Lepsi texted back, “Probably
jammers to take the cameras off line or to loop them.”
A thieving strategy older than the
Backworlds. This had to be the street. Someone had prepped the area for covert
activity. Who? The smugglers? The Jix? Chocolate was reason enough for
precautions, but the tampering with cameras and motion detectors increased
Craze’s wariness.
He thought about what Talos had said
about the Jixes and Gattar in particular, wondering what the chocolate might
conceal. The worst thing he could imagine was a shipment of frizzers, taboo
weapons of the Foreworlds outlawed on the Backworlds. If he planned for that
kind of bad, he’d be ready for whatever the deal turned out to be. He hoped not
frizzers. He didn’t want to be involved with that, didn’t like the idea of
anyone on the Backworlds having those awful weapons. Setting one paralyzed the
victim in searing agony. Setting two burned flesh in blue flames. Setting three
calcified bone, dooming the victim to a slow, excruciating death. Taboo for
very good reason.
“It doesn’t have to be anything
more than chocolates.” A mantra to calm his worries, he said it again and
again.
He ducked toward the most shadowed
of the buildings, the one he’d choose for a clandestine operation he didn’t
want anyone noticing. Four stories high, a faded sign on its facade announced
it as Mr. Slade’s Emporium. Craze didn’t know what that meant, what type of
business Mr. Slade advertised. It didn’t matter.
The sealed front door wouldn’t
budge. The caked-over windows revealed nothing of the inside. Craze went around
to the back. Two doors were barred over and locked up tight. He tried them
anyway. Neither had any give. The building next door had a half-broken entry.
Craze slipped into it.
He crouched motionless, silent,
listening, letting all his senses span out to detect anyone who might be there.
The room he hunched in had been a kitchen abandoned in haste. Pots and pans,
crates and cans, mud and dirt lay strewn everywhere. Smoke stains marked the
walls.
After five minutes passed and
nothing stirred, he crept toward the doorframe. He moved deeper into the
building, seeking a way into Mr. Slade’s Emporium. Nothing presented itself on
the ground floor. Craze found the stairwell up and tiptoed over litter and
shoes, old mattresses and discarded tabs. More tables and chairs filled an open
expanse on the second floor. It was either more dining space or another
restaurant. No doorways led to the emporium, but there was a balcony. A plank
lay across its railing and rested on the sill of an open window of Mr. Slade’s.
Craze crawled out on the boards, reaching
for the sill, pulling himself over, pushing up the window, and letting himself
inside. He huddled in the dim light, pressing himself against the wall while
listening for activity within the building. The room he hunched in was stark
and small, swept clean of litter unlike the restaurants he’d slunk through to
get here. The difference was telling. This would be the place.
He heard nothing move, so he
slinked toward the doorway. The next room was larger. Some shelves and racks
with empty hangars spanned the space. It was obviously a shop in a former life.
The exit yawned wide on the far side. Craze inched toward it. It opened onto a
terrace ringing the interior. The expanse wasn’t huge. Craze could touch the
railing in front of the shop opposite if he stretched out his arms. He wasn’t
sure what it’s purpose was. Perhaps to dress the goods up as fancy when the
place sold stuff.
All rubbish and dirt had been
cleared and banished to the corners. He glanced down at the empty lobby noting
a large
X
and
O
marked on the floor in tape. Stairs led up and down. Craze went down, finding
the entrances and exits, noting the crevices in which to hide.
He went back up, mapping any
possible ways in and out on the upper floors, paying careful attention to
anything that was something in all the emptiness. He spotted a pulley system
attached to the third floor, set up with a huge hook and chains to handle the
burden of heavy weight. A large metal disc topped it off. He touched it,
sniffed it, observed an On switch. He flicked it, and the disc hummed. Clips,
hangers, and wires flew up to slam against its flat surface.
“A magnet.” Craze nodded, plucking
off the clips, hangers, and wires before shutting it off. He circled around the
interior again. If this ended up being the place, he wanted to know it very
well.
