A large crowd gathered within the open square of a marketplace as the heavier rains of Silic poured overhead. Large puddles seeped into their boots, and leaky overhangs doused passers in water as they walked beneath the expiring tarps overhead. Each stall sold a different product, completely unconcerned with whether or not they were soaked. The food seemed near expiry, but not yet smelly or ugly enough to throw out, as vendors heckled passersby to make a purchase or see what they had.
Riza hadn’t seen food in such poor condition since Cintri, and that was because the inner rim was the last to receive shipments from around the galaxy. The soil on Cintri wasn’t good enough to grow much besides potatoes and a strange, single-layered onion, but it was to be expected, considering the rest of the galaxy almost viewed Rims as sub-human. She never expected to see food like it anywhere else, let alone a planet like Silic, where the average net worth was much higher than the inner rim.
“Two for fifty,” A vendor waved at her.
“I’ll give you three for fifty,” Another contended.
She eyed the not-so-fresh goods suspiciously, “No, I’m just asking if you know anything about a warehouse.”
“Three for fifty,” The vendor reiterated, uninterested in her words.
“I’m not buying, sorry,” she said as both vendors grunted in annoyance, continuing their charade with another person in the area.
One of Izzy’s bees shadowed her, and she received a constant update in her feed of what it was observing. The three of them had split up since arriving in Otewo, with Izzy having gone to find her contact, Takii, a few roads down, and Pilo having gone to find them a place to stay. She’d been tasked with the unfortunate job of getting them a meal, but the longer she observed what was available, the less she wanted to make a purchase.
Not only was the quality bad, but most of it was dirty, some of it was moulding or rotten and with the number of rodents that she’d seen scurrying in the shadows, she didn’t want to imagine what they might’ve done before the food was put on display. Among the constant buzz of chatter and haggling, she heard a soft cry coming from a few aisles down, and she sent the drone to find the source of the sound as she followed behind it.
It was a child crying as unconcerned walkers bumped and knocked her around. She held tightly onto a small toy that seemed to be carved out of wood and rope. Riza arrived just as it was knocked out of her hand by a busybody, and fell to the floor. The little girl's dark hair and green eyes flared in a panic as she reached out for it, but it was kicked away, unnoticed.
“Gotcha,” Riza grinned as she swept it off the ground before someone stood on it.
The child snatched it from Riza’s hands, catching her off guard, and that’s when she noticed that the little girl only had one green eye. The other was a dark, milky grey that didn’t move when she looked up at Riza.
“You okay?” She asked.
The girl stared at her, without saying a word and flicked her near-black hair to reveal the orange layer beneath it.
“Where are your parents?”
The girl looked at the floor, and Riza realised the child might not have any. She looked at the crowd of people, briefly hoping she was wrong, and that a concerned Mother or Father would be calling out in search of a lost child, but the continuous patter of footsteps and rain among the unbothered negotiations of buyers and sellers suggested otherwise.
“You hungry?”
The little girl looked back up, and Riza smiled, knowing it was a good sign.
“Yeah? How about I get you something to eat?”
The little girl nodded and squeezed the wooden toy in her hand as her eye looked back to the ground.
“There you are!” A woman groaned as she yanked the child by the arm, “What did I say about staying put?” She mumbled, striking the child across the cheek.
“Hey!” Riza said, removing the burly woman's grip on the child, “Take it easy.”
“Da fuck do ya want? Looking ta buy ha?”
“Huh?”
“One hundred and fifty-five thousand units is da price,” The woman scoffed, grabbing the girl by the hair, “Odawise, fuck off.”
Riza watched as she pulled the little girl away. What the fuck, she was uncertain of how to react, and saw that a few shoppers had noticed the little exchange but didn’t seem interested in participating.
“Hey!” Riza yelled again, feeling a surge of rage as she charged at the woman dragging the child.
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She picked up the toy again, noticing it in their path and continued forward as one does when they are being led by their emotions. Her fist tensed up, and her mind rummaged through all the possible solutions. Even suggesting that she’d pay the price and spend a large portion of her available funds. But that didn’t sit well. The last thing she wanted to do was fuel the trafficking of children with a payment.
Riza stepped up behind the lady, grabbed her shoulder, and when the lady turned, she threw the hardest punch she could. Her fist crashed into the woman's jaw, causing her to stumble and nearly fall over whilst releasing her grip on the child.
“Get behind me,” Riza stepped in front of the child, her hand writhing in pain.
