Heavy bass, snow on the tips of noses, crack rock smiles, and club fog mixed with crack smoke in the air, with hands as the bass thundered with cloud phonk.
Brillian made fight-eyes at three women on the floor as he dragged her across the sticky black floor. They didn't look like trouble, and he didn't want any. Past the illumi light blasters that projected nude women dancing that sparkled and flashbanged. They reached the main wall of fake fog, gathered up where the bouncers stood at the back. He passed through with Brillian and realised he subconsciously held his breath when he exhaled. The bouncers flanked them on all sides with a woman in the middle.
"So who you?" she asked in a New York accent.
Brillian hissed like a cat.
"Steady there, alright little baby?" she said, "What's the big man here want?"
"Greenthorne." Locke said, "Doxies have been going missing, one of our guys went missing too. Linked."
The woman looked at the men, "A warden is after this, too. Good thing."
"We'll help," said one of the bouncers, "But we have leads that are our business, like rest of Shurin. Follow." The man took out a small lantern-shaped object, turned it on, and blue lights came to life with a whirr. Scrambler. Locke followed the man through to the back of the club. Gangs, rappers, beatboxers sat at tables battling, spitting, and drinking while they whored. Brillian seemed distracted by something but kept up with the group.
They entered a large dressing room full of doxies and through to the back door where a man had a doxy bent over the table.
"The fuck?"
"Boss, warden here about the girls disappearing."
"Oh, good." he pushed the woman off him and sat her down. "First off, Shurin Street, Vantara, in that run-down shithole they call a club on Vantara Street. Run by Metis knows what now, but they're bad news, wouldn't be surprised if one of the majors wiped 'em off the map or planned to." he lit a cigar then stuck it between the doxy's lips, "So you want that fucko Greenthorne. He came here in two ways but left. Look up the girls that work in the Vantara wrecks and the Vantara club, might find a trail of him there and do us a favour and wipe out the ganger trash there. Clip, cut, kill 'em, just scare 'em off. Maybe you'll find trails of Greenskin there."
Locke stopped the engine a mile away from Vantara in a large parking structure, paid premium for the makeshift security gates to come up around his vehicle with sensors that used this ID as verification. No TPSB premium meant the company was predatory enough to shoot at thieves instead of relying on a federal investigation.
He lit the last cigar he nicked from Cha as rain started to fall. Brillian stepped up beside him and shielded him from it with her Resonance Field.
"I don't want you to hate me," she said.
"I know," he replied curtly, "But where's this coming from?"
She shrugged, "Just a weird feeling." She raised her hands, "Nothing supernatural."
"Let's get a move on now." He started down the staircase.
The floors of Vantara were akin to Murphy and Incari's lower-end slum poverty rows, injectors, pipe ends, broken glass, gum, and teeth on the unmaintained concrete. They walked under the grim clouds lit by bright blue Boreal aurorae. Large buildings that should've stood the tests of ten years in this city had fast-forwarded into decay. Barley a few walls weren't filled with holes or crumbled to piles of rubble. Amberend's booming Kemetism and Hellenicism didn't extend to Vantara for reasons people didn't like to talk about. Brillian pointed out a building to the right. They made their approach to a building that belonged to a steel manufacturer, and the sounds of sex emanated from inside, with the smell of Mary Jane. Locke rested a palm on the back of his gun when they rounded the corner, and Brillian pushed the door open. Men and women smoked on the floor in ragged clothes, a few boffed dealers in corners, one drug wriggling woman had a gun to the back of her head, her eyes swollen from crying. They were all covered in muck, waste, and piss. A broken toilet overflowed and sat at the back of the room. Locke pointed his gun at the rapist and looked to the right. The man tried to continue, but Brillian decided it was his time and sliced his throat open with a Reignpainted razor.
The woman scrambled away and huddled in a corner.
"I trust that's enough for you to answer all my questions." The other dealer tried to scramble over a wall, but Locke said, "I wouldn't try to leave, you're guilty to her by association."
He froze, climbed down nice and slow like a good boy.
"Smart choice."
The room was cemetery quiet. Locke heard a wall crumble in the distance.
"Doxies have been disappearing round here, don't suppose any of you girls are one of 'em?"
