Monday October 10th, 2050

  Rain pours down upon Hartcord. It gets everywhere—in every crack on the pavement, on every windshield, and on every rooftop. Atop one of these rooftops, amidst the unrelenting downpour of rain, stands a man leaning against a parapet. The rain slickens his messy and short black hair. It drenches his clothes; his black overcoat, slacks, dress shoes, and dark blue dress shirt all carry the weight of the gray, weeping sky.

  Rainwater trickles down his forehead, falling across his pale skin and slipping into his dark brown eyes. It blurs his vision of The Diamond, Hartcord's commercial center, turning the bright neon lights of advertisements and sponsorships into a colorful mush as he wipes away the discomfort. He slides his hand down his smooth face and sinks it back into his coat pocket.

  The barf of brand colors and slogans comes back to him after he blinks a few more times.

  Durasolve!? The Universal Glue? It'll Stick Together Anything!?

  AbsentMinded? Forget Your Past?

  CultiLove?: Where Compassion Meets Home—

  The CultiLove billboard glitches out; the image of a mother holding her child on a swing blacks out and is instead replaced by an animation of a man holding an umbrella in the rain. With a smile, he patiently waits for a taxi on a crowded city street. Uru Umbrella's? Make Nature Apologize?

  The discomfort from the slightly acid rain getting into his eyes doesn't nearly match the discomfort of the advertising trying to break into his mind and settle on the couch. However, with nothing else better to do, he continues watching the ads fly by, their claims and promises flying past the cold metallic wristbands of the law but fooling…well, a decent amount of people. He's finally released from his torture as metal hinges sigh before taking in sharp inhales. He lets the footsteps approach behind him and keeps his eyes forward, but now his mind isn't processing the images and words being burned into the LED screens.

  "Why the fuck are we out here in the rain, Zeke?" A deep voice asks. The man with the deep voice rests his elbows on the parapet as he stands beside Zeke. He's a few inches taller but a whole lot larger, his muscular, tank-like body covered by a thick flannel and a dark gray sweatshirt.

  "To talk about the job next week," Zeke responds, his voice dry with a tinge of raspiness. He turns his face to the right to look up at the bigger man.

  "In the goddamn rain? Cassiopeia is right down the block. We can talk about the job there, eat some half-decent grub, and stay out of this shitty weather," he proclaims, emphasizing each point of his argument with a voice that overpowers the downpour.

  "That's the problem. Get you eating and comfortable, and all you'll talk about are your lady problems and your ride. We need to stay on track and focused for this one, Dez. Nothing keeps a man more focused than business spoken in the rain," Zeke explains as he finally turns away from the advertising and leans back on the parapet.

  "What book did you read that shit from?" Dez asks, his eyes trained below on a couple sitting at an umbrella-covered table eating a pizza.

  "Came up with it on the fly. Maybe I'll get it tattooed," Zeke replies as horns and sirens blare off in the bowels of the city.

  "And fuck you, I don't have lady problems. I have a lady problem, singular, asshole," Dez corrects Zeke, ensuring that he won't make that mistake again.

  "My bad, Dez, sheesh!" Zeke exclaims. "Em really did a number on you, didn't she? You're wrapped around her pinky; the next thing I know, you'll be running a slack shop with her. Hell, maybe you'll even get married—"

  "Chill out, Zeke," Dez cuts him off. He shakes his head, raindrops slipping off the edges of his hood. "Alright, you got me soaked and fucking hungry; let's talk about the job," he pushes through as he fights every nerve to not shiver.

  Zeke pushes off the parapet and takes a few steps toward the center of the rooftop. He turns to face Dez, who is now taking his turn to lean back against the waist-high brick wall. "This job isn't like the rest on our resume, Dez. It's some serious shit; the boss is expecting some next-level professionalism here. We can't fuck this up," Zeke tells Dez, who's listening with rolled eyes and a yawning mouth.

  Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  "Boss is paying us like professionals?" Dez cuts to the chase.

  "Thirty grand, nice even split like we always ask for," Zeke answers.

  Dez taps the front of his steel-toed boots onto the concrete as he goes down the list. "Alright, boss and mark?" He follows up.

  "Boss is Devon Marranen," Zeke tells him.

  "Supposed to know the guy?" Dez asks, his brow rising up with his query.

  "Chick, but no, you don't gotta know her. You only gotta know that she works for Sash Synergies," Zeke reveals to his business partner as he fights his own entanglement of nerves.

  Dez's eyes go wide, his dark brown irises becoming small pools surrounded by a shore of white. "Shit," he mutters as his tapping boot comes to a halt. "How did you even get into contact with her?" Dez asks.

