"How much did you say again?" Mikel asked with wide eyes.
"2k a gram, take it or leave it" Luke frowned.
"Your brother said that it was a thousand"
"The market mechanism, you know, since the current demand is so high" Max looked at Luke with a grin.
"You bas.."Mikel couldn't help but curse but he managed to stop when he saw Max glared at him.
"How do I know that you brothers are not cheating us? Maybe you didn't even have the real thing" Mikel scoffed
"Are you questioning our integrity?" Max glared at Mikel again with fierce glint in his eyes.
'Yes!' They both wanted to shout at Max's face but they didn't want to carry each other back home.
"As I said, take it or leave it.
We are taking more risks now since the unrests broke out.
The authorities numbers have been increasing and our mobility was limited. Especially the street, you know its reputation.
They are keeping an eyes on us making it harder to secure any resources.
So naturally, the price go up"
Max smiled and spoke leisurely making it hard for Luke and Mikel to believe in what he said.
"Can I see it first?" Luke asked
"Do you think this is some fish market so you can select the goods, chatting with the seller and shopping happily?
Don't be so naïve.
One chance is all you got and if you don't want to take it, just don't. There is no one forcing it on you.
You should already be content that I didn't beat you up since you were a potential customer" Max grinned.
Luke and Mikel gritted their teeth and left.
"Useless things" Max said purposefully and then got back to his almost-empty can of beer.
Both of them heard it before they left the room but there was nothing they could do but smiled wryly.
"That piece of sh*t, I bet that he would be a premium candidate for the radies within 5 years" Mikel said after they was already out of Ling's house.
"I bet 3 years" Luke said.
"I bet half a year" They looked at each other and laughed.
"If I was bigger than him, I would've already smack that pig's disgusting face" Mikel complained.
"The problem is the money right now.
I only have 4k-ish on me, so I could only buy 2 grams worth of it, not taking the other components into consideration" Luke felt the incoming headaches.
"Keep the 4k and let us just scavenged the other components, or just work our ass off to buy them.
We might get them cheap by melting up some trashes" Mikel said in a consolation tone.
"Let's get back.
It's almost midnight and my mood is already ruined by that pig" Mikel walked ahead while Luke followed from behind full of thoughts.
Ling house was at R-37 which meant that her house was on the third block of the residence area and her house was the seventh in that particular block.
The authority tried to keep it as simple as possible so they could manage easier so when they did the urban planning they just denoted them with numbers, at least that's what they said, and this was the practice of every single ruling entity.
"Why did your Gram decided to live at the outskirts of the residence area anyway? There were a lot of junkies in the 15th block and further since like, forever ago" Mikel just randomly brought something up.
"Said the one whose mother took the house next door" Luke said sarcastically before he continued.
"Maybe she couldn't get it because she was slow, you know. Like, when everyone just scrambled to reserve the least number blocks, Gram would just yell in the background and curse at everyone while walking slowly there. And that also applied to those high-rise buildings too like, 'ooh, my knee hurt' "Luke said touching his knees and making fun of her.
"Hahahaha. You gonna end up in hell for sure.
But that was hilarious" They both laughed out loud disrupting the silence of the night.
After they walked to the 12th block, they could see the gradual change in the environment, the streets were littered with trashes and there was also some camping to be seen.
They were used to the sight already since they roamed here before they even know any curse words.
Luke and Mikel had developed skills to stay away from trouble and know who they could and could not approach.
When they reached 14th block, they saw a strange scene.
There was a woman who looked to be in her mid-fifty to which they have never seen before was roaming about, walking from trash can to trash can, scavenging.
Suddenly, she screamed while clutching her head and started running in their direction.
Luke and Mikel were shocked and they tried to clear the path when she suddenly stopped in front of them and looked back.
'Boom'
A loud sound suddenly reverberated through the night.
The dark night was suddenly lit up by the light of the houses that were lining up on the opposite side of the road. People were peeking through the curtains to find out what had happened or if there was any earthquake happening.
Mikel and Luke stood still, terrified, and looked at the origin of the sound.
There was a hole on the ground with debris lying around the site and at the center of that hole there was an entire piece of concrete wall sitting there, cracked.
They looked up and immediately knew where did that wall come from.
It seemed that one of the unit of the constructing high-rise building was hit by an arm of the tower crane resulting in the entire piece of the wall broken off and fell down.
They looked at each other and notice that there was a deep fear still lingered in their eyes. If they didn't stopped because there was some woman running at them or if the woman stay in place, there would already be at least one casualty.
Thought of that, they looked around to find that the woman who was running toward them just now was sitting there on the ground so they approached her.
"Are you alright, miss?" Luke approached, asking.
"I don't want to know anymore. It hurts. Please make it stop" The middle-aged woman didn't seem to hear anything they said and just mumbled to herself while clutching her head in pain.
"It hurts. It really hurts" She continued to mumble.
"Ma'am, are you alright? Do you want to go to the med care?" Luke continued to ask.
When suddenly, she looked up at Mikel, stunned and then suddenly grinned.
"I didn't expect to find such rare sight before. Life was really hilarious. Hahahaha.
You are really handsome like your grandfather.
What a pity he did such a thing otherwise your fate might be completely different " Her eyes filled with mysterious light.
"And you" She paused while looking at Luke, her eyes filled with pity and understanding.
"You are just like me.
A rarity that sees beyond.
But the price must be paid to maintain the equilibrium. I paid it with my life.
Maybe there are others like us and they have their own price to pay.
Maybe your price would be your life too. That would really be interesting and I'll not be alone."
"Are you a Seer?" Luke looked at the woman strangely.
"You may not believe me but that's fine.
You don't have to and I didn't expect you to.
But when the time comes, find the Validators. If they can't help, then no one can" She said and pushed both of them aside before moving forward while clutching her head.
"Cherish you time together as they won't last long. The next time you meet, hehe, you will not be standing together like that"