Clang! Clang! Clang!

My ocular shutters flick open like I was never asleep.

I brush the threadbare covers off me and lever my legs around. Yawn.

Clang! Clang!

Okay. I guess my visitor's already given up and started trying to beat information out of my door. That doesn’t seem very sporting. My door never did anything to anyone.

I flip through the possibilities in my head. Not many people know where I live, and none of them would ever come calling for the fun of it. Maybe it's a client. Or maybe someone's trying to kill me. If they are, they're being pretty polite about it. I probably wouldn't knock before trying to kill me.

I stand up, but gingerly, like the floor is one big bruise. Should I put on a robe, at least? Nah. They can have an eyeful on the house.

The concrete holds me up like a champ as I thud my way over to the old steel door. The hatch rumbles to the right on greased tracks.

Standing on my poured gray doorstep in the cistern causeway are two people. The first is an average-sized guy in a blue-and-white uniform, with thick eyebrows, close-set eyes, and a chin so weak it's almost concave. Behind him is a much larger cut of beef in a full suit of mechanized armor, including helmet. I can't see his face, but I assume he's spectacularly ugly, because lack of sleep makes me more spiteful than a claims adjuster with jock itch.

Two Watchmen. Well, a Watchman and a Centurion, technically, but same umbrella. That's kind of funny. Last time it was three Centurions. I guess the cops are starting to wise up.

The patrolman looks up at me. I look down at him. I also look down at the Centurion, but I can't tell what his eyes are doing, so I look back at the one not wearing a small assault vehicle.

His eyes go wide, and he gulps. That’s understandable. Looking at a slab up close is never a whole lot of fun for regular people. A slab wearing nothing but a pair of aquamarine undershorts with rubber duckies printed on them is as close as one gets to a genuine aesthetic catastrophe. I watch as his eyes go from my ocular implants, to the injection ports above my collarbone, to the knotted network of twisted scars all over my chest, which is almost three times as wide as his. That's right, squirt. Behold the power of maintaining a good diet and regular exercise regimen. And genetic engineering.

I raise my eyebrows and cough quietly.

He snaps his eyes back up and sputters for a moment. After a second he finds his big Watchman authority voice, and says, “Good morning, sir. We are responding to an anonymous call concerning unauthorized magical activity in this area. Are you currently aware of any such activity in the vicinity?”

I blink once. I don't have any biological reason to blink anymore, but the gesture still carries some helpful symbolism. I lean out of the doorframe slightly and reach my right arm across my mutilated chest, to tap on a metal plaque right by the door.

It says in plain block capitals, “BAULRIC FEATHERLIGHT – REGISTERED BIOMANCER”. Below that, “Extermination services, lost people and pets found, bulk rate muscle for hire. Twenty-four hour availability, rates always negotiable. Inquire within.”

I watch as the cop reads it. He beetles his fuzzy brows. It takes him a bit.

Once he's done, I reply, “Don’t they teach you guys environmental awareness at the Academy? It's alright, we all make mistakes. Yeah, I guess you could say I'm aware of magical activity in the area. I'm the activity. Look how active I am. Thanks for that, by the way. Why sleep when there are so many wonderful people to meet?”

Okay, yes, he’s just doing his job, but this is the third time this has happened so far this month and I'm starting to get a bit peeved.

He instinctively puts his weight on his back foot and reaches for something down on his belt. Jumpy. I don't have the heart to tell him that what he's reaching for would be about as harmful to me as a chocolate chip cookie.

The patrolman blurts, “Is that an admission of guilt?!”

I nod. “I refer you back to the plaque. See that third word, there? That says 'registered'. As in, I'm in the Arcanist Registry. I'd show you my ID card, but it's in my other underwear.”

He squints at me. His hand hasn't moved. “But you're a slab.”

I gasp. “What gave me away? Was it the scars? My height? The fact that I'm literally four times your size? Slabs can be mages too, chief, it's just rare.”

The cop is still squinting, like he's staring right at the sun. “Go get your ID.”

I shuffle back into my bedroom, over to the nightstand, pull the little plastic card out of my wallet, and give it to him. He frowns at it like it's basic math.

“I know. I'm just as shocked as you are. But there I am, in ink under laminate. You can tell the picture's me by how very smooth and handsome the guy is.”

I'm smiling in my ID picture, or at least doing what could be legally construed as a smile. Generally speaking, people aren't reassured when something as big as me smiles at them. Even less when that thing is eight feet tall and wearing a ludicrous pink tie and turquoise dress shirt.

He gives the ID back to me. “Well I’ll be. Suppose you're tellin' the truth after all.”

I smirk patronizingly. “Mm. Imagine if I wasn't. You didn't even bring a Neutralizer! You must be one of the expendable guys at the precinct, huh.”

