I tapped into my neurospace and messaged Deleon. He was going to learn eventually, if he hadn’t already.


    Petya: The kid lost it. Make sure the ride is close to the station. We’ll be off in a few minutes, and I expect to run into plenty of enforcers.


    “Did you at least finish the teeth?” I asked.


    “Yeah.”


    “If you are that desperate to feed, I need you to make sure you keep something around to hold you over for a while. If you lose control like that again in the Violet district, you’re done.”


    “You’d get rid of me that easily?”


    “I’d have no choice. Deleon would do it for me. This is delicate stuff.”


    “Okay, I get it.”


    “I sent Deleon a message. If we’re lucky, we’ll make it past any enforcers to our ride. He’s usually good at squaring things away like that.”


    “Is this the first time you’ve been caught?”


    “No. Sorry to be so hard on you, but just because we might make it, doesn’t mean you can ever be so careless.”


    “So the ruling parties and enforcers know you about teeth-eaters?”


    “No. Deleon has the means of covering up our trail. I don’t know how far his reach extends, but the government hasn’t hunted us yet.”


    “Sorry. I’ll be better next time.”


    I wanted to say that I believed him, but I didn’t. I knew how it felt to be an impulsive kid at his age and felt that his confidence was even more pernicious based on his privileged upbringing.


    I received a notification.


    Deleon: Thanks for letting me know. I’ve alerted your driver. You should be fine, just hurry.


    Petya: Planned on it.


    “How much longer?”


    I checked my map. “Grab your stuff. Hide behind the sides of the doors, away from the window.


    The voice spoke over the intercom: “Now arriving: Gibson - Indigo District East station. Please gather your belongings and prepare for your stop.”


    He tripped, throwing his duffle bag across the floor as he scrambled red-faced towards the cabin wall.


    I peered through the window. The train hadn’t slowed yet. “Is this close to where you lived?”


    “No, I lived more north, near the–” his fearful gaze shot to the windows as hisses of air signaled the skytrack slowing.


    “We’ll talk another time. Follow me as fast as you can.”


    He nodded.


    “Don’t worry about getting shot. Unless you have a couple of direct shots to anything vital, your Bite will protect you from the initial light shots.”


    “Shot? Zeg, Petya, I–”


    “I told you this would happen. If we make it out alive, I hope you will have learned your lesson.” Zeg I sounded like a cliche parent.


    “Okay.”


    “Like I said, I''ll stay in front.”


    Is this how my poor excuse of a life would end?


    No. I would have no problem burning my reserves to dash free of any light shot. Boyband was my problem. Even if Deleon understood, I failed to save the kid, I could never forgive myself. To be given such a responsibility and fail it so early on into the assignment was a damaging reflection of my character. Damaging, but true. What good had I done since my arrival in the Republic? Maybe my life would have been better off complying with the Medislavian tyranny.


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    No. The Republic had its problems—classes, poverty, gluttonous consumerism to name a few—but it granted me an opportunity to do something with my life. I hoped I could discover what that was once I left Deleon''s service. I hoped I could discover something other than an illusion of what could have been a good life.


    “Arrived: Gibson - Indigo District East station. Please mind the gap. Thank you for using Republic Skytrack.”


    I patted his shoulder and pushed him behind me.


    The doors opened.


    An Indigo streetburner revved its engine and flashed its headlights on the pavement. I would have thought it odd to find the car off of the street, but the dark red smear before us was more daunting.


    I stepped from the car, looking both ways.


    “What are you doing?” Boyband pushed me.


    I swatted his hand away and moved aside for him to step forward.


    “Zeg,” he muttered.


    The red smear had cracked pieces of enforcer armor scattered throughout with the bodies to match smashed to the sides of our path.


    I looked to the driver''s seat to see who had plowed over our would-be squad of assailants. A woman with short hair and an optical implant band like Tevon’s waved us forward. The back door facing us retracted into the roof.


    Boyband was breathing heavily as he basked in the massacre.


    I hit him on the back with more urgency than politeness. We ran to enter the car.


