"I thought that was our last one," I commented as I looked through the coin purse I'd somehow been entrusted with on this latest collection run. Successful though we'd been tonight, not a single soul turning down our offer of protection, news of what a lack of it did likely having already spread by now, the sun had already set, and we were loath to take our chances. The last thing we needed to end our golden streak was a random cranked out mugger getting lucky, though with four of us: me, Saku, Shen, and Letan, I imagined the chance of it was far from likely.
You complaining, Fluke?" chuckled Letan. "Not very becoming of a fledgling Hornet."
"Hornets don't fledge, Letan," Saku grumbled before I could answer. "That's a bird."
"Eh," he dismissed. "Same shit.
It was not, of course, the same shit.
Letan looked back towards me to catch a glimpse of me sporting an amused grin that, perhaps in my current predicament, I shouldn't have. "Hey," he scolded. "No smiling 'till you're done with the first month."
"I've already been here nearly two," I protested in response.
"Correction. You were a prisoner for nearly two months. Not a Hornet."
"Oh, but I'm not a prisoner anymore?" I playfully retorted.
Letan paused, turned to face me, and in a manner I thankfully knew was in jest, said, "Just try me. If you miss that cell you say you were kept in at the start, I can make certain arrangements."
"That won't be necessary," I answered back, stifling a chuckle, but still allowing my amused grin to shine.
I doubt I could have gotten away with the same behavior just a few weeks ago, but things have taken a turn for the better since. As in, I was no longer viewed as more in demand strung up from my legs in the middle of the Hive to act as a communal Hornet boxing mat, but rather, alive and on my feet.
Much as I hated to admit it, helping them kill the fireflies had been what'd done it. Though I hadn't taken a life, I'd put my own on the line by being there, acting as lookout, and even slicing that one's face after nearly being killed myself. I suppose it shouldn't have surprised me that it'd taken nearly dying for the Hive to convince them of my intentions. One could get around the slums feigning allegiance for as long as one wanted with the intent of living another day, but that was just that–a feint in the name of self preservation. That wasn't loyalty, only survival. But putting your own survival at risk, that was loyalty.
Was it?
I considered myself.
I hadn't run. I'd stayed when Bee and Saku were being robbed, helped them fend off the Rats. I stayed when running collections even though I'd had more than a dozen opportunities to run. I'd stayed when I was sent off on my own to spy on the enemy, get their numbers. I'd come back, gone with them again, nearly died for it, but I'd stayed.
Did I do it all because I was loyal? Or did I do it all because I was more afraid of them than the rest of the slums?
I wasn't sure I knew anymore. All I knew was that, for the first time in my life, I felt as though I was part of something.
The reception from some had been warmer than that of others. Danev and Riu kept things professional, which I had to commend them for. There were those such as Ladle and Shirak who saw my being there as a burden and a waste of resources. I could understand that. I was yet another mouth to feed. There were those who disliked me for the sake of doing so, such as Aden and Shen. I could blame them even less. I'd made their lives miserable for years as an information broker. The majority, however, if not outright friendly, seemed to bear me no ill will. They allowed my past to be just that, the past. They were curious, I could see. They wanted to know if I could hold my end of the bargain, if I would prove to be worth the water I drank, the food I ate, and the space I took.
Ensuring that what little we had was used right, I could tell, was not something to be taken lightly. I'd seen the looks that the other Hornets had been giving Shuho in the last few days after his leg'd gotten worse, enough to the point that we were running this collection without him. The others were sympathetic enough. They were his friends, but their concern was palpable. Even so, they weren't going to give him up at the drop of the hat. Hornets didn't abandon one another.
That's what they wanted to believe at least.
But I still remembered Bee. I remembered the truth at least, something they hadn't been given the luxury of. They would do whatever they could for Shuho, but Danev and Riu, they had other priorities–keeping the Hive alive. I didn't know if it was heartless or necessary. Perhaps I just chose not to think about it, namely for fear of where I'd wind up the moment I got so unlucky as to sprain my ankle. I would disappear, a lie would be told, except in my case there wouldn't need to be a lie, there wouldn't be any vengeful zeal in my name.
At least not yet. Maybe in time.
