Martyna had been doing her new job for over a month now. It was fun work for her?it kept her busy in this crazy world that she didn?t quite fit in. The work she did for Mr. Slovenski usually involved hacking into the Star?s End Spaceport?s mainframe computer system and logging information about arriving and departing ships that Slovenski was interested in. She didn?t know why he was interested in those particular ships, she didn?t ask. She also didn?t hear about the robberies that went on regarding some of the ships she had logged information about for Mr. Slovenski.

She was keeping busy at McLeod?s shop one afternoon, adding up numbers for inventory and double-checking them. She looked up when the bells over the door rang out, ready to greet whomever it was that was stepping inside just as her job description required her to do. She flashed her usual, small smile at all four men that entered.

However, the smile quickly melted away and she felt old, familiar feelings of panic and anxiousness flutter in her stomach. All four men were very large, in very nice suits, and were drawing guns from within their jackets once the front door was closed. She didn?t need to look in the mirror to know her face had turned ashen under that mop of pink hair.

?Don?t move, Miss,? one of the men said as she stepped forward, before the rest, his voice booming out. Like she could if she wanted to! ?Jackson, go in the back and round the guys up,? guy number one ordered another guy while he trained his gun on Martyna to make sure she didn?t move.

Guy two, Jackson, nudged past Martyna, opening the door and stepping into the back room. The familiar hum of the machinery got louder for a moment before the door fully shut, leaving it as only background noise in the deathly silent storefront. She heard Jackson shouting and she jumped suddenly when she heard shots being fired. That comforting hum stopped and the men who worked in the back room started filing into the storefront.

The girl who rarely noticed things going on around her took note of the fact that Jimmy was not one of the men filing out of the work room before the nozzle of Jackson?s gun despite the fact that Jimmy had come into work that morning. She also noticed how Jackson met guy number one?s gaze and nodded into the back room before shutting the door.

She felt herself getting physically ill.

?Line them up,? guy number one called out. Jackson and guy number three both went into motion, moving the five guys into line. They had gotten lucky, all of McLeod?s shop workers were in today.

No, Marty thought, it wasn?t luck; they knew exactly who was going to be in the shop.

?Mister DiCola does not appreciate your efforts in helping Slovenski jeopardize his business and steal his merchandise. Do you feel like divulging any names to us, perhaps someone who has aided you in these tasks? It could save your life.? Guy number one looked to each guy but they all remained silent. Marty could feel herself panicking more the entire time?they could name her and save themselves!

But they didn?t and not once did it occur to Mister DiCola?s henchmen that it had been the pink-haired teen that had really helped Slovenski out for the last month. They directed Marty out of the way, letting her stand witness to the murder of the five remaining workers in McLeod?s Tech Fix shop including both Nathan McLeod Senior and Junior.

They fed her the usual line as they left, something about ?No one messes with Giancarlo DiCola.? She didn?t stay in the shop long after they departed, filing out the door much the way they had come in. She couldn?t stay. Like a frightened animal, confused and bewildered, she skidded out the door and never looked back.

Giomane Slovenski was a pretty fair employer. Marty didn?t have to get dressed up to go to work in the large brownstone that was on the edge of the WestEnd and Old Town. The old house was just a front for the large complex that was hidden behind the fa?ade?underground rooms and a web of connected smaller buildings in the surrounding area.

Martyna walked up the steep steps every day and before she even reached the door, it opened for her. There was no one ever standing in the doorway but she knew they were watching. Her steps echoed loudly as she walked down the pristine hallways to the room that had been assigned to her (down the hall, down two flights of stairs, and through another hallway). It was actually a series of rooms filled with computers, filing cabinets, databases, and a small workshop for her to create and fiddle in.

The last room was her favorite because it presented a challenge. Her usual task?breaking through passwords, codes, and firewalls, that Stars End put newly in place every day, to find out departures and incoming flights, cargos, etc.?was too easy for her. She had the lists every day on the boss? desk by mid-morning. The rest of the day was spent fiddling unless some other task was presented to her. Fiddling, though, was something to expand her mind. She worked on little maintenance things for Slovenski before working on her own pet project: creating technology that was better than magic and could work in the WestEnd.

Fearful of magic and frustrated by the ever-changing atmosphere of the WestEnd and how it could make obsolete the strongest and greatest of her creations, Marty strove to beat whatever great power had set such limitations in the End. She attempted to make programs that could study and graph the changes that took place there, searching for some rhyme or reason to them. She created surveyors that attempted to monitor the ebb and flow of magic without being destroyed by it.

Slovenski didn?t care about her pet projects. As long as she continued to hack through every system set before her as well as create such items that he felt were useful?fraudulent documents, ID cards, and the like?then she could do whatever she liked with her time.

Marty worked for several months like that, still not breaking out of her shell; work got her out of the house but she still embodied the spirit of a recluse. She rose in the morning in that still ghastly bedroom, throwing on whatever clothes she came across first. She walked to work alone, smoking a clove?Elly had gotten her hooked to this particular brand in the past?outside the building before crushing the cherry beneath the toe of her sneaker and heading inside. She worked all day with little heed to the time or the other people that came in and out of her workshop. There was no quitting hour. Whenever she felt like being done, Marty put down her tools and left. To her surprise, it was almost always dark when she finally stepped outside again.

