Neon Dust [Progression Cyberpunk]

31 – Complications

Addie stepped out of the shower and, after drying off, took a minute to wipe the steam from the oval, LED-backed mirror. Her dad had installed it—one of the many little finishing touches he'd made to the apartment they'd built inside the warehouse while she and Tony were off doing other things. The ceiling wasn't finished; a square hole in the snap-together panels where a vent fan would eventually go yawned into the abyss of the warehouse, but, other than that, the bathroom was almost done.

As the mirror cleared, she stared at herself for a long minute. She was studying the shiny finish of her new Dust reactor's display. She examined the sleek chrome curve, trying to remind herself that it was just hardware, just a piece of tech. Even so, when she wasn't paying attention, when her mind drifted toward the device without her conscious control, she'd see Zane's face again—his look of shock, disbelief, and horror as she'd reached around to pull his PAI.

She probed the red, swollen flesh around the implant. It was tender, but not too bad. Surprisingly, the new reactor was nearly a centimeter smaller than her old one, and Doc Fox had needed to give her a synthetic bone graft to make the housing snug. He said the healing would take an extra few days compared to a usual install.

When she slid her fingers over the chrome-like surface, it came alive, displaying her Dust levels—1109/5000—her current draw rate—22 Dust per minute—and a rotating, holographic close-up of a sun, complete with solar flares. Living in the Blast had the dubious benefit of easy Dust collection, but it was all dirty, making it less effective by a factor of four than the refined stuff. Still, that count was something else. Whenever she felt gross about having a piece of tech in her that had once been in Zane, she'd look at her Dust reading, and her reservations would diminish. "Five-thousand Dust!"

It was a nice display—shiny, as people would say. If she wore a revealing enough top, it would make a splash at the Ninety-nine. She smiled at the idea of flexing on other operators with her Dust count. Of course, she didn't need to see the display to know her count; it was also on her AUI. "Shiny," she said, trying to reinforce the idea as she ran her fingers over the smooth surface again. She wanted to believe it, but something in her felt like it was more of a scar than an achievement.

She dressed, dried her hair, and then messaged Tony, asking him if he was up. She knew he probably was. If she had to guess, she'd say he was at the—

Tony: Yo, just finished at the gym. You heard from Glitch?

Addie: Not yet. Today is only day three, though. Should I message her?

Tony: Sure, but we could do another job in the meantime. Torque said he might have something.

Addie: All right, you talk to Torque, and I'll talk to Glitch.

Tony: Roger, boss.

Addie smiled. He'd been doing that lately, calling her out for acting bossy, but he was always playful about it, so she wasn't sure if he was serious. It wasn't like she called all the shots; in fact, she was always more than willing to let him make major decisions. She'd acquiesced about the darn Dust reactor, after all, hadn't she? She still couldn't believe she was wearing a piece of tech worth a hundred thousand bits. "Tier four," she muttered, clicking her tongue.

She'd asked Tony about that, wondering if all tech had some kind of rating on the SOA scale. He'd chuckled at the idea, though. It seemed some things were easy to rate—Dust reactors, for instance. They had a value that was displayed numerically: how much Dust they could hold. Other things, like Tony's arm, would be far more difficult to evaluate. There were all sorts of "stats" for a cybernetic arm, and some were intangible—style, for instance.

No, you'd never find an SOA rating on a cybernetic arm unless it got so expensive and exclusive that only a high-tier operator could swing it. Then, someone with a piece of gear like that might say, "My arm's tier-one tech, scrub."

Addie sat on her bed and tried to focus. Why was her mind wandering so much? Maybe she was trying to think of anything but the thing she really wanted to think about—her relationship with Tony. He was more and more sweet on her, she was sure of that, but there was no way he'd normally move so slow with a girl he was interested in. Tony was an operator from New 'Hattan! There had to be more holding him back than his fear of his former employers.

He said he was doing a counseling program with his PAI, but she could tell there was something he still wasn't confronting, and she was pretty sure it had a lot to do with his last—what? Partner? Lover? Girlfriend? Wife? Her inability to even label the mysterious woman just illustrated how little Addie really knew. She wondered if the mystery woman had been involved with the betrayal. That would surely put a damper on someone's romantic interests, right?

"Argh!" Addie shook her head, punching herself on the knee. "Quit spacing out!" She cleared her throat and focused on her AUI. "JJ, message Glitch."

"What should I say?"

