“A change of heart? I suppose that’s one way to look at it.” Aiden mused, looking down towards his kicking feet.
“What else would you call it then?” Samantha asked.
Aiden paused for a moment before he gave a small shrug and looked up at her, “Curiosity? Once I got wind that you were following me, I had a bad impression of you. The only reason people follow me is to try and rob me, after all. But seeing how you reacted to being turned down and how you nearly got jumped after you walked straight into gang territory, I decided to re-evaluate some assumptions I’d made about you. Maybe you are actually just kind of dumb?”
Samantha felt heat start to rise to her cheeks at the way that Aiden spoke that last question in an almost pitying tone. “I’d prefer the word ‘ignorant’,” she began, “and that’s related to the reason why I wanted to speak to you–”
“Well, hold on!” he cut her off, “I don’t even know your name yet. Let’s start there first.”
She paused to think of an alias to give Aiden. Although ‘Samantha’ was a common enough name, she didn’t necessarily want to be associated with her real name here.
As she quickly compared a few different options in her mind, he spoke up with exasperation, “Wow, you haven’t even thought that far ahead?” He shook his head in disbelief, “Rule number one of The Gutter: Have a name prepared, or someone’s going to give you a nickname you don’t like.”
“That sounds made up.” Samantha said skeptically.
“It’s as real as it gets, Cheese. So, now that I have something to call you... what’s the job you had in mind for me?”
“Wait, what? Did you just call me ‘Cheese’?”
“You bet! That’s your name now. Learn it. Live it. Love it. It’s better than pausing to think whenever someone asks for something to call you by.”
“That’s not even a proper nickname!”
“Sure it is. I caught you not a half-hour ago cornered by the Pack Rats. Rats like cheese. Thus, you are Cheese. Makes perfect sense!”
Samantha groaned aloud at the horrible reasoning, but before she could give an alternative option Aiden repeated his question from earlier.
“Are you gonna tell me what this job you were so excited to have me do is, or what?”
She decided to come back to the name issue later and focus on the business aspect for now. “Yes, as I’m sure you can tell, I’m not really from around here. Seeing as how I just unknowingly wandered into gang territory, I’m realizing more and more that I need someone to show me the ropes. I was also looking for a guide to the night market or a shop that sells cultivation aids, and was told before coming here that hiring locals was a good option for that.”
She opted to hold off on asking him about the delivery to Thomas for now. She had just gotten into Aiden’s good graces and didn’t want to push him with too many requests. Getting a guide was of higher priority at the moment anyway.
Aiden leaned his back against another wooden crate that was stacked behind him, nodding along to her words, “First off only outsiders call it the night market, so you’re really giving yourself away. Call it the black market or the under market from now on. As for cultivation aids... I’m sorry to tell you but those old rumors aren’t true. I’ve seen more than a few desperate people resort to consuming cultivation elixirs in a bid to unlock their quest, and I have to advise against it. All of them became incredibly sick–some even dying–and the worst part is you can’t even tell if it’s because the product was bad or if they weren’t able to process the energy.”
His expression turned particularly grave, “It’s not worth dying over. And besides, you’re still young! People can still get their quest in their twenties, you know? If I were you, I’d go back to wherever you came from and forget what you heard.”
Samantha schooled her expression. Aiden had made a completely incorrect assumption about her reasons for being here, but that misunderstanding gave her a good cover story. She had to tread carefully though. Since she was trying to build trust with Aiden, being caught in a lie could set her back to worse than square one.
“I don’t want the elixirs for when I’m mortal, it’s for when I become a cultivator. Like you said, the quality of the pills and elixirs here can be spotty, but the ones from proper alchemists in the city are too expensive.” Samantha pleaded, using context clues from Aiden’s earlier explanation to expand a little on her own. What she said was misleading, but not exactly a lie if he ever found out she was already a cultivator.
He seemed a bit conflicted at hearing her words, but ultimately nodded. “If you’re that set on it, who am I to stand in your way? At the end of the day, it’s not really any of my business what you do, so long as the price is right. On that thought… what are you paying?”
“What would be fair to you? I’ll tell you straight away I’m short on coin, but I’m more than happy to do some work for you to make up the difference.” Samantha asked.
Aiden barked out a short laugh, “Everyone around here is short on coin! If you hadn’t already told me that you weren’t from around here Cheese, that would’ve tipped me off. You always, always, offer favors first, then money since it’s so hard to come by.”
Samantha grimaced at the usage of her new nickname and at her novice mistake, her mind flashing back to her dealings with Ol’ Man Whisper. She feared she gave away more about herself than she initially thought.