She hated walking the streets of the WestEnd alone at night, but what other choice did she have? There was a time that contacting her cousin Alain popped into her brain momentarily; he would surely be able to find someone to walk with her, right? But asking for such help seemed like a foreign concept, and she couldn?t even rightly recall where she could find Alain even if she did want to talk to him. Her projects pushed all else from her memory; they were her life. So she tightened her hold on her bag, a special gun she had designed hidden within, and walked warily through the dark streets of the End.

Sohail guided Marty through the building, an arm still slung around her shoulder to make sure she did not stray to the right or to the left into the rooms that branched off from the hallway they traversed. A few of the doors were closed, but the ones that were open revealed a conference room and a lavish sitting room.

?You live here?? Marty asked dubiously. Her savior didn?t seem one to prefer the rich brown leather furniture she had caught sight of.

?I keep a room here, yeah. And in ten other places around the city, kid. They won?t catch me in a trap.? She winked aside to her.

Marty nodded numbly; the whole event felt surreal. The second Sohail had said her name, it felt like a ton of bricks had hit her. She knew that name, knew her reputation. Here was a rising power in the underworld of RhyDin, leading her about her house like an old friend. Martyna suspected that nefarious business deals were probably going on all around her, which only increased her surprise when she was led into an ordinary looking kitchen, complete with a linoleum floor and ugly, fading wallpaper.

?Sit,? Sohail commanded, pointing to a chair at a small four person table. Marty obeyed, taking a seat and watching Sohail move about the room as if she owned the place?which she probably did?finding some iodine and a clean napkin. She wet the napkin, sprinkling it with the iodine before handing it over to Marty. ?For your head,? she explained at the blank look she received.

Marty had forgotten the cut on her head by now with all else that was happening around her. She reached up, expecting the sting that came when she touched the napkin to her head, and blindly cleaned the cut as Sohail continued to move about the kitchen, talking. ?You?ll stay here tonight and tomorrow we?ll visit Slovenski before we get to work.?

?What kind of work?? Marty had a million questions and was quickly getting over her fear of strangers as this scarred young woman talked to her like she didn?t notice her perpetual social awkwardness and how out of her wits scared she was after her brief encounter with Vinny earlier. Sohail also helped humanize herself by beginning to eat a bowl of some fruit-colored cereal like a child.

?We?ll see,? she responded between bites, ?you want some of these?? Even though Marty shook her head ?no,? she soon had a bowl of cereal in front of her and both females were sitting across from each other at the kitchen table.

?So, you always let people tell you what to do, kid?? Sohail reopened the conversation, eyeing the pink haired wonder.

Martyna was just starting to get comfortable when Sohail spoke again. The spoon paused halfway to her mouth, ?What? No? I mean, I didn?t??

Sohail laughed, ?Yeah right, kid. Don?t think I don?t know your history. I do my homework on anyone that works with me.? Marty only had a minute to puzzle over this second allusion to the fact that she would now be working with Sohail before the woman continued. ?Slovenski dragged you in without objection to work with him and you haven?t offered a single objection since I stumbled upon you earlier. We?re gonna need tah get you a backbone if you?re gonna survive around here.?

?Well?it?s not really that,? Marty began quietly.

?Then what is it? If yah want something, kid, you gotta stop letting people push you around and just take it!?

Marty stared, frowning, at the colored cereal letters floating around in her bowl of milk. ?And what if I don?t want anything?? It was amazing how she hadn?t spoken so truthfully with anyone in months, not since the last time she saw her sister, and here she was opening up to a stranger. She didn?t really have to marvel or try hard to understand why many street kids flocked to work with Sohail; she understood them.

?Then we?ve got a real big problem. Everyone?s gotta have something driving them or else they?re dead. Are you dead, Martyna D?Mourir?? Sohail had certainly done her homework after meeting Marty weeks earlier. She knew what she needed for her little empire to succeed, and Marty was just what her plans had called for.

?No.?

?Then figure out what?s driving you or lie down and die already.? Sohail?s whole manner was gruff and no nonsense. She had never been the sweet and cuddly kind and she certainly wasn?t going to coddle this girl no matter how much she needed her to reach her own goals.

Marty grasped for a response. Was she really just dead? If not, what was driving her? Once upon a time the answer had been clear: work hard in school and follow her father?s footsteps in bettering the world with science and maybe help make it more beautiful with her art. But then the war came, it poisoned everything, and what she wanted was freedom to expose the lies they were all bound by. Then, when they had ended up here in RhyDin and everyone scattered, what did she want? Did she even want to live? If yes, what for?

?Well? what drives you?? Maybe if she could understand what others lived for, she could find something to live for again. For a while, revenge filtered through her mind and she had tried to live for that only to get caught up in meaningless work for Slovenski.

?Me? Isn?t it clear? I live for power. I want the power to always have self-sovereignty and to do what I will. And I?ll take it any way I can get it.?

Power? But that didn?t seem quite right to Marty. She had never really wanted power, but it would be nice not to feel weak and powerless in the chaotic world of RhyDin. Was that really something to live for, though?

Sohail could see the internal struggle taking place on the teen?s usually passive face. ?Don?t hurt yer brain there, kid. I?m gonna need it to help me crack a few nuts, so take your time; you?ll figure it out soon enough. In the meantime, I?ll keep yah busy with work.?

Marty stared at the remaining bits of cereal in her bowl that were quickly soaking up too much milk and becoming a soggy mess. She glanced up to Sohail after a few moments of silence, curious. ?Just what did you have in mind??