When I arrived on the outskirts of Aythryn City and felt the drops of rain, I thought it was a dream. When I pulled into Little Yukoto with all its familiar oriental decor and scattered neon in Ukiyonese, I realized it was a miracle. When I arrived home, I finally awoke from my stupor.

My home was an odd place, of which there was no doubt. I lived in the Ryu Container Yard. It was a massive shipping yard full of cargo containers. Once upon a time, it had been right on the shores of the ocean. Now with the recession of the water levels? It was a stranded port that eventually became devoured by the city as ‘progress’ inevitably moved closer to the waterside, wrapping around the rusting yard.

As the population rose, and with a sudden surplus of abandoned cargo containers, the place had been turned into a small town of its own for the ‘good’ people of Aythryn City. The containers were stacked on top of each other, each one forming the container town with varied bits of shops and homes slapped together with, of course, neon acting like glue. Seriously, for however much neon was in the city, it's a surprise it wasn’t named Neon City, or just Neon for that matter.

Anyway, the Ryu Container Yard was just one of the many sub-districts throughout the ‘great’ city. It was dingy. It was trashy. It reeked of cheap Tosta and even cheaper cigarettes. And yet it was home.

I rode into the long blocks of the yard, occasionally broken up by what used to be freight warehouses. All around the yard sat the rest of the city, dominating the skyline with their abusive lights just as my wrist abusively screamed in agony. The cargo town was in the middle of the north side of the city, with the megabuildings edging ever further in from Downtown.

People were out and about, chilling outside the container shops and stores as they enjoyed life. Most of them were busy cracking open a cold one, a box of smokes, drugs of some type, or all three. The glares and stares of paranoia were just another reminder I had arrived back home, as if the trash and stench weren’t enough.

The overall color of the Ryu Container Yard was quite overwhelming, with colors rapidly changing from one crate to another, all illuminated by the neon advertisements that permeated the city. The street lamps and bits of neon helped light the place up, but the ever-present bioluminescent graffiti was the true star of the show.

I pulled in front of one of the crates, parking my bike as I grabbed the briefcase with my good hand. I tossed it up over the edge, and painfully worked my way up the ladder welded to the side of the crate with only three limbs to keep as much pressure as possible off of my wrist.

Pulling myself up over the ledge of the crate, I worked my way to my very own cargo container, leaving my bike resting below. Thankfully I didn’t have to worry about my bike too much. I had an agreement with the grandma living below that she would pop anyone trying to take it as long as I kept quiet during prime time.

I shook off the remnants of sand, or as much as I could, outside the door. After putting in my security code, undoing the several deadbolts, and opening the other security door, I picked up the briefcase and entered my place. It was small, sure, but it was home. Man was it good to be back.

A shaky breath escaped me as I set down the briefcase and locked everything up. My home had just enough space for a bed, desk, and tiny kitchenette. It was small, of which there was no doubt in my mind, but it was cheap. Free, actually, thanks to the ‘generosity’ of a ‘choom’. At least till I was eighteen.

Plugging in my handheld, I settled down on the corner of my bed and checked on my left wrist. Every sharp pain let me know it was broken, which was worrying considering my normal profession required my hands. I couldn’t even really grip anything as my wrist just hung. It hurt like hell. I’d have to go get a Medech to check it out. It would chew into savings, but… And he wasn't open at this hour. I'd have to try and sleep it off.

The briefcase sitting on my desk called out to me. I still hadn’t even checked my ill-gotten loot. A brief moment of hesitation faded as I dragged myself over to it and popped it open. Thankfully it didn’t have a lock or anything, nor did it explode.

The briefcase was filled with important-looking documents covered in barely legible script. There was also a small phone, but I was in no way suicidal so I didn’t turn it on. Who knows what kind of tracking tech the corpos have in their devices?

This was great. Just great. I almost got myself killed for a few pieces of paper. I took a calming breath. Maybe I was looking at this wrong? Obviously, the man thought they were important, and whoever shot him thought they were important enough to flatline the guy over. And he had been a ‘borg. No way a ‘borg would die over just some papers.

