Chapter 1 - Raven
God was dead. All that remained behind were his dumb third cousins, Hunger and Misery. And those bastards were drawn to me like flies to shit.
My stomach growled in agreement as I peeled the shirt over my head, wincing at the searing pain that spread through my lower back. Gritting my teeth, I fumbled with the bloodstained bandages until the dressing finally dropped at my feet.
Catching myself on the edge of the dirty sink, I bit back a groan. Still blurry from the tears, my eyes landed on the small, cracked mirror I had propped against the wall, staring at the scary creature in it. My skin had taken on a nasty greenish tint, eyes sunken and bloodshot enough to make me look like a dark ghoul that had crawled out of someone’s worst nightmare. At least I had cleaned most of the blood from my hair using the rainwater from the clogged spout outside the window, so I did look a bit like a human, too. Kind of.
When I told myself I needed a wash a few days ago, that wasn’t what I had in mind.
This was what I got for trying to play the hero, for thinking I could do the right thing and get away with it. I had barely known those women, but watching them get dragged away so they could work in the brothels or the Underground had made me snap. Especially since everyone else had turned away—just like they had done ten years ago when Robert’s gang took me from the streets.
In the end, I had saved no one. They still took the women, and all I won was a freshly painted target on my back. It was as everyone said, ‘No good deed ever goes unpunished.’ Maybe this would finally teach me to mind my own business and let people deal with their shit. That’s what everyone else did.
I grabbed the mirror, angling it so I could see my lower back. My stitching from last night looked even more deplorable in the pale morning light, but at least the bleeding had stopped. A couple of inches to the right and the blade would have hit my spine, and then…well then I’d be totally fucked.
Luck, fate, or total incompetence had guided the stabbing bastard to miss all of my vital organs, so now my biggest issue was the pain. Well, that and the risk of infection, but I had already disinfected the wound with alcohol last night, so there really wasn’t anything else I could do. Maybe a second time wouldn’t hurt, though.
Picking up the half-empty bottle of rubbing alcohol from the sink, I unfastened the stopper with my teeth and poured the rest of the contents over the injury. Clenching my jaw, I closed my eyes and tried to focus on breathing. Fuck, it did hurt.
“You fucking idiot!” I cursed through shallow breaths, waiting for the bright blotches in my vision to go away. My trembling fingers brushed against the tiny metal container I had left by the mirror, and I stared at the one remaining pill in it. My last painkiller—if I took it now, I was going to regret it later since I had no credits to buy more. But damn, it hurt! “Fuck!” I popped the pill into my mouth and started applying a fresh bandage. By the time I was done, a blissful numbness had spread through my body, turning the searing pain into a dull throbbing.
It was going to heal soon. It always did. I just had to endure it for a bit.
It would be fine in no time.
Wincing, I picked up my shirt from the floor. The thing was crusted with dry blood, and now there was a hole where the knife had gone through it. Not that I had any other options. This was the only shirt I owned.
A quick look around the safe house—a one-bedroom apartment with no furniture aside from the rotting sofa I had slept on—told me I wouldn’t find anything useful there. The only good thing about this place was that it had a sturdy floor and a single entry point—through the very unstable fire escape attached to the crumbling wall outside. The corridor on the other side of the door had collapsed, so nobody could surprise me from there. While that made it extremely hard to access and great to hide in, the opposite was true as well, especially in my current condition.
I picked up my wide leather belt from the edge of the sofa, making sure my five remaining throwing knives were properly tucked inside. The pain intensified as I tightened it around my middle, but I refused to leave it off for something as stupid as comfort. That thing was the only reason the wound had ended up so shallow.
Once my precious saber was secured across my back, I pushed the window open. The sounds of Boston City flooded the tiny space like a tidal wave, making me hesitate. I really didn’t want to go out there, but I couldn’t stay in here either. I needed medicine and supplies and a more convenient, safe place to lie low.
Slipping one leg out the window, I climbed onto the fire escape. Rust fluttered in the air, slowly descending to the busy street below as the metal screeched under my weight. Nobody spared me a glance when I landed with a squirm, apart from a filthy old man who shouted in surprise before he snatched his tattered blanket and bolted, glancing over his shoulder as if expecting me to follow.
Shaking my head, I scanned the packed street instead, searching for something that might actually be of interest to me. Getting into chases and fights was never on my agenda unless the person got food, a target on their back, or they had royally pissed me off. Even then, I was already in enough trouble after last night’s escapades. Now the only thing I cared about was how not to become minced meat at the hands of Boston’s most notorious miscreants, the Dellus Gang.
An urgent voice called for the people to get out of the way, and I stepped into the narrow space between two buildings just as a man on a moped blasted past us, sending a few of the slower citizens into a screaming frenzy. After a minute of grumbling and cursing, everyone calmed down and went back to their work—selling, buying, stealing… murdering.
