Corroded Cells, page 4
part #2 of Cyberpunk Saga Series
“He’s okay, we just need help,” Ynna pleaded.
“Don’t tell me he’s okay if he ain’t,” she said and upturned a whiskey bottle into her mouth.
“Well,” Ynna began, and Jo put the bottle down, pure misery replacing the anger.
“Come on upstairs,” she said and looked at Ynna. “I’ll get you some new duds.”
They followed her up the wooden stairs to a couple of doors where she whispered, “little ones sleeping in there, come on.” She led them into the room, which served as her office and bedroom—a desk with papers on one side and a bed on the other. Kids’ toys littered the floor. “Tell me,” she said as she indicated for the boys to sit on the bed.
“Carcer arrested Patchwork,” Ynna said, not mincing words.
“I suppose it was bound to happen someday,” his mother admitted. “Boy’s been hacking things he shouldn’t since he was knee-high.”
“Must be why he’s so good,” Gibbs offered.
“I don’t know this one,” Jo said, pulling out a cardboard box with “lost and found” scrawled on the side and handing it over to Ynna. “Here,” she offered, and Ynna began rummaging.
“I’m Gibbs,” he said, “another friend of your son’s.”
“Yeah, you would be,” she said, and Gibbs gave her a puzzled expression. “He always did run with nerd boys like you.”
Gibbs chuckled, “Dead to rights.”
“Ugh, these pants were pissed in,” Ynna complained, dropping the jeans she was holding.
“Ain’t running a charity here,” Jo snapped.
“Sorry,” Ynna said, returning to the box.
“Suppose I’ll be hearing from Carcer soon myself,” Jo said.
“Almost certainly,” Moss agreed. “They will charge him high and low, and as next of kin, you’ll be expected to pay up.”
“This fucking system,” Jo snorted. “Live under the thumb of the rich, then pay them when they accuse you. Keep the poor poor. It’s sick.”
“We are trying to do something about it. So was your son,” Moss offered.
“I know it,” she admitted. “He knows I’m proud of him. All us who served, fought, and bled for corporate greed and were thrown to the street, we all appreciate what you kids do.”
“Thank you,” Ynna said, holding up a checkered skirt which looked similar to what she normally wore. Moss felt guilty accepting praise from a woman who had just lost her son into the system they were working so hard to fight.
“They gonna take him to C City?” Jo asked. Gibbs was watching Ynna pull the skirt on under her bathrobe. “Give the girl some privacy,” Jo admonished.
“Yeah, he’s a man of great fucking subtlety,” Ynna laughed. “They will probably take him there, question him.”
“Torture, you mean,” Jo said, darkness in her voice.
“We are going to try to get there before that happens,” Ynna explained and turned to pull on a shirt. Moss noticed the scar on Ynna’s back—the exit wound from when Warden Ninety-Nine had shot her. Grimy had offered to smooth the skin, to leave no trace of the event. Ynna had said no, she wanted the reminder of all that had happened that day.
“We also learned,” Moss added, “that they have Sandra. I assume you know her, too?”
Jo was shocked, her mind racing to try and understand. “No shit. Burn drowned himself for months after she died—after we thought she died, anyhow.”
“Can you tell us about it?” Gibbs coaxed.
“You knew Burn, weren’t much of a talker, except to cuss,” Jo said, sitting at the chair beside her desk. “Just said she died how she lived, fighting for what she believed. There was one night where he was hardly conscious. He said he left her to die. That she made him. I asked about it when he was clear-headed, but he just said he must have been drunk. Don’t know much more than that. Sad to think he died with that on his soul.”
“We can take solace in the fact that he died the way he thought she did, fighting for what he believed in,” Moss said, more to himself than the room, but Jo nodded.
“That’s something, anyway,” she said quietly. “So, how you going to get my boy back?”
“We need to get outside the wall,” Ynna said. She had pulled a black tee shirt with “Nirvana” written across the front over a long-sleeved gray shirt. She had set her microdyed hair to black and was pulling it into pigtails with loose twine from the floor. Gibbs was staring at her in a way Moss had never seen his friend look at anything.
