THE ORANGE looms before me.
Swallowed by the pulsing citrine ambiance of the brothels, I cross a barren pedestrian bridge with Matthias at my side, taking in the full scope of Dynasty’s redlight district from closer than ever before. Though we enter far from the main thoroughfares, even in a little-trafficked corner of the block, the architecture looks like it was ripped straight from a village playwright’s dream. The depth of detail is staggering. Each pixel has a purpose. From the artificial flora with petals that gradient across every shade of red-orange-pink to the creaking rickshaws, the faint erhu strings that always seems to be twanging from just a little further away, the dirt roads, the wood-and-paper buildings that cunningly conceal the deeper towers built directly into the superstructure of the undercity, the lithe slaves in their sheer silks and the glowering enforcers draped in traditional robes… every piece builds into the liar’s handshake that the Orange’s patrons willingly partake of. Even the ones who don’t go past the electroclubs for the squeamish.
It’s so sickeningly clean. So perfectly sterilized from the hell that surrounds it, like a flower grown in a lab. An ungodly amount of technology and Elementals work constantly to purify the air of smog and humidity. Crisp, cool wind ferries untraceable pheromones in an undulating cycle around the block to loosen inhibitions. There’s no trash. No homeless. No gangs. No crime. Not a brick out of place. An illusion, a lie, the predatory dream of a monster that feeds on such things. You’ll never see the cracks from the outside. Never know what it takes to make a place like this turn a profit. And I’ve come to kill the singular vision that drives it.
I can’t help but swallow in apprehension.
Krey’s first salvo ignites on the undercity horizon as Matthias and I arrive at our first real checkpoint. The enforcers manning the outer bridges didn’t do more than ogle when they thought we weren’t looking. Those who wait past the electroclubs have better things to worry about than rigorously checking our IDs. I summon up everything I remember from my encounter with the Iros in the Vector Seven tower as I suffer their attention. If I could do to them what she did to me, how would I be acting? Probably not giving two shits about these mooks. It checks out.
The enforcers take one look at my false pink eyes, stiffen, let the Iros’ clearance go through, then nervously shuffle to the side. It doesn’t matter that I’m about a foot and a half shorter than some of them, half naked while they’re fully armed. Just the threat that I could turn them into a gibbering mess without even looking at them is enough to keep them in line. We’re past the checkpoint and heading down the main dirt thoroughfare in moments. Paper-walled brothels lit with orange and red lanterns line the way on either side. Only a few tired silhouettes drift through them in the early hour. One is hunched over and crying silently. Another drifts out of a floral-themed den to join her coworkers under the wooden awning for a smoke.
Their eyes meet mine as I pad along. I glance away quick, realizing I’m staring. But they’re quicker. The closest to the street, a girl who can’t be older than I am, brushes a length of silver hair behind her ear and mutters a cover for the others.
“Forgiveness, please.”
I’m about to reply when I feel an iron pressure around my arm, a careful tug from Matthias. “Leave it. You’re an Iros,” he whispers.
I bite down on my tongue, folding my arms under my chest. Wait for us to get out of earshot and a good distance closer to the Orange’s central concrete tower, shaped like a geometric hourglass, before I speak up.
“Do Iros not talk to the others?”
He makes a furtive glance in both directions before replying. “They’re the chosen elite. Not just because they’re good at getting peoples’ jollies off, but because they volunteered for a selective process and advanced training to become spies. They don’t have contracts like the rest of us. They’re… devoted, to the syndicate. It’s a path to power for them. One they see the others as too weak to attain for themselves.”
“They started in the same place, though.”
“The Orange twists us all.” Matthias quietly shakes his head. “You see the Iros walking free while you’re forced to serve patron after patron, and you loathe them, but you would do anything to escape this life. Even if it means becoming one of them. They have the power to change their fate. The power to rule themselves. And when you acquire that kind of strength, it’s all too easy to look down at those who were too weak to acquire it for themselves. See them as something lesser, simply because they could not do what you could and they envy you for it.” He shrugs, fixes an earring. “Some, I imagine, were just born cruel. One doesn’t climb the Dynasty rung unless they have a certain capacity for evil.”
