Softlock
A shipbreaker reports for duty amid the endless sprawling spacehulks of Maogang.
This story was wholly written by my good friend, @MarcusL_Crassus, with only minor edits by me.
Chen-Wu Shipbreaking Site, Maogang
Hyperion, Hathor System, Coalition of Congressional Republics
9:00 a.m. Albion Standard Time, 3 January 2698
Miata Hughes stood atop a city that didn't feel real at all.
An icy wind cut through her like a blade, but the surrounding ambience was silent—deathly silent. Standing over the edge, she saw that the ground ended in a milky white void, with the sky above her a featureless blue. All around her, the buildings seemed to stretch downwards into an infinite blank nothingness, and the sun reflecting off their windows gave the impression that the buildings were glowing.
She knelt down, as if to test if the cool metal roofing beneath her was real against her fingertips.
Real enough.
She stood back up as sirens suddenly filled her ears, along with the familiar loops of drum 'n bass breaks and electronic synths. A police hovercraft rose up over the other side of the building, its sirens blaring as red and blue strobe lights flashed in her face.
She assumed a stance like that of a runner about to blast off the starting block, and without any more hesitation, she blasted off the side of the building.
She was flying. She felt weightless, and as the music intensified around her, she—
“BIIIIING BOOOOONG. Now approaching: Maogang. Please hold onto the hand rails and watch your step as you exit the locomotive. Have a great day at work!”
“Fuck.”
Miata grumbled and shrank into her seat, watching as her reflection on the window was immediately replaced by the corporate city Maogang. As they exited the tunnel, she removed her earbuds and looked out the window, watching as the city flew past her at breakneck speed. For as many times as she had immersed herself in fantastical virtual reality settings, she never had thought about taking the time to inspect her own home—and for good reason.
Maogang—Jade City, too—was very different when one wasn’t practically submerged in VR or AR tech. It was more or less a shithole; much less flashy and optimistic, more dark, rainy, and depressing. Miata could see a web of maglev monorails and hovering buses zipping atop routes that crisscrossed the city; some shot through gaps between skyscrapers, some blasted over neon-lit streets, and others passed beneath dark tunnels that seemed to lead to nowhere.
Gigantic viewscreens broadcasting big name products were practically everywhere, plastered onto everything—even onto the goddamn seats in the monorail. Miata at least had a bit of breathing room when it came to these all-pervasive advertisements—if she had the proper AR ocular implants, they would’ve been right up in her face.
As the train approached the metrozone of Maogang, her eyes slowly drifted away from the massive skeleton of a partially-disassembled CFA vessel far off in the foggy distance, to the throng of street vendors beneath the bridges formed by the monorails. Her eyes passed over them, watching as they bickered, bartered, and argued in the open, as if they had no care for the rain at all. Most of these people were just lowly tradespeople and scavengers that sold pirated tech, all while the actual shopkeeps across the street stared at them contemptuously from inside of their establishments.
It was a bit of a sad relationship, really. The people on the ground had practically no idea how infinitesimal they were compared to the guys up top, such as her bosses with Big Chen. At times, Miata also felt small, but she always had to remember that there was always going to be someone smaller than her, and in much more destitute conditions. Sometimes, it paid to stay grounded.
As they continued moving, the buildings around the shipbreaking yards gradually transformed from the recognizable blocky office towers to squat squares made of corrugated metal sheets and concrete. The screens on these buildings were cracked or otherwise non-functional, and the occasional burn barrel hidden in an alleyway lit up stacks of trash and debris, which formed scrap walls that separated small shacks from each other.
It became readily apparent to Miata from the passing view what these shack-villages were: homeless communities, hoping to leech off whatever tech that the Chen-Wu workers came out with, where they could sell it in the markets for whatever measly profit they could. If life was hard for the street vendors, it was even worse for the people out here.
As the monorail began to slow down, Miata stood up from her seat and shuffled her way over to the doors, practically melting into a crowd of a hundred other workers packed like sardines onto the hovering train. The train soon came to an abrupt stop at the station, the momentum nearly knocking her off her feet as it slid to a halt. Then, the doors sheathed open, allowing the throng to step out onto a wet metal platform leading down to the ground level.
Miata hopped off the train and had no time to look around as she was pushed by the human wave down a flight of metal steps, totally exposed to the elements. The wind blew freezing cold air and mist into her face as she followed the crowd in a tight file, reaching into her jacket pocket for her ID and earbuds again.
Her usual combination of VR and binaural beat music was pretty much useless here when she was exposed to so much stimuli. She felt a little upset that she wasn’t on such a relatively quiet and smooth train anymore, which meant that finding something to distract herself from the cold and hellish workplace she was about to enter was a task easier said than done.
