Strong Enough 1.3

Solo 1.3

She would wait longer if she could.

“There?” Taylor’s fingers clasp around the grip of her pistol as she stares at the rusty door. “You’re sure.”

“You paid for the info, choom.” The man shrugs. “Now, we square?”

Two weeks more, maybe even a full month.

Taylor swallows. “Thanks for the assistance.”

“Sure, whatever.” He’s gone almost before the eddies hit his account, leaving Taylor alone next to an overflowing dumpster. The walls of the nearby buildings stretch up into the night, red aviation lights blinking gently where the stars used to be.

But Taylor has never seen the stars, and she doesn’t have more than a week.

The gun feels too heavy as she racks the slide and starts down the alley. Two steps in and she almost trips on the oversized men’s jacket hanging down to her knees. She staggers, feet tromping through a heaping pile of garbage. Something slips, and her hands slap against the wall a second before she slips.

Her gun falls from her grasp.

Taylor slips into null-time. She reaches out, hand leaving trails in the air as she plucks the gun up mid fall. For a second, she almost feels cool, accomplished. Then she looks down at herself, rotten nutria-paste and unidentifiable sludge caked on her boots, nearly suffocating in the too-big jacket she threw on over her mother’s lab coat.

“Idiot!” She slaps her hand against the wall, palm stinging against the permacrete. “Gonk. Moron. What do you think you’re going to accomplish in the middle of the night?” She can feel her resolve deflating like a punctured blimp, a full rant about to erupt along with, when a battered trashcan clangs over farther down the alley.

Taylor freezes as a lanky man stumbles around the corner kicks the hunk of metal into the far wall. She drinks in the red hex of lenses where his eyes used to be. He turns to glare at her, and Taylor’s vision narrows down to his head, the greasy black locks, flaming gaunt cheeks, and chapped lips forming words and sentences she can’t hear.

There is only rage, rage rage RAGE—

Her arm jerks back in a crack of thunder. The gun bucks in her palm, spitting a bullet she doesn’t remember firing. The dumpster breaks her fall as her boots work frantically at the garbage, arm waving wildly.

The ‘strommer groans, hands sinking to his thigh, dirty pants soaking red through the faux leather. Taylor wins her way free of the garbage at the same time the man tries to take a step forward. They both stagger, but only one of them falls.

Taylor stands above the groaning man. Her chest heaves, gun arm trembling as he writhes on the ground.

“Gonk bitch! I’ll fucking rip your arm right out of its socket and feed it to you!” The words come out in a seizing, staticy burst.

Taylor walks forward, breath still coming in short pants. Her hand is still trembling too, but she’s used to getting screamed at. Instead of slowing, her steps pick up speed before she’s practically running. With a kick of her own, she snaps the gangoon’s head back.

It jams her toe; it doesn’t flip him over like she intended.

It does make her feel better.

Like she’s in charge of her life for the first time since the accident.

“Where’s Garnt?” Taylor asks.

The ‘strommer on the ground spits out another round of curses.

A frown crosses Taylor’s face. “Hey.” She waves her gun.  “I—"

The man’s hand clamps down around Taylor’s ankle. A blade folds out of his forearm, glinting like liquid mercury.

This time, Taylor is fully aware as she pulls the trigger. One, two, three times. The last bullet sinks into the metal door in front of her, blackening corroded metal.

The first two put holes in lower back, high enough that he lets out a gurgling breath as Taylor stumbles away from his grasp. The cordite in the air wafts over her in a heady cocktail as crimson blood burbles over the gangoon’s lips. His fingers twitch once before relaxing.

Taylor is alone again in the alley.

A scratching sound comes from the door, metal against metal; Taylor’s head snaps up as it cracks open, letting out a harsh blare of music that crashes into her like a physical blow. It almost swallows the static filled voice. “Said you were gonna shoot up, you fucking gonk—not fucking literally—”

Taylor breathes in and lets fire race down her spine once again. If anything, her implant activates easier the second time. Heat fills her limbs, burning bright as she skates forward over the body, over the blood pooling on the ground, through an open door just barely wide enough for her body.

She shoulder checks the chromed-up woman just inside the room. Time starts again a moment after the woman’s feet leave the ground. Sound crashes back into her with the thrumming beat of blaring speakers that rattles the metal spine in her back.

The woman hits the far wall of the room and slumps to the ground, chrome sparking around her shoulders.

Taylor almost expects the music to stop, like a scene from a BD. It doesn’t, but every eye in the room is on her all the same.

Maelstrommers have lots of eyes.

Taylor raises her chin. This she’s used to, all of her fear and self-loathing burning out of her veins. Then she takes in the three people still on their feet, and her eyes land on the broad, flat face of Garnt, and her rage turns into an inferno.

“You!”

Garnt looks at the two other ‘strommers at her sides. “Well? Light the bitch up!”

The fire in Taylor burns hotter still. She’s across the room before they can do more than rise from the stained couch, two hands wrapped tight around her iron and pressing it into the first man’s neck.

Breath rushes back into her lungs. The ‘strommer grunts as still-warm metal presses into his skin. Taylor pulls the trigger, sparks fly.

