Chapter 3-14 Unwilling Survivor

Chapter 3-14 Unwilling Survivor

Chrome is a money trap. This isn't a statement. This is an objective fact.

Lets look here at your standard implanted limb. Sure. It can be made of solid Adamantine. You know what isnt as tough and strong as adamantine? Your spine. Your skin. Shoulders. So, every implant is a full-body package too.

But thats okay, I hear some of you say. The nanosurgeons can fix it right up, ignoring the fact that if you could afford nanosurgery, youd be purchasing less invasive augmentations anyway.

So, that leaves the poor and downtrodden with limited options. Sure, they can visit a grafter or, if theyre brave enough, a street sculptor. Plenty of old exo-armors laying around to protect you from the mean streets. Just need to bolt that to yourself right?

Energy. Dont forget about energy.

Thats a category-E microfusion cell for the cheapest linear combat rig. You could make an argument about getting a category-A cell and cybering yourself to the roots and sinews, but by that point, youre already spending enough imps to build a void cruiser, while only being about as effective as maybe a heavy drone.

Compare that to a wager with market-standard biomods, and youre looking at a net loss in both effectiveness and longevity. Compare that to premium nanosuite injections, and the question of hardware and software begins to blur.

There is a tax that comes with the alloy, and it stays long after the implant gets chipped in.

-Dissertation on Cybertechs Effects on the Socio-Economically Disadvantaged Populations of New Vultun

3-14

Unwilling Survivor

Back down to the guts of the Warrens Avo found himself descending. Again down, two hundred levels, and more. He was beneath the plates of the surface now. He could taste it in the air, in the rumbling weight of the city above him.

The question he had for why the medical levels were located so far down was a fleeting one. Building essential facilities far below Layer One was a deliberate choice for most organizations. There were too many points of insertion on the levels above, and it still wasnt clear to him if Conflux controlled the entire structure or not. With how Mirrorhead had them stationed, there was a feeling that they were mostly squatting in the block rather than formal occupants.

Ved, he asked, watching as the elevator sank down toward the four hundred and fiftieth level; thirty-five more to go. Medical: is there anything lower?

She blinked at him momentarily, not understanding the vagueness of his words. The Underways? We got a motorpool. Well, almost a motorpool. We got, like, three golems; two Shadowcrawlers and a Galeslither. She chuckled. And only half of them work.

Avo stared at her in confused disappointment. Why laugh? Unprofessional to have broken equipment. And how does half a golem work?

His answer made Ved wilt. Theuh, Galeslither has a busted engine. Still flies though.

Can it land? Avo asked.

Not sure. Havent really tried.

Avo frowned. Then you have one working golem. Ved didnt have much to say about that. Fitting. A broken tool wasnt a joke but a sign of incompetence or ill-discipline. Such displays reflected poorly on Mirrorhead. For all his resources, the morale of his people was certainly abysmal. Imps could buy motivation, but having a boss that constantly monitored you and could kill you at any point from a reflection likely left everyone here risk-averse.

Flaws upon flaws. Mirrorhead probably viewed his control over Conflux like a master with a leash. Apparently, he forgot that when you pulled too hard, a leash could also be a noose.

The elevator doors chimed and opened. A flurry of movement was already underway, med-techs and their medical drones already in a whirlwind of motion. Overhead, another plane of mirrors coated the ceiling while cone-shaped surveillance drones whistled through narrow vents along the walls.

The shine of the room made him reflexively wish that he had found some shades or goggles. It was hard to see, even with his ghosts tuning his perceptive brightness. The cognition of sight could be adjusted, but the light stung his eyes all the same. He needed to find something to blunt brightness if he eventually found himself operating during the day.

Going with the flow of foot traffic proved to be a sound idea as the hospitals layout was a maze. Hallways led to twisting turns that ended in plascrete-sealed dead-ends. Doors were melted shut or clamped down with mag-locks. It looked like they secured this place in the aftermath of a siege and never renovated it.

Following the crowd into a larger chamber, a hive revealed itself to Avo, the walls lined with hexagonal hab-cells, each meant to serve as a treatment center of some kind. Judging from the scuffed numbering painted over each cell, however, it was obvious this used to be a coffin hostel of some kind.

This is C-Wing, Ved said. Used to be a capsule hotel. Back when the Blackways were the Underways. Back when the darkness wasnt infested with

Ghouls, Avo finished for her.

Yeah.

One of the last insults from the Low Masters, the Blackways. Infusing all darkness beneath the city with a Heaven of liminal spatiality was one thing. Connecting that spatiality with random alleyways across the gutters to ensure their ever-replenishing nests of feral ghouls would always be a problem, meanwhile, was deliberately cruel.

Starring beyond an entire shredded wall of C-Wing, Avo found himself look down quick-fabbed plasteel railings leading to a twenty-foot drop to the former Underway station below. Rusted rails left unused for a nearly decade stung at his nose with a familiar stench of decaying metal. Three tunnels had been fused shut with battle foam and plascrete blockades, while a final path looked cored clean through by some impossible force.

