Story 2: Digging Out of the Grave


“Don’t judge a man until you’ve walked a mile in his shoes.”

That’s a life maxim that was drilled into my head by my parents for years.

Despite our cushy corporate lifestyle, my family was pretty nice people. Whereas most people that work for the corps tend to be bastards to the disadvantaged, my parents helped host donation drives to soup kitchens on the outskirts of Redmond (where they wouldn’t get shot up by several hundred gangs) and in general treated them as metahuman beings like everyone else.

I remember having friends whose parents stared down their noses at those people. My mom hated those people. She said that they thought all the poor were lazy, that they were on the streets because they didn’t get off their asses and try to make a living.

Mom would always say that every street person ended up where they were for different reasons. Some of them had their house burned down and couldn’t afford another place to live. Some lost their jobs and had trouble finding another one. Some had to spend their rent money on the medicine just to stay alive ‘cause they were getting gouged by insanely high drug prices.

I somehow doubt mom would have thought of the possibility that some poor guy just had his family sucked dry by a vampire and had nowhere else to go.

That’s what I was after the attack on my family.

Just another reason why the homeless exist.



I think I ran for about three hours straight after I killed that vampire. I didn’t know where I was going. I’m surprised I didn’t end up running right over the Salish-Shide border.

Actually, that might have been preferable. I mean, at least the Salish Council has pretty forests, nice grasslands and all that other nature stuff that all us sprawl-dwellers hardly ever get to see.

Instead, I ended up in the worst possible place: the Redmond Barrens.

Welcome to Redmond. Abandon hope, all ye who enter or are born here.

It took me about 30 seconds to realize where I had ended up – the Rusted Stilettos gang sign spray-painted on a warehouse wall was as good a signpost as any – before I started panicking. I was completely lost and didn’t even know which direction to turn to get to the nearest district. And in Redmond, stopping to ask for directions is about as intelligent as walking up to a troll ganger and saying, “Kill me now!”

As I was scanning the area, frantically looking around me for the slightest movement and ready to jump on anyone who so much as walked towards me wrong, my eyes caught sight of a pamphlet lying on the street not a foot away from me. It was decorated with a crucifix, and it read “St. Michael’s Shelter.”

Relieved, I picked the snow-covered pamphlet up and checked for the address. There was map on the back of it, and judging by the street names on it, I was only a couple blocks away.

Two blocks might not sound like much, but if you’ve never been in Redmond, you have no idea how long a walk that can seem like. Feeling like you’re behind enemy lines, shooting quick glances at everyone you pass; just long enough to gauge their threat potential, but not long enough that they may take offense if you stare.

Worst hike I’ve ever taken.



After what felt like an hour of walking – though my watch indicated only 10 minutes had passed – I arrived on the front stoop of St. Michael’s.

It wasn’t much to look at from the outside. The brick walls were shot up, just like every other building in that hellhole district of Seattle. The front lawn of the place was overgrown with weeds, and the bell tower was so far gone even Quasimodo would have raised objections to living there.

At that moment though, the decrepit cathedral meant a roof and food, and that was all I was thinking of as I walked in.

The place wasn’t too bad inside, really. Somehow, despite its dilapidated conditions outside, the church had everything needed for comfortable living. The heat was turned up enough that I could take my coat off without even feeling a draft, and a bunch of tables around the church’s walls held a buffet line of cheap soy-based food. Several homeless were using the pews as beds. Hell, they even had air fresheners set up
around the place.

If it weren’t for the sorry shape of everyone there except the volunteer workers, it might have been mistaken for home.

After treating myself to a warm meal, I set my stuff down on a pew and sat, thinking about what the hell I was going to do next. I had nowhere to go, no family to turn to in Seattle to get out of the hole I’d just been thrown down. The only thing keeping me awake at that moment was the anger coursing through my veins about the hand fate had dealt me.

Just then, someone made the mistake of arousing that anger.

“Hey fresh meat, outta my spot!”

I looked up to see a scraggly-bearded white guy staring at me angrily.

“I don’t see a placeholder with your name on it,” I growled, not in the mood for this shit.

All of a sudden, I was lifted from my seat by my collar and held an inch away from the angry vagabond’s face. I could smell every whiff of his rank odor as he shouted at me.

“You don’t just get to come in here and sit where you want!” he yelled. “Guys like me, who’ve been here for years, we get our spots! So fuck off, or I’ll…”

*POW*

The vagrant let out a high-pitched scream as my knee connected with his gonads. He also released me from his grip, stumbling backwards with his hand to his crotch and his knees to the floor. I finished the fight with a punt to the bastard’s face, putting him flat on his back.

