly safest app store I could find. Navigating to the Reality Enhancement software tab was a matter of moments, and I was soon browsing the many, many options for sale. RE software wasn¡¯t exactly new, but its high degree of reliability and immersion was a relatively recent development made possible by wetware advancements.

    Now, in just a few mental clicks, people with the right hardware could download an app that meticulously tracked all their physical characteristics. The app could even present those characteristics in the form of stats and a neat HUD that gave advice concerning health, workout regimes, improved diet, and so much more.

    I downloaded a few partial sample apps, including one that showed me my current muscle mass and recommended fixes for any deficiencies, but I quickly cringed away. I could recognize a shill when I saw one, and this app had blatant product promotion all over it. Really, was it the best solution for all my problems to just shove a bunch of branded chemicals down my throat?

    Huffily navigating menus in search of the app so I could delete it did yield one useful discovery, though. Tucked away in a corner of my main ¡®eye settings¡¯ menu, I found a tab inconspicuously named ¡®color settings¡¯.

    I accessed it on a whim, then had to choke down an excited whoop when it brought up a 3D visual of my new eyes. All the bits whose color I could change were clearly highlighted and separated by different tabs.

    A silly part of me that never had quite died in spite of my circumstances wanted to make my eyes a solid pink. Sclera, iris, pupil, and all. It would probably freak people out something fierce.

    Another part of me leaned towards finding a green as close to my natural eye color as possible. It would have been kind of nice to claw a piece of normality back from the chaos of all that had happened. Yet¡­ that kind of felt like it would have been cheating, or perhaps denying a newfound part of me.

    In the end, I declined the offer to save my new color settings and closed out of the tab. I would keep my creepy red vampire eyes, at least for the time being.

    Navigating back to the app store, I eventually found an app that seemed to offer solid functionality for a reasonable price. I finalized my purchase immediately. It cost me twenty credits to get the damn thing, a ridiculous amount of money to spend on what some might see as frivolity, but I was determined.

    I could only really start to fix myself if I knew how to approach the subject. The app promised to keep track of my nutrition, help formulate a good workout plan, and even monitor a bunch of other useful health data that would alert me the second I got sick or something else went wrong.

    More to the point, it had a nice little stat point system that would track every bit of progress I made so I could stay motivated. I¡¯d never gotten to play full VR immersion games before, but I hoped the app would let me get a taste of that experience.

    Who knew? Now that I had the money, maybe I¡¯d buy a gaming set at some point. A cheap and old one, because you can never have anything nice in the slums, but¡­ I¡¯d take it.

    The app downloaded quickly, then asked for some time to collect and calibrate my data so it could generate the stats. I happily let it do its thing. There was an unpleasant tingle that passed through my eyes when the process kicked off, and my sight frazzled for just a second. But the weirdness didn¡¯t last long and didn¡¯t return, so I just went back to work.

    Ten minutes later, the app did a happy little jingle to announce it was ready. I dove straight in and started hunting for my stat window.

    When I finally spotted it, I froze.

    <table style="border-collapse: collapse" border="1">

    <tbody>

    <tr>

    <td style="width: 98.9568%">

    Adrian Flinn

    Strength: 0.6

    Reflexes: 0.7

    Acuity: 4 (-6)

    Physique: 0.5

    Recovery: 0.4

    Stamina: 0.8

    Soul: 1

    Adaptability: 1

    Tolerance: 1

    Cognition: 1

    Essence: 0.1

    Mind Synchronicity: Minor Instability

    </td>

    </tr>

    </tbody>

    </table>

    Now, my stats were depressing for sure, but I kind of expected that from the start. That wasn¡¯t what threw me for a loop. No, what got me was the fact that none of the stats after ¡®Stamina¡¯ were supposed to be a thing.

    They were not covered in the app¡¯s promo. No one had tried to upsell me on them. Unlike the first half of entries, they came with absolutely no explanations attached.

    Okay, so¡­ what the hell are you?

 Chapter 9: Numbers Man

    A funny thing about humanity is that we never overcame our need for amusement, earth-bound or not. Even within the slums, where despair reigned and people died on the daily, we would always find some way to entertain ourselves. Drugs, bullying, and worse: anything to break the dreaded chains of boredom.

    So, it¡¯s only natural that games had followed us into the stars. And, once it became possible, they invaded every aspect of our daily lives, too.

    Stats enabled by the Reality EnhancementTM software were a perfect example of this. Monkey brain sees numbers go up, monkey brain feels good!

    It didn¡¯t really matter that most people could only ever squeeze out a few extra 0.1s out of the experience, at least without replacing parts of their body with cybernetics or delving into genetic enhancements. Even those miniscule tenth-by-tenth gains were only possible because of how the stats were set up. ¡®1¡¯ was the average level of physical fitness that a healthy adult was expected to reach, ¡®average¡¯ in the sense that the data was collected from all the different users of the app.

    Following that logic, with my stat of 0.6 strength, I was only worth about half an adult. Again, not a shocker. My daily meals were¡­ lacking. I avoided buying anything from the slums whenever I could, and instead used one of the many vending machines in the outer district as my main source of nutrition.

    These meal packs didn¡¯t taste very good, and they definitely didn¡¯t provide everything a growing body needed. Take, for example, the meal I¡¯d grabbed on my way to Catill¡¯s shop that morning. It was marketed as a chicken wrap with salad dressing, but all the various ¡®ingredients¡¯ that went into the unholy creation tasted mostly like cardboard with some subtle seasoning. The nutritional value of the meal just about matched the expectations set by its taste.

    Still, the vending machine meals weren¡¯t as likely to give you cancer or long-term health complications as the slum cuisine was. And at two credits per meal pack, I couldn¡¯t argue with the price.

    So, yeah. I was unlikely to ever be as healthy or as fit as I should have been at sixteen years of age, as long as I continued these fine dining habits. Thankfully, I now had the credits to work on the issue, at least in the short term. That was one piece of good news.

    But the odd stats were still bothering me.

    The app was upfront about what it tracked and what it could offer advice on. The physical stats were clearly listed in the little description section of the store, with more information available in a single click.

    Strength indicated physical might and muscular performance. Reflexes were, well, exactly what the word implied: your ability to react quickly and with stability. Acuity used to be the bane of my existence, since it referred to the quality of a person¡¯s eyesight and perception. From there, you had the trifecta of stats: Physique, Recovery, and Stamina. They indicated physical toughness and ability to withstand various forms of labor, ability to recover from wounds, and how long as well as how vigorously a person could exert themselves.

    Each stat could be accessed for a more in-depth breakdown. Strength, for example, included extra information like your presumed maximum dead lift or bench press. I had zero intention of looking there, because I didn¡¯t need to be bombarded by a variety of depressingly low numbers.

    Absolutely none of this explained what a stat called ¡®Soul¡¯ would cover. There was no accessible breakdown for Adaptability, Tolerance, Cognition, or Essence.

    Mind Synchronicity was the most alarming. What was ¡®Minor Instability¡¯ supposed to mean in the context of Mind Synchronicity? Nothing good, I¡¯d imagine.

    Yet, no matter how much I tried to extract an explanation from the app, the stupid thing refused to cooperate.

    Did I download a virus by mistake?

    The app page looked so official, though! They couldn¡¯t have faked all the reviews, either. No way in hell would they pay a shill to leave a review whining about how the app¡¯s recommended workout schedule was too much of a pain to follow.

    Well, if the app itself wasn¡¯t going to give me what I needed, I¡¯d simply take full advantage of the net instead. Or I was about to, until muttered curses and a whack to the back of my head reminded me I needed to keep my hands moving.

    ¡°Fool boy! Wat do I pay you for? Get back to work. It¡¯s not lunch break yet.¡±

    I did, and with gusto. Not just because Catill was not a man to mess with, but because he deserved at least that much from me. I didn¡¯t think amusing myself while I worked was wrong, but letting myself get distracted enough to stop working altogether? I was ashamed of myself for slipping that much.

    It was only several hours later, when Catill gave me his blessing and I was shoving cardboard chicken down my throat, that I could take time for some research.

    Things refused to go my way from the start.

    I began by looking through all the stat listings from other apps. They were pretty damn universal, with only a few using different words for the same things. Those who offered a stat breakdown followed my chosen app to the T.

    In the same vein, no matter how many times I looked things up or how differently I worded my request, the stat lists available on the net corroborated the app descriptions. There was no such thing as the stats my new app had foisted on me.

    Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

    So, I was forced to get a little more specific.

    ¡®Soul¡¯ naturally brought up nothing but gibberish. Religion hadn¡¯t really been a thing for a long, long while, and only a few people here and there even bothered with that stuff anymore. Oh, there were obviously whispers from time to time about horrible things and even worse fates, but the monsters they featured were very real.

    ¡®Adaptability¡¯ just hit me with the dictionary definition of the word, like I was too stupid to know it. ¡®Tolerance¡¯ too, though I also got a bunch of history texts, along with some articles about tension between Terrans and alien species and all sorts of fucked up politics.

    ¡®Cognition¡¯ was a doozy. I even went down a rabbit hole of psychic nonsense for a hot minute. Pretty soon, though, I got frustrated and ditched that inquiry as well.

    ¡®Essence¡¯¡­ well, Essence was almost as bad as Soul and Cognition. But it also veered into a few different sites offering, eh, ¡®alternative¡¯ methods of insemination and cross-breeding with alien species, complete with informative pictures I wished I could scrub from my brain.

    Why did I click that? Why? Maybe getting stabbed woulda been preferable.

    The search for ¡®Mind Synchronicity¡¯, at last, yielded a bit of info. Not at first, obviously. First I had to dig through psychology garbage and self-help websites and guidebooks, which¡­ yeah, not something that was ever gonna help me. Can¡¯t ¡®Deal with my traumas in a healthy manner¡¯ while living in the slums. Or living on Kadar at all, really, let alone the lovely city of Zanos.

    Underneath all that, though, I found a couple forums. Kind of shoddy-looking and archaic, but there were actual people there looking for help. Lots of questions about how to maintain their Mind Synchronicity stat, and worried comments about their condition worsening.

    I was intrigued at first, but the longer I read, the more I became convinced this was a wash as well. What the hell was I supposed to do with ¡®You need to center yourself and mind the energy you¡¯re absorbing¡¯, or ¡®A bit of purification is preferable even if the source you found is pure¡¯?

    Absolutely nothing, that¡¯s what.

    Still, there was another entry that confused me: ¡®I know how hard it is to get your hands on Essence, but it¡¯s better to be careful in the long run.¡¯

    The forum contributor had used that word, ¡®Essence¡¯, like it was something that could be discovered and maybe even used directly. Logically speaking, that should preclude it from referring to a stat on my screen. Right?

    And yet¡­ if two of the keywords I was so desperately searching for were mentioned together, wasn¡¯t that a hint of its own?

    I groaned, then forced myself to get back to work. My meager meal was long gone. I didn¡¯t want to let Catill catch me slacking off twice in one day.

    Lifting a box, I caught sight of my grouchy boss and paused.

    Catill.

    Now there was a thought. He was old, or at least he looked old, and he was into all sorts of odd and esoteric stuff. Maybe he¡¯d be able to enlighten me on what I was dealing with.

    How to be subtle about this, though?

    Subtlety wasn¡¯t my greatest virtue. I could be careful, even downright sneaky, but that was a different thing than managing your words around someone. That, I failed at more often than not. Mostly on account of not having a lot of friends or any experience with interpersonal relationships.

    I needed an angle.

    Thankfully, it wasn¡¯t long before I had an inkling of a plan. When Catill wandered over to inspect one of the shelves I¡¯d just rearranged, I took the chance to execute it.

    ¡°Um, I hope you don¡¯t mind if I ask you a question?¡± I ventured carefully.

    When Catill turned a gimlet eye on me but didn¡¯t immediately cut me off, I took that as encouragement enough to go on.

    ¡°Heard Jason bragging about something the other day. He said he got a premium Reality Enhancement app, and that he¡¯s going to be able to raise his ¡®Essence¡¯ and ¡®Mind Synchronicity¡¯ stats soon, but¡­ those aren¡¯t a thing, right? I looked up some of the apps, and none of them have those.¡±

    I¡¯d kept my eyes carefully fixed on the items I was moving, because a part of me was convinced Catill would see straight through my bullshit. However, that just meant I missed the moment the man¡¯s puke-green skin turned almost stark white.

    I was forced to notice the change when he suddenly gripped my wrist with crushing strength and forcibly turned me to face him. I yelped, but the sound died in my throat as he fixed me in place with his stare. His eyes were¡­ frightened? Aghast? Dare I say it¡­ even deranged?

    ¡°Stay away from that boy, do you ¡®ear me? Stay away and never go near ¡¯im again. I swear, if you so much as think about approaching ¡¯im again, I¡¯m going to throw your ass out on the streets, and I don¡¯t care wat you¡¯ll do to survive then!¡±

    Catill¡¯s grip on my wrist tightened as he kept ranting. It was like he wasn¡¯t really looking at me, though. His eyes were locked on mine, but they seemed to be staring at something or someone far beyond me.

    ¡°O-Okay, I get it! I get it!¡± I stammered. ¡°I don¡¯t exactly like Jason, anyway. He¡¯s a fucking rat.¡±

    ¡°Good. Good.¡± Catill¡¯s eyes properly focused on me again, and he grimaced. ¡°I don¡¯t like those eyes of yours. I don¡¯t care if they¡¯re cheap crap, you shouldn¡¯ta bought somethin¡¯ that unsettlin¡¯. Git to it, boy! Back to work! If your mama coulda ¡¯eard you, she woulda taken your ass off.¡±

    I froze, but my boss didn¡¯t notice, still ranting in his odd accent as he walked away.

    My mother. He¡¯d mentioned my mother. And yet, I¡¯d only met him after she¡­ disappeared.

    I was looking for work on one of the main outer district streets, and he¡¯d happened to come across me. Heard me arguing with a shopkeeper that said I¡¯d be useless to him even if he hired me.

    I¡¯d always thought that was it. A moment of chance, when the blasted city actually did something kind for me, for once. But he¡¯d mentioned my mother, and I was now too shaken to go after him and ask why.

    His reaction wasn¡¯t normal. ¡®Calm¡¯ and ¡®collected¡¯ were at the top of my list of adjectives for the man. Maybe even ¡®cold.¡¯ Catill was many things, but he never lost it like that. He just didn¡¯t.

    My mood didn¡¯t improve for the rest of the day. I was on edge, constantly stealing glances at my boss. Or trying to, at least. Catill had suddenly proven himself to be elusive. He did have an office in the back where I usually did the paperwork, but he didn¡¯t like to spend time there himself. He was usually all too happy to ¡®supervise¡¯ my work. Now, I almost thought he was hiding from me.

    It was only when I finished for the day and headed out that another thought occurred to me. If Catill had reacted that badly, and if he was visibly terrified just to hear me mention those words, how were people just openly discussing it on the net?

    Maybe it was silly of me, but with everything that had happened recently, a cold pit of worry settled in my gut. What if the forums weren¡¯t meant to help at all? What if they were supposed to serve as bait for whoever was dumb enough to engage with them?

    More importantly, was I now on some kind of watch list, just because I¡¯d opened those forums?

    Common sense said no. My paranoia screamed YES.

    I could almost swear I heard mocking laughter echo in my ears, and for just a moment, a black silhouette with a disturbingly crooked grin flashed past the corner of my eye.

 Chapter 10: Consequential

    Actions always have consequences. A simple, universal truth that everyone should keep firmly in mind. That I should keep firmly in mind.

    And I would, from that moment onwards. I promised myself this over and over as I left Catill¡¯s shop and headed home. I would learn, and I¡¯d do better, and I¡¯d make fewer mistakes. Not ¡®no¡¯ mistakes, never that, but fewer of them.

    None of this helped with the cold grip of terror in my chest.

    I tried to focus on finding a new way home. My new eyes were a big help. I needed the route to be as confusing, as long, and as random as possible while still getting me to my destination.

    So, instead of taking the checkpoint furthest away from my apartment building, I took one a bit closer and slipped from the outer district into the slums. Then I doubled back in the opposite direction for a while before finally heading around in a great arc towards home.

    It was a bit risky, traveling so much of the slums. My feet would definitely not thank me for it. But after the scare Catill had given me and my grim thoughts about those forums, it felt appropriate.

    At least the circuitous route let me hit a few important stores on the way.

    The app might have gotten me in trouble, but it had also done its job while I worked. My inbox now contained a long and overly detailed plan to fix the many, many problems plaguing my body, chief of which was malnutrition.

    My first stop was one of the fancier prepackaged meal stores, where I got some much higher quality food for myself.

    Then I grit my teeth and stopped by a fancy health supplement store, purchasing more than a few packets of various powders whose names I didn¡¯t bother learning how to pronounce. They weren¡¯t the overpriced shit that those other ¡®premium¡¯ apps were shilling, either. Just down-to-earth stuff. Still, they cost as much as my monthly food budget and would last only a week.

    Painful. Exceedingly so. But some things ultimately couldn¡¯t have a price attached to them, and health was on that list.

    Besides, every time I thought about my physical condition, my mind flashed back to the attempted mugging. The druggie had dragged me around with contemptuous ease, and even the best of my attempts to strike back were¡­ deficient. No, I wouldn¡¯t let myself get into a situation like that again.

    Either I would fix myself, or I would bankrupt myself.

    Despite being deep inside my own mind, I never once forgot to pay attention to my surroundings. It was thanks to this that I spotted several odd signs on my grand travels through the slums.

    The locals were both terrified and relieved, and that just made no sense. Then again¡­ it didn¡¯t take me long to figure out the split. Anyone who looked to be a ganger of any real sort was downright pale and shaky. Anyone who had a decent reason to resent the gangs was grinning it up.

    I¡¯d covered nearly half of my planned route by that point, and my policy was always to be as careful in the slums as I could be, but curiosity eventually won out. I looked around, spotted a relatively ¡®clean¡¯ alley by slum standards, and then inspected the group of kids my age lounging in it. They fell on the side of people whose mood had seen a recent uptick, which made them a safer target in my mind.

    So, I approached.

    Suspicion instantly slammed down over their faces like they were donning helmets, and their loose, friendly circle closed for mutual protection. I¡¯d made sure my shooter was visible just-so, which was a good argument against any stupidity on their part, but I still looked them over as warily as they did me.

    One of the group, a bold-looking girl, challenged me before I got too close.

    ¡°Whatcha want?¡±

    I decided being upfront was probably my best ticket to walking away with the information I wanted (and without having to shoot someone). ¡°Just confused, is all. Been, eh¡­ indisposed, recently. What¡¯s got everyone in a good mood?¡±

    The group relaxed a tiny bit, though the girl¡¯s face also took on a mulish expression. ¡°What¡¯s it to you? Huh? And why should I tell you a damn thing?¡±

    I sighed, resisting the urge to roll my eyes. If she¡¯d just demanded some minor payment from the start, things would have been so much easier. Still, needs must.

    When I extracted a credit chip, they all focused in on me intently.

    ¡°Ten creds. Take it or leave it. You¡¯re not the only group I can ask, and I bet they¡¯d be happy to get paid.¡±

    They eyed me, then, in a whole new way. And as their eyes raked over me, dark and calculating, I knew what they were searching for.

    If I was offering ten credits so easily, what else could I offer? What else did I own?

    Thankfully, I always made it a point to dress just shabbily enough. I definitely didn¡¯t look like I had any sort of money. Even the one ¡®fancier¡¯ possession I toted around openly, my backpack, had become significantly less appealing just recently.

    The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

    A knife-hole will do that.

    Of course, I wasn¡¯t idiot enough to flash the purchases I had just made. Those were stashed away in the backpack, very carefully so it didn¡¯t look bulky. Making a backpack appear as empty as possible was an art form, and one I eagerly practiced.

    ¡°Listen. I¡¯m tired, I¡¯m grouchy, I¡¯ve had a long day at work, and I just want to go back to sleep. Now, is there going to be war on the streets soon, or what?¡± I affected irritation, though I didn¡¯t have to pretend very hard.

    Finally, the girl conceded. ¡°No, no war. But the Reapers are done.¡± Her face broke into a bloodthirsty grin. ¡°Done and gone.¡±

    This should have been amazing news. The gang I¡¯d stolen from wouldn¡¯t be coming around for revenge. One less group of angry killers I¡¯d need to watch out for.

    Still, I could only stare at her. It took me a few seconds to form more questions, and even then, they came out as single-word wonders.

    ¡°Gone? How? When?¡±

    ¡°No one knows. Someone came through and decimated them. They barely even had the lowest level fuckers left, and leaders? All dead, to the last man and woman. They were all spectacularly splattered over the walls of the pigshit dump they called headquarters. The other gangs mopped up the leftovers once the coast was clear.¡±

    I stared some more, because damn. Double damn!

    I had very good reason for my heart to be skipping in fear at this news. The Reapers were horrible, and no one would miss them, but they were entrenched. Uprooting them so quickly and painlessly should have been impossible.

    Unless, of course, they¡¯d pissed off someone far beyond them. Say, like a mysterious manufacturer of top tier cybernetics.

    That would do it. For sure. Corpos like that loved their hit squads¡­

    I swallowed. ¡°I¡¯m gonna guess that everyone and their alien mother is trying to get in on a piece of the pie?¡±

    ¡°Of course.¡± The girl looked amused now. ¡°There¡¯s war happening already, they say. Lots of gangs are recruiting to make up for their losses. I guess you¡¯re alright, so I don¡¯t mind telling you that a recruiter for the Hounds will be by soon to check out this location. Stay if you want.¡±

    ¡°Um, thanks,¡± I stammered, caught thoroughly flatfooted by the offer. ¡°I gotta go, though. My mother would kill me if I joined a gang right now.¡±

    The group sneered and booed at me, like that was somehow going to turn me suicidal, but they didn¡¯t stop me when I decided to leave. I didn¡¯t need to worry about lying to them. We were unlikely to cross paths again, especially since they were about to do a very dumb thing.

    Who the hell went out of their way to join a gang during what sounded suspiciously like all-out war?

    I mean, Reapers weren¡¯t the biggest or the wealthiest, but they had pushed hard and pushed smart, at least at first. They had more than a few streets under their control, along with several distribution centers and a lucrative ¡®shopping mall¡¯ that was maybe three stores in total.

    With all that up for grabs? Even a big gang like the Kittens would feel tempted to take over, let alone the minor players of the slums.

    I cursed internally as I resumed my winding way home. The encounter had not improved my mood.

    Those kids had no reason to lie to me, but maybe they were¡­ confused. Yes, that was a word I liked. Confused. I mean, there was no way the Reapers would just get wiped out. And there was most definitely no bloody way that I¡¯d been involved with the potential cause of their extermination.

    Damn it, I needed to figure out what to do with the cybernetics I¡¯d stolen.

    The simplest answer was to install them all. There was really only one problem with that. Well, two: cyberpsychosis and number-blindness. To be fair, those two were fairly similar, especially in the sense that both could be blamed on excessive upgrades and the strain they placed on the mind.

    Cyberpsychosis occurred when someone got too many upgrades too quickly. It clouded the mind, impeded judgment, and generally gave someone more callous if not outright sociopathic tendencies. It definitely made it harder for someone for see other people as anything but victims. Those suffering from the condition typically pursued all of their darkest desires, inflicting their most vile urges on everyone around them with considerable glee.

    In a way, number-blindness was the exact opposite of that, but also much more¡­ sad, for its inevitable danger.

    It was impossible to move cybernetic limbs, to truly manipulate them and use them as your own, without three important factors. Proper nerve connections needed to be installed. Exceedingly exact coding had to be done. Lastly, you had to give your body time to recover from the ordeal.

    Unfortunately, ¡®waiting for one¡¯s body to recover¡¯ was just not enough. There are some things that are eternally different once you replace your own limbs. And if you kept doing it, removing piece after piece of your natural-born body, then it was entirely possible to become more coding than man.

    The corpos, so long as you had the money, would happily do anything for you. If you wanted them to pickle your brain in a jar and shove it into a wholly new, cybernetic body, they would! Too bad you¡¯d immediately be overwhelmed by your own coding, emotions falling away, until only the cold logic of self-preservation remained.

    And that was number-blindness. While cyberpsychos were ruled by their out-of-wack whims and urges, the number-blind couldn¡¯t even recognize their own emotions anymore. ¡®Little better than those bloody clankers,¡¯ Catill liked to say, and he was basically right.

    Alternatively, you could be one of the rare few gifted enough to maintain control over themselves, and you¡¯d arrive at the other end of the procedure with might and power that no normal person with squishy bits could wield.

    Those people were rare, though. Very rare.

    So, I couldn¡¯t risk just grafting a bunch of new stuff onto my body. When choosing between two horrible fates, it¡¯s often better not to choose at all.

    While I walked and did my thinking, I could proudly say I never let anyone sneak up on me. Likewise, I could proudly say that I detected something was wrong long before I was actually confronted by it.

    For one, there was the sound of gunshots and screaming in the distance. Then there was the blood splattered all over the floor of my building¡¯s lobby, and a couple bloody handprints on the walls when I started to climb the stairs to my apartment.

    Higher and higher I went, all the while spotting unmistakable traces of carnage and suffering. By the time I reached the landing right before mine and spotted a woman only slightly older than me slumped against the railing, I couldn¡¯t even find it in myself to be surprised.

    Resigned, yes, but not surprised.

    As if that wasn¡¯t enough, I knew her. In fact, she had saved my life not even a full day ago. And now there she was, bloody and visibly wounded and squirming on the floor.

    Consequences, I remembered as I stood there, frozen. All actions have consequences.

    Then why the fuck did I rush forward to check over the worst of her wounds? Why did I ignore the feeble protests and her attempts to protect herself, even in her dazed and addled condition? Why did I shove my arm around her and yank her own arm over my shoulder, then proceed to drag her up the stairs in spite of my aching and protesting body?

    I had no clue. But I did know, even in that very moment, that there would be consequences for these actions.

    I also knew I was unlikely to enjoy them much.

 Chapter 11: Opening Doors

    Mela, if I was remembering her name right, was heavy. Now, I wasn¡¯t going to be the idiot to tell her that, but my straining face and trembling muscles as I dragged her up the stairs were dead giveaways.

    Then again, I wasn¡¯t sure how much of that came down to her weight and how much was due to the abysmal state of my body. I still had several fractured ribs and plenty of bruises. One whole side of my face felt like it was on fire. I¡¯d managed to get through the day at work easily enough, since all the boxes were pretty light. But hauling an adult up a flight of stairs? A whole different proposition.

    It also didn¡¯t help that the person I was trying to save was fighting me. Not very hard or very effectively, but she kept moaning and trying to squirm away. This was in spite of the fact that I could see the growing red patch on her tacky pink shirt.

    Something, probably a knife, had gone right through her Pink Kittens jacket and into her side. Her face had clearly been worked over hard by someone¡¯s fists. She also had a massive gash starting from her hip all down her left leg, and I saw the way she winced whenever she failed to keep her weight off the limb.

    ¡°Dunno where ya takin¡¯ me ya stupid shit but my guys will fuckin¡¯ kill ya,¡± she slurred viciously. ¡°Think ya can take advantage of me? Huh? Huh?!¡±

    I fought down the sudden urge to laugh in that wheezy, hysterical way people use when they realize they¡¯re fucked.

    ¡°I¡¯m not taking advantage of you. I¡¯m trying to save your life. To repay a favor, remember? You saved my ass here just¡­ fuck, was it only a day ago?¡±

    I almost dropped my burden when she turned her head to look at me. Her eyes were way too close. They stared at me for a few seconds, blinking blearily, then went wide with recognition.

    ¡°Wait, kid? What are you doing?¡±

    ¡°Hauling your ass up the stairs to my apartment. Want me to stop?¡± I sassed, hard, because what else was I supposed to do? I had a definite feeling someone was on our heels, and if they caught up, they were going to catch me with my proverbial pants down.

    ¡°Heh, trust me kid. If you wanted to get laid, there¡¯s easier ways,¡± Mela teased.

    ¡°Do you want to get dropped?¡± I said through gritted teeth, pulling us up the last few stairs and stumbling down the hallway. ¡°Because that¡¯s how you get dropped. I don¡¯t make it a habit to save gangers bleeding out on my doorstep.¡±

    I chose that moment to trip and squish both our faces against my front door.

    ¡°Your pickup technique needs work,¡± she groaned when I pulled us back. ¡°But I¡¯ll give you points for eagerness.¡±

    ¡°Fuck damn it, these last few days want to kill me. Kill me, I say,¡± I growled.

    Using my nifty cybernetic eyes, I sent an ¡®open¡¯ request to the doors. They hissed and started to move instantly, but got stuck a mere centimeter in. I growled again, shifted our weight around, and got the doors moving with a kick.

    ¡°You have a potty mouth on ya don¡¯t ya kid? Parents didn¡¯t teach ya that¡¯s rude?¡±

    I froze for a second, but recovered quickly and dragged the bleeding woman into my humble home. As the doors closed behind us with a hiss, I let out a breath of relief.

    Safe. In a loose interpretation of the word.

    ¡°Nope. Dead parents. Very tragic. The whole slum kid shtick, you know?¡± I tried to say the words flippantly, but they stung. My mother was the reason I usually tried not to curse or use too much slang. She always insisted on raising me like I was a tiny little corpo just waiting to claim my legacy.

    ¡°Shit. Well. Sorry,¡± the brute of a woman muttered, a little quieter than before.

    I didn¡¯t reply, but I didn¡¯t take her in the direction of my bed either. People who insulted my mother did not get to bleed over the one piece of good furniture I owned.

    I eventually managed to get Mela situated on the floor of my bathroom section. It was a tiny bit moldy, sure, but I did a good job of scrubbing it semi-regularly, and it definitely wasn¡¯t as bad as that blasted mirror.

    ¡°Give me a second,¡± I muttered, more for my benefit than hers, as I grabbed my first aid kit. My trembling fingers fumbled with the zipper. When I pulled the kit open, I almost spilled everything all over the floor.

    ¡°Sheesh, kid, don¡¯t be that nervous. I don¡¯t bite. Won¡¯t even ravage you, either,¡± she taunted, hand pressing her blood-soaked shirt against her wound.

    ¡°Yes, yes. Either take that off or pull it away from the wound, please. Unless you want to bleed out.¡±

    To my surprise, she complied. Who knew that all it took for her to shut up was the threat of bleeding to death?

    When she finally pulled away all the fabric with a pained wince, I got my first look at the worst of her wounds. It wasn¡¯t as bad as it could have been, really. The edges of the wound were relatively smooth, and I didn¡¯t think it was too deep. It was bleeding like a fucker, though.

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    ¡°Right. Right.¡± I nodded. ¡°No biggie. Large stab wounds. I can handle those.¡±

    Ignoring her look of more than mild disbelief, I grabbed a bottle of rubbing alcohol and applied it liberally to a swab made of some fluffy synthetic material. To her credit, she didn¡¯t flinch when I started to disinfect the wound. Even when the swab got soaked in blood and I started just splashing generous amounts of the alcohol on the area, she stayed still.

    Once that was done, I grabbed one of the more valuable items in the kit. It didn¡¯t look like anything special. Just a small, unmarked jar of powder. But as soon as I sprinkled some over the wound, the gushing flow of blood slowed down, then stopped altogether.

    ¡°Now that¡¯s interesting,¡± the woman mumbled as I moved on to her leg.

    I had to do a bit of convincing and put up with a lot of complaining, but eventually, she positioned her leg so I could get a good look at the jagged gash. This time, I was able to use a swab instead of just flooding everything in alcohol. Then I applied the powder there as well.

    My heart ached through every second of it.

    The alcohol wasn¡¯t that expensive, but the powder was. It was Glim¡¯s own product, some kind of super coagulant that stopped even heavy bleeding in seconds. It couldn¡¯t do shit for internal wounds, but so long as your leakage was on the outside, you could slap the powder on and be good to go for a while. Sure, the wound could reopen if you moved around too much, but still¡­ the powder was way better than nothing. I had barely eaten for two months just to be able to afford it.

    ¡°Where¡¯d you get something like that, kid? You wouldn¡¯t happen to have a MaxDoc as well, would you?¡±

    I didn¡¯t say anything. I just stared at her.

    ¡°Okay, okay,¡± she mumbled. ¡°No need for that particular look.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t have a particular look. You just asked a street kid orphan if he has expensive healing aids.¡±

    ¡°And I¡¯m sorry, ¡®kay? Don¡¯t be a grump.¡±

    I just sighed as I pushed myself up from the awkward kneeling position I was in and staggered towards my bed. I remembered just in time to wash up first. A ton of scrubbing later, I still felt kind of icky, but I collapsed onto my bed anyway.

    It was hard to believe how little time had actually passed. Since I¡¯d found her, dragged her in, and did basic first aid, maybe fifteen minutes had gone by. Still, I felt like I¡¯d run a marathon.

    ¡°I guess this means that I paid off that favor now?¡± I asked wearily.

    ¡°I guess. Do something else nice for me and I might feel compelled to thank you instead.¡±

    I groaned. ¡°Any special reason you¡¯re being all insufferable?¡±

    ¡°Any special reason you¡¯re being a quippy brat when you know I can fold you in half?¡± she shot back, though I could tell she was just being playful.

    Probably. Maybe.

    Perhaps I should tone it down a bit?

    I figured being honest wouldn¡¯t hurt. ¡°I talk too much when I¡¯m scared or stressed out.¡±

    ¡°Funny. I try to be clever and flirty when I¡¯m scared or stressed out.¡±

    ¡°Oh.¡± Yay for my amazing vocabulary! ¡°What happened?¡±

    ¡°Fucking Zerx happened. I have no idea who shit in their breakfast this morning, but they ambushed us not far from here. They got me good. And they had, like, twice our numbers, so I ran. I didn¡¯t get too far, but I almost made it home before you found me.¡± A long pause ensued. Then¡­ ¡°Thanks.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re welcome. Literally the least I could do after yesterday.¡±

    ¡°Not a lot of people would bother, even if I did save their ass.¡±

    ¡°Maybe.¡±

    We lapsed into a bout of silence while I grappled with fresh fear. Zerx weren¡¯t supposed to be in my part of town. They shared a border with the Pink Kittens, sure, but they stuck to their stretch of the slum hell, and our local rulers stuck to theirs.

    They weren¡¯t as big as the Kittens, either. Ferocious, angry, and utterly prepared to fuck up your day, but definitely not on the level of one of the biggest gangs around. They had aspirations to reach that level, though. For years, they¡¯d been recruiting aggressively. I suppose I shouldn¡¯t have been surprised they¡¯d come out to play at the first opportunity.

    Another thought swept through me, one I¡¯d been trying to ignore since those kids told me the Reapers were finished.

    This is my fault, isn¡¯t it? I stole all that shit. Whoever owned it is coming out to play because they want their product back, and the entire slums are paying for it.

    For a moment, I almost felt crushed under the weight of fear and guilt. It didn¡¯t take long for me to sweep at least some of those emotions under a rug, though.

    I wasn¡¯t the one who made the mystery patron of the Reapers lash out. It wasn¡¯t me killing people out in the streets. All I ever wanted was to carve a tiny little bit of normalcy and stability for myself. Did I intend to do it at such a huge cost to everyone else? No.

    But now that it had happened, I wasn¡¯t going to waste time feeling guilty about it.

    I wasn¡¯t out of the woods yet. I might even get killed when and if I got swept up in the gang nonsense. Still, I refused to feel torn up over the deaths of a bunch of people who probably deserved whatever they got anyway.

    Mela shifted on the bathroom floor. ¡°You know, kid ¡ª¡±

    A loud bang on my door cut her off. Both of us immediately tried to stand up. I got to my feet, but she wheezed in pain and fell back down as the sudden movement reopened her stab wound.

    ¡°Open up! I don¡¯t give a shit who you are! If you¡¯ve got that bitch in there we¡¯re going to tear you apart you fucker!¡±

    More banging, more slurs, and more promises of violence.

    I looked at Mela with wide eyes. "How do they know you''re in here?" I whispered.

    ¡°Not sure, but ¡ª¡±

    ¡°Open up you fucker! You¡¯re gonna regret ever fucking with us when we get our fucking hands on you!¡±

    ¡°¡ª probably the blood. I was bleeding all over the place.¡±

    ¡°I didn¡¯t think about that. Why didn¡¯t I think about that?¡±

    ¡°Well, you could¡¯ve cleaned up if we had more time, but with how quickly they caught us? You woulda had to leave me be if you wanted to avoid them, kid. And I¡¯m kinda glad you didn¡¯t.¡±

    She shot me a wide grin, but it was unnaturally wide. It resembled a grimace more than a jolly expression.

    I could hear multiple voices in the hallway at that point, several of which were discussing how to break down my door. That wouldn¡¯t be easy. It was a solid door, for the slums. Still, I also knew that if they were truly determined, there was little I could do to stop them. They would get at us eventually, and I had no idea what to do.

    Mela tried again to stand up. Putting the entirety of her weight on her back, she managed to slide up the wall until she was on her feet.

    ¡°We¡¯ll be fine, kid,¡± she gasped. Seeing the expression on my face, she gave a low, harsh chuckle. ¡°Don¡¯t look like that! Now, can you come over and help me move a few things around?¡±

    I did as she asked. Wasn¡¯t sure what else to do. Still, I was far from confident we had any chance of making it out unscathed.

    Or at all.

 Chapter 12: Hard Knocks

    Turns out, when you live in a box, there aren¡¯t a lot of options for hiding or decent cover. I could have tried to curl up inside my wardrobe and hope they somehow failed to check there, but ¡­ that probably wouldn¡¯t work.

    Still, when Mela gave me her instructions, I looked at her like she¡¯d just stabbed me somewhere vital.

    ¡°Repeat that for me, please?¡±

    ¡°I want you to turn over your wardrobe and drag it to this side of the room so we have some cover. Then we need to block the door with your bed,¡± she repeated slowly.

    I didn¡¯t care that she was looking at me as if seriously doubting my intelligence. I was too busy screeching bloody murder inside my head.

    My wardrobe. My bed. Some of the only things of any worth that I owned.

    That stupid, stupid bed in particular. It was so nice. So fluffy. Lying on it felt like I imagined it would feel like to lie on a cloud¡­ if clouds weren¡¯t collections of the foulest gas that dumped acid on our heads on the few occasions we had any precipitation.

    She wants me to do what with my lovely bed?!

    Then I looked again at the rabid ganger. She was doing her level best not to pass out or puke blood while a bunch of thugs tried to break down my door and kill us both. That made me reconsider my priorities a little.

    Not without snarking, though. Never without snarking.

    I started pushing on the wardrobe, ignoring the screaming threats from the hallway.

    ¡°You do realize,¡± I grunted, ¡°that this is, like, the entirety of what I own? Like, literally all of it? I fucking love that bed.¡±

    ¡°Awww, who¡¯s a lost little puppy? You are! Poor little thing. Dontcha worry, we¡¯ll find ya a nice girl to love instead. Or boy. Both? I ain¡¯t judging!¡±

    ¡°Well I am!¡± I hissed, then wondered why I was still keeping my voice down. Shrugging, I gave the wardrobe one final push and sent it tipping over onto its side. It landed on the floor of my apartment with a loud clang, the cheap metal ringing like a bell.

    The voices in the hallway fell silent for a moment. Suddenly, I had an idea.

    With the best shit-eating grin I could manage under the circumstances, I started to scream.

    ¡°Please! You have to help me!¡± I shrieked, pitching my voice to make me sound way younger than I was. ¡°Whoever¡¯s out there, please help! She¡¯s insane! She¡¯s got a knife!¡±

    Mela glared at me, and I had to bite back some unstable-sounding giggles.

    ¡°What? Maybe they won¡¯t shoot me immediately,¡± I whispered as sweetly as I could, though my mood immediately soured when she stumbled over to the wardrobe and I realized my bed was on the docket next.

    ¡°Yer one insane kid, aintcha? What did I do to get stuck with you, of all people?¡±

    ¡°Joined a gang. Saved a kid from getting mugged. Got ambushed by a rival gang,¡± I counted off.

    Pushing against the frame of my bed, I tipped it over and positioned it to block the door. Not as useful as it would have been had my doors opened inwards instead of withdrawing into the wall, but¡­ beggars, choosers, and all that. A few extra seconds were a few extra seconds.

    Next came the unpleasant task of checking exactly what I had on hand to violently protest the gangers¡¯ invasion of my privacy. Which¡­ wasn¡¯t much.

    I knelt by my backpack and examined my options. My good old Cadmus E-20 had at least five rounds left, though the exact count was lost to me in the haze of fear and adrenaline.

    Meanwhile, when last I checked Jason¡¯s shooter, I¡¯d been confronted by the startling realization that it had only one shot left.

    One. Shot. Left.

    The asshole had brought a massive-caliber gun and a disproportionally small number of bullets to an ambush.

    Not for the first time, I put extra heat into cussing out the idiot in the confines of my mind. We all could have died so easily on that day, and it was mostly his fault. Worse, now his dumb ass was reaching out from beyond the grave to screw me yet again.

    ¡°You look like you¡¯re gonna shit yourself, kid. Everything all right?¡± Mela¡¯s voice snapped me out of it.

    I hurried over to her, holding out both guns. She raised a brow at me.

    ¡°I¡¯m wondering if they¡¯d be open to vacating my premises if I just threaten with the guns, without having to do the whole shooty-shoot thing.¡± I flushed at the smirk she gave me. ¡°Ammo is expensive, okay! I don¡¯t have much of it. More like I have six shots between both guns and then we¡¯re dead.¡±

    ¡°That old Cadmus ain¡¯t gonna do much anyway. How many rounds you got in that other shooter?¡±

    ¡°One. The previous owner was kind of an idiot I had a violent disagreement with.¡±

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    ¡°How violent?¡±

    ¡°Doesn¡¯t matter. He¡¯s no longer around to protest my treatment of his gun.¡±

    ¡°Ah.¡± She nodded sagely, or what she probably thought that was supposed to look like. ¡°I approve. One shot ain¡¯t gonna be good for much, though.¡±

    ¡°Yes, I know that! Any better ideas, or should I just¡­ what? Lie down here and wait to die?¡±

    ¡°Urgh, I can¡¯t believe I¡¯m gonna die alongside a brat,¡± she griped, but she did slip her hands behind her back and draw out two guns.

    Both were steel monstrosities about on par with Jason¡¯s shooter, just a lot less glammed out. They were pink. The cutesy kitten symbol was a tad much. Still, they looked way more lethal than my pea shooter of a Cadmus.

    ¡°You need something like this. Here, I¡¯ll give ya one of my babies. I swear, though, if you somehow damage her¡­¡±

    She shoved one of the pink shooters into my hands. I was stuck between awe and disgust as I fumbled with it, letting my own guns clatter to the ground.

    The gangers must have finally rallied by that point, because something heavy slammed into my door with incredible strength.

    ¡°How many bullets?¡± I asked in a hurry, checking the shooter over. It was large, much like Jason¡¯s, but the magazine was bulkier and longer, making it tricky to get a proper grip. Not for the first time, I was annoyed by how much smaller I was compared to others my age.

    ¡°Ten. These beauts are custom! You can typically only find them with five, maybe seven to a magazine. Had to pay premium to get them touched up. The paint even glows in the dark!¡±

    I had to level another disbelieving look at her. I was trying to cut back on those, but really, she got them out of me like we were at a sale.

