Benjamin Wray: Acid Reign: Genesis

Her mind raced with all of the possibilities of what might be on the other side of the door, and all the gear she could buy with the credits. Ripp would be proud and have to admit she was ready to take on solo contracts. It also meant her Pigeon rating would be untouchable for anyone close to her age, and that had endless rewards of its own.

She turned on the hacker, and stared at the small red light that blinked halfway up the right side of the door. The hacking device cycled through the first two spots and stopped on the number three, and then two. The next three numbers seemed to take forever for the hacker to locate. She nervously watched the portable battery as the numbers cycled through, worried that there might not be enough power left to finish.

“C’mon, c’mon.”

The light on the door turned green and the door clicked. Lilly screamed inside her rad-breather. She was in! Her first solo run, her first locked door, and she was in. She shut off the portable battery, stood up, and quickly pulled the door open as far as she could. Air rushed out through the door, blowing dust in every direction.

Lilly shook off the dust and pulled her sidearm. She pointed its light at the small opening in the door, and slowly exposed the contents of the room from one corner to the other.

The room was small. There was a desk in the middle, and a row of rusted filing cabinets along the left wall. The floor was completely covered with empty, rusted cans. There were rotted books lumped on sagging shelves, and plastic buckets stacked to the ceiling next to the door. One of the buckets looked like it had melted near the bottom and a large dark stain surrounded it. Lilly did not want to think about what might have been in it.

In the corner to her right, two skeletons lay next to one another. One clutched the remains of a picture frame, the picture long decayed and the other had something in its hand that she couldn’t see clearly. She angled the light higher and saw that it was a gun.

“Hell, yeah!”

She squeezed through the opening in the door. The air was thick and even through her filters it reeked of decay and rot.

“Now Lilly, I don’t think you’re ready for your own contract. You’re a good shot, but still way too young,” she said mockingly and in a very good impersonation of the way, Ripp had said it. “You have a lot to learn, you need to know where to look,” she continued.

As she got closer, her light revealed a bullet hole in both their heads. A dark rust colored stain on the wall finished the scenario for Lilly. She felt sorry for them, and wondered how long they had been locked in the room.

She leaned over, grabbed the gun and pulled, but it didn’t come free. She pulled harder, bones snapped and it dropped to the floor with part of the hand still wrapped around it.

“Thanks for the gun,” she said as she playfully patted the rotted cloth on his shoulder.

Lilly picked up the gun, peeled the remaining finger bones from the stock, and put it in her pack. She scanned the room one more time, then walked over to the first filing cabinet. The drawer let out a horrible shriek of metal dragging across metal as she yanked it open. She wasn’t worried about the noise. She was where she needed to be and could leave in a hurry.

The drawer was empty and so were all of the others. Lilly checked the other filing cabinets with no luck, and then moved to the desk. There was a metal badge of some kind. Rust and oxidation hid whatever design had been on the front. There was a box of ammo she knew wouldn’t be good anymore, but shoved it in her pack anyway. Gus could reconstruct them or at least smelt the good metal out of the rounds. There was an empty glass bottle in good condition that she knew Johnny would pay for. She pulled a cloth from one of her pant pockets, wrapped it carefully, and put it in her bag. The last item was a small plastic device. Its monitor and case were surprisingly unblemished. She checked all the sides. There were no symbols on it, but she knew Nun would pay well for it. She hadn’t been this excited since her first trip to the Fringe with Ripp and Gus. Nun would have to pay her well.

A crash from outside the building echoed down the corridor, waking Lilly from her daydream about all the things she would buy. She squeezed back through the doorway, quickly packed the rest of her gear, and moved smoothly down the hall with her gun drawn. She made her way back to the opening in the ceiling that she had used to get inside and waited. She activated the Pigeon display. The battery was about to die, but it didn’t matter; she had what she came for. She typed a few commands into her Pigeon and waited. A sonar pinged the area. The scan showed nothing moving or making noise. She jumped up and grabbed a metal bar that was sticking out of the ceiling near the hole. While holding onto it with one hand, she managed to toss her pack through the opening with the other, then easily pulled herself up.

Another hundred yards and she would be on her way back to Nucrea. No one would know she had even left. Ripp wouldn’t be back from his contract for another day, and that gave her plenty of time to charge his spare Pigeon and put it back where it was supposed to be.

Lilly decided to skip the broken stairs and slid down the embankment. When she reached the bottom of the crater, she looked up at the sun, barely visible behind the rust hued overcast of the Fringe, and thought there might even be enough time to see Nun tonight.

She picked up speed and plowed her way up the other side of the crater. Breathing heavily through her filters, she turned to see if anyone or anything had followed, but there were just the ruins of the factory and a broken city surrounding it.

Lilly dusted off and headed to the transport she had parked under a partially collapsed building. It was a one seater, which didn’t leave much space in the cab, but it had a rugged six-tire system that could navigate over and through almost anything. It was well armored with tempered steel and sealed tight. It might have been overkill, but it was the cheapest to rent, and Nun suggested it in case she needed to drive through a pack of Fringers.

The Pigeon beeped as the battery went dead. Lilly should have been worried about not having navigation, but her tracks should be easy to retrace, and she could partially charge it on the way back.

She keyed the code on the hatch to unlock the cargo hold and was about to pull the lever down when two Fringers came running around the corner of one of the buildings.

Broken teeth forced their way through cracked frothy mouths. Their eyes were dark yellow and wide with hunger. Their skin had rotted and was covered in dark veins. They were fast.

She pulled her gun from its holster and in the same motion shot the closest one in the shoulder. The impact threw him back for a moment, but he quickly regained his footing and charged. She took aimed again and took half of his head off with the second shot. The other one was now right on top of her. She quickly pulled her knife, deflected a grab and stabbed him twice, once in the side of the chest, puncturing a lung and once in the neck. He let out a garbled, painful cough and grabbed at his side, seemingly unaware of the neck wound.

Lilly didn’t expect the Fringer to charge and was knocked off balance. Twisting, she stabbed him twice again, once in the back and once in the cheek, crunching bone. She pushed him away from her and got ready for another attack, but the Fringer slowly walked away and collapsed. Dark blood painted the ground around him.

She shook from the adrenaline racing through her body as she looked around for more. She had killed Fringers before, but never alone. Lilly caught her breath and walked over to where she had dropped her bag. She picked up her gun, holstered it, and smiled, as she realized that killing these Fringers made the contract official, and it wasn’t only about proving to Ripp that she was ready to work alone, but she also needed to prove something to herself, and she had.