39 – The Roads We ChooseStanding in yet another line, Hector looked around the cavernous lobby of the central RMC administration building. If the size of the pit hadn’t been enough to tell him he’d underestimated the size of the mining operation going on in Redwick, then the building he stood in would have finished the job. It was an enormous concrete and plasteel structure built into the top third of the mountainous mine-tailing ridge. It sat there like a hulking gargoyle, looking down over the wound they’d carved year-by-year, truck-by-truck, out of the Martian surface.What made the lobby impressive wasn’t the high ceiling or the expansive marble floor—it was the single hundred-meter expanse of diamond-glass that gave an unfettered panoramic view of the pit. Yes, the mine was on Mars, but the view into that great hole was another level of alien—like staring into an abyss that bridged one dimension with another. Hector got so lost in the view that he hardly noticed the passage of time.When the woman at the counter called him over, the person behind him had to give him a nudge to get him moving. He blamed his aura system and the work it was doing to his corpus vivum.“Registering for the fight?” the young lady asked. She wore an RMC uniform, but hers was more of a jumpsuit than the laborer’s coveralls Mira had worn.“Already registered. Supposed to get evaluated for, uh, bracket tiers.”“Right! Just look here”—she tapped a tiny lens embedded in her counter—“and we’ll get you seen.”Hector followed her finger to the lens with his gaze, and she nodded almost immediately. “Looks good. There’s just the matter of the entry fee: 500 bits.”“What?”“Yeah, they didn’t tell you when you registered? Gotta pay an entry fee today before noon in order to get a spot in the brackets.”Hector sighed. Go ahead, Evie.//Payment issued!//The woman’s tablet chimed, and she (...)