Warren didn't remember much of the walk out of the Red's fringe.
His body ached. Not a sharp, clear pain, but a layered exhaustion that hollowed out his steps. Every muscle protested, but he moved steadily, driven not by strength but by necessity. Stopping was not an option. Stopping meant death.
The world narrowed to a series of simple goals: move forward. Find supplies. Find a weapon.
He knew where he was heading. The Bazaar. He had been there before, more times than he could count. It wasn't just a market. It was the closest thing to a safe zone in the Yellow, chaotic but ordered by the scavenger clans that enforced their own brutal rules.
But the Bazaar was still distant. Between him and it, the world sharpened.
The Green Zone loomed ahead, cutting the ruined skyline like a knife. The wall was absurd in scale: seamless, towering, gleaming white even under the rain. No graffiti touched it. No vines climbed it. It repelled the world like an immune system rejecting a virus.
Closer now, Warren caught the hum of unseen power grids and the faint, wasteful flicker of electric lights just beyond the barrier.
The Verge separated the real from the unreal: a sterile band of open ground where nothing was allowed to grow, no shelter left standing. It gleamed with standing water, bomb craters turned into shallow lakes, reflecting the steel-blue menace of the sky.
The enforcers patrolled there, ghosts in armor. Their suits were heavy, white, segmented for mobility but dense enough to absorb flechette impacts without a flinch.
Each helmet was sealed, blank and smooth, lenses dark as oil slicks. Nothing human showed through.
They moved in groups of four. Tight formations, sharp discipline. Lances slung over their backs, shock rods swaying at their hips, every step synchronized without wasted motion.
They were not hunters looking for kills. Not here.
As long as you kept moving, as long as you did not linger or draw attention, the enforcers let you pass.
Their orders were clear: control, not slaughter.
Anyone who crossed the Verge with intent could slip by under their cold, silent watch.
But if you paused too long, if you hesitated, if you made yourself an object rather than a ghost, you became a problem.
And problems did not walk away.
Each group covered their sector like a machine. No chatter. No glances. Each unit a reflection of drilled instinct.
Their armor wasn't just for protection. It was for domination. The gleam of white in a dead world spoke of untouchable power.
Their boots hit the broken ground in perfect rhythm, a mechanical march that vibrated through the puddles.
Each squad moved with calculated intervals, enough to trap runners between them without needing to sprint.
Above them, drones drifted, small black specks against the grey sky, scanning for motion and warmth.
The lances they carried weren't just weapons. They were tools of absolute enforcement. Every modular upgrade meant faster firing, tighter spread, more efficient killing.
Their shock rods weren't secondary tools. They were the punctuation after compliance: bone-breakers wrapped in clean ceramic grips.
Warren had watched them before from rooftops and gutters. He knew their patrol patterns. Knew when they tightened formations. Knew when they loosened, baiting traps.
No enforcer ever ran. They advanced or they waited. Retreat wasn't programmed into them.
Their comms units were internal. No hand signals. No radio chirps. Only synchronized response.
Each man and woman inside the armor had long since ceased to exist as an individual. They were parts of a larger will.
The Verge belonged to them entirely. The flooded craters, the shattered ground, the jagged remains of fences. All of it was part of their territory.
The flechettes in their lances could shear through reinforced doors, tear through stonework, ruin a body beyond recovery.
Their helmets filtered out the stink of rot, blood, and oil that clung to the Yellow. They lived in a sterile silence Warren could only imagine.
Even when rain blurred the air, even when mud swallowed the ground, they moved without hesitation, every sensor and system dialed into their zone.
Their presence radiated the same message the wall behind them carried: you are not wanted. You are not feared. You are less than an inconvenience.
To challenge them in open ground was to die without ceremony.
Warren stayed low, counting the gaps, measuring the rhythm, breathing slow and steady as he let them pass.
