RAW - Chapter 1: In the mouth of dullness.

I rubbed the sleep from my eyes, groaning as I walked to the gates of the local Cheapo-Mart, the oh so great wretched hive of scum and mass production mega mart where I worked. “Ok brain,” I said to myself. “I know you hate me, and sometimes I hate you too, but its six in the morning, so I need you to wake up so I can earn that guap. I want running water this month.” In a clear sign of pure mental anarchy, I felt my face contort and my left eye twitch, giving me that patented sensation of burning needles piercing my skin.

I slapped my face, trying to gain enough cognizance to open the door of the place. Six bazillion mosquitos, flies, and discarded candy wrappers welcome me along with that familiar smell of cheap chlorine and sweat. “Ah right, the Classic Cheapo smell. You know you’re shipping Cheap when the smell somehow gives you acid reflux.”

I walked down the many aisles to a corner of the mega mart, past the drunken hobo that fell asleep on a bed made out of cockroaches and toy cars. It was the meat section, and it was hard to miss, with its huge sign above the barely functional displays that said ‘Actual meat not guaranteed’.

I was in charge of the ‘sausage assembly’. It was as interesting as it sounds.

The door to the section had been stuck since forever –stuck in the sense that it was actually painted on and was never a real door to begin with- so I simply jumped over the displays, careful not to step and slip on the great puke stain of sixty three that simply refused to go away. It is said that whatever shoes stepped on it would forever be haunted by its smell.

I went behind the freezers to look for my partner in crime –since making people pay six cents per Cheapo sausage was an actual crime in several states… and Nantucket- and found him right where I expected him to be, sleeping on top of the ‘Can’t believe it isn’t real meat’ boxes. I slapped him on the back of the head. “Hello, Lester.”

“Glycolysis,” he shouted as his neurons were shaken awake. “I mean… hello Paul.”

“So, my tall yet chubby friend,” I said as grabbed one of those fluffy freezer jackets from the floor and shook all the rats off.” You ready to partake on yet another grand adventure of the mundane and insanely maddening exercise that is poorly paid manual labor?”

“No.” He adjusted his glasses as he stood up. “But I don’t think it matters. Nothing really matters if you really think about it.”

I laughed. “Oh Lester, your pessimism really cheers me up. No matter how miserable I think I am, the fact that I know you’re here to share my misery always makes me feel all warm and fussy inside. Well, it’s either you or the nuclear fusion batteries that keep this antiques we call ’freezers’ running to barely legal levels.”

“Oh how I wished I had your natural excitement,” Lester said with slumped shoulders.

“Funny you say that, because I have none right now.” I opened the first freezer. “Smell that? Smells of…  tedium.”

“Didn’t know tedium smelled like warm beef blood and ammonia.” Lester picked up some old, wet boxes from the floor.

And so began yet another day, just like all the others. Uninteresting, boring, dull, repetitive, and in the end, mundane. Not even the haunted carts that moved on their own from aisle twenty two that went by in front of our section made it fun anymore.

CyRun - Chapter 5

“Hey, what do you think is his deal?” a bodyguard wearing a hat asked one of his colleagues as they entered the kitchen and saw Gabe, putting some salt on his fingertips. He was on the table, eating a plate of very thinly sliced red meat, eyes closed as if enjoying every morsel.

Three men entered the kitchen and closed the door behind them, all of them part of Medici’s outfit, and they didn’t look too pleased, specially the one in the middle, with eyebrows arching forward. They didn’t know who he was or why he had helped their boss, but they didn’t care. They didn’t appreciate a total stranger coming in as if he owned the place.

“I don’t know, but he has kind of a face you just want to punch, doesn’t he?” said the bodyguard to the left, loudly and on purpose, he wanted the man in front of him to hear him. Half of his face was grafted, with pieces of metal and cables going in and out of it.

