Toledo and Ray rode the metro hovertrain through the Neon City skyline.
The train snaked and weaved through the business district, past the luxury high rises near the park and finally out toward the great black void of the bay.
They got off at the last stop, on the edge of the warehouse district. The train didn’t even stop at a proper station. There was just a single platform connected to the side of an abandoned warehouse.
“Do you bring all of your dates here?” Toledo quipped.
Ray led Toledo down the rickety stairs and into the dark alley below. If Toledo didn’t know Ray, he’d assume he was being led into a trap.
As they made their way to the street level, they came to the end of the warehouses. The view opened up to a vast swath of the bay. The Neon City skyline iconically rising in the distance. The city skyscrapers reflecting across the glassy black mirror of the bay.
If there was ever a postcard view of this over-illuminated tech megalopolis, this was the vantage point to base it on.
“Well, come on, it’s not much farther now,” Ray said.
Ray was a beefy man. Not fat, but kind of unintentionally strong. He must have been a horse in his prime. Because conversations flowed so easily with him, you wouldn’t be intimidated by him. But if you needed to pick someone out of a lineup to have your back in a street brawl, Ray would be the number one draft pick.
After walking a couple of football fields, Toledo saw it.
“No way!” he lit up.
Set up on the edge of the bay, was an old school baseball batting cage. A handful of mechanical pitching machines were set up on the water’s edge. The range spread out so that the batter was facing exactly the skyline of Neon City.
“How’d you find this place?” Toledo asked.
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