"Just open the chat." Addie watched as the appropriate window opened, then she thought her message. JJ was pretty good at picking up text from her mental impulses.

Ember: Heya – any luck on that, um, missing person you're helping us with?

While she waited for a response, Addie flopped back onto her pillows and pulled up the Dust manipulation exercise app Pyroshi had sent her. It wasn't a complicated program; it just displayed a three-dimensional model of a hypothetical "Dust flow" and illustrated how to pull it into threads and weave or pattern it. The idea was for Addie to examine the model, watch the animation, and then apply it in practice with the Dust she had stored in her reactor. Once she completed it, she could select the green checkmark, and the program would then provide her with the next exercise.

So far, she'd managed to make it to exercise five out of fifty. That was one thing a new Dust reactor couldn't do for her: it didn't make manipulating Dust any easier. No, she'd have to practice and learn that the hard way. As she started the first exercise, a simple twist of two "ropes" of Dust, she let her mind wander a little, and she fantasized about properly fading and being able to move around while she was in the space between dimensions.

Theoretically, she'd be able to walk through walls or even drift up and down through floors and ceilings. Of course, it was risky; just as she'd knocked Mary Harper out of her fade when she'd attacked Tony, someone could do that to Addie. If she were passing through something solid… she could die.

She completed the braid, hit the checkmark, and moved on to exercise two: a flat grid of thread lines resembling a tic-tac-toe board. She was just laying down the third line of Dust when her message window flashed:

Glitch: Hey, super sorry it's taking so long, but no, I'm not there yet. I promise it's not for lack of trying. I have a couple of leads, though. I just need to get past some firewalls and a clever little defensive AI. I'm working on a trap for it. If it works, it should buy me enough time to snoop out what I'm looking for. Give me another day…maybe three at the most. In the meantime, can you ask your buddy why he won't return my messages?

Ember: Okay, I'll pass that on. I mean, about the timeline. Um, what buddy, though? You don't mean Tony, do you?

Glitch: No—Beef! I mean, I get it, he's a hard-case banger tough guy, but that doesn't mean he should just leave me swinging from a wire, you know? Sure, maybe I flirt with everyone, and he saw that and doesn't think I'm for real, but I'm not trying to jerk him around. Can you tell him for me? I don't think he's reading my messages—not after the first one.

Addie giggled, hardly believing what she was reading.

Ember: Wait… How many messages did you send him?

Glitch: Just the one…initially. So, yeah, maybe three. Four. No more than four.

Ember: Oh. My. Gosh. Beef probably doesn't know what to do with all that. I'll talk to him.

Glitch: Thank you, sis! I'm terrible at people. Either they think I'm weird or I come on too strong or… Well, you get the idea.

Ember: I think you're fantastic. Talk soon.

Glitch: <3

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

Addie lay on her bed for a long minute, smiling, thinking about Beef and Glitch. Could it happen? She couldn't help thinking it would be really, really good for Beef to have a relationship with someone who wasn't a doll or a banger fangirl. Glitch was an operator with a real talent. The fact that she liked Beef was…surprising to Addie. Of course, that thought made her feel guilty, and her grin melted as she realized how superficial she was being—how superficial she'd been with Beef for most of their long semi-friendship.

Maybe Glitch was just better at seeing past all that surface stuff than Addie was. Maybe she'd seen that Beef was brave and loyal and confident. She sighed, seeing the colorful Dust pattern waiting for her to complete. "Okay, Addie," she muttered, "let's focus."

She spent another hour working on the exercises and finally pushed through to the sixth pattern, but after straining to hold the Dust in position for more than fifteen minutes, she gave up. Despite it being entirely mental, it was hard work, and she could feel her frustration and strain starting to give her a headache. When she closed the app, she rested her eyes for a few minutes, then messaged Tony:

Addie: Hey, any word from Torque? Are you coming back soon?

Tony: Torque wants us to drop by tonight, and yeah, I'll come home soonish. I, um, stopped by the course to try out my new rig.

By "course," he meant the little shooting range they'd set up in an abandoned warehouse.

Addie: Your rig? You mean the hook thing?

Tony: You're making me laugh. Yeah, the "hook thing." It's pretty awesome, Ads. If the battery runs dry, I can charge it almost instantly with Dust. 'Course it eats up my whole supply, but that's another matter.

Addie: We need to get you a better reactor.

Tony: Priorities, sis, priorities.

Addie: Anyway, no need to hurry if you're having fun. I might go visit Beef.

