3-134 - 13th December – 5 p.m. – Market

It was freezing outside. I worked faster, needing to get warm, and the drones easily latched onto the solid material. Once they were secure, nothing slipped. After removing the materials from the shuttle with extreme caution, I had to force myself to swallow my pride and push them across the space that separated the shuttle and the track. The drones groaned in protest as they tried to secure themselves against the metal of the track. I needed to make a quick decision because the situation could easily spiral out of control. The more pressure they applied, the more difficult it became for me to move the tiles. I went into the configuration settings for the drones, and within a few short minutes, I had their program disabled.

That was also something I probably shouldn’t have done. This was so much easier on the lower levels of the building: When something fell off the track down there, it wasn’t going to matter—it wouldn’t cause someone’s death.

If this thing fell—heck, if anything fell, it was a potentially life-threatening accident.

Shields, of course, were at various levels of the building, unless they’d been taking shortcuts. In many of my previous jobs, there were no shields to protect the people below from debris.

Taking my time, I moved with the drones while keeping my hand on the cargo to reassure myself I had complete command of the situation. I didn’t. If it was going over, it would do so regardless of whether or not I had hold of it.

The track went downhill, and I followed it all the way till I reached the bottom of the building and entered it to find the suite I had been working in.

Velas was waiting for me with his hand on his hip when I arrived. “Are you aware of how much that’s worth?” he asked.

After bringing the materials inside, I positioned them on the floor and gave him a slight nod. I’d literally just seen it. “Eight thousand four hundred credits,” I said. “Give or take a few.”

“And what are you earning today?”

I added it up and swallowed. “Usually around a hundred.”

Velas smiled. “Never met a runner who took chances before. Rescheduling would have cost me a few months’ work and time,” he said and held his hand out for the control pad. “The remaining items in the cargo are a smaller size. You can give them to us by hand if you don’t feel comfortable with the drones.”

I smiled back at him. “Don’t worry, I might take risks, but only if I thought I could handle them.”

“Noted,” he confirmed and then off he went. The drones were safely inside with that 8,400-credit cargo.

I looked to the shuttle and checked the schedule showing on my HUD. Thirty minutes left in the window. I ran up the track and did exactly what Velas had asked, starting to hand-ball the rest off; no way would I trust the drones when I could carry these. That’s why they called us runners, after all.

The sweat ran off me, but there was no time to mess around. There were two more deliveries before morning break, one more before lunch, and the final delivery off-loaded and distributed to the right men before the dinner call came in.

“The next shuttle you’ll like,” Velas said with a smile. When it came in, only two guys were needed to unpack the bags. I sat with Velas and the others as they spread out the contents. There was literally more food and supplemental drinks than I’d seen in a long time. “Help yourself. Anything you can eat.”

Anything I could eat meant many things. Mostly, it meant not to make myself sick. “Thanks,” I said, and I took a handful of sandwiches. I made sure I ate slowly enough not to vomit afterwards.

The others all returned to work before their time was up; I needed the rest.

“Bus is back at seven,” Velas said. “Would you stay late?”

There was no way I could get home if I missed that bus. “How late?”

I thought of my mother, who was expecting me and food from the market.

“Does that matter?” he asked.

“I live on the west side. It’s a long walk.”

Velas spun his data pad around and looked over a few things. “I can drop you to the west side, but I could do with an extra pair of hands till eight.”

I could still make the market last call. “What are you paying?” I asked.

He frowned, ran his numbers again, I presumed, then met my eyes with his. “I’ll pay you for twenty minutes of online time and an extra twenty credits.”

“I’ll stay.”

“Good lad.” Velas moved then, his bulk shifting the wooden slats under me. “We’ve two more deliveries this afternoon. You’re in charge.”

Ordering the older men around was actually pretty interesting. They didn’t want to listen at first, but when Velas shot them a glare, they backed down.

The loads came and went, and the materials were unloaded and distributed in no time. As a team, they all worked extremely well; with us keeping them going, it was even better.

The bus came, and the crew left. So it was just me, Velas, and one other young lass. I’d been surprised to see someone else of a similar age to me. There weren’t many they’d let up here, even if the labor was cheap. She wasn’t thin, by any means, and she had almost as much muscle as Velas had. She wore shorts and a tank top, with a jacket and ratchet straps draped around her, and as my eyes traced over her bare skin, I caught the tell-tale signs of tech. Yes, holy shit! Her lower left leg and right arm were bionic. I’d not seen anything like them before, but I knew they were hella expensive. How did she afford those if she really was the same age as me?

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Her eyes twinkled at me. “Like what you see?”

I coughed and looked away, heat flushing up my neck.

“What are we doing tonight, Dad?” she then said, and I had to do a double take. Dad?

There was no family resemblance at all, apart from her build; she was still really short compared to the hulk of a man Velas was.

“Special delivery, Tae.” He smiled. “Going into the master bedroom.”

“Oh.” That was cool. I’d not been that deep into the suite as yet, and I was pretty glad. It was too rich for me. I was terrified I’d damage something. By the time the shuttle came in and we offloaded its precious cargo of a bed and its internal components, it was clear that my sticky fingers didn’t need to be near any of it.

I stood and gawked at the room.

“Amazing, isn’t it?” Tae asked.

It was more than that. She handed me some slippers, to protect the flooring, and we both carefully moved the cargo into the room. Everything we touched in here was more expensive than the slab I’d almost dropped this morning.

Next, we helped Velas organize all the items. “Ready for the first run in the morning,” he said while grinning as it got closer and closer to eight. “Come on, Rus. I’ll get you home.”

