Sarah stood quietly at the edge of Murkings Plaza, checking her position every few seconds to make sure she was standing at the right spot for the handcuffs.
At the age of 11 Sarah was more or less a veteran street runner, dropping off unidentified parcels, doing handoffs and receiving the occasional bruise from an unsatisfied or disappointed customer; but it was all part of the job's unspoken requirements; anything was allowed as long as you were paid and left alive to spend the money.
And even at 11 Sarah understood that clearly.
She checked the cheap plastic watch on her wrist and sighed softly with relief as the time read, 11:27 AM, the handoff was due for 11:30 but her undisclosed employer had paid her extra to arrive at the plaza 10 minutes earlier.
Why?
She didn't ask, she never did.
Questions were unhealthy and even she knew it.
She idly watched the traffic of well-to-do persons, young and old crisscrossing the congested plaza and many stared back at the untidy girl carrying an obviously heavy backpack.
She was an oddity.
Everyone knew it.
From the corner of her eye, Sarah watched the plaza guards watch her, the slightest suspicious activity from her and they'd have her regretting the day she was born. It was the way of the world. The poor and destitute usually got that sort of treatment.
Not that it bothered her or anything.
It was just what it was.
She looked at the watch again.
11:29 AM
The dirty little girl balanced herself on her stubby little toes, neck craned in a vain attempt to identify the customer her package was meant for. She'd been paid so handsomely for the delivery that the temptation to steal whatever the backpack contained had almost overwhelmed her.
Logic and a profound sense of self-preservation had however ruled against the idea. Thieving runners were not unheard of, it just so happened that such runners invariably found themselves lying dead in gutters where everyone could learn from their errors.
No one knew who meted out the justice but it always came and it was always gruesome.
11:31 AM
Sarah fidgeted nervously with the strap across her left shoulder. If her intended recipient was late it would reduce the number of deliveries she could run and the thought of lost income worried her.
A few hundred meters away from her, atop the scaffolding of a 4 storey building under construction, a man clad in a long overcoat and slouch hat flipped a coin contemplatively, then he muttered a silent prayer and pressed a small red button.
A few seconds passed and nothing happened; the man frowning in an odd mix of worry and relief.
Then the backpack exploded taking half the plaza with it.
