Darkness cuts through the metro as it drops into the sunless subcity.

  The metal superstructure of the capital’s crust flashes past the windows, then bleeds away as we break out into the inverted underbelly of the city. The chrome skyline of the Electric Town flips upside down. Gleaming streets and glass windows morph into the familiar brushstrokes of poverty: cracked concrete bridges, bombed out buildings, failing street lights. Punctuation marks of the silent tragedy that’s been eating away at the city for longer than I’ve been alive.

  Kicked back against the train’s rattling door, I watch the Vents slide past with heartless detachment. Down and down we go. Into the grime, the smog, the hopeless miasma; all of it suffused with sickly neon like some concrete bog of human vice. Past towersides choked with hawkers selling scavenged blackmarket weapon and body augments, past freerunners carrying cases of stims and Shatter. Past the laundry hanging from the power lines, the flint-eyed kids staring bitterly at the black sky, the tattered posters of abandoned promises, the masked Biohancer volunteers carting a body bag out of an apartment complex with a three-story mural of a crimson-haired legend spray painted across the bricks.

  It’s a tragedy. But it’s not my tragedy, yeah?

  Welcome to the world of Cal Kyriaku: nineteen-year-old prodigy assassin. I used to be an unsanctioned killer who worked the pseudonym Feint, infamous slayer of league fighters, criminal kingpins et al. But for the past three months and three weeks, I’ve been trying to be a little more altruistic instead. Being one of the good guys hasn’t been the easiest job in the world. Lucky for me, one of those good ones was a hot mess with a thorny personality who made all the trouble worth. My older brother, her ex, is another one of those used-to’s- in his case, used to be the apprentice of the Champion Gami himself.

  Now he’s topping the most-wanted charts right along with her, and I’m trapped a world away from them both.

  These days, I only have room for two priorities. One of those is a freckled danger magnet who’s wanted by the most powerful man in the world. The other is keeping my head attached to my neck. Pity for anyone else doesn’t make the list.

  Kicked back against the train’s rattling door, I glance up with the crowd as people start taking note of the red-haired wrecking ball coming into the car a few steps behind me, seizing a handhold that miraculously frees up right as he arrives. Broad shouldered and brutal, endowed with thundercloud eyes and surly, chiseled facial features that’ve never been creased by anything other than sneers, Aurix Mons would catch eyes even if he didn’t look like the spitting image of his world-famous father. But he does. So people make space for him. And then they keep making space, as a cadre of weapon-toting mercenaries comes in right behind him.

  Nearly twenty men and women in the black, uniformed armor of the Metro Blockhouse’s famed Counterespionage Division force their way through the train. Helmets with tinted faceplates, armor bristling with a mix of Innovator and Guardian tech developed specifically for city runners and urban combat, the homogenous operatives assert their place in the crowd with the easy smoothness of lifelong professionals. To the people who have reason to run into them, these bad omens are known as Blackjacks. They’re ex-leaguers who couldn’t pivot to life after the M, independent contractors scooped from the nooks of the capital’s ‘Net, and security specialists dogmatically loyal to the gladiocracy itself. The white-gloved, officially-sanctioned counterpart of personal cabals like Gami’s Shadows or the harems of apprentices and mercenaries that prominent leaguers keep up.

  I keep my distance from them, straightening the collar of my buttoned shirt. My uniform is as dark as the underbelly I’m headed for. Cropped jacket, steel-heeled boots, and a rubbery weatherproof skinsuit; all in standard Counterespionage Division black. I check the straps securing a pair of long, nano-edged blades strapped to my thighs. My eyes stray to watch the layers of the undercity drifting past. Thinking only of a different darkness, orange light through a barred window, white hair strewn across the pillow. Jaded crimson eyes, softened by tentative emotion, watching me. Then my JOY vibrates on its belt tether and I snap out of it, looking up.

  Two pale golden eyes blink back at me, reflected in the dirty glass.

