Properly slitting a throat is a learned skill. You cut too deep, your blade hits bone and dulls. Too shallow, and your victim isn’t dead. I like to slide that little extra distance around the side and catch the carotid as well. My own version of the double tap.
I slipped away from my victim and ducked down. I slid my razor along the left side of the man I had hamstrung, just deep enough to slice about halfway through his kidney.
His screams told me he was out of this one.
Corso carried a pistol. It was an older weapon called a revolver. He was taking aim at me, so I moved. The shot went wide to my left, as I had gone right. I dove forward and down as the second bullet screamed over my head. I rolled and launched myself left this time, and his next shot was wide again. I felt the next one tug at the bottom of my coat just as I reached him. My blade sliced from his straddle, straight up to his sternum, as another shot whistled past my ear.
I snatched the gun with my left hand as I passed him on his right side, and his insides tumbled into the street. With a deft move of my left hand, I flipped the gun into a firing position and shot Corso’s second-in-command right between her beautiful blue eyes.
Make your choices wisely. Consequences are deadly in this Fallen World.
* * * * *
Chapter 4
I dusted my coat off and looked, sadly, at the single hole near the hem along the bottom.
“You still don’t have any blood on your coat,” Wilson said.
“Yeah, but look at this,” I said, with my finger poking through the hole.
“I think you’ll be fine,” he said. “You can hardly see it.”
I sighed. “Maybe I should start a tab for Simon to pay when I go visit.”
Wilson chuckled. “You are kidding, right?”
I stared at him.
He shook his head, and we resumed our trek. The screams of Corso’s pack had become whimpers and moans by then. Soon, we had walked out of earshot of even those.
“I got blood all over me,” Wilson said.
“Good thing you wear black,” I said. “It takes a certain finesse to wear light colors. I’m pretty sure that thing can’t be wielded with anywhere near the finesse it would take. Stick to black.”
“Four people and not a drop of blood on the coat,” he said with a shake of his head.
“If it wasn’t for the rollin’ on the ground, I’d get a white one.”
“I don’t doubt that.”
“Looks like we made it to Yamato’s,” I said.
The huge Scraper we were nearing was bigger than any in our own Zone. “The Old World used to call them skyscrapers. Just another of those useless facts floating around in my noggin.”
“I can see that,” he said. “They are so tall, they scrape the sky.”
“I think that was the idea,” I said. “They date back to before the Corporate Wars. They used to house businesses in the old days. Then, later, they became the seats of power for the Corporations. Now, as it was then, the wealthy reside in the Scrapers. The poor do the best they can.”
“How do you know all this shit?”
“Too many imprints, each with its own small pieces of knowledge,” I muttered.
“Imprints?”
“Maybe I’ll tell ya about it someday,” I said. “There’s some work needin’ to be done here first.”
“How ‘bout you tell me what this case is?” he asked. “I seem to have been volunteered for a mission I know nothing about.”
“Kidnapped girl, stolen from a Caravan. There’s a shopkeeper here who set her up with Drekk.”
“Drekk!” He spat the word out.
“I had pretty much the same reaction,” I said. “First, I’m gonna find out if this shopkeeper is stupid or if he set up Hale to lose a daughter.”
“Hold!” the guard just outside the main entrance to the Scraper said. “It’s a little late for visitors.”
I slipped a ten scrip into his hand as I shook hands with him.
“Just a little business to conduct,” I said, “then we’ll be on our way.”
He nodded and motioned for us to proceed. This part was easy if you had a few scrip. Without them, I would have had to bring some form of proof I was working for Cedric Hale. Easier to just bribe your way in.
I held up a five scrip. “Can ya point me in the direction of a shop owned by a guy named Denton?”
“Sure thing,” he said, and the scrip disappeared. “Straight to the back, last shop on the left. He’s closed this late, but he lives in the shop. He may open up if you wake him.”
“He’ll open,” I said. “Later, Guardsman.”
“Keep out of trouble.”
“You just spent a day’s wages in the tunnels,” Wilson said as we entered the Scraper. “Must be getting paid well for this one.”
“I’m thinkin’ Denton is gonna be more than happy to reimburse me,” I said.
“Already convinced he’s dirty?”
“Fairly certain,” I said. “We both know how Drekk works.”
“True enough,” he said. “He usually stays away from the wealthier ones.”
“Maybe he’s trying to move up in the world,” I said. “If so, he’s just started swimming with the sharks. I don’t think he knows what he’s gettin’ into.”
“Probably true,” he said. “What’s a shark?”
“Top of the food chain in the ocean.”
“Never seen an ocean,” Wilson said. “Can you imagine travelin’ that far in one trip?”
“There are people outside the city who do that kind of travelin’,” I said. “Maybe someone can get the city under control so people can do that sort of thing again.”
“No one can afford to bribe their way through that many Zones.”
“What would ya think of a city where a person didn’t have to use a Caravan and bribes to cross?”
“Good luck with that, Kade.”
“Everybody’s gotta have a goal, Wilson.”