Warren watched from a ruined overpass, eyes narrow. The Service Lances the enforcers carried were heavy-caliber models: modular, adjustable, brutal. He knew what they could do. Single-shot. Burst-fire. Stun-blast capable. And no hesitation behind the trigger.
There were rumors about their chips: suppression of fear, pain, doubt. Maybe even emotion itself. Warren believed it. Not because of the rumors, but because he had seen them work.
They didn't kill for pleasure. They didn't kill for hatred. They killed because they were told to. Nothing more. Nothing less.
The rain washed the Verge in silver sheets. Pools sucked at the edges of the bomb craters. Mud swallowed boots if you stayed too long.
Nobody crossed the Verge without permission. Nobody.
Warren moved with the flow of the scattered few making their way along the Verge's edge. He did not stop. He did not look back.
One enforcer squad passed close enough that Warren could feel the mechanical hum of their gear. Their heads turned as he crossed their vision, lenses fixing on him. They saw him. A yellow flare in the grey.
They did not act.
Warren understood. Without needing words, without needing signs, he knew the rules. Keep moving. Be nothing more than another breath passing through their world.
He did.
No challenge. No warning. Just cold acknowledgment.
Their discipline was complete. They did not kill because they could. They killed when the rules demanded it.
Warren made sure they had no excuse.
Step by step, he crossed the Verge.
The Bazaar clung to the edge of this wasteland like mold clinging to stone. It existed because the Green Zone tolerated it, a pressure valve for the desperate and the dangerous.
Every step tightened Warren's focus.
The Bazaar would come soon enough.
First, he had to get there intact.
He needed a weapon. He needed supplies. He needed time.
The market would give him all three.
If he reached it first.
The Bazaar's edge folded into the ruins like a wound that refused to heal. Warren passed under a sagging overhang, boots scraping over broken stone and half-flooded asphalt.
Vendors barked in low tones, flashing glances at him, gauging threat and opportunity. Tarps flapped above narrow aisles, stitched together from old flags, plastic, and scavenged clothing. Metal piping framed stalls haphazardly, leaning at strange angles, some braced with bundles of wire or salvaged concrete.
He ignored it all.
He needed a weapon first. Trade could come later.
The roadside debris thickened the deeper he moved. Broken furniture, snapped pipes, shattered signs. The bones of a dead city repurposed for desperation.
Warren knelt near a pile of trash, fingers working through the mess with clinical efficiency.
He triggered Examine.
The system dumped everything into his sight. Loud. Useless. Flashing garbage.
Examine Readout: Rusted pipe
Attribute
Value
Notes
Rarity
Standard Issue
Durability
Low
Severe corrosion
Weight
Light
Minimal striking force
Material
Iron composite
Rusted surface degradation
Balance Rating
Poor
End-heavy, unstable
Modification History
None detected
System Integration
None
No interface compatibility
Origin
Unknown salvage
Value
12 credits
Notes
"Reliability you can trust!"
He crushed the pipe over his knee. Garbage. Noise.
He moved on, rifling through a broken signpost. This time, he trimmed the value fields out of the overlay. Tried to kill the notes too. Failed. They clung like rot.
Examine Readout: Signpost
Attribute
Value
Notes
Rarity
Service Grade
Durability
Low
Hairline fractures
Weight
Light
Fragile under load
Material
Polyalloy blend
Weather-resistant, degraded
Balance Rating
Unstable
Center shifts during motion
Modification History
Minor surface repairs
System Integration
Minimal
Flickering signals
Origin
Civic Infrastructure Division
Notes
"Engineered for resilience!"
It sagged under two fingers of pressure.
Still too much noise. Still blind.
A battered chair leg next. He stripped out the Rarity tags entirely, forced the overlay to show what mattered: real structure, real hands-on traits.
Examine Readout: CN5662 Chair(leg)
Attribute
Value
Notes
Material
Synthetic wood
Fragile laminate core
Durability
Very Low
Splinters under stress
Structural Stability
Compromised
Cracks with side force
Weight
Light
No real striking mass
Balance Rating
Poor
Top-heavy, unstable
Grip/Surface Texture
Splintered
Risk of hand injury
Modification History
None detected
System Integration
None
Not compatible
Origin
Mass-market furnishing
Notes
"Handcrafted for your home."