It wasn't the most optimistic take, simply hoping to become somebody worth avenging, but if it also meant being somebody worth keeping alive, I'd take it.
"No, but really," I started. "We forget something? Skip over somebody? Could've sworn those fucked up twins were the last ones we had to collect from."
"Riu had special orders," Shen spoke up, albeit begrudgingly. "Said he wanted us to hit one more joint."
"What's the place?" I asked.
I recognized the streets we were walking down. Hell, I recognized nearly all of Taisho's slums, but these areas in particular.
After everything with Mini had fallen apart, and I'd nearly been killed beside him for stealing from the lawmakers, I'd, much as it amused me to admit, become an honest working man for a while. The Nàilì district, as it was called, in truth just a collection of a few streets and city blocks, only a small bit due north of the Liángshí Road, was one of these few remaining places in Taisho's slums to house functioning businesses, though the number of them decreased with every passing year, either due to their owners passing, the places getting robbed, or making the mistake of taking up with one gang or another and painting a lucrative target on their back.
The Nàilì district had been safe enough with the Lawmakers in power. The benefit of being a streetwide hegemony was the lack of external competition. It rendered them the equivalent of local government, the tax they charged the businesses more than just the "protection" the Hornets offered, but a guarantee of representation as well. The lawmakers' interests were the same as those who kept some semblance of an economy flowing. An economy I took part in.
Mishi was an honest man, and an even more honest businessman. I don't necessarily think it'd been fear of the lawmakers that had driven him, steep though the punishment of cheating them was–the removal of a hand, an eye, and the tongue: the tools of a cheating man.
Mishi was reasonable, and intelligent. At least, most of what he did was indicative of that. I was positive it'd been pity that'd incited him to give me a job and a cot to sleep in, but pity was different than charity. He put me to work. And damn, did he work me hard. At first, it was just carrying messages, acting as a courier, cleaning his shop, stocking shelves, even painting the joint from time to time to keep it presentable. Mishi, however, was not fond of unskilled labor, and I worked my ass off to be sure that I wouldn't lose the bedding, water, and food he paid me in alongside a few copper pieces of pocket change every other week. However, it was to my benefit that Mishi had no intent to replace me.
As he taught me to read, he would put me to work interpreting requests from customers, filing through them, organizing his orders. As he taught me to write, he put me to work handling relations between him, the other businesses, and even the lawmakers. As he taught me to count, handle arithmetic, it was stock, inventory, and sheets that he put me to work on. The fruit of my labor was an education. At least, it was as close as I would come to one.
I sometimes wondered why it was that I had left.
It was a pity to see this place in as much disrepair as it was now. Nàilì really has fallen far without the Lawmakers. I rarely stopped to wonder if it was for better or worse, just that it was. If change meant these slums would lose what little life they had left, then so be it. That's just how it was. My only wonder was why we were here. Had one of these businesses been so stupid as to throw in with the Hornets? Why? Extortion? That or having their place robbed? And why was it, that with every step, we were only coming closer to…
No.
"No, no no," I said upon realizing immediately where we were, drawing the attention of the other three instantaneously towards me. "You're kidding, right?" There was no way. No way that, even with the threat of violence, Mishi would have given in. "We're collecting from here?!"
There was a silence right then, one I didn't know how to interpret. All I knew was that it had me on edge. More on edge than ever I would have liked to have been.
"He's paying y'all off? We're collecting from him?!"
It was Shen who finally spoke, though his words brought no comfort. "This isn't a collection. He'll give us what we want, but it won't be his choice to make."
All of a sudden, memories from a different life coming back, and I was frozen there, in the past, unable to move except to utter one word, "Please."
They were already at the door, but they turned to look at me one last time. "Please don't…don't make me do it."
It was a mixture of looks. Shen looked about ready to kill me. Letan appeared almost sorry. Saku, he refused to look at me, finding more interest in whatever was on top of his shoes than the pitiable expression on my face.
"You're going in there, Fluke," Shen said. "You want to be a Hornet, that means you're loyal to us! Nobody else!"
I couldn't do it. Couldn't go through with this, couldn't go inside, couldn't even move. I wanted to beg, to do whatever in spirits' name I had to in order to not be a part of this, but I couldn't talk if I wanted to.
"We need somebody to keep lookout," Saku said. "Make sure no do-gooders decide to get involved."