“Says a lot about the Vents that they’re allowed to exist so openly.”
“That’s why we’re here. Isn’t it?”
“Speaking of, that checkpoint was awfully easy.”
“Because I’ve been doing my job. Tricky balance, smoothing things out like that. Anyone can notice if you’re applying pressure to their mind, even if they don’t have a JOY on. Working unnoticed takes an extremely light touch and a convenient distraction.”
Another explosion rumbles somewhere far higher in the Vents, smearing a chasm between the bridges with waves of firelight. I pick up the pace. “Let’s not waste ours.”
“Couldn’t agree more,” Lain drawls in our ears. “Central tower is where you’re headed. Stay away from the high traffic areas. Should be a couple passages between the tower and the docks, next intersection. Cut down the alley and hang a right.”
We do, leaving the illusion behind and reentering concrete reality. Grey walls of acid-resistant stone rise to bracket my vision as we draw closer to the tower. I’ve been inside once before, though a haze of Shatter covers my memories of the night. I feel naked now without my gun. Several times I catch myself reaching down unconsciously, searching for the reassurance of its grip.
At the end of the alley, a squeaky-clean holopad accepts the Iros’ digital signature at a tap from my JOY. Green light, faint click, Matthias releases a breath I didn’t realize he was holding as he opens the door for me and dutifully falls in behind. I narrowly resist the urge to mention it.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
A cold chill of familiarity settles between my shoulder blades as my wooden sandals clack down against polished wood instead of concrete. I sink into the zen state Sarah drilled into me. Catalog every second as a singular instance of information. Again, the Orange morphs in presentation as it insulates us from the grime of the undercity. The outer shell of village culture is for anyone who can afford a night of entertainment. Only patrons who offer more than money see these halls. They’re tight and efficient, like everything in the Vents. Dynasty renovated the look, not the size. Hooded lamps and tech-torches glow pale orange at regular intervals. Plush wine-colored carpet covers vast stretches of the wooden passages. Gold trim, lacquer, authentic grains. I have to wonder how many millions of credits they poured into this place. Billions, even.
Room after room of private chambers sprawls on either side. Some ludicrously massive, others intimately confined, others like any you’d see in a corporation skyscraper. Scantily clad servants wearing silk robes or nothing at all slip out of doors and drift between the chambers at regular intervals. While they work, the main body of the enforcers is out fighting Krey- or more likely, recovering from the battle that still has to be waging in the Kwa-Hon.
My disguise passes muster at what few encounters we have with servants on our way to a reclusive bank of lifts that our maps told us was at the rear of the tower. We’re only on the ground floor. Sarah’s best guess put the Executor’s private quarters somewhere on the sixth story, north-facing wing. Lain keeps her commentary to a minimum, calling out our turns only a few seconds in advance until interference from the tower’s insulation is obliterating almost all her words.
“…Almost there… next is a right and twenty meters up.” she’s saying, as we pass through a dimly lit lounge for the enforcers. A subtle heartbeat of music pulses along the walls to match rhythm-synced lights. My eyes stray to the sunken pits we walk between. Most are filled with passed out drunks. Surly men, strong-bodied women, and naked slaves who attend them in the shadows. Hands caress and slip inside clothing. A hugely powerful Duelist, woman’s got a back as broad as a warehouse, has two girls working on her at once.
I glance away from the shifting flesh as the lounge’s other entrance slides open in front of me. Motion triggered, two hunched enforcers in greased combat gear passing through the hall on the other side, Dynasty-colored robes only thrown over top as a perfunctory measure. Dozens of meters of seamless glass stretch along the far side of the hall, looking out over the Abyss-black chasm separating the Orange from its southern neighbor. For a moment, I’m worried they’ll recognize my stature, my hair. But I’m not that infamous.
One of the enforcers, dark ponytail and dead tired, glances through the open doorway as we stride through and dips his head in deference.
“Long night, ma’am. You been out in it?”
Matthias and I exchange a glance as we fall in beside them. “The Kwa-Hon,” is all I say, tilting my head to the side.
