Read #2 Shades of Gray: From Moscow, With Love Page 11

  Chapter Eleven

  Where Is Pandora?

  Neon signs and flickering street lights cast a dim glow on Wayfaring Lane as Dry Clouds roared and growled overhead like a wrath filled beast. Tainted Rain fell from the menacing sky, specking the streets and people with black drops, and soon the storm left the area, leaving behind an oily residue. A street clock chimed five times as evening approached. Without clocks, no one would know if it was morning, afternoon, or night. Stephanie walked through Wayfaring Lane; it was a street made famous in the Hellenistic Sector, Old Business Vicinage for its unscrupulous activities. She had shoulder length blonde hair, wore jeans and a black printed t-shirt of a smiley face, and passed many people lining the street. They sold canned food, Transgenic Vegetables, and used clothes, and a few bartered flesh, Sunna Snaps, and/or stolen water ration cards. The streets were crowded. Some of the people wore Winnow Masks, marking them as immigrants to the Dark Half of the planet, but most of the people didn't wear the air filters, having lived in Noir long enough for their lungs to become accustomed to the pollutants. Stephanie paused and adjusted the bright yellow backpack on her shoulders. She didn't wear a mask.

  A Street Sanitizer activated once the Tainted Rain storm passed and as the loud automatized machine rumbled down the potholed road, she quickly crossed the street ahead of the machine. Stephanie paused at the sidewalk and turned, watching the Street Sanitizer. She had wondered how they got rid of all this oily muck and shifted the pack on her back. She couldn't understand why any one would want to live in the Dark Half and yet... Stephanie grinned, thinking of the twenty-four hour clubs she visited and the men there who satisfied her in carnal ways, so eternal darkness did have its perks. She made her way to a shelter called the Kitchen and went in to the office, and she waited a few minutes before a man came in.

  "Can I help you?" he asked, carrying a sack of Chinese takeout.

  "Yes, I'm looking for my sister." Stephanie reached into the backpack, pulled out a H.H.C., and showed the man a photo on the screen. "Have you seen her?"

  "Let me see." He took the device and looked at the picture. "Yeah." He shook his finger at the photo. "Her name was Katie... No wait. Kat, I think. She hung around Preacher a lot." He handed the small computer back. "He used to run this shelter."

  "Where can I find this preacher? Is he at a church or a temple somewhere?"

  The man shook his head and answered, "He wasn't a real preacher; it was his name around here." The man removed the food from the sack and placed it on the desk. "Anyway, Preacher's dead." He opened up the sweet and sour chicken. "He was killed over a week ago. He was gunned down right outside. They say it might have been the work of an Illicit Closer."

  "Oh. Do you know of anyone else who might know this woman... Ah... I mean my sister or where I might find her?"

  "No." He removed chopsticks from the sack and broke them apart. "But they're holding Preacher's funeral tomorrow." He grabbed a piece of chicken with the chopsticks, shoved it into his large toothy orifice, and continued talking with food in his mouth. "Maybe she'll show. Here..." He scribbled down an address on a napkin. "This is where it'll be."

  Stephanie's view...

  "Thanks."

  I take the paper, grab my bag, and walk out of the office, reading the napkin. It looks like it will be tomorrow. I put a hand to my chest as my heart races. I've never been this excited. I can't wait to meet... What did he call her? Kat... I'm looking forward to meeting Kat and proving myself.

  I wave for a taxi. The Council's sending its best wishes, and tomorrow Pandora will meet Cerberus.