Three days. It took three days for the recruiter to contact me again by phone.
"Thank you," A deep, but oddly straight voice put my thoughts away from my phone and I smiled as the large Tusk patted my back, the movement of his arms caused his orange worker clothes to tighten around his large bicep. "We appreciate the help." His arms swept to his right where a bunch of muscled guys of all species were talking to each other, laughing. Showing that lunch, as usual, is lively.
"I'm more than happy to come back," I said, throwing both my hands in my pockets and grasping the roll of Digits handed to me a few seconds ago."And I probably will?"
"That sounded like a question." He asked as the two of us started walking to where the rest of the movers are. "You found a proper job yet?"
I scratched my head, "Ah... well, I was just waiting for someone to call me again."
And thankfully, three days later, he actually did. And after spending the first day sitting around my room, staring at my phone while feeling anxious that he won't call me back because I'm still too green as a merc, I decided to get up and actually do something until he decides to contact me again and that's how I've been working with movers for the past two days, earning money on the hourly which we collect at the end of the day.
Or, in my case, I decided to take it during lunch because I had other things to do- When one is working with the corpses of men killing monsters, I guess a little bit of flexibility when it comes to the income gets passed.
"Ah. Hope it works out for you then."
"Thanks." I pocketed the 28 Digits I made from four hours of work and left the premises of Broker Dam's bottom half, walking back to the set of elevators and quickly getting back up to the middle of the city where the entrance lay.
Finding a train had been quick and I had more than enough money to get a ride to lower Gloria with more to spare. The ride had been silent and nothing much happened during that time, I just sat next to a bunch of hard looking people who didn't mind while I wear my costume inside the cart.
Thanks to th speed of the train, I managed to appreciate the scenery as we passed them by, and watched things go from the clean, bronze colored entrance of Broker's Dam to the ruined streets of the slums and then back to the clean concrete walls lit up with neon light as we arrived at Lower Gloria had been fascinating, if not slow and tedious. In the far distance, I saw the glass skyscrapers of the upper parts, their pointed tips touched the clouds as several dots of colored lights streaked across the skyline like meteors to a night sky.
"Arriving at-"
"Oh thank god-" A Duskkin woman with metal for arms in front of me slumped down and slid down her chair like some sort of slug. Brown hair flew across her face as another Duskkin opened the window right next to him. He pat the woman and she eyed him with a smile, "Thanks," he nodded but said nothing more. After that, silence. Then her eyes moved over to look at me and she said, "Alright, fuck it, I'm way too curious why we're sitting with a goth clown, might as well ask right?" She faced a female Tusk to her right and a human right next to me as if looking for affirmation.
The Tusk grunted, "Do what ya want' jus' don' regret it." And then quickly stood up and left, followed shortly by the androgynous human who said-
"She's right." Judging from his voice, I think he might be male.
With a beaming face, the Duskkin faced me, "What's up with you?"
"Nothing," I said with a shrug, "Just a mutant going to Lower Gloria for a job."
"Ah! So a merc then?" I nodded, "Huh, just like us. You have a team ye- Aghgf!" The bulky hand of the female Tusk who left earlier covered her mouth before looking at me with a vicious grin that I don't doubt she thought was friendly.
"Forgiv' er' ya?" I nodded, her grin went wide. "Sorry bout that."
"It's nothing." I stood up and left the seat and watched as the two girls whispered to each other like schoolchildren. After two steps, I got curious and decided to boost my ears to listen in to what the Tusk had to say to the Duskkin-
"Did ya see his ID?!" A gruff but feminine voice said with a scolding tone.
"YES. And he looked alone! Telling him to join us is a good idea! What if I succeeded?!"
"Yer stupid then! What makes' ya think that he's jus' gonna join us'??" Despite the childish way they bickered, I still found out that I smirked. They seemed friendly enough with each other that if they asked, I probably would have joined.
