Mistrunner 2 - Chapter 21 - A Day Off (Patreon)

There is nothing better than physically dominating someone. Once the bio-enhancers took hold, I really came into my own, and the knowledge that I could wrestle just about anyone into submission really did a number on my self-confidence. I’ve been leaning on it ever since.

Nora Lancaster

I sat beside Patrick, watching the city whip by as we rode the monorail to Bywater, which was home to the highest class shops I was likely to be allowed into. It was where most of the Garden’s corporate lackeys shopped for their knockoff suits and imitation accessories. For my part, I’d never put much stock in who made my clothes, but to the sorts of people who worked on the higher platforms, such things mattered a great deal.

And for good reason, too. It wasn’t just vanity, though that did play a role. Nor was it a desire to delude themselves into believing that they were somehow better than the men and women who worked in the factories or silos. That was a part of it as well, but it wasn’t the driving force behind their choice of clothing. Instead, the culprit was a simple desire to climb the ladder.

Everyone who went to work on one of the higher tiers had one thing in mind: advancement. They wanted to prove themselves to their middle managers, who were once right where they were, so they could get promoted. Some were even ignorant enough to believe they might one day climb to the top and rub shoulders with the city’s real aristocracy. It was sheer idiocy born of powerful delusion, but thousands – if not millions – of people had been caught up in the idea that they could somehow overcome their humble origins through nothing more than hard work. What they never considered was that the system was designed to prevent just that from coming to pass; after all, why would the higher-ups create a hierarchy at all if they weren’t going to protect it by any means possible?

So, it was with a twisting anxiety in my stomach that I watched the Garden pass me by as we headed to Bywater. The district where I’d been born and raised was almost unrecognizable, it was so mired in conflict. Everywhere I looked, there was evidence of the ongoing tribal war. Plumes of smoke, dead bodies, and burned out hulks that were once mega-buildings abounded, and with those sights came a modicum of guilt. After all, I had provided the spark that had become the conflagration that had engulfed the district. Without my actions, everything would have continued on like normal.

Not that I let the guilt spread. I wouldn’t allow it to become much more than an inkling. An errant thought. A slight tickle up my spine. It was easy to ignore my own culpability when I remembered my mission. Even easier when I thought of those automatons going about their lives like they were really living. For some, catching an errant bullet would be a godsend. At least, then, they wouldn’t have to trudge through a life of misery while they pretended they weren’t banging their heads against an immovable wall.

I did my best not to look upon them with disgust. Or with a sense of superiority. But I was just so disappointed that nobody else seemed to realize – or care – that they were being oppressed. That they were willingly subjugating themselves to people who just didn’t deserve their obeisance. It was difficult to see that and not feel the winds of condescension pushing me into a mindset I didn’t really want to foster.

Regardless, I knew things would get much worse before they got better. Soon enough, the tribal war that was only beginning would escalate. I intended to see to that. But until then, I’d let them all stew in their own hostilities while I focused on more important things – like making Nora pay. To that end, I was heading toward Bywater, which was what passed for a mercantile district. Not only did it house the Dome, which in turn provided access to the Bazaar, but there were hundreds, if not thousands of shops in the vicinity. Some sold clothing. Others, cybernetics that only an idiot would put in their bodies. Still others sold delicacies or weapons and everything in between. My uncle had once called it the city’s Mecca of capitalism, whatever that meant.

My needs, though, were very specific. I needed a new wardrobe. Too many times, I’d been hampered by my limited clothing options. Mimicwas great, and it let me assume just about any identity I wanted to take. However, it was limited to my own body; my clothes would always stay the same. So, even if I took the face of someone who had every reason to head up to Lakeview, I’d still stick out because of my clothes, which were limited to a few sets of fatigues, my infiltration suit, a full Enforcer’s uniform I’d looted in Haven, and my well-worn refugee’s rags. None of those, save for the Enforcer’s uniform, would get me into Lakeview. And I didn’t want the hassle that came with wearing that.

So, I needed something more mundane. Something that would let me blend into the crowd of starry eyed, would-be ladder climbers that would be headed from the Garden and into Lakeview. Delusional, the lot of them, but pretending to be one of them would be fantastic camouflage when I took the next step in my quest for revenge.

The other passengers on the monorail were an eclectic bunch. A few were obviously Operators, identifiable by their shifty eyes, visible prosthetics, and easy confidence. Others were the dead-eyed factory or silo workers who were on their way to the mercantile district to spend some of their meager earnings. They weren’t paid enough to provide for much of a surplus, but even the least frugal would have a little extra to spend on luxuries. Otherwise, how else were they supposed to remain docile and placated?

It was a simple cost-benefit equation. If a worker was happy so long as she got a new dress once in a while, it behooved the powers-that-be to give her just enough to give her access to that luxury. It was meant to be infrequent. The carrot for the delusional donkeys to chase. Sometimes, they’d be allowed a bite, but not too often, lest they get the wrong ideas about what they deserved.

