After using more time than I have to spare, I find a suitable black mini in the \*_might be dirty_\* pile and a green top from the \*_definitely clean\*_ one. Slouching into the bed, I drag up thick socks and chunky boots. With a quick brush of my teeth and a solid makeup base, I’m ready to shrug into my old coat and head downstairs.
“Hey, Les,” I greet as he exits the liquor store. Varik is the owner, a waifish man who dreads speaking but makes some of the best liquor in this part of the city. Les, his energetic counterpart, has been his assistant as long as I’ve lived upstairs. And they’re probably a bit more than business partners. He’s always hanging outside the liquor store, beckoning middlings with samples of their newest mix. The business specializes in Thur brews, distilling and selling two potent fallow mixes that keep them in business. But they’re also well known for middling concoctions, hence the bitter bottle of glees outside my bathroom door. Les smiles and shrugs a shoulder, as much of a greeting as I’ll get with a middling couple asking about the glees mix on his tray.
The walk to work is short, but it’s already after sunset, and when it’s cold, the walk feels longer. Fishing out my phone, I slide it into auxiliary mode, sending the feed straight to my eye imbed. A zing of warmth flushes my body. The mod always performs better after a fresh recharge.
I trot across the street at the next light and flip off the car that honks at me while scrolling through the latest news. Of all the body mods the girls at Mid have gotten, I think this is the most useful. Gabby is a close second with imbedded knee plates that provide support when with clients, and Audra has alloy ankle sleeves for hours spent standing behind the bar. Those are both more useful than boobs that auto-size based on preference or a stomach mod that pops gas bubbles before they can cause bloat. Cherris even has springs in her hips for when she dances. A waste of Sakrin if anyone asked me, but no one ever does.
Thur tech powers every modern advancement, but the mods are the worst sakrin drain. Maybe that’s a compelling reason not to have a mod at all, but they’re almost necessary these days. The Thur feel more possessive when their preferred tech is installed on a girl, as they’re covered in them as well. And when the difference in preference means a good night in tips or a bad night, mods become mandatory.
As a VIP dancer, I know I’m privileged not to have to worry about that. I’m just blind in one eye and partially deaf in one ear. There’s nothing wrong with having a disability, let alone two, but I work a job where, ninety percent of the time, it’s too dark to see well, even with perfect vision. So I splurged on the eye imbed first. The clients don’t make enough conversation for my partial deafness to matter, so that mod is on the back burner. I’m maybe two years from enough sakrin, assuming I have two more years left before my desirability is gone.
Maybe if things with the Institute work out like I want them to, I’ll get my ear done at a better clinic than the one that did my eye. Until then, I have to keep paying regardless or justify having crippling useless tech anchored to my body. The migraines are only going to get worse.
I blink the screen from political news to headlines. Who cares about the next middling voice on the ruling council? Everyone knows whoever it is only sits on the seat for the optics. New Eden is always watching from across the ocean, and seeing a middling sitting on the council seems to keep them from waging an all-out war.
\*_Rare Settled sighting in Cachis bar in Upper Tres City_. _UTC abuzz with rumors.\*_
I make a disbelieving sound. The Settled are never seen. Settled Thur, both Darkmire and Lightfleck, are so rare that aside from Jack and Ry, no one else I know has claimed to see one. I wonder how much Cachis, our direct entertainment competitor, paid for the marketing ploy. I scroll to the next one.
_\*Magic in peril. Is there an economic crisis on the horizon?\*_ The headline makes me squint. Every day, they bleat about the decline of magic. Tech starts fritzing, and suddenly, the magical recharges are “getting weaker.”
I think they’re all just trying to stunt the effectiveness so their profits will rise. Of course, the Darkmires and Lightflecks on the council have yet to comment. Thur never feel like they owe us anything, least of all answers.
They’re petty, sometimes cruel, but not stupid, and I’m sure they’re well aware of middling spending habits. Plus, if magic were truly on its way out, middlings wouldn’t still be showing signs of Magical Affect Syndrome, MAS, as we call it. Terminal MAS has an unknown shelf life. A middling could time out within hours of diagnosis or years.
The Institute says Thur have another name for the condition, but it doesn’t matter what it’s called because the power poisoning still happens regardless. Essence. Magic. Poison. Power. Either way, our DNA warps just enough to cause a whole host of illnesses that no one can seem to cure. All from being in proximity to them or from their imbedded tech. All from serving them in whatever way they wish.
We’re simply not compatible.
I blink away the display. Ahead, the flashing sign and dull bass give way to a crowded sidewalk. The entry line stretches for several buildings, but I easily move around the flood of faces.
Along the path, Lightfleck eyes follow me. Their tell-tale ears are pointy and pearlescent, but the coldness in their eyes is familiar. Rumor is that their flat silver eyes, chaotic and sharp, turn molten, glowing like silver moons when their magic settles.
How true it is, I can’t know. They don’t film the council members for privacy's sake, and that’s the closest most middlings can get to seeing a Settled Thur. Maybe they don’t have the same sharp edge because the magic isn’t as new. I can’t say for sure. According to the Institute, the Thur aren’t forthcoming about their secrets. I do know the Unsettled look at us like they might break us open just to see the colors we make with our insides.
So many have tech mods tonight. A decorative metallic plate over a shoulder. An alloyed collarbone that links to the throat. A half sleeve of components that make a faint buzzing sound near the hips. An altered hand. And some are covered by a different kind of modification. One that showcases the kind of power they wield. A male nearby has both biceps wrapped in twisted bright metal, letting it sink under his skin like a tattoo in places. Another has ruby shards protruding down his nose. A female lingers at the wall with a crown of onyx crystals near her temple.
I don’t claim to know more than what I learn at the Institute. Which is that war followed their arrival in our world, but we were sorely outmatched because of what decorates their bodies. Tech that leveled buildings. Magic that pried the metal from beneath our very feet, gemstones too, twisting and braiding them into projectiles they loaded into their war machines. Their advancements dwarfed our basic weapons and capabilities, leaving us destroyed and utterly dependent on them. And I know it took the better part of half a century for all that conflict to settle into this delicate balance. We’re still in the first generation of true peace. The first generation to adopt their modifications as our own.
To coexist.
We came out at the bottom of our food chain. We lost. New Eden saved itself and left us behind in Lumoria, the majority of the planet now reformed under Thur rule.
Now, every one of our cities is bracketed on either side by their population_._ Light in the highlands. Dark in the underground. Opposite sides. Opposite habitats. And us, stuck between them, serving both. Upper Tres City, my city, is the capital of it all, where it is rumored that the council lives.
A Lightfleck bumps my shoulder hard as she jokes with her friends, disrupting my thoughts. As if I can make out the skyline from here, I glance toward the highland skyscrapers where she must live. Despite the knowledge we’re taught at the Institute, it’s hard to imagine what life is like up there. When I turn back to her, she makes a crude gesture, and I want to return it. But they're a sensitive lot, and Jack disciplined me enough times for making a scene.
Ry would understand.
That’s the funny thing about Unsettled Thur. As strong as their magic can be, it’s wild and unpredictable. It’s not always available to them, not always at peak performance. And every bit of flesh they haven’t modded allows a human punch to hurt all the same. I’ve tested that assertion firsthand and can confirm. I can also confirm Jack punished me so hard after the last one that I couldn’t sit for a week.
So, no more starting \*_or\*_ finishing. No more anything. The female shoots me a grin I know spells trouble, so I turn away.
If the Unsettled act like this, I’m not convinced Settled means sane.