The Last City

by Nina D'Aleo

  ‘Goes without saying,’ Caesar replied, his voice deep and rich. ‘But he’ll show.’

  ‘It’s not too late to cancel this,’ she told him.

  ‘And put what in its place?’ he asked.

  Smudge shrugged. ‘Breakfast.’

  A weary smile touched the edges of Caesar’s mouth.

  ‘I am serious, Caesar. You don’t have to go through with this,’ she told him. ‘You don’t have to do what Shawe says. He’s nothing compared to you.’

  ‘As much as I despise Shawe, what he’s saying is right. Life in the Gangland is not sustainable anymore.’ He sighed. ‘There’s no going back now.’

  He turned away from her, and the look Eli saw in Smudge’s eyes, directed at Caesar, made him feel guilty that he was watching and fascinated at the same time. Truth was, ever since Eli had known her, Smudge had suffered from a degenerative, incurable disease – love – and not just any kind of love, the worst love a person could have: forbidden love that could never be returned. Eli had no doubt that Caesar knew how she felt for him, and she probably knew that he knew, and he knew that she knew that he knew, yet everything was left unspoken, unfixable, unchangeable.

  ‘The Galleys are coming,’ Caesar said, though Eli heard no sound.

  The gangster boss moved out of the shadows and stood up on the ledge of the roof. In the square below, all eyes turned his way and every conversation, even between rivals of the Pride, ended immediately. All the gathered Pride members fell to their knees, their heads bowed. After a moment’s quiet appraisal, Caesar lifted his hand and the masses burst onto their feet releasing wild, deafening roars, making the Pride sign high in the air. Caesar’s great felines paced and stalked, silently pawing the air, eyes fixed on their leader. Caesar leapt off the roof and landed lightly on his feet some four storeys below. He waded out into the crowd greeting his Pride brothers and sisters, speaking to each by name.

  ‘No turning back,’ Smudge whispered to herself. She crossed herself, and she and Inski jumped off the roof after Caesar. They went to join their family girls, each with the sleek physique of hunting cats.

  The distant sounding of a horn jarred Eli’s nerves and silence fell again over the crowd, but this time not out of respect for Caesar. This silence was the disquieting still before the storm. The blast sounded again.

  ‘Can you smell cabbage?’ Eli quipped to SevenM. It was a joke between him and Jude about the Galleys, known for their violent brawls, potent brews and foul cabbage soup.

  The horn sounded a third time very close and the Greenway Galleys turned the corner. The leading gangsters held up banners decorated with their gang symbols, the horn and the fist, and each wore a cap tilted to the left towards Greenway. Some had even dyed their entire skin green for the occasion, patriotic to the extreme. This top-ranking gang was not blood in blood out like the other gangs. To really be a Galley, you had to be born a Galley. As they neared the crowd, the arriving gangsters flashed the Galley symbol, both thumbs crooked and pointed out like the horns of the gang beast – the Galley rhinoceros. These hulking and ill-tempered giants lumbered in the midst of the men, some permitting riders, others given a wide berth. Every Galley member was armed with a thick sword, fashioned after the horn of the great rhinoceros, displaying their collective cynicism that this would be a peaceful meeting.

  At the head of the gang strode the Galley boss and King of the Gangland, the fierce and ugly Christy Shawe. He was wearing his lucky dragon-skin jacket. Eli pressed further into the shadows. He hadn’t quite remembered exactly how huge and how ugly Shawe was. He led his gang up Baxter Street and they poured into the square, assembling opposite the Pride. For a few long moments the rival gangs stood in utter silence staring each other down – then Caesar snarled, Christy Shawe gave him the middle-finger salute and all hell broke loose.

  From their opposing sides of Whitlow Square, the Crook’d Town Pride and the Greenway Galleys fought to out-shout, out-stomp and out-curse each other. Their deafening sounds shook the ground. Eli’s skin prickled at the terrifying and awesome display. Swears hurtled back and forth and both sides made insults of their rivals’ gang signs, but no one threw any objects. No one dared to violate the neutral ground treaty. All the other gangs stood on the periphery of the square, no one stupid enough to get between the superpowers. Christy Shawe laughed and jeered with his gang-mates, but Caesar K-Ruz stood silently taking everything in. The essence of the longstanding rivalry between the two men spoke in the pauses between the sounds. Neither side backed down and nothing changed until a Pride prince made the distinct mistake of questioning the Galleys’ manhood. In response, Christy Shawe grinned savagely, his teeth yellow and chipped, and immediately whipped down his trousers and waved his genitalia in the prince’s general direction, to the outrage of the Pride. Eli tried to look away, but the sight was somewhat mesmerising. To say Shawe had been blessed with more than his share of manhood was an understatement.

