Down the main street he walked along, industrial snow swept by in icy gusts. It felt like oil against his skin, blackened with soot. Snow clouds mixed with the harsh smoke from factory chimneys. In winter, everything the industry pumped into the atmosphere came down on the workers.
It was 9:39 PM, and only seven degrees below freezing. Mild temperatures for Vega Prime’s winter. He looked away from his PDA and across the street. At this hour, only the homeless were around. On the other side, facing the Cordwell River—just as polluted as the clouds above—a group huddled around burning barrels provided by the Keldaraan district administration, meant to keep the lowest-ranking workers from freezing to death in winter. Next to a fenced-off construction zone, where the road had been torn up for sewer repairs, was a shabby building with dark windows. In front of the entrance, a man in a trench coat smoked beneath the flickering number 13c.
Shadowed by the faint overhead light, Lex could only make out the man’s silhouette and the occasional glint of his glasses, giving the impression that he was watching him while he took steady drags of his cigarette. The boy lingered on the other side of the street, surrounded by piles of rubble and trash bags. The wet asphalt reflected the lights of nearby shops. The letters E and M of a neon sign above a general store had fallen off, scattered in a mess of broken glass near the entrance. Lex entered the fully automated 24-hour shop, entered the drink code he’d been instructed to choose, paid with the last of the credits on his PDA, and then stepped back onto the street with a bottle of water in hand.
The smoking silhouette still stood in the doorway of the building. Lex crossed the street, approached the mysterious man carefully, and asked, "Is this 27b?" He took a swig from the water bottle, making sure to extend his pinky finger. It was the secret signal of the rebels, something he’d learned to use back in Rykuunh. It symbolized raising up the smallest members of society.
The man lit a new cigarette, its glowing tip reflecting in his data glasses. Up close, Lex could see how gaunt he was beneath the long trench coat. The man blew smoke in the boy’s direction, then scratched a spot on his bald head with his own pinky finger. "Come on. Don’t ask questions until we’re in the car."
Once they left Keldaraan on the expressway, the air coming in through the car’s vents smelled noticeably fresher. In the rearview mirror, the massive dark cloud of pollution drifted over the receding district. Only the snow kept falling. The cloud cover spread eastward across the entire city. At one hundred twenty-five miles an hour, they sped through the blur of lights, past other cars, heading back toward Ataris.
His contact lit a cigarette, shielding the flame with his hand. The cigarette case lay in his lap. He put away the lighter and offered one to Lex. "Go ahead, take one."
Lex shook his head. "Quit ages ago," he said, eyeing the mysterious smoker next to him. "Are you the one I was messaging on the infonet?"
"No, that’s not me. But you’ll meet the one you were talking to soon enough."
"A she?"
The man shrugged. "A she, a he—depends on how you look at it. With her, it’s all a matter of perspective. But let’s go with she. She runs our organization. That’s who we’re headed to now."
The boy looked out the windshield. Was he talking about Veela? The shimmering lights of the district flew past. After a moment, he turned down the fresh air vent. "It’d be a lot faster if we took the Hyperloop station. It’s not far from here."
The man wrinkled his nose, as if he’d smelled something foul. "Would be faster," he said, "but there are more security checks. And if they pull us over, I’ve got an unregistered automatic under the seat. No offense, kid, but why do you smell so bad?"
"No secret," he said. "Spent a few months on a refugee ship. Then over a year in Adenaaru, and after that I got a job as a street sweeper. This stink’s never coming off me, no matter how much I wash."
The smoker’s expression turned thoughtful in the silence. "Did you just say you’re from Adenaaru?" he asked.
"Yep, from the giant refugee district on the peninsula. Why do you ask?"
The smoker didn’t answer. Instead, he asked Lex to open the glove compartment, gesturing toward the closed panel. Lex did, finding a bunch of injector devices scattered around like discarded parts in a junkyard. Stimulants glimmered in the glass cartridges, casting a colorful shadow play on the inside of the compartment.
"Hand me that stim, will you?" he asked, pointing again at the glove box.