He flexed it. The wood splintered like wet paper. Another failure.
More cuts to the system. He went deeper again. Forced new layers to show. How long things lasted. How loud they broke.
A corroded length of rebar lay twisted near a drainage pipe.
Examine Readout: Rebar
Attribute
Value
Notes
Material
Carbon steel core
Severe oxidation
Durability
Critical
Powdered structure
Structural Stability
Nonexistent
Crumbles under tension
Weight
Inconsistent
Degraded mass
Balance Rating
Irrelevant
Breaks before balance matters
Grip/Surface Texture
Brittle
Surface flakes off
Fatigue Resistance
Collapsed
No endurance under use
Sound Signature
High
Shattering disintegration
Modification History
Extensive corrosion
Timeline unknown
Origin
Southline Industrial Salvage
Notes
"Southline construction guaranteed."
It powdered under his hands.
The guarantee still flickered at the corner of his vision. He tuned it out the way he tuned out pain.
Now the overlay was rough. Brutal. Tight. No colors. No credits. No garbage.
Material. Durability. Structure. Weight. Balance. Grip. Fatigue. Sound.
Just truth.
The collapsed awning sagged low ahead, heavy with water. Beneath it, wedged against a rotted cart frame, he found it.
A brick. Heavy. Sharp-edged. Cracked but whole.
He triggered Examine one last time. Somewhere in the depths of the stripped-down system, he found it: Simplify.
This time, the system spoke cleanly. Like a knife drawn along bone.
Examine Readout :Brick (Southline standard)
Attribute
Value
Material
Hardened ceramic blend
Durability
High
Structural Stability
Stable
Weight
Moderate
Balance Rating
Acceptable
Grip/Surface Texture
Rough
Fatigue Resistance
Moderate
Sound Signature
Low
Modification History
None detected
Origin
Southline Industrial Cast
Notes
"Southline durability. Trusted since 7122."
Warren skimmed it without thinking. The information slid into place behind his eyes without even slowing his hands.
Not elegant. Not precise.
But it would do.
He hefted it, feeling the solidity shift through his palm. It was the kind of weapon no one respected until it broke something important.
He slipped the brick into a side pocket of his coat, adjusting its weight across his centerline.
Not perfect.
But it was close enough.
Warren found a slumped doorway half-sheltered by a collapsed awning and slid into it. Just out of the way enough not to be bothered. The brick weighed steady at his side, a rough comfort.
The system prompt hovered at the corner of his sight, patient. Silent.
2 unallocated stat points available.
He leaned his head back against the wall, breathing shallowly, the cold dripping from the edge of the collapsed roof over him. The rain softened from a hammering sheet to a slow, steady weep against the stone.
Two points.
He shifted his weight slowly, feeling the drag in his muscles. His strikes were slowing. His ability to dodge had already started to cost him more energy than it should. He needed more.
He placed one point into Strength. One into Dexterity. Simple. Efficient.
It was the math of survival: hit harder, move faster, die slower.
It felt mechanical, empty of any hope. Just necessity clicking into place.
The rain slicked off the worn fabric of his coat, sliding away as if the jacket itself rejected the world around him. His breath fogged slightly in the cold. He accepted.
The nanites moved immediately.
He barely had time to brace against the doorframe, one hand locking onto the cracked metal, the other clutching the brick tighter against his ribs.
Pain detonated through his body, not with the sharp clarity of a clean break, but with the relentless grind of something drilling through flesh and bone, chewing as it burrowed deeper with every second.
He jerked sideways, collapsing into the mud, shoulder slamming into the broken edge of a stone slab. The impact rattled through his bones, the shock spreading through his ribs in jagged waves. The cold from the ground seeped into him instantly, a second assault that layered itself over the fire beneath his skin.
