Dysto.001's Arc

Chapter 3 of 5

Two nights after Big Reece backed off the workshop door, Jdawwwwg spread the wet manifest on the bench and tapped the highlighted line. He said the order was still live. Paper like this did not die on its own. A collector settled provenance at the source, he said, or the source came for you. He folded the page into his chest pocket. He looked up at D1. "Walk in with me. Front gate." They took the long road to Lot 44 on foot. Rain sheeted off the stacks of dead haulers on either side. Smelter chimneys burned orange at the far end of the corridor. D1's tread plates left clean prints in the wet grit. He remembered this road from the other direction, strapped to a flatbed with his optics dark. His cores knew the frequency of the gate before he saw it. The checkpoint booth was a rusted box with one bulb inside. A clerk looked up, saw D1, and stood. D1 pinged the gate on the old smelter handshake. The bar lifted. The clerk sat back down slowly and did not reach for the phone. Jdawwwwg walked to the ledger window with the manifest open. He kept his voice low and flat. He said Lot 44 was closed. He said the frame on the page had asserted status and the reclamation was void. He asked the clerk to stamp the line. The clerk read the page twice. He looked past Jdawwwwg at D1 in the doorway, pink and blue reflected in the wet floor. He picked up the stamp. While Jdawwwwg argued the seal, D1 walked into the holding pen behind the booth. Crates stacked to the ceiling, taped and labeled for the furnace line. On a sagging steel rack, between coiled cable and a cracked shell, sat a palm-sized scout drone. Gunmetal plating. Pink and cyan running lights, one of them stuttering. Its rotor twitched when his shadow crossed it. He lifted it off the shelf in one hand. Jdawwwwg came through the pen door with the stamped page. He stopped when he saw what D1 was holding. D1 turned the drone so the light caught its optic. "This one is still good," he said. Jdawwwwg looked at the furnace tag on the crate below it. He looked at the drone. He nodded once. "Bring it." They walked back down the corridor with the manifest stamped closed and the scout tucked against D1's chest plate. The gate dropped behind them. D1 felt the weight in his hand, lighter than a tool, warmer than scrap. Lot 44 was shut on paper. But the rack in the pen had been full, and he had only carried one out. He filed that away as he walked. The rain kept coming. The chimneys kept burning.