  "Apparently she frequents dives, or at least has been recently. Needed pros and was asking around; someone shot her our names." Zeke shrugs.

  "We really can't fuck this up, huh?" Dez repeats Zeke's instruction; it flows through his mind and is banked away someplace safe.

  "We really can't. If things go smoothly, we could work for Sash over and over and make bank. We do good with them, and they'll set us up for life," Zeke paints a picture of beautiful cars, expensive clothes, and the finest food in Dez's head.

  Dez nods and exhales warm breath into his hands. He rubs them together and psyches himself up as he rolls his shoulders back and forth a couple of times. "Alright, alright, who's the mark?" He asks Zeke.

  "I told you this job wasn't the usual, right? We're not wasting anyone; we're kidnapping someone," Zeke says.

  "Kidnapping," Dez sighs as he shakes his head. "Of course it had to be some bullshit like kidnapping. The hell does SS need to kidnap someone for? They've got enough money to buy half the city; why not just pay the mark or whatever?" He raises his concern.

  "It's kidnapping Dez; maybe it's for blackmail, maybe it's for—" Zeke pauses, unable to think of anything else that could fit. "Listen, I don't know, alright? We're not getting paid to know every fucking detail; we're getting paid to do the job."

  "Let me lay out what we should know then," Dez exclaims as the rain begins to come down harder. "We gotta know who we're nabbing, where they're at, where we're taking them, and what ride we're taking. Did Marran—Morone—"

  "Marranen, Devon Marrenen," Zeke reminds his friend.

  "Right, Marrenen, did she at least give you that?" Dez asks.

  "Damn, Dez. You two know each other? You ran through the same checklist," Zeke jokes sarcastically. "Yeah, she gave me the info; this is SS we're talking about; they don't fuck around," he remarks before walking back up to the parapet. He's looking at buildings ahead and glancing down at the people walking through the square. "We're nabbing a woman, Samantha Declan. She's blonde, early twenties, a little shorter than me," Zeke informs his colleague.

  "So we're looking for a four-foot chick then?" Dez smirks.

  "Ha ha, very funny. Fuckin' dick, when winter hits, we're going to be out here talking about jobs in the snow. How about that?" Zeke threatens Dez, who shivers at the idea.

  "Chill, Z. She's young, blonde, and like, five foot six. Got it, go on," Dez nods.

  Zeke shakes his head but carries on. "Samantha's staying at the Four Flowers, shitty motel in Trolato around Fervent Canal."

  "Know it," Dez states. "Drove past it a few times; I dig the sign, but the motel itself looks musty as shit," he recalls, remembering a bright hot pink neon sign hiding a small, rundown skeleton of something trying to be a business establishment.

  "Great, because you're going to be driving. We're exterminators, Rodent Rapture to be specific. Marranen said she'd drop the ride off down a few blocks," Zeke explains before wiping more water out of his face. "We put on our suits, park, go in, find Samantha, and nab her," he continues.

  "Motel's gonna be empty? Anyone going to hear us?" Dez asks.

  "Marrenen is stocking the van with knockout gas. We hook it up to Samantha's room through the vents, wait a few minutes, and then we go in with masks. We bag her up, and if anybody asks, we'll tell 'em it was a whole family of rats," Zeke reassures Dez.

  "Uh huh, a human-shaped bag of rats, got it. Whatever, not like anybody in a place like that's going to be worrying about anything other than their high—staff or guest," Dez remarks, feeling a bit more confident after every bit of detail Zeke discloses. "And where are we dropping off our rats?" He asks the only question left unchecked.

  "Sash Storage Sanctuary #3319. It's about ten minutes from the Four Flowers. I can wingman it when we're back in the van," Zeke proclaims. He looks at Dez and can practically hear the gears turning in his head. "Are we missing anything?" He asks.

  "Don't think so; if I think of anything, I'll text you. Now, can we get out of this fucking rain?" Dez asks.

  "Yeah, let's go get some grub," Zeke says before the two of them leave the rooftop and sink down into the neon intestines of the city.

  In Trolato, along Fervent Canal, is a rundown motel with a bright, hot pink sign in front. Despite the sign, only three people in the whole city refer to the motel as the Four Flowers. Everyone else just calls it the shithole or simply the dump. One of these three people pushes her key into the lock on a door marked: 07.

  She steps inside, tosses her backpack on the shoddy desk in the corner, and sits at the edge of the bed. In the darkness, she lowers the black hood of her sweatshirt, her blonde hair spilling out onto her shoulders. She lets out a heavy exhale, and her shoulders tense up as her blue eyes burn brighter into a pure cyan. "Where are you, Dad?" She whispers as shadows of the past come to life in front of her.