Hey everyone, I've embarked upon an odyssey and started to write a book. Below is the first chapter of said book, and I would love to get some people opinions and comments on it. So witout further ado:
I let the tides pull me along, direction and destination mattered not. Each change in direction is accompanied by new sensual stimuli; sights, smells, and tastes even. The constant flux of my surroundings serves to distract my mind from things that don?t bare thinking about. The gentle currents of the crowd worked to counteract the roiling torrents within a mind that was in disarray and turmoil. My mind. The packed streets of the under-city always serve as a distraction from the monsters that lurk within my soul. What with the host of services on offer - both legal and illegal - one could lose themselves.
The steady beat my feet have been drumming out upon the pavement for the last few hours ceases. My features are thrown into sharp contrast by the blood red neon streaming out of the shop window. I tilt my head towards it slightly. Not a shop, a pleasure den.
The young women in the window are flaunting their flesh, writhing around in hedonistic dances as they try to tempt me inside. The alluring smiles they all wear don't extend to their dead eyes. What joy they ever found in this - if they ever found joy - has been long since destroyed, replaced by indifference and pain. Not even the airborne smog of engineered pheromones and perfumes that hang around this place could tempt me inside after meeting a gaze like that.
Besides, it's not the girls I'm interested in, although I do a good job pretending that's the case.
In the reflection on the plexi-glass I see my tail. As much as I want them to, even the distracting thoughts and emotions I?ve been trying to manufacture during this trip can't block the training. It's hardwired, always running in the background.
The legions of distractions my wanderings here provide only force it back, they stop short of blocking it completely although it comes close. As close as anything can without befouling my mind at least. In case you were curious, Darsana leaf does the best job if you want to chemically dull your brain to the real world. That's beside the point though. Even pushed so far back, the training still manages to highlight this man for me.
He has been following me since the moment I stumbled out of my hab block. He's good, obviously trained. Not just some rat scoping me out. He stays in the sweet spot: far enough away to not draw any undue attention to himself, but close enough to never lose me in the crowd. He doesn't quite fit in though, it?s subtle and I doubt anyone else notices, but it's enough to draw him to my attention.
He won't be alone, but I can't locate the rest of his team with my indirect investigations. The constant downpour of condensation is reducing my vision distance. There could quite easily be some rooftop spotters or even aerial back up. The ceiling is high enough to accommodate some smaller craft or unmanned drones. I don't look too hard or they may twig that I'm alert to their presence. That could force their hand. Just how bad that could be, and how many people would die, depends entirely upon who this so far anonymous ?they? are.
I resume my journey with purpose now. I mentally run through the list of possibles for a job like this. The list is long: I've made a lot of enemies in my time. Hell, I don't even know what the job IS. I'm going on very little information and I desperately need to redress that. I'm also woefully unarmed. My body - as deadly as it was - wouldn't fare so well if there were any weapons involved.
I drift over to one of the thousands of street stalls that infest the under-city. Groups of them here and there, they sprout like mushrooms. An appropriate simile considering the constant damp conditions. I casually glance over a few things and drift on down the line. It took me a good ten minutes to reach the stall I wanted. If I'd made a beeline straight for my target it would have looked unnatural.
It's a tech vendor; the tables and shelf units are piled high with all sorts of equipment and technological paraphernalia. There is hardware to suit any purpose you care to name. Some of it is quite clearly scrap; scavenged from the refuse pits and plundered for any working components. The pieces that look like they may be serviceable are likely to have slightly more dubious origins.
As I move forward and duck under the plastic sheet that serves as a roof, the proprietor moves forwards to greet me. To my left is a hulking bear of a man who probably acts as the stalls minder. He is slouched in a chair and has a chunky looking gun that looks like it has been cobbled together from junk laying across his lap, it probably was. His beady eyes never leave me and follow me as I approach the owner; he keeps his hands on the weapon.
The shop keeper looks ancient. His skin has taken on some of the qualities of corpse and looks almost gangrenous. It happens to everyone down here eventually; it?s one of the many side effects of the constant damp conditions. He?s wearing a sophisticated looking piece of headgear that he has just pushed up from over his eyes, its all lenses and scanner bars. It must help him work with the tiny circuitry in all of his merchandise.
