Page 112 of Neon Flux

I walked past the kitchen, filthy, as always—except for a small pocket of cleanliness at the end of the counter, where a plate of cut fruit had been laid out. There was always cut fruit after I got back from a job. This one had been especially dangerous, so the orange bastard child of an apple was on the menu today. My mother’s favorite.

I was about to shove one of the sweet wedges into my mouth when I got tackled from behind.

“Onii-chan! You have time to play UltraVengence with me today?” It was Ishi, my fourteen-year-old sister. We probably had the same dad, judging by how much we looked alike, but I didn’t know the yarou and Mom never said.

“Get off. Go play with one of the other brats.” I shoved the little creature away, though not too hard.

She pouted. “They’re all babies. They suck. You’re the only one actually good at it.”

“I don’t got time for games like that.” I hated the way her eyes looked at me—with admiration, almost adoration. I wasn’t good. Didn’t want to be. Ishi still had a chance. She was smart and could read people. I’d watched her scam more poor fucks out of creds than any other street kid I knew. Maybe she could be the one to break out of this wretched place. Not if she followed me.

“Come on! You just finished a job—”

“I said no, Ishi. Now get.” I grabbed her by the back of her jacket, one that used to be mine. As I shoved her away, I slipped a roll of FructoPops into her pocket—her favorite. She was smart enough not to argue with me again, and instead surreptitiously walked to the most secluded corner of the room to eat it where the others couldn’t see.

My mother dropped a pot in the sink, and I turned back to the derelict kitchen.

“I brought you some money,” I said, reaching into my pocket and tossing a wad of hardcreds onto the cluttered counter. It looked out of place amid the chaos.

She snatched it up and counted quickly. Her face twisted in anger. “This is it? This all you brought?”

“It’s all I could get,” I replied, trying to keep my voice steady. “I’ve got my own expenses, you know.”

“Your own expenses?” She scoffed. “You think you’re too good for us now? Out there playing gokudo while your family starves?”

“I’m trying to help!” I snapped, my frustration boiling over. “But it’s never enough for you, is it? No matter what I do, it’s never enough!”

I saw the signs and dodged just in time as the teapot she was holding came flying at my head, smashing into a cabinet. The baby wailed louder.

“Onshirazu no kuso yaro! You ungrateful little shit! After everything I’ve done for you!”

“Everything you’ve done?” I laughed bitterly. “You mean abandoning me to raise myself while you screwed around with every guy who looked your way? Yeah, thanks for that.”

She slapped me hard across the face. The sting was nothing compared to the anger burning inside me. “Get out!” she hissed. “Get out and go die on those streets like all the other boys.”

I stared her down, my jaw clenched. A notification popped up on my cracked Vysor lens:

Everyone needed at the port. Unknown disturbance.

“Fine,” I hissed. “I’ll go. But I’m not coming back. One day, you’ll realize what you lost.”

I charged for the door, ignoring the high-pitched cry of my name from the far corner.

I stormed out, slamming the door behind me. The sounds of the slums swallowed me whole—but this time, I welcomed them.

Code Red at the port.

I started running, though I wasn’t sure if I was headed toward something or away from it. I weaved through the underground, diving deeper into the abyss. Code Red meant enemy activity in our territory. No restraint required—and I wanted nothing more than to lose myself in blood.

I made it to the port. A hole had been blasted through the side of the old subway tunnel we used for smuggling beneath the city, and I was greeted by the sharp, metallic scent of blood.

My entire crew was dead, riddled with bullet holes. Blood mixed with the water and sewage that leaked from every pipe. If Magenta was lawless, then the underbelly was hell itself. The Kitsune had carved out their domain down here, claimed it as our kingdom. The war to stake that claim had been brutal—more than one bridge burned, both metaphorically and literally—but we’d won. We held almost all the power in the Magenta underworld.

So who the fuck dared to mess with us now? The goddamn Cielos? No fucking way. At eighteen, I would’ve killed a puppy that looked at me the wrong way. Every beat of my heart craved a fight—especially one I might not walk away from. They’d turned me into the perfect weapon: over-drugged and over-sexed. Not that I was much different now. But back then, barely out of puberty, it was rawer, more powerful—and my Flux echoed that.

I heard a cough from beside me. One of my boys, Yuri, was clutching his stomach, blood leaking from holes in both his gut and mouth.

“What the fuck happened here?”