“Look you fucking prick, I’m not in the mood to get into a territorial pissing match, but if you insist on it again, I’ll be more than happy to accommodate you!” I shouted, standing over the guy. “Let me warn you though, the next punt might break your fucking spine instead of just your nose!”

I thought about threatening the guy with the knowledge that I’d just killed a vampire, so I could kill him even more easily if I was pissed off enough, but decided against it. Lone Star usually didn’t bother with the Redmond Barrens at all, but it still wasn’t exactly something I wanted to sing from the mountaintops.

It wasn’t until then that I noticed that everyone in the church was staring at us. Clearly, they weren’t expecting a street fight here.

I returned to my seat as quickly as I could, and everyone in the church went back to their business. Except one guy. He was standing by the altar at the front of the church, staring at me weirdly.

I did my best to ignore the guy, but he just kept fixating on me with this weird stare. I got up to get my meal and sat back down, and his eyes followed me the whole way.

This went on for an hour before I decided I’d had enough.

Not wanting the entire church to take notice of the confrontation that was coming, I got up and strode towards the altar, standing in front of the guy. He looked like most of the other clientele in this place; scraggily beard, unwashed hair, dirt-encrusted clothes. He was an old guy too; past age 50, certainly.
Whoever this guy was, he was ticking me off. There was still some residual adrenaline coursing through me after the fight with that other bum, and my attitude still hadn’t cooled off.

“What the hell’s your problem, man?” I whispered.

The old guy just chuckled and took a step away, turning his back to me.

“You’re one of them, aren’t you?” he inquired.

“One of who?” I asked back.

“The Talented. Those with The Gift. Magically Active, if you prefer such dry scientist-speak. They go by many names in this world.”

Me? Magically active? No, it couldn’t be. I’d taken all those magical potency tests earlier in my life, and they never identified even a trace of magical power. Having one parent be a magic user, or even two of them, was no guarantee of having the Magus Factor, and I’d been living proof of that.

“That’s impossible,” I said. “My mom is…was a shaman, but…the tests never showed anything.”

I thought for a minute.

“Wait a minute…how can you even accuse me of being a magic user? How would you know either way?”

The old man turned to me and tapped his face near his eye socket.

“The Sight,” he said. “Most magic users have it. Astral perception, as it’s called by technical-minded mage types. In any case, it reveals a subject’s true nature. And your aura betrays your power, my friend. And as for the tests…no science is ever foolproof. In fact, some say…”

“WaitwaitwaitWAIT!” I said, cutting him off in mid-ramble. “You were SPYING on me?! I’m not much for religion, but I thought churches were supposed to be SACRED! What’s so sacred about spying on someone’s aura without them knowing it?!”

“My apologies; I did not mean to offend,” the old man said, seeming genuinely sorry.

“Alright, so I’m a magic user; what’s it to you?” I asked.

“Oh, nothing. Just…thought you might want to know,” he said.

I turned away from the old guy, a bit annoyed that he’d disturbed me for that. Taking my seat again, I started thinking. Thinking about what I was going to do now, where I could possibly go from here.

It was then that I was glad I had that conversation with the goofy old man.

It all made sense. That feeling telling me to stand and fight, telling me that I could win against the bloodsucker. How I had managed to avoid the vampire’s attacks. Managing to leap farther than I ever had before. How I had managed to survive the whole encounter at all.

There was no other way to explain it. That old man was right. I had Awakened.

I caught myself just then. I was trusting an old kook to tell me I had somehow Awakened after every test I’d taken years ago told me it was impossible? Even with all those other factors, there had to be another explanation. Adrenaline rush, maybe.

For some reason, in spite of everything that had happened to me in the past 12 hours, I felt the immediate need to resolve this question. I just had to know.

Taking my bag, I went over to one of the volunteers and asked if they knew where any magic-users could be found. Yeah, I know, it’s not exactly the telecom book, but I didn’t have too many options.

Turns out, she did in fact know where I could find one. She said he was a street doc only one block from the church, quite adept at healing magic. She said that the volunteers often took critically injured transients there to help them get back on their feet.

Satisfied, I got out of there and ran as fast as I could to the doc’s upstairs office one block away. Not even noticing the other patients in the “waiting room” the guy had set up, I crashed into the doc’s examination room, closing the door behind me and gasping for breath.