I settled down at my small desk as I began to flip through the papers. Most of it was technical jargon that flew over my head. One thing did stand out to me though; the triangular shield crossed over a spear, the logo of Sentinel Corp. After the first couple pages, I realized what I had my hands on as I flipped to a blueprint of an experimental cybernetic implant. I passed through a dozen others of varying types before I got to weapon blueprints, of which there were a couple dozen ranging from pistols to HMGs. I think. It was hard to tell, and they all looked unlike any gun I'd seen before.

The ‘borg, from Raijin International, had stolen experimental data from Sentinel Corp, the premier expert in military cybernetics and weaponry. Experimental data that I had in turn stolen from the man’s corpse, assuming he actually died. In a word? Dead. I was so irreversibly dead if- when Sentinel Corp found me.

I cracked my eyes open, my left one crusty as it usually was since it was low-end chrome. My head pounded and my wrist throbbed as I confusedly looked up at a message in front of my eye. The confusion was for a good reason. My eye was a low-end ASCorp Genov-4 Optic, which barely let me see let alone have a hud built in.

「Connect to the Net

- 3 Traits」

I blinked a couple of times and the notification disappeared. Weird. Not that I have time to worry about my chrome glitching. My wrist, the briefcase, and stolen Sentinel goods required far more attention. They were practically a ticking time bomb.

After an exciting meal of Silage ExtraBland™, I hid the papers behind the liner of my fridge and grabbed the case and phone. I wasted little time grabbing my gun, getting back out to my bike, and heading out of the container yard to the city proper. I stopped on the outskirts of the yard and bought some over-the-counter pain meds, which significantly helped the utter agony in my wrist. They dropped the pain down to a dull throb. It was incredibly sad seeing my money just fly away...

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The streets were still wet as my bike slid over them, reflecting the moody sky and duplicating the eye-bleeding neon. People were out and about as they always were in the city that never rests. Homeless sat around in alleys, begging for Rayn as others dived into the rampant trash of the city.

Little Yukoto was a beautiful section of the city, as long as I ignored the trash all over the place. Unfortunately, it only grew worse as I headed away from the main streets patrolled by Blue Crusade Inc, the main policing force of Aythryn City. Everything around was tall, nauseatingly so. The occasional megabuilding reached far up, the holograms and neon standing out under the solemn sky.

The buildings themselves were an odd mix of jut outs and odd placements with an oriental flavor. Holographic tori gates were even set up over the road, a mockery of what they used to stand for. The streets and walkways were mostly covered by the hyperdense buildings protruding out with shadowed alleys and vendor carts scattered about. Neon was literally everywhere as if the color could help take away from the oppressive capitalism. It was almost sickening, yet felt perfectly like home.

This section of the city held far more oriental structures and graffiti, which only made sense considering its title. You can’t get more oriental than the capital city of Ukiyon. I drove under the red gates as lanterns swayed along with passing traffic, almost as prevalent as the neon signage trying to sell wares of every kind.

First stop, I headed to a trash compactor on the far side of Little Yukoto. These days most garbage trucks only pick up from compacting stations throughout the city, so it was the best place to get rid of the potential trackers in the briefcase. Once I threw it in, I headed back out with a far lighter weight on my shoulders. Plan accomplished. Sometimes the best plan is a simple one?

As for the phone? I didn’t quite want to get rid of it yet. I knew some people that might be able to see if it was bugged. If it wasn’t, it would be a waste of a perfectly good device. It would be nice to upgrade from my current phone, and the new one might even have a PA. Looked fancy enough anyway.

I pulled up to a particular street in the sub-district of Sabyt, this one covered with businesses of all kinds trying to make their way into this malevolent city. I parked my bike close to a Blue Crusade patrol and headed down to Viceroy Street. It was the same mess as every other street, but this one held probably the most humane person I had met to date.

I checked my pistol, its weight on my hip a small comfort, and entered a back alley. It was usually a very poor idea in the city, though there were few exceptions I knew of. I walked back behind the storefronts towards the middle of the block. No streets led back here, and the back alleys were a mess of confusion that always took me just too long to get through. At least it was clean- err, cleaner than most back alleys. There were even kids out playing with a ball under the watchful eye of their gun-toting parents.

The alleys here weren’t quite like the others and had residential doorways leading right out onto them. There was even the occasional store, though most were small in scale, probably due to only serving the nearby residents.

