by M. E. Thorne
She sidestepped the quick peck I tried to give her on the cheek as she entered and inspected the place. “What do you think we’re looking at? Some kind of hotel suite?”
I settled for tweaking one of her ears, which earned me a quick hiss.
Stepping back into the hall, I grabbed our bags and began preparing to carry our loot out. “I remember hearing stories that some of the corporate workaholics would keep little apartments or boltholes near their offices. They could go and sleep for a few hours, shower, then run back to their desks. I’m thinking that’s what we found.”
Gnasher pounced on top of the kitchen island and began going through the cabinets. “No bars of gold or lost technology?”
“Nope, but this place was sealed tight, so we’re bound to find some good stuff.” I went back into the bathroom and grabbed the towels, packing them in the bags.
“Towels?” she asked, with an arched brow.
“I hate to tell you, but the ones in our place are a mess, they always get stuck full of your fur.”
I barely dodged the empty can she tossed at me.
I went into the bedroom. The bedsheets had been stripped, but I found some clothes hanging in the narrow closet. The majority seemed to be made from synthetic fiber and covered in bright, eye-tearing patterns. I carried them back into the main room.
“Damn, they’re hideous,” Gnasher commented when I held one up.
“I checked the prices before we left,” I said, “the Guild is paying pretty well for any clothing we can bring back. With the state of our budget, we can’t afford to leave any potential credits just lying around.”
Gnasher was piling up any small appliances she could find, which included a blender, a juicer, and a quick freezer.
Even if none of them work, they'll still be worth something when we bring them back, I reflected. Parts are always valuable.
She was just pulling a can opener off the wall when her ears swiveled again. Stopping, I did my best to listen. Off in the hallway, something clanked.
Faster than I could blink, Gnasher took off out the door. I moved the half-loaded duffel bags towards the back of the room and unhooked my machete from my belt. In the hall, I heard at least three sets of booted feet approach.
They marched into the abandoned suite as if they owned it. Three men, wearing matching black boiler suits streaked with dust and dirt. All three wore respirator masks and goggles that covered their faces. Two of them had machetes out. I couldn’t help but notice they were Guild-issued weapons.
At least they’re not flesh-eating mutants, I thought to myself as my arms tensed up.
“Afternoon, delver,” the one in the front greeted me in a muffled voice. Unlike the other two, he didn’t have a weapon in his hands.
“Afternoon,” I answered warily. His two buddies spread out and began casing the place, their gazes lingering on the duffel bags.
All three appeared to be slim and skinny. Peeking through the cuffs of their clothes I could see scaly skin. Snake or reptile hybrids?
“Slow day?” the one to my left asked as he exited the bathroom. The other picked up the can opener from the kitchen, inspecting it.
“Not bad,” I answered, willing myself to stand up straight and face them head on.
Each of them was wearing a tablet pinned to their chest, but they were turned off. Normally when a delver was on the clock, they had it on and their badge glowed. It would also mark their presence on the map for any other delvers working nearby.
They didn’t appear earlier while we were searching, they’ve had them off this whole time.
With my free hand, I pointed to the leader’s tablet. “You forgot to turn that on.”
He looked down with feigned surprise, before shrugging. “You know how it is. You get busy, you figure you’re not going to run into anyone --” He shrugged again, before pointing to my illuminated tablet. “We’re far enough down, I doubt anyone back home could get a signal from that anyway.”
Seeing that for the threat that it was, I slid into a fighting stance and brought up the machete. “This is my claim, and unlike you, I’m here on Guild business. Get out.”
The one to my right chuckled, before suddenly whipping the can opener at my head. Ducking that, I barely avoided an attack from the left as the one from the bathroom lunged at me. He missed with his machete swing but managed to wrap his arms around my waist. I slammed the hilt of my blade into his neck as he took me to the ground.
“Make it quick,” said their leader. From behind his back, he pulled out a handgun.
Fuck! I mentally screamed. Guns were rare, expensive, and illegal. If he’s pulling that out, he’s going to kill me.
He was just bringing up his arm to aim when Gnasher leaped through the hallway door and onto his back. He didn’t even have time to respond before she used her claws to shred the webbing holding his mask in place. I caught a glimpse of a pale, scaled face before she let out a savage roar and bit into his neck. Blood splattered everywhere.
The other two thieves froze. They must have thought I was alone, I realized.