His teeth clamped down on the edge of his coat's collar, muffling the involuntary noise ripping up his throat. Every tendon in his body pulled taut, stretched to the breaking point, cords drawn so tight they felt ready to snap.
The nanites tore through him without mercy, burrowing beneath the surface, shredding old fiber and weaving new strands into the raw gaps. They stitched him into something stronger, but the stitching burned like a wire dragged across open nerves.
His heart stuttered, a momentary blank, a missed beat. Then it slammed back into rhythm under a flood of jagged, blinding noise. His chest convulsed with the force of it, lungs seizing around the broken air.
Spine compressed inward. Vertebrae ground against each other as if the core of his body was being re-forged under pressure no flesh could withstand. His hips wrenched violently, bones locking and shifting against their old anchors. Micro-fractures screamed along his joints, splintering and healing in brutal, nauseating cycles.
The world blurred and spun, angles snapping away from sense. His vision tunneled down to a narrow, colorless point. Grey bled into darker grey, swallowing the edges of his awareness.
Warren buried his face in his arms, grinding himself into the concrete to keep his muscles from tearing themselves apart under the strain. His breath sawed through his throat, dry and ragged, every heartbeat a hammer against the inside of his skull.
He felt the nanites thread new nerve pathways through shredded muscle, burning like acid inside the marrow.
Somewhere in the back of his mind, he recognized the mistake too late. No real shelter. No distance from threat. If anything stumbled on him now, he would be as good as dead.
The process dragged through his awareness like a blunt knife.
Seconds bled out like hours. His internal clock fractured, unable to track.
Finally, a shuddering gasp. They withdrew.
Warren sagged against the doorframe, muscles twitching under skin stretched too tight.
He stayed there, curled inward, feeling the rebuilt engine of his body rev just under the surface.
The changes weren't visible. No growth, no swelling, no shining signs of power. Only harder tissue, faster nerve jumps, cleaner lines between intent and action.
Slowly, he pried his fingers free from the weave of his coat.
His nails had torn small gouges into the fabric.
Good. It meant he had fought.
He pushed himself up, one slow movement at a time. Tested his balance. Flexed his grip around the brick, feeling the slight shift in leverage.
Faster. Stronger.
Enough for now.
The rain traced narrow lines down his face, dripping from his chin in slow, uneven rivers.
His shoulders rolled back under the weight of his coat. It felt lighter. It felt earned.
Warren set one foot into the street, head low, pace steady.
One level stronger. One mistake sharper.
It would not happen again.
Not if he wanted to live long enough to make the next mistake better.
He looked over his new statues.
Warren Smith — Level 2
Class: Unclassified
Alignment: Aberrant
Title: None
Unallocated Stat Points: 0
Attributes:
Strength: 7
Perception: 8
Intelligence: 10
Dexterity: 9
Endurance: 7
Resolve: 10
Skills
Examine (Active): Allows close, precise inspection of physical items. Identifies structural materials, mechanical condition, origin markers, manufacturing details, and utility potential. Does not reveal hidden properties.
The rain didn't stop, but it softened. It slicked the broken streets and smeared the light, turning the world into a blurred ruin.
Warren moved steadily, cutting through the flooded ruins without slowing, until the edges of the bazaar came into view.
He reached the fringe of the Market by midday.
The bazaar sprawled before him in a twisting, chaotic mass of tarps, broken vehicles, stacked crates, and makeshift structures leaning against each other like drunks. Bright scraps of cloth fluttered overhead, stitched into patchwork roofs that barely kept the mist out.
Life clung here stubbornly: scavvers bartering with sharp eyes and sharper knives, traders calling out hoarse offers, beggars huddled in the spaces between stalls. Smoke curled up from rusted oil drums. Old songs and new arguments blended into a steady, low roar.
Warren slowed, taking in the scent of old metal, damp earth, burnt meat, and something sour under it all. The Market smelled alive and dying all at once.