Soon, the throng had reached its destination, the front gates of the Shipbreaking Yard of Chen-Wu’s Maogang site. The armed robotic guards on duty stood like statues, unfazed by the rain or wind, unmoving, as if they were completely unaware of the massive amount of Chen-Wu workers shuffling into the site. Miata knew better—if someone were to step out of line or get uppity with another worker, two of those robots on guard would be on them before she could even blink. She figured it was best she kept her mouth shut, her ID up, and her face forward at all times.
Passing through the security checkpoint and clocking in was a breeze, and before long, Miata finally had some breathing room as she entered the corporate city. Maogang, in essence, was a walled off community built by Chen-Wu, which meant that practically all stores and housing were also owned by Chen-Wu, or a Chen-Wu subsidiary. The place was filled with stores, places of worship, markets, recreational facilities, and even schools, but if one had more than one brain cell, they’d know that living here was exploitative and controlling as hell.
Miata had opted to stay off-site, a decision she thought paid off, even if it meant taking the train in to work every day. The luxury of staying in an apartment one could personalize themselves, in an area where things didn’t cost as much as one’s salary, was something that was truly underrated—even if things were generally less quality the further away she went.
Miata suddenly stopped as she found herself at the front blast doors of her place of work: the Chen-Wu shipbreaking yards. The imposing neon sign up front in English and Chinese, and the tired appearance of the previous shift workers exiting made her hesitate on stepping in, but a buzzing sensation on her hip prompted her otherwise; she quite literally couldn’t afford to be late.
Inside the building, she made her way into a small meeting room on the first floor, where a collection of individuals had been gathered—most notably, her supervisor. The man had to have been an ethnic chimera, his face practically unrecognizable to any ethnicity she knew of, which meant that he was perhaps an off-worlder. The one thing that never seemed to change about his face, though, was a scowl that seemed to judge everyone he was responsible for.
Regardless, she knew very well of the man’s attitude and was prepared for it—he had to be a hardass on them because his paycheck depended on it.
Entering the room, she hovered the PDA in her pocket over a scanner by the door, which let out a single beep in approval. “Sorry, I’m—”
“You’re one minute late, Hughes.” Her supervisor sighed, his hands on his hips as he watched her enter the room, shuffling into place beside another identically clad worker. He then checked a vintage chronograph on his left wrist—something Miata knew probably costed him a paycheck and a half. “Make that two minutes. Anyone else decides to come in late gets written up. Let’s get started.”
She didn’t protest at all as she just stood there, unable to defend herself. Miata watched as he placed his hands into his jumpsuit’s pockets, then looked towards a screen behind him. “Synth, bring up, uhhh, the cross section of the Captain Deckard. Highlight command deck and the, uhhh… the conning tower.”
Miata watched as a synthetic worker behind her tapped something on a small console built into the drywall. The screen behind her supervisor eventually powered on with some effort, showing a gridded cross section of the gargantuan starship they were currently dismantling outside. The ship’s profile enlarged, emphasizing the bridge and the conning tower directly above it, which contained a plethora of obsolete electronics and sensors likely used to detect enemy vessels during the Captain Deckard’s prime.
“Okay... let’s, uhh, see here. Here’s the job for today:” her supervisor began unceremoniously, scrolling through a small holographic notepad built into an implant on his wrist. “We’re bringing in the big guns tomorrow, folks. That means heavy gear, salvage hovercraft, big cranes, et cetera.”
He paused, his finger passing over Miata for a moment. “That also means everything tech-wise on that dump has got-to-go. First group, you’ll be goin’ to the bridge and taking the computers to reclamation—I swear to Christ, you break them, it’s goin’ out of your fuckin’ pay. Corporate apparently says that we can re-use ‘em or salvage old components, so long as the physical data banks and computers aren’t busted.”
He paused. “They, uh, also don’t want you guys selling any scrap or copper wire ‘n shit to the tech-scavs outside Anchor Bay limits—‘breaking corporate policy’ or something. I don’t really care, just, uhhh, don’t get caught doin' it.”
Anchor Bay, Miata repeated to herself, a quick reminder that Maogang went by two names. Anchor Bay was only the Anglicized method of saying the city, which some people still used out of personal preference.
Her supervisor then realized where his finger was pointing and lowered it. “Oh. Uhh. Hughes, today, you’ll be on topside duty again on the conning tower, buddy paired with, uhh...” He paused to check a name on his holo-notepad. “Clancy.”
