Chapter 23 Part 6
Sal considered the man's unfortunate predicament. As close to compassion as he could come was to give the man a fighting chance. Sal took his knife and cut one of the man's writs's horizontally. The loss of blood would not be enough tot kill him, but it would be enough to allow some of the nanobots to run out instead of reaching his brain.
Sal glanced back once where the man lay as he made his way toward Iron Bastion, which was now impressively close. When he did, he saw other people striping the man's immobilized boyd of the motley assortment of technology he wore. Sal found it distasteful, but the man had gambled on the law of the street and lost. When he awoke, provided he survived the torture, he would find himself naked. At the very least, perhaps it would humble the man in the future--provided there were anything left of him to humble.
Finally, Sal arrived in front of Iron Bastion. He gazed up at the tall spires which were here and there pock marked from various conflict. He had never been so close to the structure. It was not exactly a welcoming ambiance. Iron Bastion had been the final resting place for many people. If all the bloodshed in and near its grounds could be collected and measured, it would have easily have dwarfed the tallest spires of the building.
Iron Bastion had, indirectly, been one of the reasons Undertown had rejected using the holonosphere. When conflicts had arisen in the past, most everyone found their way to Iron Bastion when things got bad enough and rode out the conflict. Undertown folks figured that if you had a building that was large enough and well defended, regardless of what might happen in the world, when the world came knocking on one's doorstep, they would have to overcome that stronghold. Since the invaders would not be playing on their home turf, those who were defending would have a slight advantage. It wasn't important, subconsciously then, for Undertown citizenry to be well connected with the outside world. Rather, it was more important to have some impregnable structure in their town, which, technologically, the dampening was.
As Sal mad his way past Iron Bastion, he noticed a curious little cottage nestled back into a cove. This must be his destination. The cottage itself was a rotund little building, with strange instruments poking up all over it. The whole dwelling was just exceptionally odd. It didn't fit in with the rest of Undertown. Perhaps if Undertown had been some 14th century shire combined with post-apocalyptic technological advancement, maybe it would fit--but even then it would be a stretch.
Sal checked to make sure his knife was still handy in case this proved to be some elaborate Inner Sanctum trap. The cottage was not in a bad part of Undertown, but then it looked to be in a world all of its own. It was strange that the bad elements of Undertown had not bothered to touch any of the technology so prominently displayed here. The man Sal had seen coming in to town had been stripped bare almost as soon as he hit the ground, but here this little cottage sat, seemingly untouched.