Brillian waved a hand, and a large anvil swung across the room, "Your life," she whispered.
"Alright- Alright!" one of the girls shouted, "sometimes the feds around here that patrol like you know, to get some action. Alright? Clean us up, sometimes use us, then use us to pay off criminals. That's all. A couple o' Yaks came down and gave us some brut or sheen sometimes half a bag to talk on the feds." She trembled, "That bitch over there, not the one fatback raped the other one hiding in the corner, Arn, she was a favourite of a big guy. Looked rich, had a fat face."
"Arn." Locke walked over to the corner. The woman he'd saved earlier still trembled, her eyes almost devoid of what they'd call a soul. Behind her was a small Asian girl who looked younger than Brillian.
"Did Greenthorne touch you?"
She looked up at him with terror in her eyes.
He lowered his voice and took a step back, raised his hands, "Did Neil Jameson Arshad touch you?"
She nodded.
He looked at Brillian, "You can kill that nonce after I put him to some questions."
Behind her mask, she rabidly smiled.
"Is Neil... coming back...?"
"That's not his name, and he won't come back for you." Locke said, "Now, you're coming with me."
Her eyes went wide. Brillian thrust an arm in front of him. She swept up the girl between her arms and carried her away. On the way out, he flicked his cigar on the floor, stepped on it, and shot the drug dealer who still looked for an escape in the head.
"Dickhead."
Brillain rested Arn down on the back row of seats, then sat down beside her. He started the engine and took off.
"Can you tell us anything about him? Did he talk about anything?"
She looked at Brillian with those victimised eyes, if he brought this kid back to Cha she'd have his head on her heel.
"What's wrong, Arn..." Brillian placed a palm on her shoulder, "You're a Reignpainter just like me."
Locke furrowed his brow.
"We're taking her to... shit."
"Chahof will kill you," Brillian said.
"Nah, I was thinking of someone worse." he set a course for Wiretown-- he went sideways, flung from his seat into an airbag in the shotgun seat on impact. Arn screamed as her arm was crushed by the impact that indented the vehicle. His thoughts whirled, targeted attack. Betrayed. Someone tracked his AV. Someone's onto him. Someone wants Arn. Someone wanted Brillian. He'd take over Niji's position and run the TPSB properly. All the money that he could make-- he hit the ceiling when they began to descend. Fought against the force and pushed himself down to yank the backup thrusters. The AI onboard redirected all power to them as soon as the joystick went up. The Laenic projectors flickered, and the lights shut off a few times. As the ship stabilised on a slant angle, he looked out the window to see the Armoured Air Vehicle Carrier that rammed him pass by.
"Fuck you Fuscian." he muttered as he realised he was on the edge of consciousness. In the corner of his eye, he saw Brillian get up and raise her hands. The AV stabilised flat again. She ambled over to him.
"Are you okay?" she said huskily, "Hey, stay with me- Don't die! Locke!"
"Shut up." he muttered as his head spun. "You saved us, land us somewhere so I can collect my sanity off the floor."
"I need you to stay alive, okay?"
"Don't tell me why, you'll get me into more shit." he fumbled for a cigarette. "We need to get Arn t-to a hospital." The girl had passed out with her arm bleeding profusely. He dropped the cigarette and his phone.
Brillian pressed the emergency dial and put the phone to her ear. "Where are we?" cupped the microphone with her hand.
"It's fine, locay services are on... clearly..." he scowled at the carrier that had driven half a mile on.
Minutes later, the emergency services arrived, and Locke opened the working door for them. Brillian had landed them on a corporate gunsmith's rooftop. They surmised that Arn needed her arm severed, but when they made the move to cut it, her eyes struck open and she screamed when the diamond saw hit her Resonance Field. Brillian raised a hand to them.
He gave a nod for them to back off. She went over to Arn and whispered into her ear. The girl relaxed a bit, and her eyes filled with dread when Brillian severed her arm from its socket with a guillotine. She passed out in the next moment. The doctors scrambled to stop the bleeding.
"Get her a new arm, put it on S. M. Locke, forward to Fuscian Niji." he said, sitting up with a cigarette between his lips.
"Hey, Brill."
"Yeah?" she spun around.
"Thanks. And call Yama, tell her to send Moby to pick us up."
"Okay."