“Actual relationships between Samurai are rare, although not unheard of. Most don’t have the time to bother between saving humanity from the apocalypse. Most stories are actually found between rookie Samurai. Those typically last less than a week, considering the flux they are experiencing. Makes for awesome fanfics though.”

- Anonymous Redditor

Luckily it didn’t take long before we found ourselves a ride. One of the higher ranking soldiers offered one of their smaller hovertransports for the job, since they wouldn’t be leaving anytime soon anyways. We thanked him and took off.

Not long after we had taken off I received a call from Castas. That didn’t bode well, but at least it meant he wasn’t dead yet.

“Hey Castas,” I greeted him with a nod.

“Hey Princess. Thought I’d let you know that xeno activity around the area has picked up. We see more and more of those fucking aliens, some shelters on the edges of the district report even bigger groups. Worst part none of them are fucking off city side anymore, which has me worried.”

I nodded in reply, “Yeah, figured. We just found some lures that were the reason they all tried to get into the inner city, already on the way back. How are you holding up?”

“So far so good. That Samurai I told you about has shown up again. He’s pretty beat, seemed like he spent quite some time in the field out there. Can patch him through if you want.”

“Don’t bother, we’ll be there shortly, can talk face to face then. Hopefully we can make some points though, Snuffles is nice but she can’t do everything alone.” I sighed, rubbing my eyes.

“Snuffles that huge fuckoff alien dog thing that I saw in the feeds not long ago? Gotta say, quite the design clash, isn’t it?” He sounded amused.

“I mean, yeah. But she is still growing so maybe once that is done I can figure that one out. Anyways, I’ll see you shortly, bye bye~” And with that I hung up.

Sitting back I yawned again. By this point it was already dark out, and when I checked the clock I saw that it’s been roughly six hours since my appointment with Chloe was supposed to happen, even if it felt like days had passed then.

“Yeah, me too,” Chloe said when I yawned, barely stifling her own, “Hopefully we can get some rest soon. I’m beat…”

“Yeah… Strange though, it feels a lot longer than six hours. Is that just me?” The scenery was flying by quick, and I checked the damage. In the darkness it was a bit harder to see, even with my newly improved eyes, but it seemed… extensive. Not a lot of big damage, but lots and lots of smaller things.

“Nah, that’s normal. When you’re a Samurai you can spend days fighting xenos only to realise the day isn’t even over yet. Just hope that we can get the shelter evac’d soon, otherwise we need to think about night watches.”

Jenna snorted from the back seat, “I doubt anyone will come. This is lawless space.”

I nodded, “Yeah, part of the reason gangs are left alone is because the cops don’t care and the megacorps in the city proper are just fine with leaving the filth outside their pristine borders. If anyone comes at all, I doubt it will be to evac the civies.”

We spent the rest of the flight in silence, and a couple of minutes later we arrived at the shelter. There were some dead xenos out when Chloe landed us not far from the entrance, and the guards were no longer outside. That did make sense though, I doubted anyone else would get here at this point, and even if someone did, Jenna’s bot was still standing outside to let them in or at least let us know.

Getting out of the car we walked over to the shelter entrance. Not wanting to spook the people inside I dialled up Castas once more, while Chloe chucked some fleshmelters at the alien corpses. No sense in leaving them out in the open.

“Hey,” I said once he picked up, “We’re outside, care to let us in?”

“One moment,” he replied, then disconnected again.

And a moment it was indeed, we had barely closed the call when the door started to rumble before it slowly opened. We didn’t waste any time and entered, the door quickly being closed behind us once more.

The inside was much like we had left it, utterly filled with people, all in their own little groups. Most of them seemed to be just sitting out their time, eyes glazed with drugs or with augs, not that the net here seemed to be too great. Some people kept walking around, talking. From the looks of it mostly Castas boys and Tina’s joytoys.

One of the corners had been turned into a makeshift play area for the kid Jenna had saved and some others, a group of joytoys busy keeping them occupied. The kid seemed to do alright, crawling from one person to the next, chasing the tiny little holographic images they were playing for him. It was a nice sight, no bullshit, no fear, just a kid having fun. I hoped that things could stay this way.

