Connections, Money and Secrets [Almaz]

[Nesrin Aziz]

Helena had not been exaggerating about the dichotomy. Nesrin had only seen the topside bar in the daylight, absent any of its obscenely wealthy or influential clientele of course, but she remembered the chandeliers and leather and that smell which just said rich. Even the bar’s stairs down to the arenas were grand and gilded in gold light. But it was to an industrial and neon-drenched underworld they led. Half-way in the descent the rumble from below became audible, then prominent. Temperature controls lapsed and a chill pebbled the skin with the promise of something primal.

The staff warrens for the same route were not in any way decadent. Nothing unintended for the public eye was. Yet once you were below no further attempt was made to hide that Almaz was carved from the tunnels of the undercity. It gave it an air of clandestine. Steel bars. Concrete walls. Some of the ceilings were cavernous; an underground colosseum for the modern age. Amidst it all holoscreens displayed fighter stats with all the spectacle of celebrity, else replayed flashes of particularly gruesome or impressive highlights.

Nesrin was told that was how they announced fatalities too.

It was a whole different world.

After leaving Helena's office she found herself in one of the breakrooms with a supervisor. Rev considered her while he puffed on a rollup, the smell of it tart, though she wasn't sure exactly what he had in it. The room was just a small, shadow-splashed area tucked behind one of the bars. A few chairs and a row of steel lockers were the only notable furnishings. Sound was muffled inside, though lights strobed through the glass panel in the door.

“Nez-reen,” she corrected of her name pleasantly as she pulled her curls into a bun at the back of her head. Rev was tall, thick at the shoulder, with tattoos crawling up his neck. An undercut and locs piled high stop his skull.

He dismissed her easily in that one glance.

“Watch out for elbows. You lose a drink, it comes out your wages,” he said, then finally shifted with a sigh to configure the sleek tablet and hand it over. “There's a tracker in your screen. Trust me, you'll get lost. Security handles any shit so just stay out the way if anything kicks off. Anyone gets handsy, we have deals with some of the clubs in the RLD. Just give 'em a card. Discount for them, commission for us. I don't expect it'll be a problem.”

She took the screen without glancing up at his expression.

“You don't look like our usual,” he added.

“I'm studying for my Masters. Student loans, you know?”

He shrugged the answer away, which was a lie anyway, but something settled in his gaze like he’d landed on a judgement, and it wasn’t one that was interested in asking questions. Gaze still down on the tech, Nesrin still didn’t smirk anywhere but on the inside. It wasn’t like she hadn’t waited tables before, or worked a bar. She didn’t anticipate any problems tonight, and nor was she concerned about keeping the job; or at least, not once she got what she wanted out of it.

“How do I know who's important?”

“There's no face ID in here. Signal’s all scrambled to protect the clients. Just treat everyone as if the Ascendancy himself shat them out.” Rev had returned to his smoke now, and Nesrin laughed a little as she headed for the door; for more reasons than one. Old-fashioned methods then. She slipped the screen into its holster as she lay her palm flat to push the door. As the roar of outside rushed up to greet her, Rev spoke again. “One other thing. Try and last until midnight, princess. That's what I bet on.”

She didn't glance back as she left, and he never saw the darkness of her smile.