Fanfiction: "Gutted" (Transistor)
Mar. 29th, 2022 02:49 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
deemoyzaTitle: Gutted (2,017 words)
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Transistor
Rating/Warnings: Mature / Strong Language
Characters: Blue (Auden), Mack Orthon
Summary: Auden runs into an old friend at the bar, a mechanic who just lost his livelihood to a vote he couldn't even participate in.
Notes: Written for a prompt on Tumblr: "An absent look or touch."
"What do you think it's like," he said quietly, "to be a big sports star? Everybody throwing themselves at you, every door open? You think they get tired of that, think they want a little challenge in life?"
Auden took a long sip. "I've never thought about it."
"Well, if they want challenge, they're welcome to mine." Mackey raised his glass toward the screens in a rueful salute. "See how long they'd last down here, with us 'little folk.'"
"Mackey, what's wrong?"
"Oh, nothing's wrong. Not with the system, anyway. Cloudbank's being Cloudbank. Flighty, restless, changing." He slammed his glass down with a loud curse. "They got me, Audie. They finally caught up. They're shutting me down."
"What?"
"You heard me. They're shutting down my shop. Popular vote, a couple days ago. Said it was too noisy."
"It's a garage. Of course it's going to be loud."
"Well, it was a little too loud for the good people of Goldwalk, evidently." He smirked. "They're replacing me with a boutique perfumery."
"That's quite a switch."
"Yeah, forgot to mention the other part: smell complaint. Too much grease and exhaust. Won't be hard for them to pull it off, though. Administrators work their little admin magic, and poof!, ol' Mackey's shop is gone, not even a grease stain left." He tossed his head back with a sharp, cynical laugh. "They could probably make me disappear just as easily. You, too. Make the whole lot of us disappear if they wanted to."
Auden sighed. Mackey was right. All it took was a bit of code-wrangling. Change a number here and there, change the landscape. Purge some data, purge a person. He wasn't aware of the specifics, and couldn't begin to understand them even if he were, but he knew how much power the Administrators wielded, how much weight the votes of citizens carried. He took another drink and looked at Mackey, who still had his head tilted back, smiling at the ceiling.
"Mack," he said quietly, "I'm sorry."
"Why?" Mackey kept staring up. "You didn't do nothing."
"I'm sorry for what they did to you. You don't deserve it."
"I didn't even have a choice. Didn't even get a single vote to try to save my own ass." Mackey's voice grew thick and his words slurred. "Everybody else gets to decide what I can and can't do, who I get to be. I don't have one fucking say in the matter. 'The city of Cloudbank, only for you.' Bullshit. Only for them."
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Transistor
Rating/Warnings: Mature / Strong Language
Characters: Blue (Auden), Mack Orthon
Summary: Auden runs into an old friend at the bar, a mechanic who just lost his livelihood to a vote he couldn't even participate in.
Notes: Written for a prompt on Tumblr: "An absent look or touch."
"What do you think it's like," he said quietly, "to be a big sports star? Everybody throwing themselves at you, every door open? You think they get tired of that, think they want a little challenge in life?"
Auden took a long sip. "I've never thought about it."
"Well, if they want challenge, they're welcome to mine." Mackey raised his glass toward the screens in a rueful salute. "See how long they'd last down here, with us 'little folk.'"
"Mackey, what's wrong?"
"Oh, nothing's wrong. Not with the system, anyway. Cloudbank's being Cloudbank. Flighty, restless, changing." He slammed his glass down with a loud curse. "They got me, Audie. They finally caught up. They're shutting me down."
"What?"
"You heard me. They're shutting down my shop. Popular vote, a couple days ago. Said it was too noisy."
"It's a garage. Of course it's going to be loud."
"Well, it was a little too loud for the good people of Goldwalk, evidently." He smirked. "They're replacing me with a boutique perfumery."
"That's quite a switch."
"Yeah, forgot to mention the other part: smell complaint. Too much grease and exhaust. Won't be hard for them to pull it off, though. Administrators work their little admin magic, and poof!, ol' Mackey's shop is gone, not even a grease stain left." He tossed his head back with a sharp, cynical laugh. "They could probably make me disappear just as easily. You, too. Make the whole lot of us disappear if they wanted to."
Auden sighed. Mackey was right. All it took was a bit of code-wrangling. Change a number here and there, change the landscape. Purge some data, purge a person. He wasn't aware of the specifics, and couldn't begin to understand them even if he were, but he knew how much power the Administrators wielded, how much weight the votes of citizens carried. He took another drink and looked at Mackey, who still had his head tilted back, smiling at the ceiling.
"Mack," he said quietly, "I'm sorry."
"Why?" Mackey kept staring up. "You didn't do nothing."
"I'm sorry for what they did to you. You don't deserve it."
"I didn't even have a choice. Didn't even get a single vote to try to save my own ass." Mackey's voice grew thick and his words slurred. "Everybody else gets to decide what I can and can't do, who I get to be. I don't have one fucking say in the matter. 'The city of Cloudbank, only for you.' Bullshit. Only for them."