He continued, “But I do have something in mind I think. The Pack Rats have been hounding me more than usual these days. They always seem to know when my important deliveries are coming up and try to hunt me down before I can complete the route. I’ve got a big delivery coming soon that can’t be delayed, but I’ll need to give you some tests and take you on some smaller hauls before I trust you with more information about it. Think you can handle it?”
“To be clear, in exchange for you teaching me about how to blend in better in The Gutter and how to get access to the black market, you want me to help you somehow with this delivery?” Samantha posed, trying to get more defined terms to the agreement.
“Basically! If things end up not working out that way, we can renegotiate then. Do we have a deal?” Aiden inquired, holding out his hand for her to shake.
The conditions were uncomfortably vague to Samantha’s merchant mind, but considering the fact that there was a lack of trust on both sides she could admit that they were relatively fair. She started to reach out her hand to return the gesture but stopped dead in her tracks when she remembered something from earlier. “Wait, isn’t that the hand that you threw the piece of–” She paused, looking for a polite word, “--‘waste’ with? At the Pack Rats I mean?”
His hand snapped forward like a striking viper and clasped firmly around her own, giving it a single shake, “Don’t worry! I’m pretty sure it wasn’t from a human.”
Samantha’s stomach churned at the thought, but before she could free her hand with the ‘mortal’ level of Strength she was trying to maintain, Aiden let go. He stood up and opened up the door that led back into the main building, saying, “Trust me, working this job you touch a lot of unexpectedly gross things. You’ll get used to it as you follow me on the routes!”
She doubted it.
Samantha walked alongside Aiden towards the entrance, again noting how young everyone around seemed to be. “Hey, Aiden, why are so many couriers around here kids?”
“The first question of our little arrangement! Appropriate, considering you’ll be working as one of us for a bit.” he replied, chuckling a little. “The short answer is that children are lighter than adults. A lot of us use the rooftops to travel, and most of the buildings in The Gutter are in rough shape. Being heavier means less routes are open to you, so couriers either move on to different jobs as they get older or try and get work in better parts of Yivesh.”
“Will that be a problem for me, then?”
“No, I wouldn’t have you do the work if I thought it’d be an issue. You’ll be more limited in where you can go, but I’ll show you some tricks so that you can keep up.”
By the time they had finished this conversation, they had reached the base of one of the shorter buildings outside of the warehouse. The structures themselves were in various states of decay, with the heights of each and spaces between each differing noticeably. For almost every building there were two bridges that connected them to the other structures nearby, one a couple feet wide and one only several inches wide. Fluffy bags filled with something soft lined the alleyways between the buildings to help break a potential fall. Despite these precautions, she had no doubt that a bad fall from the taller buildings would be enough to end the dreams of an aspiring courier.
Suddenly a scream and a ‘whump’ sound emanated from the direction of one of the mid height buildings, and Samantha found herself moving to check on the unfortunate courier who didn’t make his leap. Aiden grabbed hold of her arm lightly to stop her, and she looked back with some confusion.
“Being too helpful will make you stand out, just so you know. People fall all the time around here, so just do your best to ignore the shouting. If someone is seriously hurt they’ll call for someone.” he patiently explained.
This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.
“Oh. Right.” She reluctantly agreed. “So, what’s first?”
“I’m going to run you through a series of Agility tests to see where you’re at. You followed me decently earlier, so we’re going to see how far you can push it. First, some wall jumps…”
What followed was a series of grueling and somewhat terrifying physical tests. Wall jumping, beam balancing, distance jumping, quick turning, gauging what paths were safe for her weight, and others that she had frankly forgotten in the whirlwind of activity all made the time fly by. It would not have been such a bad thing if she was able to use the full extent of her abilities. In fact, completing almost every task that Aiden gave her would be laughable with the usage of all 8 Agility points and [Swift]. Problem was, she was committed to playing the role of mortal.
With her ‘usable’ Agility at the approximate level she was at before becoming a cultivator--around 4--she frequently found herself doubting she could meet Aiden’s lofty expectations. A few wall jumps from street level to a second story window? Doable. Perhaps a dozen to get from the ground to the top of a three story building? Not so much. And she found that this was the case for everything. The more she succeeded at meeting Aiden’s benchmarks the further he stretched them, but he never asked her to do anything that he couldn’t demonstrate himself. Whenever she failed to do a task, he pointed out where she was losing momentum and ways she could adjust her form to improve her output, and then moved onto the next test.
