He returns his attention to the street. We stay on the Promenade as it goes from stores and cafes to market stands and stalls. Crowds slow things down to a mere crawl. But I’m safer here, mired in potential casualties, if I’m being hunted.
The Promenade widens at a small square. On the opposite side, past a construction crew busting up a section of concrete with a painfully loud jackhammer, a phalanx of faux marble columns rises up four stories, embellishing the front of a casino.
Randall tugs me toward it, and I look at him in surprise. Unlike the ones that grace the upper levels, a Terrestrial casino’s bad news. Rife with malware and the very worst of humanity, not beholden to New Worth’s strictures for public spaces. As soon as you pass through the security gate at the entrance, you’re subjected to the ever-changing house rules.
I shake my head and pitch my voice. “Don’t know what’ll happen if I go through the gates.” Depending on what Aventine did to me, what alerts they put out, I could light up like a holiday tree on the security panels.
Randall gives me a smile, the first one since I dropped in on him. “Do you trust me?” His smile curdles. “Don’t answer that.” His eyes cross, synching maybe or otherwise using his implant. He nods to himself. “We’ll take the third gate. Charon’ll make sure we get through. Come on.”
People drift in and out, business brisk no matter the time of day. Randall angles for the third security gate and I follow him in, breathing a sigh of relief when no klaxons sound or lights flash at my entry.
Brita had a birthday party at a casino in the Canopy a few years back. But two steps in, I can already tell this place can’t command nearly a fraction of the gleaming glamour and ostentatious hospitality we enjoyed that night.
The casino floor’s a logistical nightmare. Too many people and too few exits. This place would be off-limits for an Aventine op. Inside, strategically placed lights soften the devices of pure avarice. Slot machines, both old school and high tech, with their bells, whistles, and flashing digital readouts. Vid poker and other games requiring a physical uplink from a naked fingertip – the people at those machines must be truly addicted or desperate or both since all kinds of corruption can be mainlined through those interfaces. Clusters of the machines are positioned around the main floor, leaving long corridors for foot traffic between gambling areas, the on-site restaurant and lounge, and the various entertainment options – adult and otherwise.
Even the people are skewed toward extravagance. Body modifications abound – edgier than what’s customary in the upper levels. And not just mods to present the body at best advantage. Ones that disrupt, perturb, and fascinate. The combinations limited only by the imagination.
One man has matte plastic scales protruding from his skin. A woman has printed hair – the only way she can have so much of it braided into ropes that dart in and out of piercings across her body – that doubles as clothing. A person of indeterminate gender has had their legs elongated and then wrapped in downy fur. Embedded LEDs or bioluminescent proteins grafted to the skin abound, as do bone spurs and ridges of cartilage that have been coaxed to extend outside the body.
And those are just the augmentations I can see. Who knows what goes on underneath?
I glance up at Randall, realizing the same is true for him. He tips his head toward the door to a small theater off the main room. “In there.”
On stage, a magician tries to charm an audience that only half fills the rows. Bypassing the seats, Randall leads me down a small walkway, taking us backstage. I blink away the bright lights. Randall holds a silent conversation with a stagehand. Synching. Prudent considering the venue, but I don’t like not having enough information to choose the next course of action. Makes me too dependent on Randall and whatever delicate negotiations are going on.
Beyond the curtain, half-hearted applause breaks out and strengthens as the magician executes a trick with unexpected skill. Randall and the stagehand break off their conversation. The stagehand rolls a wardrobe painted with whorls and arcane symbols that must be part of the magician’s act across the floor, exposing a small hatch beneath it. He unlocks it, revealing a stairwell into darkness.
Randall gestures me forward. Aventine couldn’t possibly know about this access point. I wonder what else they don’t know as I lower myself down. The stairs lead to a short hallway, then another set of stairs takes us down, down, deeper into the bowels of New Worth.
Randall, a silent presence at my side, doesn’t seem concerned by the feeble lights – too many burned out – or the slight humidity in the air that makes my clothes stick in all the wrong places.
