The Shell (2)
I ran into these things until I was sick of them in the game, and now here they are in real life too.
At the moment, I was standing in a dark back alley of the Port District. No cameras here, and the street itself was so hemmed in by buildings that not a trace of light reached the ground.
No. 26, tucked snugly against my chest, broadcast a wave of discomfort.
｢It's stuffy.｣
[Zzzzzz (Bear with it just a little longer)]
｢Okay.｣
I stroked her until she calmed down, then turned my gaze toward the mouth of the alley.
In the distance, beneath a synthetic night sky cast by a colossal dome-shaped screen, the lights spilling from a thousand billboards swirled together in a dizzying haze. It looked dazzling from the outside, but I knew exactly what this city really was.
A sick place.
It wasn't Earth, the capital of Mega Corp, but this place was a jungle all its own. It teemed with people who treated human lives like flies, and crawled with degenerates so addicted to pleasure they'd commit unspeakable crimes without a second thought.
Plenty of people flowed in for tourism or work — and plenty flowed out in body bags. That place was the T&C Special Trade Hub.
Which is part of why I chose it. Now then, where do I start?
This space city was divided into four districts plus the Administrative District at its center — five zones in total.
The Port District in the east, the Residential District in the west, the Entertainment District in the south, the Commercial District in the north, and finally the Central Administrative District, which oversaw them all.
Of these, public order was shakiest in two places: the Entertainment District and the Residential District.
The Entertainment District was packed with establishments where Mega Corp citizens vented their secret desires on those who had been 'Employed' as slaves. Just as red-light districts of this kind in the real world were watched with a lenient eye thanks to the interests of the powerful, so it was here. There were almost no surveillance cameras — but combat androids patrolled the streets instead, dragging off anyone who broke the law.
Androids were tricky opponents, so the Entertainment District was out of the question for now. The district I needed was elsewhere.
The Residential District.
It bore the name Residential District, but in reality it was closer to a slum. Home mostly to the mid-and-lower Capital citizens of Mega Corp and to alien species who'd found work in the city, it would be a lie to call it safe even as a figure of speech. It was the same in every city, anywhere: wherever the poor huddled together, public order inevitably rotted.
On top of that, residents of the Residential District had a habit of blowing every credit they earned in a day back in the Entertainment District. With so many of them living only for today, nobody thought it strange when a neighbor vanished. As long as I was careful around the patrolling police and androids, I could grow at my own pace without much trouble.
Good. Destination decided. Next problem is…
How to get there.
Sticking to back alleys would only take me so far. Unlike the research vessel, a space city was bristling with security infrastructure, and androids roamed everywhere.
A place where I could go anywhere in the city without ever crossing human eyes. I knew of exactly two routes that fit the bill.
The sewers and the underground railway.
Both were vital facilities built together with the space city itself. Since they handled the essentials of daily life — water and transportation — they effectively served as the city's veins and arteries.
If this were the game, I'd take the sewers. But this is reality, so that might be a problem.
Water couldn't simply be extracted in space, so the city supplied its residents through two methods: recycling wastewater through purification treatment, and regularly airlifting water in from outside.
In the game that existed only as flavor text. Here, it was reality. The odds were good that the sewer system was maintained to a far higher standard than I remembered.
Shame, but the underground railway it is.
Setting off with No. 26, I moved through the city — now through pitch-black alleys, now vaulting across rooftops. The Central Administrative District was full of high-rises where someone might spot me, but here in the Port District there were no tall buildings. The people on the streets never noticed a thing passing over their heads.
Let's see. The entrance should be around here somewhere.
Obviously, I had no intention of walking in through the station entrance. With androids and surveillance cameras guarding it, a casual stroll inside would raise an uproar in seconds.
I had infiltrated this place hundreds of times. I hadn't always used the same route, but there was one secret passage I'd relied on more than any other. It had originally been a kind of shortcut used by the workers who built the railway, and after the line was completed, it had slipped from everyone's memory.
As far as this spot goes, I'm the only one who knows it.
I remembered how the players, furious that I kept worming my way in no matter how meticulous a surveillance net they threw up, ended up bickering among themselves. One clan even got so sick of my raids that they abandoned their base entirely.
Chuckling inwardly, I lifted the rusted manhole cover ahead with four of my hands.
This spot, right on the boundary of the Port District, was my own private little gateway.
Among the Noble Capital families of Mega Corp, the T&C Family stood out for having a distinctly corporate character.
And little wonder — the T&C Family had begun as an insurance company in a city once called New York.
Perhaps that explained it.