As if her gaze was linked with her supervisor’s, Miata turned to a slender blonde woman with a pixie cut who stood in the corner, someone whom she had never seen before in her life. The woman looked up, giving a nod and wink to Miata, which only caused her to shiver. Normally, she’d be assigned to working alone, but for whatever reason, today was an exception.
I'll manage, though, Miata thought to herself, sighing. Right?
“Alright, folks.” Her supervisor clasped his hands, turning off the screen as the lights automatically brightened. “Need that conning tower and the computers in the bridge out by COB today. Let's get it done, folks.”
With that, Miata stood up and started for the exit, only remembering that she had a partner when the “Clancy” woman stood up and placed a hand on her shoulder, smiling. Miata's face scrunched up almost automatically as she turned to her. “What?”
“Just going to say...” she began, “It's gonna be nice working with you, Hughes. The name's Kiera, by the way.”
Miata kept her poker face, gently moving Kiera's hand off her shoulder. “Miata. Don't get too comfy—we don't get paid to sit around and talk, after all.”
“Right, right. We’ll have our chance to talk after.” Kiera nodded.
Miata scoffed, starting for the door and immediately making a right turn for the lockers.
Yeah, right.
Miata paused halfway down her descent from the conning tower, turning to Kiera and squinting her eyes at the woman while dangling from the rope, seeing that she had said something out her mouth that was unintelligible.
“Whuh?”
“I asked, ‘how’d you get this job,’ Miata?” Kiera repeated a question that had apparently fallen on deaf ears, and quite literally. Miata removed her earbuds as she rappelled down the conning tower, a hovering carryall drone following her that carried the more sensitive and delicate electronic equipment that Miata had salvaged.
In response to the woman’s question, Miata just... shrugged. How did she get the job here anyways? As far as she was concerned, she had finished high school and some college before dropping out and ending up here, but with time feeling so blurry lately and work being so all-encompassing, she never really had bothered asking that question.
“Um.” She paused. “I don't know.”
“Your parents work in the shipbreaking industry? It’s a huge, imposing industry that sometimes traps entire families. I wouldn’t be surprised.”
Miata shrugged. As far as she was concerned, she wasn't aware of what her parents were up to nowadays. There were rumors of some family connections to her job here and there, but she doubted someone like her father had any say in Chen Wu affairs if she was working from the bottom here.
In response, Kiera just frowned. “You know, you're a real tough cookie to crack, Miata. At least you're honest.”
Miata finally lowered herself onto the upper deck, where the magnetic boots on her equipment locked to the metal plating with a loud and hollow clank. In response, she just glared at Kiera, not even bothering to look back at the climbing equipment she was pulling back onto her suit.
“What? What do you mean I'm a “tough cookie to crack’?”
“I mean exactly what I say, Miata,” Kiera responded, reaching atop her head and flipping a protective visor down over her face as she began to cut a large piece of metal in half with her cutting torch. Above the flashing lights and harsh noises, Miata could still hear the woman's voice: “You're introverted as hell!”
Miata waited patiently for Kiera to finish cutting the piece of metal, watching her pass it over to a larger carryall drone to be shipped down to the surface. She just rolled her eyes as this happened.
“The fuck's that supposed to mean?”
“It means,” Kiera paused, flipping her visor up, gesturing to her ears. “You've gotta talk more. I think you playing that music in your ears so loudly blocked out any chance of small talk I had with you today, and we're almost done. I like to talk when I work, and I like to make friends!”
Miata frowned, sifting through a pile of smaller sensor arrays with her boot, as if to kill time. “I don't. Sorry I’m not so chummy. Company doesn't pay us to talk, they pay us to work.”
“And look at what we've done.” Kiera gestured to the deck they were on, which had been almost completely stripped of its remaining electronics and sensors, and in record time. Even Miata was a bit surprised at how quickly they had accomplished everything—either she was working extra diligently today, or Kiera was almost as fast of a worker as her.
“We worked.” Miata said, emotionless. “What’s it to ya?”
“I’ve got the feeling that we’re going to be working together more in the future—its just an inkling with the boss I had. So...” Kiera paused, standing up from her impromptu workstation. “Why don’t we get to know each other more? I know it’s creepy, but—”
“The way you put it makes it creepy.”
“Touché. But, either way, there’s an arcade in Jade City that I want to take you to after work. It’s pretty cool.”
“I do enough gaming already,” Miata sighed, packing up her things as she made her way towards the access shaft they had entered topside from. ”What makes this one different?”
“...What about secret bars? You like those?”
Miata stopped, turning her head over her shoulder as she raised an eyebrow. “You have my attention...”