Cheese rattled on a chain. From the right turn of the intersection, Via Light was brightly shining and the markets behind loudly it bustled on the turn left. Ames came to a stop, crouching. Into her grip jumped the doll. Clutching it, she ran straight at a wall as a confused voice neared from behind.

Don’t worry, you’re not the first. Ames passed a barely visible alley. And unless my luck’s friends with rock bottom, you won’t be the last. Holding her breath, she jumped through a crack under a dead neon sign. Darkness was everywhere. Then dust settled and her eyes effortlessly adjusted.

The family had put up some decorations on the hideout: signs and ads made it look like a closed shop. To keep with the aesthetic, large cracks took over the doors’ responsibilities. Inside, nothing had changed since the day the building got abandoned. At least they did that much, Ames thought, walking through the darkness. She’d managed to become a leader of sorts, but after a while, the gang refused to be led. They even ignored one another’s orders. You could say they did whatever the fuck they wanted. Different gangs functioned differently: Ames had become a part of one where leader was synonym for fellow. And teamwork -- for taxes.

Frustrating as that was, the fact that all her efforts did fuck all was the worst.

Solo jobs can feed a person, but we’re not moving out of here any time soon…

The doll sat on the table that stood under a spotlight. Next to it was a map, a bunch of chairs and a chest. Old school, but did the trick, as you’d imagine. Ames unclenched the doll’s grip and took the loot it’d repoed: a bunch of lasergun charges.

Eh, pretty expensive, but pretty useless, she thought, tossing them on the table, then grabbed a chair. Instead of cold metal, her hand landed on something warm and breathing: Talori. He raised an eyebrow. Ames jumped, biting her tongue.

“I’ve been waiting forever,” the bandit said.

Talori joined the gang a few months ago and was seemingly the only one with a pair of ears connected to his brains. Not only did he listen to Ames, but also tried to help the gang. Incredible, right?

“I saw that a little too suddenly,” Ames said, sighing. “What’s up?”

“All down.”

“Don’t need reminding -- what’s up with you?”

Talori’s blue eyes fit his blue suit well, but surely not the cargo pants full of gadgets that come in handy once in a thousand years. “Nothing important. Char got caught in Centercity.”

“Oh. Oh no.” Ames slumped into a seat and her head started shaking. “Is not saving her selfish ass even an option?”

“We’re bandits with a few hundred credits in our chest. The second they bring out something sharp, Char will say all of our names and point to our safe spot with surprising accuracy.” Talori stood up, grabbed his dagger and scratched the top of the table. “We gotta save her.”

“Like I thought.” Ames forced herself to her feet. “Ain’t no rest for the bandits in realm…”

“She got caught by a private hunter in the west of the district.” Talori stepped over to the map and pointed at the building a few of Ames’ bandits had tried to loot. Yes, they weren’t incapable of organizing. They just either sucked at it, couldn’t stay as a team or tried to steal from one another. Bandits.

“If it were a Worker you wouldn’t have even bothered telling me,” she said, putting one of the charges she’d loot in between her fingers like a card. “If we had a good laserpistol, we’d go in guns blazing. One providing cover, the other -- in on the action.”

“Sure, but we don’t. Someone’s gonna be a decoy while the other sneaks in.”

“Well, you know your expertise and I know mine.”

“Don’t wanna try switching it up?” Talori raised an eyebrow.

“Don’t wanna risk it for, perhaps, not even a thanks.”

Talori walked towards the exit. “I get that,” he said. “They’re all fuckers -- doesn’t mean they’ll stay that way.”

“Riiiiight.” Ames followed, rolling her eyes. “And the wall is gonna become a pyramid after you ask it fifty times.”

“Not really, asking won’t do shit.”

They got out through the gap and headed towards Centercity. Ames scanned the alley to make sure the poor gun salesman who she’d looted hadn’t followed her.

Talori continued, “But you can hammer a wall into a pyramid. Not really feasible with a person, but the idea stays the same. They need actions. You can’t turn a bunch of street bandits, to whom survival is ingrained in their very makeup since day once, into an organized group of legendary street terrorisers in a few months.”

“That’s the point,” Ames said. “I’ve been at it for longer than just a few months.”