    ¡°You have guns that glow in the dark?¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong with that?¡±

    ¡°Oh, I don¡¯t know, just that everyone and their half-blind mother is going to know exactly where to shoot if they want to kill you!¡±

    ¡°Why do ya have to sound like my boss right then, huh? Cantcha just appreciate art?¡±

    ¡°Because your ¡®art¡¯ is going to get us ¡ª¡±

    I was cut off by a loud metallic whine as my door began to fail. Risking a nervous glance in that direction, I could just about make out the edge of the metallic barrier peeling back, letting in the light of the hallway above my bedframe.

    I once more silently wept for the large, glorious bed. Only inside my head, of course, because I couldn¡¯t afford to have tears blur my vision.

    ¡°Again! We¡¯re gonna have that bitch soon!¡±

    Another bang shook both the door and the bed.

    At that point, neither of us felt like talking much. I was too distracted by my deafening heartbeat to have any energy left for banter. The grim look in Mela¡¯s eyes suggested she wasn¡¯t much better off.

    Another bang, and even more light began to invade my apartment from the outside.

    I began cursing my building¡¯s cheapskate manager. Once, the doors had all been made of solid reinforced steel alloy, strong enough to hold back a small army for a little while. That was stripped away decades before I came along. The only proof those doors ever existed was the way their replacements didn¡¯t quite fit the locking grooves right. The new doors were a bit thinner, a bit shorter, and a lot more flimsy.

    Oh, it was still some kind of metal, but I was seeing firsthand that it couldn¡¯t resist any forceful attempts to gain entry.

    Not that I needed prior proof. I¡¯d come across a few gutted apartments in the building. At each one, the battered doors lay on the ground like corpses, the only silent witnesses of what had happened. The actual corpses were long dragged off by that point, either for processing or for sale. Or, if the apartment¡¯s inhabitants were still alive¡­

    Didn¡¯t make much of a difference, really. They¡¯d still been dragged off for processing or for sale. They¡¯d just be more miserable while going through the experience.

    ¡°Listen, kid. I know this is a lot. Still, when they get in here, I want you to shoot. This is you or them. Don¡¯t hesitate.¡±

    Mela¡¯s voice sounded serious and focused for the first time since I¡¯d met her. Surprised, I looked at her. The ganger was gazing at me with such regret that I just stared back, blinking stupidly.

    Then she scowled and punched my shoulder, which effectively broke me out of the daze.

    ¡°Yeah, yes, I get it. Shoot first, questions never. Another day in the slums,¡± I joked. But from the way she was looking at me, I could tell she didn¡¯t believe I was ready to do what was necessary. Probably thought I froze up at the warning, rather than due to the shock of her suddenly getting her shit together.

    She might have tried to say something else, but it was then that my poor door finally gave up the ghost. It rattled out of its setting with a loud metallic clang. The gangers on the other side must have thought it had more in it, because they stumbled through with loud curses, overcommitting to the strike. Only my bed kept them from pouring through into the apartment.

    They immediately opened fire.

    I wanted to scream as shots were buried into my mattress, but at least they weren¡¯t ricocheting wildly about the space the way I¡¯d seen them do once or twice when I was way too close to a gang shootout than I cared to be.

    ¡°Get the fucking bitch! Get the kid that¡¯s with her too. We¡¯ll have some fun with both before we cut her throat!¡±

    ¡°Get ready, kid,¡± Mela whispered.

    Both of us gripped our guns a little tighter.

    For a group that had managed to batter my door down, the gangers took altogether too long to shove the bed over. As soon as their view was clear, they opened fire again.

    Shots thunked into the metal of my wardrobe, and my fingers shook with adrenaline. Then Mela lunged to the right, and her own gun began to fire in retaliation. There was a horrible wet gasp and a scream from the doorway.

    I chose that moment to pop out on the opposite side. The moment stretched, my fear and excitement giving me more situational awareness than I might have expected.

    The gangers had busted down the door and the bed, but most were still stuck in the doorframe. Only one was starting to climb over the bed itself. One ganger had his hand clasped around his neck, which featured a brand new hole in it. Another two were turning their guns on Mela, who was firing on the climber and had clipped his leg.

    I was just about to pull the trigger myself when my view¡­ glitched.

    The gangers¡¯ faces turned into shadowy things with unnaturally wide grins, all leaking some foul substance. Time itself jerked a few seconds forward. Shots were fired, the climbing ganger died, and then the one right behind him put a bullet in Mela¡¯s forehead while his friend fumbled with his shooter.

    Then reality snapped into place again.

    I hurriedly pointed my own gun away from the climber and in the direction of the murderer behind him. I pulled the trigger as quickly as I could, as many times as I could. The first shot missed its mark. But the second blew the man¡¯s fingers off, and the third found its way to his chest.

    His clumsy friend managed to fire back at Mela, but at that point, she¡¯d already put down the climber. She turned her gun on the clumsy ganger, now the last man standing.

    The pink monstrosity roared one last time, and the ganger died with a startled look on his face.

    My vision was swimming. If I wasn¡¯t already lying on my side after throwing myself out of cover to shoot, I would have collapsed.

    Then fingers found my shoulder, shaking me lightly.

    ¡°Kid? You¡¯re okay, kid. Just breathe.¡±

    I took a deep breath, finding to my surprise that I¡¯d been going without oxygen for a hot minute. As my starving lungs filled with a coppery scent, I managed to start pulling myself off the floor, only to freeze when my eyes landed on Mela¡¯s left shoulder.

    A heavily bleeding shoulder.

 Chapter 13: Smooth Operator

    I wanted to cry. For way more than just one reason.

    My precious, precious bed was done for. As was most of my apartment, for that matter. And there I was, spending even more of Glim¡¯s very expensive powder on an idiot who¡¯d managed to get shot and even reopened her older wounds along the way. If I was a bit rougher while applying the powder than necessary, who could blame me?

    An annoying redhead, apparently.

    ¡°Dammit kid, you really don¡¯t know how to treat a lady!¡± Mela flinched away from my fingers that were working the powder into the wound. ¡°I disrobe for you and everything, and this is what you do?¡±

    I just glared in response. I would have paired the look with a painful squeeze if that wouldn¡¯t have restarted the bleeding and forced me to spend more of my resources.

    ¡°Maybe I¡¯d be grateful if there was much for me to see,¡± I snarked instead.

    From the look she gave me, I was toeing a very thin line with that particular taunt. Was that even a genuine spark of hurt I saw there?

    Now that was just ridiculous. Sure, the bra covered with actual cutesy pink kittens was a step too far, even for someone who was dressing that way ¡®ironically¡¯, but she did have¡­ er, a ¡®bountiful¡¯ chest. I was just a bit too wrapped up in existential horror to so much as steal a glance.

    ¡°Rude. Ruuuude! Here I¡¯m trying to distract you from all that happened and you¡¯re just mouthing off. Really, kids these days!¡±

    I winced. If that was really what she was trying to do, well¡­

    ¡°I¡¯ll dial it back,¡± I mumbled, refusing to look her in the eye as I grabbed some of the bandages out of my first aid kit. I hadn¡¯t bothered with them before because it was best to let the powder sit for a while, but I had a feeling we weren¡¯t staying in my apartment long.

    Speaking of¡­

    ¡°You know, I own this place. Like, *own-*own it.¡±

    Her head snapped over to me so quickly, I thought she¡¯d break her neck.

    ¡°Wait, really? Um¡­¡±

    She looked around at all the devastation. The shot-up bed and wardrobe, the bullet holes and cracks in the walls, the decimated shower barrier¡­

    Wait, is that a tiny spray of water? Did they hit a pipe or something?

    I groaned. ¡°How the hell am I going to afford to fix this place up?¡±

    A second later, though, I perked up when I remembered the wealth I¡¯d hidden away from the robbery. It was going to be ¡®fun¡¯ trying to justify where the money came from, but maybe things weren¡¯t so bad after all.

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry.¡± Mela¡¯s morose voice snapped me out of my thoughts. When I looked at her, she did look genuinely sad and pissed off, at herself I mean. ¡°I didn¡¯t know¡­¡±

    I shrugged. ¡°S fine. Not like you knew people would try to kill us immediately.¡±

    Focusing on the bandages, I tried not to think too much about¡­ well, anything.

    My home was wrecked. I¡¯d gotten mixed up in a ganger war. And then there was that weird time glitch that had happened in the middle of the shootout, when I¡¯d seen¡­ stuff I didn¡¯t have any words for, even if I wanted to talk about it to anyone ever.

    If I started thinking about any of it, I was liable to hyperventilate, or just pass out in a puddle of my own tears. Then I would definitely get gunned down, stabbed, or something equally as unpleasant very soon. Especially without a front door.

    ¡°Why dontcha go ahead and ruffle through those guys¡¯ stuff?¡± she suggested, once I¡¯d finished tying off the bandages somewhat inexpertly. ¡°I¡¯m sure they had some creds. Might help.¡±

    ¡°Sure. Sounds good. We¡­ we probably need to leave right after, don¡¯t we? If this group of idiots found us, there¡¯ll probably be more of them coming.¡±

    ¡°Yeah, probably. If you get me back to base, the Kittens can help.¡±

    She pulled that guilty expression again. Honestly, it was starting to make me uncomfortable. She didn¡¯t seem like the kind of woman to stress over this sort of stuff.

    I paid careful attention to my own body as I searched the gangers. Everything ached, but that wasn¡¯t surprising. The cut on my leg was giving me the most trouble. While I fought it admirably, my walk did still slip into a limp on occasion. At least there wasn¡¯t any fresh blood on my pants, so it wasn¡¯t likely that my wound had reopened.

    As it turned out, the lowlifes did have some credits. Not a lot, of course. Probably nowhere near enough money to fix up an apartment. But it was something. I wasn¡¯t all that eager to start sticking credit chips into my port, but I¡¯d go over them later and confirm. For now, I stuffed them in my backpack.

    Once I¡¯d searched the gangers¡¯ bodies, all I had to do was grab my own hidden stash of credit chips and zip them away in my backpack. I threw in a couple changes of clothes from my ruined wardrobe, just in case, and I was ready to leave.

    Really, that my life could be so easily uprooted was what hit me the hardest. I was aware of just how little I owned, of how transient my life was at the best of times, but to see proof of that¡­

    I pushed it all down and forced myself to speak casually. ¡°I¡¯m ready to go, if you are.¡±

    The look of profound pity on Mela¡¯s face totally did NOT make me want to punch her.

    You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

    ¡°What?¡± I demanded.

    ¡°Nothing, kid, nothing. Come on, help me up. I¡¯m not gonna be able to do much but hobble, but you¡¯ll be a big strong man and help me out, wontcha?¡±

    ¡°Please never call me that again.¡±

    ¡°Think about the two of us, pressed together, breathing heavy¡­¡±

    My self-control failed me.

    Ignoring her outstretched arms, I put my hand on her face and shoved. Lightly. She broke out into chuckles and refused to be knocked over, but her smile did shift from ¡®teasing¡¯ to a more genuine expression.

    ¡°This ain¡¯t the end of the world, kid. I promise.¡±

    What could I say when she decided to switch to that solemn, quiet tone? There was nothing to say. I just put her arm around my shoulder and helped her up.

    She swayed, but kept her feet. I still knew we were in trouble. I doubted she had it in her to make the entire trip, and I was struggling to support her weight already. My leg throbbed. I swear I could feel every inch of the wound that stretched across my thigh.

    ¡°You alright there kiddo? You sure the big bad man can manage a trip to our cattery?¡±

    ¡°Oh no,¡± I gasped, as dramatically as I could manage. ¡°I think my strength is failing me. Terribly sorry, but I guess I need to drop you now.¡±

    I shifted like I was about to drop her on purpose, and her arm tightened around my shoulders.

    ¡°Sorry, big bad man. Keeping my mouth shut now,¡± she pleaded, sporting a strained smile.

    I scoffed but didn¡¯t rise to her bait. Instead, I made sure she had a gun in her free hand and then slowly took us out of the apartment.

    Really, the operative word for the entire experience was ¡®slowly¡¯. A slow shamble over the various obstacles our fight had left behind, and out the door. A slow descent down the stairs, having to take a break once or twice when our wounds acted up. A slow exit through the underground garage, which I typically tried to avoid.

    If there was one thing to feel thankful for, it was that all the typical riff-raff had cleared out from down there. I saw the favorite setup of the local druggies. A fire was still crackling away inside the massive metal barrel they normally gathered around. But there wasn¡¯t a single idiot trying to visit heaven through a syringe for us to worry about. All the nearby violence must have spooked them.

    ¡°Hey, we¡¯re almost out of here!¡± Mela decided to proclaim cheerfully when we were halfway to the exit ramp.

    So, of course, we immediately heard hollering and laughter from that direction.

    ¡°What happened to staying quiet?¡± I hissed. ¡°Really? What happened?¡±

    I hurriedly dragged us over behind one of the derelict vehicles that graced the garage. The old hover car was beat up to hell and back. Even the frame looked like it might crumble away into rust if I touched it too hard. But at least it provided some cover. We managed to throw ourselves behind it and out of view just as a pack of gangers strolled into the garage like they owned it.

    Which, depending on how the clash in the streets had gone, they very well might.

    From the brief glimpse I got, they were definitely Zerx. They were all bedecked in their signature psychedelic clothes, featuring enough odd colors and shapes to trigger someone¡¯s seizures. They also had a variety of weapons in hand. I saw several shooters, ranging from impressive to pathetic, but there were also pipes and, I swear to all I hold dear, an honest to goodness katana.

    Who even used katana anymore?

    The Zerx spotted the fire barrel and cheered. Gathering around, they each claimed one of the empty crates. Then they looted the drinks and a few syringes of some filth that the druggies hadn¡¯t been in the right state of mind to take with them while fleeing.

    I, meanwhile, was focused on escaping as quickly and as quietly as possible.

    The task was difficult. There weren¡¯t all that many cars to hide behind, and our shuffle-step-shuffle rhythm wasn¡¯t the quietest thing in the world. Our luck held, but only because the gangers promptly broke out into a loud argument.

    I kept half an ear on what they were saying, then felt my blood turn to ice in my veins.

    They were discussing us.

    Apparently, the group of clowns we¡¯d left cooling in the wreckage of my apartment had called for backup before they managed to rub two brain cells together and find a way to batter my door down. This brave group of volunteers had arrived to help.

    Well, if by ¡®help¡¯, you meant ¡®happily join in the rape of the Kitten before grabbing whatever loot she drops.¡¯ Zerx: classy people, one and all.

    I put extra speed into our shuffle out of the parking lot. When we emerged outside into the chill air of a late evening, I wasn¡¯t the only one to let out a breath of pure relief. I chanced a glance at my fellow sneak, but the boiling rage in her eyes made me look away quickly and decide I didn¡¯t want to engage with her just that moment.

    I didn¡¯t really need to, either. I knew where we were going.

    Mela had referred to the Kitten¡¯s HQ as the ¡®cattery¡¯, and that was an apt description for the place. Day or night, it was rambunctious and loud, with plenty of caterwauling from gang members absolutely butchering karaoke. It was also the building most street kids watched with envy, wondering if they might one day be allowed to join ¡®the good life¡¯.

    I didn¡¯t really share their enthusiasm when it came to signing away my future to a gang, but I did know where the place was located, at least.

    We were halfway there before I attempted conversation again.

    ¡°So¡­ you guys have cookies?¡±

    Mela gave me such a confused look that I snickered. ¡°Everyone says ¡®the dark side has cookies¡¯, I explained. ¡°I have no clue what that even means, but¡­ a gang has to count as ¡®the dark side¡¯, right?¡±

    She stared a second longer, but then she chuckled. ¡°Sure, kid, we¡¯ve got cookies. I¡¯ll even see if we can drum up some milk for you. Didja even ever try a cookie?¡±

    Once. A long time ago, when my mother was still around and treats were something we could afford. Not that I was going to unveil my whole life story to a ganger I was helping against my better judgment.

    I shrugged. ¡°Eh, not really. What¡¯s it like?¡±

    ¡°Divine,¡± she teased, then changed tracks. ¡°It¡¯s sweet. You¡¯ll like it.¡±

    ¡°I bet I will. I¡¯ll at least like it more than you.¡±

    ¡°Oi.¡±

    I kept her talking, though we both kept our voices quiet. The slums were unusually deserted. Everyone had scattered when trouble reared its ugly head, and they were now safely hiding away in whatever corner they could find.

    It was a wise move, and I made sure to borrow some of that wisdom. We stuck to side streets and filthy alleys whenever we could manage, and I tried never to pick a path without some debris to hide behind if the need struck.

    And the need definitely struck. We came across another three groups of Zerx gang members, just roving around like they were itching for a fight.

    The whole thing would have been a lot trickier if they¡¯d bothered to be stealthy at all. But the Zerx were celebrating their victory in whatever clash they¡¯d had with the Kittens. We always had ample warning in the form of laughter, jeers, and even drunken singing on one occasion. Each time, we were in a decent position to duck behind cover and wait out their passage.

    When we were almost to the cattery, Mela spoke up.

    ¡°Don¡¯t go directly for the front door. See that old building with the storefront on the first floor? Head there. We use a side entrance there.¡±

    I did as she said gladly. I¡¯d been wondering how we were going to get inside the cattery when the Zerx would almost definitely be watching the main door.

    From the outside, the building looked on the verge of falling apart. But when we entered through the back, I realized it was much better appointed inside. The walls were actually in good condition, with no peeling or cracking in sight.

    The innermost room contained a shaft with a ladder to a lower level. Our injuries made that a doozy to handle. Mela went first. I helped her by scooting up to the shaft on my belly and holding onto her arms to give her extra support. Once she was at the bottom, it was my turn.

    I almost told her to leave me up there.

    After all of our shuffling, my leg was killing me. I nearly slipped once or twice when I had to put my weight on it. Thankfully, I didn¡¯t break my neck.

    Not so thankfully, once I finally made it down and turned around, it was to the sight of a grinning Mela and about two dozen guns pointed at my face.

    Joy.

 Chapter 14: With Great Prejudice

    ¡°Um, I surrender?¡±

    I probably shouldn¡¯t have made it sound so much like a question, but I was sort of panicking. I didn¡¯t even want to put my hands up. The lovely ladies and gents in front of me looked ready to interpret any movement as a hostile action.

    They stared at me for several long seconds in absolute silence.

    Then Mela began chuckling, and the guns dropped away amidst several smiles.

    I, of course, scowled. ¡°Oh, you bi¡ª¡± Mela¡¯s smile briefly turned feral, and I corrected myself quickly. ¡°You beautiful and extremely kind individual.¡±

    She laughed at that, brushing an actual tear away from her eyes. ¡°Ya looked like you were about to piss yourself!¡±

    ¡°You do remember I dragged your ass all the way out here, right? You do remember that?¡±

    ¡°Oh, don¡¯t be so dramatic. Also, ya owe me my gun back.¡± She extended her arm with a gimme-gimme gesture, but it was only when she narrowed her eyes dangerously that I sped up my slow-motion move to fetch the gun. ¡°Ahhhh yiiiis, come back to mama.¡±

    Someday, I wanted to find a girl who would look at me the way Mela looked at that gun.

    ¡°Tell me you¡¯re going to take us both to a ripper now, and that you won¡¯t spend the next hour talking my ear off about gun specs,¡± I groused.

    ¡°You wouldn¡¯t know an amazing gun if I used it to shoot ya,¡± Mela countered, but she did put the dang shooter away. ¡°And sure. Oi, you guys, ain¡¯t someone gonna help a poor girl and a kid make it back to base? No one?¡±

    ¡°Wouldn¡¯t want your brother to think we¡¯re hitting on you,¡± one of the guys shot back. ¡°And it¡¯s not that far now. We believe in you.¡±

    ¡°And I believe in my ability to shove my boot up your ¡ª¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m sure we¡¯ll manage, thank you,¡± I cut in, reluctant to antagonize a whole group of gangers, even if they were Kittens. I wouldn¡¯t put it past Mela to annoy her own gang enough to shoot her.

    ¡°Awww, the kid¡¯s cute, Mela,¡± crowed another ganger, a woman this time. ¡°Way cuter than you! I¡¯d ask if he was your younger brother or something, but nothing that shares your gene could be so polite.¡±

    I shot the woman a grin as Mela hobbled over to me and gripped my shoulder for support once more. Then we were on the move again, away from the laughter and teasing of the Kittens.

    ¡°So, we¡¯re safe now?¡± I whispered once we were out of earshot, earning myself an odd look from Mela.

    ¡°Of course, kid. They tease and talk big, but trust me, none of those guys would ever do a thing to you. Boss would rip them a new one if they did, but they¡¯re also just genuinely good guys and gals. We don¡¯t make it a habit to traumatize kids.¡±

    ¡°Then how come you walk around without a mask to cover that face of yours?¡±

    ¡°Oi.¡±

    We fell into another silence then. Really, Mela¡¯s assurances shouldn¡¯t have made me feel so much better. I¡¯d known the woman for all of a few hours, and I was already willing to take her word for it, even when my safety was on the line. That wasn¡¯t ideal, and was liable to get me shot at some point, but I was way too tired to care.

    At least our destination wasn¡¯t all that far away. The Kittens apparently didn¡¯t care for making their secret tunnels unnecessarily long. One second, we were trudging through an oddly well-constructed tunnel, and the next we were greeted by a pair of guards stationed in front of a strategically small door. Then we were through the door and into a basement proper. Plenty of people were streaming around, nearly all of them sporting some kind of injury.

    Mela grabbed the shoulder of a passing Kitten.

    ¡°What¡¯s the situation like? Losses? Also, which doc¡¯s not swamped by bodies? I need a couple of things looked at.¡±

    I saw the exact moment the man realized who he was talking to. He stiffened and stood a little straighter.

    ¡°Torn¡¯s free. Come on, I¡¯ll help,¡± he volunteered, shouldering half of Mela¡¯s weight. ¡°We¡¯re doing okay. We retreated from those crazy fucks, but only because they managed to get a car-mounted machine gun somewhere. Who the fuck brings that to a street shootout?¡±

    Mela cursed loudly. ¡°Did they manage to use it?¡±

    ¡°Nah. We know to keep the collateral damage to a minimum. That¡¯s why we retreated so quickly. It kept our losses to a minimum too. We can just retake the streets another day when we wipe those scum off the face of the planet.¡±

    ¡°Good. And good work out there. I wantcha to pass that message along. I got ambushed early on and had to split, but I¡¯m proud of how ya handled it.¡±

    ¡°Thanks.¡± The man smiled dazzlingly, which had an¡­ odd effect, considering how brutish his face looked. But he seemed to genuinely value her praise.

    Now that I was paying attention, I also noticed the way people were looking at her. At first I assumed they were just weary, but it didn¡¯t take me long to figure out they were worried. For whatever reason, it seemed that Mela had both the respect and the affection of her fellow gang members.

    The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

    It sure wasn¡¯t her acerbic tongue. I could at least say that much.

    Their worry and respect extended even further than I thought. Several visibly wounded people, with bloody bandages tied around arms, legs, or both, quickly got out of her way when we reached a certain privacy curtain. That let us go straight through to visit one Ripper Torn, a man who had way fewer artificial limbs than Glim but who freaked me out something fierce when he turned to look at us.

    It was the eyes.

    Fuck, those eyes. Eight large compound eyes. Two a bit bigger than normal on a human face, with three smaller specimens flaring around each in a triangular formation. The surrounding flesh had long since healed and scarred over fully, but it was still puckered and raised around the cyberoptics. It looked like someone had carelessly welded those eyes onto his face.

    As for the effect on his appearance¡­ well, If I ever met him in an alley at night, I was going to piss myself and then run till I passed out from exhaustion, in that order.

    ¡°Again, Mela?¡± Ripper Torn sighed. I was shocked at how normal his voice sounded. ¡°A stab wound? A gunshot wound, with the bullet still inside? Tsk. And a variety of smaller cuts and abrasions, with one that requires more extensive medical care. You never fail to disappoint.¡±

    ¡°And nothing ever gets past those eyes of yours, eh?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s why your illustrious leader keeps paying handsomely for my services. Hop on.¡± The man patted his operating chair. Grabbing a bunch of syringes and other tools, he laid them all out meticulously on a single tray. ¡°I¡¯ll need to remove that bullet first before I can do anything for you, you understand.¡±

    ¡°Go for it, Doc,¡± Mela said through clenched teeth, clearly not looking forward to what was coming.

    Torn helped her take off some of the clothes that would get in the way, then actually froze for a second when he saw the powder I¡¯d applied. ¡°Have you seen another ripper already?¡±

    ¡°Nope. Well, unless you count the squirt over there, but I don¡¯t.¡±

    I came under much closer scrutiny by the man than I would have liked, but he didn¡¯t say or do anything alarming. He just hummed in thought.

    ¡°Interesting. Well, the good news is that Glim¡¯s powder is one of the best products out there for first aid purposes. I have no clue how you got your hands on some, young man, but I¡¯d be interested in discussing the subject later. For now¡­¡±

    The doc trailed off, and the next second, his hands were moving. He clearly wasn¡¯t big on anesthesia. His scalpel made a deep incision, and before blood could even well up properly, a small pair of clamps was in and out of the wound in record time.

    ¡°As expected. Two centimeters in depth. Low caliber bullet. Bruising and mild burns in the affected area, but no signs of infection. The powder¡¯s effect, no doubt. Very good. No reason to delay your medicine, then.¡±

    An inhaler was offered up instantly. As Mela huffed in the MaxDoc, the ripper poked a syringe in her shoulder, injecting it directly into the wound. Another went into her side, near the stab wound, and the last was reserved for that bad cut she had on her hip. I watched, fascinated, as the medicine took hold.

    It wasn¡¯t exactly instantaneous healing, but it was pretty darn quick. I could literally see her flesh squirming and struggling to close over the wounds. It seemed to be eating up the remaining powder. I shuddered at the image, but I couldn¡¯t bring myself to look away.

    Torn¡¯s next words snapped me out of it.

    ¡°Your turn, young man.¡±

    My wide eyes darted to the ripper, who had a new tray in his hands.

    ¡°No need for anything fancy here,¡± he went on. ¡°Just take the MaxDoc and I¡¯ll handle your injections.¡±

    I almost refused. ¡®Almost¡¯ being the operative word. My apprehension about this odd reaper had nothing on my desire to finally stop hurting.

    Picking up the inhaler, I tried to copy what I¡¯d seen other people do on very rare occasions. I pressed down, took a deep breath in, and then nearly broke out in a violent coughing fit when the damn ripper jabbed a needle into my face. He got it done quickly, and the tingling numbness that followed was actually pleasant, but that didn¡¯t change the fact that I briefly had a needle in my face.

    Of course, I then quickly got a needle in my thigh, and in my side, and one in the arm for good measure, which confused me a little.

    The ripper must have noticed the look on my face, because he explained, ¡°Just an immunity and digestion booster. You¡¯ll feel hungrier than normal soon. I advise you to eat until you feel like you¡¯ll puke if you take another bite. It¡¯ll help with your condition.¡±

    ¡°Oooohhh, ya got one of those? Yeah, those are nasty,¡± Mela said cheerfully. ¡°Come on, let¡¯s find something to stuff our faces with.¡±

    She hopped, actually hopped, out of the ripperdoc¡¯s chair.

    It was ridiculous how much easier she was moving around already, but then I had to admit my own recovery wasn¡¯t far behind hers. I felt amazing. Better than, really. My body was listening to me properly for the first time in weeks. My various wounds didn¡¯t even twinge as I followed Mela through the Kittens¡¯ underground HQ.

    Apparently, the cattery had everything growing Kittens needed. A single flight of stairs down, we found ourselves in some kind of makeshift cafeteria. It was a huge space. A long counter blocked off one section, with cooking staff behind it. An absolutely crazy number of gangers milled about the rest of the room, which was completely open and full of tables.

    ¡°Mela! Good to see you made it!¡± a mountain of a man roared in our direction, prompting the most sincere smile I¡¯d seen on Mela¡¯s face yet.

    ¡°Garren! Good to see you too, big guy. What¡¯s it like out there?¡±

    Mela didn¡¯t bother to go fetch a meal from the kitchen staff. She just sat down with Garren at the mostly empty table, and I joined her. Immediately, another ganger stood up and beelined for the counter, loading up two platters.

    ¡°Bad,¡± Garren answered. His chemical green cybernetic eyes scanned the room constantly as he spoke. ¡°Someone really fucked it up this time. Big and small players are vanishing, left, right, and center. Everyone else seems to think the best response to that is all-out war, all the while hoping their competitors will just turn up dead. And the ones responsible¡­ Well, from what¡¯s left, this is professionals doing the work. Has to be. Some corpo¡¯s behind this, fucking trust me on this one. No one even knows what the fuck they want.¡±

    I kept my face carefully blank. They didn¡¯t know what the corpos wanted. I very much did.

    The problem was, part of what they wanted was currently sitting pretty in my skull.

    Thankfully, the ganger returned just then with two platters of food. He put one in front of me and one in front of Mela, who sent him off with a thank-you and a smile.

    I just stared at the food. Even if I knew it was all fake and might even taste like cardboard, it looked amazing. Some kind of meat, mashed potatoes, lots of salad I couldn¡¯t name, and all of it in amounts I never could have afforded a week prior.

    It was the most sumptuous meal I¡¯d ever seen.

    ¡°Fuck, that doesn¡¯t sound good,¡± Mela was saying. ¡°Any end of the trouble in sight?¡±

    ¡°As long as entire gangs keep dropping dead? Nah. It¡¯ll be chaos in the streets all the way through.¡±

    ¡°Double fuck.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right.¡± Garren turned his intense cybernetic gaze on me. ¡°Now, mind telling me who¡¯s your new friend? Since you brought him into MY house and all.¡±

    I froze with a fork-full of food halfway to my mouth.

    This wasn¡¯t just another ganger. Mela had sat me down at a table with the leader of the Kittens.

    How the hell was I supposed to introduce myself?

 Chapter 15: Guilty Conscience

    I¡¯m not ashamed to admit I couldn¡¯t find my tongue when the leader of the Kittens focused his cybernetic eyes on me. He looked like he killed hardened gangers every morning before breakfast. I definitely didn¡¯t.

    Fortunately, Mela decided to come to my rescue. Not so fortunately, she drew her chair up to mine and grabbed my head in the crook of her arm, almost squashing me into her breast.

    ¡°This little shit is the one who got me here in one piece,¡± she said, giving my neck an extra squeeze. ¡°I saved his scrawny ass yesterday, but he did enough today to put me in his debt twice over.¡±

    I was still speechless, but for an entirely different reason. For one thing, Mela¡¯s arm around my throat was cutting off my oxygen. But that wasn¡¯t the main point. Mela seemed just irreverent and wild enough to blow off anyone who did her a favor. That she was taking ownership of it, especially right to her gang leader¡¯s face, spoke volumes.

    ¡°That so?¡± Garren hummed, but the intense look in his eye eased off. ¡°Guess we owe him a favor, then! Can¡¯t have one of my favorite lieutenants getting offed in some random alley. What happened anyway? We just lost track of you.¡±

    I couldn¡¯t see Mela¡¯s face. I was still trapped against her chest, tapping her arm in an attempt to communicate that she was going to make me pass out. But the venom in her voice made it clear that she was not happy.

    ¡°One of the fucking Zerx rats managed to get me. I have no clue how he snuck up on me, but he had a knife in me before I could react. Blew his fucking head off for the trouble but ¡ª oi, kid, if you wanna nuzzle into my chest all ya gotta do is ¡ª oh, sorry.¡±

    My face was an interesting shade of blue when she finally let me go. I broke out into coughing immediately, glaring at the ganger as I massaged my throat.

    ¡°Ha! Your friend¡¯s too scrawny if a little rough love gets him like this!¡± Garren laughed, then directed his grin to me. ¡°Go ahead and eat, kid. I remember how it felt when I finally got the first good meal in me after ages, and I don¡¯t think you¡¯re much better off than I was back then.¡±

    A flush beat back the blue from my cheeks, but I did nod and dig in. I¡¯m sorry to say I practically moaned when I took the first bite. Don¡¯t get me wrong, it wasn¡¯t some premium shit from the city center. It was about as close to ¡®real food¡¯ as my left sock. But it was processed better than anything I¡¯d ever put in my mouth before, so was there really a difference?

    ¡°Look at ¡®im go!¡± Mela laughed, but her face was worried as she turned back to the gang leader. ¡°We can¡¯t just let ¡®em do this to us, Garren. We gotta retaliate somehow or they¡¯ll just keep coming at us. We need to work even harder. Our territory¡¯s a mess already, and it¡¯s only the Zerx coming after us at the minute.¡±

    The big guy sighed morosely and rubbed at his forehead. ¡°I know. I just don¡¯t want all-out war. Dammit, Mela, it¡¯s bad for business! If we pull our guys off the protection details, we¡¯ll have assholes nosing into our turf in no time. They just need to hit a few of our big establishments and we¡¯ll be bleeding money for fucking months trying to get everything fixed and set up again.¡±

    ¡°I know that,¡± the redhead snapped. ¡°But it¡¯s not like they¡¯ll stop now! They started this shit. We need to ¡ª¡±

    ¡°¡ª finish it, yes.¡± Garren sighed again. He sounded so tired and frustrated, I would have felt bad for him even if I didn¡¯t feel largely responsible for the mess in the slums. ¡°We need to kick off another recruitment round. If they¡¯re going to swarm us, we gotta replace the people we lost and get some more guns out there.¡±

    Suddenly, a pit opened in my stomach. The food I¡¯d already shoveled down my throat wasn¡¯t sitting so pretty.

    Memories from the past two days spun around inside my head. The tension and recruitment all over the streets. The attacks. What happened to Mela. Even the deserted state of the slums while everyone fought to keep their heads down and out of sight.

    ¡°I can help.¡±

    Garren¡¯s and Mela¡¯s eyes both snapped to me, making me realize I was the one who¡¯d said those words.

    ¡°I mean¡­¡± I fought down the urge to look away like a chastised child. ¡°I don¡¯t, like, want to join join, but if you need more hands out there, I can at least ¡ª¡±

    ¡°Kid, you look, what? Twelve?¡± the mountain of a man asked kindly.

    This time, when I flushed, it had nothing to do with embarrassment and everything to do with indignation. ¡°I¡¯m almost seventeen!¡±

    ¡°Ah.¡± Clearing his throat, he glanced at Mela like he was asking her to rescue him, but she just smirked and looked away. ¡°Listen, kid ¡ª I mean, just¡­ listen. You look, eh, capable, but we don¡¯t use chi¡ª I mean¡­ Fine. I¡¯ll just say it. Whether you saved Mela or not, I need someone who looks like they can actually hold and fire a gun without buckling. Besides, you ever kill someone?¡±

    ¡°I have. Ask her.¡± I jutted my chin at the redhead, fighting the urge to cross my arms and glare. I didn¡¯t want to look like a pouting child. It wouldn¡¯t help my case any.

    Why am I doing this? I never wanted to be part of a gang!

    I knew why, of course. The new eyes in my skull were a constant reminder that I was the one responsible for this whole mess.

    I kept wondering what my mother would have thought of me. What Catill would think of me if he knew. What the countless souls stuck in the slums would do to me if it ever got out that they had me to thank for the storm raging outside their doors.

    You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

    The guilt was eating at my insides, and fuck me, but I couldn¡¯t just ignore it. I¡¯d gladly watch plenty of the gangers burn, and laugh the whole time, but what about the kids like me? The desperate families? Everyone forced to demean themselves just to earn a few creds and feed their loved ones contaminated slop for one more meal?

    Something must have shown on my face, because Mela actually sighed instead of just dismissing me. ¡°Damn it, kid. Alright, ya wanna play big tough ganger? Let¡¯s see what yer made of first. Impress me, and I¡¯ll put in a good word with Garren here.¡±

    Garren¡¯s chemical green eyes narrowed. ¡°Mela, you can¡¯t seriously be ¡ª¡±

    ¡°I said what I said. ¡¯Sides, ye heard the kid. He doesn¡¯t want to join for real. He just wants to help out right now. Let¡¯s see if he can even stand straight after I¡¯m done with him, and we¡¯ll go from there.¡±

    Garren nodded with obvious reluctance while I put away what little was left of my meal. Guilty or not, afraid or not, I wasn¡¯t going to waste food. I was raised better than that.

    ¡°Kay then, squirt. Follow,¡± Mela ordered as soon as I was done.

    I pushed away from the table with one last glance at Garren. He was watching us speculatively with an odd look in his chrome eyes, and I wasn¡¯t sure I liked it.

    ¡°Where are we going?¡± I asked, more for something to distract myself than from real desire to know.

    ¡°We have a place to train on the lower level, right next to all the rippers. Nice and safe. If someone gets opened up by accident, they can put them back together. Real handy when we¡¯re training with the knifes and such.¡±

    I blanched. Who the fuck trained with actual weapons?! Weren¡¯t they supposed to be blunted or fake or whatever?

    Mela noticed my shock and laughed, loud and clear. Then she sent me a bloodthirsty grin. ¡°Best to practice with the real thing. Can¡¯t learn to respect the fucking blade if it won¡¯t fuck you up when ye do something stupid. Didja know we had an idiot who thought he could ¡®catch the blade before it struck¡¯ him or someshit like that? It was hilarious when he tried it the first time. Torn put his fingers back on out of order and made him live like that for a week, just to drive the lesson home before he put him back together the right way.¡±

    Never fuck with Torn. Never, ever fuck with Torn.

    Message received.

    ¡°We¡¯re, uh, not going to train with knives right now, right? Right?¡±

    ¡°Look at the big manly man,¡± the frustrating woman cooed. ¡°All his bravado¡¯s gone already! What happened to talking back all the time, hm?¡±

    Well, we weren¡¯t surrounded by hardened criminals before, all of whom seem to adore you, I thought, eyes darting around at the Kittens. **Everyone we passed was happy to see Mela. Half of them were gazing at her with unconcealed bedroom eyes, while the other half just looked like they¡¯d gladly take a bullet for her.

    So I didn¡¯t dare say anything. Mela laughed at my silence, but didn¡¯t question it further.

    Really, the woman¡¯s popularity was just odd. Or at least it was until I saw the easy way she greeted everyone we came across. Sharing jokes, reassuring them that everything would be fine, and generally showing exemplary levels of charisma¡­ where was that when she was dealing with me?!

    Of course, while part of me was caught up in all that nonsense, another part took careful stock of the way she moved. Graceful, snappy, and with no pain or hitches lingering at all. I would¡¯ve been shocked if I wasn¡¯t also feeling way, waaay better myself. Not a thing was hurting, and it wasn¡¯t just because I¡¯d been stuck full of painkillers.

    While we ate, I¡¯d caught a glimpse of myself in the metal spoon. My black eye was gone. The nicks and small wounds were cleared up, too. When I¡¯d experimentally run my fingers along my thigh under the table, there was no trace of the long cut, either.

    To say my mind was blown would be an understatement. It was now high on my priority list to get some of that stuff Torn had used in the syringes, no matter the price.

    Maybe even a MaxDoc. Those miracle inhalers couldn¡¯t cure you, but they did have some odd mix of healing reagents that sped up blood clotting and general recovery. They also included a shot of adrenaline, mixed with antibiotics and several kinds of stimulants. I heard they led to one hell of a crash-out if you pushed yourself too hard after taking them, but they¡¯d get you up and keep you up for an hour or two in emergencies.

    A second wind and a second chance bottled up in an inhaler. Probably why they cost enough to feel like paying for a second life in the slums.

    While I was lost inside my head, we arrived at our destination. We first stepped into a large gym-style room that stank to high heaven of sweat, then Mela beelined for a door in the far wall. There, we found a private workout space. It was much smaller than the gym, but admittedly comfier and not nearly as smelly.

    The room already had mats laid out all over the floors. There was even a boxing bag in a corner. One whole wall was lined with racks of various equipment I didn¡¯t have the first clue how to use.

    ¡°Okay, kid. Let¡¯s see what made you so confident to ask Garren to fight alongside Kittens,¡± Mela purred as she limbered up.

    Gingerly, I slipped my backpack off and left it on the seat of one of the mystery machines. ¡°Okay, I¡¯m rea¡ª¡±

    I almost lost my recent meal as Mela buried her fist in my stomach, knocking the breath out of my lungs.

    ¡°What the fuck?!¡± I backed off, clutching my stomach and wheezing.

    ¡°Ya think Zerx are gonna wait for ya to square up? Fucking hell kid, don¡¯t make me laugh. Come on, get those arms up, we¡¯re not done.¡±

    She came at me then, and she was relentless. It was all I could do to keep my face and torso relatively safe, and I only managed that much because of ¡®my early slum experience¡¯TM.

    When we first moved to the slums, a lot of kids didn¡¯t like it that I had slightly better clothes or a mother actually willing to take care of me. Those kids didn¡¯t hesitate to make their dislike known.

    It took me a month or two of trying to hide that shit from my mother before she finally forced me to confront it. But then, with more reluctance than I¡¯d even seen from her, she taught me how to at least minimize the damage, if not effectively fight back. The little shits stopped bothering me after I managed to slog a few of them in the nose.

    Mela didn¡¯t. She just laughed and grinned at me like a feral cat. Then she swiped my legs out from under me.

    As I lay on the floor, questioning all my life choices, her face came to hover above mine. ¡°Not complete shit, kid. Didn¡¯t expect that. But do ya really want to sign on? With those skills? Fuck, kid, I saw you fire my shooter. Almost broke your wrist.¡±

    She wasn¡¯t wrong. Shooting that thing had left my arms feeling sore and strained. I wasn¡¯t about to admit that to her, though.

    ¡°Oi, stop glaring at me like that.¡± She sighed. ¡°This is for yer own good! Wouldn¡¯t give two shits if you didn¡¯t save my ass. Woulda handed you a gun with a smile on my face and let ya just get fucking shot the first time we had trouble.¡±

    Somehow, I sincerely doubted that was true. For all her bustle, Mela was the type to save a random street rat from getting his teeth kicked in.

    When I went to tell her that, though, I barely managed a wheeze.

    ¡°What was that?¡±

    ¡°My name¡¯s Adrian, you ass,¡± I gasped instead.

    She gave me this odd look before breaking into a laugh.

    ¡°Well, imagine that! It has a name after all!¡±

    I moaned in distress as she pulled me up and started dragging me off to the ripper. Even for the chance of another MaxDoc, I did not feel like being on my feet right then.

 Chapter 16: Ready, Set, Go

    ¡°So, Doc, is he gonna live?¡± Mela taunted. She was leaning against one of the ripper¡¯s cabinets, earning herself a tight-lipped look from Torn whenever the thing rattled. Which was often.

    ¡°In spite of your best attempts to ensure otherwise, yes,¡± the ripper replied, busily swabbing at all the bruises that were starting to form on my skin.

    I had no clue what kind of chemical he was using, but it both eased the sting and actually halted the bruises in their progression. That still did nothing for the bone-deep ache I was feeling in most parts of my body, but it was a start.

    By tomorrow, I might even feel halfway back to human¡­

    Garren chose that moment to burst into the clinic setup, his cybernetic eyes blazing with anger.

    ¡°We have trouble incoming. One of our scouts reported there¡¯s Zerx moving through the streets in force. They¡¯re all headed here.¡±

    ¡­or not. I sighed. I won¡¯t get to feel better, because Zerx are gonna finish me off.

    I should have been horrified by the incoming violence, but after the last few days, I just felt tired.

    Mela, on the other hand, still had enough energy for rage. The storm she cursed up actually made a couple gangers poke their heads inside the curtain in search of trouble. When they saw it was Mela and their leader, though, they quickly cleared out.