When done, he inched back over the
boards to the building next door. From its balcony, he could leap onto the
terrace of the shop across from it. He slipped inside the window and down the
steps, finding himself in the backroom of a deli. Tiptoeing into the aisles, he
was about to sneak out into the street undetected. His tab buzzed and he
jumped.
The chime sent him in a hurry to
examine the goods in front of him as if looking for just that very thing. He
pretended to determine the best one, grabbed a jar of pickled
snoink
feet and tails, set it down on the counter, and
hoped the shopkeeper hadn’t noticed he’d ducked in from the back. It was
possible. She was quite engrossed with her tab. Maybe watching a movie.
“Fifty chips,” the merchant said,
still giving more attention to her tab than Craze.
Shit. Fifty chips for something
Craze wouldn’t eat. Chips he couldn’t afford. Not until he got his hands on
that chocolate. Craze pinged the money over, glancing at the ID of the incoming
call. He gulped. He should let it ring or cut it off, but the tiny face was one
he hadn’t learned to say no to yet. He wondered if he ever would.
“Hello, Yerness.”
Craze left the deli, staring at the
miniature depiction of his lost love. He hadn’t changed her avatar, so hearts
tumbled from her lips. Part of him didn’t want to know what she had to say, but
the part that did want to know won out.
“Baby,” Yerness drawled. “You
really miffed with me?” Her long lashes fluttered, each blink like a tumbler
full of rancid ale in his gut.
“Shouldn’t you be
botherin
’ Bast? You punched in the wrong tab code,” he
said, gazing into store windows as he strolled down the street, acting as if he
wasn’t interested in her call.
“Don’t be like that. It was the
only way we could be closer. It was marry Bast or creepy old
Confo
. The elders wouldn’t pair me with you. You don’t meet
my requirements.”
She had known that when they met,
ignoring his mid-level status in the end, toying with him all these months. His
chest felt as if it sank. He rubbed at it. “How long you been
aimin
’ at my pa?”
“Don’t pout. It makes your lips all
sexy. Wish I could kiss ‘
em
up ‘n make you feel
better.”
The kittenish tones raked over his
nerves, rendering them raw and ragged, bringing on a case of tight jaw until he
growled. “How long you been
anglin
’ for Bast,
Yerness? The whole time you with me?”
Her brow furrowed and the flirty
smile flitted off her lips. “Noise of his rise was rumored in the council
fifteen months ago. My uncle, one of the elders, gave me the list of
potentials. I couldn’t get stuck with
Confo
, Craze.
Just couldn’t.”
She shuddered, scrunching up her
pretty face, but her helpless act wouldn’t work this time. His lips drew taut.
“Your uncle ‘n his friends branded me a leecher.”
“Not forever, Baby. My uncle ‘n
Bast promise they’ll get it lifted before the year is out, then herald you as
hero when you make your fortune.”
Those promises meant nothing. Bast
and the council would do what was in their best interests like they always did.
Craze didn’t hold out hope for any other result. Unless he let them in on the
chocolate. No, none of them deserved the show of respect. They’d only take it
as a sign that Craze was a mark to be tromped on and used. Like he’d been under
Bast all these years. He didn’t want that. It was time to stand on his own, to
rise above them and show them he was someone to take seriously. That included
Yerness.
He didn’t get this call. Although
he now understood
Yerness’s
motives in getting close
to him, he didn’t get what her current one for contacting him was. “What do you
want from me?”
“We about to be family. Let’s not
be angry with each other.”
What did she have to be angry with him
about? He shook his head, stopping in front of a bright purple shop splattered
with sparkles and splashes of cobalt blue,
Must Have
Gear for the Edge
. Coats, bags, and supplies were crammed everywhere
inside in no order Craze could discern.
“It doesn’t matter,” he answered.
“We not allowed to be in touch anyway. Bast said. The council said.”
“I know. Just wanted to call this
once ‘n say how sorry I am. Tell me you sorry, too.”
She was something. Craze vowed not
to let beauty play him like this ever again. “For what?”
“For not finding status ‘n fortune
faster, so I could be yours instead.”
Craze sucked in a sharp breath. “I
was on the list.”
“Not at the level I need, Baby. Try
to understand. You let me down.”