“Try to focus on one that you might be able to reach,” he said. “I can name three reasons within a three-mile radius that you wouldn’t reach that goal. And that’s just the ‘Big Three’ reasons. There are hundreds of slightly lesser reasons after those.”
“Yeah, I can think of a few, too.”
“Derris.”
I nodded.
“Blechley.”
“Not as big a worry as some would make him,” I said.
“Whatever,” Wilson said. “But then there’s the Circus.”
“Yeah, that could be troublesome.”
“Those are just the local ‘Big Three’ reasons,” he said. “Shall I go on?”
“Nope,” I said. “I know you love to hear yourself speak, but we’re here.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
The shop we were standing in front of looked like a General Goods store. I could see containers through the metal fence that undoubtedly held food supplies like flour or rice. There were various sorts of clothing, cooking utensils, and jars of spices. Overall, it appeared to be a fairly successful store. The shops inside the Scrapers were much different than the shanties and open shops around the outside.
I rattled the fence, loudly.
I heard grumbling from the back of the store, and a man came stumbling out of the dark, fumbling with a set of keys.
“It’s late,” he said.
I held a ten scrip where he could see it.
“We’re leaving early tomorrow, and we need provisions,” I said.
“Come in,” he said, eying the scrip.
He unlocked the sliding metal gate and pushed it to the side far enough to let us in. It truly was a good thing Wilson wore black so the bloodstains on his clothing were hidden.
We stepped inside and followed Denton toward his counter.
“So, how many provisions do you need? Will this be a long trip and are you the only two traveling?”
I listened to the questions he asked. They could be innoc
ent questions, or they could be questions meant to fish for enough information to set someone up for some sort of ambush. So far, they seemed innocent.
“We’re traveling to the east. We need enough for two into Kathrop’s Zone.”
“Dangerous traveling to the east, my friend,” he said. He pulled a map from under the desk and placed it on the counter. He pointed to the spot where Yamato’s Zone was marked. “If you were to take this route, you could bypass several of the more dangerous Zones.”
He traced a route east, then north around several Zones. Still, there was a possibility of innocence.
“Are you familiar with these Zones, my friend?” he asked as his finger followed a trail east.
“Can’t say I’ve ever traveled those.”
His finger backtracked just a tiny bit and turned south into Ramos Antilles’ Zone. That was the clue I had been looking for. I’ve studied this city for nearly seventeen years, and I know the safest routes to almost anywhere. He was trying to send us right into the hands of someone who would almost certainly detain travelers and probably take anything of value from them.
“What can ya tell us about a possible Caravan?”
“There’s a Caravan coming through Jaxom’s Zone tomorrow about noon,” he said. “If you’re interested in that option, I can send word for him to meet you at a pre-chosen point so you can join them.”
“How would you get a message to the man?”
“I have a shortwave radio,” he said. “Most of the shops inside the Scrapers have ways to communicate.”
“How much would this Caravan run?”
“His standard rate is forty scrip per Zone traveled. From Jaxom to Kathrop is eleven Zones. So, four hundred and forty scrip would take you through.”
His price was too cheap. A Caravan wouldn’t make much money at forty scrip per Zone. Normal rates for an accredited Caravan were a hundred scrip per Zone.
Everything was screaming the shopkeeper was crooked. He would get kickbacks from Antilles or kickbacks from his Caravan. The next question would make or break it for me.
“So, who’s the Caravan Master? Maybe one of us knows him.”
He smiled. If we weren’t familiar with the area, we wouldn’t know Drekk. “His name is Hodipis Drekk, and you won’t find a finer Caravan Master in this corner of the city.”
“Is that what you told Cedric Hale when you booked the trip for his seventeen-year-old daughter from here to Kathrop?”
“What…what?”
“The most important question you’ll answer this night is the next one I ask.”
Wilson stepped back to the gate and slid it closed.
“Just who do you think you are, coming into my establishment and…?”
His words were cut short as he saw, for an instant, the cold, dead eyes of an entirely different person staring at him.
“I’ve been hired to find the girl and bring her home,” I said. “My name is Mathew Kade.”
His face turned several shades whiter when I said my name.
“Oh, dear God,” he whimpered. “What have I done?”
“That’s exactly what we’re about to find out,” I said. “Tell me everything.”
“He’ll kill me.”
I moved like lightning. I slammed his back into the wall behind him, and my left hand clenched around his throat. “Worry about me.”
“I-I’ll t-talk,” he stuttered.
“Tell me.”
“It’s Drekk,” he sputtered. “He pays me to send people to his Caravans. It’s supposed to be a simple ransom.”
“Kidnap and ransom?” I asked. “Then what are the demands? Hale received no demands.”
“I-I don’t know, Mister Kade,” he sobbed. “He just sent word that the girl was gone.”
“How many people have you betrayed, Denton?” I asked, my voice vibrating with anger. “How many lives destroyed? How much did he pay you to send a seventeen-year-old girl out into this perverted abomination of a city?”