His head snaps to the side, round after round pinging off his jaw and skull.

Until the slide locks back.

With a gasp, she activates her implant again. She slips back, fumbling with the spare magazine at her waist.

Her back hits the far wall.

Time resumes like a piece of twine snapping in half.

“Shit!” The man she shot tips over, hand clutching at his ear.

“Sandevistan!”

Taylor ducks to the left behind a freezer.

Bullets fill the air behind her.

Garnt laughs. “Rip it out of that bitch’s back for me!”

Sandevistan.

Taylor tastes the word.

“Go left. Left!”

More rounds plink off the freezer. Taylor screws her eyes shut—

“Don’t waste my time, little giiiii-i-i—i—i—”

—and ignites the Sandevistan.

Once more, the music fades away into a distorted chord that seems to linger forever in the air. She rides the burning wave inside of her over the freezer, slipping between the two chromeheads trying to flank her.

The spent magazine is pulled out manually. Taylor flicks it through the air, watching it turn slowly end over end at lefty’s head.

Before her stolen moment ends, she reloads. The slide glides backwards in her grip. It stays drawn, stretched like a rubber band even after she’s let go, held in place by the trails of light following her fingers.

With a dull and distant creak, the slide inches forward, a round pushing up into the chamber so slowly she can almost feel it through her fingers.

Garnt’s mouth is open in a shout. Spittle flies from his lips.

This time, Taylor shoves the gun between the man’s teeth.

Sound and color rushes back into the void.

The slide hisses into place.

Taylor pulls the trigger.

Bang

Bang

Bang

Garnt hits the ground.

Taylor stands with her arms outstretched, palms stinging, ears ringing. For the first time, she’s truly grateful for her new eyes. They can record the exact moment Garnt’s fingers stop twitching.

Taylor turns. One of the remaining gangoons is gaping at her, staggers to the side, clutching a bleeding ear. Her spent magazine hits the ground a second later, metal warped from the speed of her throw.

Well, she’d better finish up here.

The Sandevistan on her back whirrs once, shifting as the fire races up her back. When the slide of her gun locks back for a second time, she’s the only one left in the room.

Her pistol drops from limp fingers. Taylor’s leaning over the same freezer, breath coming in short gasps. It takes her a minute to push herself upright, waving away the haze of gunsmoke. Spent casings roll and tinkle under her feet as she picks her way across the room, staining the soles of her boots with blood.

It’s hot.

She pulls off her bulky coat and dumps it on the ground. Who cares about the blood; no, really, who cares? It all comes out in the wash.

Taylor manually ejects the datashards from Garnt’s ports with a grimace. Then she draws herself upright, and looks around the room. One thing comes to her immediately. She needs a higher caliber rifle.

Then she turns and retches.

Nothing comes out, but only because she couldn’t bring herself to eat before her raid. She had a plan. She can’t remember what it was, only that it didn’t involve this, didn’t involve anything remotely like standing in a room of dead bodies, chest heaving for air while her back burns.

She forces herself upright, staggering. Reaching out, she grabs the revolver that fell from Garnt’s hand to the tattered couch. Revolvers hit harder, right? She doesn’t know, doesn’t care. She just knows that she can’t be here any longer, can barely stop long enough to collect her own pistol, shoving both guns in the pockets of her pristine white lab coat. Then she’s stumbling out the door.

She trips for the hundredth time that night over the body outside. The one she forgot about. With a slurred curse, she half steps, half jumps over it. Her boots leave bloody prints on the permacrete. The world swims.

Somehow, she makes it to the NCART station.

Somehow, she slips into an empty seat on the next monorail that comes through.

Somehow, she staggers back to her apartment without collapsing in the elevator.

Somehow, she doesn’t realize that blood is dripping from her nose until she looks into the mirror.

“Oh.” Taylor slumps onto the counter. “That’s not…good.”

How many times did she use her implant—her Sandevistan—tonight? She can’t remember; more than she should have. Self-preservation cuts through the blurry haze surrounding her head, and she pulls out the medi-kit they have stashed in the top drawer.

It takes her two tries to undo the latch, and three to raise an inhaler to her lips with trembling fingers.

She gets the plunger in one.

Taylor gasps once, then again as the chemicals from the BounceBack hit her bloodstream. The pounding in her head eases slightly, enough for her to slide to the ground without hitting her head on the counter.

“Owwww…” Taylor sucks in a deep breath, then moans again. Her hands scrabble for another inhaler on the countertop above before she gives it up for a bad job.

The tiled floor is cool against her temple.

Taylor stares at the shower across from her, but she doesn’t see it. Her optics show the image of the four men in the car. Garnt’s face is clearly visible, revolver in hand, shooting from the sunroof. With a blink, she crosses it out.

“Three left,” Taylor whispers. “And the driver.”

She doesn’t know where she’ll find him, or even what he looks like, but if she keeps poking at Maelstrom, he’ll turn up eventually. Or she’ll die, and won’t have to care anymore. Sounds nice.

Sensing no movement, the lights in the bathroom turn off, leaving Taylor in the darkness. She can see in it now, thanks to her mother’s eyes, but she’s just so tired.

Those eyes slip shut.