Memento Mori

5.2 - SARAH'S DREAM

THE VENTS IS GOING TO HELL. With no one left to hold the reins, the tenuous threads that once bound the undercity in peace all begin to unravel. Driven by hollow purpose, I wander like a ghost from the intra-crust lifts down barren concrete towersides, where I am greeted not by crowds and a pulsing technological beat, but the panic of a people trapped in a burning building. Roaming packs of Venters smash into storefronts hunting for any supplies they can find. Others flee burning blocks on a rush towards the Shocks, knowing they will never find shelter in the overcity. Looters spring on the chaos by scavenging on the carrion that earlier street warfare between Dynasty and the last of the rebellious gangs left behind. Trash fires roar in the shadows of bombed-out buildings. Boarded over and blasted-open windows leer at the street like pointed rotten teeth. I pass the same street where I made a fool of Carto Bask. Outside, half-smeared by runoff, the electronic paint where I left my mark. A street so loud I needed my headset to drown out the noise, now so quiet I can hear my own steps.

Further down, ash-covered Dynasty enforcers barricade checkpoints at prominent bridges and crossings between the blocks. Open conflicts between them and the remnants of the Eight's loyal fighters rage throughout the layers when I peer over the edge; eight or ten different classes explosively smashing into each other at a time, nearby allies and enemies adding to the fray as they're drawn to the lights. That theVenter patriots still throw themselves into the syndicate, dying to the last rather than breaking and fleeing to the sewers in ones and twos, tells me that Krey still lives and leads. Only my old friend could inspire that kind of fanaticism.

The upside-down superstructure of the city shudders as a kind of battle most people never experience tears at it from the inside out. The only glorified combat in our world is one against one, a gladiator show. I steer well clear of the scattered conflicts as I press on to the lower layers.

Smoke, not smog, chokes the air as I return to the home block of the Rock Bottom. An ashen blizzard billows through the chasms and streets. Soot stains the towers black. All the neon of the Vents might be gone, but in a sick twist of fate, the lights are no longer needed. The glow of an undercity sun burns ever on the horizon. All the puddles of runoff have evaporated, revealing the true surface of the streets, porous and cracked like a desert mesa. Clustered vines of power wiring and data transfer cables carry electrical wildfires across the layers in leaps in bounds, consuming homes and lives at the whim of the hellish wind. No one will come to put them out.

The famous club is dark and broken as I approach. Krey's rebels no longer bar the front doors. Those have been thrown open from the inside and left to creak as they please. Faint neon leaks from the interior, Neopop ambiance all drained away. A ghost town saloon, no one left to care.

I pause on the first step up, wincing at the ache in my gut, examining the entryway for traps. Vaguely, I'm aware that I can't remember the last time my stomach growled. Like it's forgotten how to be hungry. There's no ozone scars of a firefight marking the front façade, nor the signature cuts and chips a Duelist's blade would leave. Dynasty didn't find the others. They cleared out, probably right after I left to go after the Executor. Not a body left behind.

Except one.

She's slumped over the bar. Bottles of raw liquor around her elbows. Shattered glass behind the counter. Shimmering white hair sullied by grime, limply curtaining her face. A tall girl, full-bodied, nothing filling her now, just the husk that's left behind when half of your life is violently torn away. I know the feeling all too well. But this one, this one is only my fault.

Lain hears the sticky sounds of my arrival as I limp across a floor glazed by shots and spilt beer. Her head twists in my direction. Red-rimmed eyes, tear-streaked soot-stained face, teeth baring in a snarl as she realizes that it's me. That I didn't die. That her Matthias did it in my place. Her fingers curl into fists.