They walk to the back kitchen, the stone guy's feet clacking on the tile, through the smell of stainless steel and fried onions, past a half prepared meal, and into a quiet alley around the side of the building; only a faint jab of rotting garbage in the lukewarm shade. Rachel notes how the statue walks with the balls of his bare feet hitting the ground first, not his heels. She fixes her bun and replaces her hat while the stone man throws on a black hoodie and flips the hood. He looks ridiculous wearing that in the heat of broad daylight, but it was better than nothing.

  A crowd is buzzing about in the street in front of Mickey's, visible through the side entrance to the alley. The two start in the opposite direction.

  "First those mechs, then these bounty hunters, and now the town is quieter than usual. I think this is a roundup." Touchstone says as they march their way through the sporadically populated streets.

  "I noticed, too. People have seemed off ever since I got into town." She replies.

  "Yeah, these people make a home for people like us; now it's about to bite them in the ass. But why? What's changed? They had to have known we were here for a while, but even so, bounty hunters and authorities don't come around here because they get run out of town pretty quick, so they usually wait until we leave, and grab us outside town."

  "Something's coming. Something big." She states.

  "So everyone's coming in all at once, to pick what they can in a free-for-all before it's too late." He finishes. "Lucky us, getting tipped off in advanced."

  They duck into a network of alleys, a couple blocks from Mickey's, the main street now to their backs. The buildings here were larger, shorter, more industrial. Tar and iron taint the air of the broad alleyways.

  "Yeah, lucky." She deadpans.

  "I wonder if that's what the mechs were for. They must have been looking for someone. It wasn't a simple test drive."

  "What's your name, by the way?"

  "Friends call me Touchstone. You?"

  "Rachel."

  "Pleasure to meet a new partner in crime." He vaults over the rail of a concrete ramp that leads to a scoured, rust speckled metal door embedded in a brick wall. His hands scrape the paint off the rail, and his feet thunk onto the ramp. She follows, swinging her feet over the rail as the stone man raps against the steel door.

  A long pause.

  "Who is it?" The door asks.

  "I've come to cash in my employ's discount." Touchstone retorts.

  "I was expecting you earlier. Thought you got bagged."

  "I was in the middle of a good book."

  "Ha!" The door swings in, blasting them with cool air. A tan portly man with a cane ushers them in from the shade and locks the door behind them.

  "Our newest corporate overlords have finally decided to grace us with their presence." He enthusiastically limps past and leads them through a large storage room filled with sawdust scented crates of assorted electronic parts, into a cool, dark, cavernous single-story warehouse. Lit only by upper windows and a skylight. Metal shelves all around piled with random electronic devices, cables, tools, and parts filling shelf space. It reminds Rachel of a library, smelling of plastic and rubber rather than paper. Touchstone's feet scrape and echo against the polished concrete floor. She's surprised it's not leaving marks.

  "The net's been reporting on their every move. I got their numbers, their gear, who's in charge, a few of their Mutes. Now that AriCorp has had time to re-consolidate and build their strength, some idiot's decided to make a big show of bringing 'law and order' to a bunch of these towns." The portly man's voice bounces off the floor and walls as they walk.

  "Yeah, tipping off all the people they're trying to catch. And if they can't find fugitives-"

  "They'll make them." Rachel finishes.

  "Right you are. Gotta make their quotas somehow. And what can I do for you, miss..."

  "Rachel." She says, smiling.

  "Ortega." He replies, shaking her hand.

  "My tablet's broke. It needs a new screen."

  "Let me take a look. "

  She pulls out her tablet and hands it to him.

  "A drawing tablet? I'm sure I don't have the screen for this. But these are quite valuable. Do you wanna trade for it? It'll take time to get the parts, especially with these bozos bumbling around the countryside."

  "No, I need a drawing tablet."

  "Ok, I'll ask around." He turns to Touchstone. "And I'll send you the report once I finish it. With everything else I got going on... It'll probably be ready tomorrow evening."

  "Ok, that works. When will this merry band of mercenaries get here?"

  "You tell me. They definitely have scouts and collaborators everywhere already. So it would depend on how they split their forces, how many towns they stop by, how much attention people draw to themselves, etcetera. That's your specialty. I'm just the tech guy." He lists off as he examines the tablet, typing out information on his phone.

  "Nice to see you’ve been paying attention. Get me that report and we'll stay in touch."

  “Your networking ain’t so bad anymore either. I stopped getting so many calls to fix those servers you set up.”

Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

  "You guys don't seem that worried. What do you think will happen when the army gets here?" Rachel asks.

  "Well, this is still a legit electronics collection warehouse, so I'll just move all my... extra inventory off-site until this blows over. As for everyone else? Same as always. The new bully on the block wants to show everyone who's in charge now, so they'll fumble around for a bit, be a nuisance, bag anyone dumb or unfortunate enough to get caught until they meet their quota, or fake enough reports, then go home. We all lay low, run circles around them for a bit, and so long as no one escalates, they'll go home."

  "Don't underestimate them. Things can always get worse." Touchstone says. "Be. Careful."

  "You worry too much. I've been doing this since the meteors fell. You be careful too. After all, you're the one they're after."

  "Soldiers prefer easy targets, fat man. Give me your wifi."

