Heading out of Noe’s apartment after saying goodbye I headed down and out of Marchand’s street onto long street and headed towards home. I briefly considered heading to the gym to get some attribute work in but the mission was the focus right now, I didn’t need shaky legs for that.
Moving past the barricade I noticed some of the smaller tents were rolled up on the ground with the steel pipes stacked up next to it. Looked like the corp was packing up already, likely they’d be gone soon. Not that it meant much to me and mom now, we’d be gone before they would be.
I got to the big middle tent eventually after getting through the crowds and went to our spot to find mom. She was working through something on her interface judging by her distant focus and little eye twitches. I felt kinda bad I was gonna add a load of extra paperwork stuff to her list.
“Hey mom, I’m back from Marchand’s and I’ve got some news. Do you want the good news or bad news first? I also spoke to Noe again, remember she and her mom moved to Marchand’s street a few years back?” I said while dropping my duffel bag on the floor by my bed and sat down on the mattress.
Mom was a little surprised to see me and quickly finished up her interface work and put it aside.
“You’re back.” She said smiling but then started to frown. “Did she give you any trouble? I suppose I’ll take the good news first as I’m already a little worried.”
“Good news is I got us a place on Marchand’s street, we can move in as soon as we like. No doubt she’ll have someone come over and settle things when we poke out noses into the street next time.” I said, trying to push the good news into great news with my tone.
“That’s amazing Mal! We’re going to be living in the safest street in the district. How did you even-” Mom spoke excitedly before realizing. “What has she got you doing to warrant that kind of deal? Where does she think she is sending you?”
“Ah, mom. That’s the bad news, she needed a quick job done with a short deadline so she needed to bump up the pay a little for it. I managed to hold out a bit and get us an apartment on Marchand’s street up front, just to take the job. When I finish it I’ll get a big payday and even a bit of chrome with a more support, background set of jobs sorted out in the future. I just need to get this job done properly and we’re set for a good while.” I said putting as much positive spin on it as I could.
[User profile updated.]
[Improved Skill: Subterfuge. User Rating: Competent.]
Oh come on Sanctum! I’m hardly lying here! It’s just a little bending of the facts.
“So it’s not just a safe apartment but a bunch of money and chrome and trust? What the hell is this job!?” Mom said getting angry and visibly over-stressed. She couldn’t stress out like this.
I reached out to hold mom’s arms to try and reassure her. I lowered her back to sit on her bed from the half-standing posture she was in.
“Mom, I won’t lie to you and say the job is an in and out, no one to see, kind of job like usual. But I’ve already got all the data I need, I’ve got the maps, I’ve set up some contingencies and I’ll feel a lot calmer on the mission knowing you’re setting up the apartment on Marchand’s street in total safety.” I said soothingly, a few people nearby had swung around at mom starting to shout but they had lost interest quickly, at least obvious interest.
“You’re ten Mal. You told me you wouldn’t get into big fights until you could hold your own. Any ten year old against an adult is going to die immediately Mal.” Mom said with her lip shaking. She knew she couldn’t really stop me, I’d already agreed to the job and that locked certain things into place down here in the district. I could back out now but I’d likely never work for any fixer again, and they were the people who had work that payed life changing or life saving money.
“It’s not big fights mom. I haven’t lost my mind here, there’s some risky people but I’ve made preparations and they aren’t even the focus of the mission. Chances are I can sneak by them while they are sleeping or something and be out of there and on my way home before tomorrow afternoon.” I said, patting mom’s arm.
Mom sighed and seeming to deflate a little she grabbed my arms in return.
“Please come back to me if it gets too dangerous, I don’t care about the mission. I don’t care about Marchand or her apartment. I don’t care about the money or any of it. I just want you to come back to me alright? I want you to come home if it gets too much. I don’t want you to be stubborn and get killed for Marchand’s plans.” Mom said to me quietly, she wasn’t crying but she seemed close.
Of course, I knew she was scared for me but this job was a turning point for me. I’d either set myself up for years or I’d end it here. I could back out and live slow and small forever but I’d never get another chance like this, you were either the kind of person to take these kinds of jobs or you were the kind that never even knew about them.
I needed to be the type that took these jobs, at least here and now. Maybe one day I could throw away an opportunity like this and live with what I had, but me and mom couldn’t live much worse than how we were right now. If I was going to be happy with what I had I needed it to be more than this at least.
“I’m going to head out and get this started mom. I’ll be back in a day or two to see how you’ve decorated the apartment in the new street.” I said careful to avoid Marchand’s name. “Then I’ll grab my payment and we’ll both go and see Noe and maybe her mom if she’s home then. We’ll all have a good time catching up. I’ll buy you some nice things to celebrate and we can take it easy for a little while.”
This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.
Mom looked even sadder hearing this.
“Yeah, we’ll decorate your room however you like Mal when you get back. We’ll spend whatever it costs” She said while holding my wrists. She really thought this was going to be the last she’d see of me. For all I knew it would be.
I just pulled mom into a hug. I was a hugger. It’s how I worked out my emotions with people I cared about. We just hugged for a little while until mom calmed down.
“Alright mom.” I said as I pulled away. “I’m heading out, I’ll be back soon. Don’t forget to grab yourself some dinner on the way to the new apartment.”