The street doc was an ork, bigger than me by a good half a meter and really tough looking. Which made it all the more surprising when he spoke.

“Can I help you?” he said, his soft voice tinged with concern.

“You’re Dr. Hoskins, right?” I asked.

“Yes, that’s me. If you want an examination, all you have to do is wait for a few minutes and I’ll…”

“I need some help, now,” I interrupted. “I need to know…I need…”

“Hey hey there, calm down,” he said, getting up and helping me to a chair.

Sitting down, I took a few deep breaths before continuing.

“I need to know…if I’m magically active,” I said. “I heard you’re a mage and that magicians can see auras and stuff and I need to know…”

The ork got up and started walking around.

“Yes, I’m a magic-user,” he said. “I’m not a mage, though; I’m a follower of Bear.”

A shaman. I slapped my forehead when I realized my mistake.

“Hey, don’t beat yourself up,” he said. “It happens. Anyways…yes, I use magic and I can see into the astral.

“And if you’re looking to determine whether or not you’re magically active, then yes, I can help you.”
Sitting down in a chair across from me, Dr. Hoskins took out a blank medical chart and starting jotting things down.

“I’ll need to ask you a few questions though, just to get some history.”

So I told him. Not about the vampire killing, but about the other stuff – the five-meter jump, the increased reflexes and the kook that told me about my aura. I didn’t explain the circumstances behind my discoveries, nor did he ask. I got the feeling that was part of what kept him in business.

When he was finished asking questions, he put the chart away.

“Well, judging by what you’ve told me, you quite possibly could be a magician. I won’t know for sure until I’ve run a few tests. Since you told me your mother was a shaman, I’m guessing you’ve had some sort of magic performed on you before.”

I nodded. Mom always relied on her diagnosis spells whenever one of us got sick. Gave her some minor migraines, but it was cheaper than seeing a doctor every time we had a fever.

“Alright then. Well, just give me a few minutes and we’ll know.”



After several minutes of him casting one spell and several more minutes of him staring at me – reading my aura, he was kind enough to explain to me – the verdict was in.

“Well, I don’t know what kook you talked to over at the church, but he was right. You are indeed magically active. And you’ve become so very recently, from what I see.”

So it was true. I had Awakened.

“So what am I?” I asked. “How come I don’t have this astral sight thing?”

“Well, that’s because you’re not what the gangers that come around here call a ‘spell-slinger,’” he said. “You’re an adept. They don’t usually have the astral sight immediately after they Awaken.”

“So that huge jump I made…?”

Dr. Hoskins nodded. “Welcome to the world of magic.”

“But what about all those tests I’ve taken?” I asked. “How could they have missed this?”

The big ork leaned back in his chair.

“Well, those tests aren’t always entirely accurate,” he said. “Also, severe traumas have been known to cause spontaneous Awakenings years after the time in someone’s life when it would normally happen. It’s not common, but it’s certainly not unheard of.”


Severe trauma. I guess seeing your entire family killed by a vampire qualifies.

“I know how scary this is for you. I felt the same way when my abilities surfaced. I wish I could provide psychological healing as well as physical, but unfortunately I’m no psychiatrist.”

“So what did you do?” I asked. “When you Awakened, I mean?”

Hoskins sighed.

“I wish any advice I could give would help,” he said. “Unfortunately, everyone deals with this in their own way, and following another’s advice often does more harm than good.”

“C’mon, throw me a line here, please,” I begged, desperate for something to help me understand.

“Well…I guess the best thing I could tell you to do would be not to panic. Too often, panic leads to uncontrolled releases of power that can prove dangerous to you and everyone else around. Don’t be scared of exploring your abilities, though; embrace them. Only by understanding them can you use them positively.”

I nodded in agreement. He was making sense.

“I’m sorry, but there’s many others who need my care.”

“Of course,” I replied, getting up. “Thank you…very much.”

The ork doctor smiled, his tusks making the smile seem a bit strange, but no less welcome.

“Glad I could help,” he replied.



I stayed in the shelter for a month after that. It wasn’t like I had anywhere else to go, and it meant free food and a warm place to sleep, so I figured what the hell.

I spent most of that month training myself to handle my new powers, figuring out what I could do and how far I could push myself. I didn’t know exactly how magic was supposed to work – whether I could do whatever I wanted, whether the powers were bestowed on me somehow, or what – but I figured the sooner I got a handle on things, the sooner I could gain control of them.