The stalls lined narrow paths, branching and knotting in confusing twists. Half the vendors were behind tables. The other half had weapons resting easily within arm's reach.
He kept moving, never lingering too long at any booth, weaving through the crowd with the kind of casual precision that marked a scavver who knew better than to stop moving.
He passed a food stall where a woman with scarred arms turned skewers of something too sinewy to be any livestock Warren recognized. The meat twisted and popped over a crude oil-drum fire, the air thick with the smell of burnt fat and bitter smoke. Still, it was cooking clean. The charred scent was almost tolerable.
Another stall piled slabs of roasted fungus the size of dinner plates next to battered tins of preserved rat. The fungus smelled nutty and rich, the kind of rare, nutty richness that stirred real hunger for the first time in hours. It was a delicacy out here, the kind scavvers fought over when they found it. Warren's gaze lingered a second longer than it should have before he turned away.
Farther in, a young boy stirred a massive pot of bubbling gray stew, chunks of indistinguishable meat and tubers bobbing to the surface before sinking again like corpses in a river. The scent here was rich, almost savory. The broth was thick, spiced with something sharp that cut through the market stench. It almost smelled good enough to stop for.
The hunger clawed at the back of Warren's throat, but he didn't flinch. Hunger was a tool. You didn't let it think for you.
Past the food, the weapon stalls started.
First, the low-end scrap: broken batons, rusted knives, lances held together with tape and desperate hope. None of it better than the brick in his pocket.
He pushed deeper.
A narrow lane opened between two sagging canopies, revealing a stall that made his pace slow for half a second.
Real weapons.
Well-sharpened blades of all different sizes. Hand lances gleaming under tarpaulin covers. Reinforced batons that could break bone with a twitch.
A thin man in a reinforced coat lounged behind the table, eyeing Warren with the slow patience of someone who knew exactly how out of reach his goods were.
Warren didn't stop. He didn't have anything close to enough.
A fragment could buy most things, but these weapons would cost more than he had to trade.
He turned into the next alley, slipping past a rack of scavenged gear and a rusted suit of old body armor someone had patched with scrap leather.
The paths narrowed again, forcing him close to the flow of other bodies: scavvers, merchants, runners carrying crates on their backs like ants.
A child darted past him, a blur of movement, clutching a sack nearly as big as she was. Someone shouted behind her, but no one gave chase.
Warren adjusted the brick in his coat pocket, keeping the weight centered, movements measured.
He passed another food stall. This one sold pickled eggs tinged strange shades of blue and green, floating in cracked glass jars that buzzed with flies. The brine smell was strong, sharp enough to sour the air. Warren moved on without slowing.
Next came a tented stall where something that might have been lizard meat hung from rusted hooks, drying in the humid air. The meat smelled heavy and spiced, and Warren knew better than to dismiss it out of hand. If the cuts were lean enough, it might be good travel food.
The Green Zone's walls loomed faintly through the gaps between tents, pure white and seamless, as if nothing outside could touch them.
Warren didn't stare. He knew better.
At the edge of another cluster of food vendors, he passed a man roasting something small and hairless over an open flame. The smell was sharp, sweet in the worst way. He moved faster.
Here and there, real armor showed under patched coats: shoulder plates, gauntlets, reinforced boots. People who had survived enough to afford protection. People who would kill to keep it.
Weapon dealers prowled too, but the serious ones didn't shout. They leaned in, speaking low over battered counters, slipping knives and short blades into view just long enough to make you think.
Warren knew the look of real trades. He also knew when he was carrying nothing anyone would trade for.
A man passed him carrying a heavy hooked blade slung over his back, the weapon worn but balanced for killing. The easy ownership came from having killed for it, or being ready to.
Warren ducked between two stalls, blending into the chaos.
A merchant to his left flipped fried strips of some gristly meat onto cracked ceramic plates, ladling thick sauce over them. The smell made Warren's stomach tighten, this time not from revulsion but from a buried instinct. The sauce was spiced sharp enough to almost hide the toughness of the meat beneath.