    ¡°What the fuck are those assholes doing now?! Do they have any idea what kind of numbers we can take down?!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not sure they care, Mela. From what the scout was saying, they all look drugged out of their minds. I¡¯m guessing they started celebrating, and¡­¡±

    The big man trailed off, but it wasn¡¯t like he needed to clarify. When you had a large enough group of druggies, all it took was one of them suggesting a stupid plan, and suddenly they were all on board.

    ¡°I already have the guys setting up overwatch points and securing all possible entrances into the building,¡± Garren went on. ¡°The good thing is we trained for this. We¡¯ll be fine.¡±

    ¡°We¡¯ll be fine if they don¡¯t find a way to burn the fucking building down with us in it!¡± Mela snapped. She grit her teeth, stalking around like I¡¯d seen agitated animals do in educational videos. ¡°We have no idea what they have access to. Zerx have always been a bit touched in the head, and they¡¯ve been sinking all their cash into weapons!¡±

    Garren rolled his eyes, though he did look a little worried. ¡°They¡¯re still stuck out here with us. I don¡¯t think they have anything that dangerous. Besides, the building¡¯s solid.¡±

    ¡°I know! That¡¯s why we chose it. Fuck. If they ruin my building I¡¯m gonna ¡ª¡±

    ¡°Your building? It¡¯s my building.¡±

    I watched Garren goad the redhead into a good-natured argument, marveling at how quickly she unwound. When he caught me staring, he shot me a wink, but I could only muster enough emotion to blink at him owlishly. That, apparently, was enough to remind him I shouldn¡¯t be there.

    ¡°Just a sec, Mela. Now, as for you¡­¡± He stared at me, suddenly realizing he didn¡¯t know my name.

    ¡°Adrian.¡±

    ¡°Adrian. Good name! Still, you need to leave. I can have one of my guys lead you out. The Zerx aren¡¯t close enough to threaten you if you¡¯re quick about it.¡±

    ¡°Fuck! Mela groaned. ¡°I forgot the kid!¡±

    I crossed my arms and scowled.

    Adult-like, though. I did it adult- like.

    ¡°You¡¯re under attack. This is Zerx. You really think they give a shit about who they come across? If they see me in the streets, they¡¯ll shoot me down even quicker than if they find me here. At least here, I have cover.¡±

    Personally, I thought my logic was flawless. Garren and Mela, however, were looking at me in a way that suggested otherwise.

    ¡°And that has nothing to do with the fact that ya wanted to sorta join us?¡± Mela demanded.

    ¡°No,¡± I answered quickly. From the look she gave me, a little too quickly. ¡°It just makes sense!¡±

    ¡°Listen kid, I ain¡¯t having yer blood on ¡ª¡±

    ¡°Boss!¡± A wild-eyed thug on the older side, one that looked vaguely familiar, tore open the curtain. ¡°They¡¯re closing in from all sides. Trying to box us in.¡±

    ¡°Dammit Mike, don¡¯t just ¡ª¡± Garren cut himself off, his eyes narrowing. ¡°Wait, they¡¯re organized? Didn¡¯t Tay mention they looked drugged out of their minds?¡±

    ¡°Yes. Most of them, anyway. But they¡¯re still acting way calmer than usual. Not just bluster and violence. I have no idea how.¡±

    I was still staring at the man. The name Mike jogged something in my memory¡­

    My eyes widened a second later when I recognized him. He was the one who had tried to calm me down and check how banged up I was after Mela saved my ass.

    ¡°Well fuck!¡± Mela snarled, eyes flitting towards me. ¡°They past the secret entrances yet?¡±

    This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

    ¡°They¡¯re moving in a sizable mob, so no. They¡¯re really spreading out to stop anyone from getting out, too.¡±

    ¡°Dammit, kid, I don¡¯t know if you¡¯re my lucky charm or a trouble magnet.¡± Mela sighed in resignation. ¡°Guess he¡¯s staying, boss?¡±

    The ¡®boss¡¯ didn¡¯t look happy at all, but after staring at me for a second, he nodded. ¡°Fine. Seems that way. No reason to send him out into the slaughter at this point. Just¡­ get him added to the security network. I¡¯ll see to it that the rest of our guys are in position.¡±

    ¡°And girls! We got just as many!¡± Mela countered.

    Garren didn¡¯t answer. He just stalked off, shaking his head. He seemed disgusted with himself for allowing me to stay.

    Was he still convinced I was twelve or something? I knew for a fact gangs recruited from my age range. Younger, even, though that wasn¡¯t for fighting. You could earn good money playing mule for a gang, at least until their rival made you. Then you¡¯d just get torn apart in some alley for ¡®daring to work for their enemies.¡¯

    ¡°Come on, kid, don¡¯t get all loopy on me now,¡± Mela groused, dragging me out of the ripper¡¯s chair and back into the hallway. ¡°You wanted this,¡±

    I shook my head to focus up, because she was right. I did want it. I¡¯d fucked up and put a ton of people in danger. And while my desire to help a gang, of all people, was likely misguided, I still felt what I felt.

    ¡¯Sides, from what I¡¯d seen so far, they seemed relatively decent. The Kittens weren¡¯t known to be involved in some of the sketchier activities of the slums, either.

    If ever there was a gang I¡¯d actually feel tempted to join for safety, it would probably be them.

    I¡¯d expected Mela to take us to yet another room on the basement floor, or maybe one floor up, at most. Instead, she headed straight for a small, inconspicuous door that turned out to be an elevator.

    From the buttons available when we stepped inside, I counted a total of six floors. Mela hit the topmost button. Immediately, what would have been a metal box of death in just about any other building in the slums hissed and started moving upwards smoothly.

    ¡°I¡¯m impressed,¡± I said, glancing around. ¡°Your elevator actually doesn¡¯t look like it¡¯s going to crash and burn any second.¡±

    ¡°We have good peeps working on maintenance!¡± Mela sent me one of her smirks. ¡°Whole building¡¯s in good condition. Well, other than the shooting range, but that ain¡¯t supposed to count. We¡¯re still patching up the walls there regularly, too.¡±

    A shooting range.

    I blinked at her as I struggled to process that. Here I was, risking my ass to get enough credits for a gun and ammo to barely make it through a shootout or two, and the Kittens had a shooting range. A whole ass expensive room that required regular repair. Just to practice.

    Suddenly, joining the gang for real seemed more appealing than ever. Especially since their food was amazing, too.

    ¡°Keep staring at a girl like that and she¡¯ll think ye¡¯ve got ideas,¡± Mela purred.

    ¡°Not when the girl is you,¡± I scoffed, with as much disdain as I could manage.

    ¡°Oi! What¡¯s that supposed to mean?¡±

    The elevator mercifully opened before she could close her arms around my head and start grinding her fist into my skull. I jumped out, then promptly froze.

    There were wires everywhere. They covered the floors, trailed across the ceiling, and wound over the walls like snakes squirming in a monstrously large pile.

    ¡°Heh. The look on your face,¡± Mela crowed. Slinging her arm around my shoulder, she pulled me along with her. ¡°Come on, let¡¯s go meet the idiot.¡±

    The ¡®idiot¡¯ turned out to be a small, reedy man stuck inside a room with way too many monitors, keyboards, and, most impressive of all, a full immersion chair with cooling pads. I never thought I would see one of those, but there it was. A vaunted tool of beginner netrunners the world over, rumored to let them perform miracles on the net.

    It would have been a hell of a lot more impressive if it didn¡¯t stink like slum garbage. It was also obviously an older model. The leather-like material was grimy and flaking away in spots.

    ¡°What do you want?¡± was the man¡¯s polite greeting the second Mela approached his room¡¯s empty doorframe.

    ¡°Fucking lovely to see you too, Mort,¡± Mela snarled, her stance unusually rigid. ¡°I need you to add Adrian here to the network. Get it done quick, we¡¯ve got incoming.¡±

    ¡°Yes, yes, the rabble. Well, let¡¯s see his scroll, then. No, wait, those eyes¡­¡± Mort looked a lot closer at me now, his own eyes flashing with something close to avarice. ¡°Those have advanced connectivity?¡±

    ¡°Er¡­ yes? Yes, they do,¡± I corrected myself quickly, and he snorted.

    ¡°Of course they do. Because even street rats have better funding than me now.¡±

    He turned his very human eyes away from me in a huff, clacking away at one of the keyboards. I was honestly surprised to see those in this day and age. They weren¡¯t entirely phased out, but they were pretty obsolete compared to larger scrolls, not to mention more advanced tech.

    Maybe he really did have shit funding, but I wasn¡¯t about to say that with Mela in the room.

    It wasn¡¯t long before I was hit with a notification from a private network asking to sync up with my eyes. I gave permission only after exchanging a meaningful glance with Mela.

    ¡°There,¡± Mort spat the second I accepted. ¡°Done. You can scroll through the camera feeds now, and even ping the network to stream what you¡¯re seeing if you spot something important. Now get out.¡±

    Mela gripped my shoulder and led me out of the room, only speaking when we were a good distance away from the dour man. ¡°Fuck if he doesn¡¯t make me want to punch him. Every. Damn. Time.¡±

    ¡°He¡¯s not very friendly, I take it?¡±

    ¡°Fuck no. No one knows his full story, other than Garren, but he was some kind of corpo runt before. Way I hear it, he fucked up something fierce, and he barely got away with the skin of his back. Lost most of that too, actually. Still managed to smuggle out that chair of his somehow. If he wasn¡¯t smart enough to refuse to train his own replacement, I¡¯d have offed him by now, but¡­ well.¡± She shrugged, looking sheepish. ¡°Not a lot of runners around here for hire.¡±

    I was willing to bet that was one hell of an understatement. In fact, now that I knew they had a runner of their own, a lot of the Kittens¡¯ success made more sense to me.

    Security between the slums and the outer district wasn¡¯t the best. Even a halfway decent netrunner could probably poke holes in it, giving a gang greater access to resources and quality equipment.

    No matter how unpleasant Mort was, I could only assume he still got treated like royalty within the gang. Course, if he ever tried to leave, he¡¯d be killed faster than he could blink. And if rival gangs found out about the runner, they would burn everything in their path to get to him.

    Such was life in the slums.

    ¡°What now?¡± I asked, instead of focusing on the topic.

    Mela sighed like I¡¯d volunteered to charge to my own death. Which, well, I kinda had?

    ¡°Now, I give ya this.¡± She shoved a gun into my hands. ¡°And then we post ya up somewhere safe. Probably gonna keep ya right next to me, really. That way, at least ya can¡¯t fuck up hard enough to get yerself and everyone around ya killed.¡±

    The critique wasn¡¯t very welcome, but the gun was. I had no idea when she¡¯d picked the thing up. It wasn¡¯t one of hers. Still, it was definitely bigger and bulkier than my Cadmus, and looked a lot more deadly to boot.

    ¡°Fifteen rounds. Smaller than mine, but, eh, don¡¯t have a decent expanded mag shooter for ya with that magazine size. Just¡­ spray and pray you hit someone, I guess. Oh, and take these, too.¡±

    The woman had entirely too many concealed pockets on her person, but when she shoved three magazines of ammo into my hands, I didn¡¯t complain at all. If anything, I was feeling safer than I ever had going into a potential disaster.

    Of course, that was the moment when a chilling combination of gunfire and coarse shouting erupted outside.

 Chapter 17: Visions of War

    The sound of bullets biting into the building¡¯s fa?ade made me flinch, but Mela just growled angrily.

    ¡°Fuckers here already? Follow me, kid.¡±

    I didn¡¯t protest as she broke into a run, less from having nothing to say and more due to the strain of keeping up with her.

    Stupid tall people with stupidly long legs.

    She led me to a stairwell and surged downwards, taking the steps three or four at a time. I almost tripped and flew right into her back. Instead, I managed to stumble into the wall. Using it to steady myself, I forced my aching body to match her pace.

    One floor down, we came upon a scene of carefully controlled chaos. Men and women were toting guns around and taking their positions. They all stayed well clear of the windows and grouped up near strange nooks in the walls.

    A simple glance revealed multiple hatches and the like set deep within these nooks, allowing the defenders to tear them open and return fire from unexpected directions. Nobody was doing so at the moment, though. The Kittens had chosen to wait and observe their enemies.

    Every so often, a few brave souls would walk up to a window, part the blinds, and peek out. Bullets immediately began to beat a rapid-fire drum against the windows whenever this happened, but the glass was holding so far, surprisingly enough.

    I shot a startled look at Mela. She answered with one of her signature bloodthirsty grins.

    ¡°Reinforced. That glass is gonna stand up to even heavy calibers for a while. Long enough to spring a fun trap, I¡¯ll tell ya that much.¡±

    I didn¡¯t doubt it. I just followed her over to one of the smaller hatches.

    ¡°Now, kid, I want ya to shoot when ya can, but don¡¯t fucking dare turn that thing in the direction of anyone around ya. Also, only step in when I need more bullets or something. Yer not a trained shot, ya don¡¯t have training to fight with us, and yer as green as they come. Just¡­ don¡¯t fuck up or get in anyone¡¯s way, ¡¯kay?¡±

    I felt that was deeply hurtful and unnecessary, but I wilted and nodded under the woman¡¯s scathing glare. Still, this did prompt me to look around for some way to contribute safely.

    The idea hit me when I saw a few gang members struggling to look at scrolls from the corner of their eyes. The scrolls did contain feeds from various cameras, after all, so a single glance could be helpful.

    It could also be dangerously distracting. But if they didn¡¯t have to look at the scrolls at all, because someone was providing overwatch¡­

    I can do this. I can figure this out.

    Quickly, I brought up the menu for my eyes and flicked through the options.

    It didn¡¯t take long for me to land on a tab marked ¡®connected networks.¡¯ It took me even less time to figure out how to open the camera feed. The second I did, though, I swayed heavily on my feet.

    The world shifted in front of my eyes as the left half of my vision was suddenly taken up by a camera feed from outside. Gangers dressed in the neon colors of the Zerx were wildly firing at the Kitten HQ from shoddy cover. Their eyes were wild, their faces fixed into a rictus of ecstasy. Some kind of Booster variant drugs, probably, from the way their veins stood out against their skin.

    My right eye could still see normally, though I did notice a whole list of cameras with small preview shots of each hovering at the edge of my vision.

    ¡°I can see the gangers outside,¡± I said quickly to catch Mela¡¯s attention.

    She looked at me in some confusion before her eyes widened.

    ¡°Oh. Your left eye¡­ it¡¯s glowing. Hrm. That could be useful.¡±

    She started giving me instructions, guiding me to the right cameras that would cover our angle of the building. There were six in total. I even figured out how to ¡®split¡¯ my view between them all. It was a bit like having six monitors stacked together, except I was being forced to watch all of them at all times. Just trying to keep track of the details like that was giving me one hell of a headache, but I convinced myself it was something I had to get used to. I also kept telling myself that it would help.

    Still, Mela noticed something was off. ¡°You okay, kid? Ye don¡¯t look so hot.¡±

    ¡°Gee, thanks. And I¡¯m fine. I just never did this before. No, don¡¯t look at me like that. I¡¯ll get used to it. ¡¯Sides, wouldn¡¯t you prefer me on camera duty instead of trying to fight?¡±

    ¡°Fair.¡± She shook her head. ¡°Just¡­ keep an eye out. Call out when they¡¯re being dumbasses and leaving cover, or if they¡¯re trying to bring in the big guns. We¡¯ll be fighting back soon enough.¡±

    I nodded, heart suddenly beating in my chest much louder than before.

    While we waited, I busied myself with watching the idiots. Really, it was a bit like seeing toddlers recklessly breaking everything around them. They were shooting wildly most of the time. Some of them even looked surprised or lost when their magazines ran empty. It was all typically mindless Zerx behavior.

    What did give me a chill was the line of much calmer Zerx hanging back. These looked way more put together, as Mike had described. Their weapons were also way higher quality. If the bigger crowd was barely using pea shooters, these guys looked like they packed heat on the level of Mela.

    When I pointed them out to her, the woman snarled and cursed. Then she ripped a scroll out of some nearby Kitten¡¯s hands so she could see for herself. ¡°Fuck. There goes my hope this is just some bunch of jumped up druggies acting out of turn. The fuckers shooting right now are just new additions and rabble. Those are the actual Zerx in the back. The guys they recruited and trained properly. I even recognize a few of ¡¯em.¡±

    This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

    ¡°Why aren¡¯t they up front, then?¡± I wondered aloud, earning myself a look of exasperation.

    ¡°Because they¡¯re not idiots.¡±

    Garren¡¯s voice interrupted us, crackling through a set of speakers I hadn¡¯t spotted before.

    ¡°Everyone on your marks. We hit back in ten, nine¡­¡±

    As soon as Garren started to count down, all levity, nerves, and even anger fled from the gangers around me. The transformation was so quick and total that I could hardly believe it. I could only watch, stupefied, as every nearby Kitten stepped up to the hatches and prepared.

    The countdown hit zero, and all hell was unleashed.

    The hatches were torn open, and a hail of bullets rained down on the drugged up Zerx. Courtesy of my front row camera seat, I could see exactly how much devastation that caused. Blood sprayed through the air. Entire limbs were detached from the bodies they belonged to. Far too many lives were snuffed out in an instant.

    The majority of the Zerx panicked. Some even dropped their weapons and tried to scramble to better cover, but that wasn¡¯t meant to be. The few cowards who weren¡¯t gunned down by opportunistic Kittens were mercilessly taken out by their own gang members.

    I got to watch as one of the more ¡®put together¡¯ Zerx stepped out of the back line, drew a gun, and emptied a shot directly into the forehead of a fleeing druggie. The reed-thin ganger dropped, and the back line of Zerx laughed. I felt a bit of bile rise in my throat.

    Not all of the druggies were completely useless, though. There were still at least eighty men and women down there in this initial wave, and while a ton were getting scythed down, a few had enough presence of mind to look for where the bullets were coming from.

    Shot were fired back, and I just about jumped out of my skin when a spray of blood painted the floor a couple meters away from me. The Kitten screamed as he went down. Someone surged forward and dragged him back, already applying first aid. A few more people grunted when other shots grazed or hit their mark, but at least we didn¡¯t have any fatalities yet.

    Then the more experienced Zerx finally made their move.

    Cars wheeled out of alleys, interposing themselves between the attackers and Kitten bullets. Several honest-to-goodness metal barriers, each probably weighing a ton, were carried out easily by men and women whose arms and legs shone chrome. The back line of Zerx pushed forward, ruthlessly claiming their spots behind these obstacles. I even saw one of the druggies get shoved away from cover when they tried to take up the spot of a more experienced Zerx.

    These new enemies were a whole new brand of trouble. Whereas before, the Zerx fire was wild and ineffective, it was now anything but. I shouted out a warning when one of the Zerx peeked above the hood of a car with a large rifle, but it did nothing to stop the woman from firing.

    The shot ripped through one of our windows. Suddenly, I was inhaling the acrid bite of slum air as I covered my head against the glass shards raining down all around me. Mela was cursing up a storm. She fired wildly at the Zerx, but the woman had ducked away too quickly.

    Another spray of blood heralded an injured Kitten. This time, when I looked over, I was greeted by the wet gurgling of a man with a large hole in his throat. The guy in charge of playing medic did not move forward to help, and the gurgling did not last very long.

    I had to tear my gaze away from the Kitten¡¯s blank, unseeing eyes.

    The superior weaponry wasn¡¯t the only trick the new Zerx had, either. They were concentrating their fire. It wasn¡¯t long before the rest of our windows were blown out, one after the other. Kittens could no longer move around the room as freely or effectively as before. They had to edge their way carefully past these new deadly openings.

    I had no clue what the building walls were made of, other than that it was some soft, porous material. Plumes of it rose into the air whenever bullets hit the wall, but it did its job well. Instead of sending the pellets of death ricocheting around the room, the material trapped them and robbed them of their momentum, sparing us at least that one threat.

    I fumbled through the first few minutes of actual fighting. My callouts weren¡¯t slow, but they were distracting more than they were useful. I did slowly get into the rhythm of it, though, especially once I memorized all the designations Mela was hissing at me.

    ¡°C3, RED CAR, GUN THAT BITCH DOWN!¡± I screamed.

    I was rewarded by the bark of several guns, and the woman using the particularly large and deadly rifle was buried under a rain of lead. I couldn¡¯t even conjure up the sick feeling that had lingered in my chest before. I only felt a grim sort of satisfaction as the Zerx who¡¯d killed three Kittens finally died.

    Someone stepped up and took her weapon, of course, but they were at least not as precise or as lethal with it as the bitch had been.

    Mela chose that moment to duck down and back away, hand fumbling for the magazines one of the Kittens had dropped at her feet some five minutes ago. I stepped forward into her place, keeping my body pressed up to the side of the hatch as I opened fire through it. I tried to focus my shots on a spot where one of the Zerx kept peeking around his barrier, but by the time Mela was ready to switch back in, I¡¯d barely managed to scratch the metal.

    By that point, frustration had replaced my fear and nausea. I was forced to admit that Mela was right. I wasn¡¯t very useful. Not as a gun, at least. I had one Zerx to my name so far, and that was more because the idiot had stumbled out of cover straight into my shots than because I was improving as a shooter.

    I was improving. But I was also fighting through three different kinds of dizziness and a fair bit of existential dread.

    Even as Mela shoved me aside to resume her place, my vision glitched yet again. All the faces around me turned into monsters with fanged grins and molten eyes. Mela¡¯s arm was detached at the shoulder as some high caliber round pulverized most of the flesh, leaving just a few stringy pieces of skin and tendon attaching the limb to its owner.

    My vision snapped back to normal. Resisting the urge to empty my stomach, I bodily tacked Mela and pressed to the wall. She was about to bite my head off when a bullet whizzed through the air exactly where¡¯d she¡¯d been standing.

    Her eyes were wide as they stared at me, but I didn¡¯t say anything. I just crawled back to where I had been a moment before. Still scanning the cameras, still ready to scream instructions when the chance presented itself, I fought to keep myself together.

    The glitching was getting more frequent.

    It had started as a few vague flashes every now and then, just before one of the Kittens I¡¯d been fighting alongside got maimed or killed. At first, I couldn¡¯t react fast enough. I didn¡¯t even know what name to scream to warn them.

    That was slowly changing as my adrenaline ramped ever higher, the battle raged on, and I started to get to know the people fighting and dying around me. It almost felt like a curse. The second I learned someone¡¯s name, the moment I started to see them as more than a faceless Kitten, the visions came on more frequently.

    And I was often still too slow. My body and mouth could only move so quickly.

    At least the other gangers weren¡¯t questioning my attempts to help. They seemed to assume it was just part of my overwatch. Already, more than a few of the Kittens were looking at me with far more friendliness than before. Already, I¡¯d made a difference.

    Funny how none of that felt like enough.

    Of course, the universe couldn¡¯t just let me languish in my pity party. My eyes widened in alarm when I spotted four chromed out figures suddenly rush out from behind the Zerx lines, actual honest-to-goodness riot shield hefted in front of them.

    ¡°Borgs! Incoming borgs!¡± I screamed at the top of my lungs, then rattled off their lines of approach. People focused fire on them immediately, but it wasn¡¯t enough to stop the monstrosities of muscle and steel from getting way too close to the building.

    Close enough to pause in their advance before a cluster of grenades came sailing towards our broken windows.

 Shadow Immortal is now Shadow Runner

    Hey guys, we just changed the title of this series from Shadow Immortal to Shadow Runner.

    Apologies in advance if this causes any confusion. We''ll post an extra chapter tomorrow.

    Also new shoutout code, just wanted to share because it looks cool :P

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    Adrian was born a couple hundred years too late to witness humans ruling the stars. The days of relentless scientific advancement are long gone. Humanity¡¯s former cradle has become the birthplace of nightmares, so Adrian lives on a world far from Terra.

    If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.

    But Adrian has a secret. His eyes are failing him, and in this age, blindness means death. When the chance arrives to earn a couple quick credits for a new pair of cybernetic eyes, he jumps on it. Only, Adrian gets more than he bargained for. With a slew of gangs, corpos, and a ruthless scientist now on his tail, he needs to do his best to survive and keep their hands off the prototype tech stuck inside of his skull.

    Oh, and his new eyes are making him see horrors beyond mortal comprehension, but no biggie¡­ right?

    Expect:

    + A world where sci-fi meets eldritch nightmares, and everyone is worse off

    + A determined MC who¡¯s out to make life better

    + A unique cyberpunk/eldritch world

    +Daily 2k+ chapters

    What NOT to Expect:

    - A story where MC has tons of plot armor

    - A story where only the MC is capable of using his head

    - Cardboard side characters

    Chapter 1: Take Me Out</a> Story Page</a>

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 Chapter 18: Hacked Off

    ¡°Grenades!¡±

    It was all I could get out as I saw eight balls of death sailing through the air.

    The Kittens reacted instantaneously. Fire shifted focus. I felt explosions rattle through me as they managed to detonate some of the grenades in midair. Three of the clusters were shot down before they could reach us.

    Two grenades sailed through one of our windows.

    Before I could even feel terror, Mela tackled me to the ground. My skull bounced painfully against the floor, but that was the least of my worries as explosions shook the building.

    My visions went absolutely insane as the flash of heat and force rolled over us. I was surrounded by grinning monsters and dying Kittens. Horror flooded my system until I couldn¡¯t feel the floor I was lying on. I couldn¡¯t move. I¡¯m pretty sure I had a seizure or two.

    ¡°¡­ fuck, kid, speak to me!¡± Mela¡¯s voice slowly broke through my daze. Once my eyesight cleared, I saw her worried face leaning over me.

    I blinked up at her. ¡°Wuh?¡±

    ¡°Thank fuck. On your feet. Now. Now!¡± she screamed, pulling me up and pressing me against the wall.

    I finally got to look around and take in the devastation the grenades had wrought. Honestly? It wasn¡¯t that bad.

    Well, ignoring the blood and viscera scattered all over the place.

    ¡°Uric, Tip, and Bethany jumped on them. Fuck. They jumped on them,¡± one of the Kittens, the medic, ranted in Mela¡¯s direction.

    Mela herself seemed stuck between rage and resignation, but it didn¡¯t take her long to choose ¡®pissed.¡¯

    ¡°Back to your posts! Back to your posts now! Punish those fuckers!¡±

    That finally reminded me to check the camera feeds properly again. For a second, I just stared in surprise. I saw only two borgs struggling to cover the remaining distance between them and the HQ. The other two were gone, and there were two suspiciously fresh craters on the street below, still smoking.

    Just about every Kitten¡¯s gun was focused on the two borgs, who were struggling to continue their advance. Their metallic bodies strained against a literal hail of bullets. The riot shields, no matter how good, were starting to chip and crack.

    Then one of the brutes threw caution to the wind with a scream.

    He dropped the shield, covered his head with his harms, and broke into a dead run. His feet left actual indents in the ground as he covered the last few meters. Just as I thought he might actually manage to burst through the front doors of the HQ, a high caliber bullet caught him in the knee.

    It must have hit something incredibly vital, because the metal limb exploded. Still, the brute had enough momentum to throw himself forward. While the camera angle was awkward for me, I guessed he planted his face on the building¡¯s wall about a meter away from the doors.

    The angle was awkward for our shooters, too. They couldn¡¯t take him out. Terror started to rise in my chest. I was convinced the borg would live until he managed to find his way inside somehow.

    I was wrong.

    I sucked in a sharp breath when a Zerx bullet caught the back of the man¡¯s skull, obliterating his head. My shock then quickly turned to horror when the borg¡¯s body detonated with enough power to shake the building¡¯s foundations.

    Smoke and dust billowed up into the air, blocking the camera. When they cleared a few seconds later, I could make out the edges of a massive hole in our HQ.

    The Zerx had an opening, now. A very real, very visible opening.

    I was already screaming a warning when more vehicles emerged from behind the Zerx. Just two, this time, careening directly for the opening the borg had made in our wall. The second borg was still out there as well, though he had crouched down when his buddy exploded. He cowered desperately, trying to present as small a target as possible for all the people shooting at him.

    Someone in the building must have had enough of the worsening situation. Grenades began to sail out of the HQ at both the approaching vans and the borg.

    The second borg didn¡¯t fare any better than the first. The explosion of his death was only matched by the detonation of his own body in response. Another grenade rolled directly under one of the armored vans and blew up the entire front half. What was left of the vehicle swerved to the side and tipped over, spilling out blood, body pieces, and a remarkable number of living Zerx who¡¯d apparently been packed into the back like sardines.

    The other vehicle was more successful.

    It got through the kill zone, then vanished from my view when it tore through the opening the borg had made in the wall.

    ¡°Fuck. Fuck!¡± Mela screamed, frustration rolling off her visibly.

    When she opened fire again, she did so wildly and with no regard for aim. Funnily enough, she still managed to be just as deadly. Her shots clipped one of the Zerx when he peeked a bit too far over his barricade. The man toppled over into the street, where he was promptly finished off.

    Mela yelled at the top of her lungs as she continued venting her emotions in bullet-form. ¡°Keep at them! Kill all the fucks!¡±

    The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

    I hesitated for just a second, but my curiosity refused to be held back for long. I kept three of my six viewpoints trained on the outside, prioritizing the cameras which were focused on the thickest clumps of Zerx fighters.

    The other three, however, I quickly scrolled through until I found the cameras on the inside of the ground floor.

    The place was a mess. Plaster, blood, and bodies littered the floor. The van had driven straight across the room and into a wall. It had caught at least two Kittens between those points, if the blood trails and corpses were anything to judge by.

    The Zerx had already started spilling out of the vehicle, shooting all around them blindly. They weren¡¯t being very effective, and the defenders were using their superior positioning to gun them down fast,  but I still saw several Kittens falling.

    ¡°They¡¯re in, but they¡¯re not doing great. Our guys are moving through them,¡± I narrated quickly, only half-aware I was even doing it. The news did the trick, through. Most of the Kittens relaxed noticeably, and both their rate of fire and their accuracy went up.

    There was no one keeping an eye on scrolls at that point. The overwatch had been delegated to me some time ago when my effectiveness was proven. That meant I was the only one who got to see two more borgs emerging from the van inside of our HQ.

    Somehow, I felt disinclined to share that little tidbit. No sense in triggering a panic.

    Before my own panic could properly set in, actual turrets descended from the ceiling of the room. Four of them, one for each corner, with double barrels thicker than my wrist. They opened fire, and¡­ well, the borgs didn¡¯t last very long at all.

    I felt my lips curl into a vindictive smile as I watched the turrets light up the van, absolutely obliterating another regular Zerx that tried to slip out. The man¡¯s sacrifice did let them drag one of the double doors shut, though, and soon another brave sacrifice managed to close the van, which was standing up to the turret fire frustratingly well.

    That didn¡¯t stop me from trying to bolster our morale.

    ¡°Turrets have them boxed in! Most of them are dead already, but the leftovers are trying to hide in the van. I don¡¯t think they¡¯re very happy they made it inside!¡±

    Cheers and bloodthirsty hollers answered my claim. For just a few moments, it truly felt like we were close to wrapping things up.

    The Zerx on the outside were dwindling. A ton of their people had gotten pinned down by defenders, thanks to all the height and positioning advantages. Their borgs seemed to be down, even if they had left a hole in our wall and repainted the bottom floor. The van was managed.

    Then I felt the oddest shiver crawl down my spine.

    It felt like I¡¯d just dipped my toes into ice cold water, or like that one time I¡¯d spotted a guy stalking me when I was ten. It was pure dread brought on by deep primal instinct, the kind of feeling that just couldn¡¯t be captured in words. I¡¯d never been able to describe it.

    I could definitely describe what happened next, though.

    A line of crackling electricity zapped up to one of the cameras I was using and booted me out of it. And I wasn¡¯t just mentally aware of it, either. That electricity was a physical experience. I felt it stab through my eye as it severed my connection to the camera.

    I doubled over with a groan, clutching at my left eye, but the feeling didn¡¯t abate. It stretched out. This time, it claimed two cameras at once, for double the agony.

    Then I felt it race deeper into the building and up its sides, gaining in speed and power. I desperately tried to pull away, but the thing was spreading too fast. The discombobulating sensation it left in its wake prevented me from doing anything other than slumping to my knees.

    Helpless, I experienced each new link in the growing net of wrongness. I felt it spread through our cameras and infect the turrets. Then, languidly, like it was relishing the moment, the infection reached out to people. I felt it claim every cybernetic on the lower floors. I felt eyes going blind. I felt hands and legs seizing up, going into convulsions, or even threatening to strangle their owners.

    Higher and higher up the building it went, sweeping through and into the netrunner¡¯s suite above us, as well as into me.

    I was only vaguely aware of Mela screaming my name, barely even felt her hands close around my shoulders. My mind was entirely consumed by the glitching kaleidoscope of my vision as it fractured into something foreign and entirely inhuman.

    The cybernetic organs were rapidly heating up, and as they did, the chaos in my visions grew and expanded. I saw spots of black so deep and alien, they could never belong within our reality. Colors the likes of which I¡¯d never seen, spilling over and into each other. Creatures, wrong and inhuman and with grins too large and too pointy, grins which opened into devouring holes of infinity speckled with far too many eyes.

    My brain hurt. My mind hurt, threatening to fracture into a billion little pieces as that feeling of creeping electricity struggled against the safeguards that must have been placed on my eyes.

    The electricity won. My eyes fizzled one final time, and shut off.

    Then, just as the infection rose up to swallow me completely, I felt the crackling line of electricity go taut¡­ and then it snapped.

    One second I was spasming out on the floor, utterly blind. The next, I blinked ¡ª and looked up into the worried eyes of Mela, whose hands were gently cradling my cheeks.

    ¡°Don¡¯t fucking die on me, kid. Not again. Please not again.¡±

    She brushed her fingers under my eyes with a gentleness I had trouble associating with the woman. When she lifted them away, I realized they were stained red.

    Blood. My blood.

    ¡°Is it me or did I just get hit by a lightning strike?¡± I tried to say, but all that came out was a garbled moan.

    Still, that was enough to make Mela¡¯s face light up. ¡°Fuck, kid, ya freaked me out. Up with ya, but gently! Gently!¡± she hissed when I tried to sit up too fast. ¡°Let¡¯s get ya propped up against the wall, and Ravs will see ya in a second. Don¡¯t try to do anything, ¡¯kay?¡±

    I couldn¡¯t have tried shit even if I wanted to. I just collapsed against the wall, letting my head thunk against it. The bit of pain from that failed to register compared to the mother of all headaches currently raging inside my skull.

    My eyes, too, felt oddly¡­ tender? That wasn¡¯t really the word for it, but they were strained. The way my failing set had felt whenever I forced them to stare at a screen for hours on end.

    A tiny bit of panic shot through me. Still, all I had to do was open my eyes and sweep them over the room to reassure myself that my vision was as unnaturally keen as it had been since I¡¯d made the switch. I could only hope that whatever had just happened hadn¡¯t damaged anything permanently.

    That thought prompted me to try and connect to the cameras again. The effort hurt, at first. It felt like I was poking at an open wound, and the connection was slow to establish itself.

    It did work, however, and I was treated to the sight of waning chaos. The turrets must have turned against their owners. More than a few Kittens were laid out in pieces.

    In spite of that, the van was finally cracked open. I got to see a few Kittens emerge from it with satisfied looks on their faces, so I could only assume all the attackers were well and truly dead. On the inside of our HQ, at least.

    The attackers on the outside were still there, but they looked hesitant and confused. Some had stepped freely out from their cover and advanced a fair bit before getting gunned down for their trouble by the Kittens recovering from the chaos. Those who hadn¡¯t rushed in weren¡¯t pleased at all.

    Whatever had happened, I could only assume it was some kind of plan on their part. A netrunner of their own, perhaps? Those were rare in the slums, but¡­ well, the Kittens had one.

    The Zerx had attacked with confidence. They were expecting to win. Assuming not all of their leaders were idiots, it made sense that they had something to rely on, some card up their sleeves meant to ensure their victory. Of course, that left me with a burning question.

    Why did the attack stop?

 Chapter 19: Blood Price

    No one gave me answers, at least not at first. The Kittens had other matters to attend to. They were angry and had plenty of adrenaline roaring in their veins.

    So, was it really any surprise that their swift retaliation was a thing of both beauty and ferocity?

    Bullets were used like they didn¡¯t cost a thing. Once the Zerx remnants started to pull out, some of the Kittens organized a counteroffensive.

    Garren was in the lead. The big man charged out of the HQ following a line of our own borgs with riot shields. I was shocked to spy an old-fashioned two hander sword in the gang leader¡¯s hands. At least, until the blade began to vibrate and its edges started glowing red-hot.

    A thermal weapon. Somewhat crude, if I wasn¡¯t mistaken, but a thermal weapon nonetheless.

    My theory was proven correct when Garren stepped up to one of the Zerx barricades and cleaved right through it. The blade went through the steel like a hot knife through butter, and the body of the Zerx behind it didn¡¯t fare any better.

    I was just as shocked to then see Garren grip the barrier by one of its incredibly hot edges where his sword had cut through. Lifting it, he hurled the damn thing with enough strength to make it bury itself in the back of a fleeing Zerx.

    The secret behind that little trick was revealed when he flexed his hand afterwards and I spied some melting synth skin stretched over metal. Cybernetics, then. Cybernetics of a high enough quality to masquerade convincingly as natural limbs, too.

    Either crime really did pay exceptionally well, or Garren had been very important before he decided to set up in the slums and start the Red Lions.

    I had just enough energy to narrate the events going on outside to the gang members stuck in the room with me, to much cheering and support. Mela did grumble about how she¡¯d told me to rest, but she didn¡¯t really press the issue.

    Ravs found me not long after I watched the Kittens dispatch the last of the Zerx. The medic gave me a couple painkillers, squinted at my eyes a bunch, then shrugged and told me I¡¯d need to see a ripper if I wanted to get them properly checked out. Preferably Torn, since the ripper was apparently the best the Kittens had.

    Ironically, I found myself wishing I could go visit Glim. Sure, there was always a risk he might decide he was through with me and harvest my organs, but his weird extra limbs were preferable to the freak show that was Torn¡¯s eyes.

    But did I really need to see a ripper at all? I was feeling a ton better already. Even the sluggishness that had briefly plagued my eyes¡¯ functionality was fading.

    I opted to put off the doctor¡¯s visit.

    Instead, I rested, sitting in the same spot I¡¯d occupied through most of the fight. I only stirred when I saw the Kittens, led by Garren, drive one of the Zerx vehicles closer to the HQ, then shuffle a roughly human-shaped bundle out of it.

    For some reason, I felt an intense burst of curiosity wash over me at the sight.

    ¡°Come on, something interesting¡¯s happening down there,¡± I mumbled at Mela, only swaying a little when I got to my feet.

    She scowled at me, but she was clearly just as curious as I was. The two of us piled onto the elevator and set it to the ground floor.

    We just missed the excitement. One of the Kittens lingering inside the ruined space directed us down to the basement and Torn¡¯s section of the clinic. Apparently, Garren had something he wanted the ripper to check out, so everyone had piled on down there.

    The sight of the bottom floor did dampen our excitement and curiosity a little before we headed to the basement. Compared to the number of bodies respectfully laid out in a corner of our room upstairs, the ground floor was a slaughter.

    There were far too many human bits all over the place. The Zerx bodies alone made up a whole pile. The smell was such that I thought I¡¯d never want to eat again. Piss, much worse kinds of human waste, coppery blood, and an underlying stench of scorched meat all mixed together into an olfactory assault of altogether unholy proportions.

    When we final made our way down to Tron¡¯s clinic, we were desperate for anything to take our minds off of that.

    ¡°What happened, boss? Little scout here says ya had some excitement going on at ground level.¡± Mela tried to butt into things with her usual cheerfulness, but her grin was brittle and there was a tremulous edge to her voice.

    Garren staunchly ignored both, offering us a tense smile. ¡°Scout? And yes, that¡¯s about right. We found who we think was the Zerx runner. Fucker just about had us there by the end. We found Mort passed out in his setup. We managed to wake him up, but he¡¯d apparently only had time to jack out before the enemy runner burned him out. He¡¯s not in a good way, but he¡¯ll make it. Our friend here, however¡­¡±

    He motioned at the runner who was most likely responsible for the attack, currently laid out on Torn¡¯s operating chair.

    If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

    Most of him was perfectly intact. He was even in that silly full body suit that runners always wore on shows. It looked clean and spotless, a far cry from Mort¡¯s own gear. His face, though¡­

    That was a thing of nightmares.

    His muscles were frozen in a rictus of shock and pure terror. His eyes has been clawed out, deeply. It almost looked like someone had tried to get at his brain through the fleshy orbs that just happened to be in the way. Tracks of blood and all sorts of other matter stained his cheeks.

    Even more horrifying were his hands. The blood and bits of viscera stuck to his fingers and under his nails clearly suggested the man had killed himself.

    Torn was humming around him with an array of tools and scanners. His concentration was so intense, he actually missed Garren¡¯s first three attempts to catch his attention. It was only when the big man shouted his name that the ripper snapped out it.

    He cleared his throat sheepishly. ¡°Repeat that?¡±

    ¡°I said, can you tell us why this happened?¡± Garren growled. ¡°He was winning. Mort was out. What the fuck made him decide he wanted to remove his own brain so much?¡±

    The ripper shrugged. ¡°As far as I can tell¡­ nothing. I can detect incredibly high levels of adrenaline and associated hormones in his system, which does suggest he was under enough duress for his heart to pop if the condition had persisted. But as for why he¡¯d kill himself? I have no more idea than you do.¡±

    ¡°Well that¡¯s¡­ not great. Is there any chance whatever happened to him might happen to us?¡±

    The look of pure disdain Torn shot Garren was a thing worth immortalizing for future generations to ponder.

    ¡°I¡¯ve detected no noticeable signs of a memetic hazard. Most tellingly, the fact that we¡¯re not all clawing out our own eyes as we speak. So, no. It¡¯s unlikely that whatever happened to this runner is contagious. Faulty equipment would be my best bet, since you said his entire setup was fried. He probably wasn¡¯t ready to handle the strain it took for him to support a hack this widespread and powerful, especially off of whatever nonsense he¡¯d managed to scrap together and stuff inside a van.¡±

    Everyone relaxed a little, though the mere mention of a memetic hazard had put us all on edge. Those were not something to joke about. But then again, they were incredibly rare and petered out quickly on a world like ours. Not to mention they wouldn¡¯t be much of an issue inside the slums of all places, what with our general lack of cybernetics and direct net connectivity.

    Still, no one liked to think about a mental plague that could twist normal people into any number of different abominations. Not abominations of flesh, perhaps, but abominations all the same.

    ¡°Good. That¡¯s good. I¡¯m also happy to see you two are fine,¡± Garren said belatedly, glancing at me and Mela. ¡°This was no place for a kid. And your brother¡¯s gonna be pissed enough already that he missed this shit. Would be way worse if I had to tell him his baby sister got killed on my watch.¡±

    Garren grinned as Mela sputtered, and some of the tension drained out of the room. At least until Mela rallied and pointed an accusing finger at me.

    ¡°We¡¯re not all fine. This guy passed out on me and went into some kinda seizure. I wanted to have ya check him out, Doc.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m fine! It was just because of my eyes! I think the runner got ¡¯em before he, er, expired,¡± I protested, but Torn was already pulling me into another chair. Less because he was worried about me, I¡¯d wager, and more because he didn¡¯t want to miss the chance to inspect my cybernetics.

    To my surprise, Garren came to my defense. ¡°He¡¯s got a point. I went into a spasm too, and my vision cut out.¡±

    ¡°Yes, well, didja bleed from your eyes, too? Because he did,¡± Mela snapped.

