Tetsu Cogari's Arc

Chapter 2 of 3

By morning the sect member was back at the fence. Tanu Gilar did not come through the gate. He stood outside it in his purple robes, one hand on the broken haft of his spear, and watched the yard through the wire. Tetsu Cogari saw him from the top of the scrap pile. The ronin was asleep on the crushed cabinet with his rice hat over his screen. The six urchins were sweeping a lane between the heaps, the way Iroh Wanabi had told them to before he shut down for the night. Tetsu climbed down and crossed to the fence. He kept the wooden sword low. "You lost already," he said. "Go home." "I am not talking to you," Tanu said. He looked past Tetsu at the smallest urchin, the one who had frozen on the cargo cube the day before. The urchin had stopped sweeping and was watching them. Tanu raised his voice, but only a little. "You. Come here." The small bot looked at Tetsu, then walked to the fence. Tanu crouched so his faceplate was level with the urchin's. "The sect takes outer disciples," he said. "Robes. A bunk. Three meals. I need a good eye in this yard. Find me a platinum block, crushed square, heavier than it looks. Point at it through the wire. You wear the robes by nightfall." Tetsu stepped between them. "He is lying," he said. "He was thrown out of here yesterday. He cannot give you anything." The urchin looked up at Tetsu, then back at the silver bot in the ornate robes. Tetsu saw the small bot count the robes, the lapis, the spear-shaft, and weigh them against a scrapyard floor. "I have looked at every pile," the urchin said quietly. He turned and pointed across the yard, past the archway of stacked salvage the ronin used as a gate, to a dull square wedged under a heap of gears. A crushed car, folded down into a block. Platinum under the grime. Tanu's eyes brightened. "Good," he said. "Bring it to the fence." Tetsu caught the urchin by the shoulder before he could move. "No," he said. "There are no robes. There is no bunk. He needs that block to pay a debt, and when he has it he will not come back for you." He crouched the way Tanu had crouched, so the small bot could see his screen. "I promised you a roof. He is promising you nothing." The urchin's hand dropped. He stared at the ingot, then at the silver bot, then at the dirt. He shook his head and stepped back from the fence. Tanu Gilar straightened. He looked at Tetsu for a long moment. "Then I come back with the sect," he said. He turned and walked off with the broken spear over his shoulder. Behind Tetsu, on the cabinet, the ronin's screen lit up under the rice hat. He had been awake the whole time.