Tony: Yeah? You're sure? Want me to send you the van?

Addie smiled at that. He was always putting her first. She'd had boyfriends before—not that she was putting that label on Tony—but they'd never been like that, at least not so consistently.

Addie: You're sweet, but I'll just take a cab.

Tony: Cool, just don't walk, please. That's too far, through too many sketchy neighborhoods.

Addie: You're lucky I don't have some kind of stubborn, defiant streak! Don't worry, anyway; I'm well aware that I live in the Blast.

Tony: Right, sorry…

Addie: Oh, hush. I'm not upset. Message me when you're home.

Tony: Talk soon.

Ten minutes later, Addie was out front, waiting for her AutoCab. She'd checked in on her dad, but he was participating in an auction for some wholesale goods and had only waved distractedly at her. When the cab arrived, she slid into the back and had JJ pass along her destination. She watched the industrial neighborhood roll by outside her window, and then they were in the Blast proper, passing by corpo stacks, office buildings, and cruising toward the NGT building.

Traffic wasn't terrible at mid-morning, and they made it through the district center in only fifteen minutes. After that, they were moving into more familiar territory, cruising toward Addie's old neighborhood. She'd only been living at the warehouse a short while, but it already felt strange going back there. Things seemed…smaller, but she had a feeling that had more to do with her worldview, her outlook, than anything else.

These streets had been her entire universe for most of her life, and the work she'd been doing with Tony had opened her up to new ideas and perspectives. She wondered if Beef was feeling something like that. They hadn't spoken in a while, but Tony said he'd mentioned he might get his SOA license. She wondered if she should have messaged or called him ahead of visiting. Part of her just expected him to be where he'd always been, standing in the alley with his boys or, if not there, making his rounds, collecting protection.

What if he weren't working for the Helldogs anymore, though? He would have told her, right? Addie watched her dot on the mini-map, moving ever closer to the destination. She was only a couple of minutes away. "It'd be silly to message him now."

When the cab drove past her dad's store, she felt a sinking sensation in the pit of her stomach as she looked at the empty, weathered board where he'd removed his old business sign. Worse, she could see through the security bars into the empty interior—just a few crooked shelves and bits of packing left behind from the move. It was like witnessing a corpse left out in the open. She turned her attention to the alley coming up, blinking back tears.

When the cab stopped, she peered out the window and felt a wave of relief to see Beef sitting in his salvaged recliner while his boys played at sword fighting—one with a beat-up umbrella and the other with a length of curtain rod. Addie slid out of the cab, and when she closed the door with a thud, the three bangers all looked in her direction. Addie started toward them as the cab whirred away. "Hey!" she called, waving an arm.

"That you, Ads?" Beef bellowed. It was good to hear his voice after the disturbing feelings her dad's empty store had brought up.

"It's me." She hurried the rest of the way, and when she stopped, even Beef's boys had smiles on their faces. She looked at them, squinting in the bright light. "Hey Lester. Jerry."

"Ah, Ads, don't do that to 'em. Even their moms don't call 'em those names anymore."

"B-Beef, to be fair, my, uh, my mom's not with us…" Jerry—Reject—stammered.

"All right, you clowns. Go see if Wisdom has his money yet. Let me talk to Ads." Beef waved his heavy arm, the chains he'd looped around his wrist clanking with the motion.

"Right! Can we rough him up, Beef?" Runt asked, adjusting his breather mask. Addie knew he wore that breather because he had bad lungs—his mom had been a LusterMax addict, and he'd been hospitalized for the first five months of his life.

"Nah, don't rough him up. Well, if he doesn't have the money, you can punch him. Once! You boys can shoot for who gets to do it."

Reject giggled with excitement, and then he hurried off with Runt in tow, but not without glancing almost shyly over his shoulder at Addie and waving.

"Damn idiots," Beef sighed. "What's up, Ads?"

Addie looked around for something to sit on and dragged a plastic drink cooler over. It was missing its lid, so she stood it on its end before sitting down, facing Beef. "Just wanted to see how you're doing."

"Oh, I'm just flossy, doll. All chrome and—oof!" He chuckled and winced when Addie punched his slab-like chest, her fist making a soft plap against his synth-leather vest. "Sorry, sorry! I didn't mean to call you that. I wasn't thinking."

"Well, what's been going on? How's the SOA thing looking?"