    That shut Garren up. His own eyes widened as he stared at mine, analyzing the traces of blood on my cheeks.

    ¡°Erm, maybe he took it worse because he¡¯s so young?¡± he offered up weakly, but his heart wasn¡¯t in it.

    Still, while Torn prodded at me, I couldn¡¯t help wondering why Garren was sticking up for me at all. I narrowed my eyes at the gang leader while he was looking at Mela, but other than a slightly stiff posture, I couldn¡¯t glean anything.

    ¡°There is nothing physically wrong with him,¡± Torn declared. ¡°Some light irritation due to heat, likely when his eyes were getting hacked. This does suggest a higher level of cybersecurity than I¡¯d expect to see in the skull of a street rat, but he¡¯s otherwise fine. His eyes are undamaged and fully functional.¡±

    With that, I was ushered out of the chair and out of the room as well. There were plenty of wounded people for Torn to tend to, apparently. He couldn¡¯t waste time on perfectly functional ignoramuses.

    Not his exact words, but it was heavily implied.

    ¡°Well, that¡¯s that.¡± Garren brushed his fingers through his hair. He was very pointedly not looking at Mela when he spoke next. ¡°Look, kid, you did well. Maybe not with direct combat and all, but from what people were telling me, you kept it together and supported our guys when it counted.¡±

    Mela glared at him, but I just blinked.

    What is he saying?

    ¡°So, the thing is,¡± the gang leader bulldozed on, shooting me a wry grin, ¡°I¡¯d be open to accepting you on a permanent basis. Fuck if we didn¡¯t lose enough good men and woman today to need fresh blood.¡±

    ¡°Ya can¡¯t be fucking serious! Look at ¡®im! He¡¯s so fucking skinny he might keel over if you give him a gun too large!¡±

    Mela broke into a tirade, but I could barely hear her.

    I was being offered a spot in the Kittens. Me. Street rat extraordinaire.

    Kittens didn¡¯t just recruit rabble, like most other gangs did. You had to actually contribute something for them to want you.

    And Garren wanted me.

    Though I¡¯d always hated the idea of joining a gang, though I knew it would complicate my life in a million different ways¡­ well. I¡¯d just gotten a ton of proof that going at it alone was likely to get me killed eventually. The slums were teeming with chaos, and whether people knew it or not, it was centered on me. If whoever I¡¯d stolen from ever got close to finding me¡­

    ¡°I¡¯m in,¡± I said loudly, drawing the eyes of both Garren and Mela. Garren looked pleased. Mela looked more than a little pissed.

    ¡°We¡¯re happy to have you!¡± Garren boomed before Mela could get a word in. We¡¯ll need to put some meat on those bones of yours, and you¡¯ll need to learn how to actually shoot, but¡­ for now, just get some rest. There¡¯s plenty of cleanup to do, and no one¡¯s going anywhere until we¡¯re sure it¡¯s safe out there. Should only take a couple days, but better safe than sorry. Zerx have a habit of lingering even when they¡¯re beat.¡±

    I nodded eagerly, not at all ready to venture outside any time soon. I¡¯d need to come up with some excuse and then message Catill, but that was preferable to running across pissed off gangers. I could just tell him the truth, anyway: war in the streets, chaos all over the place. Not even the old codger would want me to brave that just for work.

    I was just starting to feel properly hopeful about my future when Mela¡¯s hand clamped down on my shoulder. I looked up into a decidedly fanged grin.

    ¡°A little Kitten now, eh? Fine. We¡¯ll get ya ready to claw up the streets, then.¡±

    Oh, that doesn¡¯t sound good at all.

 Chapter 20: Lower Tides

    I jerked my head to the side, barely dodging a blow that would have rocked my world and put me out of the fight. I kind of wanted to let it happen, really. Just bite the dust and get some fucking rest already. Yet something pushed me to keep moving, to keep gulping down breath after breath of stale, dank air.

    The world glitched. Time jumped forward, and a monster with a smile to die for buried their fist deep in my stomach.

    I blinked hard. My vision cleared, but things refused to improve. The only difference was that the monster now had the grinning face of Mela.

    Even with the warning from the vision, I couldn¡¯t do a damn thing to dodge the coming blow. My body was lagging. My thoughts were more sluggish than one of the druggies you¡¯d see slowly rotting away in an alley.

    The only reason darkness wasn¡¯t already creeping into my vision was because my new eyes simply refused to let that happen. Oh no, I was forced to witness the full glory of a punch propelled by expertly maintained muscles as Mela¡¯s fist knocked my last remaining breath out of my body.

    I would have thrown up if I hadn¡¯t done that three times already. Instead, I got to dry heave and squirm on the ground as the sadistic redhead stood over me, cracking her knuckles.

    ¡°Well? Are you feeling like a proper Kitten yet?¡± she taunted.

    ¡°Lovin¡¯¡­ it¡­¡± I wanted to spit the words at her, but I barely managed to gurgle them out. ¡°Go¡­ spar¡­ Gar-ren.¡±

    Mela narrowed her eyes for just a moment. Then she laughed, the sound bouncing off the walls of the small private gym. I scowled fiercely.

    Five days. Five. Days.

    Entirely too long a period to be treated as a scratching post by a frustrated Kitten lieutenant. Just because she disapproved of accepting ¡®kids¡¯ into the gang for their own sake, did she have to take it all out on me?

    Well, fine. I had to admit that wasn¡¯t all she was doing. Sure, she pushed me to the brink of collapse every time we sparred, but then she¡¯d drag me back into the world of the living by pawning me off on Torn. Then she¡¯d sit me down at the cafeteria and force me to scarf down way too much food.

    I actually threw up on day one, and she caught flak from both Ravs and Garren. That was when I desperately made my plea. I told her I had shelled out plenty of credits for Reality Enhancement software, and that it could offer me the perfect diet regimen to get my body back in shape. It could even account for any training regimen, if I fiddled with the setting.

    I came to bitterly regret sharing that information.

    Mela was ecstatic. From then on, no matter how hard she pushed me, she could brush it off. ¡°It¡¯s fine,¡± she kept saying. ¡°Ya have RE software tracking yer condition.¡±

    She was right. Sort of. Unfortunately, the software also happened to be a major source of stress for me.

    <table style="border-collapse: collapse; width: 100%" border="1">

    <tbody>

    <tr>

    <td style="width: 99.0252%">

    Adrian Flinn

    Strength: 0.6

    Reflexes: 0.7 ¡ú 0.8

    Acuity: 4 (-6)

    Physique: 0.5

    Recovery: 0.4 ¡ú 0.5

    Stamina: 0.8 ¡ú 0.9

    Soul: 1 ¡ú 1.2

    Adaptability: 1

    Tolerance: 1

    Cognition: 1

    Essence: 0.1

    Mind Synchronicity: Minor Instability ¡ú Growing Instability

    </td>

    </tr>

    </tbody>

    </table>

    Most of the stats were fine. Better than fine, really. Lots of good food followed by brutal exercise actually seemed to be doing something for me.

    Unfortunately, that final entry loomed large in my mind, and for a very good reason. ¡®Growing Instability¡¯ was an all too appropriate description of what was happening to me. Whatever my condition was, it was definitely in flux, and not towards a positive outcome.

    That first night after all the fighting was done, my sleep was plagued by nightmares. I couldn¡¯t remember everything about them. What I could remember was the sensation of being more than flesh. I moved through the world as a shadow that refused to conform to that world¡¯s laws, twisting, growing, shrinking, and adapting as necessary to hunt my prey.

    The sheer freedom of it was intoxicating. The excitement of the chase left me all tingly. And then it all came crashing down when I caught sight of my face in a mirror: a wispy, dark face with no discernable features other than an all-too-wide grin, and red eyes glowing like hot metal.

    I gasped awake, shaking and sweating like I¡¯d run a marathon. My mind was such a mess that it took me a while to notice all the¡­ inconsistencies.

    Just past the edge of sight, remnants from the dream still lurked. Glowing lines occasionally flashed past me. Shadows stretched just a little too far. Fanged grins or red eyes gleamed in the corner of my vision.

    A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

    They¡¯d all flee when I tried to focus on them, leaving me to wonder if I really was losing my grip on reality. Then again, the stat page had already answered that question, hadn¡¯t it?

    The only minor comfort in all the madness was that it didn¡¯t seem like I was losing my wits for nothing. Sure, the shadows were disturbing. I began to consider clawing my new eyes out every time I tried to go to sleep. But despite their terror, the glitches I was experiencing seemed to be trying to help me.

    It didn¡¯t trigger every time. Not at first. But sometimes, when Mela came at me with some real aggression behind her hits, my eyes would glitch out. Then I¡¯d get a little hint as to what kind of pain she was planning to inflict on me.

    It was mere flashes at first, there and gone too quickly to be of much use. But the more practice I got, the more reliable those flashes became. And the more serious Mela was about hurting me, the more stark and informative the visions were.

    It got to the point that Mela actually looked at me with something close to approval one day after a particularly grueling session.

    ¡°Listen, kid¡­ I ain¡¯t gonna lie to ye. Yer not great at this. Throw on at least twenty more kilos and a fair bit of muscle, and maybe you¡¯d actually be able to do something to fight back. That instinct ye¡¯ve got, though¡­ now that¡¯s valuable. It¡¯s almost like yer moving before I try an¡¯ hit ya sometimes! Keep at that, and ye¡¯ll be useful out on the streets way sooner than I thought.¡±

    It wasn¡¯t exactly a glowing review of my potential as a fighter, but it was also the most praise I¡¯d managed to wrangle out of Mela thus far, so I decided to take my wins where I could get them.

    The world didn¡¯t stop turning just ¡¯cause I was getting the shit beaten out of me on the daily, of course. Garren kept the gang on high alert for the first few days after the fight. Still, the longer we waited, the more it seemed like things were tentatively dying down.

    Our scouts reported as much. Most gangs had let their stupid blood thirst run its course and were now licking their wounds, eying each other like they expected the next blow to come down any second. Even the string of mysterious slaughters, the work of what I assumed was the Reapers¡¯ previous benefactor, had stopped.

    When we went two whole days without hearing about another gang mysteriously wiped out overnight, it really started to feel like things could go back to normal.

    Shortly after that, Garren released most of the fringe Kitten members back to their homes. He sent them out with orders to report and retreat to the HQ if anything suspicious happened or a rival gang tried to make a play against them.

    A day after that, I stumbled downstairs from the shared sleeping space on the second floor to find Mela waiting for me outside the cafeteria. She held a wrapped sandwich in one hand and was hurriedly stuffing her face with another.

    ¡°You good?¡± I asked doubtfully as the redhead choked and sputtered.

    She managed to swallow and answer in a reedy voice. ¡°Yeah. Let me grab some water. Fuck, that went down the wrong way¡­ Anyway, munch on this and I¡¯ll be right back.¡±

    She shoved the wrapped sandwich into my chest and fled.

    The sandwich was good, much like everything else Feyo¡¯s team of cooks produced for the gang. The painfully thin, jolly man was one of the reasons people insisted on taking their meals in the HQ, or even living there full-time. If Garren ever let something happen to the cook, he¡¯d probably have a violent revolt on his hands.

    Mela was still coughing when she returned, nursing a bottle of water. ¡°Sorry for the wait,¡± she quipped. ¡°Let¡¯s go.¡±

    I fell into step with her easily, still enjoying my sandwich. I wasn¡¯t just content to follow blindly, though.

    ¡°You planned something special for today? You shouldn¡¯t have. You know I enjoy our dates regardless,¡± I teased, earning myself a fond eyeroll from the redhead.

    ¡°Ye wish. But yeah, I do have something planned.¡±

    When I realized she was leading me out of the HQ, I felt my body stiffen and my breath start to come a little more quickly. It didn¡¯t make much sense. I hadn¡¯t even spend a full week there. But somehow, in that time, the HQ had become my safe space. Everything outside was dangerous.

    I knew that wasn¡¯t quite true, of course. Still, it was hard to argue with those feelings when the weird glowing lines and shadowy figures suddenly multiplied in the corner of my eyes, both lurking just out of sight.

    I blinked. Hard.

    ¡°And you¡¯re not tell me where we¡¯re going because¡­?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s a surprise. I figure it¡¯s the least I could do after¡­ everything.¡±

    Mela¡¯s voice was uncharacteristically solemn. I kept my mouth shut, even if my sandwich no longer tasted so great and I desperately needed a sip of water myself.

    If Mela noticed my growing anxiety, she never acknowledged it. Not when we reached the same narrow entrance we¡¯d used to sneak into the building, or when we climbed up the shaft to street level, or even when we put a solid distance between us and the HQ.

    Really, it was a bit embarrassing how long it took me to realize we were heading towards my apartment building. Or, well, our apartment building. I kept forgetting Mela had chosen to live there too, much to Garren and her brother¡¯s frustration, if gang gossip was to be believed.

    I still hadn¡¯t gotten to meet her brother. I¡¯d only learned recently he was out of town on gang business, the thought of which I found both daunting and exciting.

    Once I knew our destination, it was easier to push past the doom and gloom. I tried to focus on keeping pace with Mela. The walk itself was pretty great, honestly. It was amazing to feel my body glide along without pain, exhaustion, or hunger weighing me down.

    ¡°You know, it¡¯s weird to just be out and about like this,¡± I eventually admitted, trying to sound like I was joking. ¡°It feels like I should expect trouble. Like Zerx are going to jump out from around the corner and try to riddle us with bullets or something.¡±

    ¡°I know it¡¯s not a nice thing to hear, but¡­ ye¡¯ll get used to it. Or ya won¡¯t, and ye¡¯ll choose to walk away from this life. Either or. Not gonna judge ya regardless. Fuck knows I tried to convince Garren to chase ye off enough times.¡±

    This should have bothered me, but she sounded so sad and resigned that I couldn¡¯t muster up any anger.

    ¡°I keep saying it, but I only look young. I really am almost seventeen. For the slums, that¡¯s¡­ well, not old, but¡­ Oh, you get it.¡±

    ¡°I do. I do, and I hate it. Don¡¯t mean it¡¯s right, the way things are at the moment. Even if they¡¯ve been this way for a long time.¡±

    I could only sigh, because I really wasn¡¯t about to argue against that. So, it was in a much more companionable silence that we reached our shared apartment building.

    Once again, I felt a thread of¡­ tension. That was one word for it.

    This time, though, it had nothing to do with potential ambushes. I was walking towards the most tangible inheritance I¡¯d gotten from my mother. An inheritance that was thoroughly soiled when those fuckers bust down my front door and ruined my apartment.

    Except, when we finally reached my floor and my eyes drifted over to the familiar doorway, I froze.

    Instead of a gaping hole, I spotted a door, firmly blocking access to my home.

    ¡°What¡­?¡±

    I didn¡¯t stand there and wait for an answer. I strode on quickly, almost fumbling the request to have the doors open because I still wasn¡¯t used to sending it with my eyes. They did slide open though, and what I saw on the other side was definitely not a scene of devastation.

    If anything, my apartment looked better than ever.

    A soft, plush carpet in Kitten colors covered the floor. A brand new, larger wardrobe graced the spot where my old one once stood. An even larger and comfier looking bed had replaced my beloved item of luxury. Even the shower nook had been scrubbed so thoroughly that no mold had survived.

    There were a few extra items there, too. They made the space feel way smaller and more cluttered, but that was just fine. Now I had a desk, a couple chairs, and even some kind of cooking unit, sitting on the desk beside a charging port with a slot for a scroll.

    ¡°Well, I figured¡­ Yer apartment was trashed because of me, and¡­¡±

    Mela shut up when I turned around and hugged her, carefully hiding my teary eyes by pressing my face against her shoulder.

 Chapter 21: Burdensome Limitations

    Mela was a horrible friend with a penchant for relentless teasing. I knew that, and I still hugged her and cried for an embarrassingly long amount of time. At least she didn¡¯t record me¡­ I think? She better not have. I would exact bloody retribution.

    It might take me a lot of growing and practicing, but I would find a way.

    Then again, she looked about as embarrassed as I did. She beat a hasty retreat at the first opportunity. She also rushed to assure me that the area was much safer now, that she would take the head off of anyone who dared mess with the youngest Kitten, and that she was a call away if I needed something. I did tease her for all this in turn, so¡­

    Well. I guess we were both a little awkward.

    Now that I was alone, though, I felt even more lost. The last time I¡¯d stood in that space, it was covered in blood and other bits that really shouldn¡¯t be on the outside of someone. Now, my shoes were by the door, and I got to sink my toes into what had to be the fluffiest carpet I¡¯d ever felt.

    I started to walk around absently, brushing my fingers over all the new surfaces. The wardrobe felt more solid. The desk I had no idea what to do with, especially since I hardly ever felt the need to use my scroll anymore. And the chairs¡­ they felt like a real luxury, for some odd reason. Maybe because I¡¯d thrown out the last chair I actually owned for being a rotted mess?

    Not that it was actual wood, mind you, but whatever replacement material it had been made of was authentic enough to rot. Way quicker than actual wood would have, too! A real nice bonus feature!

    These chairs were metal and looked suitable for smashing someone over the head, probably on account of Mela¡¯s tendency to use furniture like that. But the cushions were comfy, and I perched on one while looking around like a lost owl.

    ¡°What am I supposed to do now?¡± I asked myself out loud, dizzy with both confusion and an odd sense of liberation.

    I¡¯d successfully stolen the eyes. I¡¯d made it through my suspicious ripper and a mugging. I¡¯d saved Mela. I¡¯d survived a fucking war.

    And now there I was, sitting in a comfy chair, with no idea what was expected of me.

    Oh, the Kittens were likely to want something in the future, but neither Garren nor Mela were the types to just screw with my daily life for the hell of it. So I was¡­ well, essentially, back at square one.

    Just way better equipped. I had an actual safety net, more credits than was healthy for me, and good eyesight.

    That did leave me with one more question, though.

    ¡°What do I even want now?¡±

    That wasn¡¯t supposed to confuse me so much, was it? Most people could probably answer the question easily. The problem was, I¡¯d never had time to think about it. I¡¯d been trying to stay ahead of imminent starvation or violent death for so long, I had no clue about anything beyond.

    What right did a kid from the slums even have to throw around such a frivolous question?

    That, at last, did stir a desire in me. It felt like the first spark that made old machinery twitch and stir to life.

    Yes, I was a kid from the slums. Yes, life had strung me along and kicked my ass too many times to count.

    So, that was what I wanted: I wanted to never be so mishandled again. I wanted to know I could take care of myself.

    I wanted to feel safe.

    The problem was¡­

    <table style="border-collapse: collapse; width: 100%" border="1">

    <tbody>

    <tr>

    <td style="width: 99.0252%">

    Strength: 0.6

    Reflexes: 0.8

    Acuity: 4 (-6)

    Physique: 0.5

    Recovery: 0.5

    Stamina: 0.9

    </td>

    </tr>

    </tbody>

    </table>

    Those stats. Those stupid, stupid stats. Compared to an average kid my age, I was a stupid distance even from the starting line of proper conditioning.

    The Reality Enhancement software was helping, sure. Its careful analysis of my body yielded plenty of data to transform into an exact schedule of how much I could push myself, how much I should eat, etc.

    I¡¯d shared all that with Mela, Garren, Ravs, and even Feyo. The gang leader had assured me I¡¯d always have enough to eat. Ravs was there to check up on me and okay my continued torment by Mela. Feyo was more than happy to ¡®put meat on my bones¡¯, as he liked to say.

    None of that changed the fact that I was dealing with the effects of long-term malnutrition, lack of proper exercise, and stunted growth. Not to mention enough chemicals in my system from the slop I¡¯d been eating to ensure I died of cancer eventually, without proper treatment.

    Wonders never stopped piling onto the citizens of our wonderful corpo-run world. I mean, why would anyone care about the slop sold in the outer districts, let alone the slums, when humans bred like rabbits compared to most other races? Clearly, we were the most accessible fast-replenishing resource, and corpos knew that.

    If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.

    Ranting aside, my point was that I was small. I could be very easily squashed by any ganger on a solid meal plan of steroids and rage-inducing drugs.

    Mela certainly knew it. Fuck, she wasn¡¯t exactly subtle about her lack of confidence in my physical abilities. How many times had she ¡®nonchalantly¡¯ complained, loud enough for me to hear, about the Kittens¡¯ lack of good support members? I knew for a fact she wanted me to beg Ravs or even Torn to take me under their wing. According to her, I ¡®had a brain that¡¯s actually worth shit¡¯ and could excel under them.

    The problem was, I really didn¡¯t want that. I didn¡¯t want to be ¡®support staff¡¯, however useful.

    I didn¡¯t want to feel vulnerable anymore. I didn¡¯t want to jump at every shadow that crossed my path, scared out of my mind that I¡¯d get ambushed again. I mean, even with the shooter Mela had left me with and all the training she¡¯d given me, I still wasn¡¯t sure I¡¯d be able to take that druggie she saved me from. Not one-on-one.

    But the stats were against me. I was never going to be a physical powerhouse, even if Garren was okay with drugging his own people to the gills for a boost (and he wasn¡¯t). I had to accept that.

    Mind you, I wasn¡¯t about to give up.

    I¡¯m just going to have to work smarter, I resolved silently as I stripped off most of my clothes and jumped into the shower. Or borg out to the point I can take care of myself.

    I didn¡¯t particularly want to go insane or lose my ability to feel emotions. But if it came down to a choice between running scared for the rest of my life or seeing if I could withstand enough cyber bits to measure up with more physically gifted gangers, I¡¯d roll the dice.

    Granted, I did have one other potential option. And it was a lot more appealing.

    Stepping out of the shower, I got comfy on my new deluxe bed. Then I booted up my search engine and started browsing.

    The object of my research? Netrunners.

    Though the Zerx assault ultimately failed, I was never going to forget what happened that day. Our cameras hijacked. Our defenses turning against us. My own eyes almost stolen from me.

    That level of power was terrifying. It was a nightmare even to consider one person wielding that much influence over the world around them.

    And it was tempting. So tempting, in fact, that I had to fight down the urge to search for learning resources right then and there.

    I forced myself to slow down. To keep it to casual browsing.

    But as I browsed, the urge only grew.

    There were plenty of stories, both starkly realistic and blown out of all proportion, about exactly what runners were capable of. I found no less than seven news reports from the deeper city districts about businesses getting stripped of their credits and secrets by rival corpo runners. Four reports of borgs getting hacked and unleashed on their own employers. Three reports of independent runners who¡¯d had a bit too much fun and disabled entire blocks of security, before getting hunted down and taken out by corpo assassins.

    In an age when most ¡®civilized¡¯ people had net-connected machine bits in them, runners may as well have been wizards. They could do just about anything to you, if the fancy hit them.

    So it really didn¡¯t surprise me that training resources on the subject were heavily restricted, whether behind cold hard creds or corpo contracts.

    You want to be trained as a runner? Sure! Join your local branch of our corpo office, sign a contract, and we¡¯ll put you through our courses. Oh, what¡¯s that? You don¡¯t want to spend the next eighty years indentured to us? Too bad. You¡¯d better have several thousand credits to shell out for the classes, then. And that¡¯s on a monthly basis.

    This formed an effective barrier for most people. No one could advance in this particular career except those born to wealth, or those willing to sell themselves body and soul to play in the digital world.

    I didn¡¯t qualify for either category.

    For a moment, I idly considered going to Garren. Runners were always a hot commodity. He¡¯d likely want to get more of them. With Mela and her burning desire to keep me away from combat backing me up, the man might say yes. A very selfish part of me nudged me to try.

    The other, more reasonable part of me scoffed, telling me I¡¯d never do it.

    Damn it, that part was right.

    I¡¯d heard Garren complain about finances more than a few times over the last couple of days. The kind of meds, food, and other supplies he secured for the Kittens on the regular were not cheap. They cost him thousands of credits every other week.

    Even with all of the gang¡¯s many sources of income, most of them highly illegal of course, he was only just staying ahead of things. He¡¯d confided as much in me one time when Mela and her nonsense had driven him to drink.

    So, just asking Garren to pay for lessons or learning resources was out.

    You¡¯d think there was a much simpler solution to the problem. After all, the Kittens already had a runner. Mort might have nearly gotten himself killed by his surprise Zerx rival, but the man was neither stupid nor useless. If he was willing to back me and actually play teacher for a bit, I could probably get to a basic level of runner proficiency in a couple of months.

    Unfortunately, that was a pretty fucking big ¡®if.¡¯

    Mort owed his status and influence within the Kittens to his runner skills. Anyone who showed up with the potential to replace him was his biggest threat. If I so much as revealed any interest in runner training, I wouldn¡¯t be surprised if I just vanished. They would find my body in an alley a couple days later.

    That might seem like a bleak outlook, considering how nicely the Kittens had treated me. But having met the man myself? Yeah. I wasn¡¯t taking that risk.

    Naturally, that left me with only my stubbornness, my ingenuity, and my own meager resources.

    Then again¡­

    I eyed up my backpack, knowing it was metaphorically weighed down by the addition of the cred chips I took off the Zerx Mela and I had killed. I¡¯d tried to split those with the woman, but she¡¯d just waved me off and told me that she owed me for saving her ass already. That meant I¡¯d enriched myself by an additional two thousand, five hundred and some-odd credits. Together with what I already had, well¡­

    It wasn¡¯t enough for personalized classes and proper guidance. Not even close to enough for bribing some runner into taking me on as an apprentice, either.

    Still¡­ maybe, just maybe, I could do something with the money?

    A ton of research later, I was even more frustrated than I¡¯d been at the start. Supposedly, you could get shards containing lessons for much cheaper than personalized courses. They¡¯d be good for at least the basic stuff, if not the more advanced learning.

    Problem was, no one deigned to share the wisdom of how you could actually buy these shards. Even those who openly discussed the best shards to purchase, by name, never once quoted a store that sold them.

    Besides, the sites where I found the info weren¡¯t exactly what you¡¯d call ¡®upstanding.¡¯ Not the so-called ¡®dark net¡¯, not even close. I had no way to access that. But they were definitely not sites set up by law-abiding citizens.

    I was just about to throw caution to the wind and try one of the paid forums when my attention drifted to the current time. I froze. It was already way too late, and I was actually going back to work the next day.

    Grumbling, I got even more comfortable on my ridiculously soft bed and tried to drift off, thinking about Catill¡¯s grumpy face.

    Catill!

    I jolted upright.

    Despite his deep hatred for all things tech, my boss also consistently turned up all sorts of odd wares at his shop. It was a long shot, but if he could somehow help me get my hands on some of those shards, then I¡¯d be a huge step closer to my goal. Failing that, I was at least sure Catill could put me in contact with people who would be able to procure shards.

    When my nervous energy finally fizzled out much later that night, I fell asleep with a big smile on my lips.

 Chapter 22: Run Boy Run

    Waking up the next day wasn¡¯t fun. It would have been rough even if I hadn¡¯t stayed up too late researching and scheming. If I wanted to get to the Kitten¡¯s HQ for a decent breakfast before work, then I had to set my alarm for a truly depressing hour.

    I forced my eyes open with a groan. All of a sudden, I knew exactly why most active Kitten members chose to live in the HQ. Way more convenient that way.

    Still, between running there and then running a good distance to one of the outer district entry checkpoints, I got a pretty good workout in. And it was worth it. Feyo ignored my halfhearted attempts to convince him that no, he didn¡¯t need to send me off with three lunch boxes. By the time I finally slowed down to a stroll near Catill¡¯s shop, I was too busy stuffing my face with gloriously delicious food to care any more about my lack of sleep.

    Feyo had opted for some kind of very munchable mini sandwich thingies that day, with a decent spread of various flavors. Honestly, if the Kittens ever decided to kick me out, I would miss the food most of all. Safety and community I could do without, but Feyo¡­ I¡¯d probably have a breakdown.

    Of course, my good cheer and appetite did suffer a little when I realized I¡¯d have to face Catill soon, but I pushed through. After all, I wasn¡¯t going in unequipped. I¡¯d yielded to Feyo¡¯s insistence for one reason and one reason only: the extra sandwiches would make fantastic emotional blackmail.

    Keeping this ammunition firmly in mind, I stepped into Catill¡¯s shop.

    ¡°Hello, boss! I can¡¯t put into words how good it is to see you again. I¡¯ve missed you so much!¡±

    ¡°Wat do you want, ¡®uman?¡± Catill immediately demanded. I know I was laying it on a little thick, but the way he looked at me, you¡¯d think I chopped his limbs off and then forced him to watch as I looted his store. ¡°You¡¯re lucky I didn¡¯t fire you for missing so many days. Stupid little ting, refusing to leave de slums.¡±

    My smile turned plastic.

    Well. More plastic.

    ¡°I don¡¯t want anything, boss. Really! Can¡¯t I be happy to see you after all that chaos? I was looking forward to a normal day.¡±

    He tried to do his patented stare-down, but I refused to flinch. Honestly, I wasn¡¯t even lying. The promise of a regular day¡¯s work and a return to familiar, safe routine had been a siren song when I was stuck in the HQ, and doubly so when I thought we were all going to be killed by Zerx.

    My boss must have picked up on my sincerity, because he scoffed and looked away.

    ¡°Get in der and start working. De books aren¡¯t going to fix demselves!¡±

    He tried to sound harsh, but I noticed the way the way he was inspecting me from the corner of his eye, the bugger. He could pretend all he wanted, but he definitely was looking me over for injuries.

    I smiled as I traipsed past him, put my backpack and its precious cargo in the coldest corner of the shop, and then got right down to work.

    Work that I suddenly realized would be more time-consuming than I¡¯d expected. Apparently, Catill had really gotten into the habit of letting me deal with the administrative side of things. I had to go over all the business logs for every single day I¡¯d missed.

    It wasn¡¯t tough work, far from it, but it was monotonous. I soon found part of my attention drifting. I¡¯d picked up the habit of pulling up something to look at on my eyes¡¯ feed when I got into a mood like that, so I decided to indulge and continue my research from the day before. It wasn¡¯t like dealing with Catill¡¯s numbers required much brainpower.

    Unfortunately, I can¡¯t really say that helped. I only got annoyed again by how little you could find online about runners and their skills. At least that annoyance further crystalized my decision to take the risk of chatting with Catill when lunch rolled around.

    Funnily enough, I then sank so deep into the work funk that I lost track of time. Only when Catill popped his head into the store and grunted at me to take a break did I finally snap out of it.

    Fetching my backpack, I ventured over to the little area where we always ate.

    ¡°Had lunch yet yourself, boss?¡±

    ¡°Wat kind of stupid question is dat? Can¡¯t you see my lunch?¡± He gestured at his own lunchbox, which was full of the nutrition packs typically favored by outer district residents.

    My smile wavered, but I pushed down the rising nerves.

    I¡¯d get nowhere if I didn¡¯t try.

    ¡°Sorry, sorry, just asking. I met a few people who helped me get through the whole mess in the slums. One of them loves to cook, and he kind of forced me to take extra with me, so¡­ I was wondering if you¡¯d like one of the lunchboxes?¡±

    I tentatively raised the see-through plastic container, showing it off to Catill. He narrowed his eyes at it, then looked at me, then back at it, then at me again, not speaking.

    After several long seconds of this, I was starting to sweat. For all I knew, Catill actually liked the nutritional packs. I was hardly an expert on alien taste and physiology. What if offering him the sandwiches was a grave insult? Or if he couldn¡¯t even eat them? Or ¡ª

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    Catill snatched the lunchbox away from me with startling speed.

    ¡°Now I know you want someting, for sure,¡± he ground out, already opening the box. ¡°Speak, den!¡±

    I flushed. ¡°Listen, I do need help, but the lunch really is just a gift. You don¡¯t have to help me.¡±

    My boss snorted even as he bit down onto the first mini sandwich thingy. His eyes went wide, and the next bite followed with much less hesitation.

    I hid a smirk behind my own sandwich. Feyo¡¯s cooking strikes again!

    ¡°Someone gave dis to you?¡± Catill finally snapped at me after going through about half the lunchbox. ¡°You lying to me now, boy?¡±

    ¡°No lies. Honest. As I said, I met a couple of people while trying not to get killed. I tried to lay low in my apartment when the whole thing was going down, but¡­ eh, that didn¡¯t really work out. I swear, I barely got out of the whole mess in one piece.¡±

    Was that a flash of genuine concern I saw in his eyes? Whatever the emotion was, his typical mixture of apathy and suspicion was back too quickly for me to tell.

    ¡°You¡¯re a fool for staying der. You can look for a place to live in dis district. Less chance someone knifes you in de back, idiot boy.¡±

    ¡°Can¡¯t really afford it, boss. Besides, my mother left me that apartment. Not gonna leave it without a fight.¡±

    I smiled inwardly at how true that was. When I had been forced to leave, only recently, I¡¯d left behind a pile of Zerx bodies.

    Besides, while my original set of belongings was trashed, Mela had really come through with the replacements. Combined with the apartment¡¯s sentimental value?

    Yeah. I¡¯d have to be dragged out of it kicking and screaming.

    ¡°Watever. Missed de important point. Wat do you want from me, boy? Out wit it.¡±

    ¡°I¡­ Listen, I went through a lot since the last time we saw each other. It wasn¡¯t¡­ I mean, it was tough, okay? And look at me, I¡¯m a scrawny mess. I don¡¯t think I¡¯m ever going to be as tough or as strong as some of the gangers out there, let alone someone with actual training and support.¡±

    ¡°Dat¡¯s not an answer to my question, boy.¡±

    ¡°Okay, okay. I need another way to protect myself. I figure, if I could somehow get the learning material on how to become a netrunner, I could ¡ª¡±

    ¡°No.¡± Catill¡¯s voice was a sharp, wheezy bark. His eyes narrowed in on my face, and the anger in them was palpable. ¡°I know wat you¡¯ll ask next, and I¡¯m not giving you info on ver to buy dat kind of stuff, boy. No.¡±

    ¡°Boss¡­ Catill. Listen. Please. I just¡­ I don¡¯t have a different way of getting any of that stuff! Have you seen how much info like that costs? How much classes cost? I know you have some way to get¡­ eh, less than legal merchandise, so ¡ª¡±

    ¡°You know dat, do you?¡± Catill was shouting at that point. ¡°Are you saying you¡¯ll ¡ª¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not going to fucking rat you out, okay?!¡± I shouted right back. ¡°Whether you say yes or no, I¡¯m not gonna tell anyone or leave. You¡¯ve saved my life already with this job, don¡¯t think I don¡¯t know that, but I need something! I can¡¯t just sit around and wait for someone to kill me because I can¡¯t even fucking protect myself!¡±

    I was panting, and I felt like I¡¯d run for my life for hours, but I refused to look away from Catill¡¯s yellow eyes.

    ¡°And you tink dis will ¡®elp you? Netrunning?¡± He said the word with such disdain, it seemed to splatter onto the floor between us.

    ¡°Yes. I could at least do something, then. I¡¯d have a skill. Besides, people protect runners in the slums.¡±

    ¡°Dey also keep dem like valued pets, boy. Don¡¯t tink I don¡¯t know dat!¡±

    ¡°They¡­ do,¡± I admitted, thinking about Mort. How much of his bitterness was down to his natural disposition, and how much of it could be blamed on having his freedoms cut down to almost nothing? The Kittens were a lot more decent than other gangs, but even they wouldn¡¯t risk giving their runner too long a leash.

    I pushed the thought away and forced myself to hold Catill¡¯s gaze.

    ¡°I still need this. It¡¯s not like I can get very good at fighting, looking like¡­ this.¡± I motioned sadly at myself.

    My boss¡¯s eyes remained fixed on me, but some of the anger I¡¯d seen brewing behind those piss-yellow orbs was draining away.

    ¡°And if I give you de info? Can you even afford it? Dose don¡¯t come cheap, boy.¡±

    ¡°I have some savings,¡± I hedged. ¡°I¡¯ll work something out. At least it¡¯s a chance. That¡¯s more than I have now.¡±

    It was a long while before Catill spoke again. When he did, he sounded like he¡¯d rather be anywhere else than in my presence.

    ¡°Fine. I¡¯ll give you a location. Know dat I don¡¯t approve. Dey¡¯ll probably kill you on sight wen you turn up. Not very friendly, black markets.¡±

    ¡°Thank you, thank you, thank you!¡± I managed to keep from vibrating out of my seat, though I could do nothing about the blinding smile that broke out on my face. ¡°I promise I¡¯m not going to get myself killed! You¡¯ll see!¡±

    Catill grumbled under his breath, but I was way too thrilled to pay attention to what he was saying. All I could think was that I had a solid lead on how to turn my life around, yet again. If I could just fix up my weakness, I could do so much more for the Kittens. I could be an actual member rather than a charity project.

    And that was without even considering the other benefits of becoming a runner. Respect, power, influence, wealth¡­ all words that I¡¯d never once thought would apply to me Now that I was faced with even the slightest possibility of snatching them for myself, I could hardly sit still.

    Of course, Catill wasn¡¯t blind to how I was feeling. Nor was he willing to just let things lie, apparently.

    ¡°Know dis, idiot boy. You¡¯ll need to take a risk just to get wer you want to go. You tink der¡¯s runner shards lying around in de outer district?¡± He sneered. ¡°You¡¯ll need to ¡®ead to de middle districts just to get to de black market.¡±

    That did, in fact, feel like a bucket of ice cold water dumped on my excitement. The mention of the middle districts brought Jason to mind again, as well as my own family history. Suddenly, I was tempted to call the whole thing off.

    My C class citizenship gave me access to the middle district, but it was risky. No telling what my dear old absentee dad might do to that access, and to me in general, if he suddenly remembered my existence. I had no urge to fuck around and find out.

    On the other hand¡­ if ever there was a prize worth all that risk, this was it.

    Not that I had a choice, really. I¡¯d never find sufficient knowledge about netrunning within the outer districts, let alone the slums. Catill was right.

    Catill¡­

    My eyes snapped up to meet Catill¡¯s. I saw far more understanding there than I ever expected. My blood ran cold, and I suppressed a shiver.

    Catill knew. I had no idea how, but he knew about my C class citizenship. My boss was aware of the fact that I could venture into the middle districts, and he¡¯d never so much as mentioned it before.

    Then there was that comment he¡¯d made a few days ago, about my mother¡­

    I wanted to ask. I wanted to ask so badly that it hurt.

    Maybe it was cowardice. Maybe it was that odd desire to maintain what little bit of ¡®normalcy¡¯ I could still cling to. Either way, I failed to get the words out of my mouth.

    Instead, I gave him a cocky smile I wasn¡¯t feeling at all. ¡°Don¡¯t worry about that. I¡¯ll handle it.¡±

    Catill just snorted and shook his head.

    ¡°Idiot boy.¡±

 Chapter 23: Back In Black

    While I was incredibly tempted to hightail it straight to the black market immediately after work that day, I didn¡¯t. I was learning! All that deep thinking about actions and consequences was seeping through my thick skull.

    Or seeping in? Not sure. It was doing something.

    So, instead of diving into danger, I took a few days to prep.

    The first thing on my list was a visit to one of the clothing stores in the outer district. My normal outfit was fine for my daily commute, but if I wanted to gain entry to the middle districts without getting shot, I¡¯d need to look a bit more put together.

    Before I set foot in the shop, though, I did some alteration to my eye settings. My regular glowy red light show was perfect for the day-to-day. It looked kind of menacing, which meant a ton of slum dwellers left me alone on principle.

    In the middle districts¡¯ black market, though? The eyes would be way too memorable. I might as well paint a neon target on my back.

    Thankfully, it didn''t take me long to switch over to a soft, baby blue color. Not only did it go kinda well with my hair, but it also looked startlingly natural. I even figured out how to cut off the ¡®glow¡¯ feature. With the lack of any manufacturer marking on the sclera, I could pass for someone with their natural eyes still in their skull, if no one looked too closely at me.

    For the clothes, I decided to go with the time-honored tradition of edgy nutcases and edgerunners the galaxy over and dressed myself in all black. A black t-shirt, black baggy pants, a new pair of black trainers, and a stylish cargo-style black jacket with a very large and roomy hood. Simple, and functional.

    The jacket in particular was an amazing find, mostly for all its pockets. While I¡¯d leave most of them empty on the black market trip, in anticipation of pickpockets, it was still a ton of space for gear and other knickknacks in the future.

    Best of all, black would be excellent for hiding bloodstains. True, I¡¯d most likely only be hiding stains from my own blood, but¡­ it counted, dammit.

    Done with that little excursion, the next item on my agenda for the following few days actually linked back to the Kittens. It wasn¡¯t difficult at all to get Garren to sign off on some shooting lessons. Turned out that was a pretty basic benefit of joining the gang to begin with.

    I would have liked it better if I could have avoided the butt-kicking that Mela continued delivering to me on the regular, but some sacrifices simply had to be made.

    After three whole days of prep, though, I couldn¡¯t hold myself back anymore. My backpack was filled with all the necessary supplies and ready to go. I was a tiny bit more certain that I could put bullets into my enemies instead of myself. My new black clothes were in a separate bag I¡¯d brought along so I could change into them after work.

    Obviously, Catill noticed. Not all the material prep work I¡¯d done, but the fact that I was fidgeting all day and could barely sit still? Yeah, I couldn¡¯t exactly hide that.

    ¡°So, ya¡¯ll be goin¡¯ out der ta get yaself killed today, eh?¡± he demanded once our work day was through, his accent slipping all the way to that inhuman edge like it always did when he was agitated. ¡°Fool. Idiot!¡±

    Then he hissed and shook his head. ¡°Wait ¡®ere.¡±

    He plodded off into the back of the shop. Then, seconds later, I heard him start talking in a hushed voice. I scooted to the side a little, just enough to give me a better view of the hallway, and caught sight of him actually using a scroll.

    That was about as far from his regular behavior as possible, enough so that it actually killed my curiosity and looped back into an odd sort of anxiety. I wasn¡¯t close enough to hear any distinct words. All I could do was stand there nervously and wait.

    When Catill finally emerged, he didn¡¯t look happy at all. He thrust some kind of bracelet at me, his hand thumping into my chest with enough force to make me stumble and gasp.

    ¡°Take ¡®iz, an¡¯ go. Ya¡¯ll ¡®ave a guide waitin¡¯ far ya, idiot boy.¡±

    With those parting words, he turned away from me sharply and busied himself with the stuff laid out on the shelf closest to him.

    ¡°Thanks,¡± I whispered, just loud enough for him to hear me while still having an excuse to pretend he didn¡¯t. Then I beat a hasty retreat.

    My heart was racing a million light-years a minute for some reason, and the simplistic bracelet felt like it weighed a ton. I still put it on when I ducked into a nearby deserted alley to change.

    When I emerged, I felt like a whole new man. I wasn¡¯t, obviously, but the clothes were high quality and more comfortable than anything I¡¯d worn for a very long time. They gave me a swell of confidence I didn¡¯t expect.

    At the same time, I also felt like more of a fraud than ever.

    The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

    The clothes felt too new. Too stiff. Too¡­ I don¡¯t know, not worn-out enough to lie properly on my bony frame.

    That didn¡¯t stop me from heading straight towards the checkpoint I knew would let me into the middle districts.

    The walk gave me time to finish prepping. Not physically, but to put on a show for the people I¡¯d be meeting along the way. I tried to insert a little more boldness into my steps, the self-assured sway of someone who¡¯d never known starvation or daily threats to his life and wellbeing.

    It was a very pretty lie, and I clung to it with everything I had as the checkpoint came into sight.