The cop frowns again. He's realizing that if I really was an unregistered mage and I'd gotten spooked, him and maybe his metallic friend could be dead in about five hundred different ways by now, without at least one Neutralizer escort.

“This is the third time this month. Here’s a bit of advice: calling in a false tip against me kills two scumbirds with one beer bottle. It inconveniences you, and it irritates the hell out of me. Next time, maybe cross-reference the address of the tip with the Registry before wasting your time, huh? Have a super fantastic day.”

I slam the heavy metal hatch in their faces. Maybe this time they'll go back and actually bring this up to one of their superiors. Some idiot's been getting a few too many jollies from screwing with me lately.

Well. I guess I'm up. What time is it?

The glowing red numbers on the wall above my desk read 08:21. Oh good. Four hours of sleep.

I sit down at my desk and turn my data screen on. If I don't have any messages, I'm getting back in bed anyway, no matter how awake I feel.

There's a blinking red (1). I wonder who it is.

07:19 –

From: Lieutenant Inspector Dathrun Deepwell, Special Investigations, 10th Precinct (ddeepwell/si/10p/Watch)

To: Baulric Featherlight (KingScumbird/arcreg)

got something interesting i want your input on. standard rate, depending on followup. precinct, 9am. skip breakfast.

Huh. Been a while since the Lieutenant's felt the need to throw anything my way. I was starting to think he'd finally decided I’m not worth the headache.

Translated from his characteristically laconic speech, he's saying that he's been given a crime scene that he wants me to analyze, because his own investigators are feeling stumped. “Interesting” means potentially magical. He's willing to pay my consultant fee, but only if my input leads to a definitive arrest or significant progress in the case. “Skip breakfast” is a hint that whatever it is, it's really nasty. Murder, of a particularly spectacular variety.

Fun. And just in time, too. I don't think I can even afford breakfast at the moment, so no worries there. I almost missed this – guess it's a good thing that Eyebrows and Tin Can woke me up.

I've only got 40 minutes to get there. No time to shower. I throw on a shirt (gaudy lime green with a fading graphic of a dead cartoon scumbird, “DEAD” in helpful block letters printed above it, in case anyone finds themselves unsure of the state of the depicted bird), dark trousers, steel-toed streetstomper boots, and my enormous canvas duster. I stuff a fistful of lollipops in my coat pocket, and I'm out the door like a landslide.

I live in an abandoned water treatment facility. Hold your applause until the end, please. My “apartment” is a reclaimed pump room. The pumps were originally included, but I dismantled them and sold them for scrap a few years ago once I realized that “public utilities” wasn't exactly the interior décor theme I was aiming for. Outside my door is a long concrete canal that stretches for a good ways to the left and right, with concrete walkways on either side. Thankfully, it hasn't been used for about twenty years. I consider myself a pretty tough guy, but I'm not sure I could live with a literal river of shit less than thirty feet from my front door. These days it's dry for most of the year, except in winter when it rains.

The one plus is that all of this is underground. The ceiling isn't so far above my head. This being a desert, it makes the summer months a lot less punishing. Some say, “Featherlight, you live in a literal sewer and the fact that you're okay with that says a lot about you.” I say, “It might be pathetic, but I'm not the chump paying half his paycheck in air conditioning every month.” My money doesn't really come in the form of a paycheck as much as what I'll call unmarked envelopes with suspicious stains on them, but they don’t have to know that.

I climb the concrete steps to the street above, and brace myself for the glares of both the sun and a populace that doesn't like or trust me very much.

This is an unremarkable part of Sector Eighteen, which is an unremarkable part of the city in its own right. The breadbox of the city, in a sense. Or more specifically it's the bread vat, I guess, being where most of the city's hydroponics facilities are. Not glamorous. But it's home, whether I like it or not.

I need to get to Sector Ten, which is clear on the other side of the city. I worm my way out of the industrial warrens in the backstreets and toward the main thoroughfares that'll take me to the train station.

It's a nice day. Summer is finally starting to die, which means people can more easily move around outside in the daytime without risking sun poisoning or heat exhaustion. Businesses are shifting off of the mid-year nocturnal schedules. The sky is clear, and there's a little bit of moisture in the air. Not much, but you can taste it. Air current coming from over the jungles to the south, maybe.

Out here in the sector center, there are plenty of people. The streets are more full of cargo trucks, automechs, and working folk than civilians looking to take in the sights. Loading trucks with vegetables and meat from the vats, taking down barrels of solvents, nutrient plasm, and disinfectant. Other than barebones grog shacks and a few sheet-metal food joints, there isn't much to see here. Unless you really like pipes, grime, and industrial hydroponics equipment, I guess.