  “Remember: I own you now,” a sultry voice purrs directly into my earcom. Valance, the ambitious Psi who’s established herself as Gami’s de-facto apprentice since my brother’s fall, opens a link to my private channel without asking. “Don’t let this little excursion give you any ideas. One word, and I can undo all those pretty little lies of mine that are keeping you alive.” She lets out a sigh, somehow even making that sound suggestive. “Between you and me, I’d rather you be useful instead of dead, okay? So be a good girl and play your part today. Let Aurix grandstand for the cameras. Then come see me after the debrief- I have another task for you.”

  Then the com link closes with a click, and the doors cut open in front of me.

  Venters and Blackjacks push past into the undercity, streaming by until all that remains in the metro are me and Aurix. Only then do I step out onto the concrete towerside. While Aurix gives orders to the Blackjacks, I finger the empty strip of pale skin where my Relic used to wrap around my wrist. Pairs and trios of black-armored warriors splinter off into the nearby cityscape, launching up to nearby rooftops with grapple cables or taking overwatch positions in shadowed alley mouths.

  For the soldiers, today’s mission is a one-liner: drive a stake through the heart of Dynasty’s territory once and for all, and streetsweep whatever unlucky tourists are caught in the raid. That said raid will be perfectly curated to fuel Aurix’s growing fame on the news streams is just a happy little coincidence I’ve been tasked with seeing to completion. I doubt even he knows just how much he’s being handed on a silver platter. Or how many levers are being pulled to manufacture his public image as the rising son of Mars Mons.

  Our entrance to the undercity is far from unnoticed. Venters loiter in nearby storefronts, lean in doorways, sit on the front steps of their apartment complexes. Pretending to keep to their own business, all while watching the action with hooded interest. A few already have JOYs out and recording. Bought and paid for by Metro Blockhouse money.

  Finished with the Blackjacks, Aurix shifts to look down at me.

  “You’ve been quiet,” he grunts.

  I shrug, hands in my pockets. “Not much to say.”

  “Sure had a lot more when you were shacking up with my sister.” His indigo eyes strafe the cavernous undercity around us, face pinching in distaste. “We shouldn’t even be down here. We should be out there hunting her, not working for the cops. Every day we spend fucking around in the capital is another day she’s getting further away.”

  “Cool your jets, dude. It’s a process,” I drawl. I focus on reacclimating to the neighborhood, finding my place in the maze. We’re in a highlayer block close to the surface. I’ve actually been here before. It’s close to that alley, the one where I finally came clean to Tay. I let a little barb back into my voice as I add, “Besides- they’d lever let you hunt her. You’re too attached.”

  “And you’re not?”

  “Do you see me out there looking for her?”

  His brow narrows. I roll my eyes.

  “I thought you of all people would be on my side on this one,” Aurix growls. “You liked the bitch, I’m not an idiot. Newsflash: you’re not the only one who did. Thane was obsessed with her. There’s no way two people like them die from a fall like that. Know what that means? While you’re sitting here twiddling your thumbs, she’s probably out there right now riding your brother’s-”

  He shuts the fuck up as a blade as long as my forearm suddenly starts tickling his jugular. I hold it there in threat while I wipe the image from my head.

  “Keep talking,” I say, voice as calm as a safety being flicked off. “See what happens.”

  His nostrils flare. Eyes burning. Elemental fire slithers around his fingerless gloves, threatening to spark. Itching to answer the dare. But he already learned that lesson the hard way. And we both know it.

  He looks away first.

  Face hard, Aurix jerks away from me with another growl. “You’ve lived down here. The Orange is nearby?”

  “Close enough.” Sheathing the blade, I start off towards the nearest bridge, crooking my chin at the citrine glow suffusing the undercity horizon. “Try using those eyes, hero.”