I glance over his shoulder at the bank of screens on the back wall, some are ancient and actually have glass screens. Archaic, but they show reflections well. My tail is on the other side of the street, affecting his own interest in a stall. The angle he is standing at keeps me in his line of sight. I ask a few discreet questions, and quickly establish this junk isn't all that this shrivelled little man sells. Sometimes the blatant corruption and lawlessness that the gangs encourage and actively cultivate down here is a real boon.
Currency changes hands, not in my favour, and I leave as casually as I entered.
The sleeve of my sim-leather coat now conceals an enervation blade and my glasses now have a couple of chips in them. Newly imposed on the lenses is a HUD, and a menu giving me access to a variety of filters. With a few specific eye movements, I select a filter that cuts through the rain. I pull my collar up to better protect myself from the constant downpour, I twin this movement with a quick glance upwards, a perfectly natural gesture and one that can be seen repeated almost every time someone has to step outside into the downpour.
I?d guessed right. An airborne drone is tracking me, and there's a figure on a roof a few buildings further along the street wearing an optical array of some sort. The tightly packed buildings would have allowed him to easily follow me anywhere in this city with only mild acrobatics. My glasses tell me the drone is a hundred metres up and the figure on the roof is a little over sixty metres distant at an elevation of fifteen metres. Too high and too far to intervene, unless he has a ranged weapon with good accuracy.
I take a right and after crossing a few intersections come out on a main motodrag. Vehicles are streaming past, the noise and fumes are almost overwhelming. There are hardly any people along here, only the very poorest and most destitute lived and worked alongside these things. Long term exposure to the pollution is deadly and can have mutagenic effects.
My conditioned brain had all but forced me to memorize the street layout around my hab block for ten miles in every direction, and have a generalized knowledge of the entire city and all its districts. As a consequence, I know that another thirty paces down this road is a subway that travels under the drag.
I turn down the steps into the dark tunnel, the light strips having long since been stolen. A hapless resident lay sprawled at the bottom of the steps, covered in a blanket and a thin layer of his own vomit and excrement. I give him a swift kick in the ribs, the man jerked violently awake. His arm shoots out of the folds in the blanket; knife in hand.
I flash some currency chips and his eyes gleam hungrily. The knife lowers, and I tell him what to do. He grabs the chips and my coat and leaps up. Now wearing my long jacket, collar pulled up high, he walks down the tunnel. I slide back into an alcove, the darkness completely hiding me. A quick eye movement switches the filter in my glasses to night vision and I waited.
My doppelganger is nearly half way down, silhouetted by the light at the end of the tunnel, when I hear the faintest of footsteps. At first I'm not sure if I'm just imagining them they are so quiet. The noise of the motodrag - a dull drone from down here - doesn't exactly make for easy listening either. The footsteps stop. It's doubtful he'll enter the tunnel while he thinks I'm still in it. If it had actually been me walking down, and I'd turned around, there would be no where for him to hide. I could do nought but spot him. The wretch disguised as me finally reaches the stairs and returns to the light. I paid him to disappear again as quickly as he can, so hopefully it will fool the guys outside just long enough to enact my plan. A few seconds after my pretender exits, the footsteps start up again; faster this time.
I slip the knife into my hand and get ready. I can feel the battle lust trying to force it?s self upon me. I can hear my blood thrumming through my body, practically feel the adrenaline flowing, memories surface, the shakes, heat. My training makes an entry, it's as if two entities are battling for control of my body. The raw, animalistic battle lust can't compete with the refined, frighteningly powerful training. It takes over. I'm a passenger now; relegated to back-seat driver. I can suggest, but not control.
My heart rate and breathing slows, adrenaline's effect is nullified, my mind is reduced to a blank slate. Nothing is allowed to intrude on the complete and total concentration. The man steps into view, every detail is analysed: height, build, posture, clothes, equipment (both visible and concealed), angles, distances. A dozen plans are formulated, accounting for hundreds of variables, and the most workable is chosen. All in a matter of seconds. What those people did to me...it both terrifies and awes me in equal measure. I'm never sure what I'm/it's going to do. All I can do is give it an objective, the route it takes...
I snake out just as he passes, my elbow connecting perfectly with his temple. I caught him right in the most unbalanced phase of his gait. The blow sends him sprawling and a cry of pain and surprise escapes him. My next step takes me over him and I come down hard with my knee right on his chest, the air whooshes out of his lungs. Stunned from the blow to the head and barely able to breathe, he poses very little threat to me and won?t be able to put up a proper defence. A totally alien voice issues from my throat. It has a guttural, uneducated quality about it, antithetic to my usual high-city accent. I sound like one of the locals.
