There was no light in Sector Nine.
Not real light. Just reflections, filtered through steel panels and static screens from the districts above—Aurelion's domains.
Down here, it was always gray. Always cold.
Kai had learned long ago not to look up. It made the distance feel real.
The market in this sector wasn't built—it grew, like mold, like rust, from the cracks of the abandoned service tunnels.
Faded fabrics hung between beams like sunless prayer flags, filtering the flicker of broken lamps above. The air was heavy with iron and spice—burnt oil, coriander, something like old incense that never fully burned away.
Makeshift stalls lined the narrow path, stitched from tarp, wire, and broken display glass. Overhead, patched canopies of woven mesh rippled in the exhaust breeze, casting broken shadows that danced like smoke.
Screens flickered with static; power cables coiled like roots across the ground, warm to the touch but never safe. Somewhere, a cracked speaker played a looped prayer in a language no one remembered, warped by time and static into something almost melodic.
Vendors watched with dull eyes behind metal grates, their voices flat, their smiles preprogrammed. Most were half-modified—one eye always tethered to the local drone feed, not for entertainment, but for security updates.
Somewhere farther down the row, a Synth Enforcer let out a low, mechanical groan. Its joints clicked in the quiet.
No one turned to look.
You didn't look at those things.
Not unless you wanted to be noticed.
Kai kept walking. He traced the edges of the vendor line, hands in his coat, eyes flicking over the old tech crates like he was searching for parts. He wasn't. He'd already spotted the chip—emotion-stamped, low-tier, cracked casing. Just enough value to trade for food if the seller wasn't watching.
He didn't work alone anymore.
A girl—barely ten—trailed behind him in silence, small and sharp-eyed, a stitched-up coat falling past her knees. She never spoke in the market, not unless she had to. They had a rhythm now: he'd distract, she'd lift. Simple.
They'd done it three times already that week.
This time, though, she hesitated. Her gaze drifted—not to the crates, but to a bar of chocolate left too close to the edge of a nearby vendor shelf. Dark, wrapped, mostly intact.
Kai saw her blink. He saw her hand twitch.
"Lina," he said, low.
But she'd already moved. A half step, nothing more.
It was enough.
The Enforcer registered motion.
One of the older Synth models—white-plate armor scuffed and patched, the golden iris of judgment still burned into its chest. Its helmet swiveled with a low mechanical whine.
The Synth's hand flexed, scanning.
Kai didn't think. He pulled the cracked chip from his pocket and threw it—hard—into the stack of hollow crates.
The crash echoed like gunfire. The Synth turned instantly. The girl froze.
Kai was already moving. He grabbed her by the wrist and ran, dragging her into the side alley like it was routine.
It wasn't.
They ran through the vendor lines, feet slapping against concrete and cable. Behind them, the Synth let out a burst of static. Not a voice—just a pulse, like a sonar ping.
"Left," Kai muttered.
Lina followed without hesitation. They ducked into a service shaft half-blocked by collapsed wiring, then out through a gap in the maintenance fence.
For a moment, Kai thought they'd cleared it.
Then came the shriek—metal grinding against metal, the Synth's servos kicking in.
"Shit."
A warning drone passed overhead, its red light scanning the alley mouth they'd just exited. Kai didn't look up. He pulled Lina down into a side tunnel, half-flooded, black with oil water.
"Stay low," he whispered.
They crouched behind an old service duct, lungs sharp with cold. The Synth's footsteps echoed somewhere close, but not closing in. A whir. A pause. Then... silence.
"It's scanning," Lina breathed.
Kai looked over. Her eyes were wide, but not with fear—with calculation.
"How do you know?"
She tapped her temple."
I can feel the pattern. Low-pulse, wide sweep. Too slow for a live target lock."
He stared at her for a second longer than he should've.
"That's not normal," he said.
"Neither's chocolate," she whispered back. "But I wanted it anyway."
He almost laughed.
Didn't.
Then the Synth turned.
Walked off.
No alert.
No pursuit.
Just the silence again.
They didn't speak until the metal footsteps vanished.
"That was yours," she said quietly. "Why'd you give it up?"
He didn't look at her.
"I hate the sound of crying," Kai muttered. "It's loud."
His breath came hard, slower now that the adrenaline was fading. He shifted his weight, and something tugged sharp at his side. Warm. Wet.
Kai glanced down. His coat was torn—just above the hip—dark and blooming. A scrape. Or maybe not just a scrape.
He winced, just slightly, then sighed through his teeth. His fingers found the ration bar in his coat. He didn't think—just held it out, shoved it into her hands like it weighed nothing.
Lina looked down at it for a long moment, then glanced up toward him as he walked ahead.
Kai didn't turn.
But for a second, he remembered another girl—older, louder, just as stubborn—stealing a cookie from a military ration box and laughing like she'd won a war.
She'd said sweets were proof the world hadn't ended yet. She'd said a lot of things like that.
That had been a long time ago.
Lina didn't say thank you.
She just followed him.