“Looking good Kay!”

“Fuck off Hernandez!” Kaylah shouted back with a smile. The mechanical servos in her hand whirring as she flipped him off.

Hernandez laughed, his holographic dragon tattoo swirling around him in delight. “I’ll catch you one of these days!” He said with mock seriousness, shaking his fist at her as she walked past.

“Hah! The only thing you're gonna catch Hernandez is these hands!” Kaylah barked, bringing her hands up and showing off her proto-steel appendages. “And trust me, these things hurt!”

The rest of Hernandez’s gang laughed. “Damn Boss, she really showed you-”

“Man, shut up!” Kaylah heard a loud smack as she rounded the corner.

Hernandez’s gang was harmless really. They were just a bunch of idiots that liked hanging out with each other and calling themselves a gang. Oh sure, they might rough up a few people and steal their stuff but that was relatively mild compared to what some of the other gangs do.

Hernandez himself was a bit of a sleaze. Kaylah had met him when she’d first moved to LA and not once has he stopped trying to get into her pants. He’d always respected her boundaries though, and while he was somewhat pushy there was never any ill intent.

The man just really wants to get laid.

“He needs to find a girlfriend.” She commented to herself as she curiously watched a beat-up Auto-Taxi make its way down the street.

It was rare to see an Auto-Taxi in southern LA. The government had stopped assigning new Auto-Taxi’s years ago as people would always assault them for spare parts and scrap to sell.

Taking a peek into the car as it rolled past, Kaylah just shook her head at what she saw.

A mousy woman in a business suit was looking around nervously out of the car at her surroundings. She said something looking at the dash, most likely talking to the Auto-Taxi’s CI. Whatever it said didn’t seem to reassure her.

Sighing to herself, Kaylah continued down the street. She only took a few steps before her V-screen began to buzz. Pulling up the contact list, Kaylah scowled.

Grumbling to herself she answered the call. “Hey Mama, how are-” was all she got out before she was cut off.

“Don’t you ‘hey mama’ me!” A shrill voice said, causing Kaylah to wince. “I told you to call two days ago! TWO DAYS! Do you know how worried I’ve been?! With all the craziness that’s happening, I’ve been worrying myself sick!”

Kaylah waited before she spoke again, making sure that her mother’s tirade was over. “...Well, Mama, things have bee-” She started only to be interrupted again.

“Did you know how close your sister came to kicking the bucket the other day! Two of those superhumans came punching straight through her living room! Damn near crushed them! And then you don’t respond to my message! Do you know how worried I’ve been!? Do you!?”

“... very worried?” Kaylah hesitantly responded.

“YOUR DAMN RIGHT I WAS!” Her mother roared, nearly causing her to fall over. “MY HAIR HAS BEEN FALLING OUT FOR THE PAST TWO DAYS BECAUSE YOU CAN’T BE BOTHERED TO PICK UP YOUR PHONE AND CALL YOUR POOR DEAR MOTHER AND REASSURE HER THAT YOU’RE STILL ALIVE!”

Kaylah muted her mother and kept walking, letting her wear herself out.

Reaching her apartment building, three minutes later, Kaylah briefly unmuted her mother to see how far along she was in her rant.

“AND ANOTHER THING-”

Muting her again, Kaylah nodded. “Alright, let’s give her another three minutes.” Stepping inside, she nodded to the elderly landlady who nodded back and went back to watching her live-stream.

Stepping into the janky elevator Kaylah slammed the fifth-floor button causing it to light up.

“Kaylah! What did I tell you about hitting my elevator with those metal hands of yours?” The landlady yelled scoldingly as the doors started to close.

“Sorry, Ms. Patterson!” She apologized as the doors closed with a ding. Kaylah leaned against the back wall and tried to relax somewhat. Her mother always had the ability to rile her up, even if she was well-meaning.

Bringing up her hand, Kaylah allowed herself to get lost in watching the servos whir and the different parts glide over each other.

Kaylah loved her hands.

Not in a weird way. It was quite normal for people to get attached to their mechanical augments. Both literally and figuratively. There was something about having a choice in how your body is made that was appealing to most.

Intoxicating to others.

Kaylah was quite surprised when she first came to the city and saw just the sheer volume of enhancements. Almost everyone in the south had one, even if it was just a holographic tattoo.

It wasn’t about utility or anything like that, it was about identity. Kaylah had never met another person that didn’t have a story as to why they had an augmentation.

For Kaylah, her hands represented her connection to her father. He’d been a professional boxer and quite a good one at that. Even getting into the finals of the national championship. He didn’t win, but he got damn close.

He would be killed by a common mugger not three days later.

Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.

That was what had caused Kaylah to leave anyway. The family needed a new breadwinner. Her mother was too busy taking care of her siblings to work, so Kaylah, being the eldest sibling, was the only one left.

Moving to LA had been a long shot. She needed a job and she saw an advertisement for a bouncer at one of the clubs. It paid well and Kaylah had been taught how to fight by her father, so she took it.

It’s been six years since then.

The family’s doing much better now. It had been iffy those first few years but once some of Kaylah’s other siblings started getting jobs, things leveled out. Nowadays things are looking up. One of Kaylah’s brothers had even managed a pretty swanky position as a dock manager over in New Orleans.

Turning her hand over, Kaylah read the quote she had inscribed into her palm. “Always get the last hit in,” she murmured absentmindedly. Her father had said that at every opportunity he had.

The elevator dinged as the doors slid open and woke Kaylah from her reminiscing. Walking over to her apartment door, it unlocked as the building CI scanned her face. Taking off her shoes, Kaylah unmuted her mother, wincing at the sobs emerging from the speaker.

