Chapter One
Michael Flynn felt naked. The sidewalk outside of a transit station on the edge of The Dirge was far from being the safest place to be standing alone at night. Even so, waiting there to rendezvous with his roommate was arguably less dangerous than walking home into The Dirge alone. He glanced up and down the street from his vantage point atop the steps leading back down to the transit bay, watching the other passengers who'd left the bus with him disperse into the night along isolated paths. A homeless woman sat hunched beneath a small overhang, silently begging as they passed without notice. Recognizing her from the same spot that morning, Michael supposed he could be in a worse situation than having to stand a few extra minutes waiting for his roommate to meet him. He wondered if she had a place to sleep.
Sleep. He'd welcome it after such a fruitless day. Maybe if he could just get home and relax his problems might go away for a bit. They might even look better in the morning.
A soft rain began to fall, spattering on a fallen poster proclaiming the arrival of the new 2051 model year Uhatsu sedans. The woman shifted as it continued, her bare feet pressing on the pavement as she tried to better position herself in the dry spot beneath the overhang. Michael watched her, doubting anyone in the neighborhood was in the market for a new luxury sedan, and noticed something more.
She'd had shoes that morning.
He cursed under his breath that someone would have stolen them from her. Before he'd really even thought about it, his wallet was open. What little cash he had clung insignificantly to the inside and made the empty space there all the more prominent. Reluctantly, he put it away again. He'd need to be thinking about from where his own next meal was coming soon.
There was still no sign of his roommate however, and after a few more moments of searching glances up the street, he found himself meeting the chance gaze of the woman. The resignation in her eyes struck him, devoid of hope and heavy with loss. Michael's heart sank in the brief moment before she turned away, and as the contact was broken, he looked down at his own shoes. Barely six months old, he'd bought them just before coming to Northgate. The city had marred them a bit, but they were still in solid shape.
He reached for his wallet again and walked the short distance to the homeless woman, regretting that he wasn't better equipped to help. At the very least, he wished he could have caught whoever had taken her shoes.
Her hands were chapped, weathered, and dusted with the grime of a life on the street. As she took the few bills he offered, her dirty fingers briefly brushed his own before withdrawing, almost apologetically, from the contact. After a moment, he took out another five and passed that to her as well. Tired eyes looked up at him and a melancholy smile passed over her worn face before her gaze quickly dropped again.
"Thank you," she whispered.
He opened his mouth for a moment, seeking to offer some form of comfort, but any words he could think of only sounded hollow. He cast his eyes about in a search for what to say, yet all he managed to find was the sight of his roommate's arrival. The older man was down the sidewalk waiting for him, keeping his distance in the evening drizzle. Leaving the woman with a weak smile to cover his loss for words, Michael stood and hurried to join him.
As Michael reached him, his roommate turned and began walking. "You've found a job, then?"
"Well..." Michael shrugged, trailing off. His search that day had been a bust. "Not really, no."
"You shouldn't be throwing away money on strangers," the other told him. "Thought you said your savings are running out."
"I know," Michael said, quietly stung. He was twenty-two with almost nothing to show for it, and giving her a portion of what little money he had left probably wasn't the smartest thing he could have done. "But...she probably had less."
"It won't help her. You might need it." He quickened his pace toward the bridge ahead. "Come on."
Michael looked ahead of them, across the water. The clouds broke along the horizon, and the moon was just beginning to rise over the degenerating slums where he lived. Most just called it "The Dirge," a violent, forgotten section of the city where police seldom went and those elsewhere tried to ignore. Roving gangs had long ago torn down the security cameras that were otherwise relatively common on public streets and the corporate run sectors of the city. Even so, his pace still quickened at the thought of getting there. Meager though their apartment might be, it was a place to call home, and sometimes just the fact that he had a roof over his head was a comfort. At least it was in one of the more subdued quarters of The Dirge. Still dangerous, yes, but there were worse places, and it certainly wasn't expensive. He still had to eat though, and if he didn't find a source of income soon, well, he wasn't exactly sure what he would do then.