My eyes fell on a slender man lying in the alley just a few steps from where I stood, his tattered shirt hanging torn and dirty over his bony frame. His shoes were missing, and so were his pants. I would have thought he was just unconscious, as stupid as it was to sleep somewhere where he could be robbed blind before he could scream, if it wasn’t for the flock of flies that kept landing on his parted lips. Then I noticed the black substance coming out of his mouth, nose, and ears, and I rushed out of the alley, away from the corpse everyone else was ignoring.
I had barely crossed the street when a deep shadow passed over our heads, diminishing the dim gray light that was our only sign that it was daytime. A few heads turned up even now, but I didn’t bother. I knew exactly what I’d see.
The Age of Perpetual Night. Somebody named it in a poem, and it stuck—a tale about a world where the sun never showed its face through the thick clouds covering the sky. Gas, some said, caused it; government conspiracy, insisted others; magic was the best one I had heard so far. Did it really matter? No, not really. Not when there was nothing we could do. Not when this was all most of us knew.
I had heard stories from the older folks that they remembered a time when the sun did shine and the world was much different—if they could be believed at all. This place, this darkness, it messed with your head, so some days, I didn’t trust even my own memories.
Yet… I believed them because part of me knew what the sun felt like on my skin, what the light looked like on a cloudless day, and what pain burned like when I stayed too long under its glare. Still, it made no sense because, even if it was true, it must have been decades since anyone had seen the sun. Decades before I was born.
I wasn’t sure how to explain it, but I knew the strange feeling had something to do with that recurring dream. The same one I had again last night while I sweated through my fever—of a sunny day, endless green fields, and the smell of flowers; a gentle voice calling my name while I walked toward a small, cozy house with fresh grass brushing against my legs. Nothing ever changed in the dream, and it always ended right when the door opened, showing only a faint silhouette inside. Then I woke up, chest heavy with longing, warmth, and… wrongness. Like I was not where I was supposed to be.
“Hey, watch where you’re going!”
Snapping out of my thoughts, I moved my hand to my leather belt, sliding one of the knives out. Those words usually meant one of two things: danger or opportunity. I’d had enough of the former, but the latter…
My eyes stopped on my target.
A tall, stocky man fumed in front of a wonky stall made of the forepart of a car. Pans, utensils, and other junk filled the narrow space, all neatly tucked where the battery used to be. On top of them stood a small crate of fruit—no doubt his most prized commodity. Most of the fruits looked brown and squishy, but I could still see yellow and green patches here and there. Somebody had toppled said box over, likely in a piss-poor attempt to steal a bite, but got scared of being caught when the owner spotted them.
Amateurs.
Slipping the knife back in its place, I returned my attention to the man just as he finished cursing the long-gone deviant. By the time I was done sizing him up, the vendor had gathered half of his stock. I knelt beside him, picking up a few of the fruits and setting them in the box under his watchful gaze.
“Thank you,” he muttered, eyeing me with suspicion. I couldn’t blame him, not even when his eyes inspected me from head to toe. His shoulders relaxed when he realized my tight pants and frayed shirt couldn’t possibly hide anything, and he even gave me a concerned smile.
“No problem,” I said as sweetly as I could, tugging my hand to my thigh. The shivers crawling down my back told me he was still watching even as I turned the corner. Once out of sight, I lowered my eyes to the two tiny apples in my palm. It had been a long, long time since I’d eaten non-canned food. If it weren’t for the old books and magazines I hoarded in a few of my hideouts, I would have forgotten what apples looked like.
As I brought them to my nose, the sharp stench of rot challenged my insides. Bile rose in my throat, and I pulled them away from my face, giving them a hesitant look. My stomach grumbled to remind me it had been way too long since I last ate any kind of food to be this picky.
Fuck it.
I rubbed one of them against the cleaner parts of my shirt, then took a small bite. The peel was crunchy, but the core was soft, melting right onto my tongue. It tasted sour and earthy, but not bad enough to spit it out. Way better than nothing.
“Raven?” a hoarse voice called my name, and I looked around in search of its owner. The pile of rags I had just passed shifted, taking the shape of an old man with an unkept gray beard and clothes several times his size. His lips pulled into a grin that revealed one too many missing teeth, while the lines around his eyes and mouth grew even deeper as he adjusted himself to face me. “Long time no see!”
“Diego.” I smiled back, leaning on the wall next to him. Only the smell of sweat, dirt, and vomit that stuck to him allowed me to distract myself from the pain as the hard stone pressed against my tender side. “What are you doing in these parts? You should go to the shelter.”
“What’s an old fart like me gonna do? Those places are for people in need,” he grumbled, waving his too-thin hand in dismissal. Past his seventies and constantly fighting a variety of ailments, how he survived in the city by himself was one of the great mysteries of the universe. “You look terrible.”
I gave him a wry look.
“Is that a way to speak to a woman? What if you hurt my feelings?”