“-nd then you just didn’t respond and I got so worried and…” Her mother broke down into crying.

“Aw, Mama, I’m sorry for worrying you,” she said gently. “Things have just been a bit hectic at work with all this stuff that’s happening recently.”

“I know, I know. I just worry about you so much. You’re so far away that if anything happens to you…” She trailed off but Kaylah knew what she wanted to say.

“You don’t need to worry so much Mama. I’m not doing anything too dangerous. The club is in northern LA, the only issues we have are drunks getting into fights with each other. Something I can easily take care of,” Kaylah assured as she made her way into her bedroom. “Hey, the family reunion is in a week, right? I’ll make sure to pop by.”

“Really?” Her mother perked up. “Oh, that would be wonderful! I’ll have to tell your brothers and sisters. Maybe we can get the whole family together! This would be our first full family reunion in ages! You better not be lying to me about this Kaylah Brown or so help me!”

Laughing at her mother’s sudden enthusiasm, Kaylah fell back onto her bed. “Don’t worry Mama, I wouldn’t miss this for the world.”

“Make sure that you don’t!” Her mother said with a huff.

Saying goodbye, Kaylah hung up and laid on her bed. She stared up at her ceiling lost in thought.

Her mother was… volatile. At least emotionally. She was even when father was still alive, and It only seemed to grow worse when he died. That was one of the reasons that Kaylah left if only a minor one.

No, her mother never abused any of them, but she was exhausting to be around. She would be smiling and happy one second, and in a puddle of tears the next. Combine that with the fierce protectiveness that emerged after father died and well…

It’s pretty obvious why Kaylah left.

It wasn’t that she didn’t love her mother, she did, it’s just that she feels stifled whenever she talks with her. Her mother wants so desperately to protect her but she didn’t seem to realize that Kaylah didn’t need protecting.

She called almost every day in her attempts to check up on her and if Kaylah didn’t answer even one of those calls, she would blow up and then break down.

While Kaylah was touched that she cared, she had her own issues that she needed to work through alone. She couldn’t do that with her mother breathing down her neck.

There was a reason that Kaylah hadn’t called or answered her in two days and that reason was nothing that her mother could help her with.

Sighing to herself Kaylah got up and opened her closet. Bending down she pulled out a cardboard box from under her piles of clothes. Making her way back to her bed she opened it up.

Pulling out the navy blue synth-leather jacket, she shrugged it on. Synth-leather was an artificial substitute that was better than regular leather in almost every way. It stretched better, was tougher, didn’t require any upkeep, and most importantly breathed better.

The days of hot sticky leather pants were gone.

Picking up the hair ties she pulled her dreadlocks back up into a short messy ponytail. With her hair out of the way she took the navy blue bandana and wrapped around her face, tightly tying it behind her head to keep it in place.

Picking up the boxing wraps laying at the bottom she started wrapping up her metal hands the same way her father taught her. Though she didn’t need to worry about damaging her hands, they were her most distinctive feature.

Shaking herself out and doing some stretches to warm herself up, Kaylah made way over to the window. The building across from her was one level lower than her story so it was a bit of a drop. A week ago Kaylah would’ve never thought of even trying to jump the chasm between her building and the next.

But that was a week ago.

Opening up her window, Kaylah took a moment to enjoy the wind blowing. Then she turned around and walked back into her apartment. Thuds rang out as feet slammed against floorboard and as Kaylah reached the open window she took a deep breath…

And leaped.

<( o )>

“Damn, we really caught a good one this time, didn’t we?” the huge thug said as he eyed her hungrily. “You’re good at choosing them Twitch,” he said to one of the other thugs.

“Naturally,” a rail-thin thug replied, not looking up from his V-screen.

“W-what is this?” Tiffany asked, backing up before hitting the Auto-Taxi blocking her way out of the alley. Pulling at the handle beside her she tried to open the door only to find it locked. “W-who are you people?!”

“Us?” the big man laughed. “We’re the Black Mob Gang! As for what this is? Well, originally this was just a robbery, but now that I’ve had a good look at cha,” he raked his eyes across her body, “I think it may have just become something more.”

As he took a step forward, the other thugs around him laughed as she let out a squeak in fear.

“Awh, Boss, she seems afraid of ya’” one of them commented.

He laughed nasally, “As she should be! Eh, Twitch?” He asked with a smile but frowned when he got no response. “Twitch?” He called again, turning around.

Tiffany searched for the rail-thing thug she’d seen before right along with the gang around her but she couldn’t find him. The gang seemed to get slightly nervous at this.

“Huh, where’d he go?” The large thug asked his group who all shook their heads.

It was then that Tiffany began to hear the sound of... metal on metal? It was slowly growing louder and soon it was clear that the rest of the group could hear it two.

It grew louder, louder, louder still, resounding in Tiffany’s mind and soul. The gang grew visibly agitated, reaching for their weapons and looking for where the sound was coming from, but the alley threw off the sound, making it bounce all over the place.

Then it stopped, and the sound of soft and steady footsteps could be heard coming from the darkened alleyway behind the rest of the gang.

Stepping out from the shadows, a figure appeared. Fists raised in front of them like they’d just finished punching each other.

“Tell me something boys…” she began almost seductively. “Do you want to experience-”

“Oh, Shit! Boss that’s Para-” one of the Thugs shouted as he tried to bring his pistol up.

‘Tried’ being the optimal word, as before he could move more than an inch he went flying into the wall behind him. In his place stood the figure from the alley.

“Paradise?” she finished, sending a shiver down Tiffany’s spine.