Seizing the initiative, I pinned my attacker’s weapon by rolling on top of the blade. I pushed up with my left arm and swung my blade with my right. I buried the machete deeply into his shoulder. Screaming, he let go of his weapon, reeling back in pain.
I scooted back and up onto my feet, and before he could react, I delivered a kick to his jaw. He went sprawling out, moaning and bleeding onto the carpet.
Turning around, I saw Gnasher had already taken out the leader, his gun kicked under the computer desk. She was just finishing off the man in the kitchen, repeatedly bashing his head into the counter.
“You bastard!” she yelled. “Do you know how hard I worked to pull that stupid can opener off the wall, and you broke it!”
Holding my hands up in a placating manner, I approached. “Gnasher, sweetie, let’s try to avoid killing them, please?”
Her face was twisted in a primal fury; her vertical pupils gleaming in rage. She snarled, her teeth were covered in gore and blood. “Why should I? These bastards ruined my can opener and tried to kill you!”
Speaking in my calmest voice, I pointed to his chest. “He’s a Guild member, like us. It would look really bad if we just up and killed three Guild members, even if they started it.”
She held the unconscious man up, inspecting the tablet pinned to his chest. With an almost casual shrug, she flung him over the island, where he collided with his injured colleague.
“Thanks,” I said, putting my arms back down.
Gnasher’s hybrid nature was much closer to the surface than other people I knew. Her rage in a fight could make her utterly fearsome and bloodthirsty.
But she can be sweet, caring, and fun two seconds later, I reminded myself.
“You okay?” she asked, suddenly full of concern.
“Just a bruised behind,” I promised.
Checking on the gunman, I was relieved to see he wasn’t dead, though he was missing a decent chunk of his shoulder and neck. Good thing hybrids are pretty tough. If he was a baseline human, he’d be a goner.
Searching his belt, I found a Delvers’ Guild issued first aid kit. Using the emergency adhesive spray, I staunched and covered his wounds. I did the same for the man I had hacked with my blade. The third man was badly bruised and likely had a few broken bones, but I didn’t think he would die.
“Give me a hand,” I asked, and we hauled the three of them into the bedroom. Using some zip ties that I had in my kit, we secured all three of them to the leg of the bed, which was bolted to the floor.
“What are we going to do with them?” Gnasher asked, after giving their leader a kick in the ribs.
I removed the other two men’s masks and goggles, but the faces underneath were as unfamiliar as their leader’s. “New members?”
Gnasher shook her head. “Probably, I don’t recognize them either.”
I confiscated their tablets and gear, then after t
hinking for a moment, I gathered up their machetes as well. “No sense in leaving all this stuff here.”
Gnasher just shrugged wordlessly at this.
I threw all their confiscated items into one of their spare bags and decided to bring it along.
The rest of the suite yielded a few small treasures. The TV and computer were broken, but I was able to pull out some salvageable components. I packed them up along with the clothing and what remained from the kitchen.
Gnasher made a point of retrieving the gun.
“It’s got to be worth a ton,” she noted with a happy grin. “Maybe my dream of a mole steak dinner isn’t so far away after all.”
I thought of arguing for a second but then changed my mind. She’s right. If we can find the right buyer, that thing will be worth way more than anything we haul out of here. If we turn it over to the State, they’ll just confiscate it or melt it down. As long as we don’t get caught --
“Smart move,” I reluctantly agreed.
She made a show of unloading the weapon and stowing it in her bag. A lump of guilt settled into my gut.
The three attackers were just rousing to consciousness as we were wrapping up. We went back out in the hall, and I closed the door behind us. I took a moment to update the map on the tablet before spray painting a big, red X over the scout’s glyph.
“Let’s head back to the guildhall. We can drop off our findings and report those three assholes to the front desk,” I suggested.
“Sounds good,” Gnasher yawned. She looked at the dried blood all over her arms. “Let’s make it quick though, I really want to get that shower now.”
Chapter 2
Heading back up the way we came, we retraced the glyph marks I had left on the walls and returned to the more populated regions of The Stacks.
The depths were virtually deserted, home to only rats, roaches, and horrors. It was a world of stillness, defined by dripping pipes, patches of mold, and vast stretches of cold, empty chambers. There was no light, no warmth.
Occasionally you’d walk into huge rooms, once meant to impress and humble. Lobbies decorated in gold, meeting rooms that were once made from crystal and wood, or factories that could produce ships that were meant to sail the stars.
