[Chapter 9 of {unknown}]
Priss stormed out of the room. It had a door so she slammed it shut behind her loudly. The on the other side Sylia's hair moved with the change of the air.
If she could have got up Sylia would have gone right after Priss and given her more than two cents of her mind. As it was, confined to her bed by her wounds she instead fumed and flung a book she had been reading into the wall opposite her.
Her body shook as the rage coursed through it like a current. Never before had her authority been so questioned, or herself so insulted.
And by a piece of gutter trash like Priss, it was intolerable. Who she had pulled out of the back streets and meaningless existence, had funneled the rage within towards Boomers and Genom. Giving the ungrateful little sod a reason for living. More than her petty music or riding. A real chance to strike back- inflict pain on the ones that had done so to her.
And this is what she gets back in return, the thanks for all her effort.
No more. No more would she pander to the whims and selfless attitude of that girl. There had been a team before Priss and she could recruit new girls to take her place.
In fact she would probably need a whole new team. Linna was seriously wounded and likely unable to put on a hardsuit ever again. Which was a shame, Sylia had always been able to count on Linna. The girl was just so willing. Nene. That one was better used for getting information from the ADP. It wouldn't be hard to replace her in a hardsuit with someone more capable and able to handle the electronics.
Yes, disband the current team. Replace them all. Start afresh. The current girls were just going to be a liability if she kept them. They would question her. Try to find out what they didn't need to know and that could be dangerous.
She would start researching right away. By the time she was healed the selection process would begin.
+++===+++
Priss had a mind to go down to The Pit and take the tape they had stolen from Genom at such cost.
"Fuck it!" it was Sylia's problem. Let her deal with the consequences. All she wanted to deal with was keeping herself, Nene and Linna alive.
She picked up the other girls washed clothes and headed out through the back, the way she had come in. Not sorry to be leaving the building at all.
Stepping outside she slung the bag of clothes over her back and walked over to her bike.
A such a simple thing, a motorcycle. Well, not really, but if all the machinery and how it worked was taken from the equation, then the motorcycle was simple. Make sure it had fuel and it would take you places. There was nothing to it that would complicate a life. Hop on and ride. No scheming, no shouting. No disagreements or fighting. No love. No companionship. A little bit of friendship.
Priss swung her leg over the leather cushioned seat and rested down on it. So familiar it was.
The engine started, an electric whine. Vibrations beneath her.
She put on her helmet and slid the visor over her eyes. Anonymity.
The whine increased and lifting her feet onto the rests she rode out into the street.
Coming into the vision of a black sedan parked opposite the Silky Doll. Opaque windows drawn up except one, a thin wisp of smoke rising out of it and dissipating.
Priss didn't notice the car. Or to her it was nothing out of the ordinary. She turned away from it, away from the Silky Doll, and the car did not move.
Through the main streets in the traffic, still a ways to go before she could get onto a raised highway that would carry her out to the suburbs.
So many stop lights along the way. Coordinating their efforts to frustrate her with Red lights. She burned to just charge through them heedless of the crossing traffic. Instead going with flow, start accelerate stop. Over and over. Each set of lights like a day in her life. Wake up, do stuff, go to sleep. She urged for the open road where she could just ride. Onwards with no impediments. No restrictions. No responsibilities.
The way it had been.
They way it was not going to be.
A motorcycle chugged up to rest besides hers having woven its way through the lanes cars and trucks. A throaty machine with long handlebars. An import. Local models were either small or for racing covered in a plastic shell.
She didn't mind the rider until a hand reached out and tapped her on the shoulder.
Startled she turned around, arm reflexively rising up to throw the hand off her.
The rider of the Hog pulled back surprised himself. Then a kind of self-cocky grin appeared, "Now I know that it is you," his voice was heavy but carried a degree of richness in its accent.
Priss turned away. What a jerk.
"I wondered if it really was you. I know your bike pretty well. There's no mistaking your feistiness..."
What was with this guy?
The light turned green.
Priss shot off leaving the hog-rider's words hanging limp in the air she had just occupied. She didn't look back, that would only be a sign of encouragement. The only signs she wanted to show were; get lost.