He stepped inside the shop curious
about what ‘must haves’ he didn’t have for travelling around the Edge. The
prices were reasonable and the workmanship of the goods not as shoddy as Craze
expected.
“Look, I’m busy,” he said.
She bit her lower lip in that
adorable way, batting her eyelids, the long lashes sweeping over the lovely
curve of her cheekbones. “Business already? I knew you’d do great. Just knew
it. The sooner you make it, the sooner the council will renounce your leecher
status. I can void my pairing with Bast ‘n—”
“No, Yerness. You can take a
flyin
’ leap off a space dock. I won’t want you when I’m
rich. We done.”
He took their connection offline,
deleting her avatar, blocking her code, grunting with a modicum of
satisfaction. “Bitch.”
The racks of gear beckoned to him.
Craze rifled through the coats, searching for a dark gray duster in his size. A
display of hourglasses sifting black sand gave him an idea. He splurged his
last coins on gum, sacks of rice, and a patrol siren.
He met the aviarmen and gave them
the siren, rice sacks, pickled
snoink
, and the spool
of clear, super-strong filament he’d taken from
Bast’s
tavern. Together they went over Craze’s tab files from the surveillance of Mr.
Slade’s Emporium and the street.
Lepsi spent a lot of time studying
the objects in front of the motion detectors near the abandoned emporium.
“These fans will soon unfold so as to block the sensors,” he said. “If we were
to go back now, we’d see they’d be slightly bigger than when you were there. If
they move slow enough, the detectors can’t see them.”
Craze peered over the aviarman’s
shoulder, reaching around Lepsi to scroll onto footage of Mr. Slade’s Emporium.
“I’m pretty sure that will be the place. It was neater than the other empty
storefronts ‘n it seemed arranged with the marks on the floor ‘n the pulley
system.”
Lepsi leafed through more images of
the emporium and neighboring buildings, slowing at the preparations Craze
mentioned. “Most likely.” The aviarman enlarged stills of the security cameras.
Craze placed a picture of an
altered motion detector beside it on the tab’s screen. “Does that look like the
Jix’s handy work?”
Lepsi cocked his head, considering.
“My knowledge of the Jixes isn’t that intimate yet.”
“Shit.” Craze’s first-hand data
about Gattar remained limited. It was an issue, but not a large enough one to
prevent him from going forward. “That’s about to change.”
“Oh, yes.” Lepsi chuckled. “We
should know her very well by sunrise.” He ran a hand through his shock of red
hair, singing his concerns away. “Will we love Jixes tomorrow? Or will they
suck like
Federoy
? Give me chocolates ‘n I won’t give
a damn.”
Craze waited for Lepsi to stop, his
hair braiding itself into a single, thick plait down his back. He waved his hand
over the rice sacks, spool of clear filament, jar of pickled
snoink
, and patrol siren. “Do you think you’ll be set up in
time?”
Lepsi nodded. “The ship is fixed ‘n
parked in a berth at the docks. We found the perfect hover scoot to borrow that
can handle any crates of chocolate we find. We’ll go work on that setup now.”
He gestured at the pile including the spool of filament and rice. “No worries,
us ‘n the scoot will be in place.”
Craze rocked on his heels, tugging
at his suspenders. “The
Eptus
? We still of a mind to
use them?”
Lepsi grinned, slapping Talos on
the back. “We’ll take care of that, too. It’ll be fun to rile them up.”
Craze let out a slow breath. “In a
few hours we could all end up very rich.”
Talos held out his prized button,
beaming. “Carry on! We’ll be able to go far out on the Edge to places few have
ever been. Find unique items ‘n send them in to Elstwhere. A trade route of our
own.”
It was a dream as nice as Craze
having his own tavern. Working with the aviars seemed a good fit, like the soft
new boots he wore. He folded his new gray coat and placed it in his duffel. He
handed his pack to Talos, giving more trust than he would normally dare.
A little voice warned him,
“Remember Bast. Remember Bast.” He told it to shut up. The aviars weren’t
Verkinn and they showed little sign of being totally despicable, just
despicable enough. Like Craze. Like normal Backworlders. So he hoped.