It wasn’t long till I neared the middle courtyard. This place was one of the few places throughout the city where I had actually seen real plant life. An ancient willow tree sat in the middle, its bark cracked and torn with age. Yet it still grew, whip-like tendrils of leaves gently swaying in the middle of the place. A couple of kids were gleefully playing tag under the tree, completely unaware of the dangers of the world.

Not far away sat the rickety neon - ‘course it was neon - sign hanging over my destination: Absolom Clinic. Oddly, the neon from the light was one of the only lights in the small courtyard, at least on the first floor, making it stand out in this secluded destination. I entered the place, the door chiming overhead as I swung it open.

Immediately, I could smell the scent of industrial cleaners, close to what I imagine a hospital would smell. But this was no Medtech hospital. Its walls were good ole concrete, not the white panels I’d seen in shows. The lighting was also quite dim, like what I imagine a personal garage would be like.

An elevated mixture between a bed and a chair predominantly took up the majority of the space. Complicated machinery and scanners I wouldn’t be able to point out from other bits of tech sat all around the chair. Other bits and bobs of medical equipment, all looking quite the same to me, were scattered about the place.

The man himself, sitting off to the side of the surgical part of the clinic, glanced up from the book he was reading. He had a short buzz cut, like I had seen on some FSA soldiers. A moment passed as his eye focused on me, then a faint smile traced his lips. “Shiro! Come on in, kid!”

“Thanks, Nael.” I stepped in as I fought off a bright smile. It was hard not to feel a jolt of joy in his almost radiant presence. As I said, the most humane people I’ve ever met.

The faint smile on his lips faded as he looked at my wrist. I wasn’t even holding it weird or anything, he just knew. “Take a seat.” He stood and began to gather some supplies before pulling a cart over to the chair.

I wasted no time sitting down. “I think it’s broken and my eye is glitching out.”

Nael nodded to himself several times as he pulled down a couple of machines over me. “It is old tech. What happened to your wrist?”

“I uh-” If I tell him and Sentinel gets to me, I don’t want to implicate him… I can’t do that to Nael. “I slipped off my bike. Say, how’s business?” Yep! Perfect distraction, as always. Great job, Shiro!

“About the same. I have some guys from Uranau coming over in a couple of hours… you get to the Outskirts recently?” He asked as he slid past to my other side and began tapping on a terminal. In a second, I handed him the Interface Plug from its jack at my other wrist and plugged it in.

I felt the warm buzz of electricity I always felt when jacked into something. “Uh yeah. Last night I watched the sunset over Aythryn City.”

“That's great, kid. Your eye looks good to me. I’ll reset it in a bit to be sure.” The table holding the terminal swiveled off to the side as he met my eyes. “It's good you’re doing something for your soul… just be careful out there, yeah?” He passed back over to the scanners.

I laughed with a bit of over-the-top arrogance. “Of course, Nael. Careful is my middle name.”

He lifted the scanners back into position and shot a look at me. “Rrrighhht… careful, she says. Just like you carefully slipped?”

“It uh, it was an accident? You know how the streets get…”

Nael sighed as he flipped a terminal around to me. An image of what looked like scattered marshmallows was on it- Oh, was that my wrist? “Yeah, I get it. Your ‘fall’ entirely shattered your wrist. Then it looks like you kept using it, gonk. The bones have been entirely pulled out of alignment. It's a miracle they haven’t pierced through yet.”

That would explain why the pain in my wrist had felt piercing. I guess it makes sense, ‘borgs aren’t considered strong for no reason. “Is it fixable?”

He pulled over a tank of some kind and a mask as he muttered to himself. “I’ll have to go in and reset the bones and Interface Plugs… hmm… maybe use a Calipen? Sorry, what did you ask, kid?”

“Can you fix it?”

“Of course. Doc is my middle name, after all.” He chuckled and passed me the mask. “I’ll knock you out and you’ll be as good as new.”

Unlike in most places- every other place, I trusted Nael. He had done good by my parents and had yet to let me down. “Thank you, Nael.” I put the mask over my head and immediately felt the fumes begin to take effect.

“Sweet dreams, kid…”