“This year you’ve spent improving, understanding the gang, not making them loyal. They need a reason to be that isn’t just following orders ‘cause they need a reason for that too.”

“If they need a reason for everything, they’re dumbasses,” Ames snapped. “How long can you not see that following my orders is for the good of the gang?”

“Remember your life in Centercity? You didn’t see that your parents wanted you to follow their orders for the greater good.”

“That’s an entirely different…” Ames trailed off. “Okay, but the gang’s pretty much my age.” I couldn’t have become the leader in a group of sixty year old bandits.

Talori sighed. “You spent your life in Centercity. They’ve spent it on the streets, in the slums and abandoned buildings. You’ve got different... cores. They can do wonderful swindling and finesse hundreds of credits without anyone noticing while you can only manage to be a decoy. At the same time, they have no view of the bigger picture. No leadership.”

They turned into the realm’s main plaza.

“That’s true. And I did sign up for this,” Ames said. “Though I really didn’t expect it to be as frustrating as it is boring or someone to go out of their way to help me like this.”

“Don’t think that I’m doing it for nothing.” Talori closed his pockets containing knives as the entrance to Centercity neared. “I’m gonna be taking a huge share when we’re swindling half the realm.”

***

The Frank building was a guild of warlords, a rare kind in mostly peaceful realms like 224. It made sense for them to lead from here: they were safe and comfortable. Sure, it would take an average message a day to reach where it was needed, but unless all out war broke out, that sort of slowness wouldn’t kill anyone. Most importantly, the Frank building was what you’d call really fucking high risk and high reward. In most cases, breaking out a bandit caught in one of these places wasn’t one of the high risk activities -- you were disposing of a person they didn’t want there in the first place. But speed mattered anyway. And Ames had none of it right now.

The fancy pearl white apartment with wires going along its corners, and with windows fully covered by blinds had caught her gaze. For a moment. Alas, that split-second allowed a sea of memories to ram back into her mind and sorrow to flood her eyes. What the fuck was she doing? This was a mistake. No, not only saving Char, but everything she’d done for the last year. She’d given up the perfect life for a dream which was exactly the opposite of what she imagined.

I need to go back there. Ames stopped, staring at her old home, the window she’d used to look down on the city. An apology, some tears and some promises will return everything back to normal…

“C’mon, you grew up in this shithole -- what is there to see?” Talori urged her.

Ames squinted then painfully bit her lip. Nothing. There’s nothing to see and you never saw me. Goodbye, she wanted to say. The words flowed out of her, her shut mouth barely keeping them in while the old building attracted her whole body. No, that’s all wrong! What if they don’t take me back? What if I waste a life and all the trust I built just to show up and argue with my parents?!

After half a minute, Talori stepped up beside her. “Old home?”

“Yeah,” she muttered.

“Wanna go back in there and say ‘hi’, then never go back out again?”

“Yeah.”

“Not surprising. That Choboloid stare you’ve got could’ve made an anxious shut-in realize what’s on your mind.”

Ames chuckled, but the urge to go back home only intensified. She clenched her fists, opened her mouth, took a step back and said, “I’m sorry… For making you wait… We gotta hurry up.”

Talori flashed a smile and turned to the Frank building, situated right beside Ames’ old home.

***

“Or you know what, I changed my mind -- maybe I’m not robbing you!” Ames gulped.

She had to do it a lot of times, rushing into a place as a decoy whilst someone else cleaned it out, and got really good at her job. Oftentimes, the fake robbery to distract from the real one garnered her some creditcoins. Or a small bounty she paid off whenever a hunter came knocking. After lots and lots of times, nothing could scare her.

The Frank building, whose lobby contained one way out, at least three turrets pointing at that way out and countless serious faces, made Ames panic. Especially the three guards wearing ultra heavy armor and laserrifles the size of her head.

Emerging out of the elevator, they’d awakened an urge, like a dormant creature of the ancient times, to unleash every curse she’d collected over her life. Talori, I hope this was enough time, she thought, stepping backwards, out of the Frank building’s lobby. Her hostage noticed her losing-of-the-shit and tried breaking out. Yeah, she’d grabbed a hostage. To be fair, this was such a common practice that it didn’t even cross her mind. The black mastermind would lose her shit for a moment, maybe mess her hair up, but she’d also learn how to not become a hostage next time.