But her fist was her last concern. She watched carefully as the lady regained her footing and glared at Riza with violence in her eyes. She’s much bigger than me, Riza realised she didn’t want to engage in a fight, and in that moment, she decided to run. She held the child by the hand and tugged her along as they turned heel. Placing the toy in the girl's hands as they stormed off.
“Get back here,” The lady followed, struggling to squeeze her way through the crowd that had stopped to watch.
“C’mon,” Riza said as the girl ran alongside her. “Get us to a safe place,”
_B33 DRONE #3
_ORDER RECEIVED
It whizzed overhead and took a turn into any alleyway up ahead. They both followed, and the alleyway led into another crowded section of the marketplace, much more densely packed than the last.
“We’ll lose her in there,” Riza told the child
_INCOMING TRANSMISSION: IZZY
“Not now, Izzy,”
“I got a notification from the drone saying you’re in trouble.”
“Yeah, just on the run is all,”
“From what?” She seemed concerned.
“I dunno, uh, a beast.”
“A what? Do you need help?”
“Don’t worry about it,” She said as she reached the crowd.
She turned to look over her shoulder and noticed the lady with her triple chins and patchy hair at the far end of the alley, looking around before noticing them enter the crowd.
“Okay… Well, I found the Takii guy,”
“And, what’d he say?” She said as they squeezed their way past people, pushing rather forcefully.
“He said he needs to meet whoever’s asking.”
“So by that, he means me?”
Riza crashed into one of the vendor's tables that held a display of desaturated fruits, and the lot of them fell to the floor as the table and Riza toppled over.
“He said he’d heard about you on the news and had some questions.”
“Shit, sorry, sorry,” Riza got up to her feet, trying to calm the whining seller.
“What?” Izzy asked.
“Fuck you, I said sorry!” Riza waved the man off in annoyance and noticed the woman pushing her way closer.
“I don’t understand,”
“Not talking to you, Izzy,”
“Oh, there’s also food trucks here,” Izzy added, “Not sure if you found anything to eat yet–”
“Nope,” Riza replied in a hurry, “Order something for the four of us.”
“The four of us?”
_END OF TRANSMISSION_
Riza cut the call, turning to take another look at the lady, but she was no longer behind them. When she turned back ahead, she crashed into someone, and both she and the child fell to the floor.
“Watch where you’re goin–” Riza grunted before noticing it was the heavyweight maiden that they’d stumbled into.
How the fu–
The lady grabbed Riza by the coat, lifting her to her feet before throwing her into a food stall like a mere sack of goods. She crashed and fell to the floor with a hefty thud before the lady grabbed her again, this time by the neck.
“I’ll kill you,” The lady squeezed Riza, choking her before throwing her into another stall.
The tarp and its accumulated water crashed on top of Riza, the support pillars knocking her on the head and sending her into a daze. Her vision blurred, and she couldn’t quite see straight, but the pale silhouette of the lady approaching stuttered her breathing.
She felt herself getting heaved up again, and in retaliation, Riza swung her fist, colliding with something, but unsure of what. She fell on all fours. A loud bellow in agony by Riza’s ear scared her, and her sight cleared up in time to see that the child had stabbed the lady in the leg with a knife she’d picked up.
She clutched on it tightly, with her toy in her other hand and approached the lady as she writhed in pain on the floor. The girl had a fury in her eyes, a look that she would take it too far, and Riza hastily got up to stop the child from doing something she might regret.
“No,” Riza wheezed, taking the knife from her hand, “Not a good idea.”
She wiped her own head, noticing the blood trickling down her temple and, still dizzy, they both fled the scene. Riza dropped the knife on the ground and walked off, stumbling and being led by the child who pulled her along. Her vision was still hazy, and her head and neck were blistering in pain.
They turned a corner where Riza sat on the floor to catch her breath. Overwhelmed, her body felt hot under the sting of the beating she’d received.
“Just give me a second,” She said to the child, who anxiously stood ahead of her, checking if they were being followed.
“You bleedin’,” The girl said with concern.
“Oh, you speak,” Riza chuckled, “I wasn’t sure we even spoke the same language.”
“Sorry,”
“Eh,” Riza shook her head, “It’s not your fault… I have a habit of getting into trouble.”
“People look for us,” The girl said after she peered around the corner.
“Then we'd better get moving,” Riza said as she got up to her feet, nearly stumbling, but the girl provided her support.
“Take us to Izzy,” She mumbled under the strain of her aching throat.
_ORDER RECEIVED
They both hobbled along down the alley to stay out of sight as the drone led them away.
