4.

The elevator brought us down a long distance. When we reached the bottom and yet another ding sounded out, voices came from the other side of the airlock. The door opened again, and I saw where the hubbub was coming from: countrified dressers whose harnesses had been replaced with full andracor sets and underlaid with frayed cotton shirts and cargo trousers. Some wore masks while others bore clownlike facepaint.

They were walking in an open hall supported by wood-and-steel pillars, thick ventilation shafts bound by nuts and bolts, and kiosks operated entirely by androids. Some robots sold weapons: guns, bats, pipe-shotguns, while others sold food and drinks, along with generic Jet-Corp tech, like the Infrared. Against the walls, round TVs were stacked on top of each other playing white noise. 

Was this civilisation known by those aboveground? Weapons were banned, right? How would they get away with selling them? Then again, how did Jet-Corp androids end up here in the first place?

Didn’t make sense to me.

“It’s a lot busier than I remember,” said Silver. He walked through the bow-shaped tunnel which led beneath the hall and stood for a moment, letting the people shove past him to the Alleyway Elevator.

They were all musty, showerless bastards; no way were they from the City. They probably came here to see the Grand Fiesta (or take part in it). I reckoned they saw the signs somewhere in the Dust, found out about this place, and spent their money here, which would make sense. My only question was, how would they sneak the weapons out without those androids at the turnpike noticing?

As we walked, I scrunched my nose. “Seems like your sort of place.”

“I like it,” said Rogue. “Though I do wish they had some air-fresheners. And it could use less people.”

“It was never this busy,” said Silver, tossing his cigar on the ground (of which there were many more come to think of it) and quenching it with his boot. “Must be about Saturday.”

“They making bets or something?” I asked.

He shook his head. “Lookin’ around,” he said slowly, “I reckon they’re participants.”

“Participants?” said Rogue brusquely. “What are those?”

“Are you stupid?” I joked. She was so cute. 

She scoffed. “Not participants, like, what are they participating in?”

He knuckled his beard and scratched it. “A lot of things: drugs, murder, raids, but here? The Grand Fiesta.”

“People participate in that?” She couldn’t believe it.

“Considering the prize is ten thousand, yeah, they do. People’ll do anything for a little money.”

“A little money.” I imitated him. “With that much, we could buy our way off this planet.” I was joking. Technically, the only way to leave the planet was through a spaceship, and all of them were unsurprisingly owned (and built) by Jet Corp. In our solar system, at least.

“I figured you might say that.” Silver laughed.

“You must be psychic then,” I said. “I’m joking. I’m tired so take everything I say with a pinch of. . . . What’s the word?” Yet another joke.

“Pomegranate,” grinned Silver.

Yes, one could not forget a pinch of pomegranate.

“Where to?” Rogue walked by my side, her thumbs in her backpack straps, her wonderful ponytailed hair bearing a lighter tint under the shine.

Silver said, “This way,” and continued shepherding us across the hall. We struggled through five tunnels (I did my best to avoid getting too close to people, but in a place this compact, that proved impossible) until we made it to hallway which expanded into a subset of other hallways, and at the end of each was a single, metal-plated door with a slidable wicket at the centre. Silver stopped at one in particular, standing with a sense of knowing. Above the door was a clown face, along with the words 𝙼𝚊𝚔𝚎 𝙻𝚞𝚟, 𝙽𝚘𝚝 𝙼𝚘𝚗𝚎𝚢—𝟷𝟷/𝟶𝟽/𝟸𝟸𝟻𝟼, 𝙻𝚘𝚟𝚎 𝚢𝚘𝚞—𝙱𝚊𝚍𝚐𝚎𝚛 etched on a blue, LED-rimmed panel.

Pa used to say that: Make love, not money. I guess this is where he got it from. 

Silver knocked with the force of a military officer who is moments away from busting in.

After ten seconds of no response, he knocked again, and a croaky voice responded: 

“One minute!”

Silver shot us a shit-eating grin, before turning around to the wicket which had slid open to reveal a pair of luminous-blue eyes. Artificial, like that bastard Mylo. 

“Who is it?” those eyes said. 

“It’s me.” Silver laughed.

“‘Who’s me?” Those eyes surveyed him with absolutely no recognition at all . . . and then they snapped open. “My God. . . . Silver . . . is that you?”

“I think so,” said Silver. “Might have lost a few teeth, but it’s me alright. How’ve you been, Badger?”

He stared slack-jawed, seemingly unable to accept that he, Silver, returned after ten goddamn years. Badger closed the wicket and slid several padlocks before opening the door. He was a tall man, slightly taller than Silver, with a pair of dirt-bike goggles pulling his blonde hair back. He wore a chest harness, no surprise there, over a white shirt, lightly armoured pants, and a brown fanny pack. “Well call me an outsider and fuck me twice, it’s really you,” he said calmly. Then, with kiddish excitement: “It’s really fucking you!”

Silver pulled him into one of those hugs that straight men give each other, ones that are neither too gay nor too awkward. “Ten years,” he said. “It’s been a while.”