The motto of the T&C dynasty, royalty of Earth, went as follows:
The Red Queen Effect, a staple of business theory, was their survival creed. Just as the Eugene Family had become kings of Earth through genetic research, the T&C Family had its own domain of focus for the prosperity of the house.
Space colonial development.
Their goal was to pioneer new frontiers rather than cling to a worn-out Earth and Solar System. Preferring to grow the size of the pie itself rather than fight over slices of the old one, they poured staggering amounts of credit into artificial habitat construction and terraforming technology.
They began with orbital stations within the Solar System, then broadened their reach into the terraforming of Mars and the construction of orbital habitats. One of the fruits of that labor was the space colony established in deep space: the T&C Special Trade Hub.
Planned as a trade hub relaying between the Solar System and deep space, the T&C Special Trade Hub was a space habitat boasting a colossal diameter of nearly 60 kilometers. In the present day it was the oldest of the space colonies, yet thanks to the symbolic weight of being the first space city, it still commanded no small amount of influence.
Even now, countless alien species visited the place to marvel at this historic monument built by human hands.
The office of the Smuggled Animal Monitoring Team in the Port District was, as always, deafening with the cries of confiscated creatures.
"I'm heading out first."
"Are you kidding me, Lars, you lunatic?! Everyone's half out of their minds over that Mountaincrawler spawn, and you're leaving early?"
"I don't do overtime. Have a good one, all of you."
"You selfish piece of shit!"
Lars answered his team leader's cursing with nothing but a lazy wave of his hand.
The moment he stepped out of the building, an AI-generated black night sky stretched out above his head.
Manufactured starlight, artificial glare bleeding from every billboard, and the moths who drifted through the streets chasing that light. Lars gladly melted into the mirage.
Who should I play with tonight?
Taking the subway to the Entertainment District, Lars pressed the digital order board outside a special establishment. A hologram bloomed in the air, listing the establishment's staff — faces, personal histories, and the services they offered.
This was a shop where those officially 'Employed' by Mega Corp provided special services. A place where the customer could demand anything, and obedience was mandatory. To some, it was hell. To others, paradise. That was what a special establishment was.
I'll take this one.
Lars picked a woman who looked a bit like one of his coworkers. He felt no particular guilt about it — he knew perfectly well that the coworker in question was a regular here too.
Whistling, Lars walked inside.
Two hours later.
Lars was wiping the blood from his hands in the shop's bathroom.
Having replaced his arm with machinery, he liked to lubricate it now and then like this.
With blood and oil drawn fresh from a living body.
Of course, once the blood dried it would stink and rust would set in, so he'd have to give it a proper wipe-down later.
Was that a bit much?
Lars glanced back toward the bedroom. The white sheet on the bed had been soaked through with red.
He considered tidying up before leaving, then shook his head. That scattered 'wreckage' was the shop's problem now. Wasn't that what he was paying them for?
Lars left the establishment with a satisfied look on his face, and felt a sudden craving for a drink.
One round, then sleep.
Telling himself it wasn't a bad call, he bought a few bottles of synthetic liquor and headed for the Residential District.
The moment he emerged from the subway station, silence greeted him. Unlike the Entertainment District, where the riot of neon signs had felt deafening, the Residential District was hushed.
Upper Capital citizens lived in towers and luxury residences in the Administrative District, but Lars was Low Capital. Better off than the Non-Capital workers who slept in sleep capsules, sure — but the Residential District was hardly comfortable. Dreary, filthy apartment blocks with lousy security; his teammates called the place the chicken coop.
"Son of a bitch! Somebody busted these again."
The street should have been lit by the streetlamps, but every single one was smashed, wherever he looked. They'd be repaired within a few days, but the prospect of walking this dark road until then put Lars in a foul mood.
Grumbling, he fished a flashlight out of his bag. White light bloomed from its tip and lit his way.
Crunch. Crunch.
The sound of glass shards underfoot broke the stillness of the Residential District. It was his usual route, yet today something about it felt off.
What is that smell?
An unpleasant, unidentifiable stench was rising from the pavement. He was wondering if a sewer line had burst when his eyes landed on a manhole cover.
The cover that was normally shut fast sat slightly ajar.
If those idiots are doing construction work, they ought to close it back up.
Lars walked on, pinching his nose shut with one hand.
He was well past the manhole now, but the smell wouldn't leave. It felt as though the whole street was steeped in something ominous.
Something was wrong.
He couldn't say why, but Lars could feel that something bad was happening. The stench, the creeping dread of the dark — without realizing it, his footsteps quickened and quickened.
He was nearly running home when he saw it — a figure standing in the middle of the road.
"Shit!"
Lars let out a screaming curse. As if it had heard him, the figure in the darkness turned its head.
It was a young man.