Being in a crowd is an experience that a lot of people feel a lot of different ways about, but I experience it a little differently than most. There's the noise, sure, and the smells, and the feeling of someone accidentally brushing you with a shoulder or a bag. But I'm a slab. My shadow falls on people's backs like a lead blanket. If you don't get out of my way, you could get hurt. I'm not the kind of bull freak that charges his way through a crowded place or anything – I don't want that kind of attention. But people get clear of me anyway. It's instinctual. A smaller animal will feel the change in air pressure that comes with a much, much larger animal looming behind them, and quietly shift out of the way.

On top of that, I'm a biomancer, which means I'm privileged enough to feel people's vitae. In a crowd, it can get a little overwhelming, if you're not prepared for it. Imagine seven symphonies all playing at once within four feet of your ears while you're being forced to eat three different meals and memorize six different lines of text, all simultaneously. That's kind of what being in a crowd is like when you're sensitive to vitae.

There's the train platform. I check the time floating in the corner of my vision. 08:27. Great. I'm probably gonna be late. If there's any delays on the express line, I'm going to be extremely late. I guess worse things could happen. It's not like my reputation with the Watch could get any more tarnished than it already is. But I need this fee. If I want to eat this week, I can't risk irritating Deepwell.

I take my ID out of my wallet and approach the scanner by the security booth. The guard behind the glass is giving me the stink eye. He's seen me come through here before. Yeah, well, same to you, pal. I might be a genetically modified sin against nature, but at least my nose isn't so big you could tie a sailboat to it. You must have a really hard time getting from A to B when it's windy out.

I mentally gird myself for what comes next, and touch my ID to the scanner.

A loud alarm buzzer rips from the PA speakers and across the platform. The upper borders of the dozens of schedule screens change. Normally they're green, and say “SECTOR 18, STOP 29” in white text. Now they're bright, ugly purple, with flashing yellow text that reads “CAUTION: CATEGORY 4 ARCANIST ABOARD”.

Cue the irritated murmurs and expletives. People back away from the platform, electing to take the next train. I can feel dirty looks being shot at me from all sides. Everyone moves away from me.

You'd think I was the reincarnation of Deathlord Kartullus or something instead of just some idiot street mage. The classification isn't even relevant in this context. Sure, the Brotherhood and Tribunal rank biomancy as Category 4 magic, but what am I gonna do here, grow some pretty flowers on the seat cushions? A wire biter or a rumblejack would be infinitely more hazardous to the public transportation system. But no, everything's gotta be a damn crisis.

At least I'll have a car more or less to myself. A little less noise in my head.

An incoming pressure on my back. I turn around.

There's a guy striding up to me from the other side of the platform. He's pretty big for a skinny, but he's no slab. Maybe about 250 pounds, six feet. Beard. Muscles. Coveralls. Probably works at one of the facilities nearby, on his way to work. Not special. More informative is his vitae – it's a flare of red-orange around his body. Bigger than it probably normally is, and glowing erratically like a crackling fireplace. This is a guy that's used to being angry, and right now, he's mad. Not that I really needed to see his vitae to figure that out – he's gritting his teeth and glaring at me like a bull about to charge.

He stomps up to me, his work boots going pang pang pang on the metal platform. He stops about ten feet away. He can see me looking over my shoulder at him.

“Hey!”

I do the worst possible thing I could ever do to a guy like this. I turn my back to him and face the rails again.

Just like I expected, I can feel his vitae flare up even bigger. He's so mad. I can feel it on my shoulder blades like a campfire. I know full well he's not going to just give up and leave me alone – that's not in the behavioral subset of this kind of person. I just think it's funny when people with low emotional durability throw tantrums.

“Don't you fucking ignore me, freakshow!”

I ignore him. He elects to stomp his little boots around to my front, between me and the rails.

“Look at me, butcher shop!”

I don't really have much of a choice, considering he's right in front of me and is currently the loudest thing in the environment. I fix my green lenses on him.

I have a hard time understanding this kind of person. The top of this cat's head doesn't even reach the height of my nipples. Well, nipple. My left one is missing. I’ll explain later. What's his plan, exactly? Is he gonna beat me up? Not to be cocky or anything, but he'd have an easier time knocking down a cathedral with his eyelids. It's just physics.

He growls, “If I don't take this next train, I'm gonna be late for my shift. There's about three dozen people over there just trying to get to work, and then you show up. Do you have any fucking shame? Are all you mutants this selfish? Step off the platform and take the next train, asshole.”

Let's look at the options, here.

1) I could engage him in debate on gentlemen's terms, and coolly challenge him on the core beliefs behind his statements, in the hopes that he might find a new way of thinking.

2) I could pick him up by the head and fling him fifteen feet through the air onto the electrified rails below, with not much more than the flick of a wrist. He'd be dead before he even hit the ground.

3) I could slam my vitae against his, snuffing out his little candleflame and causing him to feel a sudden, overwhelming, and inexplicable blood terror that would send him scurrying for the nearest dark place to hide in. He'd shit his pants, but quietly, to avoid attracting the attention of more predators.

