somewhere in the middle

She was pacing again, a frantic back and forth that threatened to burn a hole in the linoleum and made my headache strobe with every foot fall.

"Gracie! Seriously now. Let me think."

She turned in midstep and I groaned aloud, the anger was already rising into her face.

"Let you think? You got yourself into this, no way are you getting yourself out baby!"

She was smaller than me and seemed to be all curves but still her voice made me snap to attention, I think I loved her. Why else would I have drug myself to her flat instead of my own?

The fall from the burning train was a scary one for sure but the webs that hung between the towers caught me, a phospherent blue strand as thick as my waist, humming and swaying with the black wind.

"User! Why did you take that job? I told you we had enough money to get outta here."

My head throbbed and I put down the cold pack,

"No, 'we' did not have enough money. You had enough money, I wasn't going to just let you pay my way onto the boat. I'm my own person, Gracie."

Two people yelling in a small kitchen apartment green floor and white ceiling, walls that are entirely too thin, all the neighbors can hear the argument.

"Besides doll, we both know we need more than just the ticket, unless you wanna be pan-handling on the ark the whole way there. Then when we arrive we'll be in the same damn situation, just in a different place!"

I stopped myself when my vision began to shake and Gracie backed up, I looked at the plastic table beneath me, breathing to myself and listening to the train as it rumbled past the building, shaking the walls and floor every five hours on the dime.

"Okay, okay. The jobs done at least, did the cred link clear?"

I hadn't thought to look and with a sigh I sat back down and checked my watch, with a thought the small blue screen clicked and showed my cred count normally a pitiful number, this time there were a few more zeroes than normal.

"Yeah it cleared, but that just might be a mistake, or a trap. God knows who's looking for me, they ghosted a whole train of citizens Gracie."

She sat down to and grabbed my hand, which was closed into a fist, I relaxed and felt her palm in mine,

"Maybe it's the middle man, someone that doesn't have any idea what you moved or for who. With most hot goods you know the buyer rarely handles the transaction himself."

She was right, I looked at her round face and her cute smile, long black hair and white shirt. Gracie was always a little smarter than me, smart enough to know when to fight, and when to run, smart enough to get out of the game years ago, before the bodies started piling up.

If the creds were legit than that meant we could get a ticket and a room, somewhere to live when we arrived. A chance to get out of the machine, trading our lives as vagrants for a life of settlers, more dangerous but undoubtedly more noble.

"Alright Gracie we gotta lay low, if they find out I aint dead they'll come looking and I don't want you to get hurt. Maybe I should just transfer all my creds to you and you can go without me, I'll take a second ship when everything is clear."

Her grip on my hand tightened and her little fingers felt like a vise, reminding me of her past as a burglar,

"Don't talk stupid User, we both know I won't leave you to the wolves."

I stared into her face and wondered how a broken down thief could get so lucky.