“You’re right about that. Wonder if he ever knows how to fire a gun,” said the one to the left, who looked normal except for the cybernetic left eye. He took a step forward, hands on his pocket, feeling with intense bravado. “This son of a bitch walked right into the wolf’s den and doesn’t even know it.”

The one on the front, sunglasses covering his eyes, walked until he was in front of the table, the man being an arm away. The other two bodyguards quickly followed him, “Tell you what you son of a bitch, this is how it’s going to go down. You are going to drop your fucking wiseguy act and get the fuck out of our faces, you see?” He opened his coat. He was armed. Gabe’s didn’t open his eyes. “We know who you are,” the man said, and Gabe smiled for a second. “Do you find it amusing, dead guy? Ok, I’ll tell you this then, the second you leave we’re going to track you down, and you’re going to give us whatever credits the old man gave you, or we’re going to slice your fucking throat open.” The man raised his voice, “You fucking heard me?”

Gabe finished his plate. The three soldiers expected to see him at least shaking. He wasn’t. After a second, Gabe nodded, stood up,  plate in hand, and opened his eyes.

“Good, now get the fuck ou-“

Gabe punched the middle bodyguard on the neck before he could finish his sentence. He clutched his neck before jerking back and falling to the ground. While the other two men reached for their guns, Gabe threw the plate at the right one’s face, knocking him out cold, before reaching for the salt shaker on the table and smashing on the last bodyguard. He reached for his face as he fell to the floor, small drips of blood seeping through his fingers.

Gabe closed his eyes and shook his head. “Pointless.”

He turned around and was about to ask for another plate he heard the kitchen door open behind him. He looked over his shoulder; hand on the gun resting inside his jacket. On the door there was a balding man with the left half of his face being completely cybernetic, metal, plugs, and exposed wiring were his skin should be. “Hey Gabe, Medici is calling for you.” He put his cybernetic hand on the doorframe, the pinkie finger crooked backwards, as it had failed and never repaired. His eyes darted to the floor, “What the fuck just happened here?”

Gabe said nothing as he turned to face the man, his hands on his pocket, his expression cold and careless to the point it seemed like he was bored out of his mind. He walked towards the door and stood right in front of the other man. The man trembled the second their eyes met, overwhelmed by Gabe’s presence. Gabe limited himself to smirk and pat the man on his shoulder. “They tripped,” he said as he left towards Medici’s office, leaving the man scratching his head in confusion.          

CyRun - Chapter 4

"Ok doc, you take good care of her," old man Medici said to the auger, a thin man with a black coat and glasses. The doctor nodded as he signaled two men to push the stretcher carrying the wounded bodyguard away. The auger walked behind them towards a gate set on the opposite side of the garage.

After he was done, Medici massaged his eyelids and sighed. “I need to go to my office. You.” He pointed at the stranger. “Walk with me.”

As they both made their way to the same gates the auger had gone through, all of his men followed him like lost puppies. “But sir, what are we going to do about that dreger Varnetti?”

“Later,” Medici waved his arm as he quickened his pace, eager to get away of his men.

“Boss,” someone said. “Fat Larry called, he’s asking when we make the delivery.”

“Tell him.” Medici pointed at his soldier while still walking, “That he’ll have it when we have it, and not a day before.” 

“Boss, there’s also—“

Medici stopped and turned back. “God dammit, don’t you idiots get a hint? I need to think, and I can’t do that when you’re all fucking talking every five seconds.” He sighed. “Now, I know there are things to do, but if you hadn’t realized we have a dirty dreger breathing down our collective necks and I know you think we can just go to war, blow a couple of cars, kill random thugs and pushers and call it a day. But it doesn’t work like that. We need to watch our moves, come up with a plan, and I can’t do that if you guys don’t shut up.”

His men stood back, some with eyes wide open, some looking down and away. They were scared. No one wanted to make their boss mad, especially when said boss was a well-known crime boss. 

The mysterious man didn’t even flinch. It wasn’t as if he didn’t care or didn’t know what Medici was, or in what company he was in.