Lex hesitated, picking up an injector with a glowing purple liquid inside. "This one?" he asked.
The smoker glanced briefly at the device in Lex’s hand, then quickly turned back to the road. "No, that one’s for reflexes," he said. "I just want to stay awake, not blast through rush hour. Give me the neon green one, that’s the one I meant."
Lex took out the injector loaded with the neon green cocktail, eyeing it curiously. "I don’t see a needle."
"That’s because there isn’t one," the smoker replied, taking the jet injector blindly from his hand. "It shoots the stim under your skin with high pressure. Here, I’ll show you."
Suddenly, Lex felt the device pressed against his neck. The cold metal against the side of his Adam’s apple. Before he could react, the smoker had pressed the trigger. A hissing sound filled the car, like a gas canister releasing all at once.
The boy’s head spun. He felt his heart pounding fast in his chest. His vision started to blur, and all the sounds around him seemed to drift miles away. Even the smoker’s voice.
"Sorry, I lied to you. This one wasn’t to keep you awake—it’s to put you to sleep for a while. Because where we’re headed now, you’re not going to like it. Not one bit. So, sleep tight, kid."
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Lex heard his goodnight wishes just before he slumped forward, unconscious in his seatbelt.
The smoker clicked his tongue, watching the road through the windshield as he shook his head slowly.
"You nearly drove us all right into the deep end, kid."
*****
Darkness.
Where was he?
Silence.
He opened his eyes.
What kind of place was this?
Tiled walls.
The smell of blood.
He could barely move his head.
Was he paralyzed? He was paralyzed.
A distant light.
That exhaustion.
The darkness.
The next time he opened his eyes, hours had passed, and this time, he managed to move his body, though it hurt immensely. He was leaning back in a chair. Across the room was the driver, the mysterious smoker. There was someone else, too, someone he didn’t know. Sitting at a computer, dressed in a grimy surgical gown. He paid no attention to him.
Lex took a deep breath of stale air. The cigarette smoke lingered, thick enough that he could almost taste it—stale and heavy as lead. The sharp smell of antiseptics. He slid off the chair, unsteady on his feet.
"What did you do to me?"
The doctor—if that’s what he was—didn’t seem in any hurry to answer. Lex was so weak that he quickly had to sit back down. He was dizzy, his whole body hurt, especially his right hand.
"Why am I here?" he asked.
"You already know. You should feel it."
"Feel it? Feel what—"
"Anything hurt?"
"My whole body."
"We may have overdosed the anesthetic a bit, which caused you to have some cramps in your sleep. But what hurts the most?"
Lex focused inward. His right hand throbbed. Something was off. It moved as he wanted it to, but it didn’t look like his own. The skin seemed artificial, nothing like his pale complexion. He touched it. Cold. Cold synthetic material, not skin.
"The prosthetic isn’t much of a beauty, I’ll admit," said the underground doctor, still focused intently on the monitor in front of him, as if searching for the one in a million zeroes. "The main thing is that it responds to your thoughts. Looks aren’t everything, after all."
Lex looked from the doctor to the smoker.
"You cut off my freaking hand and replaced it with a damn prosthetic?"
"It’s better than it looks."
"Really," said the smoker. "The prettiest things aren’t exactly known for being the most reliable."
"I—" Lex tried to collect himself. He opened the artificial hand, then closed it again. It responded to his command. He tried again, thinking he could detect a slight delay between his intention and the action. He compared its response time to his other hand. His left—his real hand—seemed a little quicker. Or did it? He wasn’t sure. He opened both hands in unison, then closed them again. There was no difference. It all worked just like his real hand, except it wasn’t real.
"Why on earth did you do this? My hand was fine; you didn’t need to—"
"Not us, you," the smoker interrupted, his tone so sharp that Lex fell silent immediately. "You almost killed us all and destroyed our mission. I nearly led you straight to our hideout. You would have led them right to us."
"Them?"
"They’ve been watching you ever since you left Adenaaru. I had no idea you were from there. We thought the TC had sent you back. We thought you’d gained Zara Thandros’s trust. That was the plan."
