Irene decided to swing by Chicago downtown on her way north. She was dressed in her new leathers with Greg’s beautiful buttons holding the pockets closed.
The guards were collecting new taxes. They called them security fees. It was always hard in Chicago to tell if the guards were collecting for themselves or the leadership. Irene wasn’t carrying anything of value physically. No one could view another person’s virtual inventory, so she knew better than to admit she carried any virtual coin. When she showed her empty gathering bags the guards still refused to let her enter. She inquired as to what the minimum entrance fee was. They told her six rats, two squirrels, a badger or thirty iron coins.
Irene went over to the nearest room door and threw it open. Ten rooms later she returned to the guards with seven rats. There were four in the last room even though she only needed three more at the time. She dropped all the rat carcasses at the guards feet. They let her pass. At the first opportunity Irene cast a don’t notice me spell on herself. She shouldn’t have done that with the rats at the entrance. It would only make the guards remember her.
She wandered through the shopping district looking at what was available. Nothing really caught her eye. She recognized most of the high level crafters from previous visits. She thought most of them were tier three. There was one or two she thought might have reached tier four. To her surprise one of these was John, the leatherworker who tried to rob her on her first visit to Chicago.
He was offering a new type of hardened leather armor. Irene stopped her wandering to inspect it. She ran her fingers over the surface and felt the slick almost plastic feel of integrated material.
“Irene,” John said in greeting. “I haven’t seen you around for a while.” John saw through her cloaking spell like it wasn’t even there. Since the spell was just tier zero and Irene was tier three, anyone tier two or above could see through it with a little effort.
“I’ve been traveling,” Irene said vaguely. “This is new,” she commented on the armor.
“It is,” John responded. “It is lighter than mail and just as strong.” Irene thought that might be true. It was hard to predict the performance of integrated items from their appearance.
“It doesn’t seem very flexible,” Irene commented. She wore leather as more disguise than as armor. Her story to Bill about not getting hit was actually her plan.
“Have you brought any leather for trade?” John asked.
“No,” Irene responded. “I reached The Heights just after Greg left for the last conference. They didn’t have any finished leather left for trade. Are you short on materials?” she asked.
“A little,” John responded, “but don’t think you can use that admission to get more out of me.”
“The guards demanded six rats for the entrance fee into Chicago,” Irene observed. “They called it a security tax.”
“That’s a little high,” John responded. “They must have thought you were holding out on them. This hardened armor takes something stronger, like boar. Bear works better.”
That explained John’s shortage of leather. Irene considered the bear a tier three animal. As a tier three she could kill one, but she needed to be extremely careful. It was better to go out as a team to hunt them. The ruined green that The Heights hunted didn’t contain any bear. The best they could be bringing John was boar. Irene promised John she would remember him if she came across any bear hides before moving on.
It was getting late. Irene headed in the direction of the hospital. She learned on her first visit to Chicago that the hospital would allow her to stay the night if she took a turn at nursing. Irene arrived to find two women binding the wounds of a fresh arrival. The hunter’s party was passing a stack of iron coins over to a third woman to pay for the man’s care.
When one of the women working on the bandages turned, Irene was surprised to see it was her oldest sister Mary. She last saw Mary in Londontown where she was a recognized member of the royal family.
Irene waited quietly for the team to finish up with the new arrival. The man’s party helped the women move the wounded man to one of the back rooms in the suite. Irene approached the third woman who accepted the payment. Irene knew her from earlier visits. She thought her name was Melony, but she wasn’t certain so she didn’t use it.
Melony readily agreed to let Irene stay overnight. Irene settled her pack and staff in a corner of the room the women slept in before following her sister into the other room. Mary was sitting at the new arrivals side carefully trickling water into his mouth. There was no sign of the man’s party.
“It’s good to see you,” Irene said to her sister. “I’m surprised to find you here.” Mary jerked, jumped to her feet and turned to face Irene, fear stained her face. Irene was rather shocked at this response.
“Irene,” Mary said, relief in her voice. “For a second there I thought you were Mother.”
“No,” Irene said firmly. She said the word even though she wasn’t quite certain what she meant by it. “Do I really sound like her?”
“Maybe a little,” Mary responded. “I’m just nervous.” Mary was wearing a hunter’s outfit in green. It was stained with blood, some fresh and some not. Integrated cloth slowly cleaned itself, so none of the blood could be that old.
The wounded man was laying on a thin pallet. Mary lowered herself back down. She picked up a small square of cloth and wetted it with her water. She began cleaning off the man’s face. Irene said down next to her.
“How is he?” Irene asked.
