Prime City: A Science Fiction Thriller (Neon Horizon Book 2)

by Michael Robertson

  They moved with caution, weaving through the people several steps at a time. They passed a sex worker at least as tall as Marcie’s dad. She also wore heels, adding another few inches to her towering frame. The dark skin on her thick thighs had been oiled, creating a mirror that reflected the surrounding neon. She stood at once spectacular and petrifying.

  The crowd surged forwards, and Marcie slammed against the wall again, forcing an oomph from the Eye.

  A girl of about ten turned to them and frowned. Marcie balled her right fist. Dressed in a pink wig and mermaid outfit, she tilted her head to the side. The crowd cheered, pulling the girl’s attention towards Pierre and Becky, who’d been lifted in the air.

  Supported by those beneath them, Pierre punched a clenched right fist against his open left palm. “Horace was one of us, and he died at the hands of the Eye. Whatever happens, we will find him, and we will get our revenge.”

  Marcie took another step towards freedom.

  “We won’t spare him when we find him,” Pierre said.

  The Eye trembled on Marcie’s back.

  “I promise you it won’t be pretty, so walk away now if you want nothing to do with this.”

  Other than the occasional cough, the crowd stood silent.

  Nodding while surveying her people, Becky’s pale face turned red as she threw a fist into the air. “This is war. The Blind Spot will not stand murderers in our midst. It can’t be one rule for the privileged few while the rest of us are punished.”

  The tall woman shouted, “Horace was one of us. I’ll die in his name if I have to.”

  The collective roar forced Marcie back, slamming the Eye into the wall again. He clung on tighter than before, restricting Marcie’s breathing as he clamped his arm across her throat.

  The raucous crowd continued to bay for blood.

  “I need to get this backpack off,” Marcie said. Two steps took her through more people.

  Another alleyway up ahead, this one led them out of there. Were she on her own, she’d already be on the roofs by now. They’d moved far enough away from Becky and Pierre to hear the noises they made but not decipher their words. The street was still busy with frenzied people, but at least she had more room to move.

  They passed a man in a matching fur hat and coat just as he screamed, “Fuck yeah!” His call struck a bell in Marcie’s skull. It left a tinnitus ring and turned her legs momentarily bandy.

  Falling into the alley and away from the glow of the main street, Marcie said, “I need you to get down in a second.”

  “What?”

  “I need to put my rucksack across my front. I can’t carry you any farther without moving it. Just be ready to jump off and back on again, okay?”

  The crowd on the main street all stared ahead, fixed on Becky and Pierre. “Three, two, one.”

  The second the Eye jumped off her back, a child’s voice let out a tattletale shriek, “He’s there. He’s down there.”

  “Fuck it!” Marcie hadn’t looked up. A face round with baby fat and smeared with soot stared down at them from a first-floor window.

  With machine efficiency, Marcie’s arms slipped her backpack off and slung it across her front.

  The man in the fur coat and hat pointed down the alley. “The kid’s right. He’s here. He’s here!”

  The Eye jumped on Marcie’s back again.

  Even over the chaos, Pierre’s voice rang out. “Lock the place down! Whatever you do, don’t let him get away!”

  Chapter 12

  The tall sex worker with the oiled thighs overtook the man in the fur coat and hat. Her cybernetic enhancements were revealed in how they disturbed the shimmering light on her glistening skin. She led the charge after Marcie and the Eye, a wall of red targets encircling the mob packed into the alley.

  “Why did you have to bring that damn coat?”

  “It’s freezing,” the Eye said.

  “You didn’t have something more lightweight? A little bit easier to carry?”

  “Not anything as stylish as this!”

  They might have been invisible because of the cloaking device, but the tall walls on either side kept them penned in, the alley no more than two metres wide. The powerful woman ate up the distance between them. Each stilettoed step stabbed the road like an ice pick.

  “We need to beat them out of the Blind Spot,” the Eye said.

  “No shit.”

  “All right. I’m trying to help. Turn right at the end.”

