Rain falls, and the neon lights dance within it like a stream of pixels. He tosses the spent butt of his cigarette to the floor where it extinguishes with a defiant hiss in a puddle, then turns his back on the street and strides inside. Bar Vostok. Peeling plaster walls speckled with stains of alcohol and blood. The stench of stale beer and sweat. The raucous noise of drunkards. Home.
The woman behind the bar, a tall redhead in glasses, proper red like rubies, buxom and curvy in a tight leather corset and matching trousers, stops drying the glass in her hands and sets it aside.
“Ikaryss Selwynn.” she says as if the word tastes delicious, “Mighty long time since last you wet your lips here.”
He nods and drops his hood to his neck and runs a gloved hand through his coarse hair to shake the moisture free. His left eye, luminous like an emerald, whirs in its socket as the low quality bionics strain to focus. “Yes, it’s been a while, Ryza. House special.”
She smiles warmly then turns to grab a bottle from the shelf behind her. She pours a good measure of the amber drink into the glass and slides it across the counter to him.
“So what brings you back to this part of town?”
He takes a swig of the drink. The acrid liquid burns the back of his throat but he makes no reaction. “Business.” he says.
“Last I heard you were inward, on some agency job.”
He nods, “As always, you’re well informed.”
She smiles at this.
“Nothing too grand, like. Just some work on the Engineering Levels.” he pats down the six pockets on the front of his worn sleeveless jacket, like a leather waistcoat, before dipping his fingers into one and producing a small clear plastic block, not much bigger than a thumbnail and offers it up to Ryza.
She shakes it away, “This one’s on the house, ‘kay?” she turns her head to the side, “What’s it like down there?” she asks, watching a group of men in the corner gambling on cards.
“The Engineering levels? Noisy from all the machinery. Dark as most of the lights don’t work anymore. Then there’s the gas...” he takes another swig and wipes his stubbly chin with the back of his hand. His fingerless gloves stink of oil. “Not the most pleasant of places.”
“I don’t suppose there’s many a place nowadays that could be called ‘pleasant’.” she says, turning back to Ikaryss and beginning to absent mindedly wipe the bar down, “Save the Inner Circle, course.”
He nods, “First day on the job I had to come up for air after hitting a gas pocket. If we’re working under the Inner Circle, we go in and out of the Levels from the Outer Circle still; but when there’s a gas leak, protocol goes to hell. You get your scrawny arse out of those tunnels ‘less you want your lungs leaking out your nose. Came up inside the walls. You wouldn’t believe.”
“How’d you mean?”
“We’re out here in endless rain, grey skies and thunder. Streets torn to pieces. Buildings in decay. Society gone to the dogs. Rust and rain, that’s all we got. In there it’s blue skies and birdsong.”
At this he pauses for a moment, staring into his drink, then downs the remainder in three gulps. He slides the glass across the table, “And this time I’m paying.”
She takes the glass and refills it slowly, “Sounds fine.”
“Enough of me, though,” he smiles now, “What about news from here, Ryza? How’ve you been?”