All of these would be pretty satisfying in their own ways. One of them would be pointless, another would result in my death, and I'd get away with the last one scot free with no one the wiser.

But it would be cheap, and petty, and a flagrant abuse of a power that already has a history of abuse thousands of years long.

So instead I look down at him with a face of stone, and say, “I'm late for something too. I'm taking this train. You and everyone else can take this train too, if you want. I'm not stopping you. You are. I've made my choice and I'm not changing it. Time for you to make yours.”

The guy's face goes as red as an apple. I can't tell if it's rage or embarrassment. Maybe both.

“This sanctimonious bullshit is exactly why your kind ended up where you are now. You're not in charge anymore. We are. We won. And I don't have to take this shit, especially not from some cut-up fucking medical experiment. I'm calling the Neutralizers. Maybe they'll bring a Wellwarden and I'll get to watch you die right here on this fucking platform.”

He walks away. His overall countenance hasn't changed on the outside, but his vitae tells a different story. Not glowing anymore. Smaller, darker. He's still furious, but more with himself now. He knows he's going to be late.

I watch for a moment as he files back into the distant crowd. He doesn't talk to anyone, and the group all watch him. They're embarrassed for him, appreciative that he tried, and shooting dark looks in my direction. To them, I just bullied that man. I bullied every single one of them, just by showing up.

I'm an inconvenience.

I turn my back on them, huff a sigh, and take out a lollipop. Let's see. What do I get this time? Ah. Cinnamon. Sweet, but hot and spicy. Seems appropriate for the situation. I worry the plastic off and plant the candy in my mouth. Turns out I was right. The flavor really does seem appropriate here.

A bit of sweetness, to make life seem less bitter.

I don't even know how that guy would have the Neutralizers' number. Weird bluff to make. Maybe he's connected somehow. It'd be pretty odd for a worker drone to have a friend in the Neutralizers. I’m not even sure they’re allowed to have friends. If he really is that connected, they might even send a team out. That would be pretty funny. They might try to mess with me a bit, make me late, drag me in for questioning, but they wouldn't have a single thing on me. I can see the security cameras from where I'm standing. The law is on my side in this case. For once. I almost wish it would happen. I haven't had the chance to make fun of a Neutralizer in a while – they're really sensitive about their armor and they tend to get all puffed up when you tell them you think it looks goofy.

Of course, you don't want to push it too far. I'm a brash fool, but I know how a fight between me and three Neutralizers would end, and it's not with me sipping coffee in a cafe somewhere with all my blood still inside my body.

As far as a Wellwarden is concerned... I have to stifle a smirk just thinking about that. That's just plain pedestrian misunderstanding of how the Wellwardens work. No one can order a Wellwarden around, except the Mayor. The Neutralizers also hate the Wellwardens just for being what they are, and wouldn't choose to work with one willingly.

If by random chance a Wellwarden did happen to show up on this train platform as part of its patrol, I'd be able to sense the thing from a few hundred yards out and run the hell away before it ever saw me. And even if I didn't, it's not like I would die. I'd probably end up really sick for a few days afterward, but nothing life-threatening. I think it would take me... probably a couple weeks of constant exposure to a Wellwarden for the buildup of tumors to finally kill me. And I don't plan on being around one for longer than half a second, let alone two weeks.

And moreover, that's just how I would react, because of my whole... deal. I might be the only mage in the city whose physical health would be jeopardized by a nearby Wellwarden. Most mages would just have their magic dampened the closer they got. Maybe their souls would be a little chilly afterward, but that's about it.

It's not like the civilians would get off without any effects either. If a Wellwarden stepped on this platform right now, everyone here would be having nightmares for a few days afterward. That guy called me selfish, but summoning a Warden to this spot would be a really nasty thing to do to people. Fortunately for all of us, that's not how things work.

After a minute or two, the train comes. As far as trains go, it's a train. It's big, it's cheap, it's underfunded, it looks like it's made out of corrugated sheet metal and it'll probably collapse if anyone says anything mean about it. But to the people behind me, it might as well be the very last bastion of the purity of humanity, and I conquered it right in front of them. Then I walked inside and pissed all over the neat priceless tapestries.

I step onboard. Alone. The car isn't used to accepting a weight like me all at once, and it rocks back and forth a bit. The foam seats are stained and riddled with little holes, where people have compulsively picked at them while idly thinking about wherever it is they're being taken, or more importantly, where they're not being taken.

I stay standing, hunched over so my head doesn't scrape the ceiling, and grab one of the little plastic loops. When I relax my arm after getting a grip, it snaps off. It wasn't meant to support an arm that weighs almost as much as a person. I'm left holding the thing like I just won it. Here you go, buddy. Consolation prize for not being physically able to fit inside public transportation. I just toss it on one of the seats.

The train rumbles off from the platform, heading South. I don't bother looking to the left – I already know what's there. About seventy glaring eyes, each one an accusation.