  If the woman got any closer, Marcie would feel her breaths on the back of her neck. One on one, she’d beat her in a fight, but with half the Blind Spot backing her up, she had no chance.

  The end of the alley a few metres away, the Eye said, “We’re going to do this.”

  “We?”

  “Just turn right.”

  But Marcie turned left.

  “What the hell are you doing?”

  “I swear,” Marcie said, her voice low enough for only him to hear, “if you keep shouting and giving them something to follow, I’ll leave you on your own.” Turning right would have taken them towards Scala City and the tunnel to the wastelands.

  “If you’d have left me alone in the first place, I wouldn’t be in this mess!”

  The tall sex worker ran with certainty, turning right where Marcie had turned left.

  “See,” Marcie said, “I wanted to turn right, but I thought she might have heard you.”

  The mob followed the tall woman, all of them tearing off in the direction of the tunnel out of there.

  “We could have outrun them.”

  “That’s the second time you’ve said we. Last time I checked, you were no more than a monkey on my back.”

  After several turns, her clothes clinging to her sweat-damp body, the Eye forced into silence by her acerbic retort, Marcie turned right.

  The Eye finally said, “You’re heading to Sal’s house, aren’t you?”

  “We’re heading to Sal’s house.”

  Chapter 13

  “I have to see him before I go,” Marcie said. The Eye’s weight continued to press against her back. Uncomfortable, sure, but at least she had legs that could walk forever without getting fatigued, and at least they were no longer being chased.

  “You know what the mob will do to me, right? You’ll be fine. You’re the princess of the Blind Spot. Besides, we’ll get settled in Scala City, and you’ll be able to come back and see him any time. Who’s going to stop you returning?”

  “But where else do you expect me to go? I planned on turning right until you advertised it to those chasing us. I had no chance outrunning that mob. Not with you wearing that stupid coat on my back. It makes sense to go somewhere different and lie low for a while.”

  “You think this is lying low?”

  Sal’s front gates were closed, as always. If she jumped in, it would trigger an alarm.

  “So how are you going to get in?”

  “I’ll press the buzzer. Frankie will let me in.”

  “You think he’s forgiven you?”

  When she told him she was going to get some lungs for Sal, then he might. She’d have to break the news of where they were going to the Eye at some point anyway.

  Marcie reached out for the small metal buzzer on the intercom, but before she pressed it, the gate popped open an inch and slowly pulled inwards. “How’s that for timing?” She slipped inside when it opened wide enough, Sal’s front door swinging open.

  “Uh, Marce?” The Eye squirmed on her back.

  Marcie turned around and her frame sank. “Shit. That’s why the gate just opened.”

  Pierre and Becky led a small crowd towards Frankie’s gate.

  “I told you this wasn’t the best place for us to visit. There’s no chance of you getting in and out of that house without Frankie knowing. And if Pierre and Becky ask him if he’s seen us, he’ll have to tell them.”

  Her voice wavered as she pointed at the house. “But Sal’s just there.”

&
nbsp; “If they surround this place, we’re screwed.”

  Marcie moved away from the front door around the side of the house.

  “Marce, what the hell are you doing? We should be leaving. Now!”

  She reached Sal’s bedroom window. His curtains were open. He sat in bed, the glaze of boredom covering his eyes as he locked onto the television. The lungs on either side of him pumped slowly up and down, feeding oxygen into his body. “He’s just there.”

  “I feel for you, I really do, but that crowd’s growing. And if you knock, what’s he going to do? He can’t get out of bed to open the window. He’ll have to call for help. You let him know you’re here, and we’re done for. We need to get out before it’s too late.”

  A lump swelled in Marcie’s throat, and she nodded several times, her temples sore. “Just give me a moment.”

  The boy she’d had in her future ever since she could remember, he did what he’d done for half his young life: he lay in bed and let machines breathe where he couldn’t. She’d get his lungs. Whatever happened, she’d get her and the Eye across the wastelands, she’d make sure she found the Eye somewhere to live, and she’d get Sal some new lungs.