I left the train and waded through the station's crowd as they pushed past each other to get into the Neon District, which I didn't get since most of them are undoubtedly here for the services provided by the place. I sighed as I walked past three groups of teens with small bodies that have little to no muscle, talking to each other as if they were just going to a trip to The Market. I thought it was a shame that they're spending their money on a prostitute. 'And so early, too.'
The time is only what? 2 in the afternoon? 'God.'
I walked into the drug ridden streets of Lower Gloria and headed out. With my costume on, I didn't need to bother with taking detours to the "cafe" I was supposed to meet the recruiter in and as luck would have it, the group that sat next to me in the train looks to be heading in the same place. I did my best to ignore the burning look the female Duskkin was shooting me with as I walked alongside them. That burning look turned into excitement when she realized we were both walking into the same building.
Havvey's Place for Tea is supposedly a popular place for mercs to meet up and according to what I've heard, the people going there have no intention of hiding that fact in any way whatsoever. And apparently, it turning out this way is intentional for the owner's part and rumors of them designing the building to look like an old-timey "meet up bar" that one can see in movies is the exact reason why the first mercenaries went here because according to them; no one would actually believe that mercenaries are stupid enough to go into an establishment seemingly catered to them.
I stopped when The Duskkin suddenly rushed away from her group and into the cafe's doors, "You go first." I nodded, gesturing with my hand out.
"Thank you." She did a mock bow that the people of the upper parts are known for and entered the face with a vicious grin- Which she shot at the Tusk in the distance and I watched her as she rolled her eyes just as I went into the building.
Unsurprisingly, the bar is exactly what I'd expected; Large, muscled men and women sitting on old wooden chairs around circular wooden tables, both of which aren't polished. A counter with barrels of beer and buckets of ice is placed at the far back, and behind it, manning the place is a humanoid robot without any synthetic skin, showing the world all of its skeletal glory without any shame. Even when it's the only futuristic thing here, the lack of skin actually made the robot fit in with the rest of the place's design, which, I guess is intentional.
That theory got a little bit stronger as it watched me take a seat with its glowing red eyes while its body remained still, unmoving and continuing to wipe the glass cup on its hands.
I found myself a seat directly in front of the bar and near the room's center. As I got comfortable, I heard the sound of a chair's legs scraping against the floor and I turned to see the Duskkin loudly settling down on a table directly next to mine, she waved at me and I nodded, "I thought that you'd pick a seat by the walls to look cooler or something."
I raised my eyebrow and looked at the large ceiling fan above me, 'And what? Miss out on this?' The tables by the walls don't even have anything related to ventilation. She followed my gaze and giggled, "Fair enough. Exposure to cold air is so much better than looking cool right?"
"I don't want to look cool though." I replied.
"And why're ya so friendly towards him?" I looked at the angry looking Tusk who barged into the Duskkin's table with the force of a rampaging bull and grabbed her by the arm. For a second, she stopped and apologized to me and when I said it was fine, she went back to trying to kill the Duskkin with a glare, "Ya don' jus' try to recruit random people!" I flinched when she slammed both her hands into the table, "We talked about this'!"
"Please, as if you don't want an actual B lister on our team-"
"What? Course' I don'! What makes ya think that?!" She cut the Duskkin off with a yell. When she was done, the Tusk looked at me with her eyes in concern.
Then the Duskkin replied and the two of them went on to argue about things that I couldn't quite catch. Something about better team compositions or something like that.
"If you're all gonna act like little kids, you should leave." We all turned to face the speaker, a human with a scar on the side of his lip that circled down to his chin. Growling he pointed to the two girls with a metallic finger with internals that beeped in red light, "You're all ruining someone's peace and quiet-" His finger went to himself, "Another's phone call-" His finger moved to point at a glaring woman with a line going down from her right forehead and down to her eye, stopping in between obvious screws embedded into her skin.
As the man's hand moved to point at me, I watched as something writhed underneath the skin, "-And worse of all, I don't think your little friend is gonna appreciate what you're doing. Ain't that right?"