I look out the windows. The train breaks off of the highrise portion of this district and the ground completely falls away, leaving me suspended a few hundred feet above the lower districts. Looking over the edge, the vista beneath is almost entirely chemical refineries and vat farms. Sector Eighteen in all its utilitarian glory, the gray, damp, metallic lunchpail of Wellspring City. The air is wet here, even despite the climate. All the condensation and steam from the processing plants gets in the air and hangs – it takes a genuinely stiff breeze from over the city wall to dry this place out for an afternoon.

I stop looking down. I don't like heights very much. When you're my size, a fall is a lot less survivable and I don't like thinking about it.

The train car is running along the high rail and it's like I'm floating in the air, with the entire city thrown out all around me. The sun rising to the North is lazy and orange, casting a golden glow over the otherwise gray metal and concrete in all directions. Neon signs and advertisements break up the citrine display a bit with their acid greens and violent pinks and nuclear blues, especially when I pass over the sector barrier so that Sector Sixteen is on my left. Lively place. Great to visit, especially if you’re feeling dissatisfied with your collection of sexually transmitted infections.

On my right is Sector Five. Single-digit territory, in the Inner Ring. Residential districts, mostly, but only if you can afford the rents there. If you're having to wonder whether you can afford rent anywhere in the Inner Ring, you can't. The houses down there are all big and clean and beautiful. The streets are free of trash, nothing's rusted or abandoned. It forms a clear contrast with Sixteen on the other side of me. There's only a single metal wall between the two zones, but they couldn't be more different.

Further in the distance past Five, in the center of the city, is the Spire. One of the only places in the city high enough to just peek over the outer wall. It's a bright and shiny citadel, bulging in some places, boxy in others, getting wider and wider as it splashes down to ground level and blasts civilization in all directions at its point of impact. And right there at the top, in that little white-gold part above the Tribunal's meeting halls and the sector council chambers and all the other internal governmental organs of the Spire, is where the Mayor lives. I wonder if he can see me from here. Or uh, she, I guess. No one really knows. Hell, I don't even know if the Mayor ever actually leaves that penthouse. Why would he?

My ocular implants whir a bit as I zoom in on the top of the Spire as much as possible. I'm looking right into your windows, Lord Mayor. Hi. Can you pass some legislation that would let me get on a train without causing a riot? I'd really appreciate it.

I've got some quiet time to mentally prepare for what I'll find in Sector Ten. If I get there in time to meet the Lieutenant, that is.

I wonder what he's got. Whatever it is, it must be pretty interesting if his guys can't come up with a decent theory. Tenth Precinct aren't slouches. Recently they've garnered such a glowing reputation that they've started lending their investigators to other precincts that just can't seem to get their act together. And that's mostly due to Inspector Deepwell. Or so the rumors go. Either way, I hope it's something I can figure out, because I'd sure like to be able to afford food this week.

I haven't been to the precinct in about two months or so. Since that last thing, where I helped them grab that strung-out rumblejack who got it in his head to try to literally knock over banks with his tremors. Turns out that just because you have the power to manipulate Earth energy and cause localized quakes on a whim does not mean that you also have an intuitive understanding of structural engineering. I think he tried to crumble four different banking buildings before I sensed him in a Sector Nine alley trying to literally shake down a vending machine into giving him free beer. Classy. He tried a seismic stomp to split the sector foundation under me when I told him I was there to turn him over to the Watch, not understanding that sector platforms are something like twenty feet thick at any given point and are specifically designed to resist earthquakes. It didn't work out great for him. I punched him until he went to sleep (once for justice, twice for giving the rest of us a bad name for nothing other than blind greed, thrice for the fun of it) and turned him over. I got a pretty good bounty out of it. Poor rattlebones probably isn't gonna see sunlight for a few decades, but hey, that's life.

Crime doesn't pay, kids. Especially not if you're officially labeled an undesirable perversion of the human spirit by the totalitarian regime you live under. Or... well, okay, crime can pay if you're a mage, take it from me, but you've got to be a bit smarter about it than a drug-addled rumblejack if you don't want to spend half your life in the Sink. And uh, maybe don't do it around me these days, because I am often paid to hunt you down. No offense. Magic makes your vitae as loud as a person with political opinions and smellier than a person with intense political opinions, so finding you will be like trying to find a needle in a stack of needles inside a needle factory in the middle of the needlemaking district. There uh, isn't a needlemaking district, but you get the point. Haha. Get it? Point. Needle. I’m such a treasure.

