Alex grew up in a city without sunlight, and she is brutal in all the ways she needs to be. In the Underground, she finds work as a thief and a con, running odd jobs for a lethal man named Kenny Ackermann whose reputation is enough to keep her from...
Alex's breath comes hot through parted lips, lungs pleading for respite as she dodges a street cart and slips into an alley. The red is already drying, coagulating into a crust on the toes of her boots, and she idly thinks it'll be a bitch to get out later.
Not that she hasn't managed before. In these shadowy side streets, puddles of blood are as common as the streaks of mud and grime. She needs to find new boots soon, anyway—these are too small for her feet, soles worn through and the toes pinching.
Deep voices bounce in the narrow street, echoing and twisting into shapeless baritones that weave their way into Alex's back alley. She ducks behind a stack of broken crates, panting, holding a hand to her mouth to cover the sound. They won't look long—the crime rate is far too high, and they're not paid enough, the MPs that the surface sends down as more of a punishment than an assignment. She's evaded them before, and she will do it a thousand more times before she dies, before she becomes one of the looted corpses in the gutters of this hellish city.
If all else fails, she'll leverage the innocence of a nine-year-old boy—her hair's shorn short and her clothes hang loose on her sun-starved frame. (The older kids, the gangs, they leave her alone more often when she looks like this, lets her voice tilt down and then crack like she's hitting the cusp of puberty.) She'll let her bottom lip quiver until the MPs decide a little kid's temper tantrum isn't worth the trouble.
But it doesn't come to that today. When the voices fade, Alex pulls her reward out of the pocket of her torn cargo pants. She lets the coins slip through her fingers, back into the pouch, and grins when she pulls out the real steal: a hunk of cheese, snagged from an unsuspecting shopkeep on the city's southeast side.
It's so sweet on her tongue that she nearly doesn't notice the slow, scraping footsteps from the opposite side of the alley.
Almost.
She shoves the cheese back into her pocket and stands, light on her feet, ready to run at a moment's notice. But the man who emerges from the shadows clearly wanted to be heard.
He holds up his hands, palms out, chuckling quietly like this is some great amusement. A hat tugged low over his brow casts his face in grayscale, but he does not need the added intimidation factor. He towers over Alex, and he hasn't bothered to hide the blades catching the sparse light—in his belt, his boot, his left pocket.
Alex takes a slow step back.
"No need to freak, kid," the man says. His voice sounds like gravel, Alex thinks, when the heel of a shoe is dragged through it. Grating. "I'm not here to pick a fight. I just think ya might be able to help me out a little, that's all."