“You.” Medici waved at him, “Let’s go. The others.” Medici closed his eyes and massaged his temples, trying to think really fast of something that wouldn’t get whatever muscle he had left killed. “If you don’t need to go out to push your merch, don’t. If you have any pending business, use your phones and add more proxies and blanks to your stash. If you think someone from Varnetti’s side has taken your slab or territory, don’t bother going back. You’re just going to get yourself cratered.”

His men remained silent after hearing his message. Medici thought that was good enough and kept moving, the mysterious man behind him with his hands inside his black jacket pockets.

They first went through a spacious living room or lounge. A hybrid of old and new, it had several monitors and lights embedded on its walls yet it had repo-wood tables, chairs, and even a sofa in each corner. It also had a flickering wall-sized virtual display, failing to simulate a window.

It had seen better days. Some of the lights were off, and some of the walls showed cracks, revealing the rusty, metallic foundations.

Two corridors later, they ended up on a small office. It had several paintings on the left side, a bookcase on the back, and a real window on the right wall, looking out into the dreary and rainy city night. The mysterious man was surprised none of the neon lights of the city seeped inside the room, the only real light coming from a lamp on a wooden desk.

Medici sat behind the desk and waved his at the man. “Please, sit down… erm…” He raised an eyebrow and looked away, as if trying to remember something. “You know, I think I never asked your name.”

The man sat down on one of the two chairs in front of the desk. “Gabe.”

“What’s that?”

The man crossed his arms. “Gabe.”

Medici nodded, “Gabe. All right. I like it, it’s a good name.”

Gabe said nothing. He stared at Medici with cold, emotionless eyes.

“My name is Christofano Medici, head of the Medici family. I think you’re smart enough for me not having to explain what kind of business we run over here.”

Gabe nodded.

Medici laughed as he lit a cigar. “That already makes you smarter than half of my men. I’ve seen you’re very resourceful and you have a very important thing a lot of people lack nowadays.” He opened his palm, hand half-closed, “You have big balls.”

Medici expected his comments to cause at least a reaction on the man sitting in front of him, but he didn’t even chuckle, his expression remaining completely blank. It was beginning to make him somewhat nervous, but he knew how to hide that.

Medici took a slow drag from his cigar, pressed a button on a keyboard of a computer resting on his desk and said, “I’m going to offer you something. You like money, that is obvious. So, there are two ways we can do things, either I pay you right now and we end our business relationship here…”

Gabe reached inside his jacket.

“Or I can pay you more and you stick around because I could use a man like you on my organization. Just name your price.”

Gabe stopped mid motion, closed his eyes, and nodded. He took a small card reader from inside his jacket, typed something on a small keypad on top of it, and handed it to Medici.

“All right, seems reasonable,” Medici said as he took a look at the small display on the reader. “I’ll double it, and you stick around, deal?”

Gabe nodded.

Medici swiped a card on the little machine and gave it back. He stood up, Gabe doing the same, and Medici walked him to the door. “There’s food and drinks on the fridge. Don’t bother the autocook too much and be careful who you call if you decide to use one of our phones, I’ll know who you’re talking to and what you’re saying. Oh, and one last thing: the second floor is off limits. You got that?”

“Sure,” said Gabe with his usual deep voice.

Medici smiled as he patted him on the shoulder. “Good. Nice doing business with you.”

CyRun - Chapter 3

“That’s the place,” Mancini said as he pointed to one of the many skyscrapers in the city. 

The mysterious man drove the car out of the lane and, while hovering around the skyscraper, “Floor.”

“Oh, right. Erm, thirty seven.” Then as if realizing that wasn’t the smartest thing to say since all floors looked almost identical from the outside, “Five floors above this one.”