“It definitely has,” Badger said, breaking the hug and then shifting his eyes to Rogue and me. “Well these can’t be your kids, and they’re far too young to be your women.”

“We’re not,” I said. “I’m Ashe, and this is Rogue. We sort of need your help.”

“My help?” He looked at Silver. “Oh. . . . My help.”

Silver said, “I’m sorry about not coming back here. I’ve been real busy since then.”

“It’s no problem,” said Badger. “Time's been lonely down here, you know? And Monkey-Wrench has it out for you. And Ma, she died, Silver. She passed away from leukaemia a couple years back.”

My stomach twisted as he said that. All I could think about was my ma. Had Jet Corp already returned to the Gloom to kill every last one of them? That thought made my eyes water.

“I’m awful sorry again, Badger.” Silver’s voice reflected that: solemn and slow. “I didn’t expect so much shit to happen, but yes. . . . We need your help badly.”

He invited us in, and we accepted.

Rogue and I sat at his bed, which was thin and no more than a spring high, while Silver leaned against the doorway with his arms folded.

The room was illuminated by the same blue glow that came from Badger’s eyes; in fact, whenever the LEDs in the room changed, his eyes did, too, mimicking the same colour.

Badger typed away at his holo-computer as we explained to him the situation. He asked questions, fired them one after another like shells from a mortar, and we did our best to answer them. He kept saying that the situation was trickaay, a comment I chalked up to facetiousness, except that he seemed to be so concentrated on trying to find a doctor to treat my hand, and on coming up with a solution to our whole Jet Corp dilemma.

“Wild Doc’s still around,” said Badger. “But I’m not sure he’ll treat your infection for free.”

“What? Why?” said Silver. 

“Wild Doc’s been . . . losin’ money lately, because of the serious cutbacks on CleanserFluid. You know, the liquid found in Optic Cleansers?”

So that’s what it’s called. Generic.

Silver sighed, and turned to me. “Don’t worry, I’ll work somethin’ out.”

“You can try,” said Badger. “I’d help, but I’m broke as it is. There isn’t much money to be made when no one wants any upgrades to their tech anymore.”

I chuckled. “That reminds me, um. . . .” I didn’t know how to ask this without seeming like we were using him. 

“Ashe needs the tracker removed from her Infrared,” Rogue said strongly. “Can you do it?” She pressed her leg against mine, clasping her hands together. 

“Straight question,” said Badger. “Can I see it?”

I handed him the Infrared, and he noticed my wound, said it looked nasty, and then pulled on his goggles, eyeing the Infrared closely.

“Well,” he began, “there’s definitely a tracker in it. This is an old model, ’round ’254, two years before Ma died.” He hummed. “I can get it out; it’ll take a while though. There’s an alert sent to The Tower if someone tries to mess with Jet-Corp tech. Good thing I’m an expert on it. I should have it done in an hour, tops.”

I let out a sigh of relief. “Thank you, seriously.”

Badger pulled a ballpoint screwdriver from his desk drawer. “No problem . . . Ashe, was it?” I nodded. “Okay, Ashe. Couple things, you’ll need a new identity.”

We already knew that.

“And,” he added, “you’ll need to avoid bringing any attention to yourself if you plan on going up there.”

“I don’t,” I said, meaning to say we.

“Ah, ya never know. It can get lonely down here. Anyway, point is, if you’re wanted, people might notice you, and then report you directly to The Tower.”

“How do they do that?” asked Silver.

“Infrareds.”

“Shit, really?”

He nodded, tweaking at my Infrared with the screwdriver. “There’s nothing these magic devices can’t do. Well, there’s nothing the magic machine in The Tower can’t do. I’ve wanted to hack into that for years now, but I’m too far away to get a signal on my control panel.”

“Why’s that?” asked Rogue.

“Because I’d like to take a shit without the idea of them spying on me through the walls. That’s why.” 

“Something happen, Badge?” said Silver. 

“Nothing happened.” He shook his head. “That’s my point. I want to take that thing down. Always wanted to, always will. You know how much cancer those scanners cause? Fuck tonnes. I bet it’s how my mom got leukaemia.”

“My ma has cancer, too,” I said. “In her lungs.”

“Shit, kid, sorry to hear that,” Badger said, but he didn’t sound as if he was. His lips pressed together in a flat line, and he went back to what he was saying: “The Tower is making people very sick, I’m sure of it. The atmoshield does little to stop it, and every couple a days I hear from Wild Doc about, oh my stomach feels weird doc, oh I’m pissin’ blood doc. Can ya help me doc? Colon cancer, bladder cancer. Cancer cancer cancer.”

Hearing the word made my stomach twist again, and I wondered blackly if I had cancer, too.

“Anyway,” said Badger, looking at me and nudging his head towards the door. “Head on up to Wild Doc’s. Silver’ll show you where. Explain the situation and see what he says. Wish I could help more, but unfortunately, I can’t. Ya dig?”

I did in fact dig. I opened my mouth without the slightest idea of what I was going to say, and then half-said, “Thankssss.”

Yeah, what else was there?