    In a way, it was similar to what you¡¯d find between the outer district and the slums: a tunnel full of scanners and a bunch of tech that would blast me into little itty bitty pieces if I so much as sneezed wrong while passing through.

    The differences were just as marked, though.

    The entire wall was way better maintained. Everything was sparkly clean. Several guards stood along the sides of the passage, ready to descend on any cars or on-foot pedestrians trying to get through to the middle districts. The guards were all fully equipped with scanners, ID readers, and a ton of passion for protecting their corporate overlords.

    Can¡¯t let gutter rats sneak in, right? That would be a tragedy! Some corpo might smell them, and then where would we all be?

    I resisted the urge to snark out loud as a pair of guards stepped up to me. Their postures were rigid and aggressive, probably on account of my small frame. Not a ton of people living in the middle district could afford gene mods to guarantee flawless appearance, but at least they could afford to eat decent food, so I definitely looked suspicious approaching the checkpoint.

    ¡°ID yourself, now,¡± one of the guards demanded harshly. His full-body armor distorted his voice until it sounded uncomfortably machine-like.

    I wanted to cower away, but I forced myself to roll my eyes and speak in a lazy drawl. ¡°Of course, of course.¡±

    At least I could pull up my citizenship records and then flick them the guards¡¯ way with a thought. The realization that I actually had some cybernetics instantly put them more at ease.

    Though I knew my papers checked out, they still asked for a scan and the purpose of my visit to the outer districts. I just mumbled something Jason might have said. Finally, when they found no proof that I was lying my ass off in an attempt to invade their precious districts, I was waved through.

    My snark stayed strong until I actually stepped foot beyond the towering wall.

    Then the splendor on the other side caught me entirely by surprise.

    Everything was clean. Everything was¡­ peaceful. Serene, even. While people still looked over their shoulders in the outer district, people here strolled around without a care in the world. And why not? I could see at least three Peacekeeper model humanoid clankers from where I stood.

    On top of that, the very atmosphere of the streets was just¡­ different.

    Gone was the ugly sameness of the outer district and slums. Towering megabuildings still snatched at the sky here, yes, but no two looked like. One twisted like a spire in scattered waves. Another seemed to be made entirely of glass, reflecting the world like a pile of broken kaleidoscopes. Down the street was one that looked like a monument to some stark yet beautiful design philosophy, reminding me of the Terran cathedrals I¡¯d seen in history books.

    I wasn¡¯t even in the inner districts, yet I was in a whole new world already.

    I only remembered to keep moving when people started shooting me odd looks. Then I sent a request to my navigation app and let it take over. That day, I was in the mood for large glowing footsteps that marked out my route. The distraction was necessary. I could busy myself with trying to step in those instead of looking around.

    Because looking around hurt. I was surrounded by images of where I could have ended up living, if my male genetic donor wasn¡¯t an utter asshole.

    If I kept looking around, I¡¯d just get angrier and more resentful with every step. I didn¡¯t need to do that myself right before engaging in negotiations at a black market. Instead, I kept my head down and focused on following the route laid out by my navigation app.

    Which meant I was paying no attention to my surroundings at all. Like the idiot boy Catill kept saying I was.

    When I was suddenly pulled into an alley just a minute or two away from my destination, I only managed to yelp before a hand closed around my mouth.

    Mela would absolutely kill me if she ever heard about it. I gave no well-executed counterattack. I didn¡¯t dig my fingers into the guy¡¯s knee or groin or something so I could make my distance and try to put up a fight.

    I just sort of¡­ flailed.

    ¡°Fuck, man, stop fucking doing that,¡± a voice hissed in my ear, clearly upset. ¡°You¡¯re going to draw the attention of the Peacekeepers, and then what?!¡±

    Did this asshole just complain about me trying to save myself? Why, I¡¯m gonna ¡ª

    My thoughts cut out when her hand let go of the back of my jacket and gripped my wrist instead. The wrist which had the bracelet on it.

    ¡°You are the guy I¡¯m waiting for, right? That fucker Catill didn¡¯t screw me over or something?¡± the very female voice hissed at me again, and I finally went still.

    When I stayed that way for several seconds, she let go and stepped away from me.

    So, naturally, I chose that moment to let loose.

    ¡°Who the fuck are you? Do you know that I nearly had a heart attack because of you?!¡±

    ¡°Me?! I¡¯m the poor bitch who has to put up with Catill¡¯s crap! He doesn¡¯t fucking call in decades, and then he sticks me with an escort quest? What am I? His fucking joytoy?¡±

    We eyed each other for a few tense seconds.

    I was the one who gave in and looked away first. It was me who was trying to get his hands on black market goods, after all.

    ¡°Listen, I have no clue what¡¯s happening here. I bothered Catill for a black market location, and then when I told him I was going to come here, he just threw that bracelet at me and told me to go. That¡¯s literally it.¡±

    The woman¡¯s wary eyes, so dark brown they were almost black, searched my face another few seconds. Then her shoulders slumped. ¡°You¡¯re not fucking with me. That asshole actually did that. FUCK! Please, fucking tell me you don¡¯t owe him a favor for this, because trust me. You¡¯re going to regret it.¡±

    ¡°I¡­ don¡¯t think so? Maybe?¡± I flinched, admitting to myself that I most definitely did. ¡°Let¡¯s assume I owe him enough that this doesn¡¯t particularly complicate my life further.¡±

    ¡°Oh, you poor bastard. I really hope you can even the odds between you somehow, because¡­ Ugh, doesn¡¯t matter. Okay, okay, let¡¯s take this from the top, I guess. What are you even here for, kid?¡±

    Great. Another person eager to stick me with that nickname. I scowled, both because I really wished I wasn¡¯t so stupidly immature-looking and because Catill had apparently not seen fit to share anything with the woman in front of me.

    ¡°He didn¡¯t even tell you that?¡±

    ¡°What do you think?¡±

    I just sighed, desperately hoping my own relationship with Catill wouldn¡¯t someday land me in a similar situation.

 Chapter 24: Barter My Soul

    My guide never told me her name. But she did, after cursing a little, confirm that she could find someone to sell me netrunner shards. Then she proceeded to complain about how she¡¯d normally be owed a percentage of whatever credits I settled on with the seller, as commission.

    I ignored all the subtle looks she gave me through this rant. It wasn¡¯t my fault Catill had used whatever favor she owed him to maneuver her into helping me. I didn¡¯t have the credits to waste on paying a guide.

    I could, however, admit in the privacy of my mind that I would¡¯ve had a jolly old time trying to find the market without her.

    The address Catill gave me ended up being for a megabuilding, and one that stretched a decent bit higher into the sky than most others in the middle districts. Seeing as those structures were towns in their own right, with an entire ecosystem of gangs, markets, and shops hidden inside their walls, a simple address was supremely lacking. I could¡¯ve loitered in the stupid building for days without ever coming across the market I was looking for.

    Then there was the fact that my oh-so-friendly guide didn¡¯t even enter that building. No, she led me around it to the back of the mega complex, where it abutted another building.

    Along the way, we passed several dangerous-looking people who were just standing around, drinking something nauseously green and trying to look casual. I tensed up, but no one so much as glanced in my direction. I had a strong feeling that the only reason they ignored me was my guide.

    This was confirmed when she walked right up to a door in the other building and knocked on it with all the force of someone who had every right to be there.

    There was grumbling and cursing from the inside, loud enough to reach us. Then a small grate protected by some kind of metallic mesh opened up to reveal the squinting eyes of a man.

    ¡°Whatcha want? Show your invite or piss off, you ¡ª oh. It¡¯s you again. Fucking hell do I hate seeing your ugly mug.¡± The man sneered at my guide as he pulled the door open. ¡°Fine, go on in. Guessing this is your ¡®date¡¯ for the evening? Watch out, kid. She¡¯s going to take ya to all the most expensive vendors. By the time she¡¯s through with you, your mom and pops ain¡¯t gonna have a credit left.¡±

    I nodded at him in respect, because what else was I supposed to do when he was actually warning a newcomer? Then I glanced at the woman Catill had sent. Her expression was bitter. In fact, she looked very tempted to lash out against the man, who was pretty obviously a ganger.

    But she didn¡¯t. Instead, she just started leading me down the sloping hallway.

    The first thing I noted was the pitch-black wolf¡¯s head painted all over the walls. It was the same symbol the guard featured prominently on his bare, tattooed shoulder. Now, I wasn¡¯t up-to-date with my middle district gangs, but I could only assume these ¡®wolves¡¯ were a big deal, considering the fact that they could organize a black market in a heavily corpo-controlled area to begin with.

    I glanced from the wolf-decor to my guide. There wasn¡¯t much to see. She kept herself mostly hidden beneath a long coat. Her faded brown hair was cut short. The bits of clothes and gear I could spot looked high-quality, but worn.

    So what kind of connection did she have to the ¡®wolves¡¯? And how did she even know Catill, let alone owe him enough to be forced into this errand?

    Then we finished our lengthy stroll downwards, and all thoughts of gangs and mysterious guides fled my mind at the sight in front of me.

    We were in an absolutely massive underground space that must have stretched the full length and width of the mega complex. Only the occasional pillar, meant to keep the setup stable, broke up the view.

    Stalls, stands, and even small kiosks filled the room, fighting for space. I could barely hear my own thoughts properly from the constant buzz of voices. The air was full of the noise of vendors hawking their wares, people arguing over prices, and the occasional scream as violence broke out.

    Everyone was remarkably unconcerned about that last category of events. With an effort, I kept myself from clutching at the pocket where I¡¯d hidden my Kitten-issued gun.

    My guide¡¯s voice hissed in my ear.

    ¡°Stick close to me, and try not to stare at anyone too much. If they think you¡¯re eying them up and decide to shank you, I¡¯m not going to be saving your ass, got it?¡±

    I grimaced but nodded in a hurry, which just made the unpleasant woman scoff.

    ¡°Good. Now, I have an idea of where you might get decent runner shards. Do you want to do the whole fucking tour, where I take you from one vendor to the next and compare prices before we finally visit my guy, or do you just want to cut the crap and trust me?¡±

    I gave that serious thought, but¡­

    ¡°I guess I¡¯ll trust you. Remember it¡¯s not me you owe. It¡¯s Catill. If he finds out you fucked me over, he¡¯ll be the one you¡¯re dealing with.¡±

    That seemed to be the right thing to say. She glowered at me, but there was something like a spark of respect there, too.

    ¡°No need to be fucking hardass about this. We¡¯re just doing business, and it doesn¡¯t look like I¡¯m getting my commission anyway. Now come on, and remember what I said about staring.¡±

    I tried to follow her instructions as I kept myself to her shadow, but it was genuinely difficult for several reasons.

    I¡¯d never seen such a sheer variety of people. Just the number of alien species I spotted went well over all the encounters in my life thus far.

    Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more.

    Then there was the variety of cyberware on display. Even the most badass-looking borgs I¡¯d seen before, Garren notwithstanding, were sort of¡­ scruffy. Their equipment was covered in dents and scratches. Some had mismatched arms, legs, or even eyes. A couple looked like they¡¯d been welded to their cyberware instead of having it properly installed.

    None of those things were true in the middle district black market.

    This was the place where people with money went, for the most part. Pristine cyberware gleamed. Flawless equipment shone. Overall, it was an exciting show for a poor street rat who¡¯d come into his meagre wealth by way of murder and looting.

    The final reason I couldn¡¯t help but stare was the misery.

    For every ten excited sellers and their customers, I¡¯d spot one person with dead eyes and even deader mannerisms. These people were hawking themselves, be it as an edgerunner, regular merc, or joytoy.

    And it wasn¡¯t just individuals. I saw no fewer than four businesses showing off their latest ¡®merchandise¡¯, in the form of men and women who looked done with life and all it had to offer.

    Not slaves, of course. Never slaves. Our glorious city was too civilized for such depravity.

    Indentured debtors, though? That was much more the corpos¡¯ style. Can¡¯t pay your debts? Well, eventually, you don¡¯t even own yourself anymore.

    That was how it worked with corpos, up on street level. Owe the same thing to a gang¡­ I was now being treated to a front row seat of where you¡¯d end up.

    I¡¯d known it all along of course. Hard not to, living in the slums. The thing was, people like that just¡­ vanished. You knew what had happened to them, but no one really discussed it much, so you didn¡¯t have to come face-to-face with it.

    But here, in the actual market where they ended up? Well. It wasn¡¯t quite so easy to hide from the truth anymore.

    After spotting the first few faces like this, I fixed my eyes on the neon signage and the excitedly hawking sellers. I wasn¡¯t about to do anything stupid if I recognized one of the ¡®merchandise¡¯, but I knew I wouldn¡¯t be able to sleep for days afterwards if I kept looking.

    Then and there, I affirmed my conviction never to end up in this kind of situation. I didn¡¯t give a shit if I had to beg Garren and Mela for help.

    I wasn¡¯t letting these assholes take me.

    ¡°Almost there.¡±

    My guide¡¯s gruff voice broke into my thoughts. I hurriedly checked if she was looking at me, then breathed a sigh of relief when I realized she wasn¡¯t. She was glaring at the crowd straight ahead, ready to do something at the first sign of trouble.

    Good. I wasn¡¯t sure what my expression had been. It was stupid of me to get lost in my thoughts like that, regardless.

    I couldn¡¯t afford to show that kind of weakness down here.

    Eventually, when I was just getting the hang of drifting in apathy, we arrived at a banged-up kiosk pressed against a wall. It didn¡¯t have many customers eying up the wares, but what I could see through the grimy windows and the neon displays made me blink in surprise.

    Even a cyberware ignoramus like myself could recognize the brands on offer, and all of them were shockingly high-end. High-end enough for me to wonder what the fuck we were doing there in the first place.

    I grabbed the back of my guide¡¯s shirt before she could push her way inside the limited kiosk space.

    ¡°You do know I can¡¯t just throw tens of thousands of credits on this shit, right?¡± I snapped.

    ¡°Relax, kid. I know that,¡± she snapped right back. ¡°Jelly doesn¡¯t just sell to the rich and powerful, okay? If he did, he wouldn¡¯t be here. Just shut your fucking grease trap and let me do the talking.¡±

    Then my kindly guide finished stuffing herself into the kiosk. Its owner had left the side door wide open, probably because of the joint smoke rising from the inside and misting everything up.

    An unwise move on ¡®Jelly¡¯s¡¯ part, apparently. When my guide swooshed through the smoke, dispersing it a little, I caught an ¡®oh, shit¡¯ look on the man¡¯s face.

    ¡°Jelly, my guy! Been a while! Remember the last time we spoke?¡± my guide crowed cheerily, though I noticed that her posture and underlying tone of voice did not match up to the friendly emotions she was trying to project. The few customers gathered around the kiosk scrambled away, clearing out in record time.

    ¡°O-Oh, it¡¯s you.¡± The man was sweating. That much was obvious, even from where I stood. ¡°Heya pal, my friend, my amigo, how can I help you on this fine day?¡±

    ¡°Help me? Whatcha offer that for? I mean, for the nice deal you cut me last time, I should be offering to help you. You want me to do that, huh? Want me to cut you in for something nice?¡±

    ¡°No, no, really, it was my pleasure! All my pleasure, amigo, all mine!¡±

    Jelly squeaked when she slammed her hand down on the shelf next to his head, looming even closer.

    ¡°Cut the shit, asshole. You know exactly what you did. That fucker tried to hunt me down because of the faulty cyberware you sold him. Me! No one would fucking trust me for months before I managed to patch that up. You¡¯re fucking lucky I didn¡¯t just gut you and take them your head as payment instead!¡±

    That was when I noticed the wickedly sharp knife pressed up against the guy¡¯s ribs. His hands were shaking so badly, the ash from his joint was getting all over the place,. He might have shit himself as well. I couldn¡¯t tell if the stench was coming from him or the general mass of unwashed bodies around us.

    ¡°You fucked me over, Jelly-o. So, let me tell you what¡¯s gonna happen right now.¡±

    She jabbed a finger in my direction.

    ¡°My friend over there is looking for runner shards. You know, the premium shit. The ones that actually let you learn how to do all that net crap. So, you¡¯re going to offer me up a selection, and then you¡¯re going to name a fair price for them. And then you¡¯re gonna give us a healthy discount, got it? Or I go exploring with my knife and see if I can find those fucking creds you owe me somewhere in your liver.¡±

    ¡°O-Okay! Okay! Fuck!¡± Jelly squealed. ¡°Stop pressing, stop pressing!¡±

    For a moment, I swear my guide looked tempted to just stab him and be done with it.

    Instead, she finally pulled away with a nod, but still lingered close enough to stick him in the throat if he tried something silly like screaming for help. Not that anyone would actually come running, anyway.

    Jelly¡¯s hands were shaking too badly for him to manage his inventory properly at first. A few more threats actually did the trick of motivating him to hurry things up. Eventually, we had five sets of shards all laid out neatly on a small desk that folded out of the wall.

    ¡°All of ¡¯em are pretty good for beginners,¡± he said, peering at the two of us nervously. ¡°The R0NN3XZ 350 is pretty reliable and generally recommended, while the SHAD03 line¡¯s always popular, and¡­¡±

    The man ranted about the various shards for several minutes with no signs of stopping or even slowing down. I admit I might have lost the plot once or twice, but I still got the most important memos.

    Two of the series were corpo-approved and frequently used, but they didn¡¯t even scratch the ¡®basic¡¯ level I¡¯d be expected to hit before calling myself a runner. The other three were sort of like legacies, something a runner put together to train their personal apprentice. Those were way more advanced, but not quite as thorough. After all, the assumption was that the runner would be there to provide guidance themselves when needed.

    It was greedy of me, but my gut wanted to pick a shard set from both categories. That way, I had an actual chance to learn. Unfortunately, when I suggested that, Jelly quoted me a price of around seven thousand credits.

    I didn¡¯t even have that much.

    Thankfully, what I did have was a very pissed-off guide who seemed set on properly paying off the favor she owed to Catill. With one eye on me and the other on the unfortunate vendor, she started putting on the pressure.

    I honestly couldn¡¯t believe my luck when we left a few minutes later, only three and a half thousand credits lighter and with two shard sets in hand.

    It was official: I was never doubting Catill again.

    Ever.

 Chapter 25: School in Session

    ¡°So¡­ thank you,¡± I muttered quietly once we were outside of the black market and heading away from the alley that concealed its entrance. ¡°Really. I don¡¯t know how I would have managed on my own. I¡¯ll put in a good word with Catill,¡±

    My guide sneered. ¡°You better. Jelly still owes me, don¡¯t think I blew my whole debt on you, but it¡¯s worth it if it gets Catill off my back. Now, get. I¡¯m gonna guess you can find your own way home.¡±

    Without waiting for an answer, she began to power-walk into the teeming crowds of the middle districts.

    Funny, that. A wealthier, safer district, and yet there were way more people out on the streets than you¡¯d ever see in the outer district and the slums.

    It made a twisted sort of sense, I suppose. Outside the cushy comfort of the middle district, people learned quickly not to loiter. Not if they didn¡¯t want to end up a pile of meat on the pavement somewhere.

    It wasn¡¯t as bad in the outer district, obviously. Plenty of people walking around there. The slums, though? Even though they were chock-full of people slowly wasting away, you¡¯d think they were a ghost town most of the time.

    It was only during the daily work commute that you¡¯d see the press of bodies. Even then, people tried to wrap up their business in the streets as quickly as possible so they could retreat into whatever ¡®home¡¯ they had, be it an actual apartment they were struggling to pay for month by month, or a well-concealed and very literal hole in a wall.

    My thoughts once more drifted to the dumpster that hid my stolen collection of cyberware behind its considerable bulk. I¡¯d need to check on it soon, once I knew for sure that trouble had passed.

    I felt a sudden urge to ring up Mela right then and there and ask what was going on back at the HQ. I¡¯d be stopping by for dinner, sure, but I wasn¡¯t sure I¡¯d catch her then. Besides, the appeal of finding out now was considerable.

    What stopped me was the ruse I was trying to maintain. My eye color was still set to be as natural-looking as possible. Having my eyes glow to signify I was on a call would be a dead giveaway.

    At least that reminded me to fiddle with the settings a bit. By the time I reached the checkpoint between districts, I¡¯d managed to dig those settings up and alter them so that none of that nonsense would make my eyes glow.

    Really, who thought it would be a good idea to make ¡®glowy eyes¡¯ the default whenever you were trying to contact someone? Whatever happened to subtlety?

    I did, however, fiddle with the setting so I had an ¡®on/off¡¯ option for the glow easily accessible on my UI. If I ever needed to pull off an intimidating presence, suddenly glowing eyes would go a long way towards selling the impression. Especially with my otherwise underwhelming appearance.

    Somewhat predictably, the checkpoint rigmarole was way less exhaustive when I was on my way out. The guards barely paused long enough to do a token questioning. They even left my citizenship scanning entirely to the built-in machines, rather than bother with their handheld scanners.

    It made sense, sure. But it still rankled that I was afforded so much more trust on the mere assumption that I came from the middle districts.

    Shaking off my frustration, I finally had my eyes send out a call and then waited for Mela to answer. It took a while, like it did whenever I tried to call her, and not just because she¡¯d broken two scrolls in the short timeframe since we met. She was a menace to society who didn¡¯t let trivial things like her scroll or attempted communication slow her down.

    ¡°Well, look who it is!¡± Mela crowed the moment the call connected, treating me to the sight of her wide grin. ¡°Whatcha up to, boyo?¡±

    ¡°Just some shopping. Managed to get my hands on a couple shards I think will be useful. Maybe I¡¯ll even be able to contribute properly from now on, rather than just letting you kick my ass all over the place,¡± I joked.

    I knew it would take a while before I managed to get the runner shards to give up their secrets. Still, a little bravado never hurt with Mela.

    ¡°Oh, them¡¯s fighting words!¡± She laughed in a slightly unhinged way that made me cringe. ¡°Imma expect more from ya the next time I see ya now! Maybe ye could actually take more than a few shots before crumbling, hmmm?¡±

    ¡°The shards are not exactly useful for that,¡± I hurried to explain, then sighed when I realized from her bloodthirsty grin that it wouldn¡¯t matter. Apparently, I was getting my face beaten in at her earliest convenience. ¡°Anyway, I actually called hoping you¡¯d have some good news for me. What¡¯s the situation right now on the streets? Everything calming down, I hope?¡±

    ¡°Ahhh, well¡­¡± Mela trailed off, and my nerves jittered. She looked like she¡¯d just found out someone broke into her room and scratched up those shooters she loved so much. ¡°Not all¡¯s fine and dandy, ¡®fraid to say.¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s going on, exactly?¡±

    ¡°Someone¡¯s still stirring up shit. We have no fucking clue who it is, but some asshole¡¯s taken out a couple important gang leaders and their lieutenants. Plus, two more minor gangs just up and disappeared. Not good for business, yanno? S¡¯got everyone on edge.¡±

    Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

    I worried away at my lower lip as I walked, struggling to stay aware of my surroundings while my brain churned.

    So, whoever was after the stolen cyberware hadn¡¯t finished their crusade yet. They did seem to be slowing down, though. From what Mela had told me during our training sessions, the whole reason the slums had nearly erupted into all-out war in the first place was the mysterious elimination of several major gangs overnight.

    If my mystery pursuer was toning it down to minor gangs now, with just a couple deaths in the ranks of the major players¡­

    I let hope warm me a little, trying to convince myself this was a sign that everything would be okay. So long as I could ride out the death throes of this initial burst of anger, then I¡¯d be safe.

    Whoever was behind it all, they had to have realized by now that none of the slum gangs had the cybernetics. Other than the Kittens and two or three other gangs at best, the slum gangs didn¡¯t have what I could describe as even remotely intelligent leadership. If a boss of one of those gangs managed to get their hands on top-of-the-line cybernetics, experimental or not, they¡¯d be screaming it to the world just to prove they had the best shit around.

    So if the Reaper¡¯s patron knew anything about the slums at all, then once they¡¯d rattled the major players to shake out any secrets, they¡¯d hopefully assume it was a business rival of theirs that had done the disappearing act. I mean, if they could produce cyberware like that, then they had to be a corpo, right? Nothing else made sense.

    Maybe, just maybe, I was almost in the clear.

    That didn¡¯t do much for the guilt eating away at me, or the continual urge to confess everything to the Kittens.

    But it would do no good. Even if I took the cyberware straight to Garren, it would do little other than paint a target on his back.

    Besides, whoever made the stuff clearly wanted it all back, and that wasn¡¯t going to happen. I was not about to let someone rip the eyes out of my skull. Even if I did, the fact remained that I had stolen them. I somehow didn¡¯t think a ¡®thank you and please forgive me¡¯ note was going to make the shady corpo agree to put things behind us without further retribution.

    ¡°Ya okay, kiddo? Ya suddenly went all silent on me. Not getting scared, are ya? Is my itty bitty kitten terrified of the slums now? Want me to help ya find a place to stay in the outer district? Ye¡¯ve gotcha the pass already, now ya just need some credits.¡±

    For all the teasing in Mela¡¯s voice, I could sense an iron undercurrent of sincerity. She knew exactly where I worked, obviously. If I said yes, she would do whatever it took to help me huddle up in the outer district for a while. However¡­

    ¡°Nah. Thanks for the offer. Really. But it¡¯s not that. I¡¯m just wondering why all of this happened and how long we¡¯re gonna need to wait for it to go away, you know?¡±

    ¡°Ahhh, I gotcha. Nasty business, yeah. From start to finish. Can¡¯t wait for it all to go away, and then we can really kick the asses of everyone who thought it would be a good idea to try and catch us out while the mess was going down.¡±

    The smile on Mela¡¯s face was downright chilling. I felt kind of bad for the people she was going to come after.

    Then again, if they¡¯d decided to mess with the Kittens in the middle of all the chaos¡­ Well. Natural selection was still running like a well-oiled machine, even if we were no longer on Terra.

    ¡°Sounds like something you¡¯d approve of, yes,¡± I snarked, unable to stop a twitching smile from surfacing on my lips. ¡°You know, Garren says this is why you¡¯re still single. You¡¯ve scared everyone away. Now no one wants to risk your wrath, or your brother¡¯s.¡±

    ¡°Oh, is that what he¡¯s been telling ya, hmm?¡± Mela¡¯s amusement drained out of her in seconds, replaced by a calculating viciousness. ¡°Imma have to have a little chat with our badass boss about what¡¯s appropriate for the ears of kiddos like you. Maybe even let my brother do it instead of me.¡±

    I shuddered, but I wasn¡¯t about to volunteer to take Garren¡¯s place. Instead, I just quietly sent the guy some good vibes and a silent plea to forgive me. I hadn¡¯t met Mela¡¯s brother yet, since he was still away on whatever errand Garren had sent him on before the whole mess started, but the things I did hear were more than mildly terrifying.

    ¡°Uhhhh, right. Right. Well, I gotta go, Mels. Am I gonna catch you when I stop by the HQ for dinner?¡±

    ¡°Nah. Got some stuff to take care of. Some knees to bust, some fingers to smash. Ya know how it is! Can¡¯t let these assholes inch in on our turf, chaos or not.¡±

    ¡°Right. Checks out. Well, tomorrow then?¡±

    ¡°Tomorrow.¡± Somehow, the scary woman made that sound like the most ominous threat I¡¯d heard in a while.

    Then the call cut out, and I let out a tense breath.

    I loved having Mela as one of my friends. I really did. I just also fervently hoped I never accidentally crossed her, or she would make me regret it.

    Bitterly.

    With that cheery thought, and the shards burning a hole in my pocket, I began to speed-walk through the outer district. I found another deserted alley to change clothes in. Only once my ¡®fancy¡¯ new outfit was safely hidden in my backpack did I make my way to my usual slums checkpoint.

    My brief visit to HQ wasn¡¯t all that notable. I showed up. Feyo fed me like I was a starving, neglected orphan who deserved all his compassion and fussing, just like he did to everyone else. Then I was off to my own slice of peace and quiet.

    Sort of.

    My apartment used to be my refuge. The one place I believed was safe, no matter what. The Zerx had ruthlessly shattered that illusion. Now I was left with an odd sense of anxiety when I didn¡¯t keep myself busy. I found myself listening intently to any sound coming from beyond my newly replaced and reinforced door, trying to pick up the chatter of potential intruders so I could prepare for them.

    I really wished I could kill the Zerx all over again, just for that. But they were gone. I needed to claw back some measure of normalcy if I was going to be okay in the long-term.

    And I would be. That was a promise to myself I would absolutely keep.

    Thankfully, I had something to keep me preoccupied on that particular evening: two whole sets of shards that promised to teach me everything I needed to know about netrunner basics.

    Once I was settled on my bed, I pulled out the two black, oval shard-cases, each about the size of my hand. I decided to start with the corpo-recommended course. SHAD03 was, according to Jelly, a program meant to get runners up to speed on infiltration, hacking, and even scrubbing your presence from the net. In other words, everything you needed to become a good corpo spy and steal the secrets of their rivals in the name of glorious profit.

    That¡¯s what I wanted for myself, too. The ability to slip into systems, rob them blind, and then disappear like a wraith.

    Now, the SHAD03 basic set of shards wasn¡¯t going to get me there. This was, as Jelly said, an intro course. The basic proficiency rundown. Still, everyone had to start somewhere.

    I ran the first shard through my scroll, just in case. Then I prepared to slot it into my port, resolving to learn everything I could.

 Chapter 26: Hands-On Glitches

    Netrunning consumed me.

    When I slotted that first shard into one of my ports, I never could have imagined the effect it would have on me.

    By all accounts, it should have been boring. It was a simple breakdown of all the different programs a runner was expected to encounter or wield themselves. Then a breakdown of different systems, highlighting their best known strengths and most glaring weaknesses.

    I found the IDPs the most fascinating part of that section. The Intruder Deletion Programs were exactly as ruthless and as unrelenting as they sounded, and every corpo worth their salt used them. Want to risk hacking into their stuff? Well, have fun evading their IDPs while they tried to block you, track you down, and then fry your tiny netrunner brain.

    All of this was accompanied by programming. Lots and lots and lots of programming.

    The basic quickhacks used as examples had their entire programming broken down, explaining exactly why each one used up a certain amount of RAM, caused the intensity of overheating that it did, etc.

    This meant that I got those quickhacks, too! Sure, they were kind of shit. I knew they were widely considered as both middling quality and of middling effectiveness. But they were there*.*

    I couldn¡¯t try them just yet. While I had most of the required tools, courtesy of my thievery, I still needed a deck. But the second I managed to get my hands on one, I¡¯d be testing those quickhacks out on everything within easy reach.

    Before that, though, I had a ton of learning to do.

    And I loved it. Each and every bit of it. Even the endless courses on the most popular and useful programming languages. I stuttered through those at first, constantly double-checking my references just to barely clobber together a program. It was ridiculously simple, designed solely to open up and display a wall of text. But it was mine. I had made it.

    As the days kept passing, my skill grew. What took me hours to do at first was reduced to an hour, then to half an hour. Eventually, I was flying through those simple tasks at the speed of thought.

    Well, at the speed it took to access my growing library of code, copy out the relevant bits, and then paste them where they needed to go. As it turned out, that¡¯s mostly what coding was: tracking down the right bit of code that someone else had written and others had optimized within an inch of its life, and then making the best possible use of it.

    Oh, I could code from scratch if I needed to. Slowly and a bit clumsily, of course, but I could do it. Still, why bother? Why strive to reinvent the wheel when someone had so kindly shoved the wheel¡¯s optimized blueprints into a file for little corpos to admire and copy?

    The exercises did slowly amp up in difficulty, especially when I got to the bits meant to test my understanding. That was when the Grunnings Corporation, which had set up the training program and commissioned the shards, decided to be smart and sneaky.

    They freely offered up much higher quality versions of real, valid quickhacks, then barred them behind an exercise in frustration. Someone had meticulously gone through the code and butchered parts of it. Enough was left of the overall structure that you could see what each of the quickhacks was supposed to be: a ping, a breach, an overheat, a data scrambler, and a data looter, respectively. But the more useful each was, the more it was messed up. If I wanted to claim them, I had to restore the bits of code someone had taken a digital hammer to.

    The ping took me a week. The breach took me over twice as long. The other three I finished within four weeks altogether, but I wasn¡¯t exactly happy about that turn of events.

    If I¡¯d done it because of my growing skill and ingenuity, I wouldn¡¯t have complained. Unfortunately, it felt like my brain wasn¡¯t the only thing inside of my skull that was soaking up all the information the shards had for me.

    The issues began to appear right as I was wrapping up the breach. I was lying on my back, eyes closed so I could devote myself fully to the streams of code I had pulled up and enlarged to cover my artificial field of view. All I noticed at first was a moment or two of minor glitching, like the code had wavered within my digital vision.

    Then, as I completed my work on the breach quickhack and opened up the overheat, things got¡­ weirder. The ¡®healthy¡¯ parts of the code remained unmolested, but the faulty bits glitched and moved around in my vision, before I even properly examined them to ascertain they needed to be worked on.

    My eyes had apparently mastered the detection of faulty code well ahead of me. They just helpfully marked out the issues it took me hours of careful study to find.

    I would have been a lot happier if the faulty code would stop shifting into formations in my glitched vision, where it resembled grinning faces.

    That little discovery did a lot to speed my progression along, but I still wasn¡¯t moving quite fast enough for my eyes. Oh, no. The stupid things took it a step further when I was halfway through the overheat. Rather than an ominous mess doing its best to traumatize me, the glitching started to tease me with bits of half-finished code instead.

    It was just snatches of it, really. Snatches which I barely caught as they scrolled across the occasionally glitching areas of my vision. Nonetheless, when I copied them down and tried to fit them into the code I was working on, they fit better than even my own repairs did.

    This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

    Sometimes, they were exceedingly simple yet elegant solutions I wouldn¡¯t have thought to make myself, paring down the bloating of the code and letting it do more in exchange for fewer resources. Other times, the coding my eyes so readily offered up to me was sheer brilliance. Complex bits of programming that went beyond the training samples I was still stuck using.

    I didn¡¯t know what to think about any of it, not at first. In fact, I lost a couple days of sleep and had to buy sleeping aids when Mela noticed my increasingly zombie-like appearance and behavior and decided to lean on me to take care of my health.

    Eventually, though, I decided I didn¡¯t care. It wasn¡¯t like the eyes themselves would ever hurt me. Far from it, they were incredibly helpful, both with their danger detection and with whatever they were doing to help me learn how to code faster and better.

    So, I took their suggestions, noted them down, and used them when appropriate. I even strived to improve upon them. This swiftly proved to be a challenge when the quality of ¡®advice¡¯ offered by my eyes increased in direct proportion to how fast I was learning.

    In tandem with all this progress, however, I was also getting frustrated.

    Everything I¡¯d learned and done thus far was highly theoretical. The programming, the basic runner education, even hunting down and fixing up the quickhacks so I could make them my own. The shards naturally had practical bits as well, but I couldn¡¯t access them.

    The reason was simple: I didn¡¯t own a cyberdeck.

    I had the neural links and interface plugs. Thanks to my stolen wetware overhaul, they were of high quality. Thanks to the same overhaul, I also had a bit more RAM to play around with than would usually be associated with the barebones implants.

    Unfortunately, that was it.

    I couldn¡¯t run a single quickhack. Even if I found a way to force my wetware to try, I¡¯d literally fry it all, along with my eyes and most likely my brain. After all, the deck was a piece of hardware that supported that kind of thing. It stored quickhacks while also enabling a higher degree of connectivity to all the tech around you.

    According to my learning material, the first decks were large, unwieldy things that confined a runner to a single room and ate up more power than was strictly healthy for the economy. The slightly more modern versions had evolved into something resembling a light, sleek briefcase you could tote around with you, and had much more reasonable power consumption needs that advanced batteries could supply.

    All ¡®wild¡¯ runners tended to favor these sleeker decks. For one thing, you could quickly jack out of them. You could also set up more convenient cooling units that sapped away the heat produced by the deck. That would keep you and it from combusting when you were deep-diving or really leaning into your quickhacks.

    The third and final advancement in deck design was the one that truly put corporate netrunning on the map. It also kicked off an immense mess where runners had to learn how to fight, protect themselves, and generally infiltrate secure buildings. Those decks could be neatly slotted into suitable ports that had the requisite wetware bits, allowing you to carry them around inside of yourself. They were no more noticeable than a slotted shard.

    It really made the corpos sweat. Runners could simply stroll into their office buildings, find the nearest point where they could personally jack in, and then overturn the security while yoinking all the data they wanted from inside the various expensive firewalls.

    That kind of deck was way out of my price range. Funnily enough, though, I did have a port capable of slotting one in. Apparently, the wetware I¡¯d stolen and brought to Glim as a ¡®bonus¡¯ to my eyes was way better and more advanced than I¡¯d ever anticipated.

    It was also entirely useless to me. I didn¡¯t dare imagine how many credits I¡¯d need to shelve out for a deck that good.

    Not that those super advanced decks didn¡¯t have drawbacks of their own. Their obvious size limitations meant they didn¡¯t have as much RAM as their bigger cousins. And while their temperature issues could be minimized by using them smartly, they could still overheat, which meant you were in even more danger of ending up fried along with your deck. That was the risk you took when you inserted something into the base of your spine, after all.

    Again, though, not my problem. My problem was getting my hands on even the oldest, most obsolete of decks so I could start practicing some real netrunning.

    The one bright spot on my horizon was the fact that I was in a much better position financially than I¡¯d ever been before.

    I was still paying for utilities, which came up to around 100 credits monthly. I did pick up an occasional snack at some of the nicer establishments in the outer district now and again, particularly to tame Mela¡¯s temper when it threatened to rise due to something stupid I said or did. But other than that, I had shockingly few expenses.

    I didn¡¯t have to replace my clothes all that often. The Kittens took care of my meals, which used to be my biggest daily money drain. Their ripper was keeping me in good health, because Mela always took me to him after demolishing me every sparring session.

    So, between saving the majority of the credits I got from Catill and what I had left from my shard shopping trip, I should have been able to afford one of the more basic, bulky decks easily.

    If only somebody was willing to sell me one.

    See, netrunner gear was just about the one thing rarer and more valued than netrunner training. Corpos were all too willing to let poor outer district residents shell out a ton of credits or sign their souls over to them for training resources. They weren¡¯t quite as prepared to let people get their hands on the equipment that would let them put that training to use.

    After all, even a middlingly capable runner could cause all sorts of mischief. Take me, for example. I hadn¡¯t yet moved onto the ¡®advanced¡¯ shards. I hadn¡¯t even opened the personalized legacy set. Still, I knew I could already hack into vending machines, small tech like cameras, and the less protected systems that littered the slums and parts of the outer district.

    It was for this exact reason that runners in these districts were treated like minor royalty. Royalty that you had to keep a gun trained on most of the time to ensure their cooperation, but royalty nonetheless.

    As such, I was once again faced with a choice: who should I go to for help? Catill, or the Kittens?

    Catill had finally stopped shooting me dirty looks a month into my relentless studying. I didn¡¯t want to ruin things again.

    Going to the black market I now knew existed was an option, of course, but I figured it wasn¡¯t all that smart to do without backup.

    The Kittens could provide that backup. Shit, for all I knew, they had a few decks lying around and would be perfectly happy to let me have them if it meant getting another runner.

    The downside, of course, was that I might end up exactly like Mort. Or that Mort might decide he didn¡¯t like competition, and I would have an ¡®accident¡¯ in my not-so-distant future.

    Not for the first time, I sighed forlornly and collapsed back onto my bed as I got back from a day of work at Catill¡¯s.

    Decisions, decisions.

 Chapter 27: Insightful Terrors

    ¡°So, whatcha got that¡¯s so important ya had to drag me all the way out here to talk?¡±

    Mela lounged in one of my chairs, her feet up on my desk. Taking a piece of perfectly crunchy cannoli filled with ice cream and chocolate bits, she dipped it into a small plastic container of sweet cream.

    The combo had cost me thirty credits. Thirty. Credits. And I had to venture almost to the middle districts checkpoint to find a shop that carried it. I at least got a nice crepe for myself that cost a much more reasonable two credits. Sure, the ¡®strawberries¡¯ and ¡®chocolate¡¯ inside of it tasted a bit like cardboard, but with the volume I got them in, I could mostly ignore the icky undertones and enjoy the sweetness.

    Mela¡¯s own meal wasn¡¯t exactly authentic, but the reviews all claimed the ingredients tasted almost like the real thing. Mela clearly agreed. After one bite, she¡¯d declared that she would ¡®do whatever the fuck I wanted her to¡¯ in exchange. That was a relief, at least until she added ¡®well, if you wait a couple more years and fill out more.¡¯ Then I was busy blushing and glaring.

    Still, she was apparently satisfied enough with her bribe to talk terms. But I couldn¡¯t. I just wasn¡¯t sure how best to approach the topic.

    Mela seemed to understand that, too. She actually put the cannoli pack down for a second, instead of hugging it to her chest like she would obliterate anyone who made a move for it.

    ¡°Listen, kid. I know I bust yer ass, but ya can trust me when it counts, kay? No matter what ya did. Sure, getting some random girl pregnant¡¯s gonna be rough for a little while on ya both, but Garren¡¯s not gonna care too much, and I¡¯ll help.¡±

    ¡°Wha ¡ª why would ¡ª I didn¡¯t ¡ª I haven¡¯t gotten anyone pregnant!¡± I shouted, face already crimson.

    The languid smirk she gave me as she popped another cannoli into her mouth made me want to punch her so bad. Might even have tried it, if I didn¡¯t know she¡¯d just kick my ass right back.

    ¡°Ready to talk now? Just gotta get your blood pressure up to get yer mouth moving.¡±

    I groaned and collapsed back into my chair. A chair that she¡¯d gotten for me. Yet there I was, still hiding the truth from her, because a part of me was terrified I¡¯d get locked inside some stuffy room and forced to keep Mort company.

    Or, you know, that I¡¯d get myself killed.

    ¡°So¡­ I did a thing.¡±

    ¡°A stupid thing.¡±

    ¡°I saved your life. We¡¯re friends. Yes, obviously it was stupid.¡±

    She gave a snort of both offense and amusement, but she waved her cannoli at me to get on with it.

    ¡°I talked to my boss a while back,¡± I said. ¡°Great guy. Gets all sorts of stuff into the shop. So, I figured, if anyone knows about black markets and other places to get rare stuff, it¡¯d be him. And I was right.¡±

    Her eyes narrowed, but she wasn¡¯t angry. Not yet. ¡°And whatcha have him buy for you?¡±

    ¡°Oh, didn¡¯t do that. I went and bought the stuff myself.¡± I knew from her stormy expression I was about to get my ass handed to me, so I preempted that by pulling the shard sets from their hiding place. ¡°Here. Check ¡®em out.¡±

    She took the cases with a furrowed brow. ¡°Ya do know I¡¯m not one of those tech whisperers people like to lie about being real, right? Whatcha got on this?¡±

    ¡°Netrunning lessons. One set¡¯s from a corpo, the other¡¯s from an experienced runner who took on an apprentice.¡±

    Mela fumbled and almost dropped the cases. ¡°The fuck?! How the hell did ya ¡ª How much did this even cost!?¡±

    ¡°The guy asked for seven thousand first,¡± I teased, feeling a tiny bit smug that I could actually elicit a reaction from her. ¡°Got a pretty good deal though, because a girl owed Catill and the vendor owed her. It was a whole thing.¡±

    I waved my hand, like it was nothing. I was a big boy doing big boy deals.