The other way, which involved the proverbial stick to the aforementioned carrot, was simply less profitable. Punishing poor workers worked well enough, but it wasn’t a long-term solution. As my uncle was fond of saying, you drew more flies with honey than with vinegar. It was true with insects, and the same held for the working population.

For my part, I saw the truth, though. All of those rewards were blindfolds meant to keep people from seeing the world as it really was. I pitied them almost as much as I resented the fact that they didn’t even try to see reality.

“You okay?” asked Patrick, dragging me from my thoughts. I turned to see that he’d cast a concerned expression in my direction.

“I’m fine,” I said. “Why? Don’t I seem fine?”

He shrugged. “It’s just that a lot’s happened lately,” was his response. “I guess it just seems like you’ve got a lot on your shoulders. Like, when’s the last time you did anything fun?”

“I blew up a roadblock yesterday,” I said, forcing a grin I didn’t really feel after my previous line of thought.

“That’s not what I’m talking about, Mira, and I think you know that.”

I sighed, letting the fake grin fade away. “I know,” was my response. “But I really am fine, Pick. I mean, Patrick. I have a skill that helps with that kind of thing.”

It was true. My Combat Focus wasn’t merely limited to helping me out in battle. It also helped with the aftermath. In Mobile, there had been a few people who didn’t have an ability like that. Those who just couldn’t handle the mental strain they’d been forced to endure in battle. My uncle had called it PTSD, but I’d never experienced anything like what those poor people lived with every day. And I had no desire to, either. I’d seen how debilitating it could be.

“What was the last time you did anything just for fun, though?” he asked. “Not for training. Not for your…you know…quest. Just something for you to relax.”

I was about to answer, but then I realized that I hadn’t really stopped moving forward since I’d boarded the Jitterbug months before. Back then, I’d been tasked with completing my last training mission, which had involved me dismantling an alien Rift mining operation, then running the Rift myself. It had been a transformative experience, not least because of the wealth I’d managed to attain via that opportunity.

However, it brought up a comment my uncle had made during my training. I’d just finished my first mission, and he’d given me some time off, telling me that taking some time for relaxation is almost as important as the training itself. Sometimes, he’d said, we just need to recharge our batteries.

But out of all his lessons, I’d chosen not to take that one to heart. It just felt somehow disrespectful of his memory to take time off. It felt like a betrayal to relax when my every instinct told me to keep driving forward and overcome any obstacles that might present themselves before me. I knew it was a trap, and that eventually, I’d run out of steam. But I just couldn’t stop. Not of my own accord.

“How about this? Let’s do something fun today,” he said.

I narrowed my eyes. “Like what?” I asked.

He shrugged. “I don’t know. What do you do for fun?” was his response. “Besides blowing things up, I mean.”

That brought a genuine smirk out of me. “I don’t know,” I admitted. “Normal stuff, I guess? I like music, and –”

“Everyone likes music,” he teasingly interrupted. “What kind?”

“My favorite band is Leviathan,” I said. “They’re…I don’t know if they have a presence outside of Nova, but…well, here.”

I pulled the chip containing the Leviathan file from my Arsenal Implant and handed it over. He slotted it in his own port and gave it a listen. After almost a minute, he said, “This is good.”

“Just good?” I asked with a quirk of my eyebrow.

He shrugged and removed the chip from his port before handing it back. “It’s good. I like it,” he said.

“Be honest.”

“Okay, so it’s not really my thing,” he said. “But I grew up listening to Remy’s music, which was a lot…slower. And twangier. I guess it grew on me.”

I shook my head, storing the chip back in my Arsenal Implant. “No culture,” I muttered.

“What else do you like to do?” he asked, a hopeful tone in his voice.

Once again, I shrugged. I didn’t really have a good answer. Before my training, I’d enjoyed many of the same things any fifteen-year-old girl liked. Mostly, I’d spent my time reading or watching various programs on the entertainment feeds. After I got to Mobile, though, my horizons had been expanded to include hanging out with Jo and her friends. I’d never really gotten close to any of the others, but on more than one occasion, Jo and I would just talk for hours. However, I didn’t think that was what Patrick had in mind.

Other than that, almost all of my time had been monopolized by training. In a way, my whole life had been about that, and I was beginning to realize just how one-dimensional of a person I really was. Maybe I always had been.

“I…I don’t know,” I admitted, defeat lacing through my words.

Thankfully, Patrick was nothing if not supportive. “How about this? You said the Bywater district is like a big market, right?” he asked. “Usually, it’s not so hard to find fun things to do in those kinds of places.”

I looked up at him and gave him a shy smile. “And you’re an expert in big city living, all of a sudden?” I asked.

“Not quite,” was his deprecating response. He returned my smile with one of his own, adding, “But I’ve been in a lot of towns. And what’s a city if not a big town? Just trust me. Worst that can happen is we wander around for a bit.”

I shrugged, but I was saved from the necessity of a response by the monorail coming to a stop. We’d finally reached Bywater, so we disembarked the elevated train and descended the platform. Unlike the Garden, there were no megabuildings in sight. Instead, there were smaller and far more numerous structures. Above everything loomed the Dome, which we intended to steer clear of.

