I jogged back to Walker's car, wanting to get on the road quickly. My side was hurting for real now, throbbing with every step. Bitching wouldn't make it hurt less, though, a doctor would. So I kept moving.

Just as he'd said, he was still talking on the slab. When I tapped on the window, he jumped like a startled cat, his gun mostly out of its holster before he parsed that it was me. He popped the locks and opened the door.

"Uh-huh. Uh-huh. No, fuck no," he was saying. "Well, you just remind him who signs his checks. I got to go. Yeah, luck to you too." He hung up and looked at me, a burner hanging from his lips. "Girl, you are a mess. And you stink."

"Terribly sorry, sir," I said, affecting a butler. "Next time I'm off killing people for you, I'll be sure to stay clean." I winced as I lowered myself into the seat. "And not get shot."

"W-wait, you're hit?" There was real worry on his face; I was kind of touched.

"I got it bound up. I'll be fine for now. Just winged me anyway." I shifted around uncomfortably. "I'll try not to bleed on your seats."

He looked dubious. "If you say so. You gonna need a doc?"

I nodded. "This is gonna take stitches, I think."

"I know just the place." He threw the vic into reverse, whipped into a vicious J-turn, then peeled out of the lot, tires throwing gravel everywhere. "So what the hell happened? You get 'em all?"

"Er, no and yes?"

He gave me a suspicious look, brow furrowed. "An' what's that mean?""

I explained what had happened, including the fact that I'd left Tosh tied up instead of dead.

"So," he huffed. "You decided to leave one alive." He sounded like a parent trying their hardest not to yell. "Why, exactly, did you think that was a good idea when I told you to kill all of 'em?"

I was bleeding, smelled of secondhand urine, and the smoke in here was giving me a headache. All of these things combined put me in a rather irritable state.

"What the hell happened to "psychological warfare," Walker?" I snapped. "This guy's gonna be terrified of us now! He'll tell his friends what happened and they'll be scared too. And leaving him alive is a power move. It's a flex, like, 'We're so tough we don't even have to kill your guys to fuck them up."

He was silent for a moment or two before replying, his eyes on the road. "While I didn't tell you to do any of that"-I inhaled to protest and he quickly talked over me-"fact is I didn't say not to. Your logic is sound, Sharkie. I might have even done something similar, if it'd been me." I sat back, mollified, and Walker flashed a pained smile. "Just...ask, in the future?"

"Uh, sure, Walker. I didn't mean to step on your toes or anything, it just seemed like a good idea."

"No, it was, it was." He sighed. "Kind of my fault too. Some people like to have all the info, some people just want to be told exactly what to do. I'm used to dealin' with the latter, but you just might be the former."

"Definitely." I hated being in the dark.

"You know, there is one other thing you messed up."

I turned to face him, tense. "What?"

He looked over and grinned, lights flowing liquid over his mirrored glasses. "You never asked what you were gonna get paid."

My face pulled into an involuntary grimace. "Walker, please don't screw with me. I'm gunshot, bloody, covered in-"

"Eight thou sound good? Five for the work, one for hazard, one for takin' some initiative with that captive, and one more for tellin' me how in the hell you got covered in piss!" He cackled.

Eight thousand was more than okay, though of course he had to be annoying about it. "That-that'll be fine, I guess."

"Alright! Spill. Just not on me!" He laughed hard enough I thought he was going to jerk us into the oncoming lane.

"Walker-"

"You know, it's okay if you wet yourself. Happens to the best of us-"

I threw my hands up high as I could within the confines of the car. "Walker, it's all over my front! Maybe you never saw a girl naked, but I promise that's not how we work. It's someone else's-and don't you fucking dare!" I quickly added, because an idiot could tell he was about to 'comment' on that last part. I explained about Tosh and the fateful puddle quickly as I could.

"Wait, so he woke up and crawled into it?" he asked when I was done. "Sheeit. Guy's havin' a worse day than we are."

I thought about it. "You know, you're absolutely right."

"No need to sound so surprised."

We spent the next few minutes in companionable silence. Walker's mood seemed to have improved a bit. I watched out the window, looking at acid-scarred buildings and cars and the bobbing lights of people out in the darker areas. Once we crested a hill, and across the ruins of a burned-out tenement I saw the highrises of Vitroix, their pointed shapes piercing the black sky like light-streaked quills.

After a bit of that I turned back to Walker. "Did your phone call mess go okay?"

"Meeting's set for tonight." He shot through a yellow light and swung the car left onto Gramarye Avenue, heading towards the center of D-block. "Which is not to say it was at all enjoyable. "S'like herding cats, except the cats are also toddlers fightin' over a toy. With guns."

"Toddlers with guns. That's who we work for?"

"Naw, you're lucky enough to work for me." He laughed. "I work for the toddlers. Still beats getting shot though," he finished, eyeing me.

I was more interested in the first part. "What's your job in the Bones, anyway? Are you some kind of big boss, or..." I trailed off.