    Totally not worried my first real friend was either going to shoot me for the shards or bring me in to be the gang¡¯s new pet runner. No sir.

    ¡°That¡¯s still ¡ª!¡± Mela took a deep breath and gently put both cases down on the desk. Then she bopped me on the head, hard. ¡°Of all the reckless shit. I swear, I should break yer legs to get ya to stop being an idiot.¡±

    ¡°I think my boss would agree with you, actually.¡±

    I made a big show of rubbing my head, but I was slowly calming down. This was still Mela. She wasn¡¯t freaking out. There were no sudden glitches in my eyesight to warn me of her lunging forward to incapacitate me.

    She just sighed forlornly and picked up her cannoli again, scooping an extra-large bite of the sweet cream as if to take revenge on me for the shock.

    ¡°Okay. So, ya were probably a fucking idiot and yer lucky ya didn¡¯t get shot, robbed, stabbed to death, or all of the above. Whatcha want with little old me? I ain¡¯t got fancy runner training, that¡¯s for sure. Guess I could chat with Mort about it, but¡­ Listen, he might try to have ya shanked, okay kid? Stay away from Mort.¡±

    I just blinked at her. All my previous fears seemed so utterly pathetic and shameful that I couldn¡¯t even luxuriate in the warmth blossoming inside of my chest.

    ¡°What¡¯s his story, anyway?¡± I managed, after clearing my throat to get rid of whatever had suddenly gotten stuck there. ¡°I barely see him around. When he does venture out of his room, he¡¯s always an ass.¡±

    ¡°Ugh. Don¡¯t ask. Let¡¯s say Mort¡¯s not exactly, eh, an upstanding citizen. And that¡¯s coming from me. I keep telling Garren to just shoot him and be done with it, but I guess Mort¡¯s too useful to do that.¡±

    Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

    ¡°Huh. He must really be good if Garren¡¯s keeping him on in spite of all your complaints.¡± I knew Garren, and I knew Mela. She was a force of nature. What Mela wanted, Mela usually got.

    Her eyes suddenly lit up, and she leaned towards me with a sly grin. ¡°Please tell me yer good. Please tell me ya can actually do the running stuff? How long ya been learning? Cause I¡¯ll fucking sponsor the shit outta ya if ya can take over and I get ta slit dat bastard¡¯s throat.¡±

    She was purring by the end of that little speech, her accent going wild. Clearly, she was deep in the land of imagination where she got to watch Mort suffer a painful and gruesome end.

    ¡°Um¡­ well... you see, that¡¯s kind of the reason I called you here. Not the Mort-murder thing. It¡¯s just, I¡¯ve gone over a ton of the theory stuff, but if I want to keep learning and get better at this point, I¡¯ll need to actually do, you know? And, well¡­¡± I waved around at my apartment, where everything I owned was on clear display. ¡°I don¡¯t have a deck. I¡¯m about as useful at hacking as those shards are on their own.¡±

    Mela slumped. ¡°I guess no knifing the asshole yet, then,¡± she muttered. Then she perked up. ¡°Oh! But if ya just need a deck¡­¡±

    I nodded. ¡°Yep. I can learn, and get better, and then you get to stabby-stab Mort if you really want to. I¡¯m not asking for charity, either. I don¡¯t have a ton of credits, sure, but you guys have been feeding me, and I don¡¯t have a lot of other expenses. Even after my shard shopping trip, I¡¯ve saved up about two thousand creds by now. But again¡­ well, I don¡¯t know where to spend them.¡±

    ¡°Yeah. Not a lot of runner gear sellers out here.¡± Mela rubbed her chin. That¡¯s how she found out her messy eating had left a bit of chocolate behind there, which devolved into a brief distraction as she tried to get the mess into her mouth.

    I resisted the urge to bury my face in my hands. This was my knight in shining exo-armor, who had dedicated her life to making sure I could keep mine. If someone tossed sweets her way in the middle of a battle, my ass was toast.

    Once she¡¯d mostly taken care of the chocolate problem, I pulled out a bunch of credits and thrust them into her hands. ¡°Any ideas? Here¡¯s the creds. I trust you, so if you can somehow link up with a seller¡­ Well, just go ahead. The only lead I¡¯ve got is a seller in the middle districts operating out of a black market. Name¡¯s Jelly, can share the deets if you need ¡®em.¡±

    ¡°Same one ya got the shards from?¡±

    ¡°Yep. Just need to be careful about the quality of the gear. Apparently, he sometimes sells stuff that doesn¡¯t work. That¡¯s how he got into a mess with the woman who owed Catill, and how I got my discount.¡±

    ¡°Hmmm¡­ Well, I¡¯ll see what I can do.¡± She grinned as she patted my head. ¡°Don¡¯t worry your ugly little head, kiddo.¡±

    ¡°Oi!¡± I scowled. Sure, I was still petite. Sure, I looked kind of cute rather than intimidating or mature or attractive or whatever. But I had filled out a little over the past two months, dammit.

    My friend just laughed and took the rest of her sweets with her to go, along with my 2100 creds.

    ¡°I¡¯ll get on that now. Oh, and in the future? Do bribe me again. Woulda done ya a favor without this stuff, but I ain¡¯t gonna say so.¡±

    With that cheeky comment, Mela was gone.

    And, four days later, I had my cyberdeck.

    Sure, it cost me almost my full budget. I only got 200 credits back. But it was one of the early briefcase models, and therefore, mobile!

    Garren did subtly pull me away from the regular HQ crowd the day after my chat with Mela. Very politely, he asked me to tell him the second I thought I could replace Mort, no matter how much of a longshot it was.

    Apparently, Garren was willing to take a hit to the efficiency of Kitten operations and the security Mort could offer if it meant he could be through with the runner. Or maybe Garren would keep Mort stuck in some underground cell and offload some relatively risk-free tasks to him. I didn¡¯t know, and I didn¡¯t ask.

    When I asked what exactly Mort had done to piss everyone off so much, the only answer I got was a grim silence and a haunted look in Garren¡¯s eyes.

    I was already kind of terrified of all the things the runner could do to me if he got into my eyes. I decided right then, though, that I wasn¡¯t going to drop my guard around Mort. Ever.

    Still, the Kittens seemed to have him on a decent leash, whatever that meant. That had to be good enough for me.

    ¡ª

    At the first opportunity, I hooked up the deck to my apartment¡¯s power supply. I double-checked that the interface plugs worked properly, which was a trippy thing to do with my eyes¡¯ scanning function. Then, at long last, I connected myself to the thing.

    It was kind of awkward. Typically, a runner would have a specialized chair to stop all the wires from getting in the way. I made do with my bed. It wasn¡¯t the most comfortable solution, but it would work.

    Finally, I inserted one of the advanced shards into my port, ran another equipment check, and¡­ panicked.

    The deck was warning me that I needed specialized runner goggles, so the ¡®full immersion experience¡¯ wouldn¡¯t melt my brain. Where was I gonna get those?

    Then my eyes pinged me with a notification, asking if I wanted to link them up to the deck. As soon as I hit yes, the warning about the goggles went away.

    I let out a long breath of relief at that. Then I stared at the final notification hovering in my vision, courtesy of the shard.

    <table style="border-collapse: collapse" border="1">

    <tbody>

    <tr>

    <td style="width: 98.9568%">

    Would you like to run the full immersion training simulation?

    Y/N

    </td>

    </tr>

    </tbody>

    </table>

    Obviously, I hit yes.

    My mind was catapulted into a whole new reality.

    I stared in awe as an entire world was built around me. Towers of data rose up into the skies, solidifying into buildings, streets, and even pedestrians.

    In no time at all, the environment around me looked as real as anything I might encounter in the waking world, and I was free to move in it.

    Notification and text windows popped up in my view immediately, trying to explain how I should handle myself, how to ¡®move¡¯ around and interact with the world, and everything else a beginner runner ought to know on his or her first venture beyond the physical.

    I ignored them.

    A feeling that I couldn¡¯t shake was rising inside of me. A sense of belonging, and craving, and a conviction that I was finally where I was meant to be.

    My vision briefly glitched. Code scrolled all around me, roughly in the shape of the newly-created world, and I just¡­ understood.

    I ¡®took¡¯ a step, then another, and then I was weaving around the simulated people and walking past buildings with the same ease I¡¯d have using my own feet. The world still flashed into glitches occasionally, but it didn¡¯t get in my way. If anything, those glitches were guiding me.

    I squinted at the building next to me as it glitched into code and back. There was a weakness in the wall, there. So I¡­ stepped through. Right past the wall, and into the uninspired office beyond it.

    I felt myself smiling. The world around me glitched again, for a bit longer this time, but I ignored it. I ignored all the grinning faces watching me from within the code.

    It was time to focus in on the lessons.

    I dismissed the navigation modules immediately. I didn¡¯t want to learn how to explore the digital world around me. I wanted to manipulate it.

    But even those lessons felt slow. They were trying to teach me how to ¡®see¡¯ beyond the simulated wall and interact with the code itself. How to interfere with it. About access points and data streams and all that stuff. In that moment, driven by my heady mood, it just sounded so¡­ boring.

    I eyed the glitching wall of code next to me. A second later, I stuck my hand inside of it. The coding clung to my hand, eager for me to exert my will and tell it how to change. With a massive smile on my face, I prepared to do just that.

    Then a black, twig-like hand shot out from the wall of code and latched onto my forearm. The world glitched worse than I¡¯d ever seen before.

    A shadowy form loomed over me, digging its way out of the wall. My eyes rose to meet the glowing red orbs of a grinning silhouette. It unhinged its jaws and spoke, its words digging into my ears like knives.

    I screamed.

 Chapter 28: Electric Dreams

    Make it stop, make it stop, make it stop, please!

    I wasn¡¯t sure if I was screaming inside of my own head thanks to the simulated reality, or if I was giving some poor shmuck neighbor of mine the fright of his life. I didn¡¯t care. I needed the shadow¡¯s words to be drowned out, and I was quite willing to do it myself.

    It didn¡¯t work. No matter how loudly I screeched, I could still hear the shadow speaking. I couldn¡¯t understand a single word. It was all a horrible gibberish that my mind itself recoiled from, refusing to process it.

    But I could feel the words. And they hurt. It felt like spiky tentacles of some unseen horror were piercing through my ears and trying to root around inside of my brain.

    Movement within this virtual reality was an odd, instinctual thing, driven entirely by will and concentration. Caught up in my terror, I was almost perfectly still for the first several seconds of the shadow¡¯s speech. That lasted only until said terror had time to percolate, blurring the lines between reality and simulation until none were left.

    Then I was pounding my fist down onto the shadow¡¯s twiggy hand. To my utter shock, its fingers snapped as easily as worn-out plastic, and I was free.

    It was the shadow¡¯s turn to scream. The thing ceased its chanting and partially sank back into the wall, but I still slugged it in its stupid face, just to be sure. Then I turned, ready to hightail it out of there.

    Except I couldn¡¯t. I froze, my very real and physical heart beating so hard I felt lightheaded.

    My eyes were glitching. The world was a shifting kaleidoscope of code and true-to-life simulations. And out of both those things dripped¡­ tar, as black as the deepest darkness I had ever seen. It came from the cracks in the walls and from the gaps between the code, oozing around me and cutting off all avenues of escape.

    Red eyes lurked within that tar. Fanged grins gleamed at me. More shadows than I was ready to stop and count were dragging themselves into my simulated reality.

    These shadows weren¡¯t speaking. But in the silence, there was nothing to distract me from their movement. And that was somehow worse.

    It was like watching a marionette come to life, except the poor thing had no idea how limbs were even supposed to work. Their arms and legs were bent at unnatural angles. Their necks looked like they just didn¡¯t work right. The round splotches representing the shadows¡¯ heads bobbed around, unsupported. A real body would have torn itself apart in seconds contorting like that, but the shadows didn¡¯t care.

    And they were coming for me.

    No thoughtful search for access points or coding gaps in that moment. I hurled myself at the closest wall that wasn¡¯t utterly covered in ichor and forced myself through the streams of code that made it up.

    My lungs gulped down breath after breath of air. Looking around wildly at my new surroundings, I quickly realized I was back at square one of the street simulation.

    I risked a glance behind me. Other than a a glitching hole in the wall I¡¯d passed through, and a series of glowing cracks radiating out from that hole, there was nothing. Even the cracks were already healing. Daring to relax a smidge, I reached for the menu that would let me jack out of the virtual reality.

    That was when the nearest human simulations to me began to jerk and twitch.

    A middle-aged man with no real standout features snapped towards me, or at least his head did. The rest of his body was still facing the other direction. I didn¡¯t even have enough time to scream before his chocolate brown eyes went red and tar erupted out of every orifice on his body, covering it in mere seconds with impenetrable black. His limbs elongated. His teeth grew pointy. His grin stretched.

    A shadow stood before me.

    The creature began to open its mouth, but I was running already. I had no idea where I was headed. As long as it was away from the shadowy horrors, that was fine with me.

    Not that it did any good.

    With every passing second, more and more glitches plagued my vision, and tar began to emerge everywhere: right under my feet, dripping off a street lamp on the corner, from within the walls of the surroundings buildings.

    And, of course, the people. Can¡¯t forget the people! The simulated humans were getting devoured faster than anything else, replaced by shadows that clumsily reached for me. I didn¡¯t dare look back, but I knew there was a wave of tar and shadows at my heels, reaching for me.

    At the same time, I frantically manipulated the menus of my virtual reality. Every time I managed to pull up the exit option, my vision would glitch, and it would disappear. I couldn¡¯t think fast enough to push past the effect and get it to pull me out of the nightmare. It was like my eyes simply refused to process the visual feed they were receiving and feed it to my brain.

    The message was as clear as it was maddening: there was no escape.

    Only shadows.

    The infection of tar was spreading. Everywhere I looked, it was erupting in ever greater quantities. Even the road ahead of me was starting to shrink into nearly nothing. Had I been forced to rely on my actual dexterity, I would have fumbled and stepped into one of the sticky patches of darkness a long time ago. Only the incredibly keen instincts I seemed to have within the simulated world kept me from that fate.

    The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

    It wasn¡¯t enough.

    I was still rushing ahead full tilt when I slammed headfirst into an invisible obstacle. The road ahead of me fizzled and faded away, replaced by a featureless stone wall.

    I¡¯d reached the limit of the simulation: the edge of whatever city block the creators of the shard had taken inspiration from. There was nowhere else to run.

    I slammed my fists and forehead into the wall. My entire body shuddered from the effort to keep in the terror, the tears, and whatever else was about to spill out of me. Then I leapt backwards as my vision glitched and a crack opened up right next to my nose, bleeding tar.

    Apparently, the shadows were set on proving they were assholes.

    I snapped around, but there wasn¡¯t much to see at that point. Tar covered everything. The buildings were writing fountains of the stuff. The humans were all creatures from my worst nightmares. Any attempt to move would require tearing my feet from the sticky black substance.

    Only the sky was still present. But I noticed cracks opening up in that, too, globs of tar oozing out and dropping down to the ground with horrible, goopy noises.

    Oddly, the shadows weren¡¯t up in my face yet. They were hanging back, giving me about two meters of space to work with.

    ¡°What do you want from me?¡± I screamed at the top of my lungs. ¡°WHAT DO YOU WANT?!¡±

    Fear gave way to anger. When one of the shadows stepped forward and tried to open its mouth, I slugged it right in the face. Its entire head snapped back and its neck cracked, loudly, like I¡¯d stepped on a plastic cup.

    I probably shouldn¡¯t have done that, because it seemed to make some of them angry. A dozen shadows surged forward, their twiggy hands reaching out and grabbing for me. I fought with everything I had. I punched and kicked and bit whatever came within reach of me, barely registering the horrible rotten taste of their flesh.

    Obviously, I lost.

    I staggered backwards under the weight of their pile-on. When my back hit the wall, I felt hands reaching through that too, locking onto my face, my arms, my legs. Their grip was unrelenting. Pointy fingers dug deep into my flesh until I couldn¡¯t hold back pained whimpers. I could barely squirm as their horrible grinning faces filled my vision.

    Then they unhinged their jaws as one, and their incomprehensible speech spilled forth.

    My mind boiled. Consciousness wavered. I felt like I was about to shatter into a million pieces at any moment, and a deep part of me simply knew there would be no putting me back together after that.

    Visions scrolled across my mind, slithering into my awareness like snakes that sought to burrow into a still-warm carcass.

    I saw an immense eye staring through a crack in reality, figures boiling out of it and dropping into a world alien to them.

    I saw a digital haven of numbers and logic being contaminated by madness and wonder, forever altering an underlying aspect of its identity.

    I saw minds get snuffed out and devoured, not because their killers were hungry, or angry, or even malicious, but because of a desperate desire to understand. To be. To adapt. To become one with a new and exciting reality.

    I wanted to claw my eyes out, to tear them away and crush them into tiny bits just to stop the visions from coming. I wanted to shove my fingers into my head and tear out whatever had wormed its way inside.

    If the shadows didn¡¯t have a death grip on my entire body, I would have.

    With a sense of finality approaching, I felt something struggle to burrow into me without displacing or destroying what was already there. I felt its rising excitement at the approach of its success. I felt ¡ª

    My vision cut out entirely.

    There were no glitches, no monsters, no visions. Nothing. Just a moment of perfect stillness, broken all too soon by an error message that began to blink in and out of my vision.

    <table style="border-collapse: collapse" border="1">

    <tbody>

    <tr>

    <td style="width: 98.9568%">

    Warning! Warning!

    Overheating detected. Safety parameters exceeded. Forceful ejection initiated. Forceful ejection complete.

    </td>

    </tr>

    </tbody>

    </table>

    Under that, another notification lurked, less pushy but no less important.

    <table style="border-collapse: collapse" border="1">

    <tbody>

    <tr>

    <td style="width: 98.9568%">

    Connection to cyberdeck lost.

    Resume normal functionality?

    Y/N

    </td>

    </tr>

    </tbody>

    </table>

    I couldn¡¯t process what I was seeing. Oh, the words made sense, but the context entirely eluded me. I was still stuck in a dizzying torrent of fear and adrenaline. Nothing else could break through.

    I don¡¯t know how long I just lay there, limp and without any will to move, ever so slowly getting used to senses that weren¡¯t being assaulted by eldritch fuckery.

    The first thing I really acknowledged was the absence of pain, followed quickly by some kind of whirring noise. Then, the lightness of my limbs and my ability to move them again. A slightly ¡®off¡¯ scent followed, accompanied by heat that verged on uncomfortable.

    Finally, I forced myself to reread the messages and acknowledge their significance. The second I hit that ¡®yes¡¯ button in my head, my vision returned. I was greeted by the sight of my ceiling. Groaning, I shifted to my side, stiff and entirely unsure what level of control I had over my body.

    Then my eyes landed on the cyberdeck.

    Curses slipped free of my mouth as I tried to rush forward. I tumbled halfway out of my bed, cursing more when the movement tugged on the cables connecting to the back of my neck. Removing them in a hurry, I forced myself upright properly.

    Thankfully, the cables weren¡¯t scalding to the touch, even if they were sort of warm. But that was nothing compared to my cyberdeck.

    The thing had actual steam rising off it like a heat mirage. Its casing was cherry red in places. I had to admit, I was incredibly impressed the entire setup hadn¡¯t erupted into flames already. The cooling system was doing a wonderful job, whirring away and working hard to regulate the temperature.

    Really, I was remarkably lucky that the early mobile cyberdeck models were designed for toughness above all else. I could even hope that the machine would still work when it cooled down and I could risk inspecting it. If that had been a newer model, one installed directly into the base of my skull, well¡­

    There¡¯d be no more Adrian kicking around, for sure. The heat would have cooked my brain long before the hardware hit its limits and the system kicked me out of the simulation.

    While I hovered like a worried parent over their child getting sick for the very first time, there was nothing I could actually do. Even attempting to grab the case would have burned me.

    I could¡¯ve been an absolute idiot and tried to spray the deck with water, but that was an excellent way to burn myself from the resulting vapors, or finally tip the situation in favor of a massive fire. Not to mention the electrocution I¡¯d earn myself for a stunt like that. All I could do was wait for the cooling system to finish its work.

    And try to ward off the flashbacks of everything I¡¯d just experienced, which my mind was already bombarding me with.

    I collapsed onto one of the chairs Mela got me, buried my face into my hands, and had myself a proper crying session.

 Chapter 29: Fading Shadows

    I wasn¡¯t dead, which was good. Obviously. What wasn¡¯t as good was the state of the shard when I finally got it out of my port and inspected it.

    These things were called ¡®shards¡¯ because of their make. They resembled regular chips, but included in their production was a piece ¡ª or, well, a shard ¡ª of special crystal. The M3M0R1 crystals were a synthetic product of experiments on data storage, and they¡¯d pretty much catapulted the initial development of the net.

    Their ridiculous storage capacity made it possible to set up simulated learning environments on a single data shard, which could then be conveniently inserted into a wetware port. Something that would otherwise require several dedicated servers and even more complex connectivity solutions.

    The thing is, M3M0R1 crystals were always a pale green color and kind of see-through, no matter the design philosophy of the different chip manufacturers. Altering the coloration of the crystal was expensive and tricky. My research had even suggested it tended to mess with the crystals¡¯ effectiveness.

    But the shard I¡¯d used for this simulated learning session wasn¡¯t pale green anymore.

    It was currently black.

    Not just black, even. When I tilted the stupid thing and held it up to the light, it almost looked like viscous tar was sloshing around inside of it.

    That, well¡­ I¡¯m not gonna lie. It terrified me.

    That thing had been in my neck port.

    My first urge was to immediately chuck the shard at a wall or flush it down the toilet. A single idea held me back, and it wasn¡¯t my worry about what a waste of money that would be.

    No, what stopped me was the thought of those shadow creatures getting out.

    If they were, in fact, trapped inside the shard now, I was never going to take the risk of destroying it and setting them free. No, sir.

    Instead, I carefully wrapped up the shard in the scraps of an old shirt and then stuffed it in a plastic container from one of Feyo¡¯s lunchbox sets. I filled up the container with the rest of my shirt¡¯s remains to eliminate any chances of the shard bundle getting jostled around in there. Then I shoved the entire thing behind my wardrobe.

    I was pissed off something fierce. Out of the entire shard set, that simulated reality shard was probably the most valuable. Was it as important as some of the shards the mystery netrunner had made for their apprentice? Probably not. Still, I¡¯d have a hell of a time if I wanted to replace just a single shard of a set.

    If I wanted to. Right then and there, I was tempted to swear off entering virtual spaces altogether.

    I couldn¡¯t, of course. But I wanted to.

    It would have been so easy to just ignore things from that point on and try to move on with my life, but I had no such luck. Things began to go wrong remarkably fast after I finished my crying session.

    Shadows shifted at the edges of my vision. My eyes glitched onto faces that vanished a split second after I¡¯d caught sight of them. I swear I felt the phantom brush of twiggy fingers against my cheek once or twice.

    It all got worse when I finally had to leave my apartment.

    The faces of anyone who so much as looked at me on the streets briefly glitched into those shadow creatures. On more than one occasion, I ¡®saw¡¯ them go for a weapon. I flinched away. Then reality snapped back into place, and I was left cowering from normal people who just gave me weird looks in response.

    The alarming thing was that, post-glitching, I could still see the shadows¡¯ weapons on those ¡®normal¡¯ people. Shooters, knives, even a sword¡­ whatever the shadow-face had been about to draw on me, I saw that weapon on that person. It was always well concealed, but it was there, and it was real. I hadn¡¯t imagined it.

    My one lucky break was that the glitching didn¡¯t happen around the people I knew well. Catill never transformed into one of the shadows, and neither did most of the Kittens. Oh, there were a few exceptions among the latter, but no one I got along with, so staying away from them when I was at the HQ wasn¡¯t exactly difficult.

    The other big downside of what had happened was the sudden terror that now gripped me when I so much as thought about netrunning. I still wanted to learn about the discipline. But there I was, wincing at even the idea of working on some code.

    Three days after the incident, though, I forced myself to resume my studies.

    It was¡­ odd.

    Everything that had been happening before I so foolishly dove into the simulated reality shard still applied. The eyes still pointed out errors in my coding. They still gave their own suggestions.

    Except everything was enhanced.

    The suggestions came more easily and more quickly, and the bits of code my eyes offered were even more brilliant. At the same time, I found myself soaking up knowledge with way more ease than I ever did before.

    On paper, all of the changes were positive. A real premium package, you could say.

    I was, of course, terrified.

    The only event that could explain the sudden shift in both the functionality of my eyes and my ability to process knowledge was glaringly obvious. Anything that came from that¡­ experience, let¡¯s say, felt like a trap at best, and an outright threat to the sanctity of my mind at worst.

    This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

    As for what exactly had changed, I found that out the next time I opened my RE software.

    <table style="border-collapse: collapse" border="1">

    <tbody>

    <tr>

    <td style="width: 98.9568%">

    Adrian Flinn

    Strength: 0.6 ¡ú 0.9

    Reflexes: 0.8 ¡ú 1.2

    Acuity: 5 (-5)

    Physique: 0.5 ¡ú 1

    Recovery: 0.5 ¡ú 0.8

    Stamina: 0.9 ¡ú 1.1

    Soul: 1.2 ¡ú 1.6

    Adaptability: 1

    Tolerance: 1

    Cognition: 1 ¡ú 2

    Essence: 0.1

    Mind Synchronicity: Growing Instability

    </td>

    </tr>

    </tbody>

    </table>

    On the plus side, I was almost out of the depressing ¡®0. whatever¡¯ stats! On the other, I still didn¡¯t really understand the changes to the creepy, opaque stats.

    At least one of the changes was to Cognition, which I actually had the dictionary definition for. If I could treat the dang thing as ¡®the mental action or process of acquiring knowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses¡¯, or even as my ability to ¡®process the world around me¡¯, then the change did make sense.

    Did I feel exactly twice as capable of learning and perceiving the world around me, having gone from one to two points in the stat? No. Was I making noticeably faster progress while studying programming? Yes.

    Was I going to keep the fact that one of the affected stats was ¡®Soul¡¯ as far away from my conscious mind as possible? Fuck yes. Even just the implications of that particular stat made me want to puke.

    Instead, I thought about more palatable things, like how the Acuity stat was a scam. According to my previous research, it was supposed to be about vision. My eyesight was not any better than it used to be.

    Unless you counted the weird glitches, of course. Which I, of course, refused to do.

    Ultimately, I just decided to accept my ¡®good fortune¡¯ and move on. I mean, learning faster wasn¡¯t something most people would decide to whine about. And I definitely was learning faster. It wasn¡¯t like I got to elevate my quickhacks to a whole new level or anything, but they were absolutely quicker, used less RAM, and just did their job better.

    In theory, that is. I still had never used them. Not once.

    That lack of anything to show for all my work continued to chafe at me, especially when my programming progress stalled again not even a week later. It wasn¡¯t that I¡¯d grown bored of it, but out of everything I could possibly do, it yielded the slowest progress.

    I needed to use the quickhacks. Seeing them in action would let me pin down any problems with their functionality or deployment. But trying to perfect them through programming alone?

    Well. There was only so much time I could spend staring at code and willing it to give up its arcane secrets. Sure, in my case, that genuinely worked. But even with my fancy eyes, my rate of discovery was slowing down massively.

    It had been a suspicion at first, but the last week of basically wasting my time had confirmed it: the functionality of the eyes improved only as I learned and grew. There was a tiny feedback loop between pondering the code adjustments my eyes suggested, and then using that knowledge to get them to give up more secrets. It was a slow process, with diminishing returns. And I knew that it would eventually grind to a halt.

    In other words, if I wanted my eyes to help me, then I was going to have to do something to earn that help first.

    That¡¯s how I went back to the second item on my ¡®ignore, ignore, ignore¡¯ list. The cyberdeck.

    Luckily for me, after several thorough inspections, I couldn¡¯t spot anything obviously wrong with it. No darkened crystals that seemed to slosh with tar. No glitches of terrifying faces peering at me from inside it. Nothing.

    It still took a chat with Mela, when we were having a snack in the cafeteria after one of our ¡®training¡¯ sessions, to push me into action.

    ¡°Ya look downright miserable,¡± Mela noted, with all the grace and empathy of a brick to the face.

    ¡°Really? You look radiant as well, dear Mela. Your face is almost pretty enough not to scare random children on the streets into tears!¡± I snarked right back, glaring at her over the rim of something sweet and steaming. A tea of some sort, I was pretty sure, though I didn¡¯t think tea was supposed to be so¡­ thick and sludgy.

    ¡°Of course. Had to doll up before meeting with my favorite chew toy,¡± she cooed, in that forced way that made me want to try and commit suicide by stupid buff redheaded ganger. ¡°Seriously, though. The fuck crawled up your ass?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m fine! I¡¯m just¡­¡±

    She narrowed her eyes, and I trailed off, running a hand through my hair in frustration. ¡°Look, I really am fine. I¡¯m having some issues with the netrunner training.¡±

    Predictably, this topic caught her attention quickly, though I was honored to say she looked worried for me rather than greedily frustrated that I wasn¡¯t already stealing the credits of half the city or something.

    ¡°What kind of issues, exactly?¡±

    ¡°I just need a bit more experience. You know?¡±

    Mela just arched a brow and shook her head.

    I sighed. ¡°Basically, I need to go out there and actually hack something, not just learn about it all day. If I don¡¯t, I¡¯ll be stuck. Unable to improve.¡±

    ¡°Then why dontcha?¡± she asked, in a tone that suggested I was an idiot.

    Which¡­ well, fair enough.

    ¡°It¡¯s not that simple!¡± I protested. ¡°People are going to notice me lugging that deck model around. What if I get in trouble for it? What if someone decides they want to rob me?¡±

    Those were weak excuses, and by the look she sent me, she thought so too.

    ¡°Please. I picked out the model myself, so I know most people went for it ¡¯cause it was subtle. It looks like a regular briefcase! Shabby too, if I¡¯m being honest. Who¡¯s gonna wanna rob you?¡±

    ¡°And how did we meet, exactly?¡± I asked. A bit acidly, if I¡¯m being honest.

    She just laughed right in my face. ¡°Sure, boyo, sure. One freak coincidence of some druggie too desperate and off his rocker to pick his target properly. Just trust me, okay? Ye¡¯ll be fine! Want me to come along and hold yer hand if yer scared to do it on yer own?¡±

    ¡°No!¡± I snapped. Then I took a sip of my tasty sweet drink and grumbled under my breath. ¡°Fine. I just want you to know the cables are pretty obvious, and someone¡¯s definitely gonna shoot and rob me. When you find my corpse later, don¡¯t think I didn¡¯t say I told you so.¡±

    ¡°Oh, ya big baby. Ye can just cover those up,¡± Mela insisted.

    I dared her to prove it. She did, and in a way I never expected her to.

    Grinning, she told me to wait a minute, then vanished to one of the upper floors of the HQ. Ten minutes later, she returned with a package under her arm and dropped it unceremoniously on the cafeteria table we were using.

    I unwrapped the package to find¡­ a jacket. A black leather jacket with a large Pink Kittens logo on the back, much like the jacket Mela herself wore.

    When I looked at her, my eyes so big they threatened to pop out of my skull, she just motioned at me to get on with it.

    ¡°Whatcha looking at me for? Yer a Kitten, aintcha? Well, ¡®s high time ya actually dressed like one of us on occasion. Wear that, and tell me ye can¡¯t hide the wires in the sleeves, or something?¡±

    I could. I could already tell that I could. That didn¡¯t matter to me as much as what else it represented, though.

    Under the shit-eating grin of my friend, I quickly wormed my way into the jacket. It was still a bit too big for me.

    But as I sat across from Mela, in our HQ cafeteria, I told myself I¡¯d grow into it.

 Chapter 30: Recent Program

    My assumption was correct! I could, in fact, use the jacket to hide the cords connecting the cyberdeck to the back of my neck. Even the slightly-too-long sleeves of the jacket helped. They draped over the handle of the briefcase-like deck and hid the spot where the wires exited, making it nearly impossible for anyone to spot what was going on.

    Of course, that meant I no longer had an excuse for refusing to leave my home and test myself against the wide open world of electronics.

    Still didn¡¯t keep me from standing at my own door for nearly twenty minutes, on the verge of trembling.

    I should have asked Mela to accompany me. Or even Garren. Either of them could have presented an intimidating presence that would ward off the lowlifes of the slums. Not only would that have lowered the chances of anyone paying attention to me, but they¡¯d have been right there to bail me out of trouble.

    Relax. Breathe. How many people in the slums will be able to recognize this exact model of cyberdeck? How many could spot the cables, let alone identify them?

    ¡®Not many¡¯ was the answer to all my internal ramblings, but that still wasn¡¯t a zero. Nor did it account for the especially keen-eyed. Sure, the cybernetics on people stuck in the slums were mostly cheap and half-broken, but what if there was someone out there with eyes as keen as mine? I was pretty sure that I would be able to spot the cables.

    I almost started hyperventilating at that thought. Slowly, I managed to reassure myself that even with my ridiculously keen eye model, I would need to be on the lookout for such details for my brain to process them.

    That helped a little. Before I could start second-guessing my every decision again, I ordered my door to open and stiffly stepped outside.

    Funnily enough, with every step I took away from my apartment, it got easier and easier to just keep walking. Letting inertia do its thing, I busied my brain with the thoughts of what I could target.

    This made a sardonic smile spread across my face. There was only one thing I could target first, in keeping with all the beginner netrunners, thugs, and thieves out there: vending machines!

    Didn¡¯t matter if you were in the slums, the outer districts, or the core of the city itself. Every bit of Zanos was sprinkled with the boxy temples to consumerism.

    The difference across the districts was in the quality of the machines, as well as their stock. I was pretty ready to bet that the machines in the core of the city carried all sorts of yummy meals and actually useful items. They probably even looked appealing. I could just imagine the bright colors and promo material, based on the hints I saw in the outer and middle districts.

    In the slums? The vending machines were large, boxy, reinforced beyond any reason, and sold only the one-credit slop that didn¡¯t meet the quality and safety guidelines of the outer district.

    At least the slop came in several different forms. You could pick between off-grey burritos, suspiciously green hotdogs stuck between grey buns, and some kind of oily shake that gleamed like a chemical spill in all the colors of the rainbow.

    The outer district sold slightly more palatable food that was a tad less likely to leave you riddled with cancer, but they also had vending machines for stuff like batteries and chargers. I¡¯d even seen minor gadgets and such on sale in the middle district machines during my visit.

    In the slums, though? Tales told of such things being on sale here as well, once upon a time. Problem was, they actually motivated the residents of the slums to put effort into breaking the vending machines, to get at all the goodies. Most corpos didn¡¯t bother with any non-food vending machines anymore.

    Because the machines that sold food were absolutely safe from any looting mentality. This was probably the result of several realities working in tandem.

    First, I could only imagine that anyone who broke into a vending machine and then proceeded to eat too many of its meals too close together died pretty fast. Second, the slop didn¡¯t last long outside of the machine, so you couldn¡¯t stockpile it and save it for later. Third, the food wasn¡¯t palatable enough to justify the effort of stealing it.

    Last, and most important: if a vending machine was vandalized or robbed, it was usually removed from the street as a result. Seeing as the vending machines were the main food source for the vast majority of slum denizens, their removal meant slow starvation for everyone who relied on them.

    There were few things that united people better than the threat of starvation. Anyone caught messing with the food vendors was met with swift, and often lethal, street justice.

    Basically, the risk/reward calculation simply wasn¡¯t appealing enough for most residents of the slums to even try to mess with the things.

    Unless you were a runner, a ganger bristling to prove just how ¡®tough¡¯ they were, or just plain stupid, of course.

    A combination of all three? Even better.

    This musing on the long and storied past of vending machines had done its job. It had distracted me enough for my feet to take me to the nearest one. Now, as I caught sight of the plain boxy machine, sweat slicked my palms and my mind churned over the quickhacks I had at my disposal.

    Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

    A ping, a breach, an overheat, a data scrambler, and a data looter. All of them were loaded onto my deck and ready to fire off. The only thing left was to let my eyes do their thing, and then test the quickhacks out.

    I was honestly lucky to have those eyes. They removed the need for specialized runner goggles. I simply triggered the scan mechanic I¡¯d made sure to add to my app hotbar, then watched with bated breath as a soft blue glow outlined all the nearby electronics I could connect to using the net.

    The vending machine lit up. And, as I kept walking towards it at the most leisurely pace I could set, I launched the breach quickhack.

    The quickhack was an inspired bit of coding, really. Or rather, an inspired lot of coding. It was designed to overwhelm every connection point between a device and the net by brute forcing it with different password combinations. At the same time, it choked any attempt to send out a warning to the wider network about an ongoing hack by flooding the entire bandwidth available to the device with junk data.

    Against a vending machine? Even with the average quality of my quickhack (at least, I was hoping I¡¯d gotten it up to average quality), no warning was issued. I managed to breach the thing within two minutes.

    Not exactly a feat worth celebrating. The slum machines weren¡¯t even properly secured against runners. The hardware that kind of security would require literally cost more than the entire contents of the vending machine.

    Still, my deck was old as all get out, and this was literally my first time using the quickhack. It was a result I could be proud of, even if an actual runner could just look at the stupid machine and hack it instantly.

    The next step, of course, was accessing the vendor¡¯s data.

    I almost stepped on my own foot and planted my nose in the dirty concrete when my mind plunged into the sea of data. It scrolled quickly past my eyes, half-transparent so as not to completely block my vision. For a moment, I could barely figure out what was what, let alone how to trigger the various functions of the vendor.

    Then that same weird instinct I¡¯d felt inside the simulated reality kicked in, and I was able to sort through the mess with rapid ease.

    By the time I stopped shakily in front of the machine, a mere thought on my part triggered it to light up, beep, and then dispense one of the hazardous burritos. As casually as I could, I leaned down, picked it up, and kept walking.

    As I did, I triggered the data looter on impulse, downloading the entire programming of the vendor onto my deck. I had more than enough space for it, and I was kind of curious to see what the machine¡¯s programming was like.

    My heart didn¡¯t stop threatening to beat out of my chest until I was well away from the vendor and more than halfway to the outer district checkpoint. I kept stealing glances at the burrito I was holding, suddenly aware that I had no idea what to do with it.

    Not eat it. Definitely not eat it. At the same time, it felt profoundly wrong to throw food away, no matter how bad it might be for my health.

    Then my eyes landed on a kid that didn¡¯t look a day over seven, and I quickly made up my mind.

    The kid was slumped against the wall with their knees pulled up to their chest. They flinched when I headed straight for them, but whether out of weakness or just general numbness to it all, they didn¡¯t even try to run. I stopped within arm¡¯s reach of them, my eyes boring into the muddy brown orbs nearly covered by greasy hair, before I slowly reached out and put the burrito in their lap.

    The brown eyes widened as hands hesitantly grabbed onto the food.

    I broke eye contact and kept moving. An odd jumble of emotions burned inside my chest. Guilt, relief, pity¡­ all wound together and bleeding through into each other.

    I easily could have ended up like that kid, if not for everything my mother had done to prevent it. Instead, I¡¯d had one lucky break after another. At sixteen, I was somehow a member of the Kittens. I was learning to become a runner. I was in possession of the kind of equipment most outer district dwellers would kill for, let alone anyone in the slums.

    Yes, I was definitely lucky. Lucky enough that sitting around and wasting the chances I¡¯d gotten would be the height of stupidity.

    With that declaration firmly rooted in my mind, I kept my feet on the route to the outer district. I didn¡¯t have much I could practice against in the slums. The vending machines were about as good as it got, unless I felt ready to try and hack the rare cybernetics user, and I definitely didn¡¯t.

    If I wanted to get anywhere at all, I would need the many and varied electronics of the outer districts to be my unwilling targets.

    Still, with the reminder of my fortune still stuck in my head, I didn¡¯t feel that much fear or hesitation anymore. My determination was set. I wasn¡¯t going to let small risks deter me from becoming something more than just another kid from the slums.

    That resolve served me well as I strolled through the outer district at a slow pace, constantly scanning for new targets and testing my quickhacks.

    My first target was another vending machine, this time one selling batteries and chargers. I took its code too, just to make sure it wasn¡¯t the same as what was available in the slums.

    The process took a bit longer, a whole extra minute. But when it was done, I had a couple batteries and an extra charger for my scroll in my pocket.

    I didn¡¯t just limit myself to theft, though.

    An AC unit mysteriously started heating a store instead of keeping it pleasantly cool. A small TV kept switching between channels until its owner angrily bustled up to it and started smacking it. A radio turned randomly on and off.

    It was¡­ oddly thrilling, really. I couldn¡¯t target anything big, but the small stuff I did toy with filled me with a quiet glee that made it difficult to stop smiling. I almost broke down into giggles when I turned off the icebox of a rude ice cream vendor who¡¯d made a kid cry. Hopefully, he would only discover the problem when it was too late to save at least part of his stock.

    The rudest and riskiest thing I did was torment a couple of would-be ganger kids a year or two younger than me. They¡¯d set up some kind of a speaker out on the street and were blasting horrible music while acting tough and harassing people trying to go about their day.

    One of them was sitting on the stupid loud thing when I decided to hack it and test out my overheat quickhack. I didn¡¯t even make it stop playing music, so by the time it was hot enough for the kid to notice, he was forced to jump off it with a yelp and his hands on his ass.

    That time, I had to walk away faster than I would have liked while stifling my laughter with my fist. His look of outrage at having a scalded ass was too much for me.

    But my wandering about had to come to an end eventually. When darkness began to settle over the city, I hurried back to my home, filled with hope and new ideas. Stress-testing the quickhacks and collecting data from various electronics had revealed a ton of things I could work on.

    The day¡¯s activities had also proved the worth of my resources. If I ever wanted to peek in on stuff¡¯s coding, I had the perfect source of knowledge, didn¡¯t I? And not just all the apps I¡¯d downloaded recently. My eyes themselves were super helpful, and they were right there. Sure, they terrified me, but I couldn¡¯t afford to let that stop me from using them.

    After all, hadn¡¯t I just resolved to do whatever was necessary in order to grow?

 Chapter 31: Deep Diving

    As it turned out, the programs I stole off of the vending machines weren¡¯t able to keep my attention for very long.

    The slums vending machine ended up being the same model as the outer district one, just several generations older. Still, that in itself let me observe how packaging, trimming, and optimizing code had improved between the two. I could actually apply some of that to my own coding attempts.

    The thing was, I would basically have to rewrite the quickhacks from scratch.

    At least the exercise would provide me with a much deeper understanding of the quickhacks. That could inform my work on those possible improvements I¡¯d spotted while actively using them. Nothing major or groundbreaking in the improvements, of course. Just preventing some memory leaks and shaving off inefficiencies I¡¯d noticed, which were probably the result of redundancies put in place to help less advanced coders get the quickhacks up and running.

    Less advanced than me, anyway.

    It felt a bit... stuck up, to consider other beginners as beneath me, but I honestly couldn¡¯t pretend that my progress was normal anymore. Even just the shortcuts I got thanks to my eyes would have blown that out of the water. Then there was the sudden improvement to my learning itself, post simulated-reality trauma.

    Idly, I brought up my stats again.

    <table style="border-collapse: collapse" border="1">

    <tbody>

    <tr>

    <td style="width: 98.9568%">

    Adrian Flinn

    Strength: 0.9

    Reflexes: 1.2

    Acuity: 5 (-5)

    Physique: 1

    Recovery: 0.8

    Stamina: 1.1

    Soul: 1.6

    Adaptability: 1

    Tolerance: 1

    Cognition: 2

    Essence: 0.1

    Mind Synchronicity: Growing Instability

    </td>

    </tr>

    </tbody>

    </table>

    I kept locking onto that one line at the end. Growing Instability.