I soon discovered that my footsteps no longer made a sound – a discovery made by spooking quite a few people by walking up behind them and saying hi. Nearly got punched by some guy in one of those incidents. I found out later that he was an ex-ganger with some second-hand wired reflexes. No hard feelings; I’ve heard those things make you twitchy.

Judging by my encounter with the vampire, I already knew that I could react faster than normal and jump further. Something else I found out was that my senses were improved. I could see in the dark (found that out after a Seattle thunderstorm took out the power in the shelter for a night) and that I could see heat signatures (ditto). I could hear better than I normally could, and I also found my ears…closing off, I guess it he best way to put it, to protect my hearing when I heard a really loud noise (damn that insane guy and his “valuable” joke air horn).

All in all, I was impressed with what I could do, especially considering I wasn’t all that athletic. Luck of the draw, I guessed at the time.

Now I think it was fate.



After about a month of staying in the shelter, I still wasn’t sure what to do to get back to the world. Job offers weren’t exactly plentiful, not even menial work like burger flipping at McHugh’s.

I was thinking about my options one night in the shelter when I was interrupted.

“Hey,” I heard someone say.

Startled out of my thoughts, I looked up and saw one of the regulars at the shelter. He was an ork, with black hair that was starting to gray and tattered clothes.

“Yeah?” I asked, prepared for another fight. But that wasn’t what he was after at all.

“I – we – need your help,” he said, sitting down next to me, a sense of urgency in his voice.

“Whoa whoa whoa, wait a minute,” I said, not sure what this was about. “Who’s ‘we,’ what do you need help with, and why me?”

“I’m sorry, but time is short,” he said. “There is a threat that must be dealt with tonight, and from what one of my friends heard, you’re the one that might help us out.”

“You see,” he continued, “I live with a community of squatters not far from here. For the past five months, members of our community have been disappearing for days at a time, only to turn up later, their bodies completely drained of blood and any trace of life, with the telltale twin holes in their necks. We’ve been living in fear, worried about which one of us will be next.”

I nodded, letting him continue.

“One of my friends saw your face on the news,” he said. “Something about your family, how a vampire did it, and how the Star thinks you fought the bloodsucker off.”

Damn. So much for anonymity.

“Please, if you can fight off a vampire like that, surely you can rid us of this vampire that’s plaguing us! We can’t live like this any longer!”

“Wait a minute,” I said, standing up and backing away. “How do I know this isn’t some sort of set-up to collect a reward? How much is the Star paying to capture me?”

“Capture you?” the ork asked, confused. “Hell, they wanna give you a medal! The report said they’re treating the killing of the vampire as self-defense, that they just want to bring you in to find out what happened.”

“Oh,” I replied. “Alright then, that’s good news. But…what makes you think I can deal with this guy?”

“You killed a vampire using…what? A fork?” he asked.

“Kitchen knife, actually,” I corrected.

“Fine, a kitchen knife,” he replied. “My point is, if you can do that, then I have no doubt that you’ll be more than able to handle this guy, especially since you won’t be going in unarmed.”

“Huh?” I asked.

The ork took something out of his pants pocket. Something large, wrapped in cloth. He leaned in close so that no one could accidentally see what it was and unwrapped it.

It was a gun.


“One of my fellow squatters took this off a particularly sadistic ganger who thought terrorizing the unfortunate was cool,” he said. “It’s a Glock 21 – antique, but damn powerful. .45 caliber bullets; y’know how powerful those are?”

Not offhand I didn’t, but from the video games I’d played, I’d guessed they were pretty damn good. I nodded.

“Good. Ever handled one?”

“Only in FPS games.”

He groaned in disappointment.

“I guess that’ll have to be good enough,” he said, handing me the gun. “It’s got 13 shots; don’t waste them.”

“From what we’ve been able to figure out, the bloodsucker lives in an abandoned building not far from here. It’s got an old sign on it; ‘Green Creek Apartments,’ something like that. Now hurry! We cannot tolerate this one more night!”

A bit stunned at the whole situation, I walked away from the ork and eventually into the bathroom near the back of the church.




I sat in a bathroom stall for the next hour, trying to figure out what to do. I was being sent on a mission by some squatters, being asked to risk my life against another vampire so that they could live in peace.

I didn’t know what to do. Even with my powers under some measure of refinement, I was worried that my kill of the vampire that broke into my house was dumb luck, that I might not be so lucky with this one.