"Freeeesh MEAT!"
The enervation blade bites into him, just a flesh wound, but that's all it takes. The jolt the blade delivers to the man's nervous system paralyses him. He stiffens beneath me for a moment and then falls limp. It's only temporary, and will ware off in about a minute. For that extra bit of authentic brutality I slam his head back into the ground. Still in the alien voice, I say
"You ain't from arand 'ere ar ya bub?"
With that I start rummaging through his clothes. No ID or personal effects, but I wasn't expecting any. You always come to a job clean. I find some currency chips, a compact solid slug special, an enervation blade like my own, and an ear piece.
There's a throat mike as well: the clever kind. It's just a flat, skin-coloured patch: very high tech. I pretend to overlook it, a local would never see it. Whoever was on the other end would be hearing this, in fact i was counting on it. I swipe all the stuff, give him another quick once over, and stand back up.
"Pleasure doin' buisness wid cha"
My parting gift is a viscous kick in the head that should keep him out of action long enough for me to make an escape. As I walk away I insert the ear piece to listen in on the radio chatter.
"T1 is down, contact lost following altercation with a native. Life signs stable." One voice reports
"Target has entered a covered market...attempting to reacquire...reacquisition failed" another chimes in with.
"Abort the mission and establish a perimeter around the residence. Set drones on low level patrol. Maintain zero presence, the target must not be alerted" A deeper voice says. It is undoubtedly a commanding tone, this guy is in charge of the operation. I take out the earpiece and disable it for now. I don?t want anyone tracking me through it.
I round a corner and almost collapse as my training releases me from its grip, returning to its passive state. I stagger and lean against a wall for support, breathing heavily. It's a shock to the system: being back in control. I'm fatigued as well; it takes a lot out of me. I was successful though; I have, at least some, intelligence about my enemies now. Not enough to specific, but it certainly narrows down the list.
Not just anyone has access to the sort of tech and resources that I have arrayed against me. Of the ones that remain, there are a few that really set the alarm bells ringing, and one that would be VERY bad indeed. I need to hide out, see if I can't narrow the list down some more. There are a few favours I can call in.
I let the tides pull me along, direction and destination mattered not. Each change in direction is accompanied by new sensual stimuli; sights, smells, and tastes even. The constant flux of my surroundings serves to distract my mind from things that don?t bare thinking about. The gentle currents of the crowd worked to counteract the roiling torrents within a mind that was in disarray and turmoil. My mind. The packed streets of the under-city always serve as a distraction from the monsters that lurk within my soul. What with the host of services on offer - both legal and illegal - one could lose themselves.
The steady beat my feet have been drumming out upon the pavement for the last few hours ceases. My features are thrown into sharp contrast by the blood red neon streaming out of the shop window. I tilt my head towards it slightly. Not a shop, a pleasure den.
The young women in the window are flaunting their flesh, writhing around in hedonistic dances as they try to tempt me inside. The alluring smiles they all wear don't extend to their dead eyes. What joy they ever found in this - if they ever found joy - has been long since destroyed, replaced by indifference and pain. Not even the airborne smog of engineered pheromones and perfumes that hang around this place could tempt me inside after meeting a gaze like that.
Besides, it's not the girls I'm interested in, although I do a good job pretending that's the case.
In the reflection on the plexi-glass I see my tail. As much as I want them to, even the distracting thoughts and emotions I?ve been trying to manufacture during this trip can't block the training. It's hardwired, always running in the background.
The legions of distractions my wanderings here provide only force it back, they stop short of blocking it completely although it comes close. As close as anything can without befouling my mind at least. In case you were curious, Darsana leaf does the best job if you want to chemically dull your brain to the real world. That's beside the point though. Even pushed so far back, the training still manages to highlight this man for me.
He has been following me since the moment I stumbled out of my hab block. He's good, obviously trained. Not just some rat scoping me out. He stays in the sweet spot: far enough away to not draw any undue attention to himself, but close enough to never lose me in the crowd. He doesn't quite fit in though, it?s subtle and I doubt anyone else notices, but it's enough to draw him to my attention.
