"Didn't sleep much" Cassian said, rubbing at his temple. "But hey, no patrols kicking down the door, so I'll count it as a win."
Riven didn't reply. He checked the satchel quietly, more by habit than concern. Everything was in place.
They left not long after. The alleys were quieter now, only a few people out sweeping debris or cooking thin food over scavenged burners.
Cassian adjusted his coat collar. "Alright. Before we get flagged again, can we focus on actual human needs for a minute?"
Riven glanced at him.
"Water. Food. Shelter. You know, things that keep people alive."
Riven gave a small nod. "I know."
They walked past a row of older service buildings. The walls were covered in corrugated panels, and thick power cables hung between them. Riven stopped by a junction box, following the line of the conduit with his eyes.
Cassian sighed. "Don't even think about it."
"I'm not plugging anything in" Riven said.
"Good. Because I'm not sprinting through another maze of broken plumbing just to get shot at again."
Riven kept walking, slower this time. He was scanning for something, anything, still intact. The signal in the substation couldn't have been just a fluke. Whatever this system was, it had pathways, and it still responded.
Cassian walked beside him, matching his pace. "You're looking for another console, aren't you?"
Riven didn't answer at first, but eventually: "...A node."
Cassian gave him a sidelong look. "Which is different from a console how?"
"A console is like an access point... a node is part of the system itself."
"And this thing you're carrying..."
"It's responding to something out here. It's not random, it's following embedded structure."
Cassian slowed a little. "So you're saying... there's still a system alive under all this?"
"It's possible... parts of it might never have died."
That quieted Cassian for a few steps.
Ahead, a hand-painted sign hung from a leaning fence:
FILTERED WATER – SLEEP SLOTS – 2C TOKEN.
Cassian tilted his head at it. "Finally, something useful."
They followed the sign down a narrow side alley, where metal panels had been hammered into loose walls and an old storefront had been stripped down to its frame. A cracked window buzzed with white light. Above the door, faded lettering still clung to the frame:
"I-FOAM REPAIRS // BY APPOINTMENT."
Someone had scratched a new word below it in paint: "SHELTER."
Cassian pushed the door open. Inside, the space was dim and quiet. A single solar lamp hung from the ceiling, casting a soft white glow over a short desk and a stack of folded tarp blankets in the corner.
Behind the desk sat a man, broad-shouldered, rough-featured, with gray streaks in his short hair and a mechanical brace over one forearm. He didn't bother standing when they entered, he just looked up, sizing them both in a glance.
"You here for water or sleep?" he asked.
"Both" Cassian said, tossing a small coin token onto the desk.
The man caught it with one hand and slid open a drawer. "Two hours gets you a filtered water refill and a back room. Don't break anything, don't plug anything in, and don't ask questions you don't want answered."
Cassian lifted a brow. "Fair enough."
Riven said nothing, letting his eyes move slowly across the room. He found no surveillance points, no unusual sound under the floor. The entire building seemed clean and quiet, maybe too quiet.
The man looked at him now, his gaze assessing him a while longer than it had Cassian.
"You're not from around here."
"No" Riven replied.
The man nodded once, then passed two sealed flasks across the desk. "Call me Lorne. If you're planning to sleep, use the room behind the tarp. If you're not, don't linger."
Cassian took one of the flasks and handed the other to Riven.
Lorne stood and motioned toward the back with two fingers. "Clock starts now."
--------
After taking turns rinsing off with what passed for clean water, they stepped back out into Sector 14's haze.
Cassian headed toward the ration strip. "I'm getting something solid in my stomach before we wander into another collapse zone."
Riven followed, one hand still resting lightly against the satchel strap. There were too many eyes around to keep searching for nodes, so he fell into step with Cassian instead.
Cassian bartered casually, flipping a few more coins to a woman selling wrapped food packets. She slid one across the table without a word. Her eyes then paused on Riven, measuring him before moving on.
"You looking to trade?" she asked him.
Riven hesitated, then pulled a small tool from his coat, a flexible circuit tester. "How much for water?"
She squinted at it. "That's old... but maybe. Let me see."
He handed it over carefully. Her fingers traced the edges, then tested the connector. After a second, she gave a slow nod and reached behind her, pulling out a sealed water packet.
As he reached for it, a voice drifted from nearby: "Haven't seen one of those in years."
It came from a man leaning against a support post. He was young, rough around the edges, and, most importantly, he wasn't looking at the circuit tester. He was looking at the satchel instead.
The flap hadn't fully closed when Riven handed the circuit tester, and a glimpse of metal had caught the light, smooth, old, too clean for anything local. The man's gaze fixed on it for a while, like he didn't know what it was exactly, but knew enough to recognize the shape of expensive trouble.
Cassian tensed just slightly and Riven caught it.
The man pushed off the post, still watching. "That a courier rig? Didn't think they were still running those out this way."
Riven didn't answer.
Cassian stepped in smoothly. "It's junk, barely holding together. Looks better than it works. If you sneeze near it, it'll probably short out."
The man gave a half-smile and backed off, but didn't look that convinced.
The vendor woman handed Riven the water. "Don't wave things like that around" she muttered. "Some people don't know how to mind their own business."
Riven nodded once. "Thanks."
Then they left the strip without speaking.
Cassian didn't say anything until they were two alleys over. "You ever think about carrying a boring bag? Something less… interesting-looking?"
Riven didn't answer, but his grip on the strap tightened.
They returned to the shelter after dusk, moving through the back alleys in near silence.
The room was as they'd left it. Cassian dropped onto the tarp-covered mattress with a big exhale and rested his arms behind his head. Riven sat against the far wall, legs crossed, keeping the satchel close by his side.
Cassian opened one of the sealed water packets with his teeth, then paused, holding it out toward Riven. "Thirsty?"
Riven took it without a word and drank slowly. The water tasted flat and over-filtered, but it was clean.
Cassian studied him for a moment. "You really think the system's still alive? That whatever ran the grid back then… it's still out there?"
Riven nodded. "Some parts of it, yes..."
Cassian ran a hand over his face. "And you're chasing it because… what? You think you can turn the water back on?"
"My sister... she thought it was possible" Riven said.
He unzipped the satchel just slightly and checked the core, it was still warm.
"She was trying to understand how the old system worked, you know, before the collapse. Back when the grid still responded to pressure changes. Back then, water wasn't just released randomly. The Lady controlled the infrastructure and monitored flow across sectors. It rerouted supply based on demand, stability, and failures. If a zone lost pressure, due to damage, leaks, or sabotage, water would be cut and sent somewhere else. Cleaner districts, lower risk."
A pause followed for him to gather his thoughts.
"Most people think that it all stopped when the system went down. But parts of it didn't. Some nodes are still active, I'm sure of it. Not everywhere, but in places no one checks anymore. The regulators, or rather what was left of them, just abandoned the deeper layers. They said it was too unstable or too costly to support them. But she thought if we could find where the system last rerouted, if we could trace the logic backwards, we might find where the water's still going."
He paused, glancing at the satchel.
"The system didn't die. It just went silent. And she believed it was still listening and waiting for someone to 'ask the right way'."
Cassian looked at him and decided the question couldn't be avoided any longer. "And where is she now?"
Riven was quiet for a few seconds. "She didn't make it past the fourth zone."
The silence settled again, and after a minute, Cassian spoke. "You think that thing's leading you back to the origin?"
"I don't know" Riven admitted. "But it hasn't gone cold. Not once."
Neither of them said anything after that.