He moved like he belonged, weaving around a stall stacked with scavenged comms equipment, another piled high with cracked visors and half-working goggles.
Past the tech, he caught sight of another cluster of stalls: luxury goods tucked between scavenger wares like lost relics. Scarves of real cloth, hand-stitched and dyed with faded colors. Trinkets carved from bone or old plastics, jewelry twisted from salvage metal. Things no one needed, but plenty wanted.
One merchant displayed worn bottles of perfumes and oils, the glass chipped but intact, the scents sharp enough to cut through the damp air even sealed.
Another hawked medical supplies under a sagging tarp: battered medkits, half-empty vials, strips of real bandages folded neatly beside scavenged antibiotics that might still be good if luck held.
He watched a woman haggle over a bottle of painkillers with a man whose arm hung uselessly at his side. The desperation in their voices was as tangible as the smoke rising from the food stalls.
He saw a trader haggle over a bolt-action launcher, the weapon ancient but lovingly maintained, the vendor speaking of kill counts and battlefields as if they were recipes.
Someone laughed. Somewhere else, someone screamed. Neither sound changed the current of the market.
The rain thinned further, misting the bazaar under a soft, grey light that seemed to dull the colors of the tarps but sharpen every glint of metal.
He passed a table guarded more heavily than the others, a sheet of reinforced polymer stretched across the surface. Behind it, fragments were laid out in battered containment frames, cracked but still carefully contained. Fragments were fragments, they were rare, valuable, and worth killing for.
At the far end, a real merchant stood. Military bearing, broad shoulders, a well-maintained uniform from a long-dead army. Tucked under the edge of his stall's tarp, near the ground, was a scavver's mark burned into the frame. An old sigil for "Trade Honest, Blade Ready," meant for those who still remembered the old ways.
On his hip: a hand lance so polished it caught every stray beam of light, gleaming like a weapon from another world.
Warren noted him. Filed it away.
He moved on.
The paths tangled tighter ahead, knots of humanity closing in around stalls selling everything from rat leather boots to strange chemical brews in re-used IV bags.
Warren kept his head down, hands loose, eyes moving.
Not safe.
Never safe.
But safer than the Red.
For now.
Warren moved deeper into the market, the smell of damp earth and sharp oils lingering in the mist. He bartered where he could, trading a few scavenged circuit boards and a packet of dried root slices for necessities: a fresh roll of binding cloth, and a half-used medkit. Nothing luxurious, but enough to stretch his survival another few days.
He circled the weapon stalls again, hoping for something better than the brick wedged in his coat. Blades dulled from use. Spears bent and rusted. Cracked grips and salvaged lances missing half their components. None of it worth trading what little he had left.
He slipped between two traders arguing over the price of preserved meat when he spotted them: Lucas and one of his flunkies, men who wouldn't think twice about jumping him outside the walls.
Lucas locked eyes with him immediately. His mouth curled into a predatory smile. He nudged his companion and broke into a quick jog, weaving through the crowd toward Warren.
"Hey! You! In the yellow jacket!"
Warren bolted.
He pivoted toward the nearest alley between the stalls, heart hammering, shouldering past a merchant hawking cracked solar panels.
Lucas shouted again, his voice sharp and ugly, drawing attention.
Warren ducked under a sagging tarp, cutting through a tangle of hanging gear and scrap. He didn't look back. Didn't need to.
Footsteps pounded behind him. Getting closer.
He angled sideways, slipping between two piles of broken comm equipment, but Lucas' flunky was faster than he expected. The man's hand brushed his coat, snatching air.
Warren twisted left, bolting toward a wider aisle.
Lucas pushed after him, knocking a vendor to the ground without a second glance.
The market wasn't built for straight runs. Stalls closed in, narrow and uneven. Good for losing someone. Bad if you got cornered.
A heavy body loomed ahead, a scavver dragging a pallet of salvage. Warren darted under the pallet handle, scraping his shoulder raw in the squeeze.