The boy looked tensely at his artificial hand, breathing heavily. His mind raced, piecing things together. Then the truth dawned on him.
"You had to remove the ID chip," he said.
"Finally."
"Taking your hand was just the logical consequence of the fact that you came from Adenaaru. They implant all foreigners with bio-trackers there, to keep them under control. We didn’t have another option."
Lex ran his fingers over the cold synthetic material, tighter than real skin, more elastic, a little like rubber. He rubbed the artificial thumb and fingers together, feeling the pressure at the fingertips. But it felt different, a little numb. Absentmindedly, he flexed the mechanical fingers in small waves.
"And while we were at it, removing your hand, we made one more small upgrade."
Lex looked up at the underground doctor.
"You’re now equipped with a brain implant, just behind your ear, where the tracker used to be. It acts as a cyber-interface, allowing you to access Crimson Dawn tech that you’ll need to take on our most powerful enemies. Ever wondered what’s up with the level-ups? This isn’t a game, kid. The higher your rank, the higher your level, the better tech you’re authorized to use, and the more skills you’ll unlock. What level are you currently?"
Perplexed, the boy reached behind his ear, feeling the cold metal fused into his skull. A foreign object. What was it doing to him? He activated his PDA and checked his character card.
He was now [Level 29]. He needed 7,835 XP to reach the next level-up.
He still held the rank of [Knight of the Dawn], with a series of new achievements unlocked from his time in Luvanda, the journey across the sea, and from the refugee district on the edge of Vega Prime.
"We’ve unlocked everything; now you just need to get upgraded at the base. Got all that, Moonchild? What, are you just going to sit there and sulk forever? Better get up and do what’s right."
When Lex looked up, the smoker was already at the door. Lex met his gaze, dark and brooding, thinking about what they had taken from him. Weighing it against what they had given him. It wasn’t much. Just one thing. But it was enough to change everything.
"I want to see her again," he said. "I wanna see Veela."
*****
The speedometer needle climbed to one hundred fifty miles an hour. Just before dawn, they reached the Ataris district. They crossed a bridge, passing the base of the Thandros Tower, and got out in a crowded neighborhood by a marketplace lit by artificial lights. Up above, it might as well have been broad daylight—the skyscrapers crowded together like ancient giants in Luvanda’s densest jungle, blocking any sunlight from reaching the residents below. Only a few snowflakes drifted down to the lower levels of the city. The storm raging over the megacity was undetectable here. The smoker wove through the crowd, and Lex struggled to keep up. Piled trash bags, packed to the brim, formed mounds in one corner beneath an underpass, where the sickly-sweet stench of rot filled the air.
"What is this place?"
"The banking district."
"Doesn’t exactly smell like money here."
"That’s because the bankers live up in the towers and dump their crap down here."
Lex followed the man through a throng of people, as diverse as it was packed, with every age and wealth level mixing together. They passed a long row of grimy public toilets and food stands with TV screens playing Vega Prime’s 24-hour propaganda news, only interrupted by corporate ads. The smell of food momentarily replaced the stench of trash, and citizens in threadbare winter coats walked past, illuminated by the glow of advertisements. The ads flashed so brightly across the lower windows of the skyscrapers that looking up was like staring into the sun.
In the chaotic crowd, he saw TC mercenaries, poor shopkeepers smoking outside their stores, beggars, prostitutes, and injured veterans, as well as members of the upper class hurrying through, sidestepping those who had time to loiter with mechanical precision. He wasn’t sure if these people were still awake, awake again, or just never slept at all. The smoker, who’d posed as his driver until now, turned into a modest market alley, where the damp air carried the scent of exotic spices and warm food. He led the way down a narrow staircase to a dimly lit back alley cluttered with black garbage bags, where the rear doors of various shops opened out. Stopping at a metal door, he pressed the buzzer and showed his face to the camera.
A moment later, the door buzzed, and it opened.
The gaunt smoker in the long trench coat gestured for Lex to go first.
Lex hesitated.
Then he stepped inside.