"Okay. So. How it usually works is a soldier like you works for an underboss." He cracked the window long enough to toss his cig. "Underboss works for a bigger boss, who himself has a boss, and maybe that guy even has another boss. Above them are the Runes who're really big bosses, and then Moses, who's the biggest boss of 'em all."

"Plenty of bosses to go around," I muttered, fidgeting around in my seat.

He must have heard me. "I can't keep 'em all straight either. Don't worry about it. What's unusual about you, pard, is that you work directly for me. Along with Monta and a few others, of course."

"So you aren't an underboss."

He chuckled as we pulled up to a red light. "Not for a while. I'm one of the Runes. Naudis, to be exact. See there on my wrist?" He showed me his inked-up hand. Along with the skeletal lines and a smattering of other weird letters, there was a rune on his wrist like a line with a slash through it.

He just showed it off like like that? I’d think that would make him a target, but maybe it was more of a warning. More importantly, he was apparently one of the Holy Bones' top guys, and I worked directly under him. Did that make me a target?

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"Why are you driving me around, then? Shouldn't you be...I dunno, sipping wine in a hot tub somewhere?"

Walker eyed me sidelong. "Maybe you're right. I'll letcha out here and go find me a bathouse, then?"

I grimaced. "Rather you didn't."

"Fine, then." The light turned and he hung a right onto Old Pumphouse Street, then an almost immediate left onto Hsieh. "I'm not like most of the other Runes. They're either big bosses, running whole networks, or they're just real scary shooters like Raido or Yera. I'm...in between. I solve problems. Troubleshootin', in the sense that I find the trouble and have it shot." He winked, silver teeth flashing in the bars of light flickering through the car windows.

"Charming..." I murmured. This was a lot to think about. This was a risky job, and rather than wade in slowly I'd dived headfirst. It was likely people would try to get to Walker through me. Even being associated with him was fraught with danger. I'd just have to deal with it. Sharks had supposedly been predatory fish, after all.

The fact that I couldn't swim kind of ruined the metaphor, but whatever.

"Alright, here's the medico. Let's get you patched up." We'd parked on a section of Hsieh Street full of dance clubs, geisha houses, host bars, by-the-hour hotels and brothels. There was good lighting here, but the soft glow of the lifelights was drowned out by the riotous, eye-aching mess of bright-colored neon, LEDs, LCDs, plasmagrams, and holograms. They flashed the names of clubs, touted liquor and drugs, listed services offered euphemistically or otherwise. Some showed animations of technicolor men and women in varying states of undress but of almost universal attractiveness, flashing as they performed looped bows and simpers and dances over and over again. It wasn't even two in the afternoon and the place was hopping in D-block's everlasting gloom. I saw the clasped-hands sign of the Guild everywhere.

That piqued my interest. "The Guild-agh!-won't mind you showing up here?" I asked Walker as I got out. He rushed to help me, grabbing my hand with both of his own and pulling me out of the car.

"Whoo!" he exclaimed, hands on his hips. "That's two you owe me! But to answer your question, no. Guilders won't bother us."

"Even in the middle of a war?"

Walker snorted. "Ain't their war, is it? As long as we don't fuck with 'em and stay out of prostitution and the like, well, us 'n' the Blues could have a gun battle in the middle of the street and they wouldn't bat an eye. Not this street, maybe, but you know what I mean."

That jived with what I knew. Blue Division and the Holy Bones had their fingers in every pie, tart, and pastry you could imagine except for sex work. The Guild, conversely, dealt with that industry and its ancillaries almost exclusively, though from what I'd heard it was run more like an organization of workers than a gang. Maybe that was what the 'labor unions' that showed up in some of Sawada's ancient books were.

"Is it true what they say about the Guild?" I said as Walker led us down the street, his heavy leather jacket like armor for pushing through the crowd. We passed an odd blend of people. Drugged-up revelers dressed in their best (or worst) and out for a night (or afternoon) on the town mixed with workers just trying to get home, smelling of hot iron, or recycling chemicals, or the goonfish farms.

"They say a lot of things." He took us down a side street, the air warm and humid in its close confines. I followed, keeping one hand pressed on my wounded side. Tiny hole-in-the-wall bars vied with drug kiosks and always-open noodle stalls. I smelled frying fish and my stomach rumbled. Probably better to get my gunshot wound fixed before I ate, though.

"What they say about what the Guild does to pimps, I mean."

"Little miss, whatever you've heard probably ain't the half of it. The things they do to traffickers make your work look like kittens havin' a tea party. They got some real scary ladies 'n' gents on the payroll." He glanced back at me, looking serious. "In fact, there's my latest peice of unsolicited advice: Work with the Guild. Make friends with the Guild. But never fuck with the Guild. They are capital-letters Bad News when they're pissed."

Wow. That was pretty unequivocal, especially considering Walker's position. "That's pretty serious, coming from you," I replied. "I'll take it to heart."

"Do that. I've seen some shit." He paused. "Wait, does that mean you weren't listening to any of the other ones?"

I couldn't help grinning. "I listened plenty."

"You didn't go get another gun like I said you should," he wheedled.