“You need a hookup?” Jo asked.
“Yes,” Ynna admitted, “and some shoes I can borrow?”
“I can provide both,” Jo said, standing and sliding open a locked closet door. “Have to keep my shoes locked away. My daughter kept trying to put them on and falling all over the place.”
“Cute,” Ynna said with a slight smile.
“Not as cute as it sounds,” Jo corrected. “You heading to the Burg from here?”
“We are if that’s where you know someone,” Ynna said, pulling on a pair of black combat boots.
“Shoulda known you’d go for my military gear,” Jo said, raising an eyebrow.
Ynna replied with quiet pride, “Burn taught me well.”
“Sure did. And breaking into C City is the same kind of dumbfuck plan Burn would have hatched,” Jo said, a hint of a smile on her lips.
Ynna smirked. “I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“It was meant that way,” Jo said, smiling at the young woman. “My friend can get you out, but I’m sure it’ll cost.”
“We have a little money,” Ynna said, nodding almost imperceptibly at Gibbs.
“You’ll need more than a little,” Jo said. “Tell him I sent you though, maybe he’ll remember he owes me one and give y’all a discount—though I doubt it.”
“So, who is this guy?” Moss asked.
“Most folks just call him Ferret. One of those guys who gets people what they need and disappears when there’s trouble,” Jo explained.
“Sounds like our kind of guy,” Moss said.
“Oh, he’ll cozy right up, but don’t buy it. Man like that’ll sell you down the river without a moment’s thought,” she warned.
“As long as it’s not to Carcer,” Ynna said.
“Trust me, he wants less to do with them than you do. He works out of a shithole bar called the Gem. Give him this,” Jo said, writing a little note on the back of a business card. “That will get you a sit-down, but the rest is up to you.”
“Thank you,” Ynna said, taking the card. “We’d be lost in the woods without you.”
“Don’t think for a second you’re out of the woods,” Jo warned. “And don’t come back here without my boy, lest you want one less head on your shoulders.”
“We’ll get him back,” Moss promised. “And we’ll bring Sandra by just for good measure.”
“Would be nice to see that old broad again.” Jo smiled. “Now get out of here.”
Moss stood to leave, Gibbs still rooted to the spot, gazing at Ynna.
“What’s wrong with you?” Jo shouted and threw a slipper at him, striking him in the chest and returning him to the world. “I don’t know where you find these ones,” she said to Ynna.
“He came packaged with the useful one,” Ynna joked, and Moss saw his friend was hurt by the comment. Moss knew his friend was a good man and would prove himself useful but wished he would stop acting like a little kid.
“Can I ask you one more favor?” Ynna asked sheepishly.
Jo shot her a knowing look. “I got a couple of pieces behind the bar and a few boxes of ammo, but this is a loan, you hear?”
“Heard,” Ynna said in a way reminiscent of Patchwork.
“The Burg is dangerous, so you may need it,” Jo said.
“The Legion?” Moss asked nervously.
“Nah, it’s Hoplite territory, lucky for you. Willis told me you had some run-ins with those bikers,” she said.
“Yeah, well, at least the Hoplites don’t want us dead,” Moss said.
“Yet,” Jo forewarned.
Chapter 4
Moss and Gibbs waited by the van as Ynna picked out a gun. “What the fuck?” Moss asked harshly.
“Sorry,” Gibbs said and meant it. “She’s just—it’s just—I don’t know.”
“We can’t keep having this conversation. It’s getting real old,” Moss told him.
“I know, it’s how—” he began, and Moss cut him off.
“Don’t tell me it’s how you respond to stress. Just get your head out of your ass and be the man who brought me to this city.”
“Right,” Gibbs said. “Sorry.”
“Stop apologizing and change,” Moss scolded.
“Okay,” Gibbs said, hanging his head.
Ynna stepped from the bar on slightly wobbling legs, cigarette between her fingers and rifle with attached grenade launcher in the other.