On the other hand, I couldn’t let these people down. We were in the same situation, and I had a source of power that let me stand a better chance against this thing than they could.

I got up from the toilet seat and went over to the bathroom mirror and looked into it. I never realized how hardened my face looked until now. I wasn’t the high school student and video game nut that I was a month ago. I was someone who had seen his entire family murdered and had been reduced to living in a church-turned-soup kitchen/shelter. I had been through more in a month than I ever had in my life.

I couldn’t go back to my old life. I’d already gone beyond the point of no return. From now on, I was someone else.

This would be the first step of that new life.

I was going to help these people.



That night, I set out at around 9 p.m. – well after dusk for that time of year – and headed for the building that the squatter mentioned.

The building was only about three blocks away, but in Redmond it might as well have been three miles. I was hoping that the presence of a gun in my hand would be enough to ward off any potential troublemakers, but I was hoping I wouldn’t have to actually use it – the thing only had 13 shots, and I didn’t want to waste a single one if I was going to kill this vampire.


13 rounds. Considering that these things regenerated – or so I’d heard from Patterson’s; the first vamp I’d iced didn’t even have a chance to regenerate before I killed him – it wasn’t as sure a thing as it sounded.

Somehow, I managed to make it to the building without getting accosted by gangers. Mentally triggering my newfound night vision, I cased the building. Three floors, small apartment complex. I saw a light on in one of the third-floor windows and figured that that was where my prey was.

He was making this way too easy.

Staying on guard, I pushed the front door of the complex open, visually sweeping the room for signs of life.

Nothing. Not even a devil rat.

Feeling the adrenaline pumping through my body, I did a thorough search of the front desk room on the off chance that he might be here – that upstairs light thing seemed too convenient. Still nothing.

My paranoia now at full pitch, I headed for the stairwell and slowly made my way to the third floor. I figured that even if that light was a trap, it was the best place to start looking – assuming the suckhead was home.

I finally arrived at a room with light spilling out of the door cracks – Room 304. This had to be it.

Mulling the best way to get the drop on this guy, I finally settled on the S.W.A.T team approach. I stepped back from the door a bit, then lunged at it, delivering the best kick I could to break it open. The rusted metal lock broke under the force, and I stepped into the room, gun raised.

Still nothing. No vampire. I figured he must have stepped out for his nightly hunt and decided to search the place while he was still gone.

The apartment wasn’t too big. There was a single bed off to one side and a trid set on the other side, and a desk with a lit lamp on top of it in front of the window. Other than the trid set, the guy didn’t have much in the way of personal effects, though I did notice two certified credsticks on the desk. Running them through the old credchecker on the desk, I found that one had a balance of 5,000 nuyen and one a balance of 2,000 nuyen!

“Why the hell is this guy living in Redmond if he has this sort of cash?” I wondered out loud.

The answer came instantly – plenty of homeless people around equals a perfect food supply for a vampire. No one’s gonna miss them, after all.

I was thinking this all over when I heard footsteps coming up the staircase outside the room.

It was him!

Thinking fast, I pocketed the credsticks – he wasn’t going to be around long enough to use them anyways – and flattened my back against the wall just to the side of the door frame, gun raised.

“WHAT THE FUCK?!!”

The shocked exclamation I heard from just outside made me crack a smile. He obviously had seen my handiwork and wasn’t happy. Good.

Switching to my thermal vision, I prepared for the bastard to rush in pissed off. He did not disappoint, dashing into the room and checking his desk, obviously thinking someone had robbed him. He was right, actually.

His heat signature – or rather, the lack of it – betrayed his true nature. I’d seen human heat signatures before, and this guy’s was definitely not human. In fact, it barely even registered.

Switching to normal vision, I pointed my gun at the guy’s back.

“Looking for these?” I said, digging the pen-sized credsticks out of my pocket.

He whirled around, an enraged look in his eyes. Blood stained his lips and his teeth, which were gritted in anger. His tattered Seahawks shirt and jeans where also bloodstained.

The fangs, the heat signature and the blood gave me all the confirmation I needed.

“Vampire,” I said, pointing the Glock directly at his head.

“Who wants to know?” he shot back.

“The avenger of those squatters you’ve been killing,” I said, the adrenaline pumping through me and making my heart race. “Let’s just say, you’ve got a bounty on your head, and they’ve called me in.”

The vampire backed away, towards the desk. I advanced towards him, tightening my finger on the trigger.

