The Children of Zegandaria - Atanas Marinov, Atanas Marinov, Atanas Marinov, Atanas Marinov (world best books to read txt) 📗

CHAPTER SEVENTY-TWO: THE CURSE OF THE SHAYKH

There was an old tale that the dead could send you to the grave, and it was somewhat true. Killing the Sheim could not, and should not, go without consequence.

Shame had been left without parents from an early age, and there was no other way to fight for his survival than to take to the streets - it was his favorite place - there were so many interesting things that could be done there. At first he was a jack of all trades, but very soon he rose to deputy gang boss, and then he took over the leadership of one of the most brutal ones named the Blue Kings - they rampaged through this area because it was what they liked, but they also didn't know what else to do with their lives - the options in this micro world were limited, and soon Shame began to impose his immense influence on the others. Ecclestone's place was nearby, and the dope was inexhaustible. Everyone was drugged with a special cyber-drug that only had an effect on their minds when they were in a virtual environment – thena host of effects were unleashed - primarily hallucinogEnic. And they literally turned into animals.

There were people who lived in their own fears, and literally lost their minds after taking VIS GOD 114 - a strange substance of an indeterminate purple-metallic colour.

The persistent rumor was that one of the supers woke up on a giant kevlarite beam while building a huge skyscraper - his mind couldn't take it and he just jumped. And got smeared like a cockroach. Then there was some rioting in the neighborhood - bloody rioting at that!

There were other problems too - Shame didn't know how to fit in socially. He felt that his gang members were trying to get out of Enzok Ra - each in search of a new life, but many were also failing. One had had his brains blown out. All he knew was the reality being created by all those who fraternized with the VIS GOD 114 in question.

Thanks to the drug, Shame had the tastiest food and the best drink, he had popularity, and he also had great power over the minds of his peers. Soon his organization took on respectable proportions. He rose in the eyes of others, but he himself knew how fake it all was.

He lived his best years here, a place full of youthful romance and unrealized thrills. A place full of people yearning to live but not knowing how. Wanting to discover a new world. A place that eventually led to nowhere. And last but not least, a cradle of vice and cyberpunk debauchery. This, of course, couldn't last more than a dozen years - well, maybe even fifteen or twenty.

Before his brains were blown out Shame was twenty-four, but he felt like a wreck at forty-five. His whole life rested on a dose of VIS GOD 114, his intuitive menner of brutal control, and the piles of money that came to him. He didn't know what world he was in. Sooner or later this would have sent him into the abyss, even if Om Gur Nal's bullet had not finished him.

His problematic behavior was not to be ignored either. He used to love going to school, but at one point he really got fed up and started learning the craft right on the streets. He soon became a brutal leader who easily negotiated price terms.

He decided to hit the gas pedal all the way - he and Big John hit it off like horses. Quite naturally, his avatar soon got fed up and demanded to back off - something Shame didn't like.

The conflict between them had escalated shortly before Shame left this world.

Where's the goods? - He asked, thinking Big John was spinning his number.

- "Doubting your friend, eh?," asked Biggie, not looking at him again.

Usually he had his back if he went foul, as he handled firearms much better than he did. But once their relationship cooled, he stopped covering for him.

That's how the big fouls started happening.

Om Gur Nal was not yesterday's man not to understand that he was the perfect victim - the best cannon fodder he could imagine. Shame - this was going to be his greatest shame!

He had to set the stage for the execution of this arsehole, which no one was going to miss anyway.

Although the gang members spent a considerable amount of time together, they just didn't really know each other because each was playing their part.

Eradio Dee Monk was the best marksman to handle the job. It was an assassin at heart, and that's why it was given the chance of a lifetime to liquidate the leader of the gang. He was the one captured by Boss and his team.

But why did he have to die?

Well, there wasn't a super specific reason, just that Om Gur Nal saw him as a threat - a real one at that, because he and his friends were hanging around Ecclestone's place and maybe seeing this- that. It was getting pretty complicated, especially when it came to the subsequEnt disposal of the drugs he'd collected.

But all in good time.

The perverted assassin had been very cleverly bribed through the transfers in question via the fifth level of virtual reality, and Equius Mon's people had even made the transfer without even suspecting it. However, that was where Om Gur Nal had gotten himself fooled, as the man in question whom he had met had stumbled upon his true enemy who had diverted the money. It sounded rather confused, didn't it?

But in practice it wasn't!

Shame just had to get Detective Boss on the wrong trail and that was that - no more, no less.

And that's what really happened. Om gur nal was ecstatic!

CHAPTER SEVENTY-THREE: VIRTUAL DOPE

When you get high in a virtual environment it's very different from when you do it in real life. Your senses just want to find release, but it never comes. Your whole body is about to explode and you come screaming and even begging for mercy. The colors in front of you are constantly changing. With the change in level of virtual reality, it's not out of the question to even die, but definitely the scariest part is the very concept of taking the drug. It is definitely too nasty.

A lot of people want to feel what it's like to run on a razor's edge - well, it's pretty much the same.

When Shame was getting high, the party was more than cool - everyone around was getting high and then going on a rampage and making the whole neighborhood go nuts. But Shame wasn't a fool, he knew the law enforcement was watching the provocations he'd organized.

The virtual dope was so intoxicating to the mind that anyone could almost feel like a prince or king in their own skin. It was stronger than anything else.

Many felt afraid to even touch it, but things could spiral out of control the other way - one shot himself in the head after getting drunk out of his mind and taking massive amounts of the substance in question.

It had happened right in Ecclestone's place, which was declared neutral territory. From then on, Shame's trade began to slowly fade, but his gang members were in no hurry to abandon him - quite the opposite. He was like an underfed dog that was slowly dying and needed guardians. Big John stepped in somewhat as his nanny, but only for the simple fact that he could drag the others along. They had to neutralize him effectively enough and deal with him a little later.

Shame was doomed. It was just that Om Gur Nal had been following the gang long enough to be aware of that very fact. But there was something else Shame possessed, a deep trait of compassion.

Once an old lady was sick and he earmarked some of the money from the drugs he sold for her treatment.

The others were amazed at how he had actually agreed to share his share with her in this way. Then he answered them:

- I am only one man, but I do not refuse to lend a hand to someone who asks me for help.

Averia Downs looked at him a little strangely. And Milo Starthorne thought that he was being kicked like a horse. But for some reason no one asked him anything and no one changed their mind about him. But only so far!

The boat was sinking and they were ready to leave it, but not without a fight.

Big John gathered them up just then and gave them a short lecture while their boss cackled blissfully.

- "I agree he's changed and can't be trusted," Milo added with a slight note of compassion in his voice. "He doesn't care about whores and money anymore. Not even the drugs. One is like that - taken away. Too sad. Was that our one-time idol? Was that our leader?"

Big John was sad too, but he had to do what he had to do. Otherwise the rival gangs would have easily seen their bill. The dope was far from being disposed of only in Ecclestone's establishment, but also in other places in Enzoc Ra. There was a big game going on there. There was the real breakfast.

CHAPTER SEVENTY-FOUR: TRAITOR

Late at night Big John slipped away. He felt lost, and he was sick. He knew that in those nineteen years the damned planet had changed beyond recognition. He quietly separated from his friends and walked out into the street, the place he knew best.

Everything seemed to be the same, but practically nothing was as it had been. Everything was going to get even scarier in the near future.

As he strode through the streets of Enzok Ra, Big John glanced at some of the buildings - they seemed like scenery to him now, whereas before they had been full of life. With so much emotion and true friendship. They had been selling dope to the entire neighborhood through middlemen, and it was something no one had been able to do before because