Naturally, there were some people in the lower city that didn’t believe in the stories being spun through television screens. Ed being one of them. What bullshit. Ed thought, overhearing someone’s tv as he walked to his next job.

Ed could see clear as day that everything being shown on tv was a lie made up to keep up productivity, but he couldn’t care less. He knew that he had no hopes of reaching the middle city, purely because of the status of his parents. His only hope was to one day make enough money to afford a place to live and to support himself.

Ed was born into the lowest social class in Neo Athens. A group filled with petty criminals and drug addicts. No one was able to afford a home, so they resorted to sleeping in whatever little nooks they could find. They did what they had to, to survive.

His father was a thief and his mother was a street walker. They weren’t married, in fact they never even had much of a relationship before Ed came into the picture. He was rather lucky to have been born, as it became more obvious that his mother was pregnant, she struggled to continue working.

If it wasn’t for the fact that his father wasn’t a complete scumbag, then there was a good chance that his mother would’ve died long before giving birth to him. But even then, growing up was tough. And there were many times when he came close to death.

The sad thing is that it wouldn’t have mattered. No one would’ve cared if he died. He wasn’t of any importance. He was a complete unknown, cast aside by the city at large.

He was envious of the people who had their own homes. Envious that they had a place of their own to go back to. And even envious that they were deemed important enough to spread propaganda to. But he knew that his feelings were useless. A complete waste of time.

So he put himself into his work. All the while, his envy simmered, turning into hatred and contempt for those above him. But of course, that only extended so far. He didn’t have any feelings towards those in the middle city, god forbid anyone even higher. He didn’t even have any hatred towards Mr Dimarco, despite being tricked into debt by him. Dimarco was someone that was too powerful for him to even think about going against. He knew his place in this world.

Picking up another delivery, he raced off, hoping to get it done as quickly as possible.

~

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Done. Now let’s see how much I got. Dropping off the final package on his to-do list, he allowed himself to sit against the wall. Wiping away his sweat, he watched as the blue screen slowly loaded for him, showing him his account. One thousand, one hundred, and fifty credits.

Shit. That’s barely above half. How am I gonna get the money? How long do I have left? The screen took its sweet time loading, much to his annoyance, before telling him that he only had six hours left.

Fuck, come on. There's gotta be something. His fingers tapped impatiently against the floor as he waited for the job listings to load.

No. No. Not worth the time. No... Why isn’t there anything? He searched through the entire list of available jobs in the area, but he couldn’t find anything that would help him. The jobs would either take too long or were not worth the time spent on them. Either way, they were a complete waste of time, and were useless to him.

Come on. There’s got to be something.

After several minutes of constant refreshing, and even reducing the restrictions as much as his morals would allow, he wound up with nothing. He started scratching at his face in frustration, wanting to rip out the chip and sell it to at least make back some money.

The refreshes seemed to be taking forever, as if the chip was actively trying to piss him off. The clock was ticking, but Ed was wasting his time sitting there. Come on! Please just have something.

Passersby probably assumed that he was on drugs, but he had little time to care about what other people were thinking.

As if his prayers had been answered, after what felt like the thousandth refresh, a job popped up that caught his interest. The job description was incredibly vague, only giving him a location to meet up with the employer to further discuss the details.

The reward offered was also a mystery, with several question marks in place of where the reward money should’ve been listed. The only thing that could be guaranteed was that should he accept it soon, the job would be finished before midnight.

It’s very risky. What if they back out? Then I’ve just wasted my time... Fuck it. I don’t have the time to be acting like this. Before he could think about it any further, he accepted the job and made his way to the location. A relatively famous bar that was run by one of the big shots in the lower city. He had been there a few times before, so he knew how to get there even without the chips help.

He reasoned with himself that the vagueness of the listing meant that he would earn more than a typical job, and that it would all be worth it in the end.

Making his way downtown, he caught sight of the club and was thankful that it was still early. If it was any later, the line would’ve been way too long, and he would’ve had to resort to bribing the bouncers so that he could get in. And he didn’t want to spend money on that if he didn’t have to.

Jumping onto the end of the line, it only took a few minutes for it to get to his turn.