Area 16

You swear you're not a SuSie? I'm not kidding. I don't care if you've got a full swap ready and waiting, they won't find enough to make it matter. My name is good down here, and that's more important than the chips under your skin. Even Sublevel Sec knows enough to stay out of 16... at least, while they're on duty.

I'd watch your ass, either way. You uppers are all the same... you think you can buy a second hand skin suit on the way down, change in some mezzanine cubby you use to meet your eyecandy on the weekends, and you're all set to go slumming in the sub. Hell yeah I can tell! Look at your fingers and look at mine. All the grease in the world can't hide skin like that. This is what a scar looks like. You think I'm going to wait in line half a day at the clinic for a paper cut? Look, I don't care where you're from, nobody here does, but don't try to pretend like you're one of us. There are people down here that cut first when they see a poser. Never know when one of those damn SuSies might be down here looking for a fight. At least the frigging ops teams don't try to blend in.

You're here for the music, right? Yeah, they've got clubs in the mezzanine, but nothing like the ones 16. Music doesn't mean as much when you've got a cozy cubby, a day job, and a sec team that gives a damn about people. This is where the Clean movement got started when Markos came through three years ago, and now half the people here don't even have chips. This is where Rip Metal and Neuro-Mix both got their starts. But most of all, this place has history. It's like a frigging docuholo. You see the veins in the walls of Blackbird Shaft? You didn't? Organgrinder is playing there tonight, so you have to at least stop in and catch a set if you're at all serious about transdeath. Yeah, those veins are motherloving yellowcake. No crap. This whole district used to be a mine, and the Shaft is still working twelve hours out of the day, even though fission's as dead as PuffCore and lead-threads. You see those rails that run right down the middle of the strip? Those were first put in by the miners. For the military, it was just an added bonus.

Oh, now you get it? Did you think those gutted out tanks on the ceiling of the Glory Pit were props? They were making fifty of those beasts every month right up until they sealed the main line to Angel City. Garbage now. One u-rail would light up the inside of one of those things brighter than Tier Level. That's not the only club that's being run out of a fab either. Keep your eyes open. For fifteen years, right up until the mayor of Angel City finally cracked down on emigration and the port authority put the digger drones on the C-way gate, they thought they were going to end up nuking every arco from here to Teno. This place became a ghost town over night when the gate got droned.

At least it was until Kama Light and Power moved in. They figured there wasn't anybody to complain if they used old shafts as cooling pools and irradiated the hell out of the whole district, and with all that yellowcake so close by it was a natural fit. Don't look so nervous, they damn thing never actually got off the ground. They found out pretty quickly that there were still people in Area 16. My grandmother was one of them; she still claims she took down one of the foremen with a shiv. You see, when the military moved out, we moved in. This whole club is made out of the reactor core they were building. Biggest building on the whole strip. They say half the whores in sublevel bivy in the cooling system. I'm not lying! Miles of meter-wide pipes, all free housing to anyone with a blow torch and time on their hands. All you have to worry about is the cleaner drones coming through and taking care of the blockages. I'm kidding about the last part, we haven't seen one of them in weeks. Seriously... I mean, I could show you my spot, a little later... not bad if you don't mind the noise.

Hey wait, where are you going? It was a joke! Damn, you uppers sure are high and mighty. Like I said, without me you'd be dead a half hour ago. These clubs may look safe, but all it takes is one cyto-mask in your brew and you're in a body shop before the glass hits the floor. Hell, half the drinks here are restricted in mezz because of the heavy elements. You're lucky to survive even if someone isn't jonesing for your liver, your chip, or your shoes. Even I haven't made it this far without my share of back alley thrashings. You think I got this from getting my appendix out? Lucky I had my rippers put on three weeks before, or half the kids in this club would be wearing a piece of me.

You know, I can tell you're not here for the music after all. Admit it, you're looking... that's why you're in the China Train tonight. Purple dream? Acid? Nanostims? No? Something special then... let's step up onto the catwalk. Here, have a taste of this. What? Cyto-mask? That's a big accusation for a pretty little... Oh... You'll never take... oh fff...