I shook my head, "Sort of." I vaguely answered. They were acting a bit... unprofessional for Mercs so he's not wrong on that part but... eh? Still- 'They're basically a suicide squad ready to form.'
The Duskkin settled down and so did the Tusk, "I thought that he'd like how close we are to each other."
"Well, it ain't working." The man added before leaning back on his chair and grabbing the mug of beer on his table.
The Duskkin faced me with a grimacing expression, "Sorry." she apologized.
"There's nothing to say sorry for." I replied.
She smiled, "Thanks."
Again, there's no point in saying thank you. I didn't say anything though, simply looked at her. 'There's probably gonna be a back and forth if I did.' I thought and eyed the man with mods on his hands. 'That, or its his entire arm.' One can never really tell with Synthetic Skin.
"Since all of you already met each other, let's get down to the job immediately." I and the Duskkin's team all turned to look at the recruiter. Compared to when I met him three days ago, the man wore clothes that fit the aesthetic of the Neon District; with black pants and a colorful shirt full of flowers underneath a black sleeveless motorcycle jacket. Starting from his elbow and down to his wrist, a servo was visible through the glass surface of his right arm.
The recruiter sat on the table of the other team and fixed his sunglasses, "Take a seat," a gloved hand beckoned me to come over, "come on, don't be shy."
So I did and the stares the other team was sending me made me feel uncomfortable, "Sorry about the bad first impression," I said as I pulled a chair. I took a seat, "I probably seemed cold don't I?"
"Nah. Not at all. You were right for acting that way." The male Duskkin replied, "Besides, believe it or not, we already knew who you were, even back in the train."
The female Duskkin nodded with a grin, "Accurate." She snapped her fingers, "Honestly, we kinda- sort of followed you on purpose back when we saw you at the Dam. You did fit his description after all."
"So you were gouging me out?" They shrugged and the Tusk said 'Sort of.' - Which, I guess if they're gonna act casual, so will I. I let myself relax and popped up my elbows on the table, "And here I thought the world was small."
The Duskkin snorted, "You wish." she pinched the bridge of her nose, "Coincidences rarely happen. Believe it or not."
"Right." I silently agreed with a nod, "Then what if I wasn't the guy?"
The Tusk snorted, "What if?" Her eyes went up and down my body, "How many people wear a mas' like yers'?"
The Duskkin nodded, "And even if you believe the opposite, your wardrobe is kinda..." Her two hands raised themselves in a manicure position and she started moving them left and right, "...mundane."
She pursed her lips, "No offense?"
"None taken," I replied.
Something hit my shoulder and I subconsciously boosted myself. Even then, I almost fell. I grabbed the modded hand by the finger and threw it back into the table. I looked at the recruiter's servo'd arm and glared.
He returned it with a grin, "Come on! She got it too you know?" I faced the Duskkin and saw that she was rubbing her shoulder. "And I must say, you're actually pretty tough. Never thought you would be standing after that."
I rolled my shoulders, "It stung." I said.
"Yeah, yeah, don't be a bitch." The eyes underneath his sunglasses rolled as his right hand went inside his jacket to pull out a brown envelope that he quickly tossed onto the table, "Now, for the job, this one's gonna be simple." Everyone faced him with a serious expressions, "You all listening? Good- So I know that I'm a very trusted man here in the mercenary world, you know me right? I give out fair jobs and stuff-"
He opened the envelope and showed it to all of us, I got a glimpse and the mission showed that it was an attack on a gang warehouse- typical mercenary work thanks to the gangs. "So you know that even with what's written, this is practically safe."
"This is in the Queen's territory," Oliver pointed out and I agreed, Queen is one of Ace's unsavory capes.
"Yeah, but are you in? The pay's well." The recruiter simply shrugged and pointed out the pay.
All four mercs turned to me, their faces questioning. "Are you guys gonna take it?" I asked. They nodded. "Then why not?" I said, not letting out my thoughts of trusting myself to escape and leave them behind when things go bad.
