"Heard y'all just finished up," Walker said.

"Yup. No casualties. On either side, in fact."

"Damn. I'm impressed, considering you were with 'em.”

I frowned. Was that what he thought of me? "I don't go around killing people for no reason, man."

"Right. Sure. I didn't mean nothin' by it." The sound of a match being struck came over the connection. "You're still in Sixth, right?"

"Yup."

"Great. When you get the chance, head to the pawn shop on 40th and Harrison. They got a dice game in the back there, and I want you to move our cut.”

"Me? Really?" It wasn't that I thought it was below me or anything. For what I got paid, I'd mop floors if he asked me to. "I kinda stand out, Walker. I don't want to get rolled."

"The ones who got rolled are our usual bagholders. Two of 'em, in fact. Someone figured out who they are and when they move. You're gonna go at a weird time, and you're a sight better in a fight than the people we were using. Maybe you can figure out who held our guys up."

Awesome. “So I'm bait."

"No, no, no! Never! Think of it as, uh, a reverse ambush. Yeah, like that." I rolled my eyes as he broke into a coughing fit. "F-fuckin off-brand cancer sticks," he muttered. "Anyway, once you hit the pawn place head down to Hyades and get Grayson's pull too. Then you can come meet me at the office."

"Wait, you have a freakin' office, Walker?"

"'Course I do," he said irritably. "Where else would I work out of? I'll be fucked if I bring work home."

I smiled. He was as easy to set off as I was, sometimes. "I don't know, man. I guess I thought you just lived at cheap restaurants and slept in your car."

"Oh, fuck off. The building's a few blocks down from Grayson's. Big brownstone on Ishimura, across from the Cage. Be careful, hear?"

"Gotcha. See you soon." I hung up and said a cursory goodbye to the crew. Gutierrez gave me a smile and a wave, Winky a firm nod. The other's responses ranged from friendly to ambivalent to outright cold. Didn't bother me any.

I went a block over to hit Harrison Street then turned north. My feet crunched on the gravelly sidewalk and the buzz of aging lifelight elements filled my ears like wool. Sixth was one of the worst parts of D-block, I thought. Not for the reasons you might think-Alba had worse living conditions, Valiant had more crime, Port Town was a bigger mess, and anywhere with light beat a dark zone. Sixth just seemed...dead. Or dying, at least, like an old man bedridden and wracked with pain for way too long. You could see it in the dark windows and crumbling facades of the buildings, in the pulverized streets, in the downturned faces    and hurried steps of the few people I saw. Everything that wasn't steeped in darkness seemed to be the same dusty gray. The Pall was thick today. Not a trace of sun above.

The pawn shop was where Walker said it would be. The sign was faded into yellow-white illegibility and the display windows were covered in scrap boards, but it was still obvious which building it was. As I pushed in the door I wondered how the owner would even know I was supposed to take the money, but it turned out Walker had called ahead and told him to wait for the tall girl. There weren't many people who could impersonate me.

The shop's owner, gray-haired and hawkish, handed me a soft-sided zipper bag full of chits almost as soon as I walked in. He stayed behind the counter. In the doorway behind him I saw a short woman of similar age, his wife I guessed, watching nervously. Figuring that he didn't want me staying long, I quietly thanked him and headed out.

Here was the moment of truth. It was true I was off-schedule, but if someone was watching the shop looking for bagmen I might still get jumped. I kept one hand on the money, the other on my gun, and my eyes on a swivel.

The attack, when it came, was almost a disappointment. I passed by the mouth of an alley made into a black portal by the shadows of the buildings beside it. I kept my awareness high and was rewarded when I heard a step behind me. I spun around, drawing my gun in a smooth motion as I did.

Rather than a Blue Division hit squad, I'd drawn down on some kind of derelict. He looked pretty typical, as his kind go: tangled beard, matted hair, ragged clothes colorless with dirt and grime. His only weapon was a quitl, a sort of improvised blade made by stretching a length of razor wire over a piece of wood. The fact that he couldn't afford a real knife in fucking D-block said a lot about this guy-as did the way he swayed back in slow-motion panic when he saw my gun, giggling all the while. Guy was a rattler through and through, wasted out of his head on hush.

"Drop it," I said, loud and slow. "Drop it or I'll kill you." The words took a few seconds to worm their way into his hazed brain, but he complied. As I understood it, hush was a cocktail of mood-boosters, painkillers, and psychiatric-grade dissociatives. It was the perfect drug for forgetting about a shitty situation. It also tended to make the users act like drunk children. I was lucky this guy had even understood what I said.

Was this who'd been shaking down the Bones's money movers, or was I just lucky enough to be the victim of a random mugging? Only one way to find out. If this guy had been stealing form the Bones, he certainly wasn't capable of doing so alone. I quickly stepped up, spun him around at the shoulder, and jammed the coilgun into the small of his back. "Walk," I told him, prodding him toward the alley.

