Chapter 9 - Cash Corporate
Ding! Dong! Ding! Dong!
Cash awoke to the familiar sound of bells ringing across the slums.
He groaned, rubbing his face.
"It's pilgrimage already", he yawned, stretching deeply.
The sound always came with the same rhythm, distant, heavy and solemn. It signaled the beginning of the sanctuary's pilgrimage across the wastelands.
He stretched, bones cracking, before pushing himself off the mattress.
Walking out from his room, he met Coin, who was sitting behind a wall of monitors in the main hall. Wires snaked across the floor like roots, connecting multiple processors stacked on one another.
'When did these get here', he blinked.
"How did the mission go?" He cheerfully walked up to Coin, glancing at the numerous screens.
"We got the money out", Coin gruffed, eyes still on the screens. His tone lacked triumph, only focus.
"We?…." Cash chuckled. "You mean you and the other guy. Cause I don't remember being there."
He pointed at himself, sighing dramatically.
Coin's hand paused over the console for half a second. Then resumed typing.
"You don't need to remember it." He said flatly.
"Take a joke", Cash muttered under his breath
His eyes wandered across the glowing monitors. All he saw were diagrams, schematics and maps flashing endlessly.
He squinted, trying to make sense of the dizzying streams of data until his head began to ache.
He looked away, exhaling.
"Man, you really don't sleep, do you."
At the ninth hour of the day's clearphase, Cash followed Coin out of the residential district into the commercial district. It had been years since Cash had stepped out so he ogled at almost everything.
They boarded the train bound for the Commercial District. The train hummed as it lifted from the rails, slicing through the haze. The windows trembled slightly as they gained altitude.
From up here, the city looked like a patchwork of rusted steel and fog, slums sprawling endlessly beneath them.
"The Commercial District," Cash muttered, pressing his forehead against the glass. "Still looks the same."
"Not quite," Coin replied without looking up from his wrist console. "Half of it are merely shells of companies in the inner sanctuary. The rest… still pretending to be free."
"Freedom". Cash muttered under his breath.
What was true freedom?
The train slowed, entering the station with a slow hiss. Overhead, billboards flickered. Ads for oxygen recyclers, anti-corruption medication and wasteland insurance. People rushed about, drones scanning terminals at every gate.
They stepped off the train into the Commercial District. The air there was different. Clean and filtered. Tall steel towers stood beside each other. Digital billboards littered the landscape.
Cash whistled, looking around.
"Guess business is still booming."
"Business never stops", Coin replied, already walking ahead.
They made their way through the station and out of the main plaza. Every few meters, banners and billboards stood. Advertisements from companies; hauling, transportation, delivery, protection, scouting. They were everywhere.
They moved among the crowd to a massive pristine white structure that bore the insignia "Ministry of Trade"
The building stood out sharply from its surroundings. It had clean lines, mirrored glass, guarded entrances. Everything about it screamed order and hierarchy.
Cash tilted his head back, eyeing the endless rows of surveillance drones hovering above the ministry.
"Looks more like a fortress than a trade office."
"In a way, it is." Coin murmured. "Trade is control."
As they entered, a cold mist sprayed over them. A sterilization unit.
Inside, the hall stretched upward like a cathedral of bureaucracy. White marble floors, chrome pillars, and endless queues of mutants waiting before glowing terminals. The physique order mutants were in the large variety as Cash saw multiple deformed mutants as well as mutants growing various external body parts
Coin walked straight to a counter marked 'Corporate Renewal'.
He pressed his wristband to the scanner. The screen flickered.
[Entity: Cash Corporate
Type: Hauling
Form: Uni-Purpose
Status: Lapsed
Outstanding Tax Balance: 417,000 Credits
Fog Insurance: Expired
Operational License: Suspended Pending Renewal.]
Cash blinked at the numbers. "Four hundred thousand? You're joking."
"Standard accumulation," Coin replied calmly, already retrieving a small chip from his coat. "Plus late renewal penalties."
He slotted the chip into the console. Lines of encrypted code began flashing. Th clerk, a pale, expressionless attendant with mechanical eyes watched in silence..
Moments later, the screen turned green.
[Payment Authorized. License Reactivated. Welcome back, Cash Corporate]
Cash folded his arms, "So we're legit again?"
"For now." Coin responded, after a slight pause.
Cash looked around, at other queues, mutants clutching terminals, merchants pleading with drones, guards patrolling the aisles.
Freedom had a price tag here, and everyone was paying.
They exited the ministry and crossed the plaza to the train station.
The sound of bells echoed again, low and deep.
Cash glanced at the horizon.
"The pilgrimage will begin soon" Coin said.
"Right", Cash replied softly. "A new wasteland."
They boarded another train, this one older, stained with oil and dust. Its destination was printed on the side.
'Commercial district - Sector ten'
As the train slid forward, Cash leaned against the window, watching the white towers fade into the distance.
"Tell me something," he muttered. "Why bother keeping this company alive?"
Coin didn't look up from his console.
"Because men don't fear the living, Cash. They fear what refuses to stay dead. I want them terrified, Cash. Terrified."
Cash smiled faintly. "You really should write that on a poster."
The train rattled deeper into the commercial zone.
Ahead, a rusted logo came into view on a collapsed building.
'Cash Corporate'