  Entirely aware of the crosshairs following me from rooftop to rooftop, I slip right into the swelling pedestrian flow heading over the final concrete bridge that divides the Orange from the rest of the Vents. Cold, smoggy wind billows up from the Abyss through the thirty-meter gap between the towers, ruffling my bangs like a ki fighter’s aura. I peer past the black strands, taking in Dynasty’s home from the outside. Noting the distinct lack of orange-clad guards watching over the tourists, then tracing through the archaic, lantern-lit streets of electroclubs and brothels paving the way to the block’s central tower.

  In Dynasty’s heyday, the Orange was the one place in the city that not even the best of the Counterespionage Division would dare step foot. It was the heart of the undercity, rivaling the Metro Blockhouse itself in the quantity and quality of its defenses. Now, the enforcers watching over the crowds milling under the entrance gates can barely be called a skeleton crew. Place is still busy though, even if the syndicate is pulling out.

  One of the two Dynasty enforcers on overwatch finally picks me out when I’m halfway across the bridge. A powerfully-framed Magus wearing a smooth white mask beneath an orange hood. A serrated cleaver of a broadsword hangs at an angle across his back; no sheathe. Like the rest of his gear, it’s only for intimidation. He closes the distance to me just as I put my first step down on Dynasty turf, raising a hand in warning.

  A distorted, artificially deepened voice warbled out from his mask. “Learn to read, mook. We’re closed to topsiders. I suggest you do a one-eighty. Fastlike.”

  “What about old friends?”

  I open a projector screen from my JOY, showing my social profile so he can read it. The man’s mask tilts a little more up at me, briefly examining, then goes back to the screen. He grunts and motions for me to shut it off.

  “Heard there was a Kyriaku hanging around a few weeks ago. No one said you were a Blackjack.”

  I shrug and palm my JOY away.

  “Not sure why you’re coming back now, but the Executor is long gone. So is his boy. They cleared out weeks ago.” He steps back, out of my way. “Orders are orders- you’ve still got the Executor’s warrant to roam around, and I’m not going to step on any toes. But I do need to know your business in case someone asks.”

  “I’m looking for a girl I was staying here with. White hair, long legs, hell of an attitude. Hard to miss.”

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  “Could’ve just said the Ghost.” Taking a passing glance at the other pedestrians, he opens a group chat for what must be the Orange’s dwindling staff and fires off a question. “No one says they’ve seen her around the block. Same thing for Director Mons.” He swipes to the right, reads more. “Your trainer is still here. The loan shark.”

  “Where?”

  He jerks a thumb down the main street. “VIP staterooms. Ninth floor, room four.”

  “I know the one,” I say.

  “Good; I’m not an escort. Want me to send him a heads-up?”

  “Sure.” I smirk. “Tell him Feint is dropping by for a chat.”

  The enforcer stops, processing, then chuckles behind his mask. “Feint? You?” He shuts off his JOY and starts to put it away. “And let me guess- the Showmaker must be right behind you.”

  Firing up from the gap between the towers with a burst of Elemental fire, a hundred and eighty pounds of pure martial artist slam to a meteoric stop beside me. Aurix straightens up and tosses his mane back, one hand already balled into a fist.

  “Close enough,” he snarls.

  He throws his whole body into a haymaker punch, shattering the man’s mask and the face behind. The enforcer crumples backwards in an unconscious lump.

  Stepping over the body, I glance at the other guard, who’s staring in shock from across the street. “Missed one.”

  Another jet of fire catapults Aurix at the enforcer like a crossbow bolt, and the crowd finally begins to react. Shouts come first as a feral flash of flame rips across the road. Then screams, people recoiling from the fight like a multicellular organism, pushing and shoving each other in a rabid attempt to back off. The chaos builds to a panicked stampede as Blackjacks emerge from the nearby blocks and start blazing a path into the Orange, beginning the raid in earnest.

  It’s a sight that the undercity has never seen before. Since its inception, the Orange has never once been targeted by law enforcement. Its vices, legal or illegal, were free to sample by any tourist coming down to the Vents on a weekend night. It was one of the few unspoken rules of the undercity. And the moment it’s ripped off, all hell breaks loose.