I pulled out a flashlight and shone it over his shoulder as he walked. Only a few steps and the darkness was almost complete. My feet crunched on gravel, broken glass, old hush cans. The would-be mugger still hadn't said a word. He just kept giggling and if I thought he'd listen I'd tell him to stop. It was fucking eerie.

The alleyway ended in a right-hand turn. The derelict took it without any prompting and I followed a few feet behind.

"Kingshit, Larkey! You found 'em already?" called a voice. It was raspy, female, quavery with age or weakness. "Hurry up, let's get to Julian's and score-oh." That last little exclamation came when the speaker saw me, and I saw her.

She was a tiny woman, barely five feet and thin to the point of emaciation. She was huddled up against a dumpster and was in similar shape to her friend, which is to say a raggedy mess. I saw several of the thumb-size hush aerosols scattered around her. And based on what she said, it probably had been her and Larkey who'd hit the bagmen.

"You-you stay away from my husband!" She stammered out. "I don't know who you are, but-ack!" I shoved Larkey at her and he stumbled into the dumpster like a dumb animal before managing to slide down the wall and sit beside his...wife?

The woman only had to look at him a second. "Oh, Lark, you fuckup!" she hissed. "How fucking many?"   

Larkey held up a shaky hand, fingers splayed. "Fff..." he mumbled through a vacant smile. "Fffiii..."

"Five? Five? You really couldn't wait? Ugh..." The woman put a hand to her face, then jumped when I squatted down across from her. I made sure she could see the gun in my hand.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

"Is any of it left?" I asked quietly. "Or did you huff it all?"

"I-I-I don't know what you're-"

"Shut the fuck up. Don't lie to me." I stared her right in the eyes. Hers were milky-blue and bloodshot. "You think those two guys carried big bags of cash around for fun, you fucking junkie? You think they didn't have friends? Now tell me: Is there anything left?"

Her lip quivered. I could tell she was trying to think of another excuse. People like her were always full of them. But then the light went out of her eyes and she sighed. "No. It's all gone."

I wasn't surprised, but I was disappointed. What was I supposed to do with these people? Leave them alone and they'd probably keep doing this. The obvious answer was to kill them, of course, but I didn't really want to, more for my sake than theirs.

Something of my thoughts must have shown in my face. The woman spoke up again, talking fast and desperate. "I-I swear we didn't know they were made! Really! We're just trying to get by, you don't understand-"

"Oh, I fucking understand." I interrupted. Some people had sympathy for addicts, I knew. Saw them as victims of a disease. But on too many occasions I'd been hassled, stalked, catcalled, flashed, mugged, and robbed by mad or desperate junkies. Sawada's shop had been held up and burgled multiple times. What sympathy had been there had dried up long ago. Way I saw it, no matter what had happened since, you were still the one to stick the needle in your arm the first time, you were the one to pop the seal on that aerosol. Play dumbshit games, win dumbshit prizes. So suffice to say I was not eager to hear out the lady mugger's sob story.

"What you don't understand is how lucky you are. Anyone else would have just shot you by now, get it? Do you?" She nodded frantically. "I'm not going to shoot you. You aren't fucking worth the ammo. What you're going to to instead is get the fuck out of here. You're going to find a new shitheap to squat in, and you're never going to fuck with the Holy Bones again. Do you understand?"

"Yes," she whispered. Larkey leaned his head on her shoulder, drooling a little. Five cans. He looked like a stroke victim.

I stood up and fixed the lady with another glare. "I'll be here again soon. You shouldn't be." I turned on my heel and left them in the dark.

"You...you know, you're worse than we could ever be, tva!" yelled the woman, her voice cracking. "You gangsters, stealing from everyone and selling it back to us, walking around here like you're Admin...you're the real thieves!"

It was the impotent comeback of a homeless drug addict.It should have rolled right off my shoulders. But for whatever reason, when she said that I was mad all of a sudden, just white-hot pissed. Almost before I knew it, I was back over there with her neck in my fist. I shoved her against the wall, her feet not touching the ground.

"Last I checked I don't mug people trying to make a less dishonest living," I growled out through gritted teeth. Her face was inches from mine, eyes wide and rolling. She was so skinny and wasted I hardly noticed her struggles. "Last I checked I don't sit in the trash while my husband melts his brain on hush. Last I fucking checked-" Words failed me. Gods but I was fucking angry. How dare she call me out like this? I ought to just kill her, I thought. Squeezing a little harder is all it would take. No one would miss her but the husband, and he was already right here. Just take both out and save someone else the trouble-

Wait. What was I thinking? That wasn't something I would do, was it? Not for no reason. I looked down at the woman I was choking and it was like a filter swept over my vision. Suddenly I realized she wasn't my enemy. She was a person, just someone else who'd made some mistakes. Whatever her fuckups, she didn't need to die. I jerked my hand away from her neck like it was white-hot.

She slid back to the floor, coughing and hacking but definitely alive. Hubby looked at her with distant concern, gave her a slow pat on the back. "Just get out of here," I said shakily. "The next one they send'll make me look like a Penitent." I left fast as I could, needing to get away.

