There are days when you have at least the illusion of choice. This is not one of them.

There are days when you doubt that anything you do will ever justify your existence. Bingo.

Disenchantment

I knew it was a shit hunter sheet when I walked into the briefing room. It was one of those moments your stomach turns into a cold lump of steal and lands on your bladder like a lead weight. It was so bad I had to put down the coffee. Ok theoretically I could have refused it. But in my experience “No” is not a good word to give these people. They usually find something much worse to fill your time. Or if they are feeling really humorous – the same thing but for much less. The short version being that theoretically has never been more than a pipe dream.

So. here I am, sitting on a gauss train heading to the other end of the world, again; with a head full of data about a job I really don’t want; sure in the knowledge that, by the end of the day there would be one less person on this cesspool of a planet; and desperately trying to remember a time when this seemed like a good idea.

For the three hundredth and forty seventh time since I signed the paper work to be come one of Slayers hired goons I contemplate cancelling my LAD account and phoning my financier and telling him what a TALENTLESS SHIT he really is. I got as far as getting the required forms of LAD once. But the prospect of twenty three pages of tight small print kind of put me off. Yes sad to say dear observer, the only think keeping me alive right now is complete an utter apathy. I’d like to die but I can’t be arsed to do the paper work.

I review the task for the day. The sheet relates to a feral ebon, sans deathsuit they assure me, though they could be less reassuring about the prospect of glyph cards. She, based on the limited images and name, is thought to be hanging around some downtown sewer complex. Sewer complex. David Greys hints to contract killers on Sewers runs through my mind. He implies that LAD will be pointless in downtown sewers. May be this will be my lucky day after all, assuming this bitch is anything like a reasonable opponent. I remind myself I have never been that lucky.

The train stops at the closest it will ever get to my destination and I force myself from the seat. As much as staying on the train, claiming I missed the stop to those bureaucratic dick heads back in head office, some how I think they are more likely to believe a diamond dog ate my home work. I grab my bag of tricks and head out onto the ‘street’.

Street is a bit of a grand name for this semi-collapsed concrete and steel. My ITB mutilator boots (hey they work well enough for Sanction) clank where the metal is exposed, the noise bounces back off the uneven surfaces, filling the walkway. Good job I never planning on sneaking anywhere. The Drone buzzes around slightly, an indication that the fuckwit on the other end has woken up for once. I give him the finger just to let him know I care as much about him as he does about me. Still it insures he won’t be watching what I do too closely on this one.

Ok so that’s not the way its meant to be. Contract killers are meant to be all lime light and fame. Just like Gorezone says so. Thing is the ones you see all are. Ok so that’s bleeding obvious. What I mean is killers like me don’t get air time, that doesn’t mean we don’t exist, you just don’t see us much. The only reason we are tolerated at all is because we’ll take the crap un-photogenic jobs that pretty boys, like the aforementioned Sanction, would never touch. Stuff like this, which would make him “look bad to the fans.” You know – the shite stuff.

Reality reminds me of the accuracy of that thought as I reach the sewer grate. Its over flowing and some of the more identifiable things floating on the surface are definitely human turds. I seal up the armour, check my air supply and descend into the cloaca.

It’s dark and thick. Motion sensors are useless because all they say is ‘every thing is moving’. The enviro-sensor is scrolling a list of nastys with overly long chemical looking names that means nothing to me. As long as they don’t eat through the ceramic I should be ok. Drowning in this stuff does not appeal. I’m working on touch alone. Fortunately the ladder is new and well secured. If there is one advantage in the totally unoriginal way that morts architects work its that things never change. As expected, once my feet run out of ladder, an arms length from the metal up-struts I encounter the curved edge of an Iris hatch and, following that round, the card reader.

I keep a strong grip on the ladder as I thrust the card through the reader. The drone is less lucky. As the crap level drops clear of my visor I get a perfect view of it; dead in the water, it bounces off the edge of the iris before being washed away into the darkness beyond. My defence is that I didn’t think the controller would be so stupid to put such a valuable piece of equipment in a column of liquid shit. His mistake – not mine. Hopefully the play back will confirm that or I could be facing yet another fine. It occurs to me that he may have deliberately jeopardised the camera to get his own back for the finger earlier. In which case he is not only a twat, he is a rich twat.

Regardless, I am now effectively on my own. No matter, the finance chip images will confirm the kill. And it’s not like this job is going to be a threat to Third eye’s lead.

The iris hatch arrangement leaves a pool of ankle deep water. The space beyond was probably dry before I cracked open the door. The sewer beyond leads away at a steep downward slope that means with any luck I wont have to swim again. However it is obvious which way the flood went; The edge of my torch light picks up streamers of excrement caught on the pipes and ducts beyond.

I flash the light round before making my way carefully into the sewer. The briefing suggested I started by search of the target at a junction point a couple of hundred yards down from this hatch. It is likely that the water I released will have been noticed. So they will know I am coming. Good.

I give myself time, listening into the darkness. Sound in a sewer can be your worse enemy and your greatest friend. Depends on how you use it. Observe. I know the situation behind me is clear. Thus any sound is from ahead of me. The release of water will have pushed any of the normal sewer inhabitants away from my position. Survival of the fittest means that anything down here with more than half a brain will run at the sound of a flash flood. [See there was method in my apparent madness]. Thus anything I hear now between me and the water is the target, and what ever guards she may have picked up. And I hear….. Nothing…

I knock the flash light and visor onto UV, The shit glows like the Kr’th fire flies I saw on a Lonely Planet Special a few months back. I wondered at the time why they looked so familiar.

This is a standard complex B67/a lay out. So I have a 6 in 1 drop a head of me for forty meters, followed by level section of ten meters with a access hatch halfway along, on the left, to the power ducts. Then another 8 in 1 descent for one hundred meters to the junction point I am heading for. Like I said Sla architects will never win wards of originality. I wonder some times how New Parisian ops cope with their ‘revolutionary and daring’ structures. It must be hard when you actually have to look up maps every time. Still if propaganda is to be believed New Parisian ‘odour toilet’ smells a little more fragrant that Morts.

I pause in the hope of hearing something, but no such luck. Nothing but semi glowing shite disturbs the uniformity of the pipe. As I approach the junction I can make out breathing, caught short with fear.

She is in the workers alcove, just as I expected. Its about the one place she could stay dry and away from the constant trickle of shit down the walls.

Like I said the photo wasn’t brilliant, She is younger than I’d guessed, may be sixteen, little more than a child really. Her sky blue hair is plastered to her thin frame by the shit stained water. She is dressed in that popular kids fashion with badly faked blood splats and bullet holes. Despite what you may think, the irony of it is not lost on me. She probably spent more on that jump suit than I’ll earn from this sheet. And she is shivering, could be with cold, could be with fear. She looks at me with those pupil-less eyes as I raise the GA Invigorator K Her voice carries more spirit than I expect. “I haven’t done anything to you. I haven’t done anything to anyone. Why?”

I add it to the list of questions I can’t be bothered to find the answers too.

And pull the trigger.