“She had that behind the bar?” Moss asked, astonished.
“Sure did,” Ynna said, the scent of whiskey radiating from her. “You dipshits ready to hit the road?”
“Of course, we have one of the only cars in the city without autonav,” Gibbs complained, watching Ynna walk on unsteady legs.
“You don’t get to talk,” Ynna said, pointing two derisive fingers trailing smoke.
“You good to drive?” Moss checked.
“Can you operate a vehicle?” Ynna over-enunciated her words.
“Not really. I mean, Stan has been—” Moss began. Ynna shot him a withering look. “Not really, no.”
“Then you can shut the fuck up,” she said. “Let’s go meet a ferret.”
They climbed into the van and rolled toward the wall. Moss sat in the passenger seat beside Ynna who now drove much less cautiously. Gibbs sat in the back and was gently snoring after only a few minutes. She turned on some thudding electronic music but made it quiet, turning to Moss.
“What the fuck is with him?” she asked, spraying ash from the top of her cigarette out of the window. The streets of Old Oak were shoddy and tight, homes built into every available space. The congestion only became worse as they moved closer to the wall.
“It’s a huge change. We were sheltered for so long, know nothing of how it works out here. We’ve been pampered and coddled and have no relevant skills. It’s a hard adjustment,” Moss defended.
“You don’t seem to be struggling,” Ynna pointed out.
“People are different,” Moss said, knowing the hollow platitude wouldn’t work on Ynna.
“Lame,” she said, flicking the butt to explode in embers on the street. “Listen, when we get to Ferret, you need to do the talking.”
“All right,” Moss said, his surprise evident in his voice.
“Apparently, he’s sexist,” Ynna said, making no attempt to hide her contempt.
“Of course, he is,” Moss said.
Ynna smiled a little. “Right? Just what we need.”
“I mean, it was bound to get worse,” Moss joked.
“Sure, things really aren’t bad enough for us,” Ynna said, wearing a broad grin now.
“Nope. Carcer has our friends and my grandmother, who I didn’t even know was alive. We have no money. We somehow have to get to Carcer City, which is probably not an easy feat. Oh, and once we get there, we somehow have to break into a city designed to keep people in,” Moss said, laughing at the insanity of it all as well.
Ynna lit another cigarette and offered one to Moss, which he accepted gratefully. He had only smoked a few times since leaving the Burb, but now seemed like the right time. She produced a small bottle from a pocket and threw it to Moss. He took a quick swig.
“Never ends,” Ynna observed, returning to solemnity.
“No, it doesn’t,” Moss agreed.
“Have one victory at least,” Ynna said.
Moss agreed. “That we did. Even did some good.”
“Right.”
“Think we will be able to pull this one off?” Moss asked.
“Get them out of C City? Don’t know. Shit, Moss, we don’t even know if that’s where they are being taken,” she reminded him.
“Yeah,” Moss said, the weight of it landing heavily upon him. “And it’s just the three of us.”
“Two of us, more like,” Ynna said, taking a final swig and chucking the bottle out the window. She was driving more slowly now, the roads so narrow that the van could barely move without scarring the sides. She had to stop for every person on the road until they ducked into a doorway. She honked at stray dogs who lazed in the street and flashed her lights at the alleycats, the citizens of this district unwilling to spend their money on animal care. As they moved further from the center of the city, the poverty became more oppressive.
Here, people simply built homes with found material or squeezed themselves into the available spaces. Scaffolding was repurposed, covered in corrugated metal and bolted to the inside of the wall to create a horizontal community. Ladders were strapped with cable ties, rope or tape to the front so people could climb into their precarious houses, and hundreds of extension cords were pulled from the other side of the street.
Ynna parked on the aptly named Wall Road, and they got out.
“Should we leave him?” Ynna asked of Gibbs who was still asleep in the car.
“Yeah, let him rest. We’ll just say he was guarding the car,” Moss said with a chuckle. “Anyway, he was up all night, making sure I was safe in a VR.”
“Nice of him,” Ynna said. “Think he’ll be pissed when he wakes up?”
