THAT PLACE is called the Ibis, and it’s an ashtray of an underground fight club.
Six in the morning, the place is quieter than a corpse. We come upon it in the middle of a dismal morning rush dressed like a trio of office coworkers heading up to Shimano Heavy Industries’ skyscrapers in the overcity. My disguise is as thin as a projector screen. I might be as short as the grade schooler I’m impersonating, but I’ve got twice her figure and look exactly like the hell I’ve been through since last night. Hair streaked black with soot, face mottled by bruises, bandages creeping out of my sleeves, and a perpetual limp from the Armiger’s parting gifts; I’m just barely passing, and that’s not even counting the gun hiding under the thigh-cut skirt. The corporation’s fishhook logo rides high on my chest, half-covered by an ironed jacket. The stealing didn’t bother me. Knowing that this jacket belongs to someone who no longer has a home; that does.
There weren’t any bloodstains in the family’s abandoned apartment. Just a collection of holographic photos, two parents and a beaming little girl, candids from sightseeing tours on the surface. Blue skies punctured by chrome spears and speckled with greenery. A dream. An idyllic lie to forget the reality of the Vents.
Like the rest of the lies propping up the undercity, I can already see the fault lines forming in that illusion. The rattling morning metro, usually packed shoulder-to-shoulder with commuters, isn’t even half-full. When we disembark at a block just four layers from the crust, the streets greet us with drizzling unease. None of the normal slew of hovertransports, vibrant neon signs, sizzling labmeat and squawking electronic speakers. Storms brew on the surface; though this far down, we can only see echoes of the rain. Venters with acidproof hoods raised high dart between spouts of oily stormwater pouring down from the overcity. Breakfast joints on the towerside bristle not with activity, but furtive glances and hushed conversations. Their patrons watch us pass with furtive eyes, scraping silverware the loudest noise.
Unease suffocates the undercity like an invisible blanket. Even if the few people we pass don’t understand where it comes from, they too can feel that something is wrong. That primal warning of the tides pulling back before a tsunami hits.
Stream screens in closed storefronts flash electric-blue news programs over the grimy sidewalk. Clean suits, clean faces, clean studios blather through crackling speakers and cracked screens. I snort out loud when a live video of the Champion’s stoic visage comes on front and center of a screen. A firing line of floating stream cams bombard the old man with camera flashes as he heads through the two-story entrance of the Metro Blockhouse, the largest arena in the overcity. There’s calls for a comment on rumors of rising instability in the Vents, all ignored without a second glance. Cut to a morning press conference in a penthouse suite halfway across the Electric Town district; the Metro Blockhouse just the largest nail in the cityscape behind the interview. There, a uni-age girl wearing a slate grey dress shares coffee with a regal Mecha dressed in a designer suit patterned halfway between clerical robes and brutalist gunmetal fashion. Shimano Yor. Famed head of the Shimano industrial clan, a scalpel of a mogul who turned his clan’s failing company of autobike manufacturers from the Section’s rural villages into a corporation that now produces a third of the capital’s consumer electronics.
Yor’s no fighter- least, not that I’ve ever heard. Though he doesn’t need to be with the amount of pro fighters he keeps on retainer. Retired veterans from faraway Sections, up-and-comers sponsored with lucrative contracts that ensure they’ll never leave his pockets… rumor has it even a few members of the major league are on his payroll. Ulysses once called him the only man in the Section too rich for the Champion to make bow.
The golden horn of Yor’s helm shifts as he directs his next answer at the camera. “…inaction, as always, is Champion Fang’s modus operandi. While he allows the Venters to squabble amongst themselves, tens of millions of credits are squandered every hour. Civic infrastructure our taxes support are burned to the ground or coopted by undercity gangs. Power grids, medical relief, welfare and water treatment stations- who foots the bill? Certainly not the man with all the power to decide.” Two golden photoreceptors blink patiently out at me. “Yet again, the Champion’s laissez-faire management of the Vents undermines the validity of his centralist policies. He alone decides the course of our city’s future- the major league merely exists to bicker and voice dissent without meaning. The minor league is little more than a popularity contest to entertain the masses. Gladiocracy is a dated concept which has long passed its era of usefulness.” Aging metal fingertips caress a steaming cup of caf that rests in the Mecha’s lap. “To think, the right to rule our Section rests with a single warrior who has proven himself strongest over all. What a shame that it also belongs to the man who has proven himself weakest of conviction…”
“Yor’s a soulless ghoul, but he’s not wrong,” Lain says, eyeing the stream too. “Wonder what it’ll take for our wise leader to finally get off the throne.”
I snort and move on. “Hundred credits says he’ll put his foot down the moment trouble starts backflowing through his golden toilet. Not a second before.”
Two streets from the edge of the block, the Ibis glowers over a pedestrian-only zone like a domed clamshell, hunkered against the misty downpour. Wide stairs descend right into the open mouth of the building, funneling bettors and tourists right into the action. At night, I’m sure this place gets as rowdy as any underground. Mornings are a different story. Usually just a few local hotshots training their bodies in weight rooms and skills on a fighting square. And in dismal weather like this, where the halogen innards of the fight club are just barely visible through the rain, I doubt there’s a single person in the place.
Lain heads down without hesitation, knocking her knuckles against a strip of brass hastily welded over a crack in the low ceiling. Her voice rises in a tired shout. “Nab! You in?”
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
I run my eyes over the street one last time, checking for any signs of pursuers before following at a limp. All clear, just like we’ve been since leaving the Vector Seven block.
Matthias tries to reassure me from the other side. “No one’s tailing us. I’ve been keeping watch.”