He won't be alone, but I can't locate the rest of his team with my indirect investigations. The constant downpour of condensation is reducing my vision distance. There could quite easily be some rooftop spotters or even aerial back up. The ceiling is high enough to accommodate some smaller craft or unmanned drones. I don't look too hard or they may twig that I'm alert to their presence. That could force their hand. Just how bad that could be, and how many people would die, depends entirely upon who this so far anonymous ?they? are.
I resume my journey with purpose now. I mentally run through the list of possibles for a job like this. The list is long: I've made a lot of enemies in my time. Hell, I don't even know what the job IS. I'm going on very little information and I desperately need to redress that. I'm also woefully unarmed. My body - as deadly as it was - wouldn't fare so well if there were any weapons involved.
I drift over to one of the thousands of street stalls that infest the under-city. Groups of them here and there, they sprout like mushrooms. An appropriate simile considering the constant damp conditions. I casually glance over a few things and drift on down the line. It took me a good ten minutes to reach the stall I wanted. If I'd made a beeline straight for my target it would have looked unnatural.
It's a tech vendor; the tables and shelf units are piled high with all sorts of equipment and technological paraphernalia. There is hardware to suit any purpose you care to name. Some of it is quite clearly scrap; scavenged from the refuse pits and plundered for any working components. The pieces that look like they may be serviceable are likely to have slightly more dubious origins.
As I move forward and duck under the plastic sheet that serves as a roof, the proprietor moves forwards to greet me. To my left is a hulking bear of a man who probably acts as the stalls minder. He is slouched in a chair and has a chunky looking gun that looks like it has been cobbled together from junk laying across his lap, it probably was. His beady eyes never leave me and follow me as I approach the owner; he keeps his hands on the weapon.
The shop keeper looks ancient. His skin has taken on some of the qualities of corpse and looks almost gangrenous. It happens to everyone down here eventually; it?s one of the many side effects of the constant damp conditions. He?s wearing a sophisticated looking piece of headgear that he has just pushed up from over his eyes, its all lenses and scanner bars. It must help him work with the tiny circuitry in all of his merchandise.
I glance over his shoulder at the bank of screens on the back wall, some are ancient and actually have glass screens. Archaic, but they show reflections well. My tail is on the other side of the street, affecting his own interest in a stall. The angle he is standing at keeps me in his line of sight. I ask a few discreet questions, and quickly establish this junk isn't all that this shrivelled little man sells. Sometimes the blatant corruption and lawlessness that the gangs encourage and actively cultivate down here is a real boon.
Currency changes hands, not in my favour, and I leave as casually as I entered.
The sleeve of my sim-leather coat now conceals an enervation blade and my glasses now have a couple of chips in them. Newly imposed on the lenses is a HUD, and a menu giving me access to a variety of filters. With a few specific eye movements, I select a filter that cuts through the rain. I pull my collar up to better protect myself from the constant downpour, I twin this movement with a quick glance upwards, a perfectly natural gesture and one that can be seen repeated almost every time someone has to step outside into the downpour.
I?d guessed right. An airborne drone is tracking me, and there's a figure on a roof a few buildings further along the street wearing an optical array of some sort. The tightly packed buildings would have allowed him to easily follow me anywhere in this city with only mild acrobatics. My glasses tell me the drone is a hundred metres up and the figure on the roof is a little over sixty metres distant at an elevation of fifteen metres. Too high and too far to intervene, unless he has a ranged weapon with good accuracy.
I take a right and after crossing a few intersections come out on a main motodrag. Vehicles are streaming past, the noise and fumes are almost overwhelming. There are hardly any people along here, only the very poorest and most destitute lived and worked alongside these things. Long term exposure to the pollution is deadly and can have mutagenic effects.
My conditioned brain had all but forced me to memorize the street layout around my hab block for ten miles in every direction, and have a generalized knowledge of the entire city and all its districts. As a consequence, I know that another thirty paces down this road is a subway that travels under the drag.
I turn down the steps into the dark tunnel, the light strips having long since been stolen. A hapless resident lay sprawled at the bottom of the steps, covered in a blanket and a thin layer of his own vomit and excrement. I give him a swift kick in the ribs, the man jerked violently awake. His arm shoots out of the folds in the blanket; knife in hand.
I flash some currency chips and his eyes gleam hungrily. The knife lowers, and I tell him what to do. He grabs the chips and my coat and leaps up. Now wearing my long jacket, collar pulled up high, he walks down the tunnel. I slide back into an alcove, the darkness completely hiding me. A quick eye movement switches the filter in my glasses to night vision and I waited.