Three days. It took three days for the recruiter to contact me again by phone.
"Thank you," A deep, but oddly straight voice put my thoughts away from my phone and I smiled as the large Tusk patted my back, the movement of his arms caused his orange worker clothes to tighten around his large bicep. "We appreciate the help." His arms swept to his right where a bunch of muscled guys of all species were talking to each other, laughing. Showing that lunch, as usual, is lively.
"I'm more than happy to come back," I said, throwing both my hands in my pockets and grasping the roll of Digits handed to me a few seconds ago."And I probably will?"
"That sounded like a question." He asked as the two of us started walking to where the rest of the movers are. "You found a proper job yet?"
I scratched my head, "Ah... well, I was just waiting for someone to call me again."
And thankfully, three days later, he actually did. And after spending the first day sitting around my room, staring at my phone while feeling anxious that he won't call me back because I'm still too green as a merc, I decided to get up and actually do something until he decides to contact me again and that's how I've been working with movers for the past two days, earning money on the hourly which we collect at the end of the day.
Or, in my case, I decided to take it during lunch because I had other things to do- When one is working with the corpses of men killing monsters, I guess a little bit of flexibility when it comes to the income gets passed.
"Ah. Hope it works out for you then."
"Thanks." I pocketed the 28 Digits I made from four hours of work and left the premises of Broker Dam's bottom half, walking back to the set of elevators and quickly getting back up to the middle of the city where the entrance lay.
Finding a train had been quick and I had more than enough money to get a ride to lower Gloria with more to spare. The ride had been silent and nothing much happened during that time, I just sat next to a bunch of hard looking people who didn't mind while I wear my costume inside the cart.
Thanks to th speed of the train, I managed to appreciate the scenery as we passed them by, and watched things go from the clean, bronze colored entrance of Broker's Dam to the ruined streets of the slums and then back to the clean concrete walls lit up with neon light as we arrived at Lower Gloria had been fascinating, if not slow and tedious. In the far distance, I saw the glass skyscrapers of the upper parts, their pointed tips touched the clouds as several dots of colored lights streaked across the skyline like meteors to a night sky.
"Arriving at-"
"Oh thank god-" A Duskkin woman with metal for arms in front of me slumped down and slid down her chair like some sort of slug. Brown hair flew across her face as another Duskkin opened the window right next to him. He pat the woman and she eyed him with a smile, "Thanks," he nodded but said nothing more. After that, silence. Then her eyes moved over to look at me and she said, "Alright, fuck it, I'm way too curious why we're sitting with a goth clown, might as well ask right?" She faced a female Tusk to her right and a human right next to me as if looking for affirmation.
The Tusk grunted, "Do what ya want' jus' don' regret it." And then quickly stood up and left, followed shortly by the androgynous human who said-
"She's right." Judging from his voice, I think he might be male.
With a beaming face, the Duskkin faced me, "What's up with you?"
"Nothing," I said with a shrug, "Just a mutant going to Lower Gloria for a job."
"Ah! So a merc then?" I nodded, "Huh, just like us. You have a team ye- Aghgf!" The bulky hand of the female Tusk who left earlier covered her mouth before looking at me with a vicious grin that I don't doubt she thought was friendly.
"Forgiv' er' ya?" I nodded, her grin went wide. "Sorry bout that."
"It's nothing." I stood up and left the seat and watched as the two girls whispered to each other like schoolchildren. After two steps, I got curious and decided to boost my ears to listen in to what the Tusk had to say to the Duskkin-
"Did ya see his ID?!" A gruff but feminine voice said with a scolding tone.
"YES. And he looked alone! Telling him to join us is a good idea! What if I succeeded?!"
"Yer stupid then! What makes' ya think that he's jus' gonna join us'??" Despite the childish way they bickered, I still found out that I smirked. They seemed friendly enough with each other that if they asked, I probably would have joined.
