There were armoured guards in all of the habitats. It was annoying, but not unexpected. What was unexpected, though, was that although the guards had left the habitats last night, all of the restaurants and stalls had been locked up behind them. As well as all of the sharp knives. I’d used hatches to get inside the kitchens, but there was nothing I could do with the lockboxes I’d uncovered. I hadn’t been able to gain access to even one. And therefore I’d been unable to hold up my end of the bargain with Captain Tremblay.

It was 1700 hours now. So, I had one hour left before the shops would close and the passengers would have to be in their quarters. Some might have knives in them, but the only passenger I knew well enough to surprise was Mandy. And that would mean only one knife, even if she had a suitable one to give me.

I nibbled on a thumbnail and watched the guards from the safety of my hiding hole behind a hatch. This was the first time all day that their numbers had decreased to an acceptable level. I wasn’t sure why, but I had to take advantage of it.

Habitat One, I’d already decided, was out, because I really would have stood out wearing what I was wearing now. Plus, I couldn’t help thinking my father would expect me to go there. I was a top-tier, and he’d believe I’d only associate with top-tiers.

No, Habitat One was too risky. And even though I might’ve been able to get something from Habitat Two, I’d decided to start with Habitat Three and the pay-for-passage passengers. If anyone were going to support a resistance type movement, it would be the pay-for-passages who already thought their lot in life was unequal to those tiers above them.

I let out a breath of air and then lifted my wrist comm toward the hatch, making it disappear. Slipping out, I checked both ways to be sure the coast was still clear, and then stepped away from the hatch and watched the gel wall reform behind me.

I felt entirely too exposed. Most of the people moving through the central hub had their heads down and worried looks on their faces. At least that was something. I ducked my head and merged in with the crowd, which had the usual rush hour traffic swell to it. There was a level of unease that wove its way through the people around me, though. Touching on each one as if some grim reaper marking their next victim with a dark mark.

I suppressed a shudder and approached the first stall. It was a food stall, serving burritos. The man behind the counter used a spoon to spread the ingredients, but I was sure he’d have to have a knife to chop up something. I couldn’t see it, so I hesitated. Standing there for too long while the person behind me shifted uneasily on their feet.

A guard, scanning the courtyard, looked toward me. He might have been just taking a look at each person as part of his monitoring routine, but it was enough to spook me.

“Um, changed my mind,” I said and moved off.

The guard looked at someone else.

Stalls were too exposed, I decided, and so entered a restaurant as far away from the guards as I could manage. This one was a steakhouse. As my eyes adjusted to the dimness within, I noted the number of patrons. There were more empty seats than full. My guess, everyone felt safer in their quarters right now. I didn’t blame them; this was the last place I wanted to be.

A server approached and handed me a menu.

“Take out?” he asked as if he expected that answer.

“I’m not sure,” I said. “We don’t have any steak knives.”

“Oh, we can loan them to you if you put down a deposit,” he said easily. I had the impression that business was poor and they needed to secure any sale in any way possible.

I checked behind me. No one had walked in. The guard I could see was across the courtyard. The other was out of sight, but I assumed he’d had no reason to move from his position. He hadn’t in the past hour as I’d watched from my hidey.

“I really need a different kind of purchase,” I said in a low voice to the server. “Is there any chance you’d be open to that?”

“What kind of purchase?” the guy asked warily.

His eyes scanned my clothing and then settled on my hacked up hair. He didn’t look entirely pleased with what he saw. Not much I could do about that.

I leaned forward. He carefully leaned back. This wasn’t going well.

I felt nervous enough as it was, but the waiter’s reaction set me on edge. My hands began to shake, and I was sure I was sweating.

“I need at least ten knives,” I said.

“Ten? Steak knives?” The implied was I had to be mad.

I nodded my head.

“Bigger if you have them to spare,” I added.

He looked at me and then flicked a glance over my shoulder. I felt like a target was painted on my back. Slowly, I turned my head. But there was no one there. When I looked back at the waiter, he looked frightened.

“I’m sorry, but we can't help you like that.”

What had he seen? The guard looking this way? What?

“Then I’ll order four steaks, medium rare, side of steamed vegetables to go,” I said. “And I’ll take you up on the offer of loaned steak knives.”

The look he gave me definitely said I was mad.

“OK,” he said slowly, ringing the order up. “That’ll be $99.96 plus the deposit on the knives of forty, making it a total of $139.96 plus tip.”

Tip. He wanted a tip?

“Throw in two extra knives, and I’ll tip you a twenty,” I said.

His hand hovered over the cash register, and then he rung it up.