“Ha!” the old man cackled. Still, when he looked back at me, the concern in his eyes lingered. “You sure ya alright, kid?”
“I’m fine, I’m fine. When was the last time you ate?” I asked instead.
“Ya should worry ’bout yerself. I hear some rowdy guys lookin’ for ya. Somethin’ ’bout their boss wantin’ to cut you into ribbons. What did ya do again?”
“Nothing perverted bastards like them didn’t deserve.” I shrugged, turning away from Diego’s reprimanding gaze. I had been lucky to find a place to get some undisturbed rest, but I doubted they’d just give up the search. The Dellus Gang was nothing short of persistent—about the only good quality its members had.
Just as the thought crossed my mind, I caught sight of the now-familiar face of one of Dellus’ guys as he appeared at the end of the street, two bulky men trotting behind him. A nasty bruise graced his left eye—a bruise I gave him last night after he slapped one of the women who had dared resist him.
A stall advertising a collection of knives and vicious-looking cutting tools blocked their view of us, but I doubted that would last for long. The tall, blond man behind it shouted too loudly to be ignored, raising blade after blade for potential buyers to inspect.
“It was good seeing you, Diego,” I said as I pushed myself off the wall. “Don’t be stubborn and go to the shelter.” He smiled but said nothing, which told me I was wasting my breath. “Here, catch.” I tossed him the second apple I was planning to keep for dinner, then stepped into the stream of people, adjusting the saber in a more comfortable position. I had the feeling I might need it sooner than I had hoped.
I glanced back at the group of men by the corner, only to find the one with the black eye looking in my direction. A wicked smile blossomed on his face as he pointed a crooked finger at me.
“That’s her! Get her!” he bellowed, but even before they had taken a step, I was running. “Don’t let that bitch get away! Cut her off! Cut her off! Hurry!”
A sudden shift in the hazy, automatic movements of the people forced me to slow down just a couple of minutes later. I dug my heels in, watching as the sea of gray and brown parted to make way for two grim figures—not that they needed much to clear their own path when they towered at easy seven feet, shiny metal hugging them from head to toe. Each Orion soldier, the military that all but ran Boston, held a standard-issue A18 blaster rifle set on stun, with several other weapons that cost more than everything I’d ever owned attached to their shiny armor. They moved in a creepy unison, their heads only looking forward but no doubt taking in the whole hundred-and-eighty-degree curve.
Perfect, just perfect.
I looked back to see two of the Dellus men speed-walking toward me. When they noticed the Orion soldiers, they hesitated. The only people who wanted to catch Orion’s attention even less than me were gang members like them. The Dellus Gang had been a nuisance for years—mostly for the regular citizens since they focused on extorting, exploiting, and terrorizing the populace—but once the people started complaining too much, Orion was forced to step in.
The problem was that the Dellus thugs were like cockroaches. You get rid of ten, and twenty more will appear. I was pretty sure the soldiers had permission to kill them on sight by now.
And then there was me. My fake ID was good enough for the odd jobs I did, but it had no chance of fooling their scanners if they ever stopped me. Then I, being an undocumented, hence illegal individual, would be in even deeper shit than my Dellus buddies.
The man with the black eye and his companion resumed their pursuit, so I pushed my way through the quiet crowd and ducked into the nearest sidestreet. Trying to ignore the increasing pain in my back, I almost didn’t see the tall, stout man who stepped from the shadows on the other end of the alley. Ducking under the blade he brandished at my head, I retreated a few steps to get out of his range.
Fuck. That was close.
“This is the end of the line for you, bitch!” He grinned as he blocked my exit, filling the space too well for me to sneak past without getting cut by that blade. “What would it be? Come with us and pay for what you did or have a date with one of them Orion bastards?”
Gritting my teeth, I turned sideways to find his companions closing in from the other end of the alley. In just a few seconds, they’d have me cornered, and then there really wouldn’t be any hope left. My best option was to attack before they joined forces. That or spreading wings and flying away.
I looked up, smiling.
Wings. That was it! Well, not exactly. Who needed wings when you had ladders?
Maybe this was not the end of the line after all.
“You guys should take a hint like real men,” I said, backing away from the one with the knife. “I’m into more refined gentlemen and ladies, so stop chasing me.” Before the one with the knife could reply, I was already sprinting in the opposite direction.
The black-eye guy raised his machete, moving into a defensive stance. I snorted at the foolish way he held his weapon—too high and too stiff, not to mention he exposed his abdomen like he was begging to be disemboweled. If I was planning to attack him, he would have been dead before he could nick me. The man behind him looked like he could knock me out with one punch, though. Good thing I wasn’t aiming for them.
Just before I reached them, I jumped, grabbing onto the bottom of the ladder leading to the suspended fire escape above. My arms screamed as I hoisted myself up, but before I could climb onto the landing, a hand grabbed my ankle and yanked.
