Though his arm and shoulder were still tender, Caiden willed himself to use both hands to drive. He was constantly checking his rearview mirrors, ensuring no pursuer was giving chase. The further away they drove from the brothel, the more the tension in the air dissipated. Nami and Hitomi finally seemed to relax, and they both stared off into the night sky as they drove.
“Hey, you holdin’ up okay?” Nami asked
“It's just a flesh wound. I’ll patch it up once we get back.”
“And where is ‘back’?” Nami replied
“I’m taking you to Darkside,” he said.
“What? Why there of all places?” Hitomi exclaimed.
“Just trust me, I have a place there. I got you this, far right?” Caiden said confidently.
The twins had good reason to be fearful of that area. Darkside was rife with gang activity, so much so, that the Psi-Corp military police actually disregard the neighborhood due to its instability, as quoted by the fearsome Psi-Corp military police General, Vladimir Cain. Most people did well to avoid this neighborhood, whereas Caiden found it to be the perfect place to set up shop. It was close to midnight. Activity on the streets of Darkside was beginning to pick up. The twins sunk in the backseat of the car as they nervously peered out the window at their surroundings.
“What’s going on here?” Hitomi asked.
“Late night Bazaar,” Caiden replied.
“I heard stories about it before we got kidnapped, but I never wanted to find out if it was real because Darkside is so damn dangerous,” Nami stated.
“Yup, only happens at night once every few weeks or so. This area is a barren wasteland during the day, mostly to avoid attracting any unwanted attention. But come night time, the hustlers and dealers set up shop, and openly sell premier items that they’ve acquired for a pretty penny,” Caiden replied.
“Seems pretty festive here,” Hitomi remarked.
“They make a sort of party out of it. It's pretty intense, though, being that all the rival gangs in the neighborhood gather to sell the products they have. But it’s been the one time and place where violence doesn’t occur between them. Money conquers all here,” Caiden continued.
The neighborhood phenomenon took place in a large area comprised of a partially finished roadway that stretched up to a quarter of a mile. It was a straight road, with no significant buildings around it. It was an ideal site for the Bazaar. During the night of the festival, merchant tents filled the road. Makeshift stages and booths, and retail carts the size of trucks were hauled in out of nowhere to set up shop. There were many special tents called ‘shadow booths’ where big money negotiations took place between top teir sellers and high rolling buyers. These shadow booths were also used for even shadier purposes, mainly dealing with drugs or sex in one way or another.
Even though the Bazaar only ran for eight hours, up to twenty-five thousand people would pass through on any given night. Despite Darkside being economically separated from the rest of the city in many regards, the Bazaar usually netted the neighborhood a monthly earning of around thirty million Creds in one night. This economic occurrence was only made possible by the fierce reputation the neighborhood had for its dangers, and the subsequent lack of Zonos and Psi-Corp interference.
The late-night Bazaar tents were bustling with activity. Hustlers, con artists, street merchants, and dealers made up the bulk of the sellers at each tent. Some of the tents were run by rival gangs. There was an occasional fight here and there, but money rules all, even above taking unnecessarily violent risks when everyone could be making a financial killing at the bazaar. Most of the items on the strip being sold were either stolen and illegal. The items varied from spare cybernetic parts, energy cell units, weapons, to a variety of uniquely packaged drugs, clothes, and apparel, even home grown produce like fruits, vegetables, and meat. There was music, sideshow attractions, live sex exhibitions, prostitutes, and heavy drug usage, too. It was rumored that a large percentage of home developed designer drugs originated from the bazaar. The custom designer drugs had been transported from as far as Liberty Port, on the other side of the continent.
The Darkside neighborhood was once a bustling centerpiece for technological manufacturing during the earlier times of Neon District’s history. The factory complex was originally called ‘Neo Ray Factories’. It had long since become a series of abandoned buildings, both large and small, and was spread across a two square mile landscape on the easternmost side of the Black Light District. Due to the city’s expansion westward, Zonos officials decided to relocate to new grounds and build a newer, larger industrial facility. Soon after, the industrial complex became something of a pseudo-lawless squatters’ zone, where many criminals and homeless people began to take up residence. It was rumored that some people even illegally syphoned power from the main energy grids of the city to power their homes. Others used outdated cell battery technology and portable generators.
Due to the high demand for power sources in the area, many people enlisted those they called ‘Gunners’ to illegally extract power cells or re-route power from the city’s many abundant power grids back to the neighborhood for a fee. Most of the Gunners were children, between the ages of nine to twelve, that were deemed nimble and limber, as the job required them to squeeze into small areas to infiltrate the plants. Gunners were typically led by