There's Sector Ten. You can't really miss it. Ten has a historical association with gadgeteers and inventors, so of course a few hundred years ago they just couldn't stop themselves from erecting a throbbing, veiny clocktower right in the middle of the place. It's a masterwork of gears and counterweights and architecture and hubris, with sweeping filigree spokes and a grand stained-glass clock face, depicting Dragon Deleter Kaastvam's climactic and victorious final battle against the last seven dragons alive on Almarest, led by Peltiriothurion the Golden. The history books claim that Peltiriothurion, immortal king of all dragons, was the size of a small town. His wings blocked out the sun and replaced it with his own superior radiance, and he brought six of his friends, who were nearly as big.

It wasn't really a fair fight. Kaastvam shot them all to death with artillery cannons (loaded with magic-piercing shells, which Kaastvam invented) and the “battle” was over in about fifteen minutes. Then we butchered the corpses and all the rich people got ceremonial dragon hide armor to put in their attics and ignore forever. Anticlimactic, yes, but hey, it's not like we're not going to build a monument to it. It's humanity's favorite genocide! The top of the tower even shoots fire every day at noon. Because it's not enough to wipe out an entire species, we also have to make it very clear to anyone watching that we can do that species's signature trick better than they ever could. Not that anyone else is watching, of course. Because we killed them all.

After a few stops in different places (no one dares get on, each platform announces my presence), I get off in Sector Ten's central square, the gaudy clocktower looming high above my head. I check the time. 08:52. I think I'll make it if I really shuffle my hams.

The Precinct is up a few levels on a high platform, overlooking the square and a good portion of the rest of the sector. I really hate climbing all these stairs. Nothing that weighs almost half a ton should be carrying itself up this many steps. Why couldn't I have been born a teleporter or something? Nethermancers get all the luck. Or uh... they would, if Category Five mages weren't immediately imprisoned on sight. I don't care how powerfully you can warp space and time to your will – you're never going to be able to teleport away from a Wellwarden. I only know one nethermancer and... let's just say he's not the kind of guy to share how he's managed to dodge the Neutralizers for so long.

It's starting to get warmer. The sun is about to poke up over the walls and vaporize all the nighttime cool we've saved up. I get on a sidewalk and enter the crowds again, going up and down some staircases, across steel causeways, past workshops and offices and consumer gadget stores. I take a furtive peek at some of the windows as I walk by. Ooh. There's an augmeticist selling complete intracranial datalink platforms for half off. That's a crazy deal. Good thing I already have one installed, otherwise I'd be tempted to spend six months rent that I don't have. Not that the guy would ever willingly operate on me, of course. I'm too yucky.

This is the Inner Ring, so it's generally cleaner and less industrial-looking than where I live. Most of the buildings are freshly painted and undamaged, there isn't much trash on the ground. Benches, lampposts, trashcans, streets and sidewalks without massive rusted-out potholes so big you could start a family in them. All the things that are standard here but far from guaranteed in the Outer Ring. Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to be able to live in a place that isn't literally a sewer, but then I stop myself, because wondering about things that will never ever happen is a great way to make yourself needlessly sad.

I catch some people giving me looks as I walk. I'm an eyeball magnet in most places. Realistically I'm just one freak in a city of millions, but I'm kind of a freak among freaks. Even if they don't recognize me from the publicly-available Arcanist Registry, a slab my size is a rare sight. A slab my size with obvious cybernetic augmentation is basically a once-in-a-lifetime occurrence. Most of them are probably assuming that I'm a minute or two away from a bioelectric freakout, and if I was anyone else, they'd probably be right.

The Tenth Precinct looms high above me as I try not to pant from climbing up all these goddamn stairs. I'm not really looking forward to walking in the front door. People don't like me in there. People don't really like me anywhere, but it's different with the cops. The fact that I don't have an arrest record is infuriating to them, and I'm pretty sure a good half of the Watchmen in there while away their nights at home idly thinking of ways to set me up. I'm a mutant cyborg wizard, I have to be guilty of something. And I probably am, too, but you won't catch me telling them that.

Also I just like making fun of them as much as possible, which doesn't do me any favors. I can't help it, they take themselves so seriously, they're practically begging.

Finally, after a thousand years of punishment, I reach the top platform. The precinct building is what you'd expect. Shiny, clean, a facade that looks like it was designed by a particularly fussy and imperious algorithm. Lots of stone, glass, and metal. Not a ton of decoration, other than a relief of the Watch emblem carved into the stone above the entrance. Their insignia is an eye, wide open, its pupil narrowed to a furious little point, surrounded by rays of light. The height of subtlety, basically.

There are people coming and going, all under the gaze of that eye. Tired-looking Watchmen and women leaving off the late night shift, tired-looking ones coming on to relieve them. Some civilians, come to complain about a zoning violation or a homeless person snoring too loudly or whatever Inner Ring hoity-toity types find offensive. I approach the heavy glass doors and push them in.