My doppelganger is nearly half way down, silhouetted by the light at the end of the tunnel, when I hear the faintest of footsteps. At first I'm not sure if I'm just imagining them they are so quiet. The noise of the motodrag - a dull drone from down here - doesn't exactly make for easy listening either. The footsteps stop. It's doubtful he'll enter the tunnel while he thinks I'm still in it. If it had actually been me walking down, and I'd turned around, there would be no where for him to hide. I could do nought but spot him. The wretch disguised as me finally reaches the stairs and returns to the light. I paid him to disappear again as quickly as he can, so hopefully it will fool the guys outside just long enough to enact my plan. A few seconds after my pretender exits, the footsteps start up again; faster this time.
I slip the knife into my hand and get ready. I can feel the battle lust trying to force it?s self upon me. I can hear my blood thrumming through my body, practically feel the adrenaline flowing, memories surface, the shakes, heat. My training makes an entry, it's as if two entities are battling for control of my body. The raw, animalistic battle lust can't compete with the refined, frighteningly powerful training. It takes over. I'm a passenger now; relegated to back-seat driver. I can suggest, but not control.
My heart rate and breathing slows, adrenaline's effect is nullified, my mind is reduced to a blank slate. Nothing is allowed to intrude on the complete and total concentration. The man steps into view, every detail is analysed: height, build, posture, clothes, equipment (both visible and concealed), angles, distances. A dozen plans are formulated, accounting for hundreds of variables, and the most workable is chosen. All in a matter of seconds. What those people did to me...it both terrifies and awes me in equal measure. I'm never sure what I'm/it's going to do. All I can do is give it an objective, the route it takes...
I snake out just as he passes, my elbow connecting perfectly with his temple. I caught him right in the most unbalanced phase of his gait. The blow sends him sprawling and a cry of pain and surprise escapes him. My next step takes me over him and I come down hard with my knee right on his chest, the air whooshes out of his lungs. Stunned from the blow to the head and barely able to breathe, he poses very little threat to me and won?t be able to put up a proper defence. A totally alien voice issues from my throat. It has a guttural, uneducated quality about it, antithetic to my usual high-city accent. I sound like one of the locals.
"Freeeesh MEAT!"
The enervation blade bites into him, just a flesh wound, but that's all it takes. The jolt the blade delivers to the man's nervous system paralyses him. He stiffens beneath me for a moment and then falls limp. It's only temporary, and will ware off in about a minute. For that extra bit of authentic brutality I slam his head back into the ground. Still in the alien voice, I say
"You ain't from arand 'ere ar ya bub?"
With that I start rummaging through his clothes. No ID or personal effects, but I wasn't expecting any. You always come to a job clean. I find some currency chips, a compact solid slug special, an enervation blade like my own, and an ear piece.
There's a throat mike as well: the clever kind. It's just a flat, skin-coloured patch: very high tech. I pretend to overlook it, a local would never see it. Whoever was on the other end would be hearing this, in fact i was counting on it. I swipe all the stuff, give him another quick once over, and stand back up.
"Pleasure doin' buisness wid cha"
My parting gift is a viscous kick in the head that should keep him out of action long enough for me to make an escape. As I walk away I insert the ear piece to listen in on the radio chatter.
"T1 is down, contact lost following altercation with a native. Life signs stable." One voice reports
"Target has entered a covered market...attempting to reacquire...reacquisition failed" another chimes in with.
"Abort the mission and establish a perimeter around the residence. Set drones on low level patrol. Maintain zero presence, the target must not be alerted" A deeper voice says. It is undoubtedly a commanding tone, this guy is in charge of the operation. I take out the earpiece and disable it for now. I don?t want anyone tracking me through it.
I round a corner and almost collapse as my training releases me from its grip, returning to its passive state. I stagger and lean against a wall for support, breathing heavily. It's a shock to the system: being back in control. I'm fatigued as well; it takes a lot out of me. I was successful though; I have, at least some, intelligence about my enemies now. Not enough to specific, but it certainly narrows down the list.
Not just anyone has access to the sort of tech and resources that I have arrayed against me. Of the ones that remain, there are a few that really set the alarm bells ringing, and one that would be VERY bad indeed. I need to hide out, see if I can't narrow the list down some more. There are a few favours I can call in.
