The Enthusiasts

12

"You remind me of a lion when you get into your tracking mode," Emerson remarked.

Sasha said nothing as they covered the next two intersections to the edge of the North River Crossing. She looked down the pathway that ran across the riverbank; it was another four blocks to the only usable bridge over The Bow.

"I hate this spot. If anyone wants trouble, they'll be watching the bridge... you can see everything coming in and out of the city from here. And You, with that pack, make a prime target for somebody," Sasha warned as they changed direction and kept close to the buildings lining the murky, slow-moving waters lapping up against the exposed river bank. Waterlines left from decades past had ingrained their aged sediment into the mud side-walls of the basin, marking times when the water had flowed higher and higher prior to Spectra damming and diverting their own share directly to their inner sanctum. Of course, this left little for outsiders to pull from. The basin now sat at its lowest levels in over a century. The hoods of some old sunken gassers were showing more of their broken-down bodies, bobbing up above the waterline now, all sharing the same oxidized red, black, and purple powdered sheen from rusting through to the bone. The pair kept moving at a steady pace in the direction of the bridge as Sasha kept surveying the open areas across the river and leading a careful path all the way down to where the road eventually bent around Riverfront. They got lost in the view of St. Patrick's Barge. We're so exposed out here, Sasha helplessly reminded herself.

"I'll try projecting a 3D mock-up of the bridge for cover when we cross. Anyone looking at it won't even know we're crossing. It'll be fine. I'm going to take an updated image, so there's nothing to suspect," Emerson offered. He held up The Tablet and took a picture of the bridge. He then modeled it for scale and replicated a decent mock-up of every angle in three dimensions. The low battery warning came up at seven percent. "Velp," he said while flipping through some setup screens.

"What?" Sasha broke her concentration, nearly slapping him with her rogue bang as it whisked off her face. A nervous sense of tension had popped up in her voice. She hated when a plan could not go perfectly. Things were difficult enough, she thought. The least she could ask for was that the few tools they did have would work when needed.

"Nothing... The Tablet's battery is getting low. Don't worry. We'll be back home soon. It'll have no problem projecting until then."

"I've heard that one before... Why didn't you charge it last night?"

"It's solar-powered, and we wouldn't have had any other source worth a velp in that apartment. I guess we'll have to stop watching shows during the winter when we're going out. It's cold, which is also hard on it, and we get like eight hours of half-assed sunlight in the winter months."

They had reached the bridge, and both of them looked down every direction for any sights or sounds of activity. There were none to detect.

"Okay, put on your light show. Let's not waste any time when crossing. Keep close and move where I move," Sasha ordered.

Emerson lit up the image and then ran it across his parameters. It didn't look perfect, but he hoped it would be a decent distraction. Sasha bolted out from her cover in an abandoned car, wasting no time running. She crouched and hurtled her body through the hologram, disappearing behind it like a mouse into its hole in the wall. Emerson barely had time to keep up with her movements. He stood up, crossing the street not as quickly. His eyes scanned the surrounding rooflines for any eyes on them before he entered the hologram.

He saw Sasha crouched down, beckoning him with a wave from beside a set of vehicles of all descriptions littering the bridge. Covered in some fast melting ice and snow, most of them had their windows smashed out. They were likely looted decades ago but still worth checking out. Inside the 3D mock-up, all that could be seen by the two of them was a hazy back reflection of the projected image. It was like trying to look through a bedsheet. They had no idea what was going on outside the projected area. Sasha got up and moved quickly to cross the bridge. Emerson followed, and as they reached the exit, for the first time that day he clutched the back end of the AK-47 slung around his neck. Emerson hesitantly held his finger at the trigger as they exited.