“Nah,” Moss said.
There was very little street between the wall-face homes and the businesses across. A single lane wide enough for the rickshaws which pushed one another out of the way was all that divided the two sides. People looked out of the windows of their homes to the street below, chatting and shouting.
“Real hummus sold here,” one woman shouted to them from above. “No vats here, real chickpeas! Come up for sample.”
“Doing chemistry art up here, come take a look,” another person offered from a dimly lighted window leaking smoke. They ignored all the offers and walked down the street. Nearly every storefront seemed to be either a bar or grocer, alternating back and forth between oppressive light and the dim. They read name after tavern name, looking for the Gem.
As it always seemed to after the sun had set, the sky opened up, and the rain began, light at first as if a heavy wet fog was settling into place. Everyone in the street felt the shift, and soon most were going about their business under awnings.
One building shone brighter onto the street than the others, and as they approached, they saw why. It was a massively tall affair, built of glass and clear plastic only. Each successive floor became darker and more crowded.
The ground floor was brightly lit, serving craft beer about which the locals could brag. The next few floors were populated with bars serving cocktails for the after-work crowd, those who would likely rather be caught dead than admit to their work friends that they live in the Burg.
The several top layers were dimly lit with flashing lights and dance music which thudded dully down to the streets. The name Gem was projected on the front of the circular structure, the word frenetically dancing about the front.
Moss looked at all the people moving about on all the layers.
“We should have asked what Ferret looks like,” Moss said.
“I did,” Ynna said.
“Should have known,” Moss admitted, “and?”
“He looks like a fucking weasel apparently,” Ynna said with a snort.
“I guess I shouldn’t be surprised,” Moss said as they approached the front door where a drudge sat, serving as a bouncer. It sat on a stool and tilted its metal head at them as they approached.
“One hundred each,” it said in the factory default voice.
“Steep,” Ynna said, pulling Gibb’s money card.
“Sneaky,” Moss said.
“Stole it the second he mentioned it,” Ynna bragged. Moss smiled.
“I would expect nothing less,” Moss said, and Ynna bowed with flair. The drudge scanned the card.
“Bartenders are going to love you,” the drudge said sarcastically in its electric monotone. “Cool kids think you’re so hip paying in this old-timey way, but it’s really just inconvenient.”
“They programmed you to have a fucking attitude but didn’t give you a voice, really nice,” Ynna observed, smirking at the machine. It groaned—an unnatural, synthetic sound.
“Really clever. Think you’re the first to point that out?” the drudge asked, handing the card back. “Just get in there before I beat your ass.”
As they walked through the door, Ynna hissed over her shoulder, “Prick.”
“What did you say?” the drudge asked, standing from its unnecessary stool. Moss grabbed her by the shoulder and pulled her up the stairs. She was snickering. They walked up level after level of twisted staircase, sticking out like sore thumbs on the first several floors. The people sitting and drinking, though about Moss’s age, looked like kids in their suits and dresses, sipping at expensive glowing drinks. The music from the floors above grew louder, and they could look up through the steamed floor to awkwardly moving feet dancing along. “She said he’d be on six,” Ynna yelled to Moss over her shoulder.
“Seems like an odd place for an office,” Moss said, before adding, “of this nature,”
“Safety in the public nature of it, I guess,” Ynna offered.
“Doesn’t get more public than this,” Moss said. Ynna nodded. No one seemed even to notice them on the sixth floor. Everyone just continued to dance while the DJ with a video screen over his face played the repetitive music the crowd loved. They all moved and gyrated, a sweaty mass of humanity, too focused on themselves or their partners to notice much else.
They pushed toward the tables, noticing a gaunt man with matted blond hair reclining at the back of the room, watching with tiny, suspicious eyes. Ynna handed the business card to Moss as they approached, and he placed it on the table in front of Ferret. He took the card lazily and read it, flipping it back and forth as though it were written in a foreign language. Even Moss could tell the effects of Zcode when he saw it, the man’s eyes rolled from the card up to them.