Oh, fuck me, Ved said, sounding stunned, I think the Reg punched her way through using a Shadowcrawler. Got nothing else down here that can do that.

A team of enforcers was gathered in front of the new opening, their guns raised, lights burning away the encroaching limbs of the whispering darkness, wanting to drag the unsuspecting into its depths. Avo could taste the sheer anxiety in their voices, hear it in their gasping lungs as they faced the black and called for their engineers to jock into a construction drone and fill the gap.

All Avo could hear of the father and his hostage were brief heartbeats as he crossed into the room. A nagging way still pried at his will. He could walk away. Let someone else handle this. The father really wasnt his problem anymore. Unfortunate as the boys death was, it was as it went. People died. It was part of the bargain: the city gave you Heavens and miracles, and when it came time to die, you went back to feeding the city.

In a weird way, the boy was closer to New Vultun than any of them would get for a while.

Avo had helped the man as best he could. Saved him well over five times now. So why the hells did he still feel responsible?

Walton. Walton was why. Sometimes, Avo wished he had never met the man. Sometimes, he wondered if his life and eventual death would have been easier if he became a feral like so many of his brothers.

A beam-butchered corpse greeted Avo as he entered the room. Blood did not pool and organs did not show, but it was clear that someone had taken to slashing the corpse repeatedly with a high-intensity laser until the bodys face hung in burning strips and arms were hanging from smoking sinews. Avo counted something north of a hundred slash-wounds, sloppily carved into cold flesh, driven by undiminished hate.

Reaching over, Avo pulled a piece of fried skin and ate it. It tasted crispy, but not nice. Overcooked. Let it burn for too long. Burnt. Not cooked.

Nothing came from the father. No laugh. Avo frowned. His attempt at initiating this conversation through humorous small talk had failed. He had to think of something else.

The space of the room wasnt that large, but a holo-veil shrouded what lay beyond the halfway mark of the thirty-foot room. Avo wondered if that was Draus doing as well. This had all the makings of a good ambush with the obfuscation of the veil. If Avo didnt have his Metamind, he wouldnt even notice Essus presence or his hostage.

Gonna step through the veil. Beam me and I eat you.

No response.

Avo passed through the threshold.

There, laying upon a dull grey gurney, the father stared. A glinting plate of chrome had been installed over his forehead. In his hand, he had what looked to be a spherical module connected via wires to the tetrahedrally designed surgical drone hovering over his bed. Avo tilted his head. A cluster of glowing cells shone from the back of the drone. Additional power cells jury-rigged by Draus, Avo guessed. Explain the intensity of the surgical beams.

In the corner, next to an IV stand, the surviving hostage whimpered, a brown-haired juv wearing monochrome medical scrubs. He didnt look much older than the boy did.

Avo, the father said. He gave a surprised chuckle. The joy didnt reach his eyes. For a few moments, neither one of them said anything, the only sound was the thudding of heavy boots outside. Probably enforcers arriving. The med-techs were talking, but the boots didnt stop falling until Ved interjected.

I asked her to leave me, the father said.

Why? Avo asked.

Because you were right. I was a dead man. Still am a dead man. I do not need to weigh you or her down anymore. I will find a resolution here. With them. The venomous hate that spilled out with the last word didnt fit the father. It was like something else had taken to nest beneath his skin.

What a fascinating thing, to watch someone learn to truly hate in real time.

She left? Avo asked. He was asking about Draus.

Essus understood. She wanted me to leave. I wouldnt go. She had already escaped by the time I got here. Somehow, she had disabled her doctor. Stole his prosthetics. The machine, he pointed at the surgery drone, she was using it before she gave it to me. It was not something someone as useless as I could manage to do. Essus laughed.

The hostage stared at Avo. His eyes were square implants, pulsing with strobing scanners. The juv wanted to plead for a rescuer, but his face wilted when he found himself greeted by a ghoul.

You kill the other one? Avo asked. Or Draus.

Essus blinked. I think I did.

Avo gave another look at the mangled corpse. From inside the veil, he could see out without issue. Deep lacerations revealed the whiteness of the corpses spine, along with a variety of other wounds. Yeah. The recklessness fit. Draus was efficient; ruthless. She would have taken lives in single slices.

So, Essus asked, where do we go from here?

Dont know, Avo admitted. Came in because if not me, then enforcers. Theyll kill you. Probably.

Essus blinked. I do not think I care that much. I wish you let me die.

Avo crouched and met the tired mans eyes. Tired, but there was something else there. Despair. Sorrow. Hate. Maybe an angle he could work against Mirrorhead. Essus was a flat, but his mind was ripe with potential. Something that could be used to feed a phantasmic.

Or a re-weaponized memetic contagion, built to infest others with misery and loathing.

The boy, Avo said, considering his next steps. His name. Aurrie?

Essus blinked. A tear fell. Yes.

Tell me about him.