We also avoided the street vendors that surrounded the place. Instead, we made our way to what passed for an upscale shop. The attendant gave us a derisive look, but she probably knew better than to turn her nose up at a potential customer, so after I spent a little time trying on various corporate-style outfits, we made our purchases and left the shop. Altogether, it felt less like a step along my path of revenge and more like a mundane shopping trip. Which it was. But it was also more, considering what I planned to do with those clothes.

As we left the shop behind, Patrick said, “I think I’ve got an idea where to go.”

“What? How?” I asked.

“While you were trying clothes on, I asked one of the other customers,” he said. “Nice guy. He’s starting a new job next week, and he’s buying some new uniforms. Anyway, he said that if you want to have fun, just head to this place called the French Quarter. Supposedly, it’s named after some big attraction that used to be in the original city.”

I had heard the name in passing, but I had certainly never visited. But what I knew of the place was woefully sparse, which just highlighted all the gaps in my knowledge of the city. I’d led a sheltered existence where I rarely went anywhere but school or home, and now, I was paying for it with my ignorance.

“New Orleans,” I said, desperately trying to prove that I wasn’t entirely ignorant of my own city. “That was the name of the city.”

“Cool,” he said. Then, he reached out and grabbed my hand. I had to actively suppress my urge to react violently to the sudden motion, but I managed it with only a slight grimace that Patrick didn’t notice. He was too busy holding my hand, which was far more nerve-wracking than I might’ve expected it to be. Suddenly, I could feel sweat trickling down my back as my stomach tied itself into a million knots. Thankfully, he was blissfully unaware of the anxiety rampaging through my mind as he dragged me down the sidewalk.

For our outing, I’d chosen not to bother with a disguise. There was a risk to it, but I surmised that few people from my old life would even recognize me. And there was almost no chance of running into Nora; she was too busy putting out fires in the Garden to make a shopping trip to Bywater. Besides, it wasn’t like anyone really knew to look for me in Nova. For all I knew, anyone who cared thought I was dead. Nora included.

In any case, it sometimes felt nice to wear my own face for a change.

I caught up to Patrick so he wasn’t dragging me along, and like that, we made our way down the sidewalk. There were plenty of other pedestrians, but for once, I wasn’t really paying attention to them. Because Patrick was holding my hand, which seemed far more important than some random people I would never see again.

Eventually, he led us down a side street. Then another. All the while, neither of us really talked. It didn’t seem necessary. Instead, we just enjoyed one another’s presence until, at last, we reached our destination.

The street opened up into a wide square filled with hundreds of street performers. There were dancers, jugglers, and tumblers. Musicians, singers, and even an acting troupe who were putting on a play. My jaw dropped as I beheld the chaotic spectacle of so many people moving in so many different ways.

Patrick, who’d stopped, echoed my awe when he said, “Wow.” He gathered himself, then added, “Here – let’s go walk around. Should be fun, right?”

I nodded, and we headed into the fray. The place was incredibly crowded, but I didn’t mind the other jostling pedestrians. Instead, the whole of my attention was on the performers. We passed by a man who was breathing fire, then a pair of female tumblers. I tried to donate a few credits to everyone I saw, but there were so many that I knew I missed a couple.

After about twenty minutes, we stumbled upon an artist who created holographic caricatures, and Patrick paid for one featuring the pair of us. The artist worked quickly, and before I knew it, he’d produced an animated holograph featuring cartoon versions of Patrick and me riding hoverbikes together.

Looking at it, I couldn’t keep a wide grin from spreading across my face. Patrick initiated a transfer of credits, and the artist handed him a pair of chips containing the caricatures. I bought the device meant to play them, and then we moved on to the next performers.

Over the course of the next few hours, we enjoyed everything the French Quarter had to offer, even buying a local treat called beignets. They were just hunks of fried dough covered in powdered sugar, but they were absolutely delicious. I wasn’t certain if it was the company I kept or the beignets themselves.

Either way, by the time we finished our circuit by watching a trio of musicians perform, I had a warm, fuzzy feeling in the pit of my stomach. And as we left the French Quarter behind, I felt like I was walking on air. That lasted all the way through the monorail ride back to the Garden, which saw the pair of us still holding hands while our shoulders pressed against one another.

However, once we reached the stop closest to our headquarters in Algiers, reality reasserted itself. It was a good night, and I had fun, but it didn’t do anything to allay my responsibilities.

Still, Patrick and I had something of an awkward moment when we reached our headquarters, and it became clear that he wanted something from me. Something I wasn’t prepared to give.

So, I bade him good night with a simple hug, then retreated to my bedroom. As I did, I wondered if I’d made the wrong decision. I knew he wanted a kiss, at the very least. Maybe more. But my situation hadn’t changed. I didn’t have room in my life for boys. Not with my quest for revenge looming over everything. I hoped Patrick would understand that, that he’d know that it wasn’t about him.

Whatever the case, I had other things to worry about than whatever was happening between Patrick and me.