“He lost a lot of blood. If we got the bleeding stopped he’ll live,” Mary explained.
“If?” Irene asked.
“It is a gut wound. He could be bleeding internally. I’ve seen that before. If he’s still alive in the morning we’ll know,” Mary commented. “Anyone who lives at least a day after an injury usually survives here.” Irene glanced around the room at the other patients and cast muffle.
“Do you know heal?” she asked her sister.
“No,” Mary said. “If I did, I wouldn't use it.” The disgust in her sister’s voice was enough to explain her presence here. “I don’t trust magic.”
“It’s not magic,” Irene said, feeling the need to explain it to her sister. “It’s technology.” Mary shot her a look like she thought Irene was delusional.
“Really,” Irene said. “It's nanobots. They are in everything here, including us. The heal spell is just an instruction to them to do the repairs faster. Without a heal spell they work slower. They are the reason there is no infection here.”
“What is a nanobot?” Mary asked.
“It is a tiny robot that is floating around in our blood,” Irene said. Mary was not stupid. She was highly intelligent, but her education was all in medicine. Mary should have been their mother’s favorite. She followed their mother into medicine and rose to be one of the senior doctors on the Speedwell. Oddly their mother never seemed to notice Mary at all.
“There are plans for them in the Speedwell archives. They were proposed to help combat the higher radiation levels the crew experienced in interstellar space. Earth never worked out all the bugs. If the nanobots were self-replicating they tended to consume the host. If they weren’t, they were cleaned out of the patient's body too quickly. Manufacturing facilities to make more of them required too much mass for the ship to transport.”
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“You’re saying these machines are here?” Mary asked. “Where did they come from?”
“They are part of the structure. At first I thought the structure made them, but now I lean towards the idea that they made the structure,” Irene shook her head, realizing she was getting off track.
“If heal is just instructions for them to work harder, that doesn’t explain the addiction,” Mary commented.
“That has to do with the color of your magic,” Irene said. “If you heal someone with the same color magic it causes pleasure. I think it might be a mismatch in our biology. If you heal someone with a different color magic it causes pain and there is no addiction.”
Now Mary glanced around the room. She lowered her voice before speaking. “A blue can’t heal a red,” she said.
“No, but a blue can heal purple. A purple can heal a red,” Irene responded.
“There is no such thing as a purple,” Mary countered. She turned her head, dismissing Irene, and returned to her patient.
“I am a purple,” Irene admitted. She cast blur, then reaching out to the patient, cast a tier one heal on him. The poor man moaned in pain and twisted in agony. A moment or two later his breathing evened out. Some of his color came back. Irene was pretty certain he had been bleeding internally. The injury was bad enough that her low tier heal wasn’t going to fix him. It stopped the bleeding and would shorten his recovery.
Irene realized early that leaving a trail of healed patients behind her wasn’t good for her own safety. A group of red and blue warriors tried to imprison her once as their personal healer. They found out rather quickly that heal wasn’t the only spell she knew. Small heals that put people out of danger were safe enough, along with healing people she trusted.
“What did you do?” Mary demanded.
“Did you see any pleasure in his reaction?” Irene questioned.
Mary looked down at her patient. She pulled a small eating knife from her belt and sliced her own arm open. She turned to look at Irene. “Heal me,” she demanded.
Irene cast a tier three heal on her sister. It was a harsh thing to do. The higher tier heal would make the healing pain worse. Irene was hurt by Mary's dismissal of the idea of a purple magic user. The higher tier was a petty revenge. Such a small wound wouldn’t be that much pain anyway.
Mary gasped. The blood running down her arm was reabsorbed through her skin. The cut sealed itself perfectly, leaving no scar or even hint of redness. She took a long deep breath. A thread of tension in her body seemed to melt away.
“That wasn’t a heal,” Mary commented. Her voice was softer and not as challenging. Her words were a comment, not the accusation her early observations were.
“Sure it was,” Irene responded. “I told you, the color mismatch makes it painful.”
“A heal doesn’t work this well,” Mary said. “That cut was deep, I should still have a scar.”
“Oh, that’s because it was tier three, not one,” Irene admitted.
“Tier three,” Mary echoed. She shook her head in wonderment. She looked down at the patient who was now fast asleep. “I’ve been here before,” she said quietly, “but in the end I always end up going back.” She picked the wash cloth back up and wetted it again. She used it to clean the dried blood off the man’s hands.
“Do you want to go back?” Irene asked. She didn’t know much about the family situation in Londontown.
“No,” Mary responded. “What are you doing here?”