The small sum he'd given the woman might buy her a meal or two, he knew. Even so, his roommate was right. If he wasn't careful, he'd be in the same position. ...yet there were so many like her.
"Uncle Frank always used to give to charity. Even as the farm was going under," Michael said suddenly.
"He was a good man, hard worker. ...I liked him. But in the end he couldn't afford to pay the hands. Things changed."
Michael nodded, forced to agree. "I'm trying to find a job," he said in his defense. "No one wants to hire a bodyguard without experience, they all want real freelancers. I figured that Aegis course would be enough--they certainly said so when I enrolled--but even they won't hire me."
"They only hire from their expensive courses," spoke the older man. "Give everyone else the rest."
Michael grimaced. "Yeah, well, they forgot to tell us that." The Aegis Security training program had been where most of his money had gone when he'd first arrived in the city. "I guess I figured they'd be the best place to start. They're the largest security corp in the world, and they handle most of the policing in the corporate district downtown," he vented. "Everyone respects them. I don't know, I just figured security work would be the way to go. A way to protect myself, protect other people."
"So you've said."
Michael blushed at his rambling. "Well, it's what you do, right? I'm starting to think everyone else has the same idea. I don't know, I guess maybe I'm just not looking in the right places." He glanced over his reflection as they passed a darkened window, seeing the short brown hair and youthful green eyes of the man for whom no one seemed to have a purpose. At least he had the build for security work. Years of laboring on his uncle's farm had helped to develop him, and while he was not quite as tall or muscular as his six-foot-three roommate, Michael hoped to one day be just as imposing.
His roommate grabbed his arm, stopping them both. Michael turned from his thoughts to see him looking into the distance of the sparsely-lit street ahead. "Trouble," he said flatly. "Better cross over."
With that, he let go of Michael's arm and started across to the other side of the street. Michael followed, peering toward where his companion had indicated. "Trouble? What is it, Diomedes, gangers?" One of the streetlights ahead was dark and he wasn't able to make out much in the gloom, yet Michael trusted that the other had seen something. While his eyes were the same ones he was born with, Diomedes' had been replaced with cybernetic implants. Not only were they marginally better than the norm, Michael knew he also had a few enhancements installed the other would rarely speak of.
"Maybe."
They reached the opposite sidewalk and continued walking. Michael kept looking to see some sign of the group ahead and was soon able to make out a small pack of figures. While he still couldn't tell if they were gangers or not, Michael's roommate had seven more years' worth of experience than he and knew what he was doing. Michael himself might not have seen them until it was too late.
Diomedes, on the other hand, was a freelancer--a modern-day knight errant, part of a new caste of society that supplied security and protection for those who needed it. Just the word excited Michael's imagination. Michael wasn't sure if he was in service to any particular company. Only some freelancers were affiliated. In a time when a corporation might control more land than some countries, some few even signed lifetime fealty contracts. Most freelancers, however, had more freedom to find their own causes. Diomedes' attitude made it clear that his own affiliation was not to be discussed, but Michael didn't mind not knowing. It only added to the mystery and adventure that surrounded this man, through whom all of his dreams had come.
"How much was it?" Diomedes asked suddenly.
"How much?"
"How much did you give her?"
"Oh," Michael answered. "About ten."
Diomedes pressed a twenty into Michael's hand. "Here. Don't give it away."
He was right. Michael pocketed it. "Thanks."
His roommate only grunted.
Across the street, the group of people Diomedes had spotted ran in the opposite direction that Diomedes and Michael had been walking. Cackling, laughing and screaming in a way that Michael had once only attributed to the mentally disturbed, they took no notice of the two men on the other side of the poorly lit street. He tried to steal a glimpse of them as they passed by, avoiding direct eye contact in an effort to not attract any attention. Their presence brought with it to Michael a familiar and detested uneasiness.
"I hate when they do that," Michael said aloud.
"Just noise."