Thus she was annoyed when the chugging returned over her bike's whine and the long handlebars came into her peripheral vision again.
She increased her speed. Started dodging in and out of the flowing traffic. Taking a tight corner.
Causing a near calamity behind her as cars swerved, braked and honked their horns.
The chugging persisted and came up again. The rider, face exposed by an open helmet scowled, "What do you think your doing?"
Priss ignored him.
He pulled out a badge, "Pull over!"
Not what she needed at all. But she complied, stopping near a row of shops. The hog pulled up close in front.
Priss waited. A little puzzled as the rider looked around first, as if interested in something else.
"So, are you going to book me?" she asked behind her helmet.
"I think I'll just give you a warning this time, a serious one." his voice dropped, "Did you know that you're being followed?"
"By some idiot on a ..." she stopped when she saw his eyes were directed to over the road to some parked cars. One had its brake lights on.
"Let's go inside, I don't like handing out tickets in public." he yanked off his helmet and Priss finally recognised him.
"Leon?"
He paused, "Huh? You didn't...?"
"I don't think the A.D.P has the jurisdiction to hand out traffic offences." Priss stayed on her bike, "And what were you doing following me?"
"I think it's better we talk inside,"
"What for? I've got nothing to say to you or to your hormones."
Leon frowned. Why was this one always such a difficulty. All he was doing was trying to help.
"Ok, fine. If you think you can handle what you're in, fine. But I don't see too many motorcycles being followed for half a mile in this city- especially not when the rider is just a small club singer."
Priss leaned forward over her handlebars aggressively. Small club singer?
"They're probably some of your buddies, helping you out trying to score."
She started up her engine again.
"The APD doesn't own cars like that. Too expensive. More like some corporate car." nonchantly, rubbing his chin.
Corporate car. Genom.
Shit.
Thinking fast, "If you really want to help, then go over then and stop them from following me."
"I can't just do that. There's no evidence..."
"Brake a tail light or something, do what you guys usually do when you want to screw someone around."
"Hey that's not fair."
"Well c'mon, I can't sit around her all day."
"Okay. But you owe me."
"Don't get any ideas."
Leon parked his bike and got off, walked over the road and passed behind the waiting car. With the butt of his revolver a tail light broke and he walked up to the driver's side and tapped on the closed window holding out his badge, "ADP, you've got a broken taillight, can I see your license please?"
Smiling despite herself Priss yanked her bike around and quickly drove back onto the main road watching in her rear view mirror Leon keep the trailers occupied.
+++===+++
Priss was careful in returning to the gangs home, taking a roundabout way. Even after she had turned into the courtyard she parked her bike out of sight an in the shadows and walked along the edge of the walls rather than across the courtyard to the entrance.
Dusk was settling over the quiet city. Orange and yellow lights changing the city from one of solid buildings into a giant join the dot puzzle that flickered and glimmered and cast its illumination high into the sky blocking out the growing darkness.
Gang members not out on the town lazed on worn couches and beanbags. Some stood around a pool table watching the game in progress intently.
For the first time in the day Priss felt her stomach churn. She hadn't eaten since morning.
"Where's the food around here?" she asked aloud.
A hair dyed-pink female ganger through a packet of crisps over.
"Nothing of substance?"
"This isn't the Ritz." Priss recognised Yano easily because he had a plaster over the nose she had bloodied. The biker sauntered over, hair spiky with a bandanna tied around his forehead.
"It's a wonder you aren't all in hospital if this what you eat all the time."
"Your friend doesn't seem to mind."
"She's a geek." and that was enough explanation. "Where is Nene anyway?"
Yano let out a chuckle, "Getting us cable for free."
"The end of civilisation as we know it."
"Beats looking at the cockroaches crawl up the wall or playing pool all day."
"I thought you were bikers? Not bums."
"Hey, if you're so high and mighty at least show some manners. We're doing you a favour here."
Priss grunted, noncommittally, "Is the a supermarket or store around here where I can buy real food?"
Pink-hair in the chair, "Sure there is, but they don't like having us around and give us a hard time."
"Sounds good," grabbing Yano by the elbow, "let's go."
"What, hey" he protested.