Castas was already waiting for us, Tina close next to him. She seemed a bit too close to just do business, although considering my muddled and tired state of mind it might have just been my imagination. He waved us over and led us to one of the corners, the one that Sharon had used earlier to indulge her addiction. The woman in question was sleeping not far from us on some makeshift bedding. She looked dishevelled and dirty, various fluids caked all over her, but otherwise she seemed to be doing fine.

“Finally ran out of gas, huh?” I asked with a snort.

“Not long before you lot arrived. She was at it nearly the entire time… Would love to know where she gets all that energy from. Anyways, you wanted to talk to the Samurai, this here is Patrick,” he said, then motioned to a man who sat nearby. He was most certainly a Samurai, considering all the high tech shit he had on his person, and I doubted anyone not a Samurai would have the balls to put so much effort into insulting every single common fashion sense ever conceived.

Patrick looked up when we got closer, his eyes tired and underlined by deep bags.

“Well, you look like shit,” I said, then stepped closer and sat down next to him, “Long day?”

“Fuck you too,” he muttered, but nodded, “Been doing nothing but run around, tryna help. Wasn’t much going on here, not sure why. Didn’t mean was easy though, there are some xenos at the edges of the district.”

I shrugged, “Some idiot installed some lures underneath the southern gate to the city proper, lured any and all xenos under the sun. We dealt with it now, so things will pick up again, but at least the city is no longer in danger of a breach.”

“Who the fuck would do something that stupid?” he asked, rubbing his face in disbelief.

“That’s the million credit question,” Chloe said in reply, sitting down next to me while Jenna took a seat opposite of us, “We’re looking into it, but right now our priority is to make sure this place is safe.”

He nodded and we all sat in silence for a moment, before he rubbed his face again and looked us over. “Don’t recognise you.”

I shrugged, “Jenna and I are new. People call me the Crimson Princess, although the other two haven’t gotten names yet. You?”

“Been a Samurai for a couple weeks now, already seen two incursions before this one. I tend to stick to the outskirts, cleaning duty. I’m not the biggest fighter but I am good at getting places. Family has me working the easier jobs that nobody else wants to do, I don’t think I’ve gotten enough clout for a proper name yet.”

That did explain some of his gear, although his comment raised another question.

“Family? Who’re they?”

“Group of Samurai. They direct the Samurai in North America, trying to keep the aliens in check. Normally they do a pretty good job at keeping things running, for a corp anyway. They don’t really care too much for profit and are much more focused on helping Samurai get to the place they’re needed and get the help they need. More focused on helping people, y’know?”

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

That had me frowning. I wasn’t a big fan of corporations at the best of days and this sounded a lot like bullshit to me. “A Samurai Corp? I hope they don’t expect me to join, cause I can’t stand corps at all, so that ain’t happening.”

“You can do what you want, joining isn’t required, technically you don’t even need to pick up their calls. I would advise it though, even if you don’t join them, they can help you quite a bit. Once we got some time, anyway.”

“Maybe… I’ll think about it, but I won’t promise anything.”

“Fair’s fair,” he muttered, then leaned back.

I looked over both Chloe and Jenna. The latter seemed to be having a hard time staying awake, not that I blamed her. But I also wanted to make sure nothing big was lurking nearby before I found a place to get some shuteye. “I think for the moment the both of you can go to sleep. I want to check the area before I head to bed, Chloe, care to tag along?”

She nodded, then got up, “Sure. Let’s do a quick round then figure out night shifts. If nobody is coming we need to be prepared for a long night.”

“I told the Family and they are sending some people soon-ish, whenever they have someone to send. Thanks though, I appreciate it. Wake me up if you need me, okay?” Patrick said with another yawn.

Jenna seemed to have already fallen asleep, so Chloe and I just nodded and got up. We walked to the exit side by side and left for the fourth time today. I really didn’t want to spend much time going around, but I also knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep right unless I made personally sure that nothing was going on. Snuffles would be here later, but until then I wanted to make sure nothing else was trying to break into the shelter.