I stopped briefly to keep from being tripped by a veritable torrent of stray cats headed to parts unknown. "I was sleeping until I got your call, man! And where do you think I'm going after this doc tunes me up, anyway?"

"Gonna go see your friend Tannnnnje, huh?" he teased as we got moving again.

"Yes. Shut up. Are we almost there?"

"Just a minute or two more." He led us through several more ninety-degree bends and zigzags, the alley so narrow even a kei truck would be scraping its mirrors. Most of the light came from ads and signs, the lifelights not able to reach down the canyon of buildings. "Alrighty! Here we are."

I gave the place a dubious once-over. The three-story conplas building was stuck between a pho shop and a gomi kiosk selling fake jewelry and shitty specs. The walls were painted edge-to-edge with graffiti, and there was a big holographic sign above the door, burning with rainbow colors like an oilslick. "DOC LAGGARD'S TRVE KVLT TRAUM-N-BASS: COME FOR THE STITCHEZ, STAY FOR THE SOUNDZ." It was accompanied by an image of a little cartoon guy in a labcoat going virtuoso on a DJ console. Music pumped out of big speakers at either end of the sign, a lightning-fast breakbeat that made me want to go buy a car and drive it with the throttle pinned. Overall, it wasn't exactly the image of medical professionalism.

My impression must have shown on my face, for Walker rolled his eyes at me. "Not up to your exacting standards? Hold up, I'll get Vitroix Med on the slab and have 'em send a bird for you."

I just shook my head. "Is it cool to go in?"

"Place is open, ain't it?"

It sure seemed to be. I went through the door, Walker following. The interior was tiny and dim, mostly illuminated by blacklights. Shelves full of metal-doped plastic datasplinters lined the walls, probably full of music-though why you'd bother with hard copies when the net existed was a mystery. More speakers filled the corners and hung from the ceiling. There was a very small counter next to the door, behind which a bored-looking young woman sat reading a smearily-printed pirate broadsheet. Her head was shaved, and the starkly abstract tattoos lining her scalp and cheeks flouresced orange and blue beneath the blacklights.

Walker went up to her and shouted to be heard over the music. "Is the doctor in?"

"He's home sick," she said without looking. Then she did actually look, and raised an eyebrow. "Sorry, I didn't realize it was you. Lag's downstairs, I'll buzz you through."

"Thanks much." He left a chit on the counter for her and headed for a door in the far wall. The girl looked at me warily as I followed. I met her eyes, almost as apprehensive.

The door was unlocked for us with the bzzclack of magbolts. I was almost blinded by the cool white flourescents on the other side. We were at the top of a bare concrete stairwell, now, though there were plenty of names and shapes and abstract designs spraybombed on the walls. The door shut behind me, though I could still hear that driving, speedy music.

"Don't worry about all the clubby shit. Doc Laggard's a good sort," said Walker as we went down the stairs. "Knows his stuff. He's zipped me back up a few times, that's for sure. He stitches straighter when he's sober, that's for sure!" He laughed. I didn't.

We only went down one floor's worth, our bootheels echoing on the concrete. At the bottom was a flip-flappy door, the kind that led into either a surgery or a kitchen. Walker blew through it without even slowing down, shouting "What's up, Doc?"

The basement was just as tiny as the store above, though it was done in wall-to-wall white conplas and was so bright my eyes ached. A white bench occupied the center of the room, white cabinets lined one wall, and white speakers in the ceiling corners pumped out the same music as above. Sitting in a white chair, bobbing his head and muttering sound effects to the beat, was Doc Laggard.

He didn't seem at all offended by Walker's entrance, standing up with a big white grin. "Walker, man! You look dead on your feet! Am I gonna be cutting you up for parts?" The two men clasped hands like old friends, and I was struck by how different they looked. The Doc was in baggy cargo pants and a pristine white labcoat, his chest bare beneath it. He stood over six feet, with a willowy frame and smooth skin the color of caff with a few creams put in. His face was boyish, his hair dyed dark green and done up in one of those stupid styles that's been carefully designed to look messy but not too messy. Beneath his bangs, dark eyes sparkled with either mischief or a solid dose of uppers.

Walker chuckled and shook his head. "Naw, man. I'm still movin' for now. Feels like I could sleep for about a year and half, but still movin'." He gestured back at me as I stepped fully into the room. "We're actually here 'cause my associate decided to stand in front of a bullet."

The Doc seemed to notice me for the first time. His eyes went wide and he smiled even wider. "Holy shit!" he yelled over the music. "You look awesome!"

"Uh, thank you?" I wasn't sure I agreed, considering the half of me that wasn't covered in blood was covered in urine, but whatever. I liked it. Definitely beat the hell out of 'You're tall!' or 'Did you get here in the back of a bulk hauler?'

"You're welcome!" He stuck out his hand. "I'm Doc Laggard. Doc or Lag or Gard is fine. I'll know who you mean."

I took it and shook warily. "Nice to meet you, Doc. I'm Sharkie."

"A pleasure, Sharkie! Now hop on the bench so I can get you tacked up."