“The razor,” I say again.
“Course, boss.” He flips it to me casually. I snag it out of the air. Its handle is too big for my hand. Real ivory exterior and inlaid with gold filigree. The rest is brutally economical. In whip form it coils like a thin, sleeping snake. Eager to be rid of it, I shove it in a foam carry case and tuck it into my pack.
“All right, kids.” I open the canister of custom acid and tip it onto the marble floor. “Time to go.”
THE MORNING AFTER THE HEIST, on my least favorite day of the year, I drain the vodka from my glass, waiting for the arbiter to finish his inspection. “So, is there a verdict yet?” I ask without bothering to hide my impatience. The slender man makes a show of remaining silent at the desk over which he has been hunched for the better part of an hour. It’s overdramatic White slush. Anemic assholes think it profound to feign an air of aloofness, hiding behind contracts and commerce the way spiders hide and wait behind their webs. Two hundred were sentenced to life in Deepgrave during the Hyperion Trials for their part in the Gold judicial system. Should have been ten thousand. Rest were saved by the Amnesty declared by the Sovereign.
Bored, I survey the rest of the penthouse. It is painfully tasteful, done up in the restrained ostentation popular in Luna’s upper circles—minimalist decor with rose-quartz floors and large windows that look out over the glowing nightscape. On a moon where three billion souls clamor atop each other to breathe, only the offensively rich can afford to waste space.
It reminds me of so many of the decadent flats I encountered as a high-end claims investigator for Piraeus Insurance, before the Rising. Back when I was the help.
HighColors looked down on Grays because we took out the trash. LowColors hated us because they were the trash. Everyone else feared us, because for seven hundred years we have been the all-purpose knife of the state. Obsidians? Circus freaks, the lot of ’em. Grays do work. We are adaptable, efficient, and bred for systematic loyalty. Little has changed for most of them: new masters, same collar.
I yawn. I’m thinking too much again, so I pop a zoladone, stand and pace as the drug leads my wandering thoughts back to my employer with a cold, distant hand.
Oslo, if that is in fact his name, is an inoffensive, impossibly meticulous creature with a dreadful sense of calm that borderlines on the robotic. Slender, and professional in his white business tunic with a starched high collar and sleeves to his knuckles. His skin is squid ink black. His head bald and the irises of his eyes an unsettling white. He adjusts the digital monocle on his right eye.
“I do believe this is the item my clients requested,” he says in a harmonic baritone.
“As I said. Can we wrap this up?” He leans closer to the blade one last time before straightening and sheathing it very carefully into a gel-insulated metal briefcase.
“Citizen Horn, as ever, you delivered the requested item in a timely manner.” Oslo turns back to me, typing into his datapad. “You will note that the agreed-upon sum has been deposited into your Echo City account.”
I pull up my own datapad to check. His right eyebrow goes up. “I trust everything is satisfactory.”
“Yut,” I mutter.
“Yut?” he says in curiosity. “Oh yes, legion speak. Denoting an affirmation, usually done to convey affirmative sarcasm to a disliked officer.”
“It’s called dog tongue,” I say. “Not ‘legion speak.’?”
“Of course.” He touches his chest. “In fact I studied it extensively. I suppose you could say I’m a bit of a military enthusiast. The traditions. The organization. ‘Merrywater ad portas,’?” he says with a smile, using the phrase that seven centuries of legionnaires have shouted in memory of John Merrywater, the American who almost turned the tide of the Conquering by invading Luna—a reminder that the enemy is always at the gate.
I let it go, reminded of something the Ash Lord said to my cohort as a valedictory speech. “Those you protect will not see you. They will not understand you. But you are the Gray wall between civilization and chaos. And they stand safe in the shadow you cast. Do not expect praise or love. Their ignorance is proof of the success of your sacrifice. For we who serve the state, duty must be its own reward.”
Or something like that. Good branding. Works like a charm on sixteen-year-old gray matter.
“Now, what is next on your mysterious employer’s list?” I ask. “The sword of Alexander? The Magna Carta? The blackened heart of Kuthul Amun? I know. The knickers of the Sovereign herself. If she wears any…”
“There will be nothing else.”
“Between you and me, I doubt she wears—wait, what?”
“There will be nothing else, Citizen Horn,” Oslo says, picking up the briefcase containing the razor.
“Nothing?”
“Correct. My client has found this business relationship most satisfactory, but this piece will be the final acquisition, completing their collection. Thusly will we conclude our affiliation. Your services will not be required in the future.”
“Well, my bank account’s sorry to see you go,” I say, feeling a nasty hollowness knowing no job is waiting in the wings. It’s the first time in three years I’ve not had one on deck. “But nothing good can last forever, eh?” I stand and offer my hand to the taller White. He shakes it gently, and I hold on. The platinum rings on my forefinger dig into his tissue-thin skin. “So you’re still not even going to give me a hint about who I’ve been stealing for all this time?” He jerks his hand away and I narrow my eyes at him. “Just a hint.”
Oslo stares at me intensely.
“Why did curiosity kill the cat?” he asks me.
“Is telling riddles part of the job requirement?”
He smiles. “Because the cat stumbled upon the anaconda.”
—
I linger in the suite after Oslo has left, long enough to dull the bitterness of his words with a couple more glasses of vodka. Out the window, my city of towers writhes. She looks prettier in the dark.
Idly, I cycle through the contents of my address book, looking for a distraction. It’s a sea of detritus: bodies I’ve explored, relationships I’ve stretched past fraying. And floating amidst that wretched digital sea, standing in front of the city that never sleeps, surrounded by a billion breathing mouths, I feel the dark creep of despair. I pour one last drink, willing the numbness to spread.