"Yeah, but it seems like every single ganger in the city has to do it."
"I told you you'd get used to it. So get used to it."
"Yeah, but... Yeah." Not wanting Diomedes to think less of him, Michael left it at that. At least the fact that it didn't bother his roommate was still some comfort. He wondered angrily how he could hope to be as strong as the other when he couldn't even deal with a little screaming. "I'll get used to it," he added, almost to himself. Eventually.
A brief while after the howling group had continued onward, Michael looked up from his thoughts to see that they were nearly to the run-down apartment building where they currently lived. "It's dingy, it's ugly, it probably should have been condemned years ago," he mused, "and it's still good to see it."
"Don't complain," Diomedes muttered.
"I'm not, really," Michael insisted, genuinely glad for a safe place to sleep. "You rigged up a great security system."
"Never trust a lock that's not yours."
Michael nodded at the advice and took a few more steps before deciding to ask something. "Why do you still live here? If you can afford the gear you've got in there--"
"Shut up about that out here," his roommate whispered.
Michael winced, feeling foolish. "Well, I only meant--"
Their building exploded without warning. Debris ruptured out of the front entrance surrounded by a frame of fire that billowed out and up into the night. Though Diomedes instinctively ducked, Michael was caught off guard and knocked down by the force of the blast and sheer surprise. The sound of the explosion echoed around him, reverberating off the other buildings as he lay stunned on the concrete. Michael blinked to clear his eyes and raised his head up, not believing it had actually happened.
The two had only been half a block from the building when it erupted. While still standing, the old tenement was now a gigantic bonfire. Flames jetted out of windows and the hole in the front, lighting the rubble that had been thrown into the street by the initial blast. Michael, still struggling to his feet and hindered more from the shock of the event than the explosion itself, saw Diomedes running at full speed toward the fire. As he watched the other people rushing about and tried to comprehend what had happened, it took more than a moment for him to see that his roommate was headed straight for the section of the building where their unit had been. Diomedes bolted past the few shocked residents staggering from the building, and Michael realized that he was going to attempt to salvage whatever he could of their belongings from the flames. Michael stared, his head still swimming. Their building had just exploded! Feeling as if he would vomit, he ran in to help his roommate.
* * *
Michael's world became a blur. The initial shock of the explosion gave way to frantic, desperate despair as he rushed into the blaze after Diomedes. He was barely able to force himself in against the blasting heat and acrid black plumes of smoke that filled the hallway. Pushing through it, chaos and heat engulfed him before the sight of a wall painted in flames greeted him with the terrible realization that his bedroom lay on the opposite side. The door to their unit was wide open. Michael hoped that meant Diomedes was somewhere ahead of him inside.
With the front of his shirt up over his mouth and nose, he pushed on, getting only as far as the middle of the room immediately inside that had served as their kitchen and common space. Fire was nearly everywhere, and what wasn't aflame was concealed in smoke that stung his eyes and fouled his sense of direction.
He nearly panicked then; he couldn't be sure where anything was. The next thing he knew, Diomedes came rushing past him, and Michael's confusion was such that he was nearly sent toppling into the flames. His roommate paused with a backward glance as Michael caught himself, then disappeared again towards his own room.
Cursing himself for standing in the way like an idiot, Michael moved in a rapid crouch toward the direction he hoped his own things were. The heat, intensifying with each step, slapped scorchingly against him as he passed into his room, and what little hope he had of saving anything almost completely evaporated then and there. Just a few feet away lay nearly everything he owned, swallowed in the fire. He barely spotted his laptop just ahead atop a burning dresser, but the flames seared his hands and forced him back from even that.
There was nothing he could do. His heart was pounding and he could barely breathe, could barely see in the choking heat. Still worse than that was the horror that if he didn't escape immediately, the next thing he'd lose would be his life.