I think I'd only processed his words long after it'd been said, as well as the exchange that had transpired right in front of me while I'd been locked in place, but the end result had been the same, regardless of whether I'd been paying attention or not.
"You do it, then."
"His eyes are sharper than Saku's," Letan stepped in.
Another silence, but, finally, it was settled. "Fine. Keep watch, Fluke."
And that'd been it.
By the time I finally was awake again, out of whatever guilt-driven daze I'd been locked in, the door had already been kicked in, loose of its hinge, allowing me to hear a faint version of all that transpired within.
Mishi was already up. I could hear his voice on the other side. It was only a faint muffle, the details of whatever exchange that was occurring within dampened by the walls that separated us. Was he up when it all began, or had they found him and brought him down?
The selfish part of me hoped that it was the latter. That he hadn't heard my name used on the other side of his door. He didn't have to know I was here. He didn't have to know that I was right there, past his sandcrete walls.
They were in disrepair, I noticed, the paint chipping off. It hadn't looked that way when I'd been here. I knew the color it was supposed to be, an earthy red, like that of sand in the Si Wong Desert. Mishi had a jar of it. It reminded him of his past, he'd always say, when he'd been free to travel the world, do as he wished, before he made his final journey to this city.
Someday I'll move on, he'd told me. I'll see whatever else this world has in store for me or kick the bucket trying. He believed in it as well. It wasn't just a pipe dream for him. Whether it was some secret passageway he was sure had to exist leading out of the city, or the prospect of making enough to bribe enough guards and caravaneers to guide him out, he had a plan. It was what kept him going. Kept me going too. I think, back then, I'd wanted to be a part of it. See the world too, with or without him.
There was a crash inside. Glass.
I shut my eyes, as though that would make the noise go away, but opened them shortly after, staring down the building in front of me. Even the lettering on the wooden sign above the doorway was faded. Maybe this is someplace else.
It was a foolish misdirection for my mind, and one that'd only lasted a fraction of a second. There was no lying to myself, no hiding what was happening inside, no pretending I couldn't truly know what was happening inside.
I could hear it all.
"We know you're sitting on a nice pile of coin, old man," Shen spat. "Make it easy for us and point the way!"
"Pile of coin?" Mishi coughed. "What do you think this place is?"
"One of the last few places in Taisho that has any incentive to keep an open sign up all day. Gotta have some reason for it!"
As he interrogated the man, I could hear the others searching. They weren't cruel, but they weren't careful either. Objects fell, were knocked out of place. They wanted this over with.
"You'll be disappointed," he scoffed with whatever strength he had left. "Please, I only make enough for myself. It's not worth the effort!"
Another crash to the ground. A shelf by the sound of that.
Did they find it?
It was one thought among so many others that were scattered in my mind, but one that brought back memories either way.
No. It's gotta be somewhere else now.
"Makes little difference to us," Shen scoffed. "Pay's pay."
"Please. Just turn around and go ho-" He was cut off in an instant, and the only noise that came from him after was a cough. It was wet.
What are they doing to you, Mishi?
A growing knot in my stomach. Fuck. What are they doing to him?
A clatter beyond those chipped sandcrete walls, that rotting wooden door. Again, that same heave and cough.
Please, I begged nobody in particular. Just make it stop.
Then there was a quiet. One I couldn't discern the origin of. I thought it was all over for a moment. Not the beating, not the robbery, not Mishi's suffering. Just, everything. The world sat still, and, for a moment, it was bliss.
"Fluke!" Shen's voice called.
No.
"Get in here now!"
Please don't use my name.
"Get in here now or I cut the old man's throat!"
Please. Don't. He doesn't need to know. Doesn't need to know what I'm doing.
"You fucking hear me! I'll cut his throat!"
What is this? I felt a bud of water form around my eyes. Why? Why Mishi? They knew, didn't they? Of course they did. Everyone did. There are no secrets, so why? Why Mishi?
It's because they know. No other reason. They're not here for Mishi. They're here for me.
"Fluke!"
What if I don't go? I can just close my eyes. It'll be over. It'll all be over soon. If I go in, it'll only be worse.
And if I don't, he'll die.
A part of me wished he would already be dead when I entered.
