Social Climber

Ivy adjusted her booze bag as she slunk through the narrow streets towards the lift, the only legal way to travel between the levels of the Cliff without using a craft. There was an urban myth about a man who had successfully jumped between city central and the Salts. Anyone who actually lived on the Cliff could tell you this was absurd. The Salts was a 120-meter drop, and so many free climbers had died trying to scale the cliff face that it was now banned. This had put somewhat of a dampener on Ivy’s trade. It used to be that any smuggler with decent rock-climbing skills could climb down to the Salts in broad daylight under the guise of being a hobbyist.  Nowadays people of her profession were forced to brave the rails. 

The rails were the network over which the lifts travelled. Most people who travelled did so by lift. Most goods were moved that way too, unless they were from off-planet. The lifts were smart, one step through that door and the scanner would pick up liquids, which she didn’t have the permit for, and if the lift asked for a sample on the test panel, she was throughly screwed. Wine was a waste of grapes, a waste of the few fresh fruits that exploration parties could bring up from the Ground. Ivy had tried a few sips and personally she disagreed with that position. 

The lift docked at the very edge of the city, where two lines of rails converged. One line took the lift along, the other line took it down. Where the lift docked, it opened just a step away from the outcrop on which the Central was built. If you wanted to get to the rails themselves, it was a little harder. When free-climbing was outlawed, Ivy had considered doing it under cover of darkness, avoiding the risk of a lift coming. The short climb just to get to the rails had changed her mind. The cliffside was much less reliable in the dark; at least the rails were straight down, no unexpected crags or dips. She knew this stretch now, but her load was heavier than usual. Most of the time, she’d have some ill-gotten spices, sometimes a small flask of alcohol. This was a whole bag of it, poured into a water sash and strapped across her back. It sloshed around as she traversed the cliff along to the rails. Her left foot slipped. Shrapnel skittered into the void below as she regained her footing. The Salts were a few meters to the left, there was nothing directly below her until the Ground more than 800 meters down. If she fell now, they’d never even find her body. 

It would have been a lie to say Ivy hadn’t meant to get into this profession. The truth was, nothing else paid as well. Having said this, there was nothing to make you question your life decisions quite like clinging to the rails. Getting onto and off of them were the most difficult parts, because there was always a moment where you needed to let go of the surface you were on, and hope your grip on the next one was secure enough to hold you. Ivy put one gloved hand around the first rail. The gloves had rubber grip pads on the palms and the insides of the fingers, and she had fitted similar pads to the inner thighs of her leggings and the ankles of her shoes. The rails were unforgivingly smooth, and she needed all the grip she could get. Her heart thrummed in her throat as she hooked one leg around the rail. She let go of the cliff face. Her stomach lurched as she slid about a foot down before the friction of the pads stopped her. She took a shaky breath. It was just climbing, one hand after the other. The wind buffeted against her, sending chills up her spine and swirling around her ears. Carefully, she switched her position so that she was climbing with her left side to the cliff face. Almost there. 

The bag snagged on the rocks. 

Ivy stopped. 

Slowly, she tried to climb back up, but wherever the bag had caught, it prevented her. She tried again. The bag wouldn’t budge. This left two choices, take the bag off, and hope it held on the snag, risking losing the wine for good, or take one strap off, and try to reach round. She might lose her balance, the wind might knock her in a way she didn’t expect. But losing the wine – that would be catastrophic. Ivy took off a strap and reached round. She could feel where the bag was caught. She could picture it, although she couldn’t see it. Because the bag had originally been designed to carry water while you were climbing, it had a stopper, and that stopper had a loop. This loop was currently caught on a jagged, almost hooked piece of rock. If she pulled too hard, it would all come spilling out. Carefully, she moved the loop up the hook and pulled it free. The relief of saving the score fast gave way as the grip pads on her thighs slipped and, in her attempt to re-establish her hold with her remaining hand, Ivy let go. 

Her stomach jolted, adrenaline flooding through her. 

Every horrible little scheme and swindle flashed before her eyes. 

She hit the roof of the lift stomach down. 

It hurt. It hurt like hell. But it hurt a hell of a lot less than the ground would have done. Ivy could already feel her knees starting to bruise, but as she pulled the bag off her back, she could see it was still intact. With her score secure, Ivy sighed as the lift rose back up, past the Salts and up to the Central dock. She supposed she would try again tomorrow.