Tanya

Chapter 1

She was running for her life, exerting every ounce of strength. Her pursuer was right behind her. His footfalls on the plas-crete sidewalk beating themselves into her consciousness as they steadily caught up to her. She had no time to look back to see but had reached the place to which she was fleeing. It was a rotten gaping hole in the mortar foundation of a massive tenement building. One of thousands of such entrances throughout the ghetto that let into the old sewers below- now known as the warrens.
Tanya jumped straight into the opening with the footfalls of her pursuer right behind her. She slipped and slid, gouging out a long deep patch of meat along her lower thigh on the rough edged opening. She hit the ground within and instantly turned with the scrap of carbon to slash at the hand reaching in for her through the opening.
Her pursuer had not expected the beautiful, frightened, filthy slip of a girl-child to turn on him. Nor had he expected the razor sharp scrap of carbon. He had not expected the raggy street urchin to turn and attack, like a crazed animal rather than a human being.
Tanya was a thirteen year old ghetto-vagabond who had already seen the worst life had to offer and clearly understood what this one wanted with her. She’d seen him before, with his girls, and now apparently he had seen her. There was no law here in the tax-free zone, so whatever could be taken and held was property. To be sold or bartered to the constant stream of those who frequented this place.
Whatever could be taken and held was the property of the holder. That was the only law of the ghetto, the tax-free zone. That was the only law Tanya knew, so she would struggle just as ferociously to escape the jaws of a predatory lizard as she would this man, or the many others like him who thrived in these places. The outcome in both cases would be the same.
Showing the coordination of a trained gymnast, the ferocity of the gladiator, or maybe it was only her utter terror which drove her...