Changeling

“Libera me domine, de morte aeterna…”

There were seven coffins in total, set between the chairs and the pulpit in full view of the bereaved families. Seven officers dead during the attack and who would be mourned together. Bard’s coffin was conspicuously absent, though if anyone else noticed, Nestra didn’t know. She just let herself be carried by the nice music and the solemnity of it all. No one expected anything from her here beyond grim resolve. She was only supposed to be here for the others. It felt right to do so. They had been her comrades in arms. This was proper.

Nestra had never been to a Christian burial service before so she stole a glance at the church’s stained glass windows. They’d gone for sober and pseudo-ancient, understandable considering this sub-continent did not even exist sixty years before. Monotheist faiths had survived the incursion, surfing on a tidal wave of apocalyptic claims. They’d just never really taken root here.

The song finished and the audience sat down. Camus sighed by her side, then winced. Both he and Gorge sat in wheelchairs, present against every possible doctor recommendation. Nestra expected no less from those hardasses.

She went with the flow of the ceremony.

***

“Finally done, aye?”

Gorge was waiting by her car in a gravel parking lot off the main road. He had a frowning young man with him. The family resemblance was striking though MacMillan junior still had his hair on.

“What can I say? It was probably important.”

“Probably important?” Gorge said, then he shook his head in disapproval.

“Rufus. Give us a minute, will you?”

“Don’t take too long, Pa. You know what the doctors said.”

“I know. I know. Please?”

“Alright.”

Junior left them for a nearby van. It was the shittiest vehicle she’d laid her eyes on. It was so old and rugged, she wouldn’t be surprised if it ran on gas.

“Nestra, there’s something wrong with you.”

“Look who’s talking.”

“Not a barb. You’re cold. You don’t get loss, you don’t really fit in. Hell, you don’t even try.”

“Are you going to refer me to a therapist?”

“Fuck no. Just wanted to say, you’re a freak but you got a code and you got a spine. So that’s good enough for me to do biz with you. Just don’t make me regret it, alright?”

He seemed nervous, Nestra could tell. Shifty. She wondered…

Nestra’s eyes tracked the van. The van that looked like it could be used to transport things off the radar. The van where his son was.

A family operation?

“Don’t go there, Palladian. You stay off my biz and I do the same. That way, the first who gets caught can’t say anything about the other except for the fact they do business. That’s the difference between a hefty fine and a long stay in a corpo black site. Got it?”

“Got it. We don’t know anything about each other.”

“That’s right. Let’s keep it this way. Now, what do you got for me?”

Nestra had to walk back to her car where the mana crystals were hidden. Gorge didn’t seem to mind the delay.

“At least you’re a little cautious. Not that it would have helped. Gleams can smell those things like fucking blood hounds. Anyways.”

He picked the two crystals, inspecting them solemnly. Nestra got the distinct impression this wasn’t his first stint.

“Four hundred for the cracked one. One point five for the full one.”

“What the fuck? D-class crystals go for two grand at any auctioneer!”

“That’s before the tax so really they go for one point six. There’s also our cut. So no, I’m not shafting you. And I’m giving you a great price on the cracked one.”

“Fuck.”

There went her dreams of an early retirement.

“You want bullets?”

“Yes, four.”

“What else do you need?”

“I need a way to have my house not record my comings and goings. I also need a device that warns me of the presence of cameras, a vehicle without a GPS tracker, a harvesting kit, a price list for monster parts, portal world MREs, and possibly armor replacement parts.”

Gorge’s expression fell off the longer she talked.

“Holy shit, Palladian. I. Wow. You don’t do things halfway, I’ll just say that. Ok, look. For your house, just change your security console’s privacy settings. Wellington will delete the footage within the hour and it can’t be retrieved.”

“You sure?”

“They were subpoenaed for records and gave a blank page so yeah, I’m sure. For the MREs, don’t bother. Normal bars do fine until B-class worlds. I don’t suppose you or, hypothetically, any gleam you might be working with would be working at this level. Don’t comment on that. I’ll have the price list, harvesting kit, and the sniffer ready before tonight. The wheels will take longer. Oh, and that’s seven grand for those. The list is free, obviously.”

Nestra sighed. She had twenty-five in the bank for a rainy day so she could afford it, thanks to not having to pay a real rent. Still stung a little.

“Don’t be like that. We’re all getting a nice bonus for being, ya know, left to die.”

“Easy to say when it’s not your money. Fine. Transfer?”

“Fuck no, you leave the credits in a chit. Five point one if you leave the crystals with me. I’ll collect the chit during delivery. For the armor, it’s better if you just leave it with me and I’ll return it patched up, charge you according to the damage.”

“Fine.”

“You’re playing a dangerous game, Palladian.”

“So are you.”

“Yeah, because I’m helping you. Alright. Got to go. I’ll get you a burner so we can continue our discussions, free of charge.”

Nestra dropped the two crystals in Gorge’s extended palm. He pocketed them with haste, then he was off to his weird van.

Nestra really, really hoped she wasn’t making a mistake. Maybe her mysterious benefactor had plans for her loot and she could just stockpile it but she had no way to know so… might as well just get resources now before the portals increased in difficulty, as she was pretty sure they would.

This was the path of a raider.

Kill, get stronger, train, get better, pillage, get richer. The riches were reinvested in better equipment in a never-ending race to a summit that never got closer. Perhaps she wasn’t a user but she was, most definitely, a raider.