“I never expected a casino to maintain access to the Underground, but I guess that’s pretty naïve, considering.”
He shrugs. “It’s not naïve if you’ve never had cause to think about it.”
Pipes and wires run overhead. Randall ducks underneath a large vent mounted to the low ceiling. “My friend has an… arrangement with the casino so he can monitor door security for people like us wanting to avoid attention while we descend.”
“You’ve done this before,” I say with certainty. “And this Charon? What’s his deal?” The hard surfaces surrounding us distort my too-loud voice.
He gives me a sidelong glance and sighs. “Some people find their way to Charon to disconnect.”
That takes me by surprise. To willingly give up your implant? They make modern life bearable.
“Don’t look so shocked. Implants aren’t everything. It’s not a weakness to want to separate mind from machine.”
Weakness maybe not, but definitely outside the norm.
We walk in silence for a little longer before Randall speaks again. “Anyway, Charon helps people ‘cross over,’ as he says. Lets me know when promising Disconnects come to him so I can help them find work at Vector.”
“Couldn’t you get in trouble?”
He shrugs. “Doesn’t matter. Until our society has a better means of supporting Disconnects, they need help.”
When Rik and I were connected, I had no idea. “I never realized you were so passionate about this. We debated about things, but…”
His steps slow. I turn back. His face stark, eyes haunted, unseeing. “You would have found out if we were calibrated.”
He says it so plainly, I flush. I never should’ve given him an opening. “It was just an in-person meet. Anything beyond that was theoretical,” I say, hating myself for the lie. I used to tell myself we would’ve lived happily ever after if it weren’t for Aventine. That’s not true, of course, but it makes for a better story. Now, though, after everything that’s happened, I can’t afford to entertain what-ifs with Rik, not with Aventine breathing down my neck.
“I know what Liv felt, and it wasn’t theoretical.” He gives me a long look. “But I don’t know what you feel.”
“Well, that makes two of us.”
That surprises him into silence. We reach the end of the maintenance tunnel. A metal door grinds opens into a large subterranean chamber. Rusted metal girders span the ceiling. Cement blocks make up the walls. Water runs down one of the seams, creating runnels through old asphalt and dirt that seeps up through the cracks. This is all I can make out without my night amplification filter.
Randall steps beside me. “Can you see?”
“My parents got me a NAmp filter when we lived down here, but it’s not working because, you know. You?”
“Vector paid for mine. So stay close.”
As our voices fade, a scuttling along the periphery of my senses suggests we’re not alone. It’s so dark I bet even with the NAmp filter it’d be difficult to pick out the bodies creeping along the walls. Dark clothes, grime-covered skin, furtive movements. The air’s thick with sewer gas and body odor.
“This way.”
His face a mask, Randall wades into the middle of it all, heedless of the people who watch on, coveting our clothes, our relative cleanliness, our connection to the upper levels. At least I would be if I were stuc
k down here.
Further on, scavenged metal has been riveted together to create honeycomb structures – the Underground equivalent of capsule accommodations. Limbs that don’t quite fit hang out over the edge. Scrap of a blanket here, a stocking-capped head there. Someone snores. Another’s chest-rattling cough makes my ribs throb in sympathy. At an intersection, we pass an old woman hunched against the wall, muttering to herself. Her eyes track us, but she gives no other indication she’s aware of our passage, her litany unceasing.
Randall either knows exactly where he’s going or is doing a phenomenal job of faking it. He’s perfected that confident stride that leaves no room for second thoughts. Another defense mechanism I recognize from living dirtside. At the third side tunnel, he turns, hunching his shoulders slightly at the lowered ceiling with a network of pipes running overhead. He stops in front of an area that’s covered in scrap metal and particleboard. A barrier of some kind?
He raps against it. A haunting metallic sound echoes forlornly down the passage. A few seconds later a door creaks open, a feeble strip of light to welcome us.