* * *
Two hours later, the rest of what happened had simply become a haze of flame, smoke, and loss. He vaguely recalled Diomedes yelling at him to get out as Michael had fought against the panic that surrounded him. It was a storm that had filled his senses even as they had finally abandoned their home and, shortly after, taken refuge in a midtown bar. Now, sharing a booth there with Diomedes, that storm had narrowed into a single stain on the table at which Michael stared.
Dried and red, it was entrenched within the cracks of the surface. Age had turned it almost as faded as the gray color of the table itself. Michael didn't think it was possible for gray to fade, yet apparently it had. He stared at the stain, clenching his fists and struggling to keep from thinking about the mess that his world had become. He didn't want to think about it. He would not think about it, he told himself. He had to be strong.
Life had been difficult since his uncle had died, and now that he looked back on everything that had happened since, at all of the failures and catastrophes that resulted in him being nearly broke and unemployed, it seemed...well, he didn't exactly know how it seemed. All he knew was that no matter what he did, he didn't do it right. Even when he did, it didn't matter. The one thing he'd had going for him was that he at least had a stable and decent enough place to live. Now he didn't even have that anymore. He had nothing.
It wrenched his stomach like a punch to his gut. He saw himself lying in the rain where the homeless woman had been, abandoned and forgotten, his resources gone. He could almost feel it: soaked to the bone, shivering, hungry... He was lost in the world without a lifeline or anchor. Michael began to well up and squeezed his eyes shut against the tears, cursing himself and forcing them back angrily.
Pull it together! Michael swallowed up his grief, forced it down, and ran his fingers along the stain, silently tracing the tiny cracks to distract himself.
He hadn't cried since his uncle's heart attack. Uncle Frank had been his only family since he was a little boy, and his farm had been all Michael had known. He'd stood alone on the porch of his uncle's house after the funeral, head in his hands, uncontrolled grief pouring out of him. He'd felt ashamed for it then, and no one had seen him. He would not let his roommate see him so weak now. Yet what was he going to do? How could he possibly pick up the pieces of his life? Before he'd been able to sell what was left of the failing farm and follow his dreams into the city. What could he do this time?
He looked up and across the table to where Diomedes sat silent with rage as he had been since they left the scene of the fire. Michael had tried to ask what they were going to do since then, but the larger man hadn't spoken a word. Dark, angry looks were his only reply, and after a while Michael berated himself for asking and gave up. He should have known by now that Diomedes would want to be left alone. Michael was just glad that he'd been allowed to follow when the older man had stormed off from the ruin of their former home.
In fact, Diomedes hadn't even moved since sitting down except to slowly turn his glass, eyes focused through it, through the table, at some point beyond the ground. Though Michael was thankful not to be alone, he wished to God that Diomedes would offer him some reassurance, but the longer he sat, the more Michael could only sense fury within him. Diomedes was thinking within his anger, but of exactly what there was no telling.
"What're we going to do?" Michael asked again before he could stop himself. Dammit.
Diomedes didn't move.
Michael reached out for a paper napkin and grasped it tightly, just to have something in his hands. At least I still have him, he thought.
Diomedes had worked on the farm when he was younger, and Michael counted himself lucky to have found him again a few months ago. Though the older man had shaved the dark head of hair he'd once had, Michael still recognized him immediately by his stern face and the determined look in his eyes. He'd helped Michael more than a few times since, either teaching him about city life or protecting him from its more dangerous elements. Michael was glad to have persuaded the freelancer to let him move in.
Michael managed a smile despite himself. In truth, he'd more or less idolized the man soon after he'd come to the farm. It didn't seem so long ago. Michael was twelve and Diomedes around nineteen, though he hadn't taken the name Diomedes yet. Michael still remembered his real name, but Diomedes would not respond to it anymore save for the occasional burst of anger at its use. Michael had consequently decided it best to think of him in terms of his new alias as well. It was, after all, what most freelancers did.
At least I still have him, Michael repeated, trying to find comfort in his friend's presence that wouldn't come. He rubbed his eyes, trying to force out the sting of the smoke.