He was on the ground, a hand over his mouth and nose, blood flowing between his fingers, his eyes looking directly at the broken doorway of his life's work, of what years of freedom and exploration have culminated in, directly at me.
Please don't look.
Shen stood above him, a yet unbloodied knife in his hand. It was one of the Fire Nation's, not some makeshift shank made of the odds and ends one could find in one trash heap or another.
"Luke?" the old man asked.
"Shut up!" Shen yelled before kicking him again.
No.
Around Shen, the other two stood as witnesses, Letan looking back and forth between the old man and me, Saku still refusing to make any eye contact. My eyes darted between them, as though looking for something, anything. Help me.
"Fluke!" Shen looked towards me, anger flaring in his eyes. "You know where it is?"
Where what is?
"I-I-"
"His stash! Where's he keep his fucking money?!"
"You already took everything," the poor man pleaded. "I have nothing left."
"Shut up!" Shen kicked him again. "We know there's more!" Please, stop.
"So where is it, Fluke?!"
I looked around, one last time, for anything I could get. Letan, disgusted though he was by it all, said nothing, though he seemed on the verge of protest once again, still silent, however, clearly having learned from his failed efforts to object when first it'd begun. Saku, it was as though he wasn't even here. There would be nothing from him. I was on my own, in the home of a beaten old man who still, after all these years, hadn't learned a thing.
Why? Why do you still let this happen?
Everything around him, he'd worked for. For over a decade, he'd kept this palace in shape, built a life for himself until he could get back to his dream. I'd been part of it. I'd been part of his life, his dream. It'd been my own too. I knew every inch of it, every inch of this place that'd been my home as well, from the red sand that lay scattered across the ground, its point of origin the broken jar whose glass caked the ground, to the single loose floorboard beneath Mishi's prayer mat.
I'm sorry, Mishi.
I stepped forward, past Mishi, doing everything I could not to make eye contact with him, to not look into the eyes that asked me, "why?" with every second that they were open.
The eyes of the other Hornets, my comrades, my gang, followed me as I bent over, and with undue care, pushed the mat aside, revealing the single board I knew to be different from the others. It was just as loose as it'd always been, nothing having changed in these last few years.
Why? Why do you make it so easy?
Not a thing had changed either about what lay beneath either–the single lockbox that, within, contained the product of his life's work in these slums.
Except that wasn't true.
Why Mishi? What have you always made it so easy?
2 years ago, shortly before I'd left, it'd been the same thing. It hadn't been me that time, but it'd made no difference. He'd lost everything.
I asked him why he didn't do something about it. Why he hadn't even fought it, why he hadn't defended himself.
"I fucking knew it," Shen grinned in delight before looking back down to Mishi. "You should be thanking him, asshole. This kid just saved your life."
The look that Mishi gave, it was not to Shen, but rather, much as I tried to avoid it, to me. Why? they seemed to ask.
I handed the lockbox to Saku, who took it wordlessly, already on his way out with Letan. They had what they'd come for, but Shen, he gave the man one last kick in the stomach, and I knew.
Mishi told me, back then, that he hadn't fought it because he refused to be like them. Because he refused to let this city change him the way it'd changed those boys. He didn't fight now, because still, he believed he could resist this city, because he believed he could hold on to the part of himself that didn't belong here to begin with, because he thought he could stand strong against what it was that changed those boys that'd robbed him, that changed the Hornets into what they were, that changed me.
I left because the sad truth was that this wasn't the life Mishi was made for. This was the life he was made to escape from. Once, I'd dreamed of escaping from it, just like he had, just like he'd put his life's work into doing, but today had taken that away from him. I was lucky. I'd realized it sooner before it could be taken away from me as well. There was no escaping Taisho. Mishi would try to resist it, but by doing so, he would only continue to dig his grave. But I didn't want to die here.
I'm sorry, I thought one last time as I looked down at the poor pathetic man, the man who had prepared for the world, except it had been the wrong one. But I'm doing what I have to to survive.
I was the last to leave, but I did so just as the others did. I was done crying. It wasn't worth shedding tears over. The others looked at me, and they knew as well as I did that I'd made my choice. I chose not to die in these Slums, and so, just like them, I was a survivor.
I was a Hornet.