Whenever I ventured into those spaces, I was always struck by a feeling of melancholy, like I was walking through a world of fallen grandeur. It made me wonder what El Finito had looked like when it had been alive and thriving.
The higher we climbed, using stairwells, empty elevator shafts, and utility passages, the more the signs of recent civilization appeared. Notices and warning of dangerous or unstable areas. Moss-chemical lights that provided cold but helpful illumination, and bridges that spanned the larger gaps between collapses. By the time we got to a working elevator bank, we had passed a few State soldiers, manning checkpoints and patrolling the area.
The ride back up was quick and uneventful, something I was grateful for. All the elevators the State ran were rebuilt. The originals were probably nothing more than scrap metal at the bottom of their shafts. Built from salvaged metal and spare parts, the new elevators were a bit hair-raising to ride but were relatively safe.
Gnasher thought they were fun, she hummed along to their creaky mechanics. I mostly kept my eyes closed and held onto the handrail.
By the time we arrived back at one of the populated concourses, the map on my tablet indicated we’d gone at least three kilometers upward.
El Finito was a world built not just horizontally, but vertically as well. When the corporations had run out of space, they simply built more on top of the old. At the height of their reign, The Stacks had originally been hundreds of kilometers tall, reaching from the very edge of the planet’s atmosphere down to its mantle.
But that was the past. All the old towers and skyscrapers were gone, blown to smithereens. The surface of El Finito was nothing but a graveyard, the air choked by pollution, poisonous gas, bioweapons, and nuclear fallout. Those of us left lived in what remained.
It wasn’t an unduly harsh life. The State was sure to care for the basic needs of its citizens, but you had to carry your weight to survive. If you wanted food to eat and a bed to sleep in, you had to work.
Leaving the wilder areas of The Stacks, we exited the last elevator and headed towards an outlying tram station to catch a ride home.
The transport hub was busy, by my estimate it was just the end of rush hour. Using our tablets, we checked in and headed for the tram that would take us back towards the center of the Metrocomplex.
I waved to a couple of other delvers I saw as they were boarding their trams. They had empty duffel bags slung over their shoulders, indicating they were just heading out while we were heading in.
They must be trying to open up The Stacks below this station, I mused.
There had been rumors the State was trying to expand further downward, looking to find areas to turn into new residential housing and farms. The first step in that process would be using the Delvers’ Guild to map it out, pull out the valuable resources, and locate any potential dangers.
There were several small merchants, selling food, trinkets, clothing, and electronic goods near the platform as we waited for our tram. The State also ran a small distribution center, handing out rations, assigning housing, and providing medical care for those who needed it.
Gnasher hated the rations, she thought they tasted like cardboard, but I insisted on stopping by and picking up my weekly allocation.
“It’s not so bad,” I tried to console her as we boarded our tram. “Boil them in water. Throw in some mushrooms, a little bit of spice, and you got a decent soup.”
“Steak,” she insisted. “Even if it’s just rat meat, we are having steak!”
If anyone was surprised by her bloodstained appearance, they didn’t show it. None of the soldiers had even asked about it on our way back. We were still wearing our tablets with the Delvers’ Guild badges turned on, and people just expected delvers to be a rough-and-tumble crew.
Our tramcar was crowded, afternoon giving way to evening. Not just other delvers, but there were builders, off-duty soldiers, and clerks all trying to make their way home. You could identify what guild someone was in based on the tablet badge they wore.
Almost everyone on our tramcar had horns, tails, claws, or wings. Everyone living on El Finito was a hybrid; our ancestors had been spliced with animal, plant, and even synthetic DNA. Seeing someone covered in armor plating, with extra arms or legs, antennas, or a hairy pelt was the norm.
I was the outlier since I looked like a baseline human.
Gnasher and I were lucky enough to get a seat after the first stop. As soon as we started moving she snuggled up against my arm and fell asleep, using a duffel bag as a pillow. Allowing myself a silly, content smile, I kept an eye on the stations to make sure we wouldn’t miss our stop.
The Delvers’ Guild operated out of the Metrocomplex. During the Corporate Era, it had been a huge, multilevel commercial and entertainment site, housing movie theaters, department stores, parks, and even a zoo. The ceiling had been covered in electrical lights that provided artificial sunshine.
The war had reduced it to a shattered, bombed-out skeleton. The stores had burned down, the parks razed, and the zoo animals were supposedly eaten by starving refugees. Almost all the ceiling lights had been destroyed or stolen. By the time the State had taken over, only the bare bones of the original building were left.