Nearly everything else he had was lost in the fire, probably destroyed before he'd even made it inside. The printed pictures he'd kept from his days on the farm had surely burned as soon as the heat had neared them. His memory alone would have to serve him now. Even the digital copies he'd had were lost. The pocket computer that held them, only recently purchased, was among the small bit of expensive equipment he had. All of it was gone. Michael squeezed his eyes shut tightly again. Dammit.
Diomedes coughed suddenly as if about to speak. Michael looked up hopefully, but all that followed was a renewed scowling. He decided that his roommate was still dealing with the smoke as well.
All in all, Diomedes had lost even more than he had. All of his expensive equipment--a collection of weapons, armor, and other miscellaneous technical gadgets--was hidden away in a small, concealed room with an electric lock on it to keep it safe from random break-ins. Michael cursed himself again for getting in his roommate's way. One small path through a roomful of fire and he'd stood like a cow in the middle of it. He should have known better.
"I'm getting a beer," he said finally. He doubted that he'd be able to put the money to better use anyway, and he didn't want to think about the fire anymore. Diomedes had no response for him, so Michael slid from the booth to make his way to the bar.
Though The Flaming Pyre--the bar's name had suddenly taken on a sickeningly fitting quality--was a favored hangout for Diomedes and other freelancers, Michael had only been inside with him a handful of times. Reddish light and low metal music bathed the place, the latter disguising most of the noise of the patrons. Rarely in Michael's brief experience did the voices become loud, and when they did, it usually meant trouble.
As he approached the bar, his gaze traveled around the other patrons rather than over them. Diomedes had taught him to look that way, to avoid the possibility of provoking someone who might mistake a casual glance for a challenge. Don't let your eyes rest on anyone. Use your peripheral vision. And that was only for when you actually had to look for something. All other times you just looked straight ahead and minded your own business in a place like this. Though the habit seemed a little paranoid to Michael, he gave Diomedes' experience the benefit of the doubt. He'd be like him one day, with the ability and confidence to command respect. He hoped. Attaining such glorious status from his current situation seemed impossible now, even with Diomedes to guide him.
Use your peripheral vision.
A man was staring directly at him.
Michael looked away nervously after the initial flick of eye contact, trying to act as if he hadn't seen his observer. He was sitting all the way across the room, just barely in view behind a table where three Aegis-affiliated freelancers sat. Michael did what he could to avoid the stranger's gaze and focused instead on ordering his beer and watching the bartender fill the glass. Still, the stranger remained in the corner of his eye, a cool presence in a posh overcoat, watching him.
Michael didn't know how long he'd been watching. He didn't even remember seeing him come in. From the brief moment of eye contact he didn't seem to be threatening, merely observing. Maybe he'd caught the stranger's eye too long the first time and the man was merely watching him for any further threat. When his beer was ready, Michael did his best to inconspicuously return to his roommate's booth. He sat down again with Diomedes' silence and stared into the beer without drinking.
"It was no accident," Diomedes said with an air of finality. Michael suddenly turned his attention back to his friend. Diomedes was still staring through his glass, but the words he'd spoken were loud enough to where Michael thought he might be speaking to him. Despite Diomedes' sudden breach of silence, he briefly wondered if he should say anything. He decided to chance it.
"Are you sure?" It was an old building, after all. An accidental fire could have hit a gas line and caused the explosion. Michael knew he wasn't an expert on such things, but it seemed feasible enough to consider.
Diomedes looked up at him solidly. "It was no accident."
Michael glanced back down at the table for a moment, then back to Diomedes. "How do you know?"
The freelancer seemed to consider the question momentarily as he regarded Michael. "Don't ask me that question." Michael was getting frustrated. He once again regarded his drink, sighing inwardly, when a new voice entered the conversation.
"Your friend is right."
Michael jumped at the sudden presence of the voice, feeling foolish for it even as he did so. Diomedes hadn't flinched. The voice belonged to the man who had been across the room watching him only moments before.
A Shadow in the Flames, a sci-fi thriller by Michael G. Munz
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