“No offense, but I’ve heard that one before.” My borrowed clogs almost slip on the concrete, smoothed over by decades of runoff. I lower my voice to a level Lain won’t overhear without trying. “You missed their Iros back at the office. How did that happen?”
“She was concealing herself, just like I was.” Matthias suddenly finds something other than me to occupy his attention. “It’s hard to feel other Psis when you’re trying to hide from them. And she’s rather good at hiding herself.”
“You knew her.”
Matthias’ steps trickle to a halt. I hold up a hand before he can cook up a lie.
“Don’t… just don’t. She said your name right before Krey blew her arm off.”
He lets out a whistling sigh. “Can we talk about this later?”
“Not if it’s going to come back to bite us in the ass.” I push him onwards with a very firm hand to the back. “Is she going to be able to trace us?”
“Through me? No. You? I can’t be sure.” Side by side, we enter the long concrete passage that leads to the fight club’s front lobby, voices echoing along the barren, polished walls. “She was inside your head for almost a minute before I could intervene. There’s no telling what she might have seen about the summit. Do you remember any particular thoughts she was trawling through? Things she used to get you to capitulate?”
My mouth flattens into a hard line. “Ulysses. The summit didn’t come up, but he did.”
“I remember.” Matthias runs a thumb over his lips. “I used that name to jog your memory and give your mind something to latch onto, but the thought was already there. I don’t know how quickly they can debrief her, but once they do, I imagine they’ll target Ulysses next. If only to learn of your connection to him.”
“Great. I’ll add warning him to the list of things I have to do once we have a single second to breathe.”
“Are you sure that’s a good idea?”
His question sparks an instant, defensive rebuttal. “Why wouldn’t it be?”
Ahead, Lain waves an impatient arm at the two of us. “Get a move on, please. My patience is running short.” Narrows her eyes at me. “Not unlike something else in our party.”
The Ibis’ main lobby is a smooth-faced cave stained by decades of smoke, sweat, and bad bets. My nose wrinkles at the telltale reek of spilled alcohol as I enter. Low curved ceilings and muted halogen light color the space with an anthill complexion. Everything, and I mean everything, has a crack, ding, or dent in it. A dozen unused holostanchions are clustered near the front door. Between them and a ticket booth carved from raw concrete is a marinade of soiled rugs, scratch marks, polished stone, and vertical projector screens that splay flickering scorecards of the previous night’s matches; none of them worth the five-credit cost to watch. Place like this doesn’t see much good action. It’s for the up-and-comers and the down-and-outers.
I can’t tell if the greaser waiting near the counter is the former or the latter. Mid twenties, splotchy brown skin turned leathery by continuous exposure to the Vents’ corrosive atmosphere. Bushy black moustache, hairy arms, mud-colored eyes. A thickset martial artist, got that typical tape around his wrists. He smokes alone, a mop and bucket his only company. Dirty water, untouched for minutes, the early-morning uni stream spooling from his JOY a far more interesting waste of time.
His only response when I immediately start ripping off my waterlogged disguise right in the lobby is to raise a curious eyebrow in Lain’s direction. “Caco, Caco, Caco. How many times I have to tell you not to bring trouble in here? I almost got sent on an early retirement to the Abyss after that fleece we tried last month.”
“Just need a place to reset for a few hours,” Lain replies in her most soothing, late-night-healing voice. I recognize the tone immediately. Her bodysuit adds to the pile of my shoes and buttoned jacket. “In and out. You’re gonna be closed tonight, anyways.”
“Oh? Why’s that?” the greaser asks.
“This place is owned by the Anvil, right?” Jerking the tattered remains of my borrowed shirt over my head, I shake my hair out of its ruined braid and start stepping out of the skirt. “He’s going to be taking all his firepower to the Kwa-Hon block after dark. The Lighthouse. Unless you’re only good with a mop, I assume you’re going to be at that party too.”
Money-running eyes flick from the JOY stream down to me, noting the Venter pallor of my skin. “And who are you supposed to be?” he asks.
The 6-Teba’s holster slides from between my thighs back to the outside of my right leg. “Take a guess.”
Taking a slow drag on his lighter, the greaser dials down the volume on the stream. A flash of crimson hair I vaguely recognize darts across the projection before it minimizes to a corner of the display. “Firepower like that ain’t common in the Vents,” he says, inviting more.
When I don’t bother to respond, he shrugs and shifts back to Lain. “Place to rest, huh. That all?”
She nods. “Locker room, a chair in an office; we’re not in a picky mood.”
“We’ve been going nonstop for over twenty-four hours,” Matthias adds. “I’m fine, but Lain was shot twice and Mori is…” He waves to all of me, wincing when I halfheartedly flip him off. “…not doing well, to say the least. A few hours to lay low before the summit is all we ask. There won’t be trouble.”
The greaser lets out a heavy grunt. “Humor me. What exactly do I get out of helping you two again? Besides a spot for my head on the hitlist right beneath yours.”
“We’re doing this for the good of the Vents, man.”
“And I’m doing this,” he motions at the empty lobby, “for the good of ol’ Nabuna, rosado. Your girl’s last stunt put me in bad with the bossman. I’m on thin fucken ice right now.” Two thick fingers pinch together. “That thin.”
“Enough of this,” I growl. Fishing my JOY out of my pocket, I toss it across the lobby, straight into his half-closed hand. “Money talk loud enough for you?”
Nabuna’s eyes sparkle at the challenge. “Louder than patriotism.”
“Perfect.” Dumping my disguise in a trashbin, I stalk past him and start fishing through a gym bag of other stolen clothes. “There’s a couple k’s left in my account. Take ‘em for poker or whatever the hell else you gamble on. Just make sure you keep enough to buy us a ride tonight, ‘cause you’re our ticket there.”