  ‘You’ve seen mine,’ Shawe yelled at Caesar. ‘Let’s have a look at yours then, or are you scared?’ Shawe staggered, even more drunk than usual, and that was really saying something, but it was also strange behaviour considering the importance of this gathering. Shawe liked to party and get completely smashed, but he was also a sharp and gifted leader who would have never, as far as Eli knew him, turned up pissed to an event as significant as the first ever combined Gangland meeting. Something was obviously seriously wrong.

  Caesar spoke, his voice ringing loud and clear around the square. ‘I didn’t come here for a pissing competition. I came here to talk strategy.’

  ‘Yeah, Shawe, we’re not here to watch the grass grow,’ Jimmy Hatfield, boss of Kelly’s Crew, shouted.

  To the relief of all there, Christy Shawe finally pulled up his trousers and said to them, ‘It’s not the grass growing that’s the problem, it’s our ranks. We have no more space. So either we start killing each other or we start expanding into other areas of the city.’

  ‘Which means killing off civilians,’ Jimmy Hatfield said, pointing in the general direction of the rest of Scorpia. ‘I don’t like it, Shawe. Every time we directly attack the Regiment, we end up losing people and getting punished. It’s never worked before.’

  ‘If you’re scared, Jimmy, stay back with the women,’ Shawe mocked him.

  ‘Typical Galley – all balls, no brains,’ Maximum, boss of the League, said. ‘Hatfield is right. Unless we have a clear and workable plan there’s no point.’

  ‘And there is also no point if we don’t work together. This has been our mistake in the past; we attacked separately, not as a whole.’ Caesar said. ‘Why don’t we discuss this further inside?’ He gestured to the bar behind him.

  ‘Great,’ Shawe mocked. ‘Then we can all join hands and sing “She’ll be Coming Home at Noon”. Discussing won’t change anything. Only war will.’

  ‘You just don’t get it, do you, Shawe.’ Maximum stepped off his hover-bike and, with two of his high-ranking men, walked towards the building below where Eli sat. They entered and all the other bosses silently followed their lead, with Shawe being the grudging last. He took a swig from a flask and stomped through the door, slamming it shut behind him.

  Eli crawled as silently as possible to the skylight and lay on his belly peeking into the building. He couldn’t hear anything, but could see the gathering of bosses, Christy Shawe in the centre, pacing, smoking, drinking, stopping to yell at one person and then at another. Caesar’s lion shadow moved up and down the wall, twitching the tip of its tail. Soon things became heated between Shawe and Jimmy Hatfield, and Shawe’s two men had to intervene. They escorted Shawe out a side door into the alley beside the building for some air. Eli scurried to the side of the roof to listen to them speak. He peeped over, only able to see the outline of their shadows cast on the opposite wall to where they stood.

  ‘Christy, mate you need to calm down,’ the man, whom Eli recognised as Malcolm, one of Shawe’s cousins, said. ‘We need to get everyon
e on side with this, otherwise the plan will be blown.’

  Eli strained up on his tiptoes, listening carefully for any mention of dark sects.

  ‘Trutt the plan!’ Shawe cursed. ‘I don’t give a rat’s arse about it anymore! I just want to find him.’

  ‘We will, Christy, we will. Like I said, I bet you anything he’s just holed up somewhere with a few girls and some flagons of Araki and he’s lost track of time. We did the same thing when we were young like him. He’ll show up when he’s ready.’

  ‘No, Mal!’ Shawe yelled. ‘Stace would never do that – never. I know him. Something happened to him and I know Kane’s behind it. I told you. He has Stacy’s ring, for trutt’s sake. Said he found it at a crime scene, but I know he’s lying. Kane has him. He has my brother. He’s messing with me. Trutt! I’m going to kill him this time, I swear. I’m going to rip his head off and piss in his trutting skull.’