The second enforcer grunts an affirmation. “Just came back ourselves. Heard tell those bloody gangsters made a mess of it up in the Lighthouse.”
I swallow my surprise when they come with us towards the lifts and move to key for a ride. Again, I look to Matthias for confirmation. Absolutely no help there. His eyes have lost their narrowed cool. He grimaces in uncertainty and motions with a tiny kick of his foot for me to follow them. The doors gasp open on perfectly oiled hydraulics a moment later.
We file into the glass-walled tube together. First enforcer pushes the button for the fourth floor with a closed fist.
“Detention level,” Matthias notes.
“Aye. They’re calling for fresh bodies on the streets; we drew the short straw.”
“Much rather be in a bunk than managing prisoner intake,” his companion yawns. He jolts back awake as the first one elbows him with a scowl. “Sorry. Where are you headed, ma’am?”
“Sixth floor. What prisoner intake?” I ask.
“That scuffle at the casino. ‘Parently the Armiger brought back one of their bigshot fighters for the Executor. She does like her collections.”
Wide-eyed, Matthias mouths a single word at me. Volt.
“No,” Lain snaps through the comm. “No. Mori, no. We’re not squabbing our plan over one merc. Stick to the plan.” Her voice spikes when I refuse to respond. “Stick to the fucking plan, Mori!”
I shut off the comm. “Matthias, get me another route.”
The first enforcer tilts his head to the side, hand stalling over the button for the sixth floor. His mouth opens to ask a confused question. But no words come out. Just a sick groan as I walk up and smash my palm into the side of his jaw hard enough to short-circuit his brain. I’m shit with the class, so I have to rely on the JOY’s training wheels to guide the strike. It hits him like an off-center sledgehammer. Not exactly accurate, but it doesn’t have to be.
The impact of bone against bone explodes through my entire arm like an ice snap. For a moment, I’m actually worried I broke my hand. I strip the pulse pistol off the guy’s belt as he falls and whirl around to put the other enforcer squarely in the irons a fraction of a second later. This, I am not shit with. And he can tell.
“What are you-”
“Where’s the Armiger?” When he doesn’t instantly answer, my thumb flicks up and hits the safety in a perfectly fluid motion. The pistol’s charge starts priming with an evil whine. His eyes widen. “Talk or die.”
The enforcer’s hands fly up, palms empty. Can’t tell his affinities from a glance. No obvious weapons. But I know he’s trying something. I would.
“He’s around,” the man says. “Somewhere. Fuck if I know, I’m not his keeper.”
A pleasant ding rings from the lift as we pass another floor. My foot starts tapping impatiently. “How many are guarding the cellblock?”
“Whatever you’re trying, girl, it ain’t going to end well. You know what we do to runaways?”
One magnetically-powered bullet would blow out the glass wall. I can’t risk triggering an alarm, so I use my third finger to pull the pistol’s auxiliary trigger, drilling the enforcer center-mass with an electrolytic round. He shudders, convulses, and collapses.
“I don’t remember asking.”
For good measure, I put two more rounds into each of them.
Matthias skips over the bodies and crouches beside the lift’s control pad. “We’re lucky they didn’t hit the sixth. I’ll work on finding us another way up.” Another chime emanates from the lift. Flinching at something he hears through the comm, he reaches up and mutes it, leaving Lain only able to watch our progress. “What are we doing, Mori? Lain isn’t heartless, she has a point. I’m with you, don’t get me wrong. But why risk our cover to get Volt? He’s a professional. He wouldn’t do the same for us.”
I eject the pulse pistol’s mag, check the rounds, and slot it back in. “Ever wonder if that’s the reason Dynasty is winning? Everyone wants to be a survivor.”
“Because thankfulness doesn’t pay the bills, and heroes tend to be the ones who die first.”
“Which is exactly what’s going to happen to us, unless we have a diversion for our way out.” Moving beside the door, I count my heartbeats as the lift begins to slow. Behind, a darkened slice of the Vents drifts downwards behind a raindrop backsplash. “Luckily for us, your old pal just volunteered.”