+++===+++
In total five including Priss went on the shopping run. She borrowed someone else's bike. Everyone had been bored staying on doors and wanted to get out. Even if it was to a supermarket.
Even before they stepped through the front doors Security was watching them closely.
Yano set himself behind a trolley and pushed it along lazily. Up and down the aisles they went, Priss picking out most of the items, putting some back of dubious value like a mother when taking her children shopping. If they whined she gave them her stare and that quickly had them looking at their feet or checking the ingredients of some newly-fascinating cooking mix.
They chattered a bit amongst themselves, arguing over whether margarine or butter was better for spreading onto bread.
Yano watched as the trolley filled up. "Got enough money for this? I don't think we could get it all out and back otherwise."
"Didn't know you specialised in shoplifting." Priss added some bottled water to the trolley as they passed through the drinks aisle.
"Ah. Stop busting my balls. It was a joke."
"I'm sure you're carrying enough. And I think with the Ritz room prices free meals are an entitlement."
Around a corner.
Pink-hair restarted the conversation, "So Priss, what do you do?"
"Yeah, when you're not in hiding." a short gang member sniggered.
"I'm a singer."
Everyone else made an 'o' with their mouth.
"Got any disks out?"
"Not really. My band mainly does gigs."
"What kind of music?"
"Rock. Kids like you should like it."
Pink-hair, her actual name Keiko reminisced, "I wanted to be an actress or singer. Like one of those idols. On the cover of magazines."
"Dream on!"
"I'm definitely no pop idol." Priss said, "My music is real because it's about things that I care about. There's no army of sound technicians or writers running my career."
"You almost sound bitter there Priss." Yano joked not knowing how close to the mark his barb had struck.
Priss returned her thoughts back inside the protective shell around her mind and heart.
+++===+++
A sizable and healthy meal was prepared, a refrigerator cleaned out and the extras dumped there for the following days. Nene's success in tapping into the cable TV stations further brightened the mood of the gang as they clustered around what passed as their lounge and piled up their new paper plates with food.
For all variety of channels they had, the gang settled for baseball, Osaka vs Kobe derby. Everyone settled around the medium sized screen and turned into armchair umpires.
With her own plate Priss drifted over Nene who had relinquished control of the remote control and settled down.
"Hi Priss."
"Hey Nene. How are you doing now?"
"Better." the blonde sighed, "This is the first real meal I've had in days."
"Hopefully this wont go on for too long. Sitting in hiding isn't my style. But you were right Nene. I went back to Sylia's this afternoon and I think the place is being watched." she didn't want to add that she'd been followed part of the way while in the midst of the gang.
"What are we going to do?"
"I don't know. I need to find out where Linna is. I'm split with Sylia. There's no way in the world you are going to get me into the same room with her stop me from killing her."
"Priss!"
"She didn't even know the mess we're now in until I told her what you found out."
Nene gasped, "What about Mackey?! Is he still there?"
"Or Henderson. Damn." she'd forgot all about the others, even Nigel- but she didn't really care about him. Not any more. He was probably like Sylia, knew what was going on but didn't feel the need to let anyone else know.
Nene grabbed Priss arm, "We've got to let them know."
"We will." Priss felt a headache coming, "Give me some time to think."
For that she needed space and quiet. She left a troubled Nene and took the stairs up to the top of the building where she could look out at the city and the bay, where the Tower stood.
+++===+++
"Did you guys commandeer a food truck or something?!?" Kaneda stood wide eyed at the pool table which had been converted into the serving area for the nights meal.
"All right food! I'm starved." the trio who had been out with Kaneda dug into the remains.
"Any beer?"
"She wouldn't let us get any."
"She who?" Kaneda asked.
"The singer, your guest."
Kaneda looked around but couldn't find Priss. He did see Nene and went over to her, "Hi there," with a wide grin.
Nene looked up.
"Where's you friend?"
"I don't know, she went to do some thinking."
He let out a puff, for some reason he found it difficult to address Nene, "Uh, thanks for fixing the TV."
"Don't mention it, the cost comes out of the bill." Nene smiled like a cherub and then immediately back to the baseball game.