She watched in awe more than once as his tiny body jumped across seemingly impossible gaps or his ‘unconventional’ movements allowed him to reach shocking heights. She would even go so far as to label Aiden a genius.
The final trial was a long gap jump followed by a wall climb. She stood on a roof perhaps 35 feet high, looking across to one about 5 feet higher--eye level to her if the buildings were right next to each other. The gap between the multi-story buildings was a little over 15 feet, so she would need to not only make the jump, but use the momentum to push herself up that final 5 feet and grasp the ledge of the next roof. Aiden had already completed the feat and waited for her on the other side.
Samantha looked down into the alley far below her with dread. If she wanted to make this jump, she knew she would have to break the Agility limitation she set for herself. Since she wasn’t willing to do that, that meant she needed to mentally prepare herself for the fall. Stepping back from the edge to get a running start, Samantha did her best to fight down her fear. Though she knew she likely wouldn’t be hurt from the fall, it was still an intimidating distance.
Shaking her limbs and body to clear her nerves, she firmed up her will. She ran towards the edge and leapt… and then missed the jump as expected. A short scream inadvertently escaped her lips as she landed on the crash bags below. Luckily, the bags–combined with her heightened Resilience–did their job and prevented any injury. In fact, the impact hadn’t felt more forceful than a firm pat on the back.
“Yikes! You good?” Aiden called down from above.
“I’m fine!”
She dug herself free of the bags surrounding her and rolled out of the alley. By the time she emerged into the open, Aiden was already dropping down to the ground floor and rounding the corner to meet up with her.
“That was a pretty nasty fall. I know you said you’re fine but we’ll wait for the adrenaline to run its course and then check you over just in case.” Aiden instructed, waiting for her to take a seat on the ground before continuing, “I noticed that you hesitated right before you jumped, I think you would’ve made it otherwise.”
“Yeah, I never thought that I was afraid of heights before today.” she said, doing her best to appear appropriately disappointed.
“I’ll be honest, you really surprised me! You’ve already got more guts and skill than half the couriers out working, so try not to beat yourself up too much. Practically everyone is afraid of heights. I remember when I started I couldn’t even make the ‘weenie’ jump, as we affectionately call it.” Aiden encouraged, gesturing to the shortest building in the area at around 10 feet high.
Samantha laughed lightly at his description, and gave him a thumbs up to show she was in better spirits.
“Hey!” an unknown voice called out to the pair as they chatted. Samantha and Aiden looked over to see a young girl around 10 approaching them.
“Hey, Clove! I didn’t know you were training today.” Aiden replied as she drew nearer.
Samantha noted that Clove was a little shorter than Aiden and more filled out, but far from stocky. She had blue eyes and light brown hair, with lots of freckles covering her slightly round face.
“I haven’t had any challenging deliveries lately, so I don’t want my skills to get rusty. I was about to call it a day but I heard someone fall. Since there’s not many people around right now I wanted to check if they were alright.” Clove answered, looking over to Samantha briefly before returning her attention to Aiden. “But, since you’re here, I know she’s in good hands! Are you done for the day as well?”
Aiden looked at Samantha and raised an eyebrow, as if silently asking, “Well, what do you want to do?”
“Yeah, I think after that fall I need a break. I’ll come back later and see if these buildings look a bit more approachable then.” Samantha responded, happy for the excuse to leave. She had been out for nearly four hours by this point, and was starting to feel the strain of keeping her aura compressed.
Aiden gave a grunt in agreement with her words.
Clove gave her an understanding smile, “I know exactly how you feel. I’ve been there too! By the way, I don’t think I caught your name?”
Samantha had forgotten to come up with an appropriate alias during her somewhat hectic time with Aiden. In between making a deal, learning more about the slums, and training as a courier, it had completely slipped her mind. So, she said the only thing that came to mind…
“Call me Cheese.” Samantha said with a straight face, every fiber of her being revolting at using the horrid nickname.
“Cheese?” Clove asked, confusion evident on her face.
Behind Clove, Samantha could see Aiden holding a hand over his mouth, eyes watering slightly, as he doubled over with suppressed mirth.
It was too late now, so Samantha doubled down, “Yes. Cheese.”
“Oh, um… alright!” Clove replied a bit abashedly, “Nice to meet you Cheese! Good luck out there.”
And like that, Clove was off and away. As soon as she was out of earshot, Aiden erupted into a torrent of laughter.
“I can’t believe that you actually used the name!” he hollered, tears streaming down his face as he gasped for breath. “Oh gods, this is the best.”