  The Eye kissed the back of Marcie’s head. “Come on, sweetheart. Let’s get out of here.”

  A deep and stuttered breath, Marcie ran for the open gate. She moved with light steps, slowing down to walking on tiptoes while skirting around Pierre, Becky, and Frankie before jogging back the way they’d come.

  Chapter 14

  “How the hell are we going to get through that lot?” the Eye said.

  As far as the Eye knew, they were heading to Scala City. Their destination, the tunnel leading to the wastelands, sat much closer. Just thirty to forty metres away, it still presented the same problem. A crowd of several hundred people packed the street and blocked their way. Even without the Eye on her back, Marcie had no way through. A good proportion of them were armed with blasters, swords, handheld axes … If just one of them twigged, they were screwed. The rooftops on the other side of the street were too far away to give them access to the tunnel, and the crowd around the entrance too dense. Even if Marcie could make the jump from a rooftop to the tunnel, she would have landed on someone.

  “It’s going to be days before we get out of here,” the Eye said.

  Marcie moved back into the side street they’d emerged from. The blinking neon from a nearby shop advertised pleasures to punters that even the Blindspot found tasteless to advertise on the main strip. The glow of the red melons and a purple aubergine reflected in the black glass windows. Razor blades, ropes, and rubber gloves. Marcie shrugged, jolting the Eye on her back. “So what choices do we have?”

  The slamming of heavy footsteps approached. Wrench marched towards them with Frankie at his side. Both of them wore tan trench coats, both of them open and flapping in the wind.

  “Thank god Frankie’s gotten rid of Becky and Pierre,” Marcie said. Her dad’s scowl was as hard as she’d ever seen it, deep wrinkles on his forehead.

  Marcie moved aside as they drew closer, pinning the Eye to a nearby wall. She avoided the black glass window that glowed purple with the red light inside. They might have been invisible, but they’d paint a silhouette if they stood in the wrong spot.

  Just as Wrench passed them, Marcie reached out.

  “What are you doing?” the Eye said.

  She caught her dad’s large hand, the ground shaking beneath his heavy steps. His scowl shifted and his fingers twitched, but he didn’t break stride.

  “Get back!” Wrench’s deep boom drove a thunderclap down the street. Several hundred people, most of them not used to taking orders unless from a high-paying punter, all stopped. None of them moved.

  “I said get back.”

  Wrench and Frankie continued forwards, shoving people out of their way as they headed towards the tunnel’s entrance.

  A pimp no taller than five feet six inches stood dressed in a large yellow hat and yellow sunglasses. He shook his head and pointed at Wrench. “You’re covering for him,” he said. “You’re—” He screamed when Wrench lifted him above his head and launched him into the crowd.

  “Now move the fuck back!” Wrench said.

  Although the crowd shifted away from the leader of the Blind Spot, several people tutted and shook their heads.

  “If anyone else has a problem, say it to my face.” He looked one way and then the other, addressing the crowd while Frankie removed a large taser from inside his trench coat, the blue end buzzing like an angry viper. “Well?”

  Although one of the women lifted her lip in a sneer, when Wrench stepped closer to her, she held his glare for a second longer before easing back.

  Marcie took off after her dad and Frankie, walking the path they’d cut through the crowd.

  Wrench pointed at the two guards at the tunnel’s entrance. “The guards on this tunnel have a grenade in their hands. It’s called a deterrent. The militia from the wastelands know if they come down this tunnel, they and it will be blown to pieces. If you morons gather around here, you’re asking the guards to make a choice. Do they blow all of you up, or do they let the militia in? You’re nullifying our only defence against invasion.” Grabbing Frankie’s taser, Wrench lunged at the people. It cleared more space, his voice growing louder. “Now move the fuck back.”

  All but three people followed his orders. The tall sex worker who’d led the charge after Marcie and the Eye remained, with two of her friends. All three of them women, maybe they thought Wrench would cut them more slack.