  Eli’s foot slipped and he fell on the roof with a thud. The talking below him stopped abruptly and he could feel the strained silence of listening.

  ‘Oi!’ He heard Malcolm calling back into the building. ‘Check the roof! Now!’

  They were made.

  SevenM instantly fled, scurrying into the darkness. Eli buzzed his wings and took off fast, not looking back, expecting the zap of an electrifier to fry him any second. He zipped around corners and through open windows and out the other side, gradually losing the shouting voices behind him. He slowed to gain his bearings and eventually found his way back to Hackside. He paused in the air above the Ebony Rain where the commander stood a few paces from the craft, talking with someone half-hidden by shadows. Eli knew it was impossible, but the other person looked like a Midnight Man. Eli flew down and landed. Sensing his presence, the commander turned. The shadows shifted and the shape was gone, but Eli could still feel eyes watching them from the darkness. He moved swiftly to the craft. The commander jumped in on the other side and they took off, not talking until they had put some distance behind them.

  ‘Anything?’ Copernicus finally asked.

  ‘In short,’ Eli said, ‘Christy Shawe is trying to get the gangs together for the first ever combined uprising. Only Shawe’s losing it, because his brother, Stacy, is missing. The ring we found – it belongs to Stacy. Please never ask me to do that again.’

  ‘Stacy?’ Copernicus said. ‘He was so young when I left the Gangland, I didn’t even think of him. So he gave the actual ring, or at least a replica, to Stacy – that’s why there are two?’

  Eli nodded. ‘Must have, but Shawe is blaming you for Stacy. He’s seriously crazy-angry and he’s coming after you.’

  Copernicus gave no sign of concern. ‘Any mention of dark sects?’

  Eli shook his head. ‘Honestly, I don’t think Shawe is involved in the crimes. I think his brother may have even become a victim of whatever’s going on.’

  The commander considered this in silence.

  ‘Who were you talking to back there?’ Eli asked.

  Copernicus glanced at him. ‘An old friend.’ He said no more.

  13

  Eli hurried along the white corridors of Headquarters, his boots squeaking on the shiny surface of the floor. He saw a group of colleagues turn the corner up ahead and darted through one of the many hidden shortcuts he’d discovered in the walls. At the present moment, he didn’t have time to be the centre of entertainment or be embroiled in a long and pointless conversation about someone’s boyfriend. Right now he needed to talk to Jude. He was worried that the commander was in real danger from Christy Shawe and that he wasn’t taking the threat seriously. Eli wasn’t sure what could be more serious than someone wanting to rip off your head and piss in your skull, but the commander was disturbingly unaffected by the notion.

  Racing up the flights of stairs, Eli bypassed several floors and came out on the residential level where Jude’s apartment was situated. He found Jude’s door unlocked and slightly ajar and remembered the Ar Antarian saying his apartment security needed to be fixed. He was in the part of the building still functioning on the old system, which Eli hadn’t designed. Eli opened the door and padded in.

  Jude’s apartment was neat but functional. He liked neutral tones and had very expensive tastes in everything. His training equipment took up the bulk of the main living area. A can of Androt fuel stood beside the equipment; Eli guessed it was to grease up the working parts of the training gear or for SevenM to drink. Eli headed towards Jude’s study, where his friend could often be found, but slowed at the sound of voices. He came to the end of the corridor and saw a light on in Jude’s bedroom. The door stood open just enough for him to see in. Jude and Diega were in there together. She got out of bed, naked, and started to gather her clothes. They had obviously been making up for a night of arguments and tension. Eli froze, stuck in the moment, not knowing whether to try to leave quietly and maybe get caught, or announce himself and have the embarrassment of explanations of what he had and hadn’t seen.

  Jude sat up in the bed, staring at the bedside table where his tinted glasses lay. His eyes were distant in thought. He spoke, his upper-level accent stronger now that he was off duty and in his own place. ‘I’m not saying he should be given a medal of honour or anything, I’m just saying that Christy Shawe is far more intelligent than people give him credit for. If he is orchestrating these murders and abductions, I’m sure he’ll have no loose ends for us to follow back to him.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’ Diega laughed, pulling up her trousers. ‘What about him leaving his ring at the crime scene? Shawe is as dumb as an iron pole. He’s just got a lot of protection around him. But it’s only a matter of time before he slips up bad and then we’ll have him. Why are you always trying to see more in people than there actually is?’