A man in his late twenties with brown skin and slightly unkempt hair darker than the shadows around us gestures us inside. Charon’s beady umber eyes are his most striking feature, refusing to settle on any one point for longer than a few seconds.
He lives in a little vestibule that’s been fashioned from scrap metal and wood, floor to ceiling, but it’s watertight and warmer than the slick chill of the public areas we passed through. The door’s shut up again, Charon taking his time with the complicated set of locks. Whether it’s to keep us in or someone else out, I’m not sure.
A small pallet is tucked up against the wall. A couple of shelves are welded above it, scattered with an array of empty wrappers, hand tools, cans of food, and pill packets. A large worktable fills the rest of the space, covered with computer components and a nightmare’s worth of medical equipment and tools.
Charon greets Randall with a nod, then studies me with an intensity that raises goose bumps on my flesh. Randall doesn’t say anything, but Charon’s gaze flicks to him, and he snorts. Must be synching. I don’t like how it leaves me out – something I never really noticed until my implant stopped working.
“Yeah, right, well, have a seat.” Charon gestures to a stool in front of his workbench. He raises a diagnostic wand, and I flinch away automatically. “Don’t worry. Just need to check some things out.” He glances at Randall. “What did you do to her? She’s as jumpy as a kangaroo.” He might live Underground now, but he must’ve learned about life before the domed cities somehow – that’s not always the case for people who live down here. Hopefully he’s learned enough other things to help me out.
I force myself to relax. “Sorry. I’ve had a rough twenty-four hours.”
He brings the wand up to the back of my neck where my implant lives, and whistles. “I’ll say.” He’s about to set the wand down. “Hang on.” He moves the wand back over my shirt, then down my pants legs. “Christ, you’re tagged.”
“What?”
“Your clothes. Each piece has a tiny transponder.”
Randall starts. I glance at him, then back to Charon. Since they could track my implant, I figured clothing would be overkill. In security, you plan for all outcomes, not just the most likely ones. I should’ve anticipated this from Aventine. Stupid not to. “Range?”
He moves the wand over the one that must be embedded in my shoulder and looks thoughtful. “Well, they can’t do anything from down here. Too much interference.” Who knows how many feet of earth and infrastructure separates us from the civilized levels? He looks at Randall. “But they’re probably able to get a signal from the Terrestrial District. Could take a while to triangulate, but still…”
Randall crosses his arms. “Can you deactivate them?” Charon nods. “Then do it.”
I glance around. A crinkled shower curtain blocks off one corner of the room. “Is there a place I can change?” Into what, I’m not sure.
“Eh, it’ll be easier if you keep your clothes on. We’re not really set up for…” He makes a vague gesture toward me. I’m not sure if he means my particular issue or women more generally. “Right then.” Charon plucks a taser off the table and whistles as he futzes with the controls. “Modified, of course. You’ll feel just a pinch.”
“Forgive me if I don’t believe you.”
He chuckles. I grit my teeth as his taser hums to life. He discharges a blink-and-you-miss-it blue spark and grunts in approval. He won’t look me in the eyes. “Just a pinch, OK?”
Static slams into my right shoulder, rattling my teeth. Not enough to stun, but it still smarts. Charon brings up the diagnostic wand, casting it over the same area. “Good enough.”
He turns to the one along my pants leg. More static wraps around my calf. He follows that up with my satchel, targeting a transponder along the front flap.
“All right, you should be good to go,” he says a few seconds later.
“Check again. My clothes, my bags, and me.” The modifications to my face, my forearms for the data transfers… Aventine could’ve embedded a tracker then. “All of me,” I say at his raised brows.
“As you wish.” He waves the wand over me just to double-check things, then pauses at a spot over my right hip. “Huh.”
“What is it?” Randall asks.
“Not sure. Hang on.” He twiddles with the controls and circles the area once more. “Shit. There’s one under the skin.”
“How deep is it?” I ask.
“Just a few millimeters under the skin. I could cut it out.”