H-holy shit, I almost died of fright.
For a split second he'd thought it was a monster — but it was just a person. Barely calming down, Lars looked the man over again.
He wore work clothes, so he was probably someone who labored in the Port District. He had an unremarkable face, and tucked under his arm was something like a ball, a reddish orb.
What the hell is this guy's deal?
Lars found the man unsettling, though he couldn't say why. Until Lars came along, this place had been total darkness, without a single point of light. Someone standing silently in a place like that, holding some strange ball-like object — suspicious, no matter how you looked at it.
"What are you doing here?"
"Heading home."
The man's answer came in a flat, even voice. Compared to his behavior, his voice felt utterly ordinary, and Lars relaxed a little.
"Ahem. Take care, then. I'm off."
"Excuse me."
"Hm?"
"It's dark out. Shall we walk together?"
Lars hesitated. Strolling alongside this creepy stranger was the last thing he wanted. But the road really was pitch-black, and in the end he gave in.
"…Follow me."
"Thank you."
The man fell in behind him, and the two set off again.
They were walking along in the quiet of the deserted street when the man behind him spoke up.
"Hey."
"Yeah?"
"You're a cyborg, aren't you?"
"…So?"
"I see."
With that, the man fell silent.
What's that supposed to mean?
Half suspecting some jab at cyborgs, Lars opened his mouth to snap back — and in that instant, that strange smell stabbed at his nose again.
Far thicker than before, and far more repulsive. And somehow, somehow, the smell was drifting in from behind him.
"……."
Having swallowed his retort, Lars stole a quick glance backward. The moment he saw the man, he felt the marrow of his spine freeze over.
The man following him wasn't looking at the light at all. Without blinking once, he was staring directly — precisely — at Lars.
That alone was creepy enough, but then Lars saw it.
The red ball wedged under the man's arm. It was wriggling.
Fucking hell!
A coworker had told him once. That among the Upper Capital there were lunatics who kept nothing of a person but the head, and played with them.
Coincidence? The thing in the man's hand — it was just about the size of a human head.
The moment that thought connected, Lars couldn't take any more.
His home wasn't far now. Leaving the man where he stood, Lars broke into a run.
"Hah… hah… hah…"
He looked back. The man was still standing in the dark. It was deep enough that he could barely make out a single step, but Lars could feel it — the man was glaring at him with that expressionless face.
Thankfully, nothing happened before Lars reached his home.
Whether from the near-sprint or the fear, his clothes were drenched in sweat.
Any mood for drinking had vanished long ago — instead, he was parched. Lars cracked open the cap of a bottle of synthetic liquor, beaded with cold droplets.
He downed it in one go, and a burning heat and a woozy buzz spread from his throat through his whole body.
"…Haaah. Bastards. I'm reporting this first thing tomorrow."
Perhaps it was the alcohol, but the tension drained out of him slowly. Only then did it sink in that he'd actually made it home, and he let out a breath of relief.
"…Ugh, shit neighborhood. Once I've saved up enough, I'm moving somewhere else."
Muttering a dream that would never come true, he switched on his battered virtual TV. The cramped room instantly filled with noise, and somehow the fear felt a shade more distant.
Lars walked to the window and peered outside.
Nothing there but darkness. Not a soul in sight.
And there he goes.
The cyborg had bolted off as if the hounds of hell were on his heels. I could take a pretty good guess why.
A faint sense of wrongness.
He had no way of knowing outright that I was a monster, but he clearly sensed that something about me was different. A being with sharp enough senses would pick up on the subtle chemical signals in my pheromones, even if only faintly.
Still, the whole point of the Morphing Organ was simply to make ambushes easier. I had no intention of socializing with humans, so this much was plenty.
｢He was scared of me.｣
[Zzz-zzzz (Why would that be?)]
｢Don't know.｣
The cyborg had seemed uneasy about me too, but what had spiked his heartbeat the hardest was No. 26. His pulse had hit its peak the moment his eyes landed on her.
What could possibly be so terrifying about No. 26?
I'd never seen anyone afraid of a Bubble Amoeba — the very poster child of healing and cuteness. Sure, she was a mutant, but she looked exactly like any other Bubble Amoeba. There was nothing remotely scary about her.
Afraid of this adorable little thing? What an incomprehensible cyborg.
Come to think of it, he did say cyborg, didn't he?
With the Psionium's effects worn off, I was back in my Juvenile form. To evolve into a Sub-adult, I needed to devour one more cyborg.
And I needed one anyway. Perfect timing.
He didn't know it, but I'd already worked out exactly which building he'd disappeared into.
After all, the lingering echo of the scent he'd trailed behind him as he fled was still hanging in the air.