    The doors shut right as we entered and pushed our duffle bags under our feet.


    The engine roared, and the car accelerated faster than any vehicle I had ever been in.


    Boyband looked like he was going to shout a panic-fueled accusation. I shook my head and took the lead.


    “How are you going to cover that up?” I held my tone back from bitter condemnation, rather holding to anxious curiosity.


    The driver looked at me from the rear-view mirror, or at least it looked that way. One could never tell with optic implants.


    The rider in the passenger seat turned back to face us. She wore the same Indigo tracksuit worn by the driver, but her blonde hair reached her shoulders. She had at least twenty years on me and had invested plenty into modifying her face to look like someone of my age. Even with prosthetic advancements, it was easy to recognize an unnatural face.


    She smirked at us, not sharing the panic we felt as the streetburner accelerated. “After everything you''ve been through, you choose now to doubt Deleon? Sure, he’s not the best but he’s competent.”


    “I didn’t know he–usually he doesn’t send actual people to help us. Tools, bots, hacked access, sure, but this is excessive.”


    She shook her head and faced the front. “Just because they were law keepers doesn’t mean they deserved to live any more than your victims. No need to act surprised, we know enough about Deleon’s Blue Imps. Oh, and if you try to bite us, you’ll be dead before you can touch us.”


    I nodded, though I doubted her claim. “And you’re our Indigo counterparts?”


    “We don’t have the hypothalamic implants, thank the light.”


    I would thank it, too. “How long have you been working for him?” I hated to resort to small talk, but at least it was about something other than the weather and inflation. I couldn’t let myself forget about the enforcer massacre, but she seemed unwilling to discuss it.


    She sighed. “We don’t work for him, just alongside him.”


    I checked on Boyband. He breathed with forced control and clenched his eyes shut.


    “Did he hire you?”


    “No point in hiring someone from the same organization.” She laughed and elbowed the driver, who made no reaction.


    “What do you mean?”


    “We work for another Beacon. Deleon is going after the presidency, we are–”


    “Enough.” the driver said. Her voice was rough and dry.


    “You’re right,” the passenger said. “Your worldview is about to change, but there are certain things you cannot know until you advance far enough. Who knows if you ever will? Deleon seems to like his Imps as servants.” She muttered the next line under her breath, though I could hear it. “They don’t last too long, anyway.”


    I moved around, trying to look through the windows for a sign of our destination. “Are we still on track for the Violet district?”


    “Of course. Why wouldn’t we be?”


    The passenger continued to speak to the driver in a quieter tone. I had missed the substance of their conversation while adrift in my anxieties but figured they wouldn’t have shared anything worthwhile with us in the backseats. They were transport and collateral coverage. They had no need to help their cargo beyond their assignment.


    “How much longer?”


    “To the Violet border? About an hour, but we are going north to the center. You ever been to Jinai?”


    “Never been to the Indigo district, why would I have been to the Violet?”


    “May the light help you fit in. You’ll need the luck.”


    Trust Deleon. Even if I couldn’t trust him as a person, I knew he would care for his tools.


    The morning was in full glory as we left the densest part of the Indigo district. Gibson was a cluster of skyscrapers. The outer areas were just as populated but lacked the agricultural titans that did little more than flaunt their wealth.


    I felt the warmth of the sunrise. It was clearer outside the continual smog of the Blue district and below. Even if the sky was artificial, as most things were, it was a comforting reflection of what had once been. I wondered how it would be to live in the distant west, far beyond the glowing districts of the Republic. As far as we were told, no one lived out there except for nomads and exiled wanderers. Though I had little to appreciate in my life, at least I was not alone.


    Despite that pleasant thought and the kid beside me, I felt empty within. I fell into my neurospace, turned on the playlist I had named Romanticizing Melancholia and listened.


    I selected a socitab in my neurospace and let my mind succumb to the social drug. The love and appreciation I felt rushed through my dopamine crazed mind would expire before the end of the ride, but for now, it was enough to forget.


    I never saw myself as an addict, for it was never something I wanted to quit. Socitabs were part of me.