On the ride home, I listened as he and Tae talked through the day’s work and tomorrow’s. “Coming back tomorrow?” Velas asked and looked at me. “I could do with some regular help around here.”

“I’m not sure,” I replied honestly. “I’ll have to see what happens tonight.”

I was glad he didn’t pry. The last thing I wanted to do was to start telling strangers my life story, and it really did come down to what happened tonight.

M-Corp - Depository

Credit Balance: 120c

Velas had transferred my pay for the day, a hundred and twenty credits and my screen time. Compared to that slab—eight thousand four hundred—yeah, it sucked.

It was a bit of a longer walk back through the market. At this time of night, there weren’t many people still hanging around. There was the odd seller who hadn’t sold all of the things they needed to, and for most of us on the poorer end of town, that was a godsend. They never reduced their prices till the last minute. It meant there was always a handful of people waiting in the hopes there was something, anything left.

I didn’t have much hope, though. They usually gauged their sales really well, and only provided what they could sell. Otherwise, they risked everyone hanging around till last minute, hoping for a bargain, instead of selling it at full price. Some of the merchants would also rather let the food rot than sell it for a cheaper price.

That meant that those who were hoping for cheaper food couldn’t risk loitering about and waiting for the food sellers to drop their prices, or everyone would be going hungry together.

I hadn’t been this hungry in a while. Even with the food I had eaten throughout the day, I had fresh pay in my pockets and wanted more to eat. The sweet smell of cakes and fresh breads never stopped; the bakeries around here were constantly running. Cheap labor meant cheap foods. Buying their grains from the farming mills on the outskirts of the city, the bakeries only received the dregs of what the mills didn’t sell elsewhere. But even so, the dregs still made for fine bread.

My feet stopped outside one of the stalls that had almost packed up. “Sorry kid, I’m done for the day.”

“Nothing left at all?” I asked.

“One GM cake,” he said. “Got a bit battered on the way down this morning, fucking ingredients are no way ‘top quality,’ and I paid full whack for them. They degraded way too fast. No one seemed to want to risk it.”

“I’ll take it,” I said. “My mom wanted something nice, and I’m really late.” I knew cake wasn’t really cake, not like it used to be. Now only read of in story books, fresh ingredients, sweet jams and thick creams. It was genetically modified, but as he showed it to me, even with the sunken middle, it still looked like and smelled so good. I knew Mom would be happy.

“Doesn’t look the best.”

“Looks good enough to me.” I smiled. Then I paid him and grimaced, five credits.

At the far end of the market, I also managed to get some fake chicken meat and rice dishes, another five credits. This was going to be a really good dinner for us, even if I was late. I also grabbed some protein smoothies and meal bars from another vendor. These were a lot cheaper and would last me a couple of days. It took my spending to twenty credits.

My HUD went off a few moments later with messages from Tsomak and my mom.

I quickly messaged them both back saying I had worked late, and I would be home in ten minutes.

The rain started up soon after, and I shivered with the cold. It was far too wintery to be out here without a thick coat, but I didn’t have one that fit at all. Hopefully . . . if I could get out tonight and win the race I was in, I’d be able to buy—who was I kidding. I needed, we needed, much more than just this one race.

I reached the end of my street, the apartment block looming into view in all its degraded glory. It was nothing like the version AW had given me that morning.

“Hey, Mom,” I said as I walked through the door and gave her a small hug.

“You should have sent a message.”

“No signal up where I was. Top rope. Couldn’t even get a text to you.”

I saw her face fall; she knew what “text” meant. No AWC.

“That’s okay,” she said through a forced smile, smoothing my hair down. Then she backed off and I sat. Mom grabbed a towel and roughly dried my soaked hair. “You’re freezing.”

“It’s winter,” Tsomak said.

Mom took the food from me, went to heat it in the microwave, then stopped herself. “Not enough electricity.” She sighed. “But I have some gas, if you’re quick.” She served the food and put the cake in the middle of the table. It was nice to see. Really nice. “Almost feels like celebrating, when we—”

I tried to speak, but she shooed me off with her eyes. “You’ve a long night ahead. Go take a shower.”

“Shower?” We were only taking one a week, and it had been almost three weeks since I’d been clean.

“Take your time,” she said. “I’ll make sure this is nice and hot when you get out.”

I was about to protest again, but Tsomak shook his head behind her and nodded to the back, toward our bathroom.

I stripped out of my work laden, dirty clothes and turned the shower on. Before stepping in, I made sure it was hot. It was. Once inside, I washed off the grime of the workday, and cleaned myself as best I could with the tiniest sliver of soap we had left. Yes, soap, actual soap. I had no idea where she’d had got this from, but it smelled of lemongrass and ginger. It was amazing.

While I dried off, I made use of some of the net time Velas had given me by contacting my friends.

“Are you on your way?” Bail asked.

“Yeah, maybe an hour, everything okay?”

“Nervous,” Bail answered.

“Excited, but nervous,” Daisy added.

I understood that. They were fired up and ready for this race. “I’ve some extra funds. You can place the bets.”

“Daisy said you were working today, top runner,” Bail said.

“Yeah,” I replied. “Long day, but I’m ready for this. Put me an extra hundred credits to win.” It was everything I had left, but it meant if I did win, I’d get a thousand credits and my hundred back. With our joint bet, it would mean I could walk away with five thousand credits. More than enough to stay in our apartment.

“That’s too much,” Daisy said.

“I wouldn’t have it if I hadn’t earned it today. I need to turn it into more. Much more.”

RACE BET

Placed – 100 credits – 10/1

Accept – Y/N

She sighed as I hit the Y, and I hung up on the chat to go eat.