So much for selling my virginity. I only had one option now.
A life of slavery in the salt mines.
Or running.
Fuck all this. I was fucking running.
The knife clattered to the ground as I bolted, not back to the open street that was filling with flashing red and blue lights, but deeper into the alley, up the nearest fire escape and to the roof. The sirens were screaming behind me, the alley full of yells and lights as the hologram screamed 'she went that way!'
I jumped off the roof.
No one looked up as I leapt from one building to another, my shadow lost in the smog and absence of sun that flooded this god forsaken town. I ran as fast as I could, as fast as I’d had to every other time men had lusted after me. Before I had bought the knife in the sewer markets and taken matters into my own hands.
One roof. Then another. My heart pounded in my chest, swelling against my agonizing lungs as they tried to take in oxygen but got the poison air instead. Everything was a blur, the sound of sirens fading to nothing as I jumped another roof, sliding on the loose gravel and nearly going head first into one of the tents of the homeless that lived there. Their tents speckled the roof, torn canvas cutting through the grey like little mountains.
I darted into the first one, an old man recoiling at my appearance, shaking as he mumbled something about having nothing.
Oh yeah, the blood.
"I'm not going to hurt you..." I panted, still trying desperately to catch my breath. "I need... the Gurgs..."
It was all I could get out, but it was enough. The man stared at me in silence before he turned, fishing through a pile of junk in the corner until he produced a grey cloth, pouring what smelled like vodka on the surface. It would have to do. I scrubbed the blood off of my face and arms, grateful I could ditch that damn smock. My shoes however... Damn it, I loved these things.
I had bought them when I’d bought the knife, and I’d spent time getting the yellow canvas to shine. Now that yellow was speckled with red, the colors a banner of guilt.
I took them off, eyeing the size of the shoe against the dirty foot of the man who was still looking at me as thought I was liable to attack him. It would be close, but they would work. Those, plus my old wool socks, would keep his feet warmer than they had been in years.
"Thank you," I said, holding the items out to him. He eyed them for a minute, both of our breathing ragged in question and fear.
Fear that grew as those sirens hit our ears.
"I found these, they are mine," he said, his promise of silence enough.
Every muscle in my back was coiled as I exited the tent, my shirt filthy, face no longer smeared with blood, but with something that smelled too foul to just be vodka. I quickly undid the braid that kept my hair away from the sewing machines, letting the unwashed matted mess fall around me.
The lights and sounds of the Gurg army swelled as I rushed from one roof to another, leaving behind the old man in the tent. Leaving behind everything.
I hadn’t moved this much in a long time, and every part of me ached from the work. I needed to get home, get right to the center of the city. To the hostel that I had lived in since my mom boarded a star ship and left me behind. Since my father had become the first victim of my knife.
I straightened my shoulders, my bare feet digging into the asphalt as I made my way over to the fire escape of the building, the ladder sliding out as I climbed onto it. My hair and shirt rippled in the wind as I slid backward, the ladder hitting hard against the asphalt and bucking me off. I flew off the decrepit thing and slammed into a street as vile as the one I had escaped from.
"Fuck," I grumbled as my back hit hard and I froze, staring into the smog smeared sky as I listened to the Gurg sirens that were everywhere.
Coming closer.
"Let me guess. It's you they are looking for," a woman's voice whispered through the dark, a slight chuckle making me turn.
Gritting my teeth through the pain that was sending shockwaves up my spine, I twisted on the asphalt to face whoever had spoken, expecting one of the grey skinned assassins that whisked young girls off the street as effectively as the old horny men. Instead it was a woman dressed in clothes cleaner that I had seen in this part of the city. She looked as though she had stepped off a star ship, not out of a world coated in smog. It had taken me years to get my shoes to shine so bright, but this woman had layers of fabrics and skirts that showed me colors I had never seen before.
Apparently, my shoes weren't even close to yellow.
"What is it to you?" I snapped, regretting having dropped my knife, although I don't think I would have it in me to spill her blood over those bright colors.
She grinned, skirts swishing as she walked closer, tapping her ident band and turning it off.
"I heard on my wire that they are looking for the girl who cut the cock of that greasy ambassador who fancies young girls. And if that's you, well then... I've had a bounty on that man's head for years... and I'd be pressed to settle." She stepped closer, skirts still swishing as she kneeled before me, eyes narrowing. "And with skill like yours, I