“Let’s check around the block, see if we can’t find some xenos hiding somewhere,” I said, motioning to where I wanted to go. As usual I stuck close to Chloe, and as usual she half hugged me from the side. It made it easier to keep awake, since having her near me made my heart beat just that bit faster.

“Yeah,” Chloe said with a smile, “Though I don’t think we need to worry about a hive being close by, otherwise there would be many more xenos around.”

That is most likely correct, although that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be careful. Even if there isn’t a hive nearby at the moment, that doesn’t mean one couldn’t form. I advise you to be careful, you are quite exhausted.

“Yeah, let’s hurry up,” I said with another long yawn, “Gods, I’m beat… Hopefully we can take the day off tomorrow.”

“Unlikely,” Chloe said, mercilessly crushing my dreams, “We probably need to go around and see if there aren’t some hives further out. Those things can form fast.”

I muttered complaints, but I did agree with her.

We walked in silence for a while, trying to keep our guard up but with all the exhaustion that wasn’t easy. Eventually Chloe spoke up.

“So… Any chance I can get my booking rescheduled, or do I need to ask for my money back?” She tried to sound casual, but considering I could hear her heartbeat, and it was going fast I knew she was anything but casual.

I smiled, “Well, I can probably swing a rescheduling, probably even throw in some bonuses, as a professional courtesy for the delay caused.”

That comment had her inhaling a bit more sharply than before. “Even with your newfound popularity?” she asked, a bit more quietly now. “Don’t think I missed the news, O Princess.”

Giving her a glance my smile widened, “I do make my own schedule now. And I have it on good authority that a certain Samurai missed her appointment because of, how do corporations put it, certain acts of god events? It would be highly unprofessional of me to force her to go back to the end of line, don’t you think?”

I didn’t think it was possible, but Chloe’s heartbeat got even faster at that. I still wasn’t quite sure about it all. I liked her, quite a lot actually, if I was honest with myself. Then again, we’ve known each other for what, six hours so far? I also wasn’t quite sure how she felt… I sighed, this really wasn’t the time to think on this. I was tired, exhausted, utterly beat. Although… From how close Chloe was hugging me… maybe she didn’t mind the idea too much? Or maybe she was just excited about spending a night with me… Ugh, what did I just say, hm? Stupid thoughts! Focus, Seraphine, focus! You have a fucking job to do!

We continued in silence for a while, before I spoke again. “So… How’d you end up a Samurai?”

From her warm smile and the glance she gave me I figured she knew that I wanted to change the topic. “Well… I’m from one of those old outskirts outside the outer wall. They’re small places, self-sufficient most of the time, with the backing of the city. Nice place, although not rich, but also mostly not quite as poor as you guys. Seen them?”

“Well, I know of them. Never seen them in person before, at best some pictures from my feeds. Haven’t been outside the city ever since I arrived here.”

“Oh?” she asked, curiosity radiating off of her, “That’s a story I’m curious about. Anyways, so I’m from one of those small places, we had some incursion hit on the outskirts. Neighbourhoods like that mostly police themselves and we did our best to get the people to safety. Shit went on and I was left behind with some two or so families, had to get them to safety. I did what I could, fighting tooth and nail. I got them out but I was pretty seriously injured. Kind of accepted I would die there, until Atlas just popped into my head and started telling me about the wonders of Protector grade medical shit.”

“Aren’t there normally people keeping an eye out for that kind of shit?”

“Yeah, normally. Once I beat back the tide for a day or so some other Samurai finally came in, the guy I told you about earlier, Gloomstalker. Helped me finish off the hive nearby and then told me what went down. So apparently one of the people from another neighbourhood had been in charge of notifying the people responsible. But he didn’t tell anyone because his neighbourhood had a feud with mine.”

I frowned, “Fucking assholes, seriously… I probably would have killed the guy.”

She snorted, “Well… He is alive, still. But suffice to say he is no longer on speaking terms with anyone from the outskirts. Last I heard he was playing with frying pans in some old, rundown, lower level fast food joint near the outer edge of the inner city.”