“That’s $99.96 plus the deposit on the knives of sixty, making a total of $159.96 plus a tip of twenty. $179.96,” he finished.

I blinked at him. Then pulled out nine twenty-dollar notes and placed them on the counter between us.

Holding his eyes, I said, “You can keep the four cents.”

He took the money, slipping a twenty out of the pile and into his pocket, and then put the rest in the cash register and closed it.

“That will be half an hour,” he said.

“Thank you,” I offered. “I’ll be back.”

He said nothing as I exited the restaurant. I checked my wrist comm. It was already closing in on 1730. I had to hurry if I wanted to get an order in elsewhere like that. Four freaking steaks. What the hell was I going to do with that? I checked my cash supply. It was getting low. Not so low that I couldn’t still pull this off, but anything after tonight, and I was going to be strapped.

The rest of my cash was in my quarters. A lot of cash. It was a cash society now, and my father had made sure we had oodles of it. I had enough on me for one last effort, though. I may not have the entire twelve knives the captain wanted by the end of it, but I’d have something.

I walked two restaurants down and slipped in the door. As it closed, I rechecked the guards. One of them had shifted. Had the other? My heart leapt into my throat, and I turned back around.

The waiter was already waiting. Eagerly.

“Dinner for one?” he said looking over my shoulder. “Or are you expecting someone else?”

I glanced around the restaurant. Burgers. It was a freaking burger joint. No knives. Fantastic.

“Can I speak to the chef?” I asked.

“Oh,” the waiter said, eyeing me with suspicion. He probably thought I was here to complain.

“I’m writing an expose for the newsfeeds on restaurant kitchens, and I’d love to include yours,” I said in a rush of words that tumbled over each other.

“Oh,” the guy said. “In that case, I’ll check.”

He turned and started walking towards the kitchen. I waited a beat and then followed. By the time he pushed through the swing doors, I was right behind him.

“Suze,” the waiter was saying, “I got a chick who wants…”

He stopped when he saw I’d followed him into the food prep area.

“I’ll take it from here,” I said, slipping him a twenty. “Thanks.”

He glanced down at the note and then flicked a look at the chef, and then mumbled something incomprehensible and shot out the door back to the front of the restaurant.

Suze, the chef, looked at me. Her big, bulky arms crossed over her chest.

“What do you want?” she demanded.

The smell of fried onions and beef patties reached my nose, and my stomach rumbled. She let out a huff of breath.

Now or never, I thought and stepped up to her prep table. There was a decent looking knife sitting right there. I could have just taken it and run. She was too large to chase me through the tables out front, and the waiter had looked ineffectual.

Suze slowly reached forward and picked up the knife, slipping it beneath the bench’s surface purposefully.

My eyes met hers, and I blurted, “I need knives. I’m happy to pay. But I need whatever you can give me. It’s important.”

I shut up.

Suze didn’t say a thing.

“Um,” I said, pulling out what was left of my cash. “I have two-hundred, no three-hundred and sixty dollars.” I slammed it down on the counter between us. I looked up at her again. “Please,” I said for good measure.

“Who are you?” the woman finally asked.

“No one,” I said. “No one special.”

“There’s a restriction on knives,” she offered. Did that mean she was thinking about helping me? “The guards will check my inventory,” she added. She was!

“Oh,” I said, not knowing what to say to convince her.

“It won’t help you,” she added. “They’ve got armour. And plasma rifles.”

“It’s not…”

She held up her hand to stall me. “Everyone wants protection right now.”

I nodded my head.

“I can’t give you knives,” she said earnestly, “but I do have something.”

She turned around and reached up to her hanging utensils. Her thick fingers wrapped around a meat mallet. It was the biggest meat mallet I’d ever seen.

Suze turned back and thumped the thing down on the bench in front of me. It actually dented the surface.

“They don’t check on these,” she said. “Swing hard and aim low,” she added. “And then run like fuck.”

I stared at it. She pushed it slowly closer. And then picked out a twenty from my pile and pushed the rest of the cash towards me.

OK. A meat mallet. A meat mallet and six steak knives.

I checked my wrist comm. I was out of time. Then I scooped up the last of my cash and wrapped the meat mallet in my apron, securing it to my belt.

Suze snorted and then turned her attention to the, no doubt by now, well-done beef patty.

I thanked her quietly and then walked out of the restaurant.

The steaks and steak knives were waiting. The waiter hadn’t slipped anything else inside.

I took what I had and made a quick exit. The guards were still there. Still watching. But neither looked twice. I found a deserted corridor and slipped into the emergency tubes.

I lay there for a long time smelling grilled beef and steamed potatoes and gripping my steak knives.