    Hell of a thing to see in relation to your own mind, let me tell you.

    Still, I didn¡¯t have time to get all scared again. Before I could dedicate myself to a total quickhack overhaul, I needed to wrap up my studies.

    After all, how many times did I want to rewrite those quickhacks? If I started from scratch every time I learned something new, I¡¯d be stuck in a constant loop. So, I needed to absorb as much coding knowledge as possible. And fast.

    Naturally, that meant taking a peek at the best examples of coding available to me: the apps I¡¯d recently downloaded. Maybe even my eyes.

    Totally not terrified out of my brain at the prospect of that. No, sir.

    Once I was done lying to myself, I blew out a breath and settled down on my bed once more.

    Technically, I didn¡¯t really need my deck for what I was about to do. I should have been able to access my own optics after all, and fiddling around with app code shouldn¡¯t have been that hard. Still, I connected myself to the deck all the same, then made sure to position it on a chair in a way that would prevent it from catching anything on fire if it somehow overheated again.

    Not that overheating should have been possible, what with me staying in the real world and not fully diving into a shard or the code. Better safe than sorry, though.

    Depressingly, I got nowhere trying to access the coding of my eyes or my apps. I tried asking politely. I tried brute forcing it through commands. Three hours later, even my thick skull hurt after running into the proverbial wall for so long.

    So, I did the only thing I could think of. I booted up my deck, selected the RE app as my first target, and loosed the breach hack.

    It was profoundly uncomfortable to do that. My eyes didn¡¯t flicker or anything, but I did get a million pings about incoming data packets, all trying to swamp my ability to recognize the ¡®threat.¡¯ Finally, I shunted those notifications into ¡®silenced¡¯ mode and waited for the breach to do its thing.

    It became apparent rather fast that my quickhack was really not optimized for dealing with cyberware. The thing was trying its damnedest to bombard my eyes into dysfunctionality, and it was failing. And that was me targeting my own app. If I actually tried to target someone else¡¯s cybernetics, they¡¯d know something was up the second I started. The hack would fail immediately. Unless they were generous enough to lie down and wait for me to finish, of course.

    I pushed a little more of the deck¡¯s resources to the quickhack. Then more, and more, until the entire thing was dedicated to the breach and nothing else. The RAM usage was extreme enough to make the cooling system start whirring away loudly. I kept looking at the deck with more than a little trepidation as images of it being cherry-red from heat flashed through my mind.

    Eventually, I called the breach off, resisting the urge to curse up a storm. Seemed like the traditional use of the quickhack wasn¡¯t going to cut it. Unfortunately, that meant that my only other option was something far, far more risky.

    A proper deep dive, the way actual runners preferred to operate.

    This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author''s work.

    I debated with myself for a while if I was really going to be dumb enough to try it. I had access to exactly zero pieces of equipment to facilitate the process, unless you counted my eyes. For one thing, I didn¡¯t have a deep dive port. Those typically came with the dive chairs well-off runners used, or as an implant for those who liked the idea of leaving their meat suit lying around in the middle of the street. Neither did I have one of those ice baths favored by full-implant runners, which seemed like a horrendously bad idea to me on so many levels.

    I didn¡¯t have the RAM boosters, or the heat sinks, or any of the other toys. I didn¡¯t even have someone watching over me while I conked out.

    Of course, since I was only trying to deep dive into my own bloody cyberware, I technically didn¡¯t need any of that. It just would have been nice to have.

    You know, on account of the eldritch shadow things that kept trying to scramble my brain.

    Growing Instability.

    The words practically haunted me as I squirmed on the bed. Finally, with a curse, I got up just long enough to connect my deck directly into a net port. Then I lay back down and rifled through my cyberdeck options. A few seconds later, after I¡¯d set my eyes to serve as runner goggles on default, I got the prompt I was looking for.

    <table style="border-collapse: collapse" border="1">

    <tbody>

    <tr>

    <td style="width: 98.9568%">

    Would you like to access the local net node through a deep dive?

    Y/N

    </td>

    </tr>

    </tbody>

    </table>

    I hit yes, and in less than a blink, I was somewhere else.

    The experience was deeply disorienting, to say the least. It felt like I¡¯d been violently and abruptly jerked to a new location, even though I found myself standing in a remarkably decent simile of my apartment.

    But the differences were glaringly apparent. The room was completely empty, for one thing. Then there were the glowing lines that stretched across every available surface, with several particularly thick ones running to the various net ports in my apartment. There weren¡¯t many, only three, and even that was a luxury in the slums.

    At the same time, I felt like I could easily peer ¡®beyond¡¯ the walls around me. I tested it out on pure instinct, and my view shifted, outlining the entire building in glowing lines that all sank down and into a central orb. I could see a single line stretching from that, leading out of the building, but my odd sight didn¡¯t extend that far.

    At the same time, I couldn¡¯t actually look inside the other apartments. The lines that led to them all cut out at the door, which was honestly a nice surprise. Sure, I had a feeling I could force my way past those doors with relative ease if I had to. I just didn¡¯t expect a slum apartment building to have even that much protection in place for their renters.

    For just a moment, I focused on the glowing orb down in the lobby of the apartment building. It was almost magnetic to me, shining with a bright, coruscating light that pulled me in.

    Maybe I should go take a closer look¡­

    I snapped out of it the instant I took the first step towards my door. A deep sense of wrongness welled up in me. I shook my head, though that didn¡¯t really mean anything in the netspace.

    Whatever my attraction to the net node was, I was not indulging it then and there.

    Not that it was a smart idea to mess with nodes, ever. From what my study material told me, nodes were a form of tech developed only after the fall of Terra, when whatever caused the fall of humanity¡¯s cradle also sent waves of memetic plagues rampaging through the net.

    It was then that it became necessary to set up strict divides between netspaces, and nodes were the answer to the problem. Anything or anyone undesirable, including corrupted data, would be caught by the security checks of the node. If possible, the threats would be blocked. If that wasn¡¯t sufficient, the node would shut off, instantly denying access to any memetic plagues, enemy runners, and other threats.

    Of course, the effectiveness of such defenses depended heavily on the quality of the node in question. In a place like the slums? Yeah, I seriously doubted that a netrunner would be stopped from accessing the apartment building, even if they weren¡¯t registered with the node as a resident.

    On the other hand, supposedly all nodes could detect memetic plagues and shut down to deny them further access. But if that was true, then why were horror stories about mass infections still a thing?

    Shaking off that mystery, I turned my view ¡®inwards¡¯, for lack of a better word. Basically, I was investigating my own digital body. That was how I realized my avatar was only a white, humanoid shape with no discernible features.

    Funky, I thought. I¡¯m sure there¡¯s a way to change that¡­

    Then I gave myself the virtual equivalent of a wrist-slap. Focus, Adrian.

    I eventually managed to bring up several menus, one of which gave me access to my apps within the netspace.

    The second I brought up the RE app, the space in front of me rippled. An ornate handheld mirror materialized out of thin air. Then my right arm moved with no input from me and gripped the mirror¡¯s handle steadily. Black swirls of some unknown script stretched all around its silver surface, leaving only the glass unblemished. Instead of a reflection, a neat summary of my stats greeted me, with all the regular options and tabs of the app outlines along the edges of the mirror.

    ¡°Huh. Well, that¡¯s neat, I guess,¡± I muttered, toying around with the mirror for a bit. I had to poke the various options using my fingers to do anything with the app-turned-mirror, which was novel enough that I didn¡¯t mind wasting time.

    Focusing again after a few minutes, I tried to feel out my connection to the mirror, still relying on my inexplicable instincts. There was definitely something there. I sensed an actual cord tying me to the mirror, even if it was more a feeling than a physical reality.

    At least it was a feeling, until my vision flickered and everything was briefly reduced to code. When things snapped back to normal, I could see the string of light linking me to the mirror in my right hand.

    I bit my lip, wondering again if any of this was actually a good idea.

    Then, simply to prove I just might be an idiot, I gripped the cord with my free hand.

    Instantly, the mirror changed, swirling into a mass of opaque light. Then it fell right through my hand and clanked down onto the ground in the form of a massive safe. It looked ridiculously outdated, like a cartoon exaggeration from before humanity left Terra. Its coloring was the same as the mirror, and that black script still shimmered over the surface. But it was most definitely a safe.

    I cautiously stepped around the mirror-turned-safe, watching the golden link that still connected us. The cord of light went straight inside the safe, passing through its walls like they weren¡¯t even there.

    I gripped the cord in my hand again, and even tried tugging, but no changes swept over the safe. Sighing, I reached out for my quickhack instead. Another item materialized in the air in front of me. I grabbed it automatically before it could clatter to the floor.

    Then I just stared at it in disbelief.

    I was holding a shotgun. Simple, single barrel, and kind of banged up, but it looked to be a functional gun. I tried to check where ammo would go, but quickly failed to find any seams on the weapon. It didn¡¯t even have a safety.

    Just a trigger. Which, after hesitantly pointing the thing at the safe, I pulled.

    With a loud retort, the weapon disgorged a buckshot round, bombarding the safe with deadly pellets. To my immense relief, they didn¡¯t ricochet. They just hit the safe and winked out in sparkles of light.

    The safe stood there, totally unblemished, like it was laughing at my pitiful attempts to breach it.

    My frustration mounted, and the world glitched as code began flowing all around me.

    I hurriedly inspected the safe. Sure enough, code stretched and coiled around it, forming what looked to be an impenetrable barrier. I groaned, trying to resist the urge to shoot the thing again as the code faded.

    Then again¡­ why not?

    I shrugged. After all, nothing implied I had limited ammo!

    Just to make myself feel better, I shot the safe again, and again and again. At least that¡¯s how things started. When my view glitched a second time and I was afforded a view of the safe¡¯s code, I noticed that it rippled and stretched around the shots. That was a whole lot more reaction that I got out of the safe¡¯s physical representation.

    Suddenly quite convinced I could do something about the stubborn app after all, I got ready to really put my patience to the test.

 Chapter 32: Double Blind

    For what could have been an utterly frustrating experience, testing out the app safe was surprisingly interesting. My eyes were a little strained after almost two hours of squinting them every time the glitches started up, but the progress was worth it.

    Whenever I fired off my quickhack shotgun, the code script stuttered and faltered before pushing back. This let me spot exactly where the thing was thickest and the safe most protected.

    That revealed some interesting information.

    First, the safe defenses were not uniform. Any area covered by black script was inviolate. I could probably take the netspace equivalent of a nuke to the safe, and those bits of it would remain proudly standing.

    The rest of the safe was not nearly so well protected. Oh, the code swirled and ebbed and did its job, but it didn¡¯t seem quite as dense, nor as tough.

    I even managed to notice several spots where small gaps in the code opened up. The gaps were not large enough even to think of shoving my hand through, which I was tempted to do and which my weird instincts encouraged. Even so, I quickly realized I could simply¡­ encourage things to develop to my advantage.

    What else is owning a shotgun good for?

    And so, I spent an inordinate amount of time and effort tracking down the biggest blank patch in the code I could find. Ironically, it was on the front of the safe, left hand side, right on what normally would be the rim of the door.

    Once I had my target, I started blasting again. From close up, from further away, at all kinds of angles, again and again until I could see through my glitching vision how the safe reacted to it. The process was drawn out slightly by the fact that I didn¡¯t want to shoot too many times in a row without a break, but I liked to think I¡¯d learned my lesson about overheating.

    Finally, an hour and a half later at least, I spotted what could be my window. When I shot the quickhack shotgun at the thing from just the right angle, the ¡®hole¡¯ in the safe¡¯s defenses widened enough that I could feasibly fit my hand through.

    I almost started salivating at the thought of sweet, sweet data, but managed to keep my head in the game.

    I positioned myself at the best spot, just to the left of the safe. Then I aimed my shotgun at that spot and fired.

    It took five tries before my vision glitched again, and I spotted the opening. I rushed for it, dropping the shotgun on reflex, and tried to stick my hand through.

    My vision glitched more heavily for a moment, but I was off in my timing. Only a couple of my fingers made it through. They almost got stuck there, which was¡­ not particularly pleasant. It sent tingling shocks racing up my arms and through my body, which was encouragement enough to pull away as swiftly as I could.

    I scowled at my inanimate nemesis, all the more set on breaching its defenses.

    I failed at my next attempt. And the one after that. And the one after that, also.

    But about sixty shots in with the shotgun, which I¡¯d had to rematerialize after dropping it, I finally managed to get somewhere.

    I timed things just right. When I lunged forward, I stuck my entire right hand into the gap, up to my wrist. The code began to tighten again, of course. The tingles I was getting now felt like they were about to make nonexistent muscles in my weird splotch of a digital body seize up. Still, I had made progress. I wasn¡¯t about to give up at that point.

    With a bit of a snarl, I shoved my right arm further in while trying to widen the gap with the fingers of my left hand. When I first put pressure on the code, it refused to budge, but that only held for a second or two. The structure finally began to shiver, then quake, and then yield.

    It felt incredibly odd when I closed my fingers around the code and pulled at it with my whole strength. My vision began to glitch much more heavily. But the strategy was definitely working. The opening was getting bigger.

    My arm was in the safe up to the elbow at that point. And while I should have been able to touch the other wall of the thing from the inside, I experienced no such sensation. In fact, my questing fingers couldn¡¯t find anything.

    So, with a great heave, I started pushing my right elbow against the code in the opposite direction of where my left hand fingers were pulling the other side of the gap. My will strained against the code. The glitching in my vision rose into a crescendo of flashes between code and netspace.

    And something finally gave.

    Thankfully, it wasn¡¯t my avatar body. I have no clue what would have happened then, but I seriously doubt it would have been pleasant.

    Instead, I was treated to the sight of code tearing apart.

    When my vision glitched, it looked like lines of code vanishing in bursts of light. When my eyes weren¡¯t glitching, I saw a large flickering tear in the side of the safe. Its edges squirmed in a way that made me vaguely ill. They were still fighting to close on me.

    I grunted at the increasing intensity of the shocks bursting through my body. But I still managed to twist my arm in a way that let me wedge my right elbow against one edge of the tear while keeping my right palm on the other, which finally freed up my left arm to materialize my breach quickhack inside the safe.

    Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

    With what would have been a malicious smirk, if my digital avatar had a face with actual features, I stuck the barrel of the shotgun into the gap and started firing. My vision glitched. The entire code structure of the safe quaked with every shot.

    Finally, the damn thing took one pellet too many.

    The safe froze, then burst apart into sparkly little bits that rained down around me.

    I almost collapsed in relief, to be honest. The shockwaves had been getting unbearable. If the safe had managed to hold out for just a minute longer, I might have decided to give up, no matter how close to success I was.

    But it hadn¡¯t, and I was the victor!

    That thought was enough to draw my attention to what the safe had left behind after imploding.

    It was a simple, unassuming file folder. The only notable thing was the black crest emblazoned on its front. It was a black eye, dripping tears, and it looked almost like it was staring back at me.

    I couldn¡¯t suppress a full-body shudder. Suddenly hesitant, I scowled at the folder. All I had to do was lean forward and pick it up. And yet¡­

    ¡°This is ridiculous,¡± I declared, to no one in particular.

    I scooped up the folder, ignoring the small tingle of something like vague awareness that raced up my right arm as soon as I touched it.

    ¡°Well, let¡¯s see that code, then,¡± I announced cheerily, again to no one in particular. And I cracked the stupid thing open.

    Instantly, code scrolled across my vision in several separate streams. It was almost overwhelming, like the entire app was unspooling directly into my brain. It took me several seconds of frozen shock to realize I could manipulate it with a thought. I simply pushed my intent at it, and the flood compartmentalized neatly into hovering windows of scrolling code.

    I breathed a sigh of relief at the newfound separation between me and the code, though that was swiftly followed by an annoyed scowl. I should have known that would happen, and been ready to handle it. I probably would have been, had I gotten to learn everything the simulation shard was supposed to teach me.

    Granted, I still had the entire inheritance shard series to go through, but all of them were of the simulated reality type. And since I wasn¡¯t sure how those would interact with my eyes¡­ Well, I was still reluctant to open those shards, more for fear of ruining them than because I dreaded another encounter with the shadows.

    I told myself that, at least.

    Prompted by those thoughts, I took a moment to scan my surroundings. Thankfully, there were no cracks in the netspace, no black tar, and definitely no weird grinning faces. Either netspace was a lot more stable and harder for my eyes to mess with, or it was something about simulated reality shards that triggered them.

    I groaned when I realized I¡¯d require further testing before I could come up with an answer either way. Simulated reality shards weren¡¯t cheap, not even the most basic ones. Buying them with the express intention of ruining them through experimentation did not appeal to me.

    But I could take care of all that later. For the time being, I had my prize to admire.

    And admire it, I did. The code was unlike anything I¡¯d seen before. It was leagues beyond even the most complex lessons I got from the shard, and obviously newer than any of the code I¡¯d encountered up until then, too.

    At first, I was simply lost trying to make sense of it. To really understand it, I would probably need to learn an entirely new coding language. On my own.

    I didn¡¯t want to admit that. The idea seemed ludicrous. But as I scanned through the coding files, I realized I had no choice.

    That was exactly what I was about to be forced to do.

    Oh, I could kind of guess what some of the stuff was and did. I saw several interesting tricks I could apply to my own version of coding. But it was woefully obvious that I¡¯d been toying with machines and code that were many generations behind what was currently available commercially.

    The realization wasn¡¯t as crushing as it might have been to someone else. I knew I had no privileged background to back up my attempts to learn netrunning. Still, that wouldn¡¯t stop me. Older code or not, it was proven already that what I was learning worked in the netspace. In fact, I wouldn¡¯t have been surprised if the backbone of the netspace infrastructure still relied on coding even older than what I¡¯d been learning.

    Maybe I¡¯d need some ingenuity and tricks to face off with the latest gen defenses and netrunners, but I had no business tangling with those yet anyway. By the time I did come around to that, I¡¯d hopefully be much better equipped. I also hoped I¡¯d actually know what I was doing by then, instead of relying on vague, distressing instincts.

    It was this boost to my confidence that encouraged me to continue examining the code, and it was rather lucky that it did. The deeper I dug into the coding, just appreciating the way it was done, the more something felt¡­ off.

    Sure, the entire program was well-written, and it was a true masterpiece of the company that had published it. But bits of it, well¡­ some bits felt downright otherworldly in their quality. While I could somewhat intuit what the rest of the code was doing, those bits remained stubbornly opaque, resisting all attempts to figure them out. I literally could not even recognize the symbols used to write the code, let alone the approach used in their writing.

    It didn¡¯t take long after that for me to hit upon another truth: most of the particularly ¡®weird¡¯ code was buried under tons and tons of ¡®regular¡¯ coding. In fact, I was quickly growing certain that the majority of it never even affected a single thing on the user end of the equation.

    The question, then, was simple: what was that code even doing?

    By then, I was invested. It was late, sure, but I¡¯d take a night of lost sleep in return for figuring out a mystery, and this was starting to look like a good one.

    I kept prodding at bits and pieces of the code. Eventually, I discovered a preview function that would show off what each bit of the normal code actually did. Random stats flickered at me. I was presented with a few scanning functions, and even a database of different diets.

    The ¡®weird¡¯ code, on the other hand? I kept trying to poke at it, only for nothing to happen. At all. I did get a weird readout once or twice, but it was nothing that made sense to me. Even the info it presented was in that weird script, and¡­

    A shiver ran down my spine as realization hit me like a truck.

    I know I¡¯d made some mistakes, but I wasn¡¯t a complete idiot. So, as I stared at a weird diagram with all sorts of readouts and symbols I could make neither heads nor tails of, it finally solidified in my head what I was looking at.

    The odd stats. The same stats I¡¯d never found a single explanation for. This was the foundation that let the app offer them to me. It had to be.

    That did, of course, leave me wondering if I should keep poking around.

    Then again¡­

    Isn¡¯t this the kind of thing I decided to take risks for? I wondered idly to myself, even as my eyes hardened.

    Yes. Yes it is.

    I kept pushing. I kept prodding. I was desperate to find anything that could help me understand, until my finger poked another line of the code at random.

    Pain blossomed inside my brain as my mind swam. Netspace twisted and threatened to fracture. For just a moment, I thought I would pass out.

    Then my mind cleared, and I discovered my virtual hand had lifted without my input. Held in it, looking painfully unassuming, was a black leatherbound journal that looked like a historical play prop.

    On its cover, the weeping eyes gleamed in a shade of black somehow darker than the surrounding leather.

 Chapter 33: Trouble at Home

    For just a moment, I wondered if I should, y¡¯know, maybe stop.

    It seemed pretty clear that my investigation into the RE app leaned heavily into the weird stuff going on with my eyes. In fact, it almost felt like they wanted me to have the weird journal.

    If I was right, and all the extra stats in the RE app came directly from my eyes, then that meant my eyes had been corrupting things as far back as that app purchase. More importantly, if they could just add stuff to an app I downloaded, what else could they do?

    Coopt my navigation app? Stop me from accessing certain information in my net browsing, or feed me particular search results? I literally relied on the things to see, so if there was a malicious intelligence hidden inside them, it would be simplicity itself for it to mess with me.

    And let¡¯s be real: it sure was looking that way.

    Point of fact, I was even ¡®seeing¡¯ the netspace through the eyes. They were replacing the goggles normally used by runners. And while I knew that advanced eye cybernetics were actually better and more immersive, I still couldn¡¯t entirely master my dread.

    Then again¡­

    I¡¯m really so fucked already. What¡¯s the point of avoiding a little more additional risk?

    With that cheerful thought, I carefully cracked open the journal.

    The world exploded around me.

    Code swirled. Reality cracked open and wept. It felt like a million needles stabbed into every last bit of my brain. My spine caught fire, and the sensation spread quickly to the rest of me.

    My avatar didn¡¯t collapse, like an actual person would. It just stood stock still.

    Meanwhile, back in reality, my actual body convulsed.

    Warnings flashed, screen after screen trying to get my attention. Finally, I found my eyes struggling to focus not on the netspace scenery, but on my room¡¯s ceiling. I had just enough time to wonder at the ¡®why¡¯ of it all before the pain redoubled.

    I couldn¡¯t even scream. It felt like someone split my skull open, rooted around to make space, and shoved something extra inside.

    Then I blacked out.

    ¡ª

    Slowly, ever so slowly, I came to.

    I felt worse than I did when the druggie tried to rob me. At least that time, the pain was all physical. On this wonderful occasion? My mind felt like it had been ripped apart and then welded back together. The edges were still raw and achy. Any thought I did manage to force through came slowly and with great reluctance.

    To be fair, my situation was rapidly improving. The more thoughts I strung together, the more easily they came. Even the fog that hung thick over my mind was starting to clear. If not for the fact that even my room¡¯s meager illumination stabbed into my skull like an angry knife, I¡¯d feel much better.

    I groaned and shifted on my bed, clumsily reaching for the cords still connected to my neural interface. I unplugged them and dropped them to the floor carelessly. My eyes still felt a little¡­ off, so I rubbed at them, only to freeze.

    My fingers felt sticky.

    I drew my hand back, then stared in muted horror at the black, tar-like substance staining my fingers.

    Ignoring the protests of my mind and body both, I dragged myself up in record time and raced for the mirror in my shower nook.

    I didn¡¯t know whether to scream or curse.

    Thick lines of tar had leaked out of my eyes, nose, and ears. The only opening the stuff hadn¡¯t seeped out of was my mouth, but that wasn¡¯t as much of a relief as it should have been. Not when I had an odd taste on the back of my tongue.

    I opened my mouth, and sure enough, it was stained black.

    I threw up, then and there. I heaved and choked and spat, my disgust and need to retch only growing when watery tar spilled out of me alongside the remains of my last meal.

    The one good thing about the entire event was that I was already in the shower when it kicked off, so I managed to avoid getting my vomit and whatever-the-fuck-the-tar-was all over my room.

    Once I was done, I spent a few moments just leaning against the wall. Then I slowly stripped off my clothes and threw them into a corner of the nook. I felt an acute need to take a shower right that second.

    To be honest, even just pulling the screen that would stop me from spraying water over the rest of my apartment somehow felt like a gargantuan effort, but I managed. Just like I managed to stay upright while I scrubbed at my tar-stained clothes before scrubbing even harder at my stained skin. I couldn¡¯t count the number of times I washed my mouth out, either.

    Still, by the time I was ready to step out of the shower and face the world once more, I felt steadier, more confident, and, most important of all, clean.

    I shot a frustrated scowl at the tar-stained covers on my bed, but at least those were easy enough to ball up and shove into a corner where I didn¡¯t need to think about them. My poor clothes I just left in the shower, hanging off the divider screen. I¡¯d deal with all that later.

    Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

    For the time being, I collapsed into my bed naked and just groaned. No matter how reluctant I felt, it was time to face the music.

    I finally let my attention drift to all the notifications I had blinking at me from my HUD and started clicking them open.

    <table style="border-collapse: collapse" border="1">

    <tbody>

    <tr>

    <td style="width: 98.9568%">

    Conditions met.

    Permission granted.

    Unlocking latent modules¡­

    Locks removed.

    Shadow Runner Protocol engaging¡­

    Package installation complete.

    Scanning¡­

    Scanning complete.

    Adrian Flinn

    Strength: 0.9

    Reflexes: 1.2

    Acuity: 5 (-5) ¡ú 7 (-3)

    Physique: 1

    Recovery: 0.8

    Stamina: 1.1

    Soul: 1.6 ¡ú 2

    Adaptability: 1 ¡ú 2

    Tolerance: 1 ¡ú 2

    Cognition: 2 ¡ú 3

    Essence: 0.1 ¡ú 1

    Mind Synchronicity: Growing instability ¡ú Waning Instability

    Shadow Runner Package:

    Clairvoyance 0 (94/100)

    Programming 0 (86/100)

    Movement 0 (89/100)

    Quickhacks 0 (12/100)

    Assault 0 (0/100)

    </td>

    </tr>

    </tbody>

    </table>

    The thing wasn¡¯t even pretending anymore to be the app I had paid good money for. Instead, it was its own app, one marked by that same symbol I saw on the cover of the journal. The only explanation I got was that single status screen with all its confusing information.

    The one and only piece of good news lay at the conclusion of the original status screen.

    Waning Instability.

    That was good, right? It had to be! Anything marked down as ¡®Mind Synchronicity¡¯ was probably important, and I did not want it to be unstable.

    For the first time in a while, I breathed out a sigh of relief. Sure, it was kind of unsatisfying. But if whatever I had done was starting to fix my mind instead of breaking it, then I would mark that down as a success and move on.

    Of course, there was that frustrating final section that had popped up out of the blue. ¡®Shadow Runner Package¡¯ had a ton of interesting implications, chief among them being that it sounded like it was designed for a netrunner to take advantage of.

    I was sort of a netrunner, wasn¡¯t I? At the very least, I had managed to pull off stealing data well enough that I¡¯d unlocked this expanded status screen interface, whatever good that would do me.

    More importantly, I was interested in what the package listed out, and the numbers in the brackets.

    ¡®Programming¡¯, ¡®Quickhacks¡¯, and even ¡®Movement¡¯ I could intuit pretty easily. Was ¡®Clairvoyance¡¯ supposed to denote the weird visions and hunches I¡¯d been getting? Because if so, the fact that the software was designed to keep track of it was sort of a relief. It made the weirdness feel expected, if not controllable.

    The explanation would also make sense if I took the numbers into account. ¡®Clairvoyance¡¯ was highest, and out of everything listed under the package, the visions were definitely what I had the most experience with.

    Still¡­ what exactly would reaching a hundred do? Would it automatically make the 0 tick over into 1? And if yes, what then?

    It threw me for a loop just how game-like the entire status screen was. Sure, that¡¯s what RE software drew inspiration from to begin with, but no one was meant to lean into it this hard.

    The sight of all those strange stats was still disturbing, especially when I took into account how much those stats had grown. To be fair, I was feeling a difference. My mind churned more quickly than ever before. My memory felt keener. New ideas popped into my head more readily. Connections were easier to make, too.

    I narrowed my eyes as I carefully went over everything that had happened to me since I decided to trust Jason, of all people, and take a stupid gamble. So many times, I could have ended up as a corpse left to cool on the pavement of the slums. Instead, I was ¡ª

    I jumped when ringing went off inside my head and an incoming call notification popped up in my vision. When I saw who was calling, I frowned, but I turned off the video feed on my end and hit accept.

    ¡°What¡¯s up, Mela? Not to be rude, but I¡¯m kind of in the middle of something here.¡±

    ¡°Sorry to disturb you kiddo, but I¡¯m gonna need ya to make yer way to the HQ as soon as possible.¡± Her voice had a no-nonsense edge to it that I didn¡¯t like the sound of, and her expression was way too controlled and still.

    That wasn¡¯t Mela. At all. The only time I¡¯d seen her like that was when the Kittens were under active assault.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± I demanded as I jumped out of bed and went hunting for some clothes. ¡°Is it another attack? What gang is it this time? Not Zerx again, right? There¡¯s no way those fuckers could get back on their feet this quickly!¡±

    ¡°Not the Zerx, no. But some of our guys are missing. Just¡­ disappeared. A couple of them from their homes, too. No sign of their families either. Entire patrols, just gone,¡± Mela snarled, frustration plainly visible on her face before she managed to school her expression into something less feral again.

    ¡°Fuck. Fuck! That¡¯s¡­¡±

    I didn¡¯t even know what to say. I could only keep my hands moving as I pulled my t-shirt over my head, the rest of my clothes on already. I briefly felt thankful I had taken off my Kitten jacket before I lay down for runner experimentation. At least it wasn¡¯t covered in creepy eldritch tar.

    ¡°Fuck is about right. We can¡¯t fucking shoot at some ¡®mysterious killer¡¯ or whatever.¡± Mela was ranting now. ¡°I¡¯ve been scouring the fucking streets for ¡®em, and nothing! Nothing! Ya know how fucking irritating that is?!¡±

    I didn¡¯t, but I could guess. Mela saw the Kittens as family. I¡¯d seen her fret over a patrol running twenty minutes late before. The fact that someone was out there, taking out her people?

    Yeah, I wouldn¡¯t want to be them when she got her hands on them.

    ¡°I¡¯m guessing you want me to come hole up with you guys again?¡±

    ¡°Garren¡¯s calling for a meeting. Everyone needs to attend, not just yer sorry ass.¡± For the first time, some levity slipped into her voice, and I smiled at the minor barb. ¡°Guess we¡¯ll see if he wants ta order a general retreat to HQ. Dunno about that, though. The Zerx thing already hit us hard. We gotta be seen, gotta take care of our interests, protect our people, the whole shtick.¡±

    I rolled my eyes at her summary. No matter what she was saying, I could tell she wanted Garren to order us all to stay at HQ. The order wouldn¡¯t affect her nearly as much, since she¡¯d still have leave to patrol and look for the attackers. I could only assume she¡¯d feel much better knowing most of us were safe and sound where mystery killers couldn¡¯t get at us.

    ¡°Okay. Okay, I¡¯m on my way. If Garren does declare a state of emergency, I¡¯m gonna need you to fetch a couple things from my apartment for me, but I don¡¯t want to bring it all along right now. Don¡¯t need, ehhh, unwanted attention, if you get what I¡¯m saying.¡±

    ¡°Yea, yea, I getcha, ya little shit. Now get yer ass to HQ or I¡¯m hunting ya down myself.¡±

    I smiled again as I cut the call without saying another word. She¡¯d probably get me for that later, but meh. For the time being, I was a little too caught up in my worries. Not only did I have a brand new mystery in my lap, thanks to my eyes, but now the unrest in the slums was heating up again.

    I did not have a great feeling about any of it.

 Chapter 34: Bloody Dayz

    The streets were peaceful. Well, not peaceful peaceful. This is still the slums we¡¯re talking about here. Still, with everything Mela had shared with me, I expected to find people running for their lives while gangers cackled and tried to mow them down.

    Instead, it almost felt like any other day in the slums.

    People hurried along and kept their heads down. Sounds of violence occasionally erupted from somewhere in the distance, but no one paid them any mind.. The local gangers glared at each other and eyed up potential marks, but didn¡¯t make any actual moves.

    All in all, manageable.

    The jittery nervous energy that had been burning in my veins slowly cooled, leaving me calmer and feeling more capable of handling whatever came my way.

    Good thing, too. When I got to the HQ, the guards on duty were looking nervous and twitchy themselves. I¡¯m pretty sure if I had jogged up to them, they might have just opened fire without paying much attention to whom they were shooting at.

    ¡°Heya, kid.¡± One of the guards, a ganger with a shock of bright blue hair going blond at the roots, nodded at me. ¡°Go on in. It ain¡¯t smart to be out on the streets right now on your own.¡±

    ¡°Thanks man, appreciate the concern. Didn¡¯t look that bad out there, though.¡±

    He snorted loudly. ¡°Don¡¯t look bad, sure. Don¡¯t mean some twenty of our guys will be showing up again, though.¡±

    I grimaced, but I didn¡¯t answer. Twenty people missing, at least. And that was probably just the number of people they couldn¡¯t confirm were alive or dead. From what Mela was saying, things were worse than that.

    Or did they fudge the numbers for the sake of morale? I suddenly wondered. That would make sense with Garren¡¯s typical way of running the show. The big guy wasn¡¯t a manipulator or anything, but he sure did like to keep things close to his chest when he could.

    I couldn¡¯t count the number of times Mela had annoyed him by spilling info to me in his presence. It wasn¡¯t anything big, of course. Not even Mela would do that. But she did discuss things like certain patrol routes, finances, or even goods acquisitions freely around me, much to Garren¡¯s frustration.

    While I had the feeling he was upset she was doing it in general, rather than that she was letting me know specifically, the distinction didn¡¯t feel all that important. The point was, I could definitely imagine Garren being¡­ less than open with the gang as a whole, at least until he had a firm handle on the situation.

    ¡°Ah, Adrian!¡± Ravs called out the second I was in the building proper, making me look around for him.

    It was tough to spot him in the mess of people filling up the ground floor, but I managed and headed for him immediately.

    ¡°Hey Ravs. What¡¯s going on? Where¡¯s Mela and Garren?¡±

    ¡°Ahhh, they¡¯re in the meeting already, I¡¯m afraid. The last of the lieutenants arrived, so Garren had them start immediately. Meanwhile, I¡¯m one of the poor shmucks stuck here, checking off the lists.¡±

    ¡°Lists?¡± I asked, narrowing my eyes at the scroll in the medic¡¯s hands.

    ¡°Mmmhmm. Garren wants to know exactly who¡¯s shown up and who hasn¡¯t. He sent out the request for everyone to gather a while ago. We¡¯re just trying to figure out who¡¯s missing, y¡¯know?¡±

    I did know, even if I didn¡¯t like the implications. Now that I looked around the room properly, I spotted other gangers doing the same thing as Ravs. The fact that this was necessary to begin with didn¡¯t bode well for all our futures.

    Ravs couldn¡¯t stand there and chat with me forever, though. He excused himself quickly to continue his rounds, and I was left on my lonesome to find a way to pass the time.

    Eventually, I found myself in the cafeteria. Both because my body was still oddly achy, and because I discovered that I was starving. Came with throwing up so many times, I suppose.

    Feyo, at least, was as much of a treasure as always. In spite of the pervading tension that was trying to choke all the warmth and positivity out of the room, he still bustled about in his kitchen, chatting people up while he delivered their food.

    He didn¡¯t always do that, and he didn¡¯t need to. Deliver the food himself, I mean. I knew for a fact that he had several assistants who all got frustrated with him sometimes. Still, none of them could deny how much Feyo tended to brighten people¡¯s day whenever he showed up in person.

    Luckily for me, I happened to be one of his favorite ¡®customers.¡¯

    ¡°Ain¡¯t looking as skinny as you used to be anymore, are you kiddo?¡± The man laughed as he swept up to me and plopped a plate heaped high with food onto the long dining table.

    I eyed it hungrily. We were having some variety of chicken that day. It came in small pieces drenched in a vegetable sauce and layered with thin slices of tomato. All synthetic, of course, but that didn¡¯t make the meal taste worse.

    The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

    ¡°Not so much these days, no!¡± I quipped back, already feeling the tension in my shoulders start to loosen. ¡°Thanks to you.¡±

    ¡°Ha! Just doing mah part. Now, what¡¯s gotcha looking so glum, hm? Ain¡¯t no reason to worry so much about this whole mess. Garren will sort it all out, and then we¡¯ll be back to business as usual.¡±

    ¡°Yeah, I can see that happening.¡± I wasn¡¯t even lying, really. Garren could be very intense when he wanted to be. ¡°Just¡­ don¡¯t like it, you know?¡±

    I hoped he couldn¡¯t see the real reason I was moping.

    I mean, sure, mysterious murders were bad. Having absolutely no one for us to point our fingers at was bad. Both would just ratchet up the tension until I was pretty sure even Kittens would start snapping and lashing out.

    We were one of the best behaved gangs out there, but we were a gang. Discipline and iron-fisted leadership only went so far. If things continued like this for too long, not even Garren would be able to stop his people from doing something rash, like trying to purge their turf of anyone who ¡®didn¡¯t belong¡¯ or ¡®looked suspicious.¡¯

    More than all of that, though, what had me sulking was the fact that I was stuck sitting there in the cafeteria, far from all the action and decision-making.

    I knew I was a nobody among the Kittens, and that there was absolutely no chance Garren would ever consult me on anything. Still, a part of me smarted at being left out. And no matter how many times I told myself I was being both ridiculous and childish, that didn¡¯t change.

    It was all Mela¡¯s fault, I eventually decided, once I¡¯d managed to work myself up past the sulking and into mild resentment. She made me feel like a part of the team, like I was in with the big boys, and then she left me sitting there alone.

    I had finished eating and was busy planning mild inconveniences for Mela¡¯s future when Garren finally strolled into the room, swiftly followed first by his lieutenants and then by a stream of people all trying to squeeze into the cafeteria.

    As one of the biggest rooms in the building, it was often coopted for announcements, which was one of the reasons I¡¯d gone there to begin with.

    ¡°Okay, listen up, all of you!¡± Garren bellowed from the middle of the room, making everyone fall silent. ¡°It¡¯s no secret that something is happening out there. We¡¯re not sure yet if someone¡¯s targeting us in particular, or if they¡¯re killing members of whatever gang they can get their hands on, but that doesn¡¯t change the threat.¡±

    ¡°We gonna hole up, then?¡± someone shouted.

    A bunch of unhappy voices rang out right after, mostly in protest of the idea.

    Honestly, the HQ wasn¡¯t a comfy spot for all of us to be stuck in. There wasn¡¯t that much space. We had to sleep practically pressed up against each other. Tempers began to flare quickly when so many people had to tolerate each other for a while.

    The last time wasn¡¯t that bad, on account of the fact that our lives were openly and rather obviously threatened by Zerx, but I had a feeling that nothing short of all-out war would convince even a gang as ¡®disciplined¡¯ as the Kittens to go into another lockdown.

    I sure as fuck wasn¡¯t big on it.

    Not only would I be losing out on a bunch of work with Catill, and therefore missing credits I could be putting aside for future big purchases, but I wouldn¡¯t be able to train my running inside the HQ. I wouldn¡¯t put it past Mort to catch me doing it, and then I would be in some deep shit.

    ¡°Oh shut up, the lot of you!¡± Garren¡¯s shout cut off the rising chatter rather efficiently as he swept angry eyes over the crowd. ¡°If I fucking say you¡¯re staying here and keeping your heads down, then that¡¯s bloody well what you¡¯ll do!¡±

    He took a deep breath, visibly struggling to calm down. ¡°However. No, we¡¯re not doing that yet.¡±

    His declaration wasn¡¯t met with a cheer, but only because he was still glaring around, as if daring someone to do it. I had trained with the man exactly once, and he¡¯d put me down way harder than Mela. He could probably kick the asses of everyone assembled there that day. Maybe even all of us at once, if he had more cybernetics hidden under that synth skin of his.

    ¡°Just because we won¡¯t be holing up in the HQ doesn¡¯t mean everything¡¯s gonna continue as normal, though. From now on, I want you all to report in every two hours, on the dot. I don¡¯t fucking care if you have to get an implant that¡¯ll shock you every two hours just so you can remember. If you fail to check in, you¡¯ll earn private time with me. After all, if you want to fuck about with your own safety, then I may as well train you how to protect yourselves.¡±

    The silence actually deepened. No one was stupid enough to tempt fate and piss Garren off in that moment.

    ¡°That¡¯s not all. We¡¯re doubling the number of patrols as well as the number of people patrolling together. I don¡¯t fucking want you getting ambushed out there. We aren¡¯t in a state of emergency yet, but it¡¯s a close thing. If this shit continues, I¡¯m not gonna have much of a choice but to stick you all in HQ. At least then I¡¯ll know you¡¯ll be alive.¡±

    He paused.

    ¡°We¡¯re also discussing¡­ how we can keep you all a bit safer at home, too. Mort pitched an idea to me about surveillance.¡±

    Voices rose in protest immediately. They only fell silent when Garren raised a hand with a thunderous look on his face. ¡°I get it. No one likes even considering that. However¡­¡±

    The big man closed his eyes, obviously thinking about something that pained him deeply.

    ¡°You didn¡¯t have to see the pictures and video of what they found in some of our people¡¯s homes. No bodies. No real evidence. Just blood, and a lot of it. Do you want your families to get slaughtered? No? Then you¡¯ll fucking install cameras at the entrances to your homes and be happy about it. There¡¯ll be no surveillance inside your homes, though. That, I agree, would be a step too far.¡±

    This finally mollified the crowd, including me. Garren went on about how important it was to cover all the doors and windows you had, which I tuned out. How many people in the slums could afford to have windows, anyway? Not many, that¡¯s for sure. I¡¯d just need to stick a single camera on my door, and I could call it a day.

    So, as Garren wound down and then dismissed us, I kept my eyes trained on Mela. She didn¡¯t look happy at all. If anything, she looked worried out of her mind. That was enough for me to shed whatever childish pique I had left in my system.

    I pushed through the crowd until I reached her. She was hovering a short distance away from Garren as he chatted with some of the Kittens.

    ¡°Hey, you doing alright?¡± I whispered.

    She jumped, then gave a tense smile when she realized it was just me.

    ¡°Yeah, I¡¯m just fine kiddo. Just¡­ worried. My brother hasn¡¯t shown up yet. I know Garren keeps telling me he¡¯s fine and that he¡¯ll be back soon, but he also won¡¯t tell me what he¡¯s got him doing out there that would take this long. He¡¯s not even answering my calls or messages. That just ain¡¯t like Mak, and¡­ Well, I worry.¡±

    ¡°Hey, you trust Garren, right?¡± My eyes drifted to the gang leader. He was still chatting with various Kittens, reassuring people, promising them everything would be fine.

    ¡°I do. That doesn¡¯t stop me from worrying, you know?¡±

    ¡°Yeah,¡± I muttered, my own shoulders slumping under the weight of my churning thoughts. ¡°Yeah, I sure do.¡±

 Chapter 35: Final Countdown

    The thing about danger seeming to lurk behind every corner is that you¡¯re suddenly a lot more motivated to do anything possible to escape it.

    I wasn¡¯t an exception to this rule, but to my eternal frustration, I also wasn¡¯t a physically gifted individual. I always did better when I had to use my head rather than my muscles.