“I am on my way north,” Irene responded. “I’m doing a scouting run for a group of friends of mine. I am going to travel north up high, along the ruined greens. Eventually I plan on going to Moscow. It is a red square, over forty stories down.”
“Can I go with you?” Mary asked.
“Sure,” Irene responded.
Irene took her turn in the night, bringing water to the patients. She cast four more tier one heals on different patients in the night, including a second one on the newest patient. Everyone was going to be surprised at how fast he recovered from what looked like a fatal wound. That happened fairly often in the structure. Irene didn’t think anyone would remember her.
In the morning Irene checked Mary’s belongings and made a list of things she would need for the trip. Mary headed off to make her purchases. They agreed to meet in an hour near the north gate. Irene went over to the public prize altar to pull physical coins from her inventory. She was going to use them to purchase more travel food for the two of them. She was certain she would have to pay a tax to use the altar, but that didn’t worry her that much. Going back out to use an altar in wildspace would only draw more attention to her.
“Do I know you?” a man asked Irene. She was once more under a don’t notice me spell. This man was looking at her unbothered by the spell. She returned his gaze. He was slightly built but with defined muscles. He was wearing red-touched leathers. The red was a darker shade than usual. It was an indication that he was tier four. Although there was a short sword at his waist Irene suspected he was a wizard. Irene found him attractive, but she was also certain she never met him before.
“No,” Irene responded.
“Are you sure?” he said. “You seem so familiar. Did we meet on the Speedwell?”
“Maybe,” Irene responded. “I did a lot of maintenance and got around to all parts of the ship.”
“I’m Ian,” he said to her, “from Redfalls.”
“Irene,” she responded automatically.
----------------------------------------
So it was her, Ian thought to himself. He saw the woman waiting in line for the prize altar and noticed the black staff she carried. Something about her stirred his memory. A closer look and he recognized the staff was actually a broom handle.
“There is a new cafe just around the corner. Let me buy you a tea,” Ian offered.
“Sorry,” Irene responded. “I’m on a schedule to meet someone. Perhaps another time.”
“Are you staying here in downtown?” Ian asked. “I can change my offer to dinner.”
“I’m on a scouting mission,” Irene responded. “I’ll be back.” It was her turn at the altar. She stepped past the guards and into the room that currently housed it. He considered what his next action should be. He remembered Sophia saying that Irene sensed Darien’s interest and fled from him. She stepped out of the room. The trip inside was so quick she must have only pulled out coins.
“Look me up next time you're downtown,” Ian said, “and I will pay for the dinner.” Irene smiled at him. Ian decided that she was attractive in an understated way.
“I will remember that,” she said. Ian stepped past her into the altar room. He didn’t intend to use it, but he wanted to give Irene the impression that he wasn’t targeting her. Irene headed off in the direction of the food shops. As soon as she was out of sight Ian cast camouflage on himself and followed her.
Irene purchased dried fruits, tuber flour and travel bars. She was giving every appearance of someone going out on a scouting mission. The quantities she purchased were large. Either the trip was a long one, or she wasn’t traveling alone.
Irene added her purchases to her pack, before heading in the direction of the north gate. The north gate out of downtown was a stairwell leading down to the closest green. Near the stair entrance she met up with another woman. Ian didn’t recognize her. She was wearing worn hunter’s greens that were stained with multiple layers of blood. Ian was confused by her. The blood on her outfit indicated an active hunter or butcher, but the woman carried no bow. Ian could detect only a slight trace of a blade on her.
As the women rounded the last corner to the gate they vanished. Ian realized one of them cast a cloaking spell, perhaps even the camouflage he was using. Its near perfect performance against him indicated one of them was a higher tier wizard than he suspected. Ian followed along. He wasn’t worried about losing them. It would be easy to follow them using his blade sense in the green where there was no interference from the residents of downtown.
He only realized his mistake when he reached the bottom of the stairs. Stepping out into the corridor that led to the green he passed a hunting team carrying a boar carcass and heading back to downtown. There were no weapons ahead of him. There was no way the women could have walked fast enough to get out of the range of his blade sense in the short time that had passed since he last saw them. If they broke out into a run, he would feel the vibration of their footsteps through the floor. They did not come down to this floor. Ian looked up at the stair rising above. He never had any need to go up there. He wasn’t even sure how many floors the stairs reached up. He climbed to the downtown level and concentrated on his blade sense.
He could detect no trace of them. He didn’t know why anyone would want to go up. He needed to go up there and explore. They could have stepped off on any floor. Irene escaped him for the moment. Everything she told him appeared to be the strict truth. He believed her statement that she would be back was also true.