Ames pushed the knife at the woman’s neck. “Sorry!” Her leg kicked the hostage in the back.

She loudly crashed through the Frank building’s entrance.

Take care of her whilst I take my ass out of here, Ames thought, running. A wasted second could mean I become shredded meat for a vicious creature. Just look at those guns! Shivers were on her back. And that armor too! Must be at least an extra twenty in every physical skill!

On both sides of the street was a group of passersby. The one away from Ames contained familiar faces and waving hands. She ran towards them. One of the guards grunted, crouching to help the hostage, while the other fired at her.

As you know, laserpistols had a screech which tended to deafen everyone around it for a moment. But the laserpistol in the guard’s grip must’ve sounded loud not only to the surrounding people, but in other districts and other fucking realms.

Ames put her hands over her ears and pushed. Balance deciding to abandon her, she fell into the path of the laser. It clipped her pants. The little glance was all it took for them to catch fire and her skin to throb with unbearable heat.

[Warning! Damage: -10 to health]

Fucked, so very fucked I am! Ames tried crawling to a group of passersby. But being the reasonable people they were, they connected the screech to the massive guard with a laserpistol pointed at them and carried their asses out of the scene as fast as they could. Come the fuck back here and fucking cover me you lunarist dumbshits! The crawling turned into stumbling and swerving -- anything to keep moving and dodge any upcoming lasers.

Another screech echoed around the realm. Ames screamed. The laser crashed into the ground maybe a meter to the right. Still, it was hot. Then a grunt sounded from the guard. She stood up and floored it. With every step, her heartbeat increased. With every step, she was surer this would be her end.

Ames made it to the turn where Talori eagerly waited for her.

“Told you Char wasn’t a waste of a dramatic saving!” He pointed at an open warehouse: a way out. Char must’ve used it to walk around the Frank building and gave the guard a good kicking.

“Wait!” Ames resisted. “What about her?”

“She almost made it out of that place on her own: she’ll deal--”

“Have you seen that fucking guard?! He’s the toughest hench--or bounty hunter--I’ve ever seen in my life!” Ames snapped. “If we leave Char, then why did we bother saving her in the first place?!”

“Well, you’re the leader -- how are you gonna beat the strongest guard you’ve ever seen?” Talori’s words came out insulting, though his eyes said that he was genuinely interested.

Ames growled, trying to think of something. Only swears flooded her mind. She banged her head on the wall, wishing that she’d brought the doll. Where her head landed, a bit of concrete fell from the wall.

“I got it!” Ames turned around, waving at the street she’d come from. “Go out there.”

Talori’s eyes narrowed.

“I’m the leader. Listen to me, trust me and do the fucking things I say! It’ll be alright.”

Talori contemplated for a moment then, chest held high, knife in hand, gadgets in other, strided out.

Ames opened her mastermind controls, went into the bounties section, flicked past the search and landed on the list of nearby names. You said the guard might be a bounty hunter -- let’s hope you’re right. And let’s hope he’s bad at setting management. She had 146C$ -- enough to assign and cancel at least ten bounties.

“Punch that guard in the face,” she ordered.

An unsure “aye” came from behind the wall.

Ames waited with her teeth in her lips and her eyes jumping across CHEK screens. She kept up a constant flow of assigning bounties and cancelling them. The penalties cost a lot. But money didn’t matter -- she had to save her crew.

Half a minute to see if the plan worked and Talori with Char returned, dragged into half a century. The anticipation choked Ames and burned her heart. Then Talori jumped out along with Char. The sight of their faces--alive and mostly fine--filled Ames’ with joy. Though she caught herself wasting time a second later and ran, finger waving at an alley they could hide in.

“Did it work?” Ames asked.

“Am I dumbass for trying to be a hero?” Char responded. “Actually, I don’t know what you did. But that buff guy got so angry you could think a ghost shoved a finger up his ass. And it looked like it -- he was fighting something invisible.”

“Perfect,” Ames whispered to herself then spoke up. “I’ve got more ideas from where that came. We’re about to be rich and hopefully still unknown!”