I left the train and waded through the station's crowd as they pushed past each other to get into the Neon District, which I didn't get since most of them are undoubtedly here for the services provided by the place. I sighed as I walked past three groups of teens with small bodies that have little to no muscle, talking to each other as if they were just going to a trip to The Market. I thought it was a shame that they're spending their money on a prostitute. 'And so early, too.'
The time is only what? 2 in the afternoon? 'God.'
I walked into the drug ridden streets of Lower Gloria and headed out. With my costume on, I didn't need to bother with taking detours to the "cafe" I was supposed to meet the recruiter in and as luck would have it, the group that sat next to me in the train looks to be heading in the same place. I did my best to ignore the burning look the female Duskkin was shooting me with as I walked alongside them. That burning look turned into excitement when she realized we were both walking into the same building.
Havvey's Place for Tea is supposedly a popular place for mercs to meet up and according to what I've heard, the people going there have no intention of hiding that fact in any way whatsoever. And apparently, it turning out this way is intentional for the owner's part and rumors of them designing the building to look like an old-timey "meet up bar" that one can see in movies is the exact reason why the first mercenaries went here because according to them; no one would actually believe that mercenaries are stupid enough to go into an establishment seemingly catered to them.
I stopped when The Duskkin suddenly rushed away from her group and into the cafe's doors, "You go first." I nodded, gesturing with my hand out.
"Thank you." She did a mock bow that the people of the upper parts are known for and entered the face with a vicious grin- Which she shot at the Tusk in the distance and I watched her as she rolled her eyes just as I went into the building.
Unsurprisingly, the bar is exactly what I'd expected; Large, muscled men and women sitting on old wooden chairs around circular wooden tables, both of which aren't polished. A counter with barrels of beer and buckets of ice is placed at the far back, and behind it, manning the place is a humanoid robot without any synthetic skin, showing the world all of its skeletal glory without any shame. Even when it's the only futuristic thing here, the lack of skin actually made the robot fit in with the rest of the place's design, which, I guess is intentional.
That theory got a little bit stronger as it watched me take a seat with its glowing red eyes while its body remained still, unmoving and continuing to wipe the glass cup on its hands.
I found myself a seat directly in front of the bar and near the room's center. As I got comfortable, I heard the sound of a chair's legs scraping against the floor and I turned to see the Duskkin loudly settling down on a table directly next to mine, she waved at me and I nodded, "I thought that you'd pick a seat by the walls to look cooler or something."
I raised my eyebrow and looked at the large ceiling fan above me, 'And what? Miss out on this?' The tables by the walls don't even have anything related to ventilation. She followed my gaze and giggled, "Fair enough. Exposure to cold air is so much better than looking cool right?"
"I don't want to look cool though." I replied.
"And why're ya so friendly towards him?" I looked at the angry looking Tusk who barged into the Duskkin's table with the force of a rampaging bull and grabbed her by the arm. For a second, she stopped and apologized to me and when I said it was fine, she went back to trying to kill the Duskkin with a glare, "Ya don' jus' try to recruit random people!" I flinched when she slammed both her hands into the table, "We talked about this'!"
"Please, as if you don't want an actual B lister on our team-"
"What? Course' I don'! What makes ya think that?!" She cut the Duskkin off with a yell. When she was done, the Tusk looked at me with her eyes in concern.
Then the Duskkin replied and the two of them went on to argue about things that I couldn't quite catch. Something about better team compositions or something like that.
"If you're all gonna act like little kids, you should leave." We all turned to face the speaker, a human with a scar on the side of his lip that circled down to his chin. Growling he pointed to the two girls with a metallic finger with internals that beeped in red light, "You're all ruining someone's peace and quiet-" His finger went to himself, "Another's phone call-" His finger moved to point at a glaring woman with a line going down from her right forehead and down to her eye, stopping in between obvious screws embedded into her skin.
As the man's hand moved to point at me, I watched as something writhed underneath the skin, "-And worse of all, I don't think your little friend is gonna appreciate what you're doing. Ain't that right?"
