Mars, Lower City in the Mariner Valley Cliffs

  The next morning greeted Christian with a light but nasty hangover—the kind that felt like someone was poking a screwdriver into his skull from the inside, not hard, but relentlessly. He hadn’t planned to get that drunk, but did he really have a choice? The less time he spent around his sister, the better. He splashed water on his face, looked in the mirror—same worn-out face as yesterday, just with even cloudier eyes. Time to dig into work.

  He was already reviewing orders when a call came from Garrett Harabi. The surgeon’s voice was, as always, even, carrying that lazy drawl of someone long accustomed to rummaging through other people’s flesh.

  “Need to add a couple of chest implants to the order. The pricey kind.”

  Christian raised an eyebrow.

  “Separate order? Short notice? Then the price’ll be… well, you get it.”

  He threw out a steep figure, expecting Garrett to haggle, but the man just gave a short snort of agreement. Must be a client with a seriously fat wallet.

  “Deliver it as soon as you can,” Garrett tossed out before cutting the line.

  Christian let out a low hum. There were always people itching to reshape themselves for some fleeting vision of perfection. And he was the one selling the materials for it. But right now, something else weighed on him.

  He caught himself thinking about her again. Christian tried to zero in on work, but something kept nagging, like a splinter under his nail—tiny, but damn irritating. It only hit him when the office fell back into its heavy silence: Elian hadn’t come home yesterday. He hadn’t seen her last night or this morning. That, by itself, didn’t have to mean much—she wasn’t a kid, could’ve stayed at a friend’s, lingered at work, hell, even found a guy and spent the night with him. But she didn’t have anyone like that, did she? Christian wasn’t the type to cling or control anyone’s life, but he knew Elian’s habits—and they didn’t include sudden night wanderings.

  The cursed crampedness of their apartment box hid nothing—you could hear breathing through the walls if you listened hard enough. That’s how they lived, dodging each other, feeling each other’s presence too sharply. The only upside was that their shift-working parents were off somewhere else in the system, not crowding the already scarce square footage into a total squeeze. Christian frowned, running a hand over his scruffy chin.

  This isn’t like her.

  He couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. He knew he shouldn’t do it. But he kept going anyway. His eyes slid across the screen, fingers—shaking slightly from the lingering hangover—moved relentlessly, pressing numbers into the fabric of space like an old, worn awl that always found its mark. One of his life’s rules was firm: keep tabs on people so they don’t throw him off. Elian was his closest kin, so her life was part of his too. They shared the flat, and it built a kind of strained harmony between them. She was always buying, selling, or trading something, and those money moves were as familiar to him as the rustle of leaves in an autumn forest. He knew her account, what she did with her cash, her expenses.

  Then there was the promise he’d made to his mother. One of those vows that spill out not from the heart but from duty, heavier than stone. She’d asked him to look after Elian while she and her husband were away on shift. Christian couldn’t refuse. He was older, after all—what else could he do but take it on? His mother, with her tired eyes, wasn’t too demanding, but when she asked for something, it was like the last thread tying their family together—thin but unbreakable. He remembered her words, spoken with such raw honesty: “You’ll help her, Kris. I know you can handle it. You’re smart, you’ve always been caring. Take care of her while we’re gone.” But with each passing day, that promise grew heavier, like a boulder in a backpack you carry but can’t bring yourself to drop. He didn’t know how to look after her properly. He wasn’t her friend—couldn’t be. He didn’t even know what she was to him—sister, object of desire, or just a stranger. But duty was duty, and if his mother asked, it had to be done. In a way, it even brought him some relief—it was the only way to hold onto a scrap of control in this vicious, restless world. But now, as he scanned her latest transactions, he felt a weight building inside—like realizing you don’t know where the path leads but have to keep walking.

  “Last payment?” He barely registered the numbers flashing before his eyes. It didn’t matter. He knew where she’d been. Closing shift at the cafeteria. It seemed normal, but not entirely. She’d been fine, it looked like. But something still didn’t fit. Like darkness hiding details on a rain-soaked street, that emptiness hung in the air. Elian hadn’t come home. And that wasn’t her usual behavior. Last payment—cafeteria close. After that—nothing. Nothing at all. He rubbed his temples and swore under his breath.

  The office door creaked, and the boss walked in, unhurried, with that unchanging expression Christian had long learned to read as the prelude to something big. He approached the desk, eyeing the guy still gripping a cold coffee cup like it could anchor him. Richter watched him with a faint smirk, like he’d spotted something off but wasn’t ready to show he knew. That was his style—always knowing more than he let on.

  “Werner,” his voice was dry, like a leaf brushed by winter winds. “You look like someone who tried to overdo someone else’s generosity. What’s going on?”

  Christian sighed, trying to hide the excess tension in his frame. He’d have loved to wave it off with a “nothing’s wrong,” but not this time. The unease had clung to him since morning, sitting in his gut like a rock.

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  “Nothing’s wrong,” Christian said, forcing the words out with clear effort. He tried so hard to sound sure that he started doubting himself. “Just worried about my sister. She didn’t come home last night.”

  Richter didn’t change his expression. He stepped into the office like he owned it, Christian just part of the scenery. He tossed his jacket over a chair back, fiddled with the folders on the desk. Finally, looking at him, his eyes softened with a touch of annoyance.

