Chapter 5: The Lower City

The two had driven towards a parking lot behind one of the residential blocks. Despite the clamor of tenants heading to and from their cars, and the ever present blaring of Identity scanning advertisement holoboard, said parking lot counted as quiet in this part of the city.

“Ready?” Sol asked Leyland whose hand was on the wheel, ready to zip away to wherever their prospect wanted to meet.

Leyland flashed a thumbs up, prompting Sol to insert the comms chip to the slot on her head. Her implant connected smoothly, not a bite of feedback could be felt.

Typical of Corpo high quality gear. In an instant, the video feed of a woman appeared, she wore the sleek black blazer made from some off world leather and a couple of expensive looking external implants “Who the fuck are you and how did you get this number?” she asked, a sleek marijuana vape pen in her mouth. “Carlson Wade sent me” Solus replied, keeping her face stoic “Yeah right, Wade hires random punks now.”

“He didn’t say what exactly, but he says you’re willing to pay” The woman on the other side doesn’t say anything for awhile, she takes a sip from her vape pen and flashes an address to Solus. Top Level Canals - Platform 3-A. 20 minutes. Come alone.

The feed cuts off, leaving only the address on Sol’s visuals. “What’d she say?” Leyland asks, his fingers twitching at the steering wheel, with a flick of a hand. The address is flashed to the windshield, letting her partner unleash an overly excited yell as he revs the engines and drives towards their goal.

Early morning at 26D was made to look like a summer’s break through the weather control systems.

A few low hanging clouds produced by moisture stabilizers kept things relatively cool and stable while an artificial sun peaking through the horizon as its energy danced through the city’s central pylon. But all this would be broken as the dome’s vents cranked open, the Pacific Ocean’s torrential storms tore through 26D’s residents, bathing what was once a perfectly balanced yet false summer’s day into something more akin to a December drizzle. It wasn’t terribly inconvenient, compared to the non stop rainfall that those outside of the Domes experienced but it was relatively unannounced.

“The Vents of Dome 26: Cebu will be opened for the next 20 minutes. This is all for Climate Control Purposes. Have a Nice day” signed the Arbiter’s Court, the notice flickered in every phone, hologram, billboard and street sign.

Giving nearly every denizen of the Dome that they were fully given notice by the city’s true rulers. “You know what Sol, I swear they do that shit just to remind us all they’re in power.” Leyland grumbles, easily cutting through traffic with his Impala’s superior handling. “They can do whatever they want really, as long as they keep the Dome’s running and the power flowing” “Or just stay the hell away from us”

They drove up the elevated highways, situated just at the edge of the Dome’s structures. From there you could see the world outside of their little bubble of carbon and steel.

A world of neon lit spires and half drowned riverslums, all under the grey overcast of the unending rains of the planet’s broken environment. Sol couldn’t help but feel tired yet nostalgic at the sight of the spires, it did seem like a lifetime since she’d even visited the decks where she grew up. The city’s Sectors were so self contained you could spend your whole life in one of them without ever having to leave, but unlike most of the people she knew. She did. Dilim Sector had nothing for her anyway.

“We’re close” Leyland comments.

The rumble of the canal’s downpour echoed throughout their surroundings, as the sight of blue clean water fell through 26D’s outer rings. As the Impala rumbled into the Top Level of the dome, the pale glare of marble, chrome and platinum shone against their weary eyes.

“Tint on” Leyland gave the voice command as he navigated the twists and turns of the top level towards Platform 3-A.

The luxurious top level skyline faded away as they went through the back end alley ways of pipelines and circuit feed that maintained a chunk of the Top Level’s automated services. Not many people patrolled this area, just a few sensors and worker bots toiling away.

Still the two felt a good degree of wariness, this was Megacorp property, all eyes belonged to the corp and undoubtedly they were being watched. Still would be a safe bet to keep their hands near their guns. The two kept driving till a marker popped on the windshield’s map. “ we here Solus, question is is where are they?”

In that second Sol’s the comm’s chip vibrated and a marker lit up in her view. “You seeing that Leyl?” She asks, pointing at the green and yellow arrow pointing towards one of the empty areas of the canal. He shook his head. “Guess that means I gotta head that way”

The two step out of the Impala and pull up their hoods to waylay the light drizzle. The two walked towards the ledge and saw a group of individuals standing by a bulky armored car.

“I better come”

“Nah you stay. The message said to come alone”

“This isn’t low level scrap gang dealing. These are Megacorps, they got their own morals and ethics and don’t follow any outlaw code out here. For all you know they were bored and decided to offer a job and shoot you for fun” Leyland’s protests were genuine, she could tell. There was a crack in his voice that made him signal his wariness at their new clients. “Hey, buddy come on. Just hang back here and don’t shoot anything unless I start shooting ayt?”

“Ayt” he doesn’t put up an argument, but his reply is tired and dull.

Leyland gives a fist bump to his old friend and watches her skirt down down the canal’s pipeline. A small stream gathered at the middle of the concrete surface, slowly growing from the vent induced drizzle. He zoomed in on her position, marking the client’s bodyguards and their hardware. If a fight was coming. It’d be terribly one sided.

Sol tightened her jacket as she neared the Corpo detail, parked by the dry spot. Her eye scans could pull out a few details from the guards. Usual cybernetic racket; brain cpu implants, jet boots and titanium threaded bulletproof jackets. Not unlike herself, but the woman standing in the middle was definitely her contact.

Black alien leather blazer, thin vape pen on her lips and a floating umbrella above her head. “I take it you sent the chip?” Sol says as she approached the woman and extended a hand. Within an instant one of the bodyguards immediately sprints towards her and plants a hand on her head as he drags her to the car, her right wrist locked. She thinks about resisting, but with the job at stake she lets it happen, much to her regret as the bodyguard apparently was suped up with some bio mod or inner exosuit as it felt like being hit by a truck.

“Hands on the car” she immediately complies as he checks her for weapons. “Armed” the bodyguard says as he flashes Sol’s .45 to the client. Sol, gets a closer look at the lady under the floating umbrella, she was short haired, brown skinned and had considerably less external implants than the one she contacted.

“You’re not my contact” Sol muttered, the door to the car opens and out steps a woman she instantly recognizes from the video call “Contact?” Sol asks, cracking a smile while she’s at it. A hovering umbrella opens and floats above the woman’s head, the rains begin to break as the rumbling of the vents closing becomes apparent.

Sol wishes an Arbiter on patrol would see this, those overly bulked do gooders were afraid of no one, not even a Megacorp executive. But this was Corp owned territory, Crime rates were astoundingly low and thus Arbiters rarely had to pass by.

“Contact? Yeah whatever. Search the area!” she scowls and in an instant, a security drone emerges from the car’s trunk and begins scanning their surroundings. “Wait wait, I got a friend, he’s at the car just by that ridge. He’s just a driver”

The wrist on the lady’s hand buzzed and a hologram feed revealed Leyland sitting on the hood of the Impala, waving hi at the drone, a sarcastic smile stuck to his face. “Carlson Wade sent me remember?” Sol exclaimed, hoping that would get the conversation running, “Ok, then. Comms chip?”

“It’s in my head implant, hold on hold on”

The port on the right side of her head opened up, the bodyguard quickly grabbed the comms chip and handed it to the lady. She inspected it for a few seconds, “Fuck, let her go” she orders the bodyguard who complies.