In my experience you had to really teach fucks like that a lesson if you wanted to prevent them from being stupid again in the future, and most folks around the outer city wouldn’t have given him even that chance. That shit was liable to get you shot right then and there consequences be damned. Being gang was one thing, but when aliens came knocking you at least didn’t leave the others to die. That was the kind of shit we had to deal with together, anyone who thought differently was a cancer that had to be stamped out immediately.

But, it wasn’t my call to make, and if Chloe was fine letting him rot in some cheap fast food joint then I wouldn’t argue.

“You are much more merciful than the people around here would have been.”

“Probably, yeah. Makes me curious though, how’d you end up here?”

I sighed, “Well… That is a tale I usually don’t like to talk about. Most folk around here wouldn’t like it and it has… a lot of bad memories attached to it.”

“You don’t have to tell me, I wouldn’t want to pressure you,” Chloe said with a gentle smile.

“I know, I know… It’s… Ugh… Okay, I’ll tell you a little bit. So, I wasn’t actually born in the redlight district. My ma and da were from one of those smaller cities out in the countryside, you know the kind. Have some thousand odd members, all working some low end job while some ten odd rich people are in charge and living like kings. My parents were part of that elite, some rich folk who had their life laid out for them. They wanted me to take over the family business and tried their best to groom me for it. Well, I wasn’t interested and much rather wanted to become an actress. So my da gave me an ultimatum, either I do as he says or I’ll be disowned, dropped in some shithole and never allowed back. I told him to suck it, since I didn’t think he’d actually go through with it, all the way until he did. That’s how I ended up in the outer city at some street corner all alone with nothing but personal documents. He even went as far as changing my legal name and everything to make sure I could never come back to them even if I tried.”

I heaved a heavy sigh, “Things… kinda went from there. Rest isn’t exactly pleasant and not something I really want to get into right now… I’m too emotional at the moment, plus this is the first time in like ten years I’ve been properly sober and I don’t know how well I could handle all that baggage.”

She looked down at me, worry in her expression, “Ten years? How old are you, exactly?”

I snorted, “Will be twenty next month. You can draw your own conclusions.”

That had her straighten up, and the worry exploded tenfold. She looked like she wanted to say something, but she bit her tongue. Instead she stopped and pulled me into a tight hug. I… was kind of glad about that. I haven’t told many people about my past and I wasn’t quite ready to tell her the full tale, so I was glad that she was so accepting of that.

“Thanks…” I muttered into her chest, taking deep breaths of her scent.

“You’re welcome. Once we get some time to relax we can talk further, if you want.”

I nodded, “Over a good drink, I suspect…”

We remained like that for a while, before we separated and continued our patrol in silence. It was a calm night, nothing much was going on. I could hear fighting in the distance but at least around the shelter things remained calm. The main problem was that I could hear the things in the distance slowly come closer. We definitely had to keep our guard up and think about watch rotations.

When we returned to the shelter I was surprised to find Patrick awake. He still looked like shit and looked up at us when we walked over. Most of the other people were either asleep already or busy talking in low tones. Or just sitting there in silence nursing whatever shit they preferred.

“Hey,” I said in a low tone when Patrick nodded at us, “Can’t sleep?”

He shrugged, “Janus woke me up. I placed some sensors and drones around the area to keep an eye on things. Well, some of them were tripped.”

“Janus?” I asked. I suspected he meant his AI, but I wanted to be sure.

“My AI,” he confirmed, “Told me about the things going on. I think I’ll keep watch for a while before I try to get some sleep.”

Chloe and I nodded in agreement. That seemed like a good idea.

“I’ll take watch after you. I can work with very little sleep and I think both Jenna and Seraphine could use some sleep,” Chloe volunteered with a warm smile directed my way.

I reciprocated the smile and hugged her from the side. “Thanks. Make sure to wake me if you need to though. Sleep is all fine and good, but I much rather not wake up to anything bad going down.”

We didn’t talk much more, Patrick went ahead and set up with his gear, while Chloe and I went to a small sideroom that he had pointed out to us. It was used as a sleeping area and we found some others already snoozing. Silently we settled down and I didn’t even have the chance to wish Chloe good night, before I fell asleep.