“Go to hell,” I growled.

I pulled the trigger, heard the gunshot - but instead of being greeted by the sight of the vampire’s head exploding, I found myself knocked on my ass as he ducked under my outstretched arm and shoulder-rammed me.

Damn! This guy was even faster than the vampire I’d killed before!

Rolling backwards and getting back up, I pointed the gun at the vamp and fired twice. The first shot went into his shoulder, but the recoil jerked my arm up so much that the second shot nearly went into the ceiling.

Crap, I mentally cursed to myself. Remember, video game man – REAL GUNS HAVE RECOIL!

The vampire staggered back from the shot, but recovered fast as the hole in his shoulder closed almost instantly.

10 shots left.

The vampire let a hellish scream as he charged me again, mouth open and ready to chomp.

Reacting fast, I dove out of the way and fired at him as he passed. The shot tore into his arm, but he kept on going until he went through his door and hit the wall outside.

Getting up, I put myself in a ready position and fired three times. With both hands on the gun, I managed to control the recoil enough to hit him all three times. Nearly half-inch-wide slugs tore through his right shoulder and back, prompting a pained howl.

If the damage he’d already taken was any indication, that wouldn’t keep him staggered for long. I needed to hit a vital point.

The head.

I set up to aim and fire again, but before I could pull the trigger, the bloodsucker charged at me, ramming his head into my stomach like a bull. The force of the impact knocked the wind out of me and slid me backwards, crashing against the desk. I slumped to the ground, flat on my back, but I somehow managed to hold on to my gun.

I was too busy concentrating on my throbbing back and stomach to notice the vampire at first, but when I heard him hiss, I snapped back to attention.

The bastard was straddling my chest, his fanged maw open.

“I have to give you credit; I haven’t had such a good fight in a long time!” he gloated. “This’ll make your blood taste even sweeter!”

Shaking off the shock, I clenched my hand around the gun as tightly as I could and shoved it into his open mouth.

Time seemed to stop in that instant as a look of realization and dread crossed his face, the barrel of the black-painted, polymer-framed gun shoved between his teeth.

Finally, I broke the silence.

“Taste this.”

I squeezed the trigger.

This time, I was rewarded with what I had hoped to see.

A huge explosion of blood and gray matter sprayed from the back of the vampire’s head as the .45 caliber round did its job, tearing apart the rear half of his skull.

Not wanting to get Infected blood on me, I pushed the dead vamp – at least I thought he was dead – off of me. His maw was frozen in the open position, and his eyes stared off into space.

Deciding not to take any chances, I put the Glock to the front of his skull and fired off one last round, destroying the rest of his head.

Sitting down on the floor, I took some time to cool down from the fight I’d just been through. Once recovered, I picked up the credsticks from where I’d dropped them and walked out of the apartment.

I’d done my job.



Once I arrived back to the shelter, I headed immediately for the bathroom and used the semi-functional sink to wash the vampire’s blood off the gun. I didn’t want to risk me or anyone else being infected if they handled it. Yeah, washing most guns in water would seem like a bad idea, but from what I’d heard from a friend of mine, Glocks were durable enough to handle worse.

Taking the cleaned gun, I headed into the main church area and looked for the squatter who hired me. He was still in the pew he’d been sitting in when we’d talked.

Switching the gun’s safety on, I dropped it on the pew with an audible clatter. The ork started and looked up.

“It’s done,” I said. “You’ll have no more trouble from him.”

The ork smiled and nodded.

“There’s still five shots left in it. I have a feeling you’ll need the more than I will. Oh, and by the way…”

I pulled out the credstick with 2,000 nuyen on it and tossed it at him.

“Two grand. Found it in the vampire’s apartment.”

Taking the 5,000 nuyen stick out of my pocket, I pointed to it.

“Five grand here. I’m taking this as hazard pay.”

The ork nodded, seeming to understand.

And with that, we parted ways.



The next day, I left the shelter with the bag I came with and the 5,000 nuyen. With that sort of money, I could finally afford to live somewhere besides Redmond.

A day later, I was holed up in my new apartment back in Renton, my home district. It was a basement apartment, not much to write home about, especially compared to the usual nice places that Renton was home to, but it was bug-free and only cost about a thousand a month – the best combination of cost-effectiveness and modern conveniences likely to be found anywhere in Seattle.

I let out a contented sigh as I sat down on my second-hand couch and switched on the cheap trid set for the first time.

I was back.

(end of story 2)