The Underclass - Chapter 2

Chapter 2

But Galaxy was now able to face it calmly.

The flush on her face faded rapidly, and she comforted herself by thinking that An Hua was, in a way, servicing her—a small victory to save face.

By the time she climbed out of the examination chair, An Hua had already returned to her lab desk and didn't look up again.

Galaxy let out a soft snort, turned her head, and walked away.

Butler No. 1 stood by the door to see her off. She reached out, adjusted the badge on its chest, and smiled. "Do you know that the way you speak is always so dramatic? You don't act like a human at all."

Butler No. 1 froze. Galaxy raised an eyebrow and silently counted down as she walked away: Three, two, one.

"Ahhhhhhhhhhh!" A piercing scream erupted from behind her. Butler No. 1 was glitching out, emitting a deafening screech that threatened to shatter her eardrums. Galaxy, however, wore a rare smile.

Unable to stand the noise, An Hua threw open the upstairs window and roared, "No. 1! Shut your mouth!"

Butler No. 1 continued to scream frantically, "Ahhhhhhhhhhh!"

A moment later, the noise stopped abruptly. Galaxy eavesdropped near the entrance and heard the eerie sound of Butler No. 1's parts reassembling. Then, it greeted its master with the same exaggerated tone, "Dear master, did you call for me?"

An Hua said expressionlessly, "Delete the directive in your system that obsesses over mimicking humans."

Butler No. 1 replied, "Okay! The directive is being deleted, but I still want to ask one thing: Do I look human?"

Before An Hua could answer, Galaxy—who had been lurking at the gate—curled her lips, poked her head out, and yelled, "Butler No. 1, you look absolutely nothing like a human!"

Butler No. 1 froze again, and immediately started screaming anew: "Ahhhhhhhhhhh! Program deletion failed! Ahhhhhhhhhhh!"

Galaxy stood by the courtyard gate, clutching her stomach and laughing uncontrollably. She turned and ran outward, the thrill of retaliating against An Hua spreading through her chest.

She wasn't worried that An Hua would fire her. After all, a couple of days ago, she had peeked at An Hua's files and seen the information on a rival researcher in the same field. The competitor was a copycat; whatever An Hua did, she did too. If this copycat found out Galaxy had been An Hua's experimental subject, she definitely wouldn't let her go. And like An Hua, the rival was wealthy and not short on money.

But her luck proved even better than expected. While riding the hyper-rail back home, her smart-brain lit up again. An eager email lay in her inbox, sent by the very rival she had seen in An Hua's files.

Galaxy counted the zeros on the salary offer and nearly jumped out of her seat.

When she finally returned to her home tucked in the city's underbelly, her excitement grew even more pronounced.

This was the dark side of the glamorous metropolis. Galaxy had moved here after leaving the academy. There were exposed sewers everywhere, damp floors, and towering yet impossibly cramped, crowded spaces. Only the neon signs on the rooftops advertising health serums and gambling drew any attention, as if constantly luring people toward the abyss.

The woman who used to live next door had fallen into the trap of gambling, lost all her assets, and eventually leaped from the roof, plummeting to a messy death.

At the time, Galaxy had been at home, sobbing over her ruined future, and had almost considered jumping off a building herself. But witnessing her neighbor's gruesome end terrified her—especially after the inspectors levied a 50% suicide tax on the dead woman, sold her apartment for an astronomical price, and had the new tenant sell her used belongings as scrap for 20 Galleons, throwing the rest out like trash.

With that, the woman's entire existence was erased.

Such gambling advertisements never appeared in the affluent districts. The rich had larger, better ads for mechanical assistants, bio-androids, neural interfaces, and everything synonymous with hope. They would pass down their wealth generation after generation while continuing to harvest the money of the lower classes.

Galaxy used to dream of crossing that chasm by any means necessary.

But now, she only wanted to hold onto the money in her pocket and make her life a bit better.

So, after three seconds of weighing the pros and cons, she agreed to meet the email's sender at 9:00 AM the following day.

Humming a tune in her cramped room, she leaned against her single window, gazing out at the regular residential zones in the distance. Her dream for the next ten years was to afford a small apartment there.

Homes in the slums were already exorbitantly priced, and the regular civilian zones would be even more expensive. Galaxy didn't dare ask for the actual prices; she only dared to estimate them secretly in her head.

Every time she calculated it, she felt her hope die a little more.

But things were different now. If that string of zeros could make it into her bank account, she would be very, very happy.

She was too excited to sleep that night. The next day, she put on brand-new clothes and headed to the agreed location.

It was another building brimming with smart technology. Her new employer's butler was evidently much more normal. Wearing a sharp suit, she smiled politely. "Miss Galaxy, my master has been waiting for you for a long time."

Galaxy nodded courteously, feeling that a life of wealth was waving at her. It never crossed her mind that this might be a trap, let alone that the other party would assume she was An Hua's trusted confidante.

But there really was someone in this world who could brazenly lie to her face, slap such a title on her, drug her unconscious, tie her to a chair, and prepare to experiment on her.

She stared at the ceiling in despair.

Beside her stood a woman named Lu Qi.

Wearing a white lab coat, Lu Qi was injecting something into her own arm. The pungent smell of disinfectant flooded Galaxy's nose, causing her to sneeze miserably. Before the woman could strip her down for an examination, Galaxy made one final, hoarse plea: "I am really not An Hua's confidante. She's just my ex-ex-ex-girlfriend."

Lu Qi was currently disinfecting her hands. Galaxy recognized the equipment in her hands perfectly well. The woman truly lived up to the title of 'copycat' Galaxy had given her—the tools for sampling hair, blood, and tissue were completely identical to An Hua's.

The copycat didn't react to Galaxy's defense, simply stating, "I don't believe you."

Galaxy sneered, "Don't you want to copy An Hua? Every time before an experiment, she kneels in front of me and licks me to make sure I'm in a good mood. Can you do that?"

Lu Qi frowned deeply, but eventually, she actually dropped to her knees in front of her and said indifferently, "Why couldn't I?"

Galaxy's eyes widened. She desperately wanted to slap Lu Qi across the face to wake her up, but the drug's effects left her completely devoid of strength.

Psycho.

Everyone associated with An Hua was a psycho.

She cursed internally, and then cursed out loud, "Are all of you scientists sick in the head? You're a bunch of lunatics."

Just as she finished speaking, someone even sicker violently smashed the door open and burst in.

An Hua's stun baton slammed into Lu Qi's back. Galaxy's eyes went wide. She felt that the world had truly gone mad.

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