Inside, it smells like disinfectant, air conditioning, and oppression. In front of me is a battery of large boothed desks, with Watch officers sitting behind glass to take people's business. Around and to the sides are passageways that lead into the guts of the precinct, marked by extremely visible signs that read “Watch Access Only – Unlawful Entry Punishable by Immediate Death”, and they're not exaggerating – the cops are ordered to immediately open fire on any civilian that tries to get past reception without a guest badge and an escort. I've seen it happen. Just kids thinking that it's some kind of joke, they're not really going to shoot us for just putting a single toe past this line, haha, there's no way, watch this. And they end up bleeding out on the ground full of holes before they have time to realize that they just spent their entire life on a prank.

It's a take-a-number system to be seen by someone, so I go over to one of the little ticket dispenser machines in the center of the room and push the button. It spits out a tiny piece of paper with “D298” on it. I look up at the information screens. Some numbers listed under “Now Serving” include “E910”, “D994”, “A127”, and “X883”. So, that's great. I could be here for three minutes or a few weeks, apparently. I guess I'll sit down.

Or I would, if any of the chairs in the waiting area could support my weight without snapping into so many fistfuls of shrapnel. They don't really expect slabs to come in anywhere but the back door around here, I guess. Neat. I go and stand over by a wall and settle in. I've got maybe two minutes before nine, so hopefully my number comes up riiiiiiiiiight now.

It doesn't. Okay. I'll play your game, Tenth Precinct. You win this time. And every time.

Hmm. I can see some of the Watch giving me looks. One of the cops behind glass is talking furtively to someone higher-ranked than him. I zoom in on them. They're trying to act like they're not talking about me, but they keep throwing me glances out of the corner of their eye. The higher-ranked one leaves, and the desk rider pretends really hard that I'm not there. The facial recognition scanners at the front door picked me up and immediately flagged me, and they're trying to figure out what to do. Well, they would be, if this didn't happen multiple times a year. I'm a known quantity around here at this point.

Sure enough, Lieutenant Deepwell emerges from one of the side passages, spots me, and starts his way over. I take a few steps, why not, and meet the man in the middle.

Lieutenant Dathrun Deepwell of the Tenth Precinct Special Investigations unit is a very weird man, in a lot of ways. The first is his appearance. He's like me in this respect – he's goddamn huge. Not “genetically and surgically modified” huge like me, but a big boy for sure. More than six feet tall, at least three hundred pounds. He's got a beer-lover's belly, and biceps that quietly suggest that getting punched by him would result in you never being able to breathe through your nose again. He wears his orange hair longer and shaggier than any other Watchman I've seen, and keeps a bushy beard and mustache. These clash insanely with his pristine blue-and-white uniform trench coat and shiny black boots. He doesn't really look like a Watchman – he looks like if you took a Krathian pirate or a professional slaughterball player and stuffed him into a fastidious officer's uniform.

Deepwell's vitae is... really something. I'm only exaggerating a little bit when I say that it's a blinding golden radiance that shines forth from him like the light of ten suns. It has the texture of brushed steel and coarse granite, and smells like a summertime wheat field at noon. It's so powerful that it completely drowns out most other people's vitae in a thirty-foot radius, and as far as I can tell, it's completely unique. If I didn't know any better, I'd say he was a king, or a hieromancer, or some kind of storybook champion of justice. Hell, maybe he's all three, and he just never told me.

He's also unusual in that he is much smarter and more perceptive than his heavy, oafish appearance would lead you to believe, and he will often use this fact to lull his opponents into a false sense of security before completely dismantling them, whether they’re political opposition within his organization or nasty characters out on the street. He's the most insidiously talented mancatcher the precinct has ever had, and the only reason he's not a Captain yet is because he works with me occasionally. I'm still not entirely sure why – he's never told me. It's not like we're friends or anything. But he's given up a lot of potential clout to throw me a bone every once in a while, and I owe him for it.

The Lieutenant looks at his watch, which is gold and much nicer than any I could ever afford. My “watch” is a digital readout in my ocular implants courtesy of a wireless data link with the city's time server, and the technology that makes that possible is much more expensive than a gold watch, so I get to retain my sense of self-superiority.

“Huh. Not even late. I wasn't sure you were going to show up. Didn't feel like calling me to confirm?”

I roll my shoulders defensively. “I wasn't sure if you were going to be in the office or not. And I don't like talking to your secretary. She's mean.”

He narrows his eyes at me. “Probably because the first time you met her you said her cardigan made her look like a 'flamingo with a thyroid condition'.”

“Hey. I was helping. It's you guys that were doing her a disservice by letting her walk around wearing that awful thing. That's just cruel.”

He rolls his eyes and strolls past me. I follow.

Deepwell continues, “It would be a lot easier to convince people around here that you're not a reprobate if you didn't so consistently act like one.”

I frown at him quizzically. “Why lie to people, Deepwell? I am a reprobate. Just look at me. There's no way I could still have a shred of decency left in me with a face that looks like a cross between a security camera and the inside of a meatgrinder.”

