Chapter Fifty-One – Community Feelings

Chapter Fifty-One – Community Feelings

“There’s an essential mistrust of the community. A well-honed fear of your own neighbour.

That fear, that’s what’s keeping us afloat right now. The longer people spend mistrusting their neighbour, the longer it’ll take them to realize that the person in the same shithole as them isn’t the one with the boot on their neck.”

–Clive Robertson, Head of Public Security for Nimbletainment, 2045

***

“I, uh, appreciate it,” I said. Now I just felt awkward, and I think Lucy caught on, because of course she did.

“Actually, Peter, I think Cat was here to ask about something else.”

Peter looked between Lucy and I. “Oh, okay. I jumped to a wrong conclusion then,” he said. “I assumed that you wanted me to help you… actually, I don’t entirely know. We could collect water and perishables now, before this sewer crisis really takes off. A few days of preparation could save a lot of lives.”

“Actually, yeah, that sounds like a fantastic idea,” I said.

“We do a lot of community outreach here. Foodbanks, shelter prep, school supplies. They’re all different non-profits, because we need to compartmentalize things, but all of them keep in touch, we have boards online where to share things. If you want, I can get word out that there’s going to be a water shortage. It’s happened before, we know what to do.”

“It wouldn’t hurt,” I said. “But yeah, Lucy’s right. I mostly came here to ask about something entirely different.”

Peter leaned his elbows down onto his borrowed desk. “Well, I’m listening. If it’s going to save people, then I’m definitely in.”

“Those people that the Sewer Dragons kidnapped, the ones I mentioned before, we need to help them, right now Gomorrah and I are focused on saving the city, but I’d feel pretty fucking awful about myself if I left them to rot, and I doubt there’s any system in place to help.”

“That would require medical assistance for a lot of people,” Peter said.

“It is a lot,” I said. “Do you think you can help?”

“You won’t be too surprised to know that this kind of thing comes up often. Usually it’s someone in the community that needs an operation, or some new organ, or who lost a limb in one of the factories. When people can’t afford the help they need, they often turn to us, and we in turn turn to the rest of the community. I’ve done more charity runs than I can count.”

“Could you do something for the people the Sewer Dragons kidnapped?” Lucy asked.

Peter nodded. “I think we could. Two hundred… that’s a lot of people that need help, and it sounds like it will be expensive help too, but across the millions of people living in New Montreal, that’s only a few dozen credits each. It… I don’t want to bother you, Miss Stray Cat, but could you pitch in as well?”

I only hesitated a moment before nodding. “Yeah, I can help. I’ve been thinking… I have this neat machine that can build prosthetics for people, at least I think it can. I’ll need someone to operate it though, and I don’t think they’ll be the fancy self-installing, tailor-made sort of prosthetic.”

“If you could provide them, we can find someone to install them,” Peter said. “We have a few mechanics, some doctors or ex-medical students. I’m sure they’d be honoured to work with samurai tech, or if not we can probably pay them directly, that would be a lot cheaper than buying the things outright.”

I nodded. That would help. The blueprints would cost me some points, but fuck it, a few hundred points to help a few hundred people. “I don’t know if they’ll be the greatest, but I’ll make sure they’re functional, at least. And I don’t see why we should necessarily limit ourselves to the people the Sewer Dragons took. Within reason, of course.”

“I can set up a clinic. Give me two days, three at most, and I’ll have a place for you to store whatever you make, and some people to run the place.”

I glanced at Lucy, and she nodded. I think she was impressed, which to be fair, I was too. “Alright. I’ll take your word for it. I think I can provide security too.”

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Peter winced. “We… we would like to trust everyone in our community, but some of them come from rough backgrounds, they never got the education they needed, or the care they deserved, and… yes, some might think that robbing a samurai’s clinic might mean a big pay-day.”

A couple of my mech cats would make them reconsider, I figured. It was like having guard dogs, but with railguns. “Yeah, don’t worry there,” I said. “The folk we’re helping, they’ll probably need more than just some fancy new limbs though. Therapy for some of them, I guess, and they might need more hospital time.”

Peter leaned back into his seat, a frown squeezing his brows together. “If we can prove that it works, then we’ll definitely get a lot of requests from people that need the same sort of help, which will mean a lot of donations. The community helping the community is what we’re all about here.”