That was probably her best option.

Nestra drove home and crashed down during nightfall, waking up again fresh and restored around midnight.

“I suppose this is my new sleeping schedule then.”

It was a matter of minutes to find the specific setting that wouldn’t save the recording of her home. She was warned several times that it would invalidate her insurance in case of burglary but she reasoned that, if anyone found the footage, the glitched image of her moving around would probably lead to more questions. After a few moments, she found a way to do the same with her car provided she didn’t use the integrated map. A ring at the door distracted her just as she was getting ready to leave. It was a delivery drone. Gorge had come through.

Nestra opened the delivery box inside of her home. The first find was a leather bag rolled on itself. Opened, it unfolded to show a nightmarish collection of silvery tools. There were cutting implements, breaking implements, skinning implements, plastic bags, vials… It was the harvesting kit she’d requested. It looked like the cheapest entry-level set and that was sufficient for her needs. She didn’t expect to face anything more than dokaebi-class monsters with the occasional low D-class monster like the acid ant for now. No need for more.

There were also four bullets in a neat casing.

The next find was a data chit she slotted in her visor with some apprehension. Slotting data chits of unknown origin was the best way to find one’s bank accounts suddenly drained. Fortunately, nothing happened. It contained a single file named ‘Monster price list v5.3’. She opened it.

“Property of the White Banner guild. Authorized personnel only. If you are not—”

This made Nestra giddy. Her first corpo crime! The first municipal crime had been entering a portal without declaring it. How exciting.

The database was splendidly made. She could search by monster name, by part, by affinity… There were even small tutorials on how to properly harvest the stuff. It was pretty good. On a hunch, she kept it in the visor’s offline storage, then downloaded a database of monsters from the city’s website. Those were free access to allow civilians to give accurate reports in case of portal break provided they survived long enough to make a coherent call.

The next item was a small black box with an antenna and a LED. It looked like some retro tech from decades ago, cobbled together from post-incursion salvage.

The last item in the box rang soon after. Nestra picked up the burner phone.

“Yes?”

“It’s me,” a computer-modified voice said. “Don’t use names.”

“Is my voice modified as well?”

“Yes. One more precaution. Now listen. The device I gave you has two functions. The first will blink if it’s aimed at a camera hooked to the local bluetooth. It won’t work with a wired one.”

“People still use those?”

“Corpos do because they’re harder to mess with. The second button will jam the camera. Very hard on the battery so use sparingly. Any questions?”

“Not at the moment.”

“Then cough up the dough. I’ll call you back when I have a vehicle.”

Nestra sighed and went for a chit containing five thousand one hundred credits, almost two months of salary for her. It was an investment, she had to tell herself. Then, it was time to visit the coordinates.

Just like last time, she used a manual map but this time, she drove without GPS which was a confusing and slightly more complicated affair, if only because she’d never done it before. She also set her visor to offline mode. She got lost twice on the way and had to read the street names like she was a twentieth century driver. Ridiculous. Finally, she arrived at a small parking lot in a deserted spot at the back of a warehouse, near a canal.

Nestra frowned as she parked the car. She could feel it, very faintly. The mana of a portal. It came from the canal itself.

She changed inside, tore her mask, then skulked out. A quick inspection with her new gizmo revealed cameras aimed at the back doors but nothing surveying the parking itself. Besides a few dumpsters and empty pallets, it was empty anyway. She shouldered her bag and then she was off.

Canals were rare. Threshold’s water system was fully isolated from the outside world for obvious reasons. It took only a small egg floating downstream and three months later, you had armies of pallid, bloated fishmen stealing poodles off the street. Threshold only employed canals when the underground couldn’t be used for one reason or another, such was the case now. She found a large circular tunnel as expected. It was open, the barred door yawning invitingly.

For a moment, Nestra took in her surroundings. A deep breath carried the scent of fresh water with a floral undertone. Long stalks decorated the shore in disheveled clumps. A few lilies floated where the solid formed recesses. It was, perhaps, one of the wildest places in a hyper-controlled environment, a throwback to the days when a lone stroll outside didn’t mean certain death for an unarmed baseline. Nearby lights cast selfish cones in the darkness that appeared as splashes of color to her night sight. She looked up, hoping to see stars. The light pollution reminded her of where she was.

Right.

Nestra walked to the entrance and peered inside. The black box remained quiet, the explanation obvious. A mostly dry tunnel continued on for hundreds of meters before angling to the sides. Near the entrance, a maintenance door stood open under a smashed camera, and next to that camera was a portal.

This one was large enough to occupy most of the space, though it still wasn’t much. The unusual sight was that of a sanitation employee in a jumpsuit next to a disabled drone. He sat listless against the wall.

Nestra hesitated.

The law said she had to report the portal. That was fine, she didn’t care anymore. The law and ethics said she should assist the guy since he was obviously in distress. That would come with its own list of troubles. She could call the emergency services with her burner; she just knew it was a terrible idea.

The man blinked.

Nestra sighed. It was probably ok. Just in case, she checked for a pulse and found a normal one.

There was a chance he would wake up but…

It felt sacrilegious to decamp now. There was the portal, there, in front of her, inviting her in with the sweet caress of mana, or zeta rays, she supposed. She licked her lips. Had to do it.

Nestra took her rifle, holstered the revolver, then hid the rest near the entrance. Had to do it now. She placed her hand against the surface and pushed in. Just like last time, the portal bent to her will.

She was in.