  The carnage is instant and dramatic. People begin forcing their way off the bridge in both directions, trampling over each other to run from the incoming law enforcement. The pandemonium spreads like a wave as it reaches the clubs and brothels just inside the Orange’s borders. Dust grenades crackle and blast flashbang brightness over the streets. Stun weapons warble and wail in full-auto barrages, indiscriminately mowing through the crowd. Slaves and tourists scatter off the main road in a frenzy. Dynasty enforcers duck out of nearby doorways in ones and twos only to be gunned down by streams of taser rounds or bludgeoned into senselessness by melee weaponry. It’s a scene that’ll be mirrored in a dozen different ways across the Orange as more units of Blackjacks start their own invasions. But the cameras will only care about one of those scenes.

  Aurix dismantles the other bridge guard with a knee smash combination, then wheels upright to start shouting orders to the Blackjacks. Elemental fire stirs his crimson hair to its full length as he leads the dramatic charge right down the block’s main road, smashing headfirst through the meager Dynasty resistance. I let him go, waiting until he encounters his next point of resistance before slipping off into the back streets that run behind the brothels.

  It’s like passing through a ghost town. I toggle on my JOY classes instead, using the passive enhancements of the Assassin class to lend some extra speed as I jog towards the Orange’s main central tower completely uncontested. Countless backdoors for workers and syndicate staff lead inside the tower. I pick one and jiggle the handle; unlocked. Crack it open, wince at the squeaking hinges, then ease the forearm-long blade out of my right thigh holster as I peer down the carpeted hallway on the other side.

  Attack klaxons wail in the distance. I lean back just as a servant sprints past the door on the other side, running towards the lower shipping docks with nothing but the clothes on his body. More sex slaves from the brothels spill out of rooms in various states of dishevelment, shoved aside by enforcers in various states of combat readiness as they force a path of escape through the panicked frenzy. A thuggish Martial Artist in Dynasty orange clocks a frail, scantily clad girl with a left hook to the jaw when she’s too slow to get out of his way.

  The girl goes down in a limp pile. Before she can get trampled by the others, I slip through the door and grab her by the arm, dragging her under a spiral stairwell set against the edge of the tower. She’s lucky she’s so light.

  Kneeling in the shadows, I pry back her eyelids just as she jerks back out of unconsciousness. I clamp my free hand over her mouth to muffle her first shout, holding her down until her rabid eyes regain some sanity. Her irises are pink and catlike. An Iros. No older than I am. Her naked chest rises and falls with ragged breaths. Those pink eyes trail down from my face to the uniform of the Counterespionage Division, then the blade in my other hand. She starts to shake. Tears well in the corners of her eyes.

  I let go and stand, pointing my blade up at the stairwell. “Don’t go outside. Find a room and wait. Help is coming.”

  She nods, wordless and trembling.

  I put her behind me and dash up the staircase, springing up the steps two at a time. Only twice am I contested. Once by a valet who immediately pulls a one-eighty and disappears back into the depths of the sixth floor at a dead sprint. Next by an older, gracefully aging woman with iridescent rainbow hair. The Biohancer who Nabuna somehow convinced to help stitch Tay back together, still hanging around the block.

  Skidding to a stop on the next landing up, the Biohancer’s hand darts to seize a spool of needle-tipped thread attached to her belt. Her eyes widen in recognition as she glares down at me.

  I wave with my blade for her to pass. “I’m not here for you.”

  Eyeing me like a bomb with a lit fuse, still gripping that needle and thread, she skirts past me and continues down the stairwell. I wait for the sound of her sandals to fade before working up the final flight to the ninth floor. Electronic lock, can’t pick it manually. I’m about to start tapping into my Elemental class for help when a subtended boom shudders up through the tower and the power flickers out.