I flinch, but nod. “Get it out of me.” Until I know what I’ve gotten myself into, I can’t afford to be Aventine’s property.
Charon meets Randall’s glance over my head, then turns back to his workbench, shuffling aside metal components and clattering them against the hard plastic surface. He spins around. “Right, here we go. Randall, I’ll need you to hold our girl still.”
“You want me to stay seated?” The stool wobbles as I shift my weight.
Charon frowns. “No help for it. Unless you’d be more comfortable laid out on the floor.”
I shudder involuntarily at the metal flooring, filthy-dark with grime. “No, this’ll do.”
Randall stares down at me for a moment, as though deciding how best to keep me in place. Avoiding my gaze, he presses against my left side. His arms loop around me, anchoring my arms to my sides. I breathe through my mouth, not daring to relax against him.
Charon gives me a wink. “It’s going to hurt, so be sure to take it out on him.” Charon lifts the edge of my shirt and works the waistband of my pants down to expose the curve of my right hip but no further in a bid to preserve my modesty, or what’s left of it in this company. He swabs my skin with something cold. Antiseptic scents the air. At least there’s that.
As Charon gets to work, I turn my head away, my cheek pressed against Randall’s chest, and screw my eyes shut. I feel nothing, but I can hear the scalpel flense my skin and tissue away with a wet snick.
My body jerks involuntarily in Randall’s grasp. “I can see the bugger,” Charon says from far away. “You got her?”
“I do.” Randall at least sounds unperturbed.
The sensations change. Despite the local anesthesia or whatever Charon’s using, I can feel him digging inside me. A sharp-needled pick in inexperienced hands. Screams build up in my throat. I press my face into Randall’s shoulder and let them out. His arms tighten around me. He’s saying something, but I can’t hear it, just feel the slight vibration of his chest.
Metal pings nearby, and Charon whoops. “Hang on.”
Flames lick down my side, then it’s stoppered like a bottle. Charon pats me awkwardly as he fastens bandages to my hip.
I slowly release Randall; his arms fall to his side a heartbeat later. Blood rings my clothes and is already crusting against my skin. Too much. I force my gaze away with a grimace. “Where is it?”
/>
Charon brandishes a small chip in a metal dish, no bigger than an earring stud. I move to take it, but he jerks the dish away. “Think of it as payment. I had to use my last capsule of muscle mend on you.”
“But couldn’t it be tracked here?”
“Not by the time I’m done with the chip.” He gives it another lingering, no, covetous, look, then sets the dish on the far edge of the work bench. Finally, he pulls his attention away and claps his hands. “All right. For this next bit, I need to put you under, but I can’t, see?” Charon gestures to his lab. “Down here, we have to make do with what we got. And you only got me.”
“Understood. But before you bring me back online, there are a couple things you need to know.”
Charon settles back on his heels, arms crossed.
“First, I’m probably going to show up as an anonymous user with no signal information.” I give him a general overview of the modifications Aventine’s made to my implant to help me navigate the city undetected. “Taking my randomized identities away is the first thing the… people I work for would do.”
I’m grateful Charon doesn’t ask any questions, only nods to himself. He must’ve dealt with all kinds down here: the good, the bad, and the desperate. “That’s no problem.” He spins back to his table, picks up a wire-mesh basket filled with data sticks, and sifts through them. “We’ll get you a new ID, no flags, generous permissions that should hold up to,” his gaze cuts back to me, eyebrows raised, “reasonable scrutiny.”
“What about the tech under her face?” Randall asks.
“Hmm.” Charon sets the basket down and picks the diagnostic wand back up. He waves it over my face, gaze glued to the digital readout on his screen. When he turns back to me, his eyes have a wild look to them. He’s totally geeking out right now. He doesn’t care about me. He’s all about the tech. That in itself isn’t surprising. It’s more that he makes no effort to hide it. “I think… It’s hard to say, but I’m pretty sure if the identity randomizer is turned off, your digital impressions will be too, but…”
Implanted Page 20