He sighs. “I realize that you're at a disadvantage. But leaning into it like you do isn't making anything better. For you or me.”

I'll give him that one. “Alright, okay. I acknowledge your point, officer. Where are we going?”

He pushes the heavy glass door aside and holds it open for me, a little gesture that tells you a lot about the kind of person he is. I narrow my shutters against the sun. I could swear it's gotten five degrees hotter out here in the six minutes I was inside.

“Not far. A few blocks west, in an alley behind a water pumping station.”

“Relevant?”

“Not as far as we can tell. Kind of the opposite, if anything. You'll see when we get there.”

“Keeping me in suspense, eh?”

We start down the many sets of stairs to the lower sector. “I wouldn't want to spoil the surprise. You deserve at least as much discontent as I've had to deal with this morning.”

I fish another lollipop out of my pocket. Lemon. Flavor of excitement, energy, intrigue. Or at least that’s what my quasi-logical mental constructs tell me. I hold a different one out to the Lieutenant as we descend the steps.

He looks at me with a side-eye, then lights a cigarette instead. “No thanks. I’m on a diet. I can’t believe you still have any teeth left, munching that sugar all the time.”

“My implants make me hypoglycemic. Most clankers just inject glucose supplements, but where’s the fun in that? My teeth are all artificial anyway.”

“Is any part of you real these days?”

“My undying love and affection for you, Lieutenant. There’s no augmetic that could replace that.”

“You’re a piece of work, Featherlight.”

“A work of art. Behold me and weep.”

“I think that’s most people’s reaction, yes.”

Before long, we’re ducking into the side alleys. These here aren’t much different than they are anywhere else, except a decrease in the general number of scumbags, what with the Watch building being within spitting distance. This is where the city keeps all the stuff that no one wants to look at - electrical pylons, water pumps, air conditioning units, dead dogs, garbage. If you’ve ever wrinkled your nose or raised an eyebrow at it, it’s back here somewhere. Concrete and darkness, oil and ozone, black grime between bundles of insulated wires.

We thread our way through some of the back ways, down and up through some service tunnels, a few lefts and rights until we come to an offshoot alley with two Centurions standing at its mouth. They’re doing what Centurions do best - standing perfectly still like armored statues while holding their massive blocky autocannons at the ready. Very menacing. Lieutenant Deepwell holds up his badge and breezes past them like they’re just another part of the wall. I stick close to him so the mechanized guard goons don’t get confused and blow my guts out of my back.

This alley isn’t long, but a yellow security curtain’s been hung up from wall to wall, preventing anyone from seeing whatever’s past it. A few officers of varying ranks are here, comparing files, talking seriously, and braiding each other’s hair or whatever it is that policework generally looks like. Use your imagination.

A tall, weedy-looking Watchman takes a few gangly strides over to us. He’s got sunken eyes, gray skin, and cheekbones you could chip marble with. If I hadn’t read a history book or two in my time, I’d think the guy was a zombie. He looks like a houseplant that someone stuck in a closet and forgot about. His vitae is a crazy contrast, though - a constantly-shifting matrix of angular blue and yellow shards, rotating out from his chest like a kaleidoscope made of stained glass. This guy’s got the personality of a laser beam that went to school and got a doctorate in quantum electrodynamics.

He salutes the Lieutenant like an automech that just downloaded the “SALUTE” subroutine a few seconds ago, then says, “Welcome back, sir.” He looks up at me. Going by his facial expression, I’m a giant dead spider. “Hello, Featherlight. As intrusive as ever, I see.”

I grin down at him, my green eye lamps flashing extra bright. “Why hello down there, Sandborn. You’re looking particularly unctuous today. Trying out a new hair slime? Or did you just forget to shower this week?”

Deepwell bops my elbow with the back of a hand, finger pointed up at my chin. “Shut up, Featherlight.” He aims the finger at Sandborn. “And you shut up too, Sergeant. Pretend he’s not here if you can’t act like an adult. Anything new?”

Sergeant Sandborn returns his oily gaze to his boss. “Not really, sir. The techs have taken samples and packed them off to the lab, but the lead said everything’s so charred that they’re not sure if they’ll be able to get much useful out of it. And we’ve worked with the sector engineers to rule out an accident - there aren’t any fuel lines in this service corridor that could have ruptured. For right now, we’re still in the dark.”

Deepwell sighs. “If only our vic could have said the same. Oh well. Hopefully our consultant here will be able to shed a little light. Feel like illuminating us, Featherlight?”

I shrug noncommittally. “Yeah, I guess. We’re going backstage, I presume?”

Deepwell waves a hand toward the yellow curtain. “You’re on, superstar. I’m right behind you.”

I thud my way forward, hunch down, and step through the heavy plastic sheet. What I see behind it is… It’s that special blend of fascinating and horrible that you’re only going to forget with three gallons of hooch and a lobotomy.

Kind of like me.