• The mugger has no name. Her parents never named her, as far as she knows. She lives with a master, who is fairly kind, as orphan masters go. She is young, nobody knows how young. Maybe around twelve. She doesn’t care. All she cares about right now is coming home with something, anything, so she can get supper tonight. She grips the knife tightly, pulls back further into the alleyway and breathes silently, waiting.
    There! A man in a white lab coat, turning into the alley. A scientist? You never see scientists, except on tv. They stay in the RadCo building with their families, for ‘safety.’ What is he doing out here? And more importantly, she reminds herself, what can I take from him? She sees nothing of value in plain sight but then, you never do. She steps behind him as he walks by and puts her knife to his back, hissing “Don’t turn around!” He stops. Of course he stops, they always do. Everyone knows what to do when being mugged, it’s almost tradition these days. And then he turns around. She jumps back, surprised, with a little squeak. Nobody turns around, nobody has ever turned around, not in this city! But she improvises, pushing the knife up to his throat. He’s short, it isn’t too far of a reach. “Give me your valuables,” she hisses, composure regained. “You know the drill.” Or does he? But he just laughs, reaches into the one pocket on his coat, and pulls out a little glass vial like you see on television. “This is all I have little girl, and it’s worthless to you. Unless you want to try drinking it, maybe you’ll get superpowers!” He laughs harder, patronizing her, then yells in surprise as she snatches it out of his hands and runs “Hey! Get back here with that!” He tries to chase her, but she knows these alleyways and he doesn’t. Besides, she’s a little girl.
    She slips into a little nook in the wall and hides silently until the scientist is gone. “a*****e” she whispers to herself, trying to reassure herself. She looks at the vial with interest, now that she’s safe. The liquid inside is murky brown and smells strange. The vial has a little piece of cork, or something very like cork, blocking off the top so that the liquid doesn’t escape. Maybe it will be valuable; maybe she’ll get two servings of supper tonight. It isn’t glowing, so it probably isn’t radioactive. It’s only radioactive if it’s glowing, right? She shakes her head, snapping out of it. Time to head back to base.

    “No! Get out of here with that! Nobody steals from the scientists! Get out, and don’t come back!” The Master picks her up and bodily throws her out the door, then pulls out his gun and points it at her. “Get the ******** out of here you little-“But she’s already running. What’s going on? She’s never seen him this mad, nobody ever told me I couldn’t steal from scientists, what’s going on? She runs until she finds a familiar hiding place and huddles down, sobbing. She can feel a panic attack coming on, but she needs to keep it silent. If the sweepers find her…
    It is growing dark out, and cold. Her stomach growls, but she ignores it. It isn’t the first time she’s gone hungry. She pulls out the vial again, looking at it with interest. What was it the scientist had said? “Try drinking it, maybe you’ll get superpowers!” But she shakes her head. Of course he was only joking, that only happens on tv. And it hasn’t happened in a long time, the censors must have blocked it.
    She shakes her head, and then starts sobbing again as the realization hits her. She’s been kicked out. An orphan without an orphan master is just meat for the sweepers. She is dead. No orphan master will take an orphan her age, it’s hopeless. The only place that would be safe is the roofs, and there’s no way to get up there, not anymore. They say there are whole communities of outcasts living up there, just like the ones down in the sewers. But it doesn’t matter, there’s no way up or down.
    She looks at the vial again, and makes a decision. She pulls the little piece of cork off the top of the vial and takes a sip, laughing a little hysterically. It burns on the way down, and she coughs, tears coming to her eyes. It’s disgusting! What is this? She drops the vial, and it shatters, the rest of the liquid leaking down a sewer drain. She spits several times to try to get the taste out of her mouth and waits for something to happen. She waits for several minutes, still spitting, but all is silent. She feels ill now, so she just lays down in her little nook and tries to sleep.

    “Gasp!” she wakes up a little later, it’s the dark of full night, no light at all shining through the dust in the sky. She heaves, then leans over the sewer hole and throws up. It burns as much on the way up as it did on the way down! She cries a little, regretting her impulsive decision, but it doesn’t matter now. She’ll probably die here. But the sickness has already stopped, and in its place is just an odd heat. Then, a bold of pain rips through her back. She falls to her knees, whimpering. It’s worse than the lashes the master gives out to troublemakers, but only just. She whimpers again, and staggers to her feet. Her back feels heavy, what is wrong with her? A sweeper goes by, missing her, but by its light she sees her shadow on the wall. What are those lumps, on her back? It’s some kind of mutation! She yells, then starts to run, out into the alleys, away from the sweeper, away from everything. Her shirt rips as she runs, two big holes in the back. She can see the skin on her hands bubbling as she runs, slightly hunched. Eventually the pain is too much, she collapses sideways against the wall. Her back no longer hurts, but there is still pain all over the rest of her body. Her skin bubbles and seems to harden, and she sobs silently. Then, she feels a hand on her shoulder. She yelps, the sound distorted through her now misshapen mouth, and jumps to the side, stumbling. But nobody is there. Her back is against the wall, but she feels two hands now, on both of her shoulders. Then she hears a voice saying “hush now, my child,” and she passes out.

    She wakes up in the same position. It’s still dark; she can’t have been out for long. The pain is gone, hardly even the memory of it remains. She looks at her hands, but they seem normal. Tougher, than they used to be, maybe? Then she moves her shoulder and hears a rustling. She gasps and looks around, and on her shoulder, there’s a wing! She turns around quickly, looking for the owner of the wing, then realizes she’s being silly. It must be hers. There must have been something in that vial that caused her to grow wings! Then she realized, the scientists must be pissed, to have lost something so valuable. Or perhaps they didn’t know what it did? She wonders at the story of the scientist she mugged. Why was he out there alone, outside of RadCo? Then she hears a cough, and remembers the hands on her shoulder. She jumps up, instinctively looking for the knife she left with her former master. Then, the voice says “shhh, over here.” Warily, she turns her head to look, and sees a silhouette against the wall. She looks closer, and sees that it’s a man, or maybe a woman, camouflaged well against the dirty brick in the alley way. “Who are you?” She asks. The silhouette moves, and she gasps. It’s the wall! The wall itself is moving! The man made of brick walks a little closer and holds out his hand. “I am the city” it whispers. “And I need your help.”