I must be feeling better she thought. I said something funny.
Kaneda didn't think it had been funny and walked away with a frown. He got himself a plate of food and went to look for Priss.
He found her after a long search that had cooled his food, sitting on the edge of the roof looking out at the bay.
"It's nice isn't it." he stood nearby.
The glow of the lights on the underbelly of clouds was caught by the dancing mirror surface of the bay.
"Like a dragon's lair. Waiting until we're all looking away and then the dragon will come out and burn the city down."
What was she on about? Kaneda looked at her and then followed her eyes out into the bay and to the Genom Tower. Sitting tall on its artificial island.
"They tell me you're a singer?"
"What of it?"
"Lighten up. You know, when the nights are warmer we'd all come up here. Especially if it was a full moon, and have a great time."
"How long have you lived here like this?"
So it was going to be one of those conversations.
"About a year. Others shorter and longer. Can't say about all of them but most of us were evicted from our, ah, boarding house,"
Priss cut in, "You're orphans?"
"Or dispossessed. I don't know for sure myself."
"How were you all evicted?"
"The government wouldn't support the place any longer." he shrugged, "Some company or other bought it and knocked the place down. Built apartments on where we lived for real people."
"Don't fool your self that you are any less of a real person than anybody else."
"I can see you've got an opinion." Kaneda noted her strong tone, "What about you?"
"I was orphaned by the quake. Grew up living with some distant relatives. Ran away from them to live on the streets years ago." she just had to get away from that existence. The darkness of it. By herself no better but at least she was free then.
Kaneda changed topic to something that had been bothering him all day, "You I can figure. About what you told me for coming here. Your friend, maybe. She's pretty smart and I wonder if that's what got her into trouble with Genom. But the two of you. I can't see that."
"Don't think too hard about it. It's better if you don't know."
Kaneda snorted, "You think that's going to make it go away? Increase my curiosity please."
Priss shifted on the concrete, away from the Tower.
"Why do you stay here? You sound smart enough to make something of your life."
"I grew up with most of the others. They're my family and friends. I wouldn't desert them for the 'life' of a a wage slave salariman." he jerked his thumb at himself, and surprised himself at the conviction he spoke with.
And there is the answer to my thoughts. Loyalty to my friends.
Nene and Linna. Even Mackey and Henderson although she didn't really know them at all. Mackey was Nene's friend and by extension one of hers in the small family that was the Knight Sabres. Maybe even Sylia, as much as she hated thinking so. To save that woman from her self.
"Kaneda," she took a deep breath, "I have a big favour to ask you.
"Shoot."
"I'm going to need the help of you and some of your gang. I've got friends who are in trouble, not just Nene and myself. I don't feel like I should be asking you this but I think you'll understand."
Curious and a little bit worried from the circumstances in which all this had started Kaneda asked Priss to continue and give it to him straight. If he was to consider her request then he needed to know the truth.
So Priss told him.
Most of it.
+++===+++
Sylia's eyes were tired. She'd been staring at the LCD for the day and night. Her back had a small but annoying pain from her lying down for so long.
Enough for today. She shutdown the laptop and put in by a tray of half eaten food.
"I need a drink."
Henderson had refused to bring her any while she was recuperating.
Damn the old man. She could take care of herself. Her leg didn't stop her from being able to move about the building.
Slipping out of the bed she put on a bathrobe and took hold of her crutch. With slow hobbling steps that irritated her more and more she went down to the living room and stopped by the bar to pour herself a drink.
She watched the fish drift lazily through the glass wall. One of her crown achievements the swimming pool. Full of fish of all sizes and rarity.
To swim, to float. Buoyed by the transparent crystal water. A soft embrace around her. Cool further down, warm above heated by the sun's tender rays. Rocked by the gentle waves like a baby in the womb of its mother.
What had made her so poetic tonight? It must have been the pills. Taking the reality out of her mind letting her drift back to happier carefree times.
Times long gone. No time for being carefree now.
She poured herself another glass. Iceless.
She went downstairs to the store floor. Slowly, good arm holding the crutch, winding in and out of the racks of clothes. Pulling out a garment here and there, admiring it. Not a single duplicate in her store. All originals. All the best her own collection.