I shook my head, "Sort of." I vaguely answered. They were acting a bit... unprofessional for Mercs so he's not wrong on that part but... eh? Still- 'They're basically a suicide squad ready to form.'
The Duskkin settled down and so did the Tusk, "I thought that he'd like how close we are to each other."
"Well, it ain't working." The man added before leaning back on his chair and grabbing the mug of beer on his table.
The Duskkin faced me with a grimacing expression, "Sorry." she apologized.
"There's nothing to say sorry for." I replied.
She smiled, "Thanks."
Again, there's no point in saying thank you. I didn't say anything though, simply looked at her. 'There's probably gonna be a back and forth if I did.' I thought and eyed the man with mods on his hands. 'That, or its his entire arm.' One can never really tell with Synthetic Skin.
"Since all of you already met each other, let's get down to the job immediately." I and the Duskkin's team all turned to look at the recruiter. Compared to when I met him three days ago, the man wore clothes that fit the aesthetic of the Neon District; with black pants and a colorful shirt full of flowers underneath a black sleeveless motorcycle jacket. Starting from his elbow and down to his wrist, a servo was visible through the glass surface of his right arm.
The recruiter sat on the table of the other team and fixed his sunglasses, "Take a seat," a gloved hand beckoned me to come over, "come on, don't be shy."
So I did and the stares the other team was sending me made me feel uncomfortable, "Sorry about the bad first impression," I said as I pulled a chair. I took a seat, "I probably seemed cold don't I?"
"Nah. Not at all. You were right for acting that way." The male Duskkin replied, "Besides, believe it or not, we already knew who you were, even back in the train."
The female Duskkin nodded with a grin, "Accurate." She snapped her fingers, "Honestly, we kinda- sort of followed you on purpose back when we saw you at the Dam. You did fit his description after all."
"So you were gouging me out?" They shrugged and the Tusk said 'Sort of.' - Which, I guess if they're gonna act casual, so will I. I let myself relax and popped up my elbows on the table, "And here I thought the world was small."
The Duskkin snorted, "You wish." she pinched the bridge of her nose, "Coincidences rarely happen. Believe it or not."
"Right." I silently agreed with a nod, "Then what if I wasn't the guy?"
The Tusk snorted, "What if?" Her eyes went up and down my body, "How many people wear a mas' like yers'?"
The Duskkin nodded, "And even if you believe the opposite, your wardrobe is kinda..." Her two hands raised themselves in a manicure position and she started moving them left and right, "...mundane."
She pursed her lips, "No offense?"
"None taken," I replied.
Something hit my shoulder and I subconsciously boosted myself. Even then, I almost fell. I grabbed the modded hand by the finger and threw it back into the table. I looked at the recruiter's servo'd arm and glared.
He returned it with a grin, "Come on! She got it too you know?" I faced the Duskkin and saw that she was rubbing her shoulder. "And I must say, you're actually pretty tough. Never thought you would be standing after that."
I rolled my shoulders, "It stung." I said.
"Yeah, yeah, don't be a bitch." The eyes underneath his sunglasses rolled as his right hand went inside his jacket to pull out a brown envelope that he quickly tossed onto the table, "Now, for the job, this one's gonna be simple." Everyone faced him with a serious expressions, "You all listening? Good- So I know that I'm a very trusted man here in the mercenary world, you know me right? I give out fair jobs and stuff-"
He opened the envelope and showed it to all of us, I got a glimpse and the mission showed that it was an attack on a gang warehouse- typical mercenary work thanks to the gangs. "So you know that even with what's written, this is practically safe."
"This is in the Queen's territory," Oliver pointed out and I agreed, Queen is one of Ace's unsavory capes.
"Yeah, but are you in? The pay's well." The recruiter simply shrugged and pointed out the pay.
All four mercs turned to me, their faces questioning. "Are you guys gonna take it?" I asked. They nodded. "Then why not?" I said, not letting out my thoughts of trusting myself to escape and leave them behind when things go bad.
