Chapter Forty-Six - Getting Down To Your Business

"Why do cats push things off of high places?

I don't know, you'll have to ask a cat."

--Miss Kitty K. @, Dog whisperer, 2031

***

I noped out of the meeting about twenty minutes after it started.

Honestly, I'm impressed you made it that long.

"Me too," I muttered exhaustedly. It felt like I'd spent hours in there. I knew it was only twenty minutes though, because there was a wall clock that tick-tick-ticked menacingly in the corner, and I was practically counting the seconds go by. That had lasted until I remembered that I was a samurai and I wasn't no one's bitch. I could up and leave, and that's exactly what I'd done.

"Stray Cat?" Piper asked as I started through the corridors. She ran after me, an impressive feat with the heels she was wearing. Then again, it looked like she might have cybernetic ankles.

"Yo," I said, then I paused. "Are you single?"

Piper blinked. "Yes?" she said before her cheeks started to redden. "Are you, uh, asking me out?"

"Huh? No, I have a girlfriend, sorry. Just asking to make sure," I said.

"Make sure of what? Uh, if you don't mind me asking."

I shrugged. "Look, sometimes I run into wayward and lost souls... very gay ones. It's good to keep a running tally of potential people for them to meet, you know?"

"I... don't think I do."

"Huh, well, whatever. Anyway, I'm heading out. I'll be seeing to the sewers right away and in person. Honestly, I don't know how corpo-types do it. I'd rather wade in shit than sit in on a meeting like that for another hour."

"I... see," Piper said. I think I'd set her off balance there. "That's fine. Let us know if you notice any issues that the Family needs to address."

"Yup," I said before I started walking off.

Right, it was time to check out the sewers themselves. Though I wasn't entirely sure how. The system spanned, literally, the entire city, and I had no idea where to start. I wasn't going to just dive into the first manhole I found.

My brain hiccuped as I reprocessed that last bit.

I shook it off and rephrased what I was about to ask Myalis. "I need to hover around and make it clear that there's a Samurai looking into things," I said. "It'll keep people honest."

I left Piper behind and made my way outside where it was, predictably, raining again. I started towards my bike, then stopped. There was a car parked in the handicapped spot. Parked at an angle so that it literally took up three spots.

It was a nice car, one of those extremely sexy models that looked like it was expensive just to look at. The kind of car that people bought posters of.

"Myalis, who's car is that?" I asked.

One moment... ah, it's the car of one of the CEOs of Sunrise Technologies. They have an appointment with the Family at the moment.

"Wait, the fucks that stole from me?"

Yes.

"Hey, Myalis, is there anything... that way?" I gestured to the side.

Below? Nothing in that exact location, no. There's an unoccupied terrace fifty-nine floors below.

"Mhm," I said. I walked past the car, got on my bike, then started to push the bike around. It was tricky, but I eventually had the front of my bike pressed right up against the post between the doors of the car. Then I turned the bike on and gave it some gas.

It wanted to twist to the side, but I kept it level with the car, and soon my torque overcame the weight of the car, and it started to move... sideways. The wheels made a disturbing chuffing sound as they scraped along the tarmac, at least until we got to the end of the roof.

The car tipped up onto its side, then disappeared over the edge.

"Oops," I said. "My bad."

Very funny.

"Thank you," I said before taking off in earnest. "I'm glad you appreciate my humour." I caught a faint and distant 'boom' as the car hit the ground far below. I just hoped that I didn't block traffic or something down there.

Oh well, the car was probably insured.

My first destination was the City of New Montreal Sewage and Maintenance Headquarters. I... couldn't remember the name of anyone that worked there, but I figured I'd remember their faces well enough, and that big room with the giant screen.

I parked somewhere nice, then got off my bike and headed in. It didn't take long to reach the headquarters. Surprisingly, there were about ten times as many people waiting in the lobby, all of them looking about ready to murder the poor guy behind the counter.

I waltz past them, earning more than one curious look. I was aware of pictures being taken, and I didn't really care.

I wasn't deep in when someone came running out to greet me. "Oh hey, it's you!" I said as I pointed to the guy. It was... button up, the guy with the button up shirt that was an accountant or something.

"Miss Samurai. Hello, what are you, ah, doing here?" he asked as he fell in next to me. Button-up looked like he hadn't changed shirts in a while. Had I ever asked him what his name was? Did it matter? He wasn't cute enough for it to matter, I decided.

"Here to make sure things are moving in a forwardly direction. Did any of the c-suite come back?"

"No? Ah, I heard that one of them... walked off a building."

"Really? Wow, small world."

"Pardon?"

"Nevermind," I said. "So, Button-up, how's things? Is shit starting to flow downstream at last, or are things still messed up in a bad way?"

"Ah, I think things are better? It's a lot busier," he said. "We're hiring and on-boarding people as quickly as we can. There's basically no training. Everyone already here was promoted, then promoted again, which is nice, but it doesn't change how much work there is to do."

"That's a shame," I said. "But the work is getting done?"

He nodded quickly. "We're working non-stop. I haven't been home in two days. I think some of us won't be seeing our families again until this whole thing is done, but it's... it's a lot?"

"Huh," I said. When I set off to make people fix the city's problems for me, I'd never considered that there would actually be consequences for normal folk.

Actually, I was generally pretty bad at thinking about consequences. "I'm... actually sorry to hear that," I said. "I'd be pretty pissed if I couldn't see my family for that long. Or if I couldn't go back home. You must be very pent up."

"Huh?"

"Yeah. But hey, you're doing good work. Are things coming along?" We'd reached the command room by then, and I was met at the entrance by... that guy who was the head of maintenance. He was wearing a tag, fortunately. Ethan Brown.

"They're moving," Brown said. "Not as quick as I'd like, but much faster than I'd hoped." He nodded to me. "I don't know what kind of fire you lit under the asses of the Family and their sort, but they've been hustling to get work done. I think almost every plumber in the city has work now, and plenty of others too."

"That's good," I said. "It'll keep people busy on top of fixing things." It was probably good for the economy or something too. I gave myself a pat on the back for that one.

"It's costing the city billions," Brown said. "But it was going to cost the city that much anyway. It would be a lot less if things weren't so under maintained to begin with, but there's not much we can do about that now."

I followed him into the command room and then paused to take in the big sewer map on the far wall.

There was still red. Lots of red, and now some of it was flashing purple, which seemed somehow more urgent. But, at the same time, there was a lot more orange than there had been, and the number of pins showing where workers were located had increased exponentially.

"Looks like you guys are actually getting shit done," I said.

Brown grunted. "We're trying, ma'am, and I hope that it'll count for something in the end."

"I think it will," I said. My entire life, I'd been left to fend for me and mine because no one was trying much of anything to help. On the rare occasion when someone would try... well, it counted for a lot, even if it didn't amount to much. "Is there anything you need me to look at? People you need me to threaten for things to get done faster?"

"You want to threaten people?" Button-up asked.

"Want to? Yes, actually. And also, it's a great way to actually get things done, I've discovered."

***