I turned and left quickly before I lost my nerve and packed it all in, I could feel mom’s stare follow me as I walked into the flowing crowd passing through the middle of the tent. Once I was out I took a deep breath of street air and set off towards the subway, although down here you had to take the stairs up to the subway.
Walking through the street, past the barricade and onwards through the neighboring streets I did catch the eyes of a few gang members who looked geared for war. Likely still posturing against the corpo presence even if they were leaving soon. They didn’t call out to me or anything though, just some scowls and chatter among them likely from me walking out of the street the corp was camped in.
Sometimes that was all it took for the gangs to lay a bullseye on you.
As I approached the station under-entrance there were a load of homeless around begging for charity from the passers by coming and going from the wide doorway that led to the winding staircase up to the bottom of the subway station.
Some of them obviously blitzed out on something, some of them totally lucid and miserable, others hugging an incarnation player and twitching on the floor.
I ignored them as I passed. The city ate people alive everyday, I’m not about to start pulling strangers out of the teeth. I don’t have enough hands for that job.
Making my way up the winding staircase that managed to be claustrophobic despite being twenty foot wide because of the lack of lighting and low ceiling combined with the tight upwards slope of the stairs. There was a pair of elevators that you could take but you’d be queuing for ages with all the people trying to use just two elevators.
Once I’d made the climb and got into the lower part of the subway it was a lot better lit. More so by bright and loudly blaring advertisement boards than main lighting but lit up none the less. There were a lot of vending machines along the walls for all sorts of stuff from incarna shards and tiny toys to bullets and birth control.
The crowd thinned out and the place was mostly filled with people sitting around alone or in groups. There was even a group of street performers playing some electronic music in the corner. Wouldn’t see them playing long down in the residential streets, they’d find the instruments vanish from under their fingers but I guess there was some AMCP presence in the subway stations to generally prevent crime like that.
Towards the next big staircase was a scanner checkpoint that required people to declare their weapons and augments but fortunately this was only during security lock downs so the whole checkpoint was powered down and unmanned letting the crowd just flow through the little doorways without issue. Also I wouldn’t need to take out the signet pistol I had or worry if they’d pick up Sanctum in the scan.
[Sanctum’s physical mass was designed to spoof past any remote scanning equipment that doesn’t include cell tracking scanning resolution scale which are usually only included in fixed, close range medical applications.]
Oh, well that was good then. At least I wouldn’t have to explain the tangle of iron in my chest to an officer at some point.
[Sanctum’s iron content is very low compared to other elements. It is also not found in great quantity in your chest cavity.]
Huh, I would have thought you’d be all over my heart with it being a pretty important organ.
[There are several nanite structures that are performing improvised monitoring on the heart, lungs, trachea and musculature but without a medical suite there is little that Sanctum can help with in that area. For the current time Sanctum is mostly invested in your digestive system while rebuilding nanite mass and in your brain monitoring and maintaining existing pattern structures there to prevent knowledge loss.]
So I won’t forget how to do the stuff you teach me, that’s smart. I’m not known to have the best memory.
Continuing through the subway complex I reached the lines, I needed to take the north line for a few stops and get off in the residential zone there called Dappled Heights. Under that was industrial sector twelve and my first objective and the dangers around it.
I queued up at the turnstile for the platform and a quick three aura ticket later I was on the platform waiting for the train with the other people there. The platform was pretty empty but that was normal enough, unless there was an emergency or some lock down the trains were basically every five minutes regardless of the line so the platforms didn’t really have time to build a big crowd outside of busy lines at peak times.
Checking around just to make sure I wasn’t being followed by someone, My usually on-the-job paranoia kicking in.
It was mostly low level corp types, a few bored gangers and a load of nobodies like me with no obvious affiliation. A lot of kids too, quite a few mothers standing by strollers with other toddlers standing with them. I’d always assumed I was just my mom’s mistake and she’d never actually wanted kids, it’d explain why she hadn’t had any more. Big families were quite normal in the city where you’d likely lose a few to chance, I’d never really asked her about it.
Waiting for the train was a little dull so I wandered over to the wall where there was the usual vending machine row. I’d never even seen a vending machine being stocked, when did the bots top them up? I’d only ever seen them opened when they were being broken into.
I bought a can of lemon flavor soda for an outrageous two aura, I figured this job warranted the spending, it might be my last can after all. It tasted the wrong kind of bitter and the fizz was gone the moment I took my first sip. Typical.
Just sitting down with my bad tasting, expensive drink the train pulling out of the dark and into the platform forcing me to throw away what was left of my can into the trash.
You’d get caught by the camera taking food or drink on, the train would go to the depot over night and by the morning you’d have a mail waiting for you on the grid saying you owed whatever corp owned the train fifty aura. Why is it the only things that worked well in this city were the billing systems?
I stepped onto the train quickly so I wouldn’t end up stuck behind the mother’s wrangling their tiny hordes and took a seat further in. The inside of the train had that classic “is every surface sticky or is it the poor lighting and even poorer materials” look that all the trains down here did. At least the seats were intact and not obviously doused in urine.
Looking out of the window next to me back onto the platform as the doors closed I noticed the window itself had names burnt into the plexiglass with lighters and a lot of scratches but you could still see out of it. The platform disappeared as the train quickly accelerated taking us into the dark subway tunnels.