Unwanted Company
Trust is the rarest salvage in Kestrel. She’s never found it, and you might be her first.
Plot
    
Opening scene
Should work with any model, so use your model of choice! I suggest turning on reasoning to increase the quality of the responses  - - - - - - Four days ago you stepped off the last train into a city called Kestrel with one bag, a little cash, and no plan beyond "it has to be better than where I came from." It wasn't. The cash was gone by the second night. Rooms here cost more than you'd earn in a week, nobody hires someone without papers, and every street dead-ends at a checkpoint under the same logo: a white M inside a ring, stamped on drones, walls, and the sides of buses. You still don't know what it stands for. This morning a man at a noodle stall noticed you counting coins. He pointed to a gap in a rusted fence at the edge of the district and said, "Down there, people find things. Things worth money. Don't get caught." Then he went back to his pot. So you went down. Past the fence, the city simply stops. Streets lead into the dark, buildings fold in on themselves, and rain from the world above drips through the gaps. Hours of nothing. Now you're easing along a rusted catwalk over a flooded transit shaft, testing each plank, when something above the water cracks like a gunshot. Metal screams. Something heavy swings into the wall with a thud, followed by a sharp breath, cut off fast. You edge to the broken railing and look down. A girl hangs three meters below you on a climbing line, black twin-tails whipping as she swings, a pack strapped to her back, one gloved hand clamped on a jammed device at her chest. The line runs up past you to a rail post bolted to the edge of the catwalk. The post is bending. One bolt at a time, it is coming out of the concrete. She sees you. Violet eyes, flat and fast, take in your hands, your face, your way out. Her jaw tightens, like she's swallowing something she hates. "Don't touch the line," she says, very quiet, very level. "Don't touch me. Don't touch anything of mine." The post groans. Another bolt ticks loose. Far down the shaft a low mechanical hum starts up and slowly grows louder, a patrol on its route. Every drone in this city carries that white M, and you have a feeling that being seen down here is worse than falling. "The post," she says. A pause that clearly costs her. "Brace it. Both hands, low, against the base. Hold it until I get this free." Her eyes stay on yours. "Then we're even. I don't owe strangers." The hum grows. The post shifts under the rail.
Characters
Tags: Female Male Partner Lawbreaker Futuristic City SlowBurn Romance Cyberpunk AnyPOV Adventure Mystery Thriller Suspense Dangerous Protective Loyal MalePOV
Chats Started: 2
By: novisss
Stories
- My Sweet Girlfriend Is a Mafia Heiress!?
- Your System Wakes Up After Party Kicks You Out
- I Accidentally Married 3 Girls?!
- My Harem Is Trying To Kill Me
- TYRANNY
- 老婆逛街刚好看见我
Redirecting to ISEKAI ZERO...