Heirs of Humanity

Chapter Four

“What was your first clue?” Rei asked with feigned innocence and concern. “Was it my ears? They’re too pointy, aren’t they?”

He could only chuckle as he watched Marigold grope for words, her mouth opening and closing with the attempts of half formed thoughts to escape. The fact that she looked at his, not at all pointed, ears just added to his mirth. “Yes, I am a Kitsune. Don’t tell me a heroic young woman like your self, who steals babies from government execution programs, is bothered by that! At least not while you’re carrying Pinky there.”

“No! It doesn’t bother me. Not really…” Marigold winced at the doubt on his face, and in her own voice tone. “My older brother is… well like you. It was just a surprise. I mean, I saw your neck earlier. You don’t have the seal!” The last part was said half in accusation.

“You mean that tattoo they force on newborns, so they can’t hide what they are?” At her awkward nod, Rei shrugged. “You’re right, I don’t have it. My sister and I were born in the Undercity, in our parent’s home. We don’t officially exist, and as such we never officially got tagged. It’s made my life much easier, let me tell you.”

“How can you survive like that? I mean, with rationing and the tracking of resources wouldn’t they have noticed you running around by now?”

Rei stood, brushing the remnants of his old hair off of his coat. “Nope. The civil service kiosks are so flooded down here that they give white chips out like candy, and fill out the forms with fiction later. A few even put them into candy bowls and count them at the end of the day so they know how many automatically filled out forms they should file the next morning.”

“But white is barely sustenance living! There’s no real quality of life there.” Marigold argued.

“I could debate that survival has a quality all its own, but that would be a bit hypocritical of me.” He pulled out the yellow chip he’d gotten from Mulligan. “The… we’ll call them the criminal element… have managed to work their way into our Fine Bureaucracy, and arrange for a few extra mid range chips, mostly reds and yellows, to be printed without being ordered. If you know who to talk to, they’re only a little hard to get, though with some risks.”

Marigold nodded with an appalled look on her face. “Getting caught with a falsified Ration Credit Chip can get you sent to one year in the Reclamation projects!”

“Considering you’re being hunted by buggie… sorry, InSec… death squads for stealing a baby, I don’t think you have to worry about that.” Rei chuckled. “All though for those who are a bit less willing to risk death in the swamps, there’s barter and service for trade. You’d be amazed how many people are willing to exchange luxuries just to get a sofa moved, for instance.”

Rei was satisfied by her lack of response to that, and pulled her to the maintenance hatch, and the crowds beyond.

Under half an hour later Rei was still leading Marigold through the crowd, although the access hatch was now several kilometers behind them. His grip on her elbow was firm, mostly to prevent the press of the crowded street from pulling her away from him.

Marigold was looking around her in shock and disgust, taking in the sights their unwholesome surroundings offered her. To one side she watched, shocked, as a scantily clad Kitsune girl, complete with canine ears on the top of her head, was arguing the price of sex in canned protein with a drunken laborer. On the opposite side of the street the cries of a woman, being kicked by two filthy men as she laid curled around herself on the ground drew her attention. A third dirty man, blood still visible on his shirt, used what was most likely that woman’s credit chip to buy liquor from an unconcerned looking vendor.

“This is where we’ll be safe?” She hissed frantically, convinced the Kitsune who was holding her arm was planning to sell her to a pimp, or worse. The only reason she didn’t pull away and try to run was several of the well dressed, dead eyed men had watched her pass by already, with hungry expressions on their faces.

“Hell no. I’m not safe here!” Rei stated emphatically. “If I left you alone, you’d end up just so much meat on a Feral’s table by morning.”

“A Feral?” Marigold asked.

“You don’t want a definition.” Rei assured her. Fortunately, she didn’t notice him flash a knife at a group of evil looking Kitsune and Humans as they passed. The human ears they were wearing as decoration might have given her that definition.

“Then where are we going?” She inquired instead.

“Funny you should ask.” Rei commented, pulling her suddenly out of the middle of the street, and into the front doors of a sleazy motel. “We’re going here.”

Marigold’s nose wrinkled up as scents assaulted it. The lobby reeked of sweat, blood, and other substances that she refused to let her self identify. A rickety stairwell disappeared into the upper floors of the building, around the shaft of an elevator with an “Out of order” sign plastered across the doors. The yellowing sign, scrawled with a marker on paper stolen from a computer somewhere, showed that it had likely been there for some time.

That was one of the subtlest, and yet most jarring, differences between Uppercity and Undercity for Marigold. In the Uppercity, if something broke maintenance teams or repair men were called almost instantly, and arrived nearly as quick. Down in the Undercity it seemed the people dealt with such issues by plastering signs on the broken technology, before beginning to ignore the now useless object.

While pondering that, Marigold almost missed Rei pulling her away from the front desk of the motel with a key in his hand. She hadn’t even noticed him talk to the counterperson, who seemed to be pointedly ignoring them now.

Silently she followed him upstairs, and into the small room he’d rented for them. The bed was stained by just about every color of human fluid, and the bathroom reeked worse than anything the nurse had ever experienced. “You don’t mean to stay here!” She exclaimed.

“Nice as it is, nope.” Rei smirked. He waved the key’s fob over a picture on the wall, and with a hiss of pressurized air it slid open along what she’d thought was simply a seem in the peeling wallpaper.

Marigold could only stare on in amazement, unsure of what she was seeing or even what questions to ask. Rei just grinned and pulled the girl and baby into what looked like a well kept elevator car behind him. “Isn’t this broken?” Marigold finally managed to stutter out.

“Oh yeah, the stupid thing misses the lobby every time.” Rei replied with a bark of ironic laughter as he hit the button marked Lobby, and Marigold felt the car begin to descend.

And a minute later it was still descending. “How… where is this thing taking us?”

“To the Deep.” was his reply. As if Rei’s answer was a stage queue, the doors slid open to reveal a cavern a quarter the size of an Undercity district, filled with small huts and people going on about their own business.

Marigold hesitantly followed the Kitsune out, once again peering around. This time her disgust from above was replaced with wonder.

The roof of the cave, she couldn’t think of what else to call the cavern, was only four or five meters above the floor. A strange glowing substance, that looked for all the world like moss in some Uppercity decorative planters except for its luminescence. Those small plants cast otherworldly pools of green and purple light erratically around the path between huts.

The people, too, were different. They passed children playing, with handmade toys and each other without a care in the world, only the watchful eye of a parent to keep them safe. Other people seemed to be performing crafts of various sorts, or chatting, or in several cases taking care of small groups of strange, loud birds.

“What are those?” Marigold finally worked up the courage to ask, gesturing at one of the creatures.

Rei, glancing at it, shrugged. “It’s a chicken.” Marigold looked up at him, and marveled at how very unimpressed he was by everything they were walking by. That’s when it hit her.

“You’re from here.” She stated, more then asked.

“Yep.” Rei nodded. “A born and bred Deep dweller, that’s me.”

They soon came to a larger building, distinctive for its electric lighting. Marigold almost held back as Rei entered the structure, not sure what she was going to see when they entered. She cried out when a strange woman walked up to Rei and smacked him up the side of the head.

“And where the hell have you been?” The woman demanded.

“Shit sis…” Rei growled, rubbing his head. “It’s good to see you too.”