FEARLESS

Chapter 1: Falling

Anne weaved through the crowd with a practiced ease that came with years of very nearly, almost, being late. At eighteen years, her jet black hair streamed behind under her dirt brown tweed cap barely keeping up as she made her way through the shanty town and market place. Her feet pounded on tempered iron, steel and whatever forsaken metals the techmensurgists of old used create these narrow roadways of station Genesis. The oldest of space stations A.E. One of the ten remnants of humanity After Earth.

Darting left, she disrupted the flow of people moving to the lifts at the scaffolds, she received the annoyed mutterings of early morning commuters shuffling toward the lifts. "Sorry!" she added with every bump overhearing the muttered statements. The most being; 'that girl'. Under normal circumstances going to the lower city involved following the masses along the main roadway the spiraled down to the lift scaffolds. But she knew of a better, faster and more thrilling way.

Slipping into an alley, she made her way descending into 'the techie line'. The alley where most of the poorer, less talented techmensurgists practiced their craft to patent their wares, machines and trinkets or repair broken machinery for the upper class district of the station. Her chest felt the familiar burn of exhaustion as she ran, descending the stretch of road marked by the sound of thousands metal parts moving and the smell of burning metal from the forges.

"Mornin' Anne!" A woman with platinum white hair shouted with a smile as she passed. A grinning blur of brown and black. The path ahead narrowed into an obstacle course copper beams. Eight years ago, when she started going to school "almost late", the techies of the upper district had made it their business to make her late to teach her a lesson in prudence and get her to go to school earlier with all kinds of "safe" metallic traps and barriers. But never once in her eight years has it ever stopped her. At first it was to their chagrin, then to their bewilderment and eventually to their amusement. The techies referred to her as a natural. A techmensurgists who had the innate ability to sense machinery and metal in a way that would take more advanced techmensurgists years to fully master.

A techie with an eye patch she recognized as Allan waved his patched hat marking the start of challenge. The soot stained men and women of the line gathered along the line and cheered. She jumped clearing the first beam supported by opposite stalls, her palm tapping it as she went over. One touch was usually enough. That touch fed a flood of information of the metal connected to that bar and their positions instantaneously. The rush making her pale sweaty cheeks a rosy red. From what she saw, common sense would had urged her to stop. It must have taken the techies all night to set up. If the techies knew her any better, they would've known that lacking common sense what one of her redeeming qualities.

She took a deep breath, braced and sped up. A larger fraction of cheers immediately halted replaced by uncertainty. She ducked past two broad men who meant to grab her before she did something stupid and killed herself. Meeting the first obstacle, she twisted to the left and cartwheeled getting through three bars and saw the tangled mess of copper bars barring her path a few units ahead. She veered right and jumped towards the alley wall concentrating on her next task. Her face warmed as the concealed stud mechanism in her boots whipped out and gave her traction she needed as she ran up and along the wall over tangled mass. She felt the techies roar with elation when she cleared the mass, her studs retracting and boots meeting the road again. She burst out the alley all intentions to cross the road and jump off the lift scaffold as usual. As she came out of the alley, three thoughts ran through her mind, her momentum making her unable to stop. One, the air much cleaner than usual in the upper city. Two, why in the station was the air scrubber unit up here at this time of day floating on antimatter cushions and three, if-I-do-not-stop-I-will-die. Her techmensurgy reacted in panic, studs snapping out faster than she could register the threat to her life, releasing sparks as they grinded into the ground slowing her descent. She instantly felt the sharp pain of recoil in her head as studs and rubber burned breaking her momentum slightly. She leaned back onto her steel pack containing her basic school equipment, slid under the Unit, passed the startled onlookers, an angry scaffold attendant and off the scaffold into the skies above the lower city.