  “Werner,” he said, not without some irony in his tone. “At her age, that’s normal. Wandering off for days without a heads-up—totally in character for little brats. Nothing to fret over.”

  His words, though seemingly meant to calm, still felt off to Christian. The old boar talked like his sister was just some random, insignificant figure in this story—not someone he cared about. His own thoughts started racing—she couldn’t just vanish without a trace. He couldn’t shake that feeling that something wasn’t right.

  “I know,” he said, but his voice sounded like it belonged to someone else. “But… this isn’t like her. She usually gives me a heads-up.”

  Adam shrugged, like it was no big deal. He walked over to Christian’s desk, started leafing through some documents, paying him no mind.

  “Do your work,” he snapped, without a trace of regret. “I’m worried about profit, not your sister's issues. If she decides to disappear for a couple days, that’s her call. I’m not digging into employees’ personal stuff unless I have to.”

  Christian felt something cold, like steel wire, twist inside him. He should’ve been glad the boss was downplaying it, but instead, a strange, bitter veil settled over him. He could feel her absence pressing down, a heavy load. It’d only been a day, but it felt like forever. He didn’t know where she could’ve gone, but the thought that something worse might’ve happened wouldn’t leave his head.

  Adam nodded, turned, and stepped toward the door, but just then his voice cut through the air, making Christian jolt.

  “If she’s not back in a week, then take action. Until then—relax, it’s nothing.”

  The door swung shut behind the big guy with a quiet creak, and Christian sank back into his thoughts. He tried to push away the grim shadow clouding his mind, but with every breath, it only grew thicker. His nerves were strung tight like a wire, and for a moment, he felt a faint chill run down his neck. But he knew: he had to work, had to forget.

  Soon, the boss spoke again, and Christian latched onto work matters with relief.

  “So, how’s Harabi doing?” Richter asked, nudging a topic that's been hanging around for days.

  Christian’s fingers moved over the keys, checking records. Work, those tasks, gave him some sense of control over the mess.

  “Harabi ordered two chest implants for some rich lady,” Christian said, feeling his fingers clench as he spoke. He didn’t like talking about this stuff, even in the context they were in, but work was work.

  Adam let out a hum, smirking, and stepped aside, grabbing a water bottle off the desk.

  “What, that guy’s going all out again? Those implants are probably the kind where you press a button and beer comes pouring out.”

  Christian couldn’t help a faint smirk. Of course, the boss was right—in this world, almost everything got turned into something more… practical.

  “Not exactly, but yeah, for ‘servicing’ a new client circle, let’s say, they’ll fit perfectly. Specializing in elite clients means something more… aesthetic,” Christian explained, narrowing his eyes a bit.

  Adam looked at him with interest and a hint of sarcasm but didn’t push the topic. Instead, he stood by the small window and gazed out at the city darkening beyond the glass. It all felt so familiar, yet endlessly threatening.

  “Alright, let’s talk about business that’s not so entertaining,” he said, turning back to Christian. “What about the shipment?”

  Christian sighed and switched the interface, shifting his eyes to his notes on the latest convoy. A few weeks back, they’d gotten an order for an extra load tagged onto one of the last metallurgist transports. At first glance, it was standard—same old routine. But the last day brought weirdness.

  “About that convoy… I know something’s not right with it. At the last minute, they attached a few containers that weren’t in the documents. They deliberately delayed the shipment for it, added a ‘not inspected’ tag to the list, so to speak. At first, I thought it was just a mistake, but then I saw the cargo batch didn’t even go through standard checks. It’s all logged in the system as ‘ordinary metals,’” Christian said, watching Adam’s reaction closely.

  Richter clenched his teeth, squinting.

  “Metallurgists pulling their tricks again, or is it the supplier? Damn vermin, I hate them. And what was in those containers?”

  Christian lifted a shoulder in an uncertain shrug, as if guessing what it might mean.

  “Not exactly sure yet, but I’ve got suspicions. One container was way lighter than the others. And when they checked its outer makeup, it showed a strange, mismatched density. Like they mixed in something not so… ordinary. I can’t say what it is for sure, but it’s definitely not metal. And our convoy guy changed the route at the last second to avoid standard checkpoints.”

  Adam narrowed his eyes and started pacing the room slowly, his face as calm as ever, but a flicker of displeasure shone in his gaze.

  “So we might be dealing with smuggling. Or something even dirtier,” he said, pointing at the folder he’d dropped on the desk. “Check it all again. Next time you land in this kind of crap, I need to know right away, not at the last minute.”

  Christian nodded again. He understood the danger too—schemes this deep often meant the convoy itself could be part of a much bigger game.

  “I’m already checking and keeping tabs on its route. I’ve got a few entry points where we can inspect those containers more thoroughly. But we need to be cautious,” he added, looking at Adam.

  The boss shook his head again, but his stare stayed serious.

  “Good,” he said, sensing the tension in the room rise once more. “Keep me in the loop. And Werner, if you’re so worked up about your sister, maybe it’s time to use your head, not just your instincts. She’s not your property. You can’t control her. But this shipment—let’s take care of that. The faster we sort it out, the fewer people end up in the muck.”

  Christian didn’t reply, just gave a slight nod, feeling the strain between them ease off bit by bit.