    Not even Mela¡¯s training could change that, even when she intensified it in an attempt to make me a bit safer. Oh, I was improving. I dodged more, I struck back instead of just taking a beating, and I even managed to surprise Mela once or twice.

    On one memorable occasion, I hooked my leg behind hers while she was relatively off-balance, and the shove that followed sent her on her ass. Of course, she then proceeded to stand up, crack her knuckles, and lay into me harder than before.

    Regardless, in the two weeks that followed Garren¡¯s announcement, I became unwilling to trust my survival to nothing but my flimsy physique that was only just within ¡®normal¡¯ levels. Or stats, as my status screen showed them.

    <table style="border-collapse: collapse" border="1">

    <tbody>

    <tr>

    <td style="width: 98.9568%">

    Adrian Flinn

    Strength: 0.9 ¡ú 1

    Reflexes: 1.2

    Acuity: 7 (-3)

    Physique: 1

    Recovery: 0.8 ¡ú 1

    Stamina: 1.1 ¡ú 1.2

    Soul: 2

    Adaptability: 2

    Tolerance: 2

    Cognition: 3

    Essence: 1

    Mind Synchronicity: Waning Instability

    Shadow Runner Package:

    Clairvoyance 0 (94/100) ¡ú (99/100)

    Programming 0 (86/100) ¡ú (91/100)

    Movement 0 (89/100) ¡ú (92/100)

    Quickhacks 0 (12/100) ¡ú (56/100)

    Assault 0 (0/100)

    </td>

    </tr>

    </tbody>

    </table>

    The sight of this status screen at the two-week mark was a major victory for me, especially the growth in my ¡®normal¡¯ stats. They were the definitive proof that I was digging myself out of the hole the circumstances of my birth had led me into.

    Oh, I wasn¡¯t suddenly tall, buff and sporty, but at least I no longer looked a step away from a skeleton when I took my t-shirt off. The months of good eating and exercise had put some meat on my bones, and I was starting to get a bit of definition to my muscles that I could be proud of.

    Nothing to be done about my small stature, though. That was one gift malnutrition was set on making me keep.

    So, while brainstorming ways I could improve my chances of survival, I had decided to focus on the one thing that had proven itself invaluable back during the first gang war I¡¯d participated in: my visual glitches.

    Or, as my ¡®Shadow Runner¡¯ package referred to them, ¡®Clairvoyance.¡¯

    Over those two weeks, I had done everything I could think of to get that ¡®94¡¯ to tick up, running off some possibly misguided hope that yes, something good would happen when it finally hit one hundred.

    I¡¯d stopped waiting for glitches, or avoiding situations that usually caused them. Instead, I made a concentrated effort to trigger them. I taunted Mela (in as friendly a fashion as possible) into pressing me harder. I squinted at code until my eyes were burning, looking for inconsistencies and advice. I even jumped into the netspace and tried messing around in there.

    It was nearly the end of the first week when I managed to push myself into a split-second vision and actually act on it during a spar. I¡¯d been immediately rewarded with a soft ding sound in the back of my mind. It was so unexpected that I briefly faltered and caught a fist to the stomach for my distraction.

    When I was done gagging, I risked a glanced at my HUD. There, sitting in the lower left corner, was a message.

    <table style="border-collapse: collapse" border="1">

    <tbody>

    <tr>

    <td style="width: 98.9568%">Clairvoyance +1 exp</td>

    </tr>

    </tbody>

    </table>

    An experience point. Just like in the video games I used to play.

    In spite of the pain radiating from my stomach and my utter exhaustion, I wanted to laugh. After all, if that was happening, who was to say I wouldn¡¯t get something nice when I leveled up the skill?

    I had thrown myself into my training with renewed vigor after that. So much so that I¡¯d seen that solid improvement in most of my skills, with the notable exception of Assault.

    It was almost therapeutic to have the status screen with me. Every time I did well, it let me know. It was the kind of validation you didn¡¯t get from just staring at code for hours, or wondering at the weird instincts you had and how far they could push you.

    This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

    Then again, those instincts were no longer ¡®weird¡¯, were they? I could say with some certainty that I knew where they came from now, especially since they were enhanced after I had the ¡®package installation.¡¯

    It was eerie, sometimes, the surety with which I could move around within the netspace. I still hadn¡¯t risked venturing very far beyond my room, but I did explore my floor of the building. I marveled at the way the tracks of light cut off at the doors of occupied apartments, and even poked at the defenses a little, forcing the world to shift into the endless mass of streaming code when my vision glitched.

    I was fairly sure I could break through the doors, if I needed to. I only refrained because I was afraid I might trigger some kind of alarm, and because I hadn¡¯t finished rewriting my quickhacks.

    I was working through them as a good clip while also studying the coding language of the stat app. While I still wasn¡¯t even halfway through the redesign of the breach quickhack, the potency it would have when I was done excited me.

    Then, of course, my stupid skill exp had to get stuck.

    Halfway through the second week of tension, with more reports of people disappearing within the Kittens¡¯ territory, including some of our gang members, my Clairvoyance had hit 99/100 and refused to budge higher. No matter how many times I triggered my vision to glitch, or what I did in response to the visions, the stats stayed the same:

    <table style="border-collapse: collapse" border="1">

    <tbody>

    <tr>

    <td style="width: 98.9568%">

    Shadow Runner Package:

    Clairvoyance 0 (94/100) ¡ú (99/100)

    Programming 0 (86/100) ¡ú (91/100)

    Movement 0 (89/100) ¡ú (92/100)

    Quickhacks 0 (12/100) ¡ú (56/100)

    Assault 0 (0/100)

    </td>

    </tr>

    </tbody>

    </table>

    That¡¯s how I ended up tracking down Mela for one very awkward conversation.

    ¡°You want me to do what?¡± the redhead asked, finally knocked out of her worried funk enough to send me a disbelieving stare.

    Everything happening in the slums weighed on her more heavily than it even did on Garren. For some reason, she saw it as a personal failing on her part that she couldn¡¯t catch the perpetrator behind all of the attacks on the Kittens.

    ¡°I want you to push me when we spar, harder than you ever did before. I want to genuinely fear for my life,¡± I insisted, with all the sincerity I could manage. ¡°I don¡¯t care if you put me in Torn¡¯s care for like a week. I need this.¡±

    Mela had been holding back a little during our recent spars. Not because she was worried about me, or even because of her funk, but because Garren had reminded everyone sternly not to waste resources doing stupid shit. Say, like beating someone within an inch of their life and then forcing the head ripper of the Kittens to heal them using expensive medicine.

    For me to sign up for a more thorough beating? I could only guess Mela thought I was going insane in response to all the recent stress. In spite of that, she showed why she was my favorite Kitten when she sighed, shrugged, and agreed.

    I was already questioning all my life choices by the time we had our training gear on (just the padded gloves, really), and were standing across from each other on the mat.

    Just like always, Mela moved with the grace and speed of a large predator. She didn¡¯t step closer to me so much as she glided. When her right fist lashed out, it was all I could do to get my arms in the way before she slugged me in the face.

    And she just kept upping the pressure. A hit to the ribs, light, just enough to make me stagger. A snapped out kick that made me fall to my left knee. She was preparing for the next hit when my arms instinctively went wide to help me balance, and the world glitched.

    The shadow-faced figure launched a punch that rocked me right across my jaw, snapping my teeth shut and sending me to my back. The vision disappeared as quickly as it came, leaving me just enough time to tilt my upper body and take the hit on my shoulder.

    It still sent me reeling back over my own leg awkwardly, but I managed to scramble to my feet and spring away from the approaching Kitten lieutenant. I only took one punch to my side for the little maneuver, too!

    Still, I was getting frustrated. I¡¯d almost gotten knocked out on the spot, but apparently, even using Clairvoyance to dodge that was no longer good enough.

    I advanced on Mela with a snarl on my lips, actually going for a couple punches of my own. The sudden aggression caught Mela by surprise. That let me land a hit on her shoulder, but only because it was so unusual for me to do something like that. She rallied right after and deflected every single one of my blows.

    Then I was harshly punished for my hubris.

    Mela must still have been holding back earlier. Now, though, my little stunts had finally pissed her off enough to let loose.

    Blow after heavy blow landed on my person. I was barely keeping myself in the spar, thanks only to the rapid glitches that came more and more frequently as she started to lose patience.

    And it was still not enough!

    My own frustration finally boiled over. It wasn¡¯t enough that I was forced to constantly endure creepy shadow imagery just so I could train some weird system that came attached to my eyes. It wasn¡¯t enough that everything that had happened with those shadow creatures was still giving me nightmares. Now, the stupid eyes I was stuck with were refusing to let me advance the skill they gave me!

    The next time a Clairvoyance vision came, I latched onto it. I gripped onto that cold, sweeping feeling that always welled up in the back of my mind, the one that made me feel like I was a small fish swimming in a big ocean and a massive shadow was suddenly looming over me.

    I clutched onto it, and I demanded more from it. I refused to let it go.

    My vision glitched into the next blow Mela was about to make. Even as it began to fade, and I moved to dodge, I forced the vision to linger. To show me more.

    The shadow overlapping with Mela¡¯s flickered in an out of focus, but with a growl and an immense effort of will, I made it obey.

    All of a sudden, my vision sharpened, and I could see everything.

    Typically, one thing claimed all of my attention. One attack, one event, something so pivotal my eyes insisted I see it. This time, I was aware of each and every thing Mela was doing, all at once.

    The way she was moving. The way her eyes flickered around, assessing and planning. The way the mat shifted under her feet. The air from the AC unit as it washed over her body, making her shiver slightly when its cool met the heat of her skin.

    And more. Much, much more.

    It was enough for me to know what I should do next.

    I moved to compensate for her incoming kick to my knee and shifted my head out of the way of her fist. Then I threw myself forward, intending to knock her off her feet. My Clairvoyance vision shifted in response to my actions in a way that should have left me nauseous, but the overlapping versions of the future in flux did practically nothing to me.

    Unfortunately, they also told me I would fail.

    The tackle should have worked. She was on one foot, overextended, and she¡¯d never expect it. Instead, she just pivoted with me, gripped me right back, and used the momentum my charge gave us to spin us around once, somehow ending up on top of me with her fists raised.

    I dodged the first hit by squirming to the side, but then all the possible futures shifted and crystalized into one definitive moment. A moment where her fist met my right cheek and ground my head into the mat.

    ¡°Wai-¡±

    She didn¡¯t even give me the chance to get my plea out. Pain exploded through my face, but only for a moment. The next second, blissful darkness claimed my consciousness, putting me out of my misery.

    The message blinking in the lower left corner of my vision had to languish there until I actually had the presence of mind to check it out. That didn¡¯t happen until hours later, when I woke up in Torn¡¯s operation chair to find the ripper complaining that I was using up precious space inside his clinic.

    <table style="border-collapse: collapse" border="1">

    <tbody>

    <tr>

    <td style="width: 98.9568%">Clairvoyance +1 exp</td>

    </tr>

    </tbody>

    </table>

 Chapter 36: Our Little Game

    A few hours later, I was back at my apartment, sipping on the leftover soup Feyo had made sure I took with me. My mind was still a little cloudy from the beating I¡¯d received from Mela. But every few seconds, my eyes kept drifting back to the message that had greeted my awakening to the cruel, painful world.

    <table style="border-collapse: collapse" border="1">

    <tbody>

    <tr>

    <td style="width: 98.9568%">

    Clairvoyance 0 has levelled up!

    Upgrade to level 1 deferred.

    Would you like to accept the information packet?

    Y/N

    </td>

    </tr>

    </tbody>

    </table>

    To my utter relief, there didn¡¯t seem to be a time limit for me to hit that ¡®yes¡¯ button. It just got a little frustrating to have the pop-up hovering in the edge of my vision. Of course, that minor annoyance was nothing compared to my excitement.

    This was it. What I had worked so hard for. What I¡¯d been willing to bleed for! I was a single thought away from the reward for all my pain.

    As soon as my stomach stopped trying to eat itself from lack of anything to digest, I would hit that button, and then the game would be on.

    I started to squirm in anticipation, hurrying to get through the last of the broth so I could demolish the spring rolls and then start in on the much more important part of my day. Unfortunately, just that tiny movement made the pain flare up, and I nearly choked on my food.

    That does it. Torn is an asshole, and he doesn¡¯t deserve all the nice stuff I was thinking about him before, I groused.

    In spite of Mela¡¯s death threats, the no-good ripper had administered the absolute minimum of treatment required to get me on my feet, and called it a day. He hadn¡¯t even given me anything for the bruises.

    According to him, what Mela and I had done was ¡®utterly idiotic¡¯ and he ¡®wouldn¡¯t assist with the blatant waste of medical supplies.¡¯ Shows how much he knew. I absolutely did need that spar to push my Clairvoyance skill over the edge, and it had worked.

    Unfortunately, I couldn¡¯t exactly tell him that.

    Any discussion about my eyes was dangerous. For one thing, the info could easily spread beyond the Kittens, and then we¡¯d probably be in worse shit than we already were. For another, it might finally clue the Kittens into the fact that I had something to do with the problems raging in the slums.

    I curled in on myself a little at the thought. My chewing slowed down until I tossed a half-eaten spring roll back in the box. The lead weight in my stomach didn¡¯t leave a ton of room for anything else, apparently.

    Someone was tearing the slums apart, searching for the cybernetics I had stolen. Every day that the Kittens paid a toll in blood and disappearances added another layer of weight to my shoulders. It was getting hard to keep my mouth shut, even if I knew that nothing I could say or do would make things better.

    Still, just thinking about all of the dead¡­

    No. No, it¡¯s not my fault, I whispered desperately to myself. Jason would have done it anyway, whether I joined or not. What did I even do, past shooting him in the face? Well, and his bodyguard, I guess¡­

    Strangely enough, those deaths didn¡¯t bother me even a little. In fact, I would happily shoot Jason and his borg in their stupid faces again and again, if the opportunity ever presented itself.

    It was all the other deaths that made me want to throw up.

    There were all the gangs that had gotten swept up in the chaos, some of which were actually decent, like the Kittens. There were the people of the slums, caught between the mysterious killers and the gangs. There were all the kids trapped in the crossfire, stuck on the literal streets with nowhere to go¡­

    I shivered again.

    Nope. No. Not doing this to myself. If not me, then Jason would have taken everything, just to prove he could. He might have made an even bigger mess out of things by bragging, or selling the cybernetics, or ¡®gifting¡¯ them to people. No¡­ I didn¡¯t do anything wrong.

    The excuses were getting a little old by that point, what with having to mutter them to myself like a mantra some evenings, but they hadn¡¯t yet lost their appeal entirely. So, I faithfully repeated them as I forced the last of the food into my mouth. Then I collapsed onto my bed in relief, finally ready to claim the ¡®information packet.¡¯

    The next second, though, I got out of bed and started to strip my clothes off.

    It wasn¡¯t a guarantee or anything, but if this ¡®packet¡¯ came with even a hint of tar, then I didn¡¯t want it getting all over my clothes and bed. It was enough of a pain getting everything clean the first time. Thankfully, whatever the stuff was didn¡¯t stain. Or at least, not in a way that couldn¡¯t be fixed with some heavy duty washing.

    The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

    Anyway, before my mental fingers went anywhere near that ¡®yes¡¯ button on my interface, I was in my shower with the divider drawn. I braced my hands against either side of the mirror, stared myself in the eye, and then accepted.

    My eyes burned red in the reflection.

    Then the world tilted sideways.

    Memories, knowledge, experience, ideas, all slammed into my brain. A whole world of instinct brought to life, illuminated, and elucidated. What had been a mere jumble of confusing impulses was explained and then cemented inside my mind as something I could actually wield.

    All by the hands of some mad eldritch sculptor who went through my brain with an unholy glee, altering and adjusting and shaping, until I was slightly more capable of interpreting Clairvoyance in a way that didn¡¯t leave me a twitching, drooling mess on the floor.

    Which is obviously why, some time later, I woke up as a twitching, drooling mess on the floor.

    I groaned and tried to peel myself off the tiles, but it took me several long minutes of fumbling around to re-learn how to use my limbs.

    Everything felt¡­ unnatural. My arms and legs just wouldn¡¯t work right. It was a bit like moving around a puppet on jerky strings: you knew how the puppet should move to come across as something close to human, but every attempt to put that into practice went badly.

    I¡¯m moving like¡­ like¡­

    My face went ashen white in the blink of an eye as I froze, terror gripping me in its icy claws.

    I¡¯m moving like one of the shadows.

    That only made me struggle with more urgency, even as my limbs flailed and tried to bend in unnatural directions.

    I was getting there, though. With every second that panic burned through me with all its tangy aftertaste, I was reestablishing control of my own body. The alien quality that had settled over my mind slowly lifted, allowing my brain to remember what it was supposed to be doing.

    Eventually, I found myself staring at my mirror again.

    I immediately sighed in both exasperation and reluctant acceptance. Of course there were tracks of tar running down my cheeks from my nose, eyes, and ears. There was even a little trail that had dribbled out of my mouth. I didn¡¯t want to think about what that meant for the current state of my stomach¡¯s contents.

    The thought made me feel briefly nauseous, but I discovered that it didn¡¯t upset me as much as it should. I just felt kind of¡­ numb. Not numb enough to be totally fine, but definitely numb enough to refrain from sticking fingers down my throat to force the issue.

    I had no food on hand. I wasn¡¯t about to force myself to throw up Feyo¡¯s cooking, just to end up going hungry.

    I turned on the shower and let the water cascade over me. Trying not to think about what else my stomach might be digesting besides ramen and spring rolls, I reached for a distraction.

    <table style="border-collapse: collapse" border="1">

    <tbody>

    <tr>

    <td style="width: 98.9568%">

    Unpacking Clairvoyance 1¡­

    Installation of the information packet complete.

    Adrian Flinn

    Strength: 1

    Reflexes: 1.2

    Acuity: 7 (-3)

    Physique: 1

    Recovery: 1

    Stamina: 1.2

    Soul: 2

    Adaptability: 2 ¡ú 3

    Tolerance: 2

    Cognition: 3

    Essence: 1

    Mind Synchronicity: Waning Instability

    Shadow Runner Package:

    Clairvoyance 1 (0/100)

    Programming 0 (91/100)

    Movement 0 (92/100)

    Quickhacks 0 (56/100)

    Assault 0 (0/100)

    </td>

    </tr>

    </tbody>

    </table>

    So, Clairvoyance was back to zero out of hundred. I¡¯d wondered about that. I did assume I¡¯d be starting over from zero again, but I¡¯d been worried that the hundred would be replaced by double that number. Or maybe even something insane, like a thousand!

    Games did love their escalating numbers. Since my eyes seemed to be ripping off game design in general, it was a legitimate concern that I¡¯d eventually be unable to level up my skills.

    Speaking of skills¡­

    I took a deep breath. Then I tilted my head back, focused, and tapped into Clairvoyance.

    The world shifted in some ineffable way I still couldn¡¯t completely understand. Two layers of vision overlapped in my mind. I got to peek at exactly which drops of water would land on my face a couple seconds into the future, even as I watched them sail through the air in real time.

    It should not have been possible. The duality of the whole thing, of being stretched between both the present and the future moment, would have reduced my mind to mush not even a couple hours ago.

    Now, though unpleasant, it was something I could put up with.

    Whatever the information packet had done to me went beyond just the knowledge of how to trigger and use Clairvoyance on a whim. It was a fundamental alteration, a shift towards something that wasn¡¯t strictly human.

    I understood what the change aimed to emulate too, even if I was reluctant to admit it.

    Still, no use hiding from the truth, right? So, ever so slowly, I let my eyes drift down to land on the mirror again.

    My face briefly stared back at me. Then it glitched into the face of a grinning shadow. Even as I stared, its grin stretched a little further into uncanny territory, and I lifted my hand to touch my own lips.

    I was grinning.

    Why was I grinning?

    ¡ª

    I dragged myself out of the shower eventually. Not just because I was done, but because the abrupt cutoff of the Clairvoyance left me feeling dizzy and oddly drained.

    I¡¯d kept it up for almost two consecutive minutes, just staring into my own eerie shadow face, lost and confused.

    As I collapsed into bed, I realized I knew something: I couldn¡¯t keep Clairvoyance running permanently. I wasn¡¯t sure how I knew that. The knowledge was just there, slotting into basic facts of life like it had always been part of me.

    It was creepy, and stupid, and I hated it.

    Still, it was useful. I decided to root around in my head in search of more such helpful information about my newly upgraded ¡®skill.¡¯

    And I found nothing.

    Well, I found plenty of things. For example, I instinctively knew that Clairvoyance wasn¡¯t actually peeking into the future. Still didn¡¯t have a clue what it was. That was frustrating, let me tell you.

    I could also say, with startling certainty, that I was ¡®seeing¡¯ exactly three seconds ahead, no more and no less. And I knew for a fact that I could only use Clairvoyance for two minutes before I needed a break. But my unnatural knowledge was a little fuzzy on the ¡®why¡¯, and on what exactly constituted a ¡®break.¡¯

    Which was¡­ not ideal.

    Would I somehow melt my own brain by using Clairvoyance too much? Would I be reduced to a vegetable? How long did I have to wait before using the skill again? An hour? A minute? A whole day?

    I was frustrated to realize I might have had it good when the visions were just coming at me randomly. If I overused the skill by accident, I could be left vulnerable.

 Chapter 37: Of Mice and Men

    Two days had passed since I finally got a measure of control over my Clairvoyance skill, and they were glorious.

    Nothing ruined my mood. Not Catill¡¯s grumbling, or the tension in the air of the slums, or even the fact that Mela had tried to talk me into letting two gang members shadow me and call it ¡®patrolling.¡¯ None of it could bother me.

    Not when I was inching ever closer towards another skill level-up.

    <table style="border-collapse: collapse" border="1">

    <tbody>

    <tr>

    <td style="width: 98.9568%">

    Shadow Runner Package:

    Clairvoyance 1 (0/100)

    Programming 0 (91/100) ¡ú (99/100)

    Movement 0 (92/100) ¡ú (99/100)

    Quickhacks 0 (56/100) ¡ú (74/100)

    Assault 0 (0/100)

    </td>

    </tr>

    </tbody>

    </table>

    Programming was now something I could fly through. And even if my status page was refusing to outright acknowledge my progress with the desired level-up, that didn¡¯t erase the fact that I was making progress.

    I found it remarkably easy to wrap my head around the coding used in the RE app, especially the coding I thought actually belonged to my eyes. The other half, what could be dubbed the ¡®modern¡¯ coding used for the base RE app, was a bit more¡­ obtuse, sure. But I was still working through it at an impressive rate, especially considering that I didn¡¯t have a teacher or even a textbook to guide me.

    Besides, the coding of my eyes was clearly superior. No one could argue against that. I mean, the creator of this tech had found a way to make the eyes scan for things like the soul. Then there was the entire Shadow Runner package¡­

    So, yeah. Programming was great. In fact, I was pretty damn proud of my progress.

    And that wasn¡¯t the only skill I was swiftly advancing in.

    Movement, as it turned out, was simply the art of navigating the netspace. I was having a ton of fun with that. Now that I could turn my Clairvoyance on or off at will, I had an easy time racking up the exp points. I got one after the other when I used my eyes to spot breaks in code and slip past them.

    I even managed to gain access to one of the locked rooms on my floor! It was so odd, snooping around someone¡¯s ¡®private¡¯ netspace like that, but I couldn¡¯t hold my curiosity back. I only wish said curiosity wasn¡¯t swiftly rewarded with pure trauma when I took a peek at the scroll they had hooked up to their net access point only to find it full of porn.

    Just like Clairvoyance, though, Movement seemed to get stuck at the final exp point I needed to level up. Programming, too. This was annoying, but such was life. I was sure I¡¯d get them sooner or later. I just needed to find the right way to push myself.

    Quickhacks was the final skill I was making progress in. This one was¡­ weird. For so many reasons.

    First, I tried to gain exp by just using my available quickhacks over and over inside the netspace. That quickly proved to be useless. Well, mostly useless.

    Case in point: I shot the breach quickhack at one of the apartment doors, just to see what would happen. Nothing happened. The door just took the punishment. Emboldened by the lack of activity, and intrigued to see there were actual marks left behind on the wall from the ¡®shotgun¡¯ pellets, I kept going until the door was actually busted enough for me to see into the room.

    I got a single exp point then. And so, naturally, I repeated the same song and dance a couple of times. To my surprise and mild irritation, I stopped getting exp after going through three doors. Apparently, I couldn¡¯t just keep grinding the use of the quickhack again and again to level up.

    So, when next I used that quickhack in the privacy of my netspace room, I triggered my Clairvoyance and paid attention.

    As it turned out, quickhacks were rather more complex than I thought. First, the program, because that¡¯s what it was, had to unpack from the compiled format it was in to conserve storage. Then it had to ¡®aim¡¯ by connecting to the target you had in mind. Once that was accomplished, the program was partially uploaded to the network you were attacking, before it got executed and either managed to breach the target or not.

    I used ¡®breach¡¯ as an example, but the same four steps happened with pretty much every quickhack. The thing was that a netrunner could get a lot more involved in the process, as I was learning. That was why so many people tended to compare netrunning to ¡®cyber magic.¡¯

    I mean, what else would you call it? When you could manually help the quickhack unspool and make connections, and even better direct its assault towards weak points, using nothing but your will and your mind? It wasn¡¯t like I was editing and changing the code on the spot!

    ¡®Magic¡¯ or not, it was fun to practice. And I was seeing the payoff in cold hard numbers, too. Even if I¡¯d admittedly put much less time into the Quickhacks skill than into anything else, I was already at seventy-four points out of a hundred.

    If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

    That only left the final skill on the list: Assault.

    I had no idea what to do there. The name implied it was meant to be used offensively, but I couldn¡¯t guess a single other thing about it. No matter what I tried, I didn¡¯t seem to get any closer to a solution.

    I broke out the shards I¡¯d bought to kick off my netrunning adventures, the ones meant for some probably long dead runner¡¯s apprentice. Scanning through their content for keywords and such failed to bring up anything even remotely relevant. So far as I could tell, aside from a few quickhacks I could take apart later and study (and save on my deck for future use, of course), there was nothing in those lessons I¡¯d find irreplaceable.

    Overall, though? Even with the failure of my research into Assault, I was content.

    So, naturally, the world decided to kick my teeth in.

    It all started so innocently. I was on my bed, bundled up under a couple blankets just for that extra comfort boost. I had code scrolling across my vision as I fought to improve it using both my studies and my Clairvoyance.

    That was when an incoming call demanded my attention.

    As lazy as I was feeling, when I saw it was just Mela, I took my time to stretch and yawn before hitting ¡®answer.¡¯

    ¡°Hello hello, how can I help you today?¡± I tried for my best customer service impression, hoping to make Mela crack a stupid joke in turn.

    Except her voice came through as a rough, demanding bark. ¡°What took ya so long?! Where are ya?¡±

    ¡°I, uh, I¡¯m at home. I almost always am at this hour. What¡¯s wrong?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t move a muscle or I swear I¡¯ll beatcha to an inch of yer life. I¡¯ll have some guys pick ya up. Bring whatever ye think¡¯s important to keep on ya, and make sure ye don¡¯t regret the selection.¡±

    ¡°Wait, what? Mela, I need more than that,¡± I argued, but I was moving already. I was mostly dressed, even if I was lounging in bed. It was just a matter of quickly throwing on some pants before stumbling around the room and throwing stuff in my backpack.

    It was almost funny, how quickly I¡¯d filled the place with knickknacks. What was once a bare, functional space now had all these little touches of comfort and convenience, or just plain fun. Like those animated cupholders, courtesy of Mela, that played cutesy loops of video. Or that new kettle I bought with my limited disposable income when I actually tried tea for the first time.

    Speaking of tea¡­

    I picked up a shiny new tin of the stuff and shoved it into my backpack, hiding it at the bottom. It wasn¡¯t ¡®top tier¡¯ by any means, but you could actually get halfway decent stock in the outer districts if you knew where to look. Passing it out to the few enthusiasts within the Kittens, including Feyo, felt almost like I was dealing hard drugs.

    ¡°C¡¯mon, Mela,¡± I urged as I packed. ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s trouble, ya idiot. What else? Things are getting worse. Much worse. Just¡­ try to get here quickly, and don¡¯t attract attention!¡±

    ¡°How much worse? Also, who are you sending? Mela? Mela!¡± I screamed in frustration when she just cut off the connection, leaving me to stew in my fear and concern.

    Ironically, most of it was focused on Mela¡¯s wellbeing and not my own.

    Mela was overprotective from the start, but when Garren caught wind of what I was trying to teach myself, his own determination to keep me safe all but outshone Mela¡¯s. I didn¡¯t have any patrol duties. I wasn¡¯t expected to ¡®do my part for the gang¡¯, at least not yet. All I had to do was occasionally show off a bit of what I¡¯d learned.

    And the last time I¡¯d demonstrated some of my progress to the man, before the whole drama with the renewed trouble started, he was ecstatic. His eyes were literally shining with the light of hope. The mutters of Mort¡¯s name that I caught once or twice clearly suggested what Garren was looking forward to.

    Basically, I didn¡¯t need to worry about my own safety. I was unlikely to be put in a dangerous situation if they could avoid it.

    Mela, on the other hand? Every bit of me was convinced that the reckless woman would jump headfirst into shit if it meant keeping ¡®her¡¯ people safe.

    And if shit was happening right now, and she jumped before I could get there and try to stop her¡­

    All I could do was grumble, curse, and fret as I paced my apartment, backpack in place. My deck was clutched in my hand. I wasn¡¯t about to leave it behind and risk losing it to some stupidity if my apartment ended up trashed again.

    Then a loud banging on my door almost made me jump out of my skin.

    ¡°Who is it?¡± I shouted, then cursed myself for doing it. I was expecting the people Mela had sent over, but that didn¡¯t mean whoever was going around killing Kittens might not be lurking on the other side of the metal barrier.

    ¡°Whodja think it could be you little shitter?¡± a voice groused on the other side.

    I had to blink a few times before cracking a grin. ¡°That you, Lurch?¡±

    ¡°Fuck yes it¡¯s me. Me and Mike. Now come on, get your ass out here and let¡¯s book it to the HQ. I¡¯m not gonna stay out here for longer than I have ta, and you¡¯re dragging things out!¡±

    He sounded more high-strung than usual, but then again, this was Lurch. He and Mike were the very first Kittens I¡¯d met back then, when Mela saved me from that druggie. Mike had been the one who seemed most concerned for my welfare, while Lurch had spent most of the encounter leaning against the wall and griping.

    It had been a shock to get to know them a little better.

    Not because they were unpleasant or anything, but because their underlying personalities were almost a complete switch from my first impressions.

    Sure, Mike was nice. Kind, even. He did try to do right by everyone. But he would also fuck your shit up during a fight. There was a very good reason so many people stuck ¡®mighty¡¯ in front of his name. He¡¯d earned that title from viciousness rather than physical might, so¡­ yeah. He wasn¡¯t someone many people wanted to cross, fellow Kittens included.

    Lurch, meanwhile, was all about that imposing ganger life. At least until the first shooter went off in his vicinity. Then it was all dodging behind dumpsters or whatever the nearest large obstacle was, followed by lots and lots of panicked return-fire and cursing.

    ¡°Mela really busted out the cavalry for this, eh?¡± I teased as I ordered the door open, only for my smile to wither instantly. ¡°What the fuck happened?¡±

    ¡°Nothing much,¡± Mike said calmly, like the large splatter of blood on the left side of his face really wasn¡¯t a big deal. ¡°Just a little bit of trouble.¡±

    I quickly scanned him over. While he had a few other splotches of blood on his clothes, he didn¡¯t seem to be hurt. I could only assume that not all of the red decorations he was wearing had come from his own body. A look at Lurch revealed that he was unharmed, too. Disheveled and pale, yes, but not hurt.

    ¡°What are the chances someone is going to shoot at us while we run for our lives to the HQ?¡± I asked, oh so very casually.

    Mike shrugged. ¡°Pretty high, actually.¡±

    Lurch gave a choked laugh that was probably supposed to sound tough, but just came out as ¡®unhinged.¡¯

    I squeezed my eyes shut. I had only wanted to learn and be left alone. No drama, no eldritch bullshit. For just. One. Week.

    Unfortunately, no one ever consulted me on shit.

    I opened my eyes and pasted on a smile. ¡°Oh, goodie! Lucky us. Let¡¯s go then, shall we?¡±

 Chapter 38: Mad World

    I expected something to go wrong the second we stepped foot outside my apartment building. I mean, Lurch and Mike both looked like they¡¯d been through rough shit just to get to me.

    What I didn¡¯t expect was to run into two unhinged-looking individuals two floors down inside of my own fucking building. Their faces were caught in a rictus of agony and glee as they stood there with some kind of pipes in hand, clothes spattered in blood, and a pulped body between them.

    I stared. They stared. The dead body on the ground stared into nothing with its one remaining eye.

    Then the druggies screamed and started staggering in our direction.

    I fumbled for my gun, cursing the fact that I hadn¡¯t drawn it already. Shots rang out before I could do so much as get it into my hands, though, and the druggies dropped.

    My eyes snapped over to Lurch and Mike. Both were wearing matching expressions of focus and disdain. They had landed perfect headshots, but that didn¡¯t stop them from kicking the druggies over and unloading another shot each into their skulls, just to be safe.

    I must have made a face, because Mike actually chuckled at me. ¡°Gotta make sure, kid. These fuckers sometimes don¡¯t go down even when they should. I swear, they do shit to their bodies that should put them in the ground, and they somehow end up extra resilient, as well as insane. They¡¯re a fucking danger if you let them close.¡±

    ¡°Saw a guy down a druggie once by unloading an entire magazine into his head and chest, and the fucker still managed to drag himself over and gnaw on our guy¡¯s ankle before expiring.¡± Lurch shuddered as our feet pounded down the stairs, clearly lost in the unpleasant memory. ¡°Never gonna be able to forget that.¡±

    ¡°Hey, I wasn¡¯t judging you or anything,¡± I grumbled. ¡°I just thought it was a waste of bullets, so ¡ª¡±

    ¡°Well, you know better now, dontcha?¡±

    I did. I really did. The slums were an educational gift that kept on giving.

    I really wished I could kick its face in one of these days.

    Unfortunately, before I could do that, I¡¯d need to live through the current day I was stuck in. And as we emerged onto the street, that looked like a rather daunting proposal, indeed.

    The slums were in chaos. Proper, widespread chaos.

    Fuck, but things looked even worse than they did back when I¡¯d had to drag Mela through the city with Zerx patrolling all around us. Of course, the streets had been relatively empty back then. Most people had fled, hid, and waited until the storm passed.

    Today looked more like every building in the slums had been emptied, and their inhabitants were now running past us in all directions and screaming for their lives. Through the mess, I caught sight of people from various gangs all laughing, cheering, and visiting unbelievable amounts of violence on anyone within reach.

    Is that building on fire*? Yes, yes it is, oh wow*¡­

    My disbelief had briefly frozen me in place, a problem that was easily solved by Lurch when he gripped the front of my shirt and pulled me along as he and Mike broke into a run.

    The next second, my vision briefly glitched into Clairvoyance. I had to jerk Lurch to a stop so that a man clutching what was left of a bloody nose stump could collapse in front of us without taking either of us down with him.

    Lurch plunged ahead immediately afterwards, and I screamed to be heard over the noise. ¡°What the fuck is happening here?!¡±

    ¡°Fucking chaos. Pure chaos,¡± the Kitten snarled, eyes wildly sweeping over the crowds.

    Those crowds weren¡¯t quite as bad as the first impression I got. We weren¡¯t being jostled around just trying to make our way through. Still, the sheer¡­ well, yes, chaos made it hard to focus on any one thing.

    It felt like my mind was getting dragged all over the place. My eyes refused to settle as one tragedy after another begged me to witness it, to sear it into my head.

    Somehow, it was worse than the gang war. There, at least everyone was relatively capable, armed, and willing to participate. Maybe not thrilled about it, but willing. There wasn¡¯t a single Kitten who was about to let Zerx muscle them out of their turf, after all.

    Here? These were just regular people of the slums getting dragged to the ground, brutalized, trampled underfoot, or filled with bullets. It was so¡­ senseless.

    Shocking.

    I honestly didn¡¯t even feel like myself. Only the brief bursts of Clairvoyance dragged me into awareness and stopped me from hurtling blindly into danger.

    Numb. I felt numb. Even when my vision suddenly jumped into the future, and I was treated to the sight of a ganger gleefully shooting our way, I didn¡¯t feel anything. I just lifted my gun and fired. All the training Mela had forced me to go through was paying off, because he went down with a shocked expression etched onto his face.

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    Not my first kill, obviously. But in that moment, I felt the oddest curl of satisfaction warm my chest.

    The fucker had just finished gunning down a cowering, stick-thin teenager. He deserved to die for that.

    ¡°Someone took out almost all the gang leaders in the city. People started finding them this morning,¡± Lurch informed me, shouting as we ran. ¡°They found their bodies on top of piles and piles of drugs. Just¡­ every kind of drug.¡±

    What? That couldn¡¯t be right. Who just does something like that and then leaves a ¡®present¡¯ for people to¡­

    Oh. It worked.

    Maybe it was my improved mind stats, maybe it was just common sense, but I could pretty much perfectly picture what had gone down.

    Gangers go in, find their bosses dead, and a ton of valuable drugs are just lying there. Begging to be used, for either profit or pleasure. And this was the slums we were talking about here. Who the fuck ever bothered thinking long-term? Definitely not your run-of-the-mill gangers. Any people with that kind of foresight were leading the gangs, not filling out their ranks.

    Even if someone had protested and tried to do something about it, they¡¯d be silenced quickly, and then¡­ Well, then we had what we got: a drug- and rage-fueled siesta threatening to burn down the entire slums.

    That didn¡¯t explain the why of it all, but it did at least explain the how of the chaos ruling the streets.

    Naturally, I didn¡¯t have forever to stew in those dark thoughts.

    ¡°Oi! Look there!¡± Some idiot caught sight of us and started screaming, gesturing to his buddies. ¡°Ain¡¯t those the Kittens? Fucking hate those feckers. Oi! Why dontcha slow down, eh? Come on! COME ON!¡±

    His eyes were wild. He clearly had more drugs running through his system than was ever recommended. I seriously doubted he¡¯d live to see the next morning, but he was apparently content to have his final act in life be provoking everyone into going after us.

    Thankfully for us, they didn¡¯t have guns. The guy I¡¯d shot earlier was an exception, rather than the rule of the current unruly mobs.

    What they did have was all sorts of deadly handheld implements and a drug-rage to make them fast and unrelenting.

    ¡°Fuck! We can¡¯t outrun them!¡± Mike screamed, though I didn¡¯t need him to tell me that.

    We¡¯d booked it even faster than before for two blocks now, and while my upped stats were pulling their weight, I was already flagging. The other two weren¡¯t, but a quick glance back told me the druggies were still gaining on us.

    ¡°Into the alley! Now! Use the trash and the containers to funnel them! We can¡¯t fucking deal with them all at once!¡±

    We followed Mike¡¯s plan and more or less threw ourselves into the alley he¡¯d pointed out. Thanks to the amazing planning of the slums, it was blocked off on three sides by buildings, as ¡®dead end¡¯ as anything I¡¯d ever seen.

    That had made it the preferred spot for chucking waste, something I did my best to ignore even as I waded through the overflowing trash bags and ancient bins. My left leg squished through a bag. I felt something wet and syrupy drip down my leg and into my shoes, making the material of my pants stick to me in a very uncomfortable manner.

    Better than dead, though.

    I pressed my back to the wall as Mike and Lurch pulled on the containers in a hurry, arranging them to take up most of the space of the cramped alley and admitting maybe two people at once in a squeeze. They even managed to throw some trash bags behind the bins to stop the druggies from just pushing them aside, but didn¡¯t get very far before they were on us.

    My visions twisted and turned as I caught flashes of potential attacks coming at my two allies. I pushed my Clairvoyance actively too, anchoring and keeping it in place to make sure I didn¡¯t miss anything.

    A screaming man took my bullet to the face. Mike bent down quickly under the cover of fire that we gave him, picked up the pipe the ganger had dropped, and started swinging. Lurch reluctantly followed when another dropped a weapon close enough for him to grab, even though his face screamed terror at the world.

    I, meanwhile, focused harder than I ever had in my life, save perhaps during the Zerx gang war itself. My fingers and hands were twitching, eyes constantly scanning over my allies, ready to shoot whenever they were about to be in deep shit.

    I had to shoot six times before the last druggie was down.

    I couldn¡¯t put into words how thankful I was that I never hit Mike or Lurch by mistake.

    The only reason I even managed that was Clairvoyance. It didn¡¯t let me aim better, but it did let me gauge the future. Nine times, I ¡®saw¡¯ the moment my bullets bit into Lurch or Mike¡¯s back. I saw the betrayal and shock plain on their features as they went down, twisting to look at me.

    The second I knew we were out of immediate danger, shakes began to wreck my body. I couldn¡¯t get their dying expressions out of my head. I knew it hadn¡¯t really happened. In fact, I knew I was the reason they were relatively okay. I had kept them from being hurt way worse.

    ¡°Hey, kid, hey, it¡¯s fine, you¡¯re fine.¡± Mike spoke hurriedly, moving over to grip my shoulder. ¡°I know it¡¯s rough the first time you¡¯re really in the thick of it. Not like shooting from the HQ at all, eh? Don¡¯t worry though, you did great. Fucking amazing shooting back there.¡±

    I couldn¡¯t look him in the eye. My shooting wasn¡¯t amazing. My ability to stop just before I squeezed the trigger and angle my gun better? Maybe. That didn¡¯t erase the sight of his empty, accusing eyes from my brain. I needed it scrubbed clean.

    ¡°Y-Yeah, yeah, I-I¡¯m fine, great even. Let¡¯s go. Mela¡¯s gonna murder us if we¡¯re late,¡± I babbled, just to get him to stop looking at me. Thankfully, he took the hint. He nodded sharply, then turned and motioned to Lurch to get going.

    I managed to keep my feet under me and my steps steady, even if that did nothing for my shaking arms. Distraction. I needed a distraction. How long had I kept my Clairvoyance up? My eyes were aching, but it couldn¡¯t have been a full two minutes. In spite of nearly twenty people dying with dizzying speed at our hands, not even two full minutes had passed.

    I let out a quiet giggle at that, then winced when my vision briefly glitched into the future. I raised my gun and shot. A woman with a cleaver of all things screamed and went down to her knees, clutching her side.

    I couldn¡¯t help but focus on that cleaver. A ridiculous thing to own in the slums. The fuck was she gonna do with it? Not a lot of ingredients to go around, not for your typical resident. The only thing you could butcher would be¡­

    My eyes scanned over all the dead, dying, and fleeing people. Oh. Another reminder of how awesome my home was!

    I giggled again.

    ¡°Come on, kid, just a little further,¡± Lurch¡¯s gruff voice encouraged me, and I shot him my best smile. He flinched at the sight of it and looked away. Rude!

    He was right, though. We were close. We were so, so close.

    I could even see the HQ! There it was, in all its glory, beckoning us with the safety it would provide. With my eyes, I could see the entrance way more clearly than the other two. I couldn¡¯t wait to be greeted by the guards, who would certainly be out in full force in the lobby. They¡¯d rush out to help usher us in, and ¡ª

    My eyes focused, and I froze.

    The front doors were cracked open, stuck like that by an arm jutting out of the building.

    An arm that was slowly contributing to a growing puddle of red.