Her labour of love. Where Genom was her blinding passion, fashion was just as close to her heart. A woman could just by clothes tell the world who she was. Sylia was certain of this. With each customer she had tried to instill this one piece of knowledge, to pass it on in her own form of feminism. A feminism seen by other feminists to be counter productive, playing into the hands of a patriarchal/male dominated society. Don't be such dykes was her response, express yourself.
All the girls who were Knight Sabres had this opinion of themselves. They may not be open about it but that's how they perceived the world. Priss; stubborn rebel not wanting to conform to anybody's opinion, Linna; taking her first steps of self assuredness with courage and having already decided on a life style she wanted, even Nene; behind her youth a social conscience worked and used her hacking skills to expose the truth.
Being in the store, closed as it was, helped her mind relax. The stress and tension seeping out of her body. Draining through her legs to the floor, running down the cracks.
She closed her eyes. Stood still, listening to the sound of her breath.
Time passed.
Tapping.
She started.
Tapping on glass.
She looked to the front doors. Someone was there, right by them. Tapping.
Who at this hour? She approached the glass doors. They were bullet proof. Well locked. If there was any trouble a metal screen would come done to cover them.
Sylia closed. The person was in partial shadow but she could make out that it was a woman, in a dress.
She pointed to sign stuck on the doors, 'CLOSED'. The tapping continued.
Sylia started to feel a little apprehensive. She was secure, but the glass felt fragile nonetheless. She stopped within a foot of the glass, close enough to make out the woman clearly.
Well dressed, long black hair pinned up in a bun. Pale complexion.
No, not pale. Not skin at all.
It was a boomer!
Sylia stepped back instinctively.
What was a boomer doing here? Had it gone rogue? What could she do? She couldn't contact any of the others, she was injured.
I'll have to call the Police. Wasn't that a laugh? The head of the Knight Sabres calling the ADP about a boomer. The irony of it would more acute because of her situation.
She turned around, there was a phone by the sales counter. The tapping continued.
Instantly she felt that she was not alone in the room.
The tap tap tap of heels walking.
There!
Sylia stood rooted to the spot. Heart pounding. Mouth suddenly gone dry.
In the filtered light, dim, she saw that she was not alone. Facing her another woman. Hard to see in the poor light.
She almost said 'whose there', a pointless and foolish thing to say. Who ever it was, they were, they were up to no good. The other woman had to be a boomer as well.
It was a monumental shift. Two boomers acting in tandem. Inconceivable.
If Sylia had looked behind her she would have seen the glass doors part.
If the pounding of her heart had not blocked all sound from her ears she would have heard the steps behind closing.
Have to get away, downstairs to The Pit. Secure.
As quickly as she could, painfully, she made for the change room. Tears of pain springing into her eyes.
The woman with casual strides cut her off. Closed the distance. Coming into the light. Short red hair. Reflective eyes.
Sylia backed up, ran into something, looked over her shoulder.
Screamed.
The first boomer reached out and grabbed her by the shoulders.
Stars burst into her eyes as the inhuman hand gripped her wound.
She gasped for air.
The other female boomer came and stood directly in front of her, staring with those dead eyes intently. Face impassive.
The lights flickered on.
Sylia could not take her eyes away from the boomers. The echo of steps struck her like an ominous tolling bell. Ringing louder and louder, reverberating inside her skull seeking to send her mad.
Then they stopped suddenly.
Shaking she let her crutch fall. Its clatter allowed her to shake the boomer's stare away. Wide-eyed she turned to gaze onto the third arrival.
A man.
He smiled, a thin lipless smile, "Sylia Stingray. It has been such a long time."
+++===+++
For this chapter the title is from the end song of the movie Plunkett & Macleane featuring a bunch of Brits (set in England too!). A good movie. Song by Craig Armstrong and Brian Eno. Time to keep the pace down after all that explosive violence in the previous chapters but still to move the story along. Another change being the placement of 'cliffhangers' and 'leaving peoples plans out' where I usually had each chapter pretty much self contained and explained everything.
I don't know where Leon came from, when I described the other bike he kinda just popped into the picture.