The man nodded as he drove the vehicle and began circling were Medici said. The old man raised his forearm centimeters from his chin and flipped his arm-phone open. Common as dirt, cheap, and fully equipped to the point of being comparable to a portable computer, they were covered by synth skin and surrounded by adaptable flexo skin to accommodate to the person’s forearm size.  He typed something on it before saying, “Hey Lou, it’s me. Open the garage.”

“Boss, what happened?” Lou asked. “We heard there were shots fired in the restaurant, are you all right?”

“Of course I’m all right. If I wasn’t I wouldn’t be here, I would be dead or on a crater in the lower levels. Now do as I tell you instead of asking the obvious.” Then he remembered his bodyguard. “And get the auger to the hangar. Silvia is hurt, badly.”

Augers were doctors who specialized in cybernetic implants and grafts. 

“All right, boss,” Lou said. “Just give me a moment.” Medici sighed before closing his phone.

After a handful of seconds, two huge gates on a side of the building opened wide. “Go inside.” 

The mysterious man nodded and did so, the gates closing behind him as he landed the vehicle inside the hangar. There where several people waiting for them already, all wearing suits and ties. They were his bodyguards, who quickly circled the car the second it landed. The stranger kept his expression cold and careless.

Medici got out of the car, hands quickly on his coat’s pockets. “Boss,” shouted one of the men as they walked towards him. “You all right?”

The old man massaged his eyelids. “Are you deaf or just stupid? I already told you I’m fine, Lou. Now where’s that auger?”

The mysterious man got out of the car without saying a word. Half of the people surrounding the car ran towards Medici and covered him, while the other half surrounded the stranger. All of them brandished shotguns from their suits. “Stop right there, mother fucker,” shouted one who was wearing sunglasses.

If the stranger was at all surprised or scared, like always, he didn’t show it, his eyes remaining half closed as if his life being in danger and having several shotgun pointing at him was nothing more than a nuisance.

The man who shouted walked towards him, shotgun pointing at the stranger’s face. “Who the hell are you? Who send you?”

“Wait,” Medici shouted, but it fell on deaf ears.

“Say behind us, boss,” said one of the people circling Medici, putting one of his hands on the old man’s right shoulder to pull him closer behind him. “We’ll take care of this.”

The man with sunglasses walked towards the mysterious man. “Who the fuck sent you?” 

The mysterious man said nothing. The bodyguard with sunglasses took a step towards him before cocking his shotgun. “Speak, you mother fuc—“

The stranger lounged forward with his arm extended, grabbed the bodyguard’s shotgun, pulled it away from him, and by the time everyone had a chance to do something about it, the bodyguard with glasses had his own shotgun pointed at his face, the eyes of the mysterious man remaining cold and almost soulless.

Everyone shouted obscenities and gasped as they took a step back, still pointing at him with his weapons. The stranger looked around. They were all shaking.

“Stop,” old man Medici had seen enough. He knew the stranger was far too fast for any of them, even when all of them had cybernetics implanted. The moment his bodyguards had doubted, they had lost. “God dammit you fucking imbeciles, he is with me,” he shouted.

“What?” One of this bodyguards asked.

“You fools, he’s the one that got me out. I’m alive thanks to him.” He walked out of the circle that his muscle had done around him. “Now drop your fucking guns, all of you, before we kill one another only because you don’t listen.”

His body guards looked around nervously, since there was a person they didn’t know pointing a shotgun at one of them, but they knew better than to disobey Medici. They lowered their guns.

“Now, you.” Medici pointed at the stranger. “Give him the shotgun back.”

The mysterious man looked at Medici. Even with his half open eyes, there was a glint of intensity on them. “You owe me.”

Medici raised an eyebrow, taken aback but quickly recovering. “Yes, I know, I’ll pay you. Now do as I told you.”

The stranger looked at the bodyguard with sunglasses in front of him, who by that point had his hands raised. He grunted before giving him his weapon back. The bodyguard took it without skipping a beat before taking several steps back.

“Now, where the hell is that auger?” shouted Medici.