Samantha stood up, “Adrenaline’s worn off and I’m still feeling fine, so I’m going home now. Are we meeting up tomorrow?” she spoke over Aiden’s subsiding laughter.
“Yeah,” he said, wiping his eyes, “I’ve got a trick to help you with the wall jumps, so meet me in the morning at my dad’s shop. It’s called ‘All The Fixin’s’, you know it?”
“Yeah, see you then!” She said, then hurried off towards Silas’s qi signature.
“Bye, Cheese!” Aiden shouted after her, and Samantha resisted the urge to hang her head in shame as she ran.
After several minutes of jogging, Samantha reached an area of The Gutter with buildings sturdy enough to hold her weight and she made a beeline for her home base. Not long after, she noted a small figure following her movements from a distance. It seemed to be the young girl she had just met–Clove. She had no idea why the courier was following after her, but the strain of keeping her aura contained was growing by the minute so she didn’t want to wait around to find out.
“Hey, Silas! Someone’s following me, so I’m going to take a few detours. Do you think you can meet up with me in your translucent state and help me look for any others?” she sent.
“Coming!” Silas chirped, and she could feel his contentment through their bond.
She couldn’t help but smile to herself, “I missed you too.”
After meeting up with Silas, he checked the adjacent areas and confirmed that Clove was the only one following her. With that knowledge, she utilized a little extra Agility than was strictly ‘mortal’ and the techniques that she had practiced earlier to gradually expand the distance between them. Not long after, Clove completely disappeared from sight and Samantha was confident that they had lost her.
They were able to return to their ‘home’ without further issue, making it back just before Samantha’s stealthing failed.
----------------------------------------
Ol’ Man Whisper sat at his writing table as the small pitter-patter of a child’s footsteps drew nearer. He looked up from his notebook to see Clove–one of his newer recruits–coming up to him.
“You have a report for me?”
Clove straightened up and stood proudly, like she was speaking to a higher-ranked officer in the Enforcers, “The girl you met followed Aiden from the market, but he saw her. He tried to lose her, but she managed to keep up with him! Eventually he confronted her, and it seemed that they weren’t going to work together. However, something she said interested him enough for him to tail her into Pack Rat territory after they parted ways. He got her out of a shake down, and after talking at courier headquarters they must’ve come to some agreement. I watched him train her for a couple of hours until she failed one of the jumps. I tried to follow her back to her home, but she somehow caught wind of me and I lost her. All I know is that she was headed northwest.”
“And did you get her name?”
“...Cheese.”
“Cheese?”
“That’s what she said. Can’t say I haven’t heard weirder before.” Clove admitted.
“Interesting. In any case, you’ve done well!” Ol’ Man Whisper praised, flipping a copper coin in her direction which she greedily caught. He continued, “Do let me know of any new developments you come across?”
“Yessir!” Clove happily chimed, and then scurried off into the darkness.
Ol’ Man Whisper scribbled more notes into the new file that he had opened on the stranger today. He had made a habit out of talking to anyone that he didn’t recognize, which usually resulted in stumbling across all sorts of fascinating people and situations. This girl was turning out to be an interesting subject as well, it seemed. He tapped his empty quill on the bottom of the page as he reviewed the current data.
Name: True name never spoken to anyone? Hiding?
Alias: Cheese
Age: Late Teens/Early 20’s
Likely not from Gutter. Claimed ‘from north of here’
Offered coin for information, not favors
Effectively haggled for price. Possible merchant background?
Clothing is too clean and well kept
Shaved head. Trying to blend in?
Likely Non-Cultivator
No detectable aura
Failed a jump at the training grounds
Why seeking Aiden?
Delivery?
Training? She’s already skilled enough to keep up with him.
Cautious, secretive
Found Clove while info gathering and lost her
“Just who are you?” he asked aloud, “If I can find out why you’re here or who’s looking for you… well… that’s a mystery for another time.”
He knew it was getting late, and with Clove’s report in he didn’t have any good reason to continue working. Though his family had long since learned to avoid prying into his business, he also tried not to give anyone a reason to concern themselves overmuch with his activities. Getting home each day at a reasonable hour was a part of that. He stretched and stood up from his desk, and started walking over to the door before stopping himself.
“Oh, I can’t believe I’m still almost forgetting after all of these years!” he admonished, before grabbing hold of the walking stick that leaned against a nearby wall.
Supporting his weight on the staff and assuming the familiar persona of a frail old man, he made his gait unsteady and his limbs tremble slightly.
“I wonder what tomorrow will bring.”