His hands trembled as they withdrew a pouch of coins from his belt. “Take it. Please don’t hurt me.”
“Hurt you?” My voice rang in the room. “It won’t hurt…long.”
His scream never made it out of his mouth.
* * *
Hale arrived about mid-morning the next day and found Wilson and me sitting patiently on the steps leading up to the Scraper. He approached me warily.
“Looks like he expects the worst,” Wilson said.
“He won’t be disappointed.”
“Have you found anything for me yet, Mister Kade?” Hale asked.
“I have some news,” I said. “There was a plot to kidnap your daughter and demand a ransom for her return. Something must have gone wrong, considering you haven’t had any demands. You haven’t had any, have you?”
“No,” he answered sadly. “Who was behind it?”
“Denton had a hand in it,” I said. “The one behind it was Drekk. I’ll be visiting him later today. When I have news, I’ll bring it to you or send it with someone else.”
“Please find her, Kade,” he said. “She’s all I have left.”
“I will.”
There was a commotion from the Scraper as several of Yamato’s guards exited the front entrance. They had kept people from entering half the morning.
“What is the meaning of this?” Hale asked the guards.
“Found a shopkeeper this mornin’, Mister Hale.”
“He was hanged last night,” the other guard said. “Wasn’t a robbery, though. There were thirty coins scattered on the floor around him.”
Hale looked at me with gratitude written across his face. Thirty coins for the betrayer. The consequences seemed proper.
Six hundred scrip is what he had been paid. Thirty coins from the Old World. He had sold a seventeen-year-old girl for seven dollars and fifty cents.
Life is cheap in this Fallen World.
* * * * *
Chapter 5
We walked north. Wilson was quiet. The case had become something else after the last night. He was there for Teresa to keep me from gettin’ myself killed, sure. But he had looked straight into the eyes of that shopkeeper with me. We had witnessed justice being served, and both of us knew that justice was what we were truly after.
“Do ya think there’s a chance the girl is still alive?” he asked.
“The truth is,” I said, “there’s not much chance of it. But we’ll find her, or we’ll find her body. Either way, I plan to set this right. You ok with that?”
“Damn straight, I am.”
“Good,” I said. “This might get ugly before we’re through.”
“You have no idea,” he said. “I used Denton’s shortwave last night. Reported to Teresa. She’s called out the Knights and put them on alert. We drag this out in the open, and the Knights will be ready to do what is needed.”
Knights of the Society of the Sword are some of the toughest bastards walking the city streets. You don’t become a Knight easily. Wilson Poe is a Yeoman of the Society, and he’s a walking army in his own right. There are thirty-five Knights. Most of the Society are Recruits, Yeomen, and Squires. The Knights travel the city, and they hate this sort of thing. But it’s a big damn city, and there’s a lot of it going on.
This had just gotten much bigger than Wilson Poe guarding my back.
“Well, what say we give the Knights a target then?”
“That, we should.”
We headed north toward Jaxom’s Zone. It was one Zone north of Zane’s. At least, we would eat well, with the Farmers in Zane’s area today.
The streets look completely different during the day. Some of the bravos still stood idle along the streets in various places. But there were regular folks as well. Travel through the Zones was always dangerous, but travel at night was unheard of for the regular inhabitants of this fallen city. I heard music ahead of us as we neared the Farmers’ wagons.
They traveled with huge box wagons made of strong
wood, banded in steel. The box wagons held almost anything that could be traded in the city or in the countryside around it.
There were entertainers, players of music, and even a wagon that opened into a stage for what used to be called theatre or plays. I’d sat and watched a play in our Zone three years earlier.
It had been a reenactment of the Fall. I had left halfway through the show. I had lived through the Fall, and I remembered so much from before. I didn’t want to relive their reenactment of something that vaguely resembled what had truly occurred.
For a time, I had thought that, if they knew what had really happened, they would try to become something better than this mockery of the civilization that had been here before. Who was I kidding? Humans are some of the vilest creatures this world has ever spawned. Then I would meet that one person who gave me hope that all, truly, hadn’t been lost, and that there might be a small chance that humanity deserved to survive.
Those, like Maddy Hale, who disappeared into the maw of this great creature spawned by the evil nature of humanity needed someone to stand up for them. I saw a part of this in the Society of the Sword. Teresa didn’t strive to control all those around her. They flocked to her because she was a good leader. She cared about those who followed her. Technically, she was the Warlord of our Zone. Stiner was just the Warlord in name. What Teresa decided would be followed, or Stiner would be removed rather quickly.
He charged his tax and lived in his Scraper, but he would have rather rolled down the street over barbed wire than cross Teresa Manora.
I smelled something divine.
“What is that smell?” Wilson asked.
“My god,” I said. “I think it’s a taco.”
“A taco?”
“You have to eat some,” I said. “First time since the Fall I’ve smelled a taco.”
“It smells different.”
“Oh, that’s because they are,” I said as I saw the source of the wonderful smell.
Kade Page 3