  The door clicks open on oiled hinges, relenting to its hardwired failsafes. Breathing out, I ease it open and slip into the plush corridor on the other side. Dark wood paneling, wine-colored carpet, moody lights flicking back on as power returns, VIP secluded. I move swift and smooth down the hall at a sideways trot. Blade held down at an angle behind me, boots silent against the carpet. The path is familiar to my feet. I didn’t tell it to the gate guard, but the reason I know the suite is because it’s not Nabuna’s room at all. It’s mine. Mine and Tay’s.

  My JOY unlocks the suite. I let the door swing loudly shut behind me as I stride down the entry hall, blade out. I turn the corner to the common room without slowing. Plopped down on the sofa like he owns the whole suite, the burly hustler who helped keep Tay and I afloat in the Vents watches me enter with utter nonchalance, a glowing lighter held between two thick fingers.

  Nabuna Nagori is a hustler, a wheel greaser, a loan shark, and a balding son of a bitch. Built like a boulder at rest, his silhouette is the uniquely identifiable bulk of someone who used to be a fighter but gave it up to be an eater and a drinker. Hairy, with spotted leathery skin and a full, tobacco-colored mustache. Leather cap, brown leather jacket, has a gut but doesn’t let it slow him. A lazy trail of smoke drifts from his lighter to pool against the ceiling. And he doesn’t look happy to see me.

  “I was wondering when you lot would show up,” Nabuna grunts. He lets out a long exhale; smoke swirls through the air between us. Eyes like simmering coals stare at me through the haze. “Wasn’t expecting you to be with them, chica.”

  “Did you really expect anything different?” I casually ask, running my eyes over the room. It’s unlived in; nothing different from the night I left it a month ago. “You knew who you were tangling with the moment you gave Tay the key to the range.”

  “My biggest mistake of the decade, in retrospect. Blanco was wrong- looks like you got more of your brother in you than you let on.”

  I grip the blade tighter, saying nothing.

  “Why’d you come all the way down here? Looking for her? She ain’t here.”

  “I’m here to cut you a deal.”

  “A deal. Huh. Funny.” Nabuna huffs out a disbelieving grunt. “Tell me what happened to you two, and I might consider it.”

  “This isn’t about Tay.”

  “Coulda fooled me.” He holds up a hand to cut me off. “See chica, in my experience, when two people go out looking like they’re gonna make a clean break and only one of ‘em comes back, there’s only a couple things that could’ve happened. And when you come back rubbing shoulders with the Champ’s roaches,” he nods at my uniform, “it doesn’t take a leaguer to put two and two together. This ain’t my first time seeing someone get the rope ran on them. So pardon me for not wanting to cut any more deals when I’ve seen what you have for keeping promises.”

  I glance over my shoulder as a sizzling sound suddenly erupts in the entryway. A moment later, an explosive report rips through the suite as the door is blown straight off its hinges. Nabuna arches an eyebrow. I smooth the frustration from my face as vitriolic bootsteps thud down the hall and Aurix sweeps into the suite like a firestorm. Literally. His boots leave molten imprints in the carpet, and a knockoff ki fighter’s aura burns around him as he takes in the small space. His eyes narrow on me as he slows to a stop.

  “What are you doing here?” he snaps.

  “I could ask the same of you,” I reply. “Aren’t you supposed to be leading the charge? All those cameras are dying to record some more heroism for the news streams.”

  “Change of plans. Valance told me to come back you up- said your signal had gone dark.”

  “Did she, now?” I narrowly resist the urge to laugh. “That’s cute.”

  “This oughta be good. You two are just peachy,” Nabuna chuckles from the sofa.

  Aurix switches gears in a heartbeat. Grabbing a stool from the window nook that looks into the kitchen, I drop it down and saddle up across from Nabuna. Elbows on my knees, playing with a knife, staring right into the greaser’s brown eyes.