Lucas cursed behind him.
Another turn. Another tangle of tarps and hanging wires.
Ahead, an opening.
A hand shot out from the side, grabbing his coat and yanking him sideways.
Warren tensed, ready to fight, but the hand wasn't rough. It pulled him into the shadow of a heavy stall reinforced with old plating.
The merchant. The one whose stall bore the old scavver mark.
"Stay low, kid," the man muttered, shoving a crate aside and nudging Warren behind it. He stepped casually back into place, blocking the view with his bulk just as Lucas stormed past.
Lucas slowed, scanning the crowd. His flunky jogged up behind him, panting.
"Where?" the man hissed.
Lucas snarled. He stalked forward a few paces, peering between the stalls, then shook his head in frustration.
"Gone."
The two moved on, pushing deeper into the market.
The merchant adjusted the crate slightly, giving Warren a better sightline without exposing him.
"You're a little far from safe places, kid," the merchant said gruffly, not unkindly. "This isn't a zone for the soft."
Warren shrugged, pulling a cracked filter mask from his coat and placing it on the table. "Trade?"
The merchant raised an eyebrow. "That still work?"
Warren nodded once.
"Battery's low, seal's warped, but it'll do in a pinch," the merchant said, inspecting it. He gestured toward a box of ration bars. "You can have two."
Warren's gaze drifted to a med-strip and an insulated canister. He pointed.
"Those cost more."
He opened his coat and showed a bent but functional energy cell.
The merchant whistled. "That'll do."
As he set the gear aside, the merchant gave Warren a longer look. "You scavving alone? No crew?"
Warren shook his head.
"Damn. You're what, eleven? Twelve? Hell of a time to be young."
The merchant sighed and slid a third protein bar across the table. "Keep it. You look like you need it more than I do."
Warren took it with a quiet nod.
"Things are getting worse. You know that, right? System's getting twitchier. Heard a guy in East Nine got flagged as hostile just for walking through the wrong checkpoint. Didn't have enough active data or something."
Warren said nothing.
"People say the System's looking for something it can't find. And it doesn't like not finding things."
Warren met his eyes.
"Something called 'Aberrations or some shit like that.' Say the System can't track them. Can't predict them."
"Then how do they know they exist?" Warren asked softly.
The merchant gave a grim chuckle. "Because things happen. Quietly. System nodes go dark. Enforcers don't report back. No evidence. No footage. Just blank space and bodies."
A pause. Then a shrug. "Maybe it's a myth. Or maybe it's real, and it's worse than anything else out here."
The merchant turned away to rearrange some wares.
The merchant grunted and tossed an old filter mask onto the crate beside him. A moment later, he added two battered protein bars, a sealed water pouch, and a coil of thin wire. Real supplies. Real survival gear. Things that could mean the difference between seeing another sunrise or not.
"You look like you need it more than I do."
Warren blinked once, then took the mask with a careful hand. He squeezed a few more items from the man with subtle glances, playing up the battered, half-starved look he wore without trying.
A patched thermal blanket. A half-empty tube of field disinfectant.
The merchant, whose stall bore the old scavver mark, didn't seem to mind. Maybe he saw something in Warren. Maybe he just felt sorry for the kid with nothing but a soaked coat and a brick.
Either way, Warren took what he could get.
While the merchant turned to haggle with another buyer, Warren's hand moved fast. Calm. Certain.
A small satchel hung behind the stall, half-hidden under a rolled tarp.
Warren palmed the opening with two fingers and slipped out the prize.
A fragment. Real. Whole. Weighty with potential.
Warren moved back into the flow of the crowd, heart hammering, the stolen fragment pressing against his ribs like a second heartbeat.
Behind him, the merchant's voice rose in an argument about prices.
No alarm. No shout. No hand closing on his shoulder.
Warren kept walking. Faster now.
But the weight in his coat felt heavier than it should have.
He told himself it was just survival.
He lied