Beef shifted in his seat, looking uncomfortable, and squinted at the sky, avoiding eye contact as he replied, "Eh, well, I decided that life ain't for me, Ads. I got a good thing going here, and—"

"You're joking, right?" Addie growled.

"What? What's so bad about this life? I've got it pretty good here! People respect me, I get paid enough to get the things I like, and most of my days are pretty damn chill. Look!" He gestured to himself sitting there in that ratty recliner.

Addie felt something like panic rising in her chest, urging her to yell or rant or hit the big lummox again, but she took a deep breath and tried to think. Why was he singing such a different tune all of a sudden? He couldn't have failed to get an SOA license; any idiot with five hundred bits could get approved for an unranked cert. Beef wasn't an idiot, either. He was a heck of a lot smarter than he looked. Rather than yell or argue, Addie leaned forward and peered closely into his dark eyes. "What happened?"

"What? Nothing." He folded his arms over his chest and shifted his gaze to the left, staring at the concrete wall behind her.

"Liar. Is it the Hell Dogs?"

Beef gathered a wad of phlegm in the back of his throat, turned his head to the side, and spat. When he looked back at Addie, she could see the defiant set of his jaw. "So what if it was? What are you going to do about it? Turns out they're not so eager to see me go. I've got a future with the org, as they say." He shrugged. "Not such a bad thing to be wanted, is it?"

Addie frowned, looking down at the Helldog patch on Beef's chest. "How'd they find out?"

"Who knows? One of my boys ran his mouth a little too much, but that's my fault for running mine. Whatever—it was a stupid idea anyway. Who did I think I was? I'm a damn gang-banger, Ads. I've got obligations here. I've got people counting on me. I can't just change who I am because some girl put some stupid ideas in my head." He smiled weakly and added, "Even if that girl's pretty great."

Addie clenched her fists, struggling to think of a reply. "Beef, it probably feels hopeless because you're in it. I mean, it's hard to see the picture when you're a part of it, you know? The Hell Dogs aren't that big of an org. You can get away—"

"It ain't that easy, Ads. There are people who depend on me, and the shot callers know it. Mrs. Cho? Mr. Nguyen? Madeline? Golden? Hell, Doc Peters! They're all on my turf, and if I leave, the Helldogs are gonna be pissed at me, and they'll put a real asshole in my place. Madeline used to babysit me! You know—" To Addie's horror, he squeezed his eyes shut and cleared his throat like he was choking back a sob. Could Beef cry? The thought was so disturbing and terrifying that Addie found her eyes filling with sympathetic tears. She leaned forward to grasp one of his ham-like hands, squeezing it with both of hers.

"Did they tell you that, Beef? That they'd make your people suffer?"

He didn't speak, just sniffed and nodded, shrugging his boulder-sized shoulders.

"I…" Addie searched for words, something she could say to comfort him or reassure him, but the truth was, she didn't have an answer.

"Nothing to it, Ads. It's just the way it is."

Addie shook her head. "No. I refuse to accept that. Beef, I don't know how, but we're going to help you. We'll get you out of this and make sure it doesn't come back to haunt the people you care about here."

"We?"

"Yeah." Addie forced herself to smile as though she had a plan. "Tony and Glitch and me—and you."

"Eh, come on, Ads. Everyone's got enough problems. Just let me—"

"Randal!" Addie thumped his chest again. "You're pretty much my oldest friend. I'm not letting this go. So get onboard or I'll make a big mess of things without you."

That got a chuckle out of him, and he sighed heavily. "You would, wouldn't you?"

Addie laughed, sniffing. "Yes! Anyway, don't worry about Tony. He'll want to help, and—Hey! By the way, why haven't you replied to Glitch? She likes you!"

Beef snorted, and Addie had a feeling he would have spit again if she weren't leaning so close. "Come on, Ads." He gave her a funny look that derailed any further objection. She wasn't sure what it meant, but something in his eyes said his feelings were a little more complicated in that area than she'd bargained for.

"Well, I'm serious. Anyway, you can't go cutting her off, whatever you think. At the very least, be friendly with her and see what happens. Besides, if we're going to work as a team on this, we need to get along."

"Just…" Beef sighed again, shaking his head. "Just don't go and do anything without talking to me about it. If you think you've got some kind of idea, I'll listen, but…" He shrugged. "Yeah, just don't go running off and starting some kind of damn banger war."

Addie smiled, encouraged by his lighter tone. She squeezed his hand again, nodding. "Fair enough—no banger wars."