  He could have done it to any one of them and it would have been effective, but he had to make a show of it. Wrench slammed the end of the taser into the tall sex worker’s stomach. She doubled over, twitching and spasming as she hit the ground in a writhing and snapping mess.

  The other two stepped away from their downed friend, the legs of the woman now pointing in opposite directions from where the shock had shorted them out. His wide frame bulging from the effort of lifting a woman as tall as himself, Wrench tossed her to the other side of the road.

  The people parted and she hit the ground with a thud, sliding towards the Blind Spot’s largest bakery. Made from red brick and wider and taller than any other building, the blue sign on its front had been shaped to resemble a sack of grain.

  Wrench panted as the woman twisted on the ground, unable to get to her feet on account of her malfunctioning legs. While her two friends helped drag her away, the rest of the crowd held their breath, every one of them averting their focus when the Blind Spot’s leader fixed on them.

  “Now I get why you’re pissed off,” Wrench said, the deep boom of his voice echoing off the tall buildings opposite the tunnel’s entrance. “But I won’t have you all jeopardising the safety of the Blind Spot while you go on a witch-hunt.”

  The wall now clear of people, Marcie ran at a jog alongside it. Two guards—straight faced and strong chinned—stood at the entrance. Just before passing them, she moved close to her dad and touched his lower back. It took all she had to keep her tone even when she whispered, “Thanks, Dad. Love you.”

  Wrench’s brow pinched in the middle and Frankie took over. “We need to keep watch on this tunnel just in case anyone sees the Eye.”

  Frankie’s words faded as Marcie ran towards the wastelands. He spoke loud enough to drown out her light steps and gasping breaths. Her lungs had wound so tight with her grief, she struggled to breathe, but she didn’t have far to go.

  Marcie burst from the alleyway, moved to the side, and eased the Eye off her back. The wastelands stretched away from them, barren beneath the winter sky. Two clusters of farm buildings, both of them surrounded with chain-link fencing topped with barbed wire. They were miles apart. Tufts of grass sat in clumps on the muddy plain.

  The Eye’s mouth hung open as he scanned what lay ahead. Prime City stood on the horizon, five miles away, the glare from it reflecting off the grey clouds above. He fished his data chip from the smal
l pocket inside his ridiculous fur coat and turned it over to inspect it. He then handed Marcie a pair of blue glasses. “I upgraded the software so they work better.”

  Marcie put them on. “Thanks. But they worked fine before.”

  “Now they work better. So what’s the plan? We’re going to wait for the crowd to die down and head back into the Blind Spot, yeah?”

  “Um …” Marcie said, slipping her rucksack from her front and slinging it on her back, “about that …”

  Chapter 15

  Marcie’s legs twitched and shimmered, maintaining her stability in the face of the blustery onslaught of the open wastelands. The only other place she’d felt winds with such power had been at the top of the Apollo Tower. And like when she flew through the sky in Scala City, small pieces of debris and dirt tapped against her glass lenses.

  The Eye hadn’t spoken since she’d told him they were heading to Prime City, and they hadn’t moved on from the end of the tunnel. He shivered while buttoning up his coat to his neck. “You have heard of the wastelands, right?”

  “Of course I have.” The landscape so barren it made the grey cloudy sky appear positively vibrant. Prime City, their goal on the horizon. They were separated from it by at least five miles of desolation. “But you shouldn’t believe everything you hear. I also heard it’s where they grow all the food, and that’s clearly not the case.”

  “It’s winter.”

  “Huh?”

  “Nothing grows in winter.”

  “So where does our food come from?”

  “You’ve noticed we don’t get many fresh vegetables at this time of year, right? Mostly bread and meat. Or do you get them all year round because you’re the princess of the Blind Spot? Does someone have them specially imported?”

  Marcie put her right hand on her hip.

  “They hunt animals in the winter, and they supply us with bread from their stores of grain in those farms.” He pointed at the two large compounds.