  “Let me put it a little clearer, since apparently you don’t get it. Greaser like you, you’ve had a brush or two with the Blackjacks, yeah?” The tip of Nabuna’s lighter glows red-hot; he says nothing. “Right now, the Counterespionage Division is down there going door-to-door on whatever is left of Dynasty. That means you and the rest of the boys in orange are either getting the short end of a bullet, or you’re getting sent to somewhere a lot less comfy than Zone A for the rest of your lives.”

  Pops of staccato gunfire erupt out in the ninth floor. Silt shifts out of the ceiling tiles as the subtended whumpf of a door-breach charge ripples through the tower’s superstructure. The lights flicker again.

  “Or I can come nicely. For whatever purposes it may be that our esteemed Champion needs me for.” Nabuna lifts his eyebrows.

  I shrug. “You’re a dealmaker. It’s a good deal.”

  “Unlike the last deal I made, I hesitate to see what I’m getting out of this one. Way I see it, with talent like him on your team,” he points his lighter at Aurix, who instantly takes a more defensive posture, “I could piss off in prison for a year or two, wait for Blanco to come around and kick your collective asses, and waltz right on out with my dignity intact.” His heavy-lidded eyes glance at Aurix. “Spitting image of his da. Shame he can’t fight like him.”

  Aurix opens his mouth to retort, giving Nabuna one chance to recount his words. “What did you say?”

  “I said you’re a disgrace to your old man,” Nabuna repeats with a snort.

  “You should shut your mouth before I shut it for you.”

  “Oh, big man you are,” Nabuna chuckles. “Whole world saw those vids from last year, boyo. Lost to a cripple when you had her four-to-one, and now you’re down throwing fists with a Venter who ain’t gonna do more than backtalk you. Real scary. I’m quaking. Truly.”

  “You know nothing about me or who I am.” Aurix snarls and jabs a finger at the greaser. “My father is dead. Whether I disgrace him or not is no concern of yours, especially considering you helped train his little bastard.”

  “Ohoh. So you don’t like Blanco? Because she’s better than you? Or because daddy liked her more than he-”

  Aurix throws a blast of fire into the wall right beside Nabuna’s head, melting the wood paneling. “One more word about that bitch or my father, Venter scum. One more.”

  Nabuna just chuckles. “I see where she got her temper.”

  I arch an eyebrow.

  He leans back in his seat, staying very, very still. “Fun as this reunion is, chica, the only reason I’m still here is because I charge by the minute. Tab’s adding up. Spit it out so we can get this over with.”

  This isn't working. Cocking my head at Aurix, I nod over at Jolie’s bedroom. “I need a minute. Your aunt’s stuff is through there. See if you can find anything.”

  He leaves with a final sneer at me. Fuming silent, one spark away from blowing the whole tower in half. I wait till he slams open the door to Jolie’s room before returning my attention to Nabuna. “Jolie said you were a boxing coach at the M,” I say.

  “Sure. And?”

  I crook my chin at the bedroom. “He needs a coach.”

  His mustache flutters as he purses his lips. “I’m sure you lot have more educated sources of training than little old me.”

  “We do. But that’s not what he needs.”

  “Or is it not what you need?” Nabuna lifts the lighter to his lips for one last drag. “Like I said, chica. Not my first rodeo.”

  His muddy eyes search mine. I hold his gaze, not saying anything. Dozens of heavy bootsteps begin thumping outside the suite, converging on our position.

  “Why you doing this?” he quietly asks. “What happened to you?”

  I shrug. “Just give me an answer. You coming with me or not?”

  He breathes out, savoring the burn of the smoke. The bootsteps thump closer. Plaster crashes as black-armored warriors surge into the entryway. Almost on top of us.

  “Do I really have a choice?” he asks.

  Nabuna waits to see if I’ll say something, and when I still don’t, a grim look of amusement sneaks out from beneath his mustache; like he’s realized some secret I won’t share.

  “Funny thing, chica.” He leans forward, his elbows on his knees, like we’re sitting on opposite sides of a poker table. “Ain’t the first time a girl with a gun to her head came asking me for help.”

  My lips quirk in a shadow of a smile.