  "Oh, speaking of which, I finished the adapter. Come look." Ortega leads them through a caged-off section of the warehouse, around the back of some metal shelves. He motions to a box sitting on top of a bundle of cables, zip-tied together, laying on the shelf.

  Touchstone grabs the box, pulling out a small wire with an ethernet port on one end, and a small USB tip on the other. As he replaces the box, Rachel sees one of the cables running out of a small hole in the back of the shelf. Touchstone, folding the ends of the bundle out of the way, reveals a short ethernet cable tucked away in the center. The adapter connects with a click.

  He pulls out a tablet in a rugged case from his bag, and plugs the other end of the adapter into it, keeping the other cables folded out of the way. Then Touch pulls a thin stylus from the case and opens up an app she doesn't recognize. They watch as it populates with a stream of unread messages.

  "Wonderful." He says, replacing the stylus and unplugging the tablet. "Ok, your turn." He says to Rachel.

  "Yep, and if anyone looks too closely, it's got your name written all over it. I can just say you threatened my family." Ortega adds cheerfully.

  "Excellent." He replaces the tablet in his pack. He turns to Rachel. "Go ahead and make any calls you need. We'll be catching up in the next room." Ortega and Rachel exchange friendly smiles as the two leave and head farther into the building.

  Rachel connects her phone, unlocks the screen, and opens her secure messaging app. Everything about this phone was black market. It's a prewar smartphone loaded with a custom operating system. Every app and program was downloaded from various free-web app stores. All of which were open-source; maintained, updated, and verified by volunteers from all around the world. She got the phone itself from Tara when she first got here, but she may have retrieved it from this very warehouse for all Rachel knew.

  During her walk into town, Tara had been sending her messages, sharing photos of the Aribots, warning that several teams of bounty hunters were searching the towns and farms looking for fugitives and divs: another name for mutants changed by energies from the asteroids.

  The town council released a statement about an hour ago, encouraging people to go on a sort of lockdown. From the looks of it, people were already doing that on their own. Since midday, they’ve been keeping their heads down, even if they weren't guilty of anything. They just didn't want to be caught in the middle of any trouble when it started. Regular social networks and illegal electronic ones work way faster than the official thing.

  Ortega was going to hide his illegal wares, track down a black market tablet screen, and put together a full-fledged intelligence report in a day while the streets were crawling with people ready to turn him in for a reward. And he didn't even seem bothered by it. Just the intelligence report would have taken her unit days back in the military; about half that when she was freelancing with her mercenary team.

  'Thanks for the heads up. I'm safe for now. But ill need to leave town for a while.' She texts, 'Are you ok?'

  Half a minute later, Tara calls.

  "Rachel?"

  "That's my name." Rachel replies.

  "Thank god. I was worried."

  "I noticed. How's the sanctuary? Has anyone come around there?"

  "No, we're all good. I found out about all this stuff when I went into town. I figured you were on the road, so I was just about to go out again with James and the truck to find you. You can stay here until you leave. Can you make it here? Do we need to come get you? Create a diversion? Burn down a building?"

  "Ha! No, I can meet you there."

  Rachel thinks.

  "Do you know anything about a guy named Touchstone?" Rachel asks.

  "Yeah, the guy's skin is literal rock. Can't exactly walk around without getting noticed. I don't know much, except he's a ghost, always on the move between the backwater towns, everywhere and nowhere, that sort of thing. I hear all kinds of ridiculous rumors, though."

  "Like what?"

  "Word is, he's a runaway lab experiment, worth a lot to AriCorp, making him pretty radioactive. So people try not to associate with him except in secret. If a bounty hunter comes around, you can't exactly say you thought he was just a regular, upstanding citizen. I honestly didn't think he was real. Now he's the talk of the town."

  "Anything about what he's like? You know, as a person?"

  "No clue. No one wants to talk about him on the nets because they're afraid of bringing unwanted attention. According to old-fashioned gossip, he's either a desperate criminal threatening to kill people if they don't feed and shelter him. Or he's an alright guy working for whoever will take him in."

  "Sooo..."

  "Oh no."

  "Can he stay with us? He seems nice."

  "He's radioactive. He can't be seen here." Rachel can hear her friend thinking it over through the phone.

  Tara sighs.

  "Can you get here without being seen, after dark?"

  "Yeah."

  "Hold on."

  Rachel hears a door squeak. She knows it's the front door, even through the phone.

  (James, wanna have some fugitives over for dinner?)

  (Plural?)

  (Rachel and that stone guy!)

  (Touchstone? Isn't he the one AriCorp is coming for!?)

  Rachel imagines she can hear James sigh.

  (Can he get here well after dark, without being seen!?)

  (Yeah!)

  (Fine!)

  (Ok!)

  "Ok, you can both stay. But as much as I love you, y'all need to be gone by tomorrow night. If he's radioactive, then so are you, if you've been seen with him."

  "You're the best. See you after dark. Do you need anything from town while I'm here?"

  "Nothing worth you running into bounty hunters. Stay safe."

  "My friend says we can stay at her house outside town." Rachel tells Touchstone and Ortega.

  "Really? Thank you. I don't want to put them in danger. We'll have to wait-"

  "Till after dark, I know." She says, rolling her eyes.