  ‘I’m trying to see the truth. Not everything in this life is as black and white as it seems. Sometimes people have no choice but to act in a certain way – do you understand what I mean?’

  ‘Jude, there aren’t different shades to Christy Shawe, just facts. He’s a gangster and a criminal and he’s Copernicus’ enemy, so he’s my enemy as well, nothing further needed.’

  ‘That’s a simplistic view of things,’ Jude said.

  ‘Well I’m sorry we can’t all be educated geniuses like you, with a perfect balance of logic and reason,’ Diega retorted, dragging on her shirt.

  Jude leaned out of the bed and caught Diega around the waist. He pulled her down onto his lap and said, ‘And we can’t all be beautiful like you, but somehow we survive.’

  Diega smiled and the frustration melted from her expression. She kissed him and he lifted off her shirt. Eli backed away as metal arms and rainbow skin blurred before him. He made it back to the front door without being detected and stepped out into the corridor. He sighed.

  ‘Eli,’ Copernicus said, right beside him.

  Eli jumped and babbled, ‘Hello. I was just visiting Jude, just to talk about stuff, a few random things, nothing important really. What about you?’

  ‘Visiting Jude,’ the commander said.

  ‘Great minds think alike, hey,’ Eli giggled.

  Copernicus gave him a look that said he knew exactly why he was there then lifted a hand to the door. It swung open.

  Eli swallowed and said, ‘Ah, boss, I’d probably knock first.’

  The commander stood in the doorway and called out, ‘Jude, Diega – you’re needed!’

  Within seconds Diega emerged from the hallway, clipping on her weapon belt. Her hair was ruffled. She looked at Copernicus and a silent undercurrent of something Eli couldn’t quite place flowed between them.

  ‘Jude’s on the toilet,’ she said bluntly.

  ‘There have been more incidents,’ the commander said. ‘Another hollowed-out body in Moris-Isles, and a large-scale attack on the Galleria Majora – at least twelve dead.’

  Diega cursed and Copernicus continued, ‘I’ll send Jude to Moris-Isles and we’ll cover the Galleria.’

  ‘
What about Keets?’ Diega asked. ‘What if she gets out of hand here? I don’t trust anyone else to know what to do.’

  ‘Oh . . . I forgot,’ Eli piped up. ‘I hid a spyer under the table in her cell, so we could keep an eye on her.’ He lifted up his communicator and a small hologram of Ev’r Keets’ cell opened above the machine.

  ‘I’ve been recording her for several hours now,’ he said, skipping through the stored footage.

  ‘Stop!’ Copernicus commanded.

  Eli stabbed at the pause button and the image scrambled then resettled on a picture of Jude entering the cell. Diega leaned in closer, staring at the hologram. Her forehead creased.

  ‘Is that Jude?’ she asked.

  ‘Play it,’ the commander said.

  Eli hit play and they watched Jude and Ev’r Keets talking. When the conversation ended, no one said anything. Eli, feeling as though his hands were working without his direction, shut down the hologram image and clipped the communicator back on his belt. He shifted uncomfortably, not daring to look up at the commander or Diega. Keets hadn’t said what she would tell the commander if Jude didn’t cooperate, but it was obviously something significant. The silence stretched on and a bad feeling gurgled inside Eli’s stomach.

  Jude appeared at the end of the corridor dressed and belted up. ‘Commander.’ He nodded to Copernicus. ‘Hi, Eli.’

  His friend gave him a warm smile and Eli winced. He felt so bad. He wished he could shrink to microscopic size and scuttle away.

  ‘There have been more attacks,’ Copernicus said, his voice controlled. ‘We’ll have to separate, but first we’re all going to talk to Ev’r Keets. She’s left a message with the guardians watching her that she has something important to tell me. Are you ready, Jude?’

  The warmth left Jude’s eyes and he swallowed. He spoke with difficulty.

  ‘No, Commander, I’m not ready.’ He cleared his throat. ‘There’s something I have to tell you first . . .’