Homecoming
Neon Heights - Marcos
Marcos Guerrero was never a big fan of Neon Heights. He wasn’t the loud music, party type, he didn’t even like relaxed concerts. He preferred to spend his free time in the relative quiet of his high-rise apartment.
He’d been lucky to get his start as an accounts investigator with Violet before transferring to the Vargos Police Department, so he had a healthy nest egg before taking on police work for relative cents on the dollar.
Now, ten years out of the force and well into retirement age, his back hurt, and his cybernetic arm and eye felt rusty, well past their obsolete date. He’d never afford upgrades doing this work, but there was something he couldn’t shake about the mere act of investigating.
He liked to tell people he believed in justice, that he was fighting for a better Vargos, that change had to start with the individual.
But in all honesty? He just had fun doing it.
He made his way through the snowy streets the morning his life was about to change, watching how the neon lights of Neon Heights flickered beneath the snowfall. The brightness softened under the weight of the storm, their glow seeping through the drifts like ghosts.
He was under contract with a couple who wanted him to find their son who’d been missing for two years. Not unusual in Vargos. A quarter of the city’s children either ran away or were taken every year.
But something about this couple stuck with Marcos–
Their belief.
Their belief that their son was alive and, more than that, that he would want to come back if someone found him. The kid was twenty-two now, and for one reason or another, their faith was contagious. Marcos found himself believing he could track him down.
Every parent deserved closure in Vargos, even if few ever got it.
Leilei’s Bar wasn’t anything special. Just another flickering neon watering hole, the kind of place that wouldn’t last long in Neon Heights’ brutal market. His contact in the area had taken one look at the photo of the kid and nodded.
“Oh yeah. I know him. Selling synth-amps out of the back. Calls himself ‘Ronin.’”
A Japanese street name? That meant one thing in Neon Heights: the Velvet Fangs.
If the kid was working for them, getting him back home would be a tough sell. If he was dealing for them, they had him locked down one way or another.
Marcos approached the bartender, ordered a beer with a shot of gin, and scanned his personal chit to pay. He downed the shot quickly before ripping through the beer in greedy gulps.
The bartender watched him, then walked back over with the bottle. Marcos nodded.
His glass filled up with clear liquid, and he downed it again without so much as a wince.
“Anything stronger?” he asked.
The bartender set the bottle down and gave him a grim look.
“Not sure what you mean. It’s a bar. We sell booze.”
“Don’t jerk me around. No chance a shithole like this is staying open just selling booze. Also, this is Neon Heights, so whatever bribe you’re looking for, just take it off the personal chit and stop jerking me around, it insults both of us.”
The bartender chuckled, shrugged, then punched in a few numbers on the register before pointing down the bar toward a table in the corner.
A young guy sat there, nursing a flat, lukewarm beer. Marcos recognized the face immediately.
It was the kid. "Ronin." Real name: Pascha Gonzales.
The kid looked rough, his face scarred up, a brutal black eye leaving his left eye swollen shut. Still, when Marcos sat down across from him, the kid perked up and launched into his sales pitch, words rolling off his tongue smoothly, rehearsed hundreds of times.
"Only QB vites here, mate. What do you need?"
Quang Xi - Blackfoot amphetamines. A dangerous hustle for someone not built for the game. Marcos didn’t respond. He tossed a printed copy of the photo the kid’s parents had given him onto the table. The kid grabbed it.
"What the–"
His black eye widened slightly as he stared at the image of himself. Marcos leaned forward.
“Don’t talk. Just listen. My name is Marcos Guerrero. I’m a private eye. Your parents sent me to find you. Two years they’ve been looking for you, and I found you in a week. You can imagine how much they paid me for this service.”
The kid didn’t respond. He just stared at the photo. Marcos pressed on.
“How do you think they’re going to react when I tell them what you’re up to? Selling QB vites in a Neon Heights bar? Using a Japanese street name? You’re wrapped up with the Velvet Fangs, aren’t you?” The kid tensed at the mention of the gang.
"Yeah. Sort of why I left in the first place," he admitted. "I used to, or still do, have a gambling problem. I was in deep with a bookie working for them. He said they were going to aether me in the system if I didn’t make good. So I’ve been here ever since, trying to make good."
"And you didn’t tell your parents because…?"
"Because they’d aether them too, if it came to that. You knew enough to find me here and guess I was working for them, so I’m guessing you know what these crazy fuckers are capable of."
“I know they’re thugs with a hard hand and a firm grip on vice sales here in the Heights. I also know they’re morons who like to bite off other cultures when it’s convenient–even when their obsession with Japanese names got them the kind of attention from the Yakuza that you don’t want. Yet here they are, still using the names.”
The kid let out a defeated sigh, his head in his hands, eyes still locked on the photo.
"If I can sell enough of these vites, the debt will be paid. I can get on with my life. I don’t need my parents cleaning up after me. I can handle this."
Marcos kicked the table, making the kid jump in his seat.
"You can’t handle a fucking thing. You know what no one ever does in this city? Get out from under the Velvet Fangs. You think Madame Koi is going to show you mercy?"
The kid collapsed into sobs. He tried to wipe his tears away, but his bruised eye flared with pain at every touch.
Marcos sighed. He hated to admit it, but he felt bad for the kid. Some people just weren’t built to survive in Vargos.
"Look. I know some guys in the Velvet Fangs pipeline. They’d cover your debt as a favor, even if you’re in deep. But I do that? You’re walking right out of here and back to your parents."
The kid’s head snapped up, locking eyes with Marcos.
“Why would you do that for me?”
Marcos considered his usual answers–justice, closure, all the usual shit. Instead, he told the truth.
"I like resolving the cases I take on, not just solving them. The case is closed when you walk back through their door. Call it an obsession if you want."
Marcos stood up.
“I hope your parents’ next call to me is a happy one.”
He stepped back into the snowy street. As he walked away, five tough-looking men passed him, their jackets bearing a glowing purple neon snake.
Velvet Fangs.
His stomach dropped as he watched them enter Leilei’s bar behind him.
So much for closure.