I was distracted most of the walk down to Grayson's. Another mugger could have come up to me and I wouldn't have noticed until his gun was poking me in the eye. I felt...well, guilty wasn't the right word about what I'd done and almost done. There was just this hollow feeling. An absence. I poked at it as the tongue does a broken tooth, but there was no real change. Only a creeping, uneasy feeling, distress at my lack of distress. I guess in richer Blocks they had shrinks, people who you could unload on and complain to for a few hundred denars an hour. Nothing like that in D, though, and it sounded kind of fishy to me anyway. I would just have to get over it and be careful in the future. I definitely wasn't right in the head.

I got a second lunch from a frybread stand on my way, which made me feel a little better. It was a golden-brown lump of dough, sizzling-hot and filled with ground meat and chopped bell peppers from somebody's rooftop garden. By the time I finished it I was on Boulevard of the Hyades proper. Place was clean and well-lit as ever, the lifelights throwing off so much healthy blue-white radiance it was like being in a Sun Age movie.

Grayson's was like I remembered it inside, spacious and well lit. The wood floor creaked as I passed between shelves full of milsurp ration packs, homebrewed beer, pale fruits grown in basement hydroponics labs and plenty of other foods. The clerk at the counter was a smallish guy I didn't recognize, but he evidently recognized me. After the usual wide-eyed glance at my height, he pointed upstairs and told me "Mr. Grayson's waiting for you."

I nodded thanks and turned to the stairs. It was nice to come here under better circumstances than last time. But then I saw Rudshila, the kid who'd been clerking when I'd come to kill the Blues. He was stocking shelves. I gave him a tentative wave and while he returned it, he looked terrified, and scurried away before I could call out. With my mood thusly damped down, I went up the stairs.

The tile-playing machine was chattering away to itself as it had been before. Two men and a woman were playing against it, and by their expressions it was winning. The elder Grayson sat in the same overstuffed chair as before, wearing slacks and a rumpled button-down. This time, he was awake. When he saw me he reached beneath the chair and pulled out a fat envelope.

"Here you are," he said, meeting my eyes. His own were deep-set, very pale.

"Thanks." I took the envelope, but he didn't let go.

"No, thank you. For the quick work during your last visit."

He seemed sincere. "Uh, sure," I answered uncomfortably.

"We are loyal," the old man said firmly. He finally let me take the money. "Always loyal."

"I...I'll let my boss know. Have a good evening." This was awkward and I wanted to leave.

"You as well." He nodded and slouched back down, fingers laced over his belly. I stomped down the stairs and left the store.

Walker's office building wasn't hard to find. It was across the street from the Cage, a huge latticed antenna structure that stood a few hundred feet high. It was vaguely box-shaped and made of thin metal bars, hence the name. Whatever it’d been built for, it hadn’t done it in a long time, but somehow no one had ever cut it up for scrap. Bad things were supposed to happen to people who tried.

Opposite the Cage, Walker’s place stood between a half-finished concrete structure and the burned-out carcass of a similar house. Once it had been beautiful, I'm sure: four stories with a peaked roof, the walls studded with panels of abstract engraving and carved windowsills. A couple hundred years of smog had done their work on it, and most of its rich brownstone was streaked black as a rotten tooth now. The crisp corners and moldings had been eaten away by acid rain, giving it a half-melted look. The door was a great slab of wood turned black and hard as iron by time, guarded by a steel grate and an intercom.

I punched the button. "Uh, Sharkie here for Walker," I said.

"Sharkie, is it?" answered a woman's voice.

Kingsdammit. "I'm also called Sawyer."

"Ah, Sawyer. Come right in." The magbolts on the gate clanked open and I went through, finding myself in a small foyer area. It was nicer than outside, at least. While the wood-paneled floor and wainscoting were dark, the pale paint on the walls and the warm light of incandescent sconces balanced them out. Ahead to my left was a flight of stairs. To my right was a hallway, in which stood a woman. She was five-eight or so, trimly built, in her forties or fifties. She wore a long, dark skirt and white blouse, like many of the fruitsellers on Solarium Street did. Her eyes were sharp, her expression no-nonsense. Her skin had the pallor of many hours spent indoors. Black hair streaked with gray framed it, pulled into a tight bun. She was looking at me over a pair of steel-framed glasses, her gray eyes making a calm appraisal. She reminded me of what a schoolteacher was supposed to be like. She hadn't reacted to my size at all.

"So is it Sawyer or Sharkie?" she asked. It was the same voice I'd heard over the intercom.

I watched her for a moment. It seemed to be a genuine question, not mockery. "Either works."

"But which would you prefer?"

"Sharkie's better." I could be tough and say I liked the gang name better. But I honestly didn't, and I had nothing to prove to this lady, whoever she was.

She watched me right back, then nodded. "Alright then, Sharkie. I hope you'll pardon my rudeness. I am Rouenn Sanverth."