Flicker Run

The premise

Vesper Reach prints its blackouts in the transit timetable. Tonight's flicker took half the Undercut with it, including the tram cell that keeps the Null Saints' clinic warm. Nix, the Saint who runs the place, knows where a spare cell is: up on the Midspan edge at Auntie Vee's noodle cart, where Sparks Mendez has been meaning to pay the Saints back since spring. Getting there means the freight lift at Dock Gate 4, which means a careful Ashline tally-keeper, which means a lost tide table. Getting the cell charged on a night when nothing has power means thinking like the city does: the only lights that never go out belong to the people who can afford them.

Flicker Run is a short classic text adventure: sixteen locations across Undercut Level Three, Undercut Level Two, the Midspan edge and one billboard catwalk, about a dozen characters, a handful of small puzzles, and two endings. Most players finish in twenty to forty minutes. There are a few small kindnesses to find along the way, and the city notices if you do.

Pick your runner

Every run starts with a choice of five classic street archetypes. A netrunner talks machines into things with a secondhand wrist deck. A street samurai has chrome in both forearms and a stillness that makes small trouble reconsider. A fixer knows who owes whom and how to make two problems cancel out. A techie carries scrap wire and a crimp tool and can persuade anything with a power rail. A courier runs on tabs, tides and local knowledge; that's Tavi Wren, if you just press Enter. Then you pick a name, which is also your handle on the city link. Your archetype changes how people talk to you and opens side doors only your kind would think of; type skills in the game to see yours, and examine things closely, because not every side door is on that list. Every puzzle still has an ordinary solution, so no choice locks you out of either ending.

How to play

Type what you want to do and press Enter. Plain English works for most things: look, talk to nix, take the tide table, give tea to ines, drink broth, use lead on junction. Move with compass directions (n, s, e, w) and up / down, or tap the buttons under the terminal. If you get stuck, hint nudges you toward the next step and status tells you your current goal.

Your run autosaves in your browser after every command, so you can close the tab and come back later. Use save name for a named save, load name to return to it, saves to list them, and new to start over. Saves stay on your device; there are no accounts.

Commands

• look (l), examine thing (x), read, search, map (m)
• n s e w up down, or go place
• take / drop item, inventory (i)
• use item [on thing], drink, wear, open
• talk to person, ask person about topic, give item to person, buy item
• skills (your archetype's edge; its verbs, like hack, stare down, negotiate, fix or read, work on anything that looks like it might answer), status, hint, help, save, load, saves, new
• Multiplayer: say text (or ' text), emote action (or : action), who, name handle, link off / link on

Other runners (the shared city)

Flicker Run doubles as a tiny MUD. When the city link is up, anyone playing at the same moment shares the same Vesper Reach: you'll see other runners (and what kind of runner they are) in the room with you, watch them arrive and leave, and can say or emote to whoever is standing there. Puzzles and progress stay yours alone, so nobody can take your cell or spoil your run. Chat is relayed live and never stored, handles are limited to sixteen characters, messages to two hundred, and links are stripped. If the link can't connect, the game simply runs solo. Type link off any time to play alone.

Where it fits in Neon Ash

Neon Ash is a free weekly cyberpunk film-noir serial about burned investigator Cass Vale and a city that has already decided what the truth is allowed to be. Flicker Run is a side story set during Season 1 that stays out of Cass's way: it doesn't touch the main plot and doesn't spoil anything ahead. It borrows the Undercut's regulars instead. Nix and the Saints' tram clinic, Auntie Vee's cart, Sparks and his misdelivered drone Polite, and Officer Pip Harrow first appear in the interludes Soft Boots, Loud Paint, The Loyalty Patch and Handbook Versus Broth. The trams, grates, sweepers and safety cafés come straight out of Reach File 01: Midspan Transit & the Grate Economy. New to the serial? Start with Episode 1: Static in the Rain, or browse the archive.