Chapter Six - FULL-AUTO STRANGER-DANGER!

I woke up feeling surprisingly refreshed... at five-thirty in the AM.

Groaning, I rolled out of bed, then slithered over to the kitchenette to prepare something to wake myself up. Coffee was needed... but no. I decided not to.

I knew that it would mess with me not to get my daily dose of caffeine in, but I had to cut it out. For one, it wouldn't work as well on a D-ranker unless I upped the dose to something nearly lethal, and for two, it wasn't healthy.

Instead, I had a nice, refreshing glass of lukewarm water and hated myself.

Good way to wake up, that.

Then, because of the aforementioned self-hatred, I started doing a new morning routine. It was half an hour of stretches and basic callisthenics. Nothing too strenuous. My muscles still burned very faintly from the night before. A few squats, some pushups (Mister Couchtop decided to use my back as a resting space, which meant small cat paws digging into me with every push and some added weight... he was going on a diet too, now.) And then some lunges and a few quick katas for the moves that I knew could be improved with those.

By the time I was done, the sun was rising.

Good enough.

I took a shower, then set a new Save, dressed and ready to go... somewhere.

Gear. The goal for today was gear. Also, I had an outfit for the interview tomorrow that I had to grab at the dry-cleaners, and an appointment to get my nails done, and my hair. But those were in the early evening, not right now.

If I was going to sneak into a portal and try to clear it on my own, with much cheating, I needed equipment. Weapons, sure, but also armour and a disguise.

I had some ideas for stuff I could get on a budget, but I needed cash for the rest.

So that was my first step. I walked out of the door, cursing the fact that I'd never gotten a weapon's license before joining Luna Corp. For that matter, I never got a handgun before joining either. It wasn't like it was hard to get iron here.

Truth be told, I'd been raised in a nicer place than Fortress ENE. A place where not everyone was packing and where, when things went wrong, they went very wrong. In a way, I was happy to be here.

Fortress ENE had only been home for a while, but it felt like I'd been here my whole life. I stepped out of the apartment and started down the street. At this hour, the buses didn't pass as often.

I walked by a trio of older teens, all three sporting jackets with RBGs that flickered and glowed. They gave me a look, but didn't bother me.

I was in casuals. Old jeans and a thick coat, the kind that could have been hiding a nasty piece, and I was walking with the easy confidence of a local who knew when to duck and dip and who wouldn't stick around for long if things went south.

The nightlife of Fortress ENE was legendary. It's early-morning life, not so much. People were only now getting up, and that was those who didn't have a choice. A few were dragging themselves or friends back home after a long night.

I noticed some guy get off a bike next to what was probably his house, so I dipped in under the eves and grabbed the bike. It looked old, low-tech, so probably no good anti-theft.

The guy stuck his head out the door and called me seven different slurs, but I was already half a block down by then.

He'd get it back when I reset.

This attempt was less about getting what I needed, and more about finding it in the first place. For that, I had an ongoing internet search on my augs for places to buy things on the down-low.

It was nice, not caring that this kind of search would be forever linked to my ID because soon I would never have made it.

The first place I rode to was about a third of the way around the outer-perimeter of the out-wall city. Past a large water-treatment facility. I arrived sweaty and with my legs a little sore, and the bike had a flat.

It was a van, parked in an industrial lot, the side open and two guys standing nearby, shooting the shit. The van was rolling, with music pouring out of it, some oldies on the radio.

I rode over to the van, and instantly the two were on guard.

"Hey, chika, what ya doin' here, hmm?" one asked.

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"Buying," was my only reply. "What'd you got?"

They were on guard, and my less-than-friendly hello had probably bumped the price of everything upwards a bit, but that was fine. What they had wasn't what I was looking for anyway, not quite. They had guns and one flak jacket, but it was way too big for my frame, and the guns were more shotguns and SMGs, stuff I didn't know how to use well.

I gave them four hundred dollars to tell me where to go to find what I was looking for, and they mentioned a name I'd picked up online already. What they added was that it was an invite-only kind of place. The password was 'the Number Eight special.'

Maybe. They could have been bullshitting me.

"Well, thanks for nothing," I said.

I pulled the trigger on Reload and was back home in a blink.

Not tired, not the way I'd been last night after all that training, but... maybe a little more tired? It wasn't physical. It was purely mental strain.

I could do it, though.

How long was I usually awake for? Sixteen hours? More, really. I was a 'scroll on my phone for three hours before sleeping' kind of woman, so that didn't help. Did my power give me about that much looping time?

That didn't quite

feel right, but it sort of did as well.

Maybe it was half as many hours as that, on top of a normal, full day of doing stuff? That meant that I was running on a thirty-two hour day, where everyone else had a mere twenty-four hours. More or less?

Well, whatever.

I left the apartment and started walking, this time the other way. There was no choice but to grab one of the very early trams. While I waited at a stop, I listened to the radio playing from this little 24/7 convenience store a block down from my house.

Some names stood out. Hoyle was running for a second term. TamTam had been caught in some sort of sex scandal. GUM, which was one of the more popular guilds, had just increased its recruitment initiative and was bolstering its numbers in Fortress ENE.

The city was living on, unaware, or maybe only slightly aware, that it was rushing towards its end.

The place I was heading to was a burger joint. At least, on the front. Just a plain old MommaPops, a chain that sold burgers that didn't taste like bread or meat or cheese, but that also had lots of calories and which didn't go bad, no matter how long they remained unrefrigerated.

Within was, apparently, one of the better shops for interesting goods.

I might have been a little more confident if there wasn't a literal billboard across the street advertising the place. FULL-AUTO STRANGER-DANGER! Your One Stop Shop For Guns, Gear, And Glory!

Shaking my head, I walked in, then moved up to the counter. It was manned by a sleepy guy who couldn't be more than seventeen. He had more zits on his face than years to his name. "Hey, number eight special," I said.

He blinked at me, then nodded and waved his head to one side.

I figured that was consent enough, so I went over that way. There were the usual washrooms, then around a corner a door with FASD painted onto it.

I shoved my way in, and found myself outside, behind the MommaPops and in a small closed-off alley of sorts. There was another building just ahead, with a half-open sliding door of the industrial sort. Lights were on within.

"Hello?" I called out as I stuck my head in.

"One minute!" someone called out. A woman's voice.

The interior was filled with racks, mostly of clothing. Used looking things. I saw one rack filled with coats, another with shirts. Mens, womens, some children's... what was this place? It smelled like mothballs and faintly of gunpowder.

"Welcome to FA-SD!" a young woman said as she came around the back, pushing through a rack of clothes with a jingle of coathangers. She was five-foot nothing, with a megawatt smile and all-blue cybernetic eyes that matched the blue in her hair and nails. "I'm Not-So-Plain Jane, how can I help you?"

Was I in the right place at all?

"Hi Jane," I said. I decided to wing it. This was a trashed loop anyway. "I'm looking for gear. I'm going to be doing lots of very illegal things, and I need a costume for it."

Jane's eyes widened, then so did her smile. "Well well, look who's forward. I think I can help with that!"

***