Jet Set Radio Future

Vertigo

Author's Note: Jet Set Radio Future and all related characters, places and events are copyright Sega/SmileBit. This story is non-profit and was made exclusively for entertainment purposes, nothing more, nothing less.

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Sky Dinosaurian Square. A gigantic amusement park built by the Gods and given to the people of Earth (so they said, at least), a massive, squirming maze of loop-de-loops and hairpin turns. It was in the very butt-end of the Benten district, so - like everything else here - it only really came to life at night. It didn't matter that this was a roller coaster 'paradise'; it was here more than anywhere else in Benten (and most of Kogane actually, if you stopped to think about it) that the air was choked with - grit, grime. The dinosaur statues screeching up into the sky stationed alongside the tracks, the soaring pterodon swings, the amphitheaters, the rails themselves...it was gross, disgusting. Neon lights flooded the sky, highlighting all the little details you didn't want to see - how sludgy the rails of the roller coaster had gotten, how filthy the waiting area was, coated with dirt long since unattended. The pungent odor of motor oil - of bad sideshow food - of stifling smog - made you shudder, if you perceived all that stuff.

Clutch hated it here.

The air felt too cold against the back of his neck, making his hair stand on end; he tried to avoid coming here as much as possible, but sometimes a gang would tag the place up, and the GGs had to do the "dominant gang in Tokyo" bit and take it back. Clutch would always take a pass, offering to go somewhere, anywhere else, sly and nonchalant so the others never picked up on the fact that he didn't like coming here. Still - Corn was the leader, and sometimes he would get hard-assed with him (and Soda, and Beat, and Garam - the outsiders of the group, the ones most liable to bail on any given duty - 'part-time GGs,' Corn would call them). So he'd wind up here every now and then despite his better judgment, and he would bail if he wasn't trying to prove to Corn that he was at least kinda trustworthy. More than Beat and Garam, anyway, because they were obnoxious assholes.

The thing about Sky Dinosaurian Square is that it was almost all aerial. Sure, the rails were anchored down to the ground, but it was so far down that you couldn't even see it. He was too familiar with the way the ground dropped away right below you and disappeared into a mass of sweeping lights and glowing buildings, swallowed up by the waiting umbra, always hungry for a new body...he'd seen some good Rudies fall that way. Not a lot of 'em got to see the light of day again, and only those with enough common sense to wall-ride to the ground had a chance of making it. Just thinking about the sheer drop made him dizzy, nauseous. No other high-flyin' place did that to him, not even the Skyscraper District.

Even then, that place was dank and scary, littered with dirt and broken, torn houses that lay abandoned, forgotten in the streams of time. The surface (heh) of Sky Dinosaurian Square was like a freakin' Caribbean beach compared to what lay down there.

The only way to the bottom of the pit was to fall, so far as he knew. There sure as hell wasn't anything safe to grind on, so you had to wall-ride - assuming you'd been fortunate enough to fall near one - and that itself was dangerous given the jagged shards of crashed roller coaster car parts jutting out from any nearby buildings. And despite all that, landing even a mite off-course would result in a broken leg or two.

Clutch felt the familiar tingling sensation jitter up his leg and slammed a fist against it to get it to stop. That had been years ago—he had the GGs now, so if he fell, they'd come after him and he wouldn't wind up in a hospital, handcuffed to the bed and sent to juvie for being a menace to society.

Hopefully. That was where the 'prove he's kinda trustworthy' thing came into play.

"Come on, Reddylocks, move it!" Beat called, shaking Clutch from his reverie. The shorter, scrawnier Rudie crossed his arms over his chest and snorted. They were still on the waiting area just past the park's entrance - they hadn't even gone near the roller coaster rails, so Clutch figured it was a testament to how vivid this place was. "You're slowing me down. I wanna get this over with and be back in time for Chinese."

Clutch shook his head, rubbing a hand through his hair, fingers combing between his dreadlocks. The self-imposed vertigo receded, drawn back into old memories and hard times. "Yeah, yo. I'm comin'." He swished past Beat, his rollerblades hissing and crunching along the grit-coated concrete. From the corner of his eyes, he spotted a little boy holding a lollipop; he reached out and plucked it from the kid's hands as he passed by. He examined it in the neon lights - damn, the thing was covered with slobber, so the only good thing to come out of stealing it was that he had stolen it in the first place. He tossed it to the side, discarding it, and cranked up the volume on his earphones, lettin' Jet Set Radio drown out the kid's wailing. Beat shook his head and followed the dreadlocked Rudie over to the loading platform.

"I don't get you." Beat shook his head and snorted, a scowl tugging down on the corners of his mouth. They scrambled up the stairs leading to the platform itself, and finally, that abyss framed with red and neon yellow rails twisting and winding like snakes, punctuated by buildings and statues and amphitheaters, yawned out before them. Clutch put on a mask of bravado because if he felt cocksure and wild and invincible, then the fear wouldn't claim him and drag him down. He was at his best as a skater with that attitude.

"Good, you and the rest of the world." Clutch laughed.

"Well, it's not like I'm any better," Beat added, a slight, smug smirk crawling its way over his lips. "I'll catch you 'round." With that, he crouched, surged, leapt away from the platform, landing in a backwards grind on the nearest rail, spiraling out of sight below.

Clutch planted his fists on his hips and beamed, his cheeks tingling. He drew a deep breath through his nose, turned, and lunged for the same rail, heading in the opposite direction, the wind cold and grubby and filthy against his face, ruffling